The first striped skunk I ever saw in the flesh and wild was when I was about 12 years old and living outside Rohrerstown, Pennsylvania. One sunny summer evening, I climbed a small tree in a hedgerow of trees and other plants along a stream in farmland close to home to be on the lookout for wildlife. I wasn't there long until I saw a male indigo bunting and a pair of northern cardinals flitting about in shrubbery. Then, suddenly, a lone gray fox trotted under the tree I was in and was away quickly into nearby shrubbery. A few minutes later a striped skunk meandered under the tree and waddled off under the bushes close at hand. Looking back, that was a thrilling evening for me!
I have seen other striped skunks in Lancaster County through the years since that time, and all of them have been exciting to experience. Fortunately, I never got sprayed by any of them.
I saw one walking through woods in daylight outside Mt. Gretna. Unfortunately for me, I didn't see it until I was fairly close. Luckily, however, the skunk didn't seem to notice, or care, about my presence and just ambled on.
When I lived in Neffsville, Pa. a skunk had the habit of visiting one of our trash cans each evening for a few weeks to eat edible garbage. When I realized the pattern of this critter, I sat in my car most every evening and waited for it to come to the can. I was in the car to not scare away the skunk and also for my own protection. When the skunk arrived, I turned on the car headlights to see him better. He wiggled into a hole in the can, then came out with a tidbit to ingest. Then back in he went, and again and again. He continued when I went into the house. But that skunk was quite entertaining!
We had another skunk living in our back yard in Neffsville, but we didn't know it until a heavy thunderstorm one afternoon. I had a brush pile of yard clippings in a ditch on the edge of our lawn. After the heavy rain that afternoon, a torrent of water rushed along the ditch and into the brush pile. I watched that pile, in hopes of seeing creatures coming out of it. Sure enough, an opossum came out and went up a pine tree, and a skunk emerged from that pile and waddled across the lawn and gone.
A third skunk in our Neffsville yard I heard first. I walked out on our lawn one late night in October to get a little fresh air and heard nearby thumping. Thinking the thumping might be from a skunk, I went in the house for a flashlight and saw the skunk, by the light of that flashlight, digging up grubs from the lawn.
One morning in February a few years ago, I saw a skunk bumbling along the edge of a hedgerow. That time of year is their breeding season and I thought the skunk might have been a male looking for a mate or two.
Several years ago, I helped lead van tours, one per season, in Lancaster County Central Park to see wildlife at night. We saw several white-tailed deer, a few cottontail rabbits, and an occasional red fox, raccoon, opossum or skunk. Some of those animals were close to the van which offered the passengers good looks of them.
In more recent years, I occasionally travel across cropland at night between New Holland and Ephrata, and I have seen three skunks here and there along the farmland roads I drove on. All the skunks were digging into roadside shoulders in search of mice, invertebrates, berries and other edibles. I drove by them slowly to see them better, and to not hit them with my car.
And last summer we had two skunks on our lawn in New Holland. One of them sprayed our Jack Russell terrior while that fiesty little dog was in the process of killing the skunk.
Striped skunks are adaptable and live in a variety of habitats in Pennsylvania, including in farmland, lawns and woods. They shelter in groundhog holes, stone walls, brush piles and in and under fallen logs. But they also hang out in barns and under sheds. And they will eat most anything, anywhere. Skunks spray a smelly musk on other animals and people when they are alarmed. And rather than being brown or gray which would camouflage them, they are black with white stripes, though those stripes vary in size. That black and white-striped pattern on skunks will be remembered by animals sprayed by skunks. And those animals will stay away from the next black and white-striped creatures they see. That pattern on skunks is a defense.
Skunks are interesting critters, but ones to stay away from. They are adaptable and live commonly throughout much of North America. They don't want trouble, but will defend themselves when they have to.
Sunday, October 29, 2017
Saturday, October 28, 2017
Late-October Farmland
One afternoon toward the end of this October, I stopped at an open woodlot/pasture in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania farmland because I saw the white flashing of wings on a pair of adult red-headed woodpeckers as they flew from tree to tree on the edge of that small woods. Red-heads, with red feathering covering their entire heads and necks, and black and white body plumage, are striking to see in their habitats of open woodlots and meadows with lots of large trees, a couple of them dead. Red-heads chip nurseries out of the dead trees to raise young in summer.
While watching those beautiful woodpeckers, and a little group of eastern bluebirds eating poison ivy berries on the edge of the meadow, I noticed there were several each of red maple, pin oak, shag-bark hickory and black walnut trees in that woodlot/pasture that straddled a stream of clear water. The beautiful maples and oaks both had red leaves, while the foliage of the hickories was bronze-yellow. The hickories also have strips of shaggy bark, each one of which peels up at both ends but is still attached by its middle to the tree, giving hickory bark a shaggy appearance. Though bare of leaves, the black walnuts still had some green-husked nuts hanging on their twigs. And there were many hickory nuts, some of them crushed by passing vehicles, lying on the rural road I was on where it passed under tall hickory trees. Only the nut-storing gray squirrels have jaws strong enough and teeth sharp enough to chew through the husks and shells of walnuts and hickory nuts to get the meat inside each nut. And all this was lovely symbols of late October in Lancaster County.
I spent about two hours driving from place to place in a northern part of the county, near a line of low, wooded hills. The landscape in this farmland is hilly and rocky, and the soil is red, causing less than ideal cropland. But that same rough geology creates wildlife habitats because much of the land is let go to overgrown, weedy fields, hedgerows, roadside shoulders, woodlots and meadows.
Weedy fields have several kinds of tall weeds and grasses that are loaded with seeds in autumn through winter, including pigweed, lamb's quarters, pokeweed, velvetleaf, milkweeds and foxtail grass. The leaves and stems of pigweed, lamb's quarters and poke turn red in fall and foxtail grass foliage is yellow in October. Field mice and a small variety of sparrows inhabit those fields in autumn and winter and eat the seeds of the weeds and grasses.
In fall, hedgerows between fields, and roadsides, are red with the leaves of poke, staghorn sumac trees, white oak trees, Virginia creeper vines and the berries of multiflora rose and Tartarian honeysuckle bushes. Some white oaks are massive, and loaded with acorns that gray squirrels, eastern chipmunks, American crows and blue jays consume. And hedges are yellow with shag-bark hickory foliage, and orange and yellow with poison ivy leaves and bittersweet berries. Poke, sumac, creeper, rose, honeysuckle, poison ivy and bittersweet berries are eaten by mice, squirrels and several kinds of birds, including American robins, eastern bluebirds and cedar waxwings.
That afternoon, I stopped at a hedgerow that was "loaded" with birds of a few species, including several robins, a half-dozen bluebirds, a few each of blue jays and yellow-rumped warblers, and one each of red-bellied woodpecker and northern flicker. Most of those pretty birds were busily ingesting red multifora rose and Tartarian honeysuckle berries, or flitting from bush to bush.
Woodlots are strikingly beautiful, including in autumn, with large trees of various kinds. Some of the trees are the species mentioned above, plus hackberry and red juniper trees, and sycamore, crack willow, white ash and silver maple trees along streams. Junipers grow berry-sized, light-blue, fleshy cones that are decorative in the green foliage of those evergreens. Several kinds of birds eat the cones and pass the seeds far and wide, thus spreading the species across the countryside. Some of the trees in woodlots and hedgerows are majestically large, helping make this patch of second-rate farmland prettier than intensely cultivated fields with better soil in flatter terrain; but with few, if any, woodlots and hedgerows.
The beauties of this farmland in rough terrain were a joy to see. The colored leaves and berries, variety of plants and birds were enjoyable and inspiring close to home. Most people throughout the world don't have to travel far to see the beauties of nature.
While watching those beautiful woodpeckers, and a little group of eastern bluebirds eating poison ivy berries on the edge of the meadow, I noticed there were several each of red maple, pin oak, shag-bark hickory and black walnut trees in that woodlot/pasture that straddled a stream of clear water. The beautiful maples and oaks both had red leaves, while the foliage of the hickories was bronze-yellow. The hickories also have strips of shaggy bark, each one of which peels up at both ends but is still attached by its middle to the tree, giving hickory bark a shaggy appearance. Though bare of leaves, the black walnuts still had some green-husked nuts hanging on their twigs. And there were many hickory nuts, some of them crushed by passing vehicles, lying on the rural road I was on where it passed under tall hickory trees. Only the nut-storing gray squirrels have jaws strong enough and teeth sharp enough to chew through the husks and shells of walnuts and hickory nuts to get the meat inside each nut. And all this was lovely symbols of late October in Lancaster County.
I spent about two hours driving from place to place in a northern part of the county, near a line of low, wooded hills. The landscape in this farmland is hilly and rocky, and the soil is red, causing less than ideal cropland. But that same rough geology creates wildlife habitats because much of the land is let go to overgrown, weedy fields, hedgerows, roadside shoulders, woodlots and meadows.
Weedy fields have several kinds of tall weeds and grasses that are loaded with seeds in autumn through winter, including pigweed, lamb's quarters, pokeweed, velvetleaf, milkweeds and foxtail grass. The leaves and stems of pigweed, lamb's quarters and poke turn red in fall and foxtail grass foliage is yellow in October. Field mice and a small variety of sparrows inhabit those fields in autumn and winter and eat the seeds of the weeds and grasses.
In fall, hedgerows between fields, and roadsides, are red with the leaves of poke, staghorn sumac trees, white oak trees, Virginia creeper vines and the berries of multiflora rose and Tartarian honeysuckle bushes. Some white oaks are massive, and loaded with acorns that gray squirrels, eastern chipmunks, American crows and blue jays consume. And hedges are yellow with shag-bark hickory foliage, and orange and yellow with poison ivy leaves and bittersweet berries. Poke, sumac, creeper, rose, honeysuckle, poison ivy and bittersweet berries are eaten by mice, squirrels and several kinds of birds, including American robins, eastern bluebirds and cedar waxwings.
That afternoon, I stopped at a hedgerow that was "loaded" with birds of a few species, including several robins, a half-dozen bluebirds, a few each of blue jays and yellow-rumped warblers, and one each of red-bellied woodpecker and northern flicker. Most of those pretty birds were busily ingesting red multifora rose and Tartarian honeysuckle berries, or flitting from bush to bush.
Woodlots are strikingly beautiful, including in autumn, with large trees of various kinds. Some of the trees are the species mentioned above, plus hackberry and red juniper trees, and sycamore, crack willow, white ash and silver maple trees along streams. Junipers grow berry-sized, light-blue, fleshy cones that are decorative in the green foliage of those evergreens. Several kinds of birds eat the cones and pass the seeds far and wide, thus spreading the species across the countryside. Some of the trees in woodlots and hedgerows are majestically large, helping make this patch of second-rate farmland prettier than intensely cultivated fields with better soil in flatter terrain; but with few, if any, woodlots and hedgerows.
The beauties of this farmland in rough terrain were a joy to see. The colored leaves and berries, variety of plants and birds were enjoyable and inspiring close to home. Most people throughout the world don't have to travel far to see the beauties of nature.
Wednesday, October 25, 2017
Hunting Strategies of Cropland Hawks
Seven kinds of hawks winter in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania's farmland, at least part of some winters with some species. All those diurnal raptors, adapted to hunting in open habitats, hunt smaller critters in cropland. And all of those hawks, including red-tailed, rough-legged, American kestrels, merlins, peregrines, northern harriers and Cooper's, perch on roadside poles and lone trees in the fields to rest, digest prey and watch for more victims. There they are spotted from country roads. And each raptor species also has a unique way to hunt prey, other than perching, a strategy to cope with hunting in treeless, or nearly treeless, human-made habitats, as well as natural ones.
Red-tails, with the adults' striking brick-red tails, nest locally and watch for prey by circling high in the sky on wind, or thermals of heated, rising columns of air that hold the hawks aloft. When prey is spotted, they dive swiftly in hopes of catching it.
Larger than American crows and about the size of red-tailed hawks, rough-legged hawks raise young on cliffs on the treeless Arctic tundra, but drift south for the winter. Rough-legs hover into the wind on powerfully beating wings to maintain an aerial position as they watch for lemmings on the tundra and mice in the Lower 48. That hovering is a way to identify this species.
The pretty, dove-sized American kestrels nest locally. And they stand on roadside wires, and hover into the wind on rapidly beating wings as they scan the ground for mice. They hover a few seconds while watching for prey, soar ahead a little, and hover again, continuing that strategy time after time. Kestrels can be identified by their size and hovering.
The related merlins and peregrines are swift, power flyers, a technique designed to chase down feathered prey in the wide open spaces those two raptors are adapted to. The highly-maneuverable Merlins, flying close to the ground, catch horned larks, sparrows and other kinds of small birds in open habitats, including farmland.
Peregrines snare shorebirds, pigeons and ducks in straight-out, swift flight close to the ground. But these falcons also dive up to 180 miles per hour from high in the sky on prey birds and hit their victims with their chests in mid-air. Those impacts either stun or kill the victims that tumble to the ground. But the peregrines swing around and catch their victims in mid-air and fly with their prey to a rocky perch to ingest it.
Northern harriers are identified by their long wings, white rumps and method of hunting. Hawks of this species pump slowly into the wind and close to the ground as they look and listen for mice and other small prey in marshes and fields. When they come to the end of the habitats they are hunting over, they swing around low with the wind and soar back to the starting point where they again power into the wind close to the ground in search of prey.
Cooper's hawks are woodland raptors that recently adapted to hunting in open country. They have short, rounded, but powerful wings, and long, steering tails for chasing birds in the woods. They use their speed of flight in chasing down and catching rock pigeons, mourning doves, starlings and other medium-sized birds in the fields.
These hawk species developed various strategies for hunting in open habitats with few perches. Some hawks hover into the wind, others fly swiftly, and one kind cruises into the wind low to the ground. These are just a few of the innumerable adaptations life makes to survive on this planet.
Life on Earth is unbelievably wonderful.
Red-tails, with the adults' striking brick-red tails, nest locally and watch for prey by circling high in the sky on wind, or thermals of heated, rising columns of air that hold the hawks aloft. When prey is spotted, they dive swiftly in hopes of catching it.
Larger than American crows and about the size of red-tailed hawks, rough-legged hawks raise young on cliffs on the treeless Arctic tundra, but drift south for the winter. Rough-legs hover into the wind on powerfully beating wings to maintain an aerial position as they watch for lemmings on the tundra and mice in the Lower 48. That hovering is a way to identify this species.
The pretty, dove-sized American kestrels nest locally. And they stand on roadside wires, and hover into the wind on rapidly beating wings as they scan the ground for mice. They hover a few seconds while watching for prey, soar ahead a little, and hover again, continuing that strategy time after time. Kestrels can be identified by their size and hovering.
The related merlins and peregrines are swift, power flyers, a technique designed to chase down feathered prey in the wide open spaces those two raptors are adapted to. The highly-maneuverable Merlins, flying close to the ground, catch horned larks, sparrows and other kinds of small birds in open habitats, including farmland.
Peregrines snare shorebirds, pigeons and ducks in straight-out, swift flight close to the ground. But these falcons also dive up to 180 miles per hour from high in the sky on prey birds and hit their victims with their chests in mid-air. Those impacts either stun or kill the victims that tumble to the ground. But the peregrines swing around and catch their victims in mid-air and fly with their prey to a rocky perch to ingest it.
Northern harriers are identified by their long wings, white rumps and method of hunting. Hawks of this species pump slowly into the wind and close to the ground as they look and listen for mice and other small prey in marshes and fields. When they come to the end of the habitats they are hunting over, they swing around low with the wind and soar back to the starting point where they again power into the wind close to the ground in search of prey.
Cooper's hawks are woodland raptors that recently adapted to hunting in open country. They have short, rounded, but powerful wings, and long, steering tails for chasing birds in the woods. They use their speed of flight in chasing down and catching rock pigeons, mourning doves, starlings and other medium-sized birds in the fields.
These hawk species developed various strategies for hunting in open habitats with few perches. Some hawks hover into the wind, others fly swiftly, and one kind cruises into the wind low to the ground. These are just a few of the innumerable adaptations life makes to survive on this planet.
Life on Earth is unbelievably wonderful.
Saturday, October 21, 2017
Migrating Sharp-shins and Red-tails
Flap, flap, flap, ssoooaaarr, flap, flap, flap, ssoooaaarr, is the flight pattern of sharp-shinned hawks, including during their journey south every autumn. Sharp-shinned hawks and red-tailed hawks are both common species and annually pass through southeastern Pennsylvania, as elsewhere in North America, in large numbers to spend winter months farther south.
These two species of raptors dominate hawk migrations during October, the sharpies during the first half of the month and the red-tails in the latter half of that same month. Both kinds on migration cause excitement among bird watchers, whether those people are perched on mountaintop lookouts along Pennsylvania ridges, including Bake Oven Knob, Hawk Mountain Sanctuary or Waggoner's Gap on the Blue Ridge Mountains, or are watching from anyplace else off the mountains.
Migrating hawks over Pennsylvania have two ways of traveling south in fall; along the southwest-running ridges of the Appalachian Mountains on north or northwest winds, or over farm country and towns when wind is from the east or south, or there is no wind at all. North and northwest winds get pushed up and over the Appalachians by wind coming from behind, pushing the migrating hawks up as well. Gravity, however, pulls those birds of prey down. But with the birds' tacking of wings and tails for lift and flight control, the hawks soar straight ahead for many miles with little effort.
Sharpies, red-tails and other kinds of hawks abandon the ridge tops and search for thermals of warmed, rising air over farmland and towns when wind is non-existent, or is light from the south or east. Those thermals of warm air swirl upward, taking the soaring hawks up with the rising air. And when those spiraling hawks reach the zenith of a thermal with little effort, they peel off to the south or southwest. But as gravity slowly pulls them down, they must seek another thermal and another to stay effortlessly aloft and drifting along for many miles in a day's time.
Sharp-shins are exciting to see dashing swiftly and often low along the ridge tops, sometimes in almost continuous streams of one or two every few minutes during much of the day in southeastern Pennsylvania during blustery north or northwest winds as the sky clears after a few days of rain or no wind. About the size of mourning doves, sharpies are buoyant on the wind as they flash by the lookouts, some almost at eye level. One must watch closely for them because they are visible one second and gone the next.
Red-tails, too, migrate south in big numbers under storm-clearing skies and roaring north or northwest winds, which are ideal conditions for them and the sharpies to migrate. A bit larger than American crows, the majestic red-tailed hawks sail magnificently high in the sky on blustery winds, and often one right after another or in small, ragged groups. As with the sharp-shins, they are something to see, hence the excitement among bird watchers every October.
Sharp-shinned hawks prey mostly on small birds in woods and older suburban areas with their tall trees and shrubbery. These little raptors are built for what they do. They have short, powerful wings for sweeping this way and that among tree trunks and long tails for split-second steering to catch their swiftly fleeing prey.
Red-tailed hawks mostly catch rodents, especially gray squirrels, that they dive on from perches high in trees or from circling in the sky. These daytime raptors are large enough to subdue gray squirrels and one squirrel might feed a red-tail for a couple of days.
The abundant sharp-shins and red-tails are thrilling to see when they are on migration in October, particularly when they are in some numbers. And they are most exciting to experience speeding over mountaintops during blustery north or northwest winds.
These two species of raptors dominate hawk migrations during October, the sharpies during the first half of the month and the red-tails in the latter half of that same month. Both kinds on migration cause excitement among bird watchers, whether those people are perched on mountaintop lookouts along Pennsylvania ridges, including Bake Oven Knob, Hawk Mountain Sanctuary or Waggoner's Gap on the Blue Ridge Mountains, or are watching from anyplace else off the mountains.
Migrating hawks over Pennsylvania have two ways of traveling south in fall; along the southwest-running ridges of the Appalachian Mountains on north or northwest winds, or over farm country and towns when wind is from the east or south, or there is no wind at all. North and northwest winds get pushed up and over the Appalachians by wind coming from behind, pushing the migrating hawks up as well. Gravity, however, pulls those birds of prey down. But with the birds' tacking of wings and tails for lift and flight control, the hawks soar straight ahead for many miles with little effort.
Sharpies, red-tails and other kinds of hawks abandon the ridge tops and search for thermals of warmed, rising air over farmland and towns when wind is non-existent, or is light from the south or east. Those thermals of warm air swirl upward, taking the soaring hawks up with the rising air. And when those spiraling hawks reach the zenith of a thermal with little effort, they peel off to the south or southwest. But as gravity slowly pulls them down, they must seek another thermal and another to stay effortlessly aloft and drifting along for many miles in a day's time.
Sharp-shins are exciting to see dashing swiftly and often low along the ridge tops, sometimes in almost continuous streams of one or two every few minutes during much of the day in southeastern Pennsylvania during blustery north or northwest winds as the sky clears after a few days of rain or no wind. About the size of mourning doves, sharpies are buoyant on the wind as they flash by the lookouts, some almost at eye level. One must watch closely for them because they are visible one second and gone the next.
Red-tails, too, migrate south in big numbers under storm-clearing skies and roaring north or northwest winds, which are ideal conditions for them and the sharpies to migrate. A bit larger than American crows, the majestic red-tailed hawks sail magnificently high in the sky on blustery winds, and often one right after another or in small, ragged groups. As with the sharp-shins, they are something to see, hence the excitement among bird watchers every October.
Sharp-shinned hawks prey mostly on small birds in woods and older suburban areas with their tall trees and shrubbery. These little raptors are built for what they do. They have short, powerful wings for sweeping this way and that among tree trunks and long tails for split-second steering to catch their swiftly fleeing prey.
Red-tailed hawks mostly catch rodents, especially gray squirrels, that they dive on from perches high in trees or from circling in the sky. These daytime raptors are large enough to subdue gray squirrels and one squirrel might feed a red-tail for a couple of days.
The abundant sharp-shins and red-tails are thrilling to see when they are on migration in October, particularly when they are in some numbers. And they are most exciting to experience speeding over mountaintops during blustery north or northwest winds.
Wednesday, October 18, 2017
Farmland Beauties in October
October in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania farmland is a month rich with beauties. By then, generally, wild plants and animals have come to their fulfillment of growth, reproduced and are now preparing for the harshness of winter, either by migrating south, hibernating, storing food or putting on layers of fat. At no time of year is food and shelter as abundant than in October. And that special month has much beauty, too; those leftover from summer and some unique to October.
Like all the seasons, including in Lancaster County cropland, a human-made habitat where most people never think to look for autumn beauties besides planted pumpkins, fall has its own special beauties, particularly in October. Then deciduous trees, vines, weeds and grasses sense lessening daylight and lowering average temperatures each succeeding day. They respond by shutting off water to their leaves, which allows their death and the death of the green chlorophyll in them. When chlorophyll dies, the other colors in foliage are visible and we say they have turned colors. Some plants with beautiful colored leaves in autumn farmland include the red ones of staghorn sumac trees, orange foliage on sassafras trees, orange and yellow leaves on poison ivy vines, red foliage on Virginia creeper vines, red on poke, pigweed and lamb's quarters weeds and yellow on fox-tail grasses. These adaptable, abundant plants create medleys of lovely colors that can be enjoyed each fall. And they produce food for wildlife.
Several kinds of lovely berries and crab apple fruits in hedgerows between fields and along rural roadsides feed farmland wildlife through winter. Some of those berries are red ones on staghorn sumac trees and multiflora rose and Tartarian honeysuckle bushes, deep-purple ones on sassafras trees, Virginia creeper vines and poke, and orange ones on bittersweet vines. Those berries are not only attractive, but feed rodents and a variety of berry-eating birds, including American robins, cedar waxwings and other species. Those birds consume the berries, digest their pulp, but pass the seeds in their droppings, thus spreading each kind of plant across the countryside.
Lamb's quarters, pigweeds, foxtail grass and other kinds of weeds and grasses along roadsides, in abandoned fields, and in soybean and pumpkin fields that can't be cultivated, produce an abundance of small seeds that mice and seed-eating birds, including mourning doves, rock pigeons, savannah sparrows and horned larks, ingest during fall and winter. Those field birds add more interest to cultivated fields during those seasons.
Goldenrod, chicory, red clover and butter and eggs, to name a few flowering species leftover from summer, are still blooming in Lancaster County cropland in October, especially in meadows and along roadsides. And in October, wild morning glory vines, which crawl up fence posts and other kinds of plants, and a few kinds of asters also bloom in those same human-made habitats. Morning glories produce big, showy blossoms that are pink, white or, my favorite, deep-purple. Wild asters produce clusters of small blooms that are white, pale-lavender or, my favorite, deep purple, depending on the species. Several kinds of bees, butterflies, particularly lots of cabbage whites and yellow sulphurs, and other insect species swarm on aster flowers to sip their nectar, the last large source of sugar those insects will get each year before frost kills them or sends them to sheltered places, depending on the species.
Interestingly, there are a few kinds of flowering plants, including nodding thistles, chicory and a small variety of asters that still bloom in October, even after they had been mowed to stubs in pastures and along roadsides. Those plants recovered from that cutting and grew full-sized, pretty blooms on stunted stalks. Bees, butterflies and other types of insects visit those blossoms as much as they visit flowers on full-sized plants. The thistles, particularly, are admirable because they normally bloom in June and July, but here they are recovered and blossoming in October, benefiting insects.
A few kinds of trees, including black walnut, shagbark hickory and pin oak, in hedgerows and abandoned fields, and along woodlot edges, waterways and roadsides in cropland, produce nuts in abundance. And the scurrying of gray squirrels, and beauty of blue jays flying in and out of pin oaks, as both species gather and store many of those nuts to eat during the coming winter are entertaining and a big part of autumn. Both these originally woodland species live in farmland woodlots and hedgerows. And the squirrels can chew into all three kinds of nuts to eat the meat inside, but jays can only chip into pin oak acorns to get their nutrition.
There are a few other interesting bits of autumn in local farmland worth mentioning, including the fluff of common milkweed pods, garden spiders, crickets and grasshoppers and fuzzy caterpillars.
When milkweed seeds are mature, the pods that contained and protected them split open, allowing those brown seeds to fall out. But each seed has a fluffy, white parachute that carries its seed cargo on the wind across the countryside, thus spreading the species. Scores of milkweed fluff and seeds on the wind are pretty to see.
The big, black and yellow garden spiders are often noticed on their large, round webs late in summer and into fall to October. These spiders and their webs are quite attractive, especially when covered with dew drops glistening like jewelry in the early morning sunlight.
Field crickets continue to chirp on warm afternoons in October. They and grasshoppers of a few kinds are spotted on roadside plants and leaping across rural roads until heavy frost kills them.
A few kinds of fuzzy caterpillars, including the black and rusty-orange Isabella moth larvae, crawl across country roads to find sheltering places to spend winter. Unfortunately, some of those attractive, little critters of October get crushed by passing vehicles.
These are some of the more common beauties of October in Lancaster County cropland. Highly cultivated farmland is not as barren as one might think.
Like all the seasons, including in Lancaster County cropland, a human-made habitat where most people never think to look for autumn beauties besides planted pumpkins, fall has its own special beauties, particularly in October. Then deciduous trees, vines, weeds and grasses sense lessening daylight and lowering average temperatures each succeeding day. They respond by shutting off water to their leaves, which allows their death and the death of the green chlorophyll in them. When chlorophyll dies, the other colors in foliage are visible and we say they have turned colors. Some plants with beautiful colored leaves in autumn farmland include the red ones of staghorn sumac trees, orange foliage on sassafras trees, orange and yellow leaves on poison ivy vines, red foliage on Virginia creeper vines, red on poke, pigweed and lamb's quarters weeds and yellow on fox-tail grasses. These adaptable, abundant plants create medleys of lovely colors that can be enjoyed each fall. And they produce food for wildlife.
Several kinds of lovely berries and crab apple fruits in hedgerows between fields and along rural roadsides feed farmland wildlife through winter. Some of those berries are red ones on staghorn sumac trees and multiflora rose and Tartarian honeysuckle bushes, deep-purple ones on sassafras trees, Virginia creeper vines and poke, and orange ones on bittersweet vines. Those berries are not only attractive, but feed rodents and a variety of berry-eating birds, including American robins, cedar waxwings and other species. Those birds consume the berries, digest their pulp, but pass the seeds in their droppings, thus spreading each kind of plant across the countryside.
Lamb's quarters, pigweeds, foxtail grass and other kinds of weeds and grasses along roadsides, in abandoned fields, and in soybean and pumpkin fields that can't be cultivated, produce an abundance of small seeds that mice and seed-eating birds, including mourning doves, rock pigeons, savannah sparrows and horned larks, ingest during fall and winter. Those field birds add more interest to cultivated fields during those seasons.
Goldenrod, chicory, red clover and butter and eggs, to name a few flowering species leftover from summer, are still blooming in Lancaster County cropland in October, especially in meadows and along roadsides. And in October, wild morning glory vines, which crawl up fence posts and other kinds of plants, and a few kinds of asters also bloom in those same human-made habitats. Morning glories produce big, showy blossoms that are pink, white or, my favorite, deep-purple. Wild asters produce clusters of small blooms that are white, pale-lavender or, my favorite, deep purple, depending on the species. Several kinds of bees, butterflies, particularly lots of cabbage whites and yellow sulphurs, and other insect species swarm on aster flowers to sip their nectar, the last large source of sugar those insects will get each year before frost kills them or sends them to sheltered places, depending on the species.
Interestingly, there are a few kinds of flowering plants, including nodding thistles, chicory and a small variety of asters that still bloom in October, even after they had been mowed to stubs in pastures and along roadsides. Those plants recovered from that cutting and grew full-sized, pretty blooms on stunted stalks. Bees, butterflies and other types of insects visit those blossoms as much as they visit flowers on full-sized plants. The thistles, particularly, are admirable because they normally bloom in June and July, but here they are recovered and blossoming in October, benefiting insects.
A few kinds of trees, including black walnut, shagbark hickory and pin oak, in hedgerows and abandoned fields, and along woodlot edges, waterways and roadsides in cropland, produce nuts in abundance. And the scurrying of gray squirrels, and beauty of blue jays flying in and out of pin oaks, as both species gather and store many of those nuts to eat during the coming winter are entertaining and a big part of autumn. Both these originally woodland species live in farmland woodlots and hedgerows. And the squirrels can chew into all three kinds of nuts to eat the meat inside, but jays can only chip into pin oak acorns to get their nutrition.
There are a few other interesting bits of autumn in local farmland worth mentioning, including the fluff of common milkweed pods, garden spiders, crickets and grasshoppers and fuzzy caterpillars.
When milkweed seeds are mature, the pods that contained and protected them split open, allowing those brown seeds to fall out. But each seed has a fluffy, white parachute that carries its seed cargo on the wind across the countryside, thus spreading the species. Scores of milkweed fluff and seeds on the wind are pretty to see.
The big, black and yellow garden spiders are often noticed on their large, round webs late in summer and into fall to October. These spiders and their webs are quite attractive, especially when covered with dew drops glistening like jewelry in the early morning sunlight.
Field crickets continue to chirp on warm afternoons in October. They and grasshoppers of a few kinds are spotted on roadside plants and leaping across rural roads until heavy frost kills them.
A few kinds of fuzzy caterpillars, including the black and rusty-orange Isabella moth larvae, crawl across country roads to find sheltering places to spend winter. Unfortunately, some of those attractive, little critters of October get crushed by passing vehicles.
These are some of the more common beauties of October in Lancaster County cropland. Highly cultivated farmland is not as barren as one might think.
Sunday, October 15, 2017
Autumn Walnuts and Hickories
Black walnut and shagbark hickory trees are more visible in October than any other time of year. And it's their nuts that make them noticeable. I see their hard fruits lying broken and crushed on country roads, while others still hang in the trees that produced them.
These two kinds of trees have some characteristics in common, including being abundant in southeastern Pennsylvania, thriving best in moist, rich bottomland soil, and having open crowns, compound leaves, nuts developing in protective, green husks and yellow foliage in autumn. The nuts of both species are as much a part of autumn as colored leaves and migrating birds. And both species range from New England to Minnesota and south to northern Florida and Texas. But each of these tree species also has its own traits that make it outstanding.
Black walnut leaves drop early in fall, making those trees practically bare by October. Green-husked, nearly tennis-ball-sized nuts still hanging from their twig moorings are easily visible then. But the hard, dark, wrinkled-shelled nut inside is difficult to crack open. The bark of this walnut, incidentally, is deeply grooved.
The most outstanding feature of maturing shag-bark hickories is their shaggy-looking bark that peels away in long, narrow strips that are loose and curled up at both ends, but still attached to the tree in the middle of each plate. The nuts of this hickory are up to two inches across and the green husk of each nut splits into four parts at maturity, revealing the white-shelled nut inside.
Gray squirrels are the only critters in this area able to chew through the green husks and inner nut shells of both black walnut and shagbark hickory fruits. Only they have teeth sharp enough and jaw muscles strong enough to be able to do so. I often see gray squirrels with a walnut or a hickory nut in their mouths and dashing about looking for a place to bury those fruits in the soil for winter use. Some of those nuts are never recovered and eaten. They sprout into new trees: Thus the squirrels insured their own future food supplies.
American crows, blue jays, white-footed mice and other critters can ingest some of the nut meat from those nuts crushed on rural roadsides, at the creatures' own risk. Those cracked nuts, therefore, offer an additional supply of nutritious food for those animals.
The annual, abundant supply of nuts on black walnuts and shagbark hickories are another attractive, interesting part of fall here, particularly during October. And they are food for squirrels and other wildlife in fall, going into winter. I look for them each October.
These two kinds of trees have some characteristics in common, including being abundant in southeastern Pennsylvania, thriving best in moist, rich bottomland soil, and having open crowns, compound leaves, nuts developing in protective, green husks and yellow foliage in autumn. The nuts of both species are as much a part of autumn as colored leaves and migrating birds. And both species range from New England to Minnesota and south to northern Florida and Texas. But each of these tree species also has its own traits that make it outstanding.
Black walnut leaves drop early in fall, making those trees practically bare by October. Green-husked, nearly tennis-ball-sized nuts still hanging from their twig moorings are easily visible then. But the hard, dark, wrinkled-shelled nut inside is difficult to crack open. The bark of this walnut, incidentally, is deeply grooved.
The most outstanding feature of maturing shag-bark hickories is their shaggy-looking bark that peels away in long, narrow strips that are loose and curled up at both ends, but still attached to the tree in the middle of each plate. The nuts of this hickory are up to two inches across and the green husk of each nut splits into four parts at maturity, revealing the white-shelled nut inside.
Gray squirrels are the only critters in this area able to chew through the green husks and inner nut shells of both black walnut and shagbark hickory fruits. Only they have teeth sharp enough and jaw muscles strong enough to be able to do so. I often see gray squirrels with a walnut or a hickory nut in their mouths and dashing about looking for a place to bury those fruits in the soil for winter use. Some of those nuts are never recovered and eaten. They sprout into new trees: Thus the squirrels insured their own future food supplies.
American crows, blue jays, white-footed mice and other critters can ingest some of the nut meat from those nuts crushed on rural roadsides, at the creatures' own risk. Those cracked nuts, therefore, offer an additional supply of nutritious food for those animals.
The annual, abundant supply of nuts on black walnuts and shagbark hickories are another attractive, interesting part of fall here, particularly during October. And they are food for squirrels and other wildlife in fall, going into winter. I look for them each October.
Friday, October 13, 2017
A Patch of Autumn Beauties
Today, October 13, 2017, I visited a 50 yard stretch of woodland edge along a country road in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania farmland, initially because I saw beautiful colored leaves and red berries as I drove by. I stopped a couple of hours to see what else in nature was going on in that little bottomland woods.
Though the woodland was mostly green at this date, poison ivy vines crawling up tree trunks on the sunny border of the woods had orange, red and yellow leaflets of three, while Virginia creeper vines on those same trees had red leaflets of five. And several spicebushes of varying sizes in the shrub level of the woods had yellow foliage, which seemed to brighten the woodland.
Red berries in the woods edge, including those on spicebushes, Tartarian honeysuckle shrubs and multiflora rose bushes, and the red fruits on a crab apple tree, add color and beauty to the bottomland woods. Those attractive berries and fruits, and the dull-white berries on poison ivy vines, will be food for rodents, foxes, skunks and other mammals, and berry-eating birds, including American robins, cedar waxwings, starlings and others through the coming winter. The birds ingest those fruits, digest their pulp, but pass the seeds in their droppings as they fly about, broadcasting those seeds across the countryside. The plants that sprout from those seeds will grow, mature and eventually feed future rodents, birds and other creatures.
I saw a couple of resident gray squirrels in that bottomland woods busily gathering and burying black walnut nuts for winter food. Each scurrying squirrel had a nut in its mouth every time I saw it through my 16 power binoculars.
I saw two wary and camouflaged female wood ducks on the slower part of a stream flowing through the edge of the woods by the road I was on. I surprised them as much as they did me, causing those ducks to scoot out of sight under tree limbs hanging over the waterway. Those woodies may have hatched young along that stream (there's several tree hollows in that woodland). Or they might be migrants that stopped on that stream in the woods to rest and feed on seeds and aquatic vegetation.
I saw a few species of small birds during the two hours I observed that woodland. And, as usual, there were few birds to be seen at first, then a flurry of feathered activity, and finally, few birds again. One must often be in the right place at the right time to see birds.
As might be expected in a woodland, I saw one each of red-bellied and downy woodpeckers and one northern flicker, which also is a kind of woodpecker. All these woodpeckers, as their family is inclined to do, get invertebrate food by chipping into dead wood. And they raise young in tree cavities. But flickers also get much of their food on the ground, in the form of ants. Flickers are mostly brown instead of black and white like most woodpeckers so they will blend into the ground as they feed on ants in the soil.
I saw a few species of permanent resident, woodland birds in that woods, including a few Carolina chickadees and tufted titmice and a couple of blue jays. The chickadees and titmice were fluttering about and feeding on tiny insects on leaves, bark and in the air. The jays came to the stream to drink and bathe in the shallows.
I also saw three kinds of migrant birds, including an eastern phoebe that was consuming poison ivy berries and a little, mixed flurry of pretty golden-crowned and ruby-crowned kinglets. The tiny kinglets, like the chickadees were flitting among the leafy tree boughs in pursuit of minute invertebrates. Kinglets are difficult to identify because they seldom are still long enough to find through binoculars.
This was one two-hour period of time I spent in a small woods near home. One doesn't have to go far to find ample beauties and intrigues in nature in all seasons. Just get out and look for them.
Tuesday, October 10, 2017
Nature Close to Home
There is a mile and a half strip of country road I frequently drive on through cropland because there is much lovely scenery of farmland, wooded hills and nature to experience the year around, starting only a half mile from home in New Holland, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Unique habitats along the way include stream-sized Mill Creek that flows through two meadows in different stages of plant succession, another former pasture becoming a woodlot, a ten-acre stand of red junipers, a twelve-acre deciduous woods of mostly larger trees, two grazed meadows studded with large trees and a twelve-acre woods of mostly red maple trees. All these smaller habitats in a larger farmland environment have sources of food for wildlife.
Several dozen each of mallard ducks and Canada geese, a few American wigeon ducks, congregate on slower-moving sections of Mill Creek in winter. They eat tender grasses and other plants on the shores of that stream. Meanwhile, a wintering and majestic great blue heron wades that waterway to catch minnows, dace and white suckers that live in it. Sometimes, in fall, I might see a stately great egret stalking small fish in that waterway. These two members of the heron family, and a resident pair of red-tailed hawks that perch on a dead tree in the pasture, also catch and consume meadow mice that live among the grass roots of the meadow. The herons and egrets dip those mice in water to slick their fur to make swallowing them easier.
One meadow Mill Creek flows through, and I see from the road, is beautiful in summer with many blooming blue vervain plants with lavender flowers and lots of swamp milkweeds with pale-pink blooms. Those lovely blossoms are visited by a variety of bees and butterflies sipping nectar from them, pollinating them in the process.
Another meadow, across the road from the first, and straddling Mill Creek, is overgrown with crack willow trees, red-twig dogwoods, and a variety of grasses and flowering plants, including lots of spotted jewelweeds with orange flowers in September and asters with pale-lavender blooms in October. The dogwoods provide berries for rodents, northern mockingbirds, American robins, cedar waxwings and other kinds of berry-eating birds in autumn and winter. The grasses and flowering plants furnish lots of small seeds for song sparrows, American goldfinches, house finches, northern cardinals and other seed-eating, small birds through winter. All these permanent resident birds and summering gray catbirds, plus other species of small birds, nest in these streamside thickets.
The croplands themselves harbor lots of wildlife the year around. There often are many butterflies and bees of various kinds on fields of lavender, fragrant alfalfa flowers. Those fields flutter and shimmer with butterflies, particularly cabbage white butterflies and yellow sulphurs.
Flocks of rock pigeons, mourning doves, purple grackles, house sparrows and a few other types of birds feed on rye and wheat seeds left on the ground by harvesters in mid-summer. Those birds make those drab fields more interesting. And an occasional red-tailed or Cooper's hawk sweeps over the croplands, scaring birds into the air. Some of the small birds are caught and eaten by those raptors.
In fall and winter, peregrine falcons and merlins prey on some of those species of birds in the croplands. Those stream-lined, fast-in-flight raptors can easily catch fleeing birds in mid-air.
In winter, Canada geese, mallards, wigeons, pigeons, mourning doves, horned larks and other kinds of birds land in harvested corn fields to shovel up corn kernels left in the fields by automatic harvesters. These same birds, and other species, also pick chewed, but undigested corn bits out of manure spread on snow across the fields.
Another former pasture is rapidly succeeding to being a bottomland woods with lots of planted cranberry viburnum along its edges. Many of the same kinds of vegetation and creatures live in this overgrown meadow as in the first two discussed above. Strikingly red berries on the viburnums give additional food to berry-eating birds and rodents.
A ten-acre patch of red juniper trees also has a few each of black walnut, red maple and American holly trees in it. Those trees provide nuts for gray squirrels, seeds for squirrels and mice and berries for berry-eating birds, and rodents respectively. And the abundant, evergreen junipers produce berry-like, pale-blue cones that are not only decorative on the trees, but also feed a variety of rodents and berry-eating birds, particularly American robins, that consume those cones as they do berries.
Little flocks of dark-eyed juncos, house finches and American goldfinches spend winter nights among needled juniper boughs that block cold, winter winds. By day, those juncos, finches and goldfinches cross the country road to patches of grasses and weeds to ingest the seeds of those plants. A twelve-acre clump of deciduous woods harbors wood thrushes and eastern chipmunks during the summer, and red-bellied woodpeckers, Carolina chickadees and tufted titmice the year around. There are other woodland critters in the woods, but those are some of the most noticeable. And there are lots of colored leaves in that woodland during October when squirrels scurry to collect nuts to store for the winter.
Two grazed, buttercup-carpeted meadows across the road from each other are studded with black walnut, white oak, pin oak and red maple trees. Those trees have lovely colored leaves in September and October.
A pair each of eastern kingbirds, eastern bluebirds and red-headed woodpeckers nest in those meadows, the latter two species in tree hollows. Early in May, barn swallows come to muddy spots in the pastures to get beaksful of mud to build their mud pellet cradles in nearby barns. And asters with pale-lavender flowers add more beauty and interest to those pastures in October.
Near those meadows, a six-acre patch of red maples stands handsomely, especially in September and October when the trees' foliage turns red. Skunk cabbage and cardinal flower plants dot the grassy floor of this woods/pasture indicating that bottomland was once covered by trees. Today a few small strips of cattails stand in the moister, sunnier parts of that red maple-dominated habitat. Robins and bluebirds nest on the maples and get their invertebrate food from nearby pastures.
Driving along that mile and a half strip of country road is enjoyable and inspiring to me every time the year around. There is so much nature close to home to see during every season, that those drives don't get boring.
Several dozen each of mallard ducks and Canada geese, a few American wigeon ducks, congregate on slower-moving sections of Mill Creek in winter. They eat tender grasses and other plants on the shores of that stream. Meanwhile, a wintering and majestic great blue heron wades that waterway to catch minnows, dace and white suckers that live in it. Sometimes, in fall, I might see a stately great egret stalking small fish in that waterway. These two members of the heron family, and a resident pair of red-tailed hawks that perch on a dead tree in the pasture, also catch and consume meadow mice that live among the grass roots of the meadow. The herons and egrets dip those mice in water to slick their fur to make swallowing them easier.
One meadow Mill Creek flows through, and I see from the road, is beautiful in summer with many blooming blue vervain plants with lavender flowers and lots of swamp milkweeds with pale-pink blooms. Those lovely blossoms are visited by a variety of bees and butterflies sipping nectar from them, pollinating them in the process.
Another meadow, across the road from the first, and straddling Mill Creek, is overgrown with crack willow trees, red-twig dogwoods, and a variety of grasses and flowering plants, including lots of spotted jewelweeds with orange flowers in September and asters with pale-lavender blooms in October. The dogwoods provide berries for rodents, northern mockingbirds, American robins, cedar waxwings and other kinds of berry-eating birds in autumn and winter. The grasses and flowering plants furnish lots of small seeds for song sparrows, American goldfinches, house finches, northern cardinals and other seed-eating, small birds through winter. All these permanent resident birds and summering gray catbirds, plus other species of small birds, nest in these streamside thickets.
The croplands themselves harbor lots of wildlife the year around. There often are many butterflies and bees of various kinds on fields of lavender, fragrant alfalfa flowers. Those fields flutter and shimmer with butterflies, particularly cabbage white butterflies and yellow sulphurs.
Flocks of rock pigeons, mourning doves, purple grackles, house sparrows and a few other types of birds feed on rye and wheat seeds left on the ground by harvesters in mid-summer. Those birds make those drab fields more interesting. And an occasional red-tailed or Cooper's hawk sweeps over the croplands, scaring birds into the air. Some of the small birds are caught and eaten by those raptors.
In fall and winter, peregrine falcons and merlins prey on some of those species of birds in the croplands. Those stream-lined, fast-in-flight raptors can easily catch fleeing birds in mid-air.
In winter, Canada geese, mallards, wigeons, pigeons, mourning doves, horned larks and other kinds of birds land in harvested corn fields to shovel up corn kernels left in the fields by automatic harvesters. These same birds, and other species, also pick chewed, but undigested corn bits out of manure spread on snow across the fields.
Another former pasture is rapidly succeeding to being a bottomland woods with lots of planted cranberry viburnum along its edges. Many of the same kinds of vegetation and creatures live in this overgrown meadow as in the first two discussed above. Strikingly red berries on the viburnums give additional food to berry-eating birds and rodents.
A ten-acre patch of red juniper trees also has a few each of black walnut, red maple and American holly trees in it. Those trees provide nuts for gray squirrels, seeds for squirrels and mice and berries for berry-eating birds, and rodents respectively. And the abundant, evergreen junipers produce berry-like, pale-blue cones that are not only decorative on the trees, but also feed a variety of rodents and berry-eating birds, particularly American robins, that consume those cones as they do berries.
Little flocks of dark-eyed juncos, house finches and American goldfinches spend winter nights among needled juniper boughs that block cold, winter winds. By day, those juncos, finches and goldfinches cross the country road to patches of grasses and weeds to ingest the seeds of those plants. A twelve-acre clump of deciduous woods harbors wood thrushes and eastern chipmunks during the summer, and red-bellied woodpeckers, Carolina chickadees and tufted titmice the year around. There are other woodland critters in the woods, but those are some of the most noticeable. And there are lots of colored leaves in that woodland during October when squirrels scurry to collect nuts to store for the winter.
Two grazed, buttercup-carpeted meadows across the road from each other are studded with black walnut, white oak, pin oak and red maple trees. Those trees have lovely colored leaves in September and October.
A pair each of eastern kingbirds, eastern bluebirds and red-headed woodpeckers nest in those meadows, the latter two species in tree hollows. Early in May, barn swallows come to muddy spots in the pastures to get beaksful of mud to build their mud pellet cradles in nearby barns. And asters with pale-lavender flowers add more beauty and interest to those pastures in October.
Near those meadows, a six-acre patch of red maples stands handsomely, especially in September and October when the trees' foliage turns red. Skunk cabbage and cardinal flower plants dot the grassy floor of this woods/pasture indicating that bottomland was once covered by trees. Today a few small strips of cattails stand in the moister, sunnier parts of that red maple-dominated habitat. Robins and bluebirds nest on the maples and get their invertebrate food from nearby pastures.
Driving along that mile and a half strip of country road is enjoyable and inspiring to me every time the year around. There is so much nature close to home to see during every season, that those drives don't get boring.
Saturday, October 7, 2017
A Beautiful October Meadow
For two hours on the afternoon of October 4 of this year, I stopped at a pretty, bottomland meadow bordering a deciduous woodlot in lovely, peaceful farmland in Chester County, Pennsylvania to experience what wildlife was active. That part of the cow pasture was studded with a few each of red maple, pin oak and white oak trees, all of which flourish best in the constantly moist soil of bottomlands. That peaceful meadow obviously was carved from the original woodland that was there, and I noticed that some of the red maple leaves had already turned red, adding their beauty to that of the pasture on a sunny day under a blue sky.
A few blue jays, a couple of gray squirrels and an eastern chipmunk were all active visiting a couple of pin oaks in the pasture to gather acorns to store for winter food. The jays were beautiful flying in and out of the oaks several times while I watched them, each one carrying an acorn in its beak on the way out. Jays store acorns and other foods in tree cavities and holes they poke into the ground with their strong beaks.
The squirrels scurried here and there under the pin oaks, presumably gathering acorns that fell to the ground. They seemed to resent each other's presence as they chased each other away from the acorns on the ground.
Gray squirrels also stash nuts and seeds in tree hollows and depressions they dig into the soil with their front paws. Then, like the jays, they dig out that food through the winter.
The chipmunk was also busily collecting pin oak acorns in its two cheek pouches to carry back to its burrow in the ground. Down the tunnel, the chippy pushed the acorns out of its pouches and hustled back to the pin oaks to gather more acorns. Chipmunks, squirrels and jays gather acorns and other foods much of each October day for several days until each animal decides it has enough, or the food supplies are exhausted. And their scrambling about to gather food is dangerous because they expose themselves to hawks and other predators.
A few patches each of thorny barberry and multiflora rose bushes, both kinds of bushes loaded with red berries, are under the scattered trees in the pasture. They sprouted from seeds sown in that human-made, partly-sunny habitat by birds perched in the trees and digesting the pulp of berries they ate, but passing the seeds of those berries in their droppings. Both species of shrubbery, incidentally, are originally from Asia.
A few each of American robins and eastern bluebirds were ingesting some of those berries while I was there, and other bird species, including a northern mockingbird, cedar waxwings and starlings will consume many of those berries during the coming winter. Those birds will spread more seeds in their droppings across the countryside.
Interestingly, I saw three species of medium-sized woodpeckers among the trees in that meadow, a pair of red-bellied, two red-headed and one northern flicker. And they were all there because they are adapted to woodlots and tree-studded pastures in farmland.
Red-bellied woodpeckers are abundant in southeastern Pennsylvania because of their adapting to woodlots and older suburban areas with their maturing trees. That pair of red-bellies was in the pasture trees partly because of the bordering woodlot. Red-bellies typically get some of their invertebrate food by chipping into dead limbs on live trees, which this meadow has.
I saw one adult red-headed woodpecker on a dead limb in the pasture and one young red-head on the trunk of a live tree in the meadow. I assume they are part of a family of red-heads that hatched in the pasture in the past summer a few months ago. Of all woodpecker species in the eastern United States, red-heads are most adapted to cow pastures with some large, live trees and a few big, dead trees. They raise young in hollows they chip out of the upper limbs of dead trees in meadows.
The adult red-head had a totally red head, but the head of the youngster was brown for better blending into its habitat. Red-heads eat invertebrates from dead trees, in the air and on the ground. They also consume a lot of acorns, seeds and berries when those foods are available.
Northern flickers are adapted to pastures because they get much of their food of ants from ant hills in the soil. Flickers are even brownish for the most part to blend into their ground level environment while getting food.
These three kinds of woodpeckers in one place might be in competition with each other for food and nesting sites, but maybe not. They have habits and habitats different enough to spread them into niches of their own, free from rivalry from their relatives.
White asters with an abundance of small, white flowers, other asters with pale-lavender blossoms, tall goldenrod plants that have clusters of yellow blooms and smartweeds with tight, pink flowers were all in bloom in the meadow. And the many white aster flowers were buzzing and fluttering with bumble bees, honey bees, cabbage white butterflies, yellow sulphur butterflies, lots of small, skipper butterflies and two south-bound monarch butterflies. All those insects were visiting the blooms to sip energy-giving nectar. And the blossoms and insects added much beauty and interest to the pasture they were in.
This quiet, lovely, tree-dotted meadow, and many others here in southeastern Pennsylvania, have beauties the year around, including in autumn. They are well worth visiting for enjoyment and inspiration.
A few blue jays, a couple of gray squirrels and an eastern chipmunk were all active visiting a couple of pin oaks in the pasture to gather acorns to store for winter food. The jays were beautiful flying in and out of the oaks several times while I watched them, each one carrying an acorn in its beak on the way out. Jays store acorns and other foods in tree cavities and holes they poke into the ground with their strong beaks.
The squirrels scurried here and there under the pin oaks, presumably gathering acorns that fell to the ground. They seemed to resent each other's presence as they chased each other away from the acorns on the ground.
Gray squirrels also stash nuts and seeds in tree hollows and depressions they dig into the soil with their front paws. Then, like the jays, they dig out that food through the winter.
The chipmunk was also busily collecting pin oak acorns in its two cheek pouches to carry back to its burrow in the ground. Down the tunnel, the chippy pushed the acorns out of its pouches and hustled back to the pin oaks to gather more acorns. Chipmunks, squirrels and jays gather acorns and other foods much of each October day for several days until each animal decides it has enough, or the food supplies are exhausted. And their scrambling about to gather food is dangerous because they expose themselves to hawks and other predators.
A few patches each of thorny barberry and multiflora rose bushes, both kinds of bushes loaded with red berries, are under the scattered trees in the pasture. They sprouted from seeds sown in that human-made, partly-sunny habitat by birds perched in the trees and digesting the pulp of berries they ate, but passing the seeds of those berries in their droppings. Both species of shrubbery, incidentally, are originally from Asia.
A few each of American robins and eastern bluebirds were ingesting some of those berries while I was there, and other bird species, including a northern mockingbird, cedar waxwings and starlings will consume many of those berries during the coming winter. Those birds will spread more seeds in their droppings across the countryside.
Interestingly, I saw three species of medium-sized woodpeckers among the trees in that meadow, a pair of red-bellied, two red-headed and one northern flicker. And they were all there because they are adapted to woodlots and tree-studded pastures in farmland.
Red-bellied woodpeckers are abundant in southeastern Pennsylvania because of their adapting to woodlots and older suburban areas with their maturing trees. That pair of red-bellies was in the pasture trees partly because of the bordering woodlot. Red-bellies typically get some of their invertebrate food by chipping into dead limbs on live trees, which this meadow has.
I saw one adult red-headed woodpecker on a dead limb in the pasture and one young red-head on the trunk of a live tree in the meadow. I assume they are part of a family of red-heads that hatched in the pasture in the past summer a few months ago. Of all woodpecker species in the eastern United States, red-heads are most adapted to cow pastures with some large, live trees and a few big, dead trees. They raise young in hollows they chip out of the upper limbs of dead trees in meadows.
The adult red-head had a totally red head, but the head of the youngster was brown for better blending into its habitat. Red-heads eat invertebrates from dead trees, in the air and on the ground. They also consume a lot of acorns, seeds and berries when those foods are available.
Northern flickers are adapted to pastures because they get much of their food of ants from ant hills in the soil. Flickers are even brownish for the most part to blend into their ground level environment while getting food.
These three kinds of woodpeckers in one place might be in competition with each other for food and nesting sites, but maybe not. They have habits and habitats different enough to spread them into niches of their own, free from rivalry from their relatives.
White asters with an abundance of small, white flowers, other asters with pale-lavender blossoms, tall goldenrod plants that have clusters of yellow blooms and smartweeds with tight, pink flowers were all in bloom in the meadow. And the many white aster flowers were buzzing and fluttering with bumble bees, honey bees, cabbage white butterflies, yellow sulphur butterflies, lots of small, skipper butterflies and two south-bound monarch butterflies. All those insects were visiting the blooms to sip energy-giving nectar. And the blossoms and insects added much beauty and interest to the pasture they were in.
This quiet, lovely, tree-dotted meadow, and many others here in southeastern Pennsylvania, have beauties the year around, including in autumn. They are well worth visiting for enjoyment and inspiration.
Tuesday, October 3, 2017
Boxelder Bugs
On a pleasantly cool, sunny afternoon in October of last year, I was walking through a long, thin woods of colored leaves along a creek in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. The dominant trees along that waterway are sycamores, black walnuts, silver maples, and ash-leafed maples or box elders. I suddenly came upon a large, still gathering of attractive insects clustered tightly together on the sunny side of a large silver maple. They were thousands of female eastern box elder bugs, each one of them about a half inch long and dark with striking, reddish-orange markings. Those bugs, being cold-blooded, as all insects are, were staying warm in the sunlight, but would soon retreat into crannies under loose bark and crevices in the wood of the tree for the cool night. Eventually, as the fall weather continues to get cooler, these female box elder bugs will stay in their protective retreats for the winter and we won't see them again until the next spring.
Many of us call all insects "bugs", but only the family of insects eastern box elder bugs belong to are truly bugs. But the interesting box elder bugs inhabit bottomland, deciduous woods east of the Rocky Mountains, habitats where ash-leafed maples, their major food source, are common. And every October, when the amount of daylight each succeeding day is less and average temperatures continually drop, fertilized female box elder bugs, sensing the approach of winter, come together in spectacular swarms at tree trunks with cavities, fallen logs, rock walls and the walls of barns, houses and other buildings. They congregate almost wherever they can find protective crevices to slip into for the winter. But, although they don't bite or sting, nor eat anything through winter, most people don't like them around their homes, either outside or inside. Just the sheer numbers of box elder bugs are what those folks don't like. And some box elder bugs do enter homes by slipping under windows or through cracks anywhere in the walls. Being in the warmth of a house, however, is detrimental to these true bugs. Their metabolism is much higher in warmth and they run out of energy and die before winter is over. They don't get to lay eggs in spring. But box elder bugs in cold shelters retain energy to well into spring. They get to lay eggs and pass along their genetic codes.
Those same female box elder bugs emerge from their dormancy in sheltered places late in spring and lay eggs in bark crevices or on maple leaves, then die. Some of those eggs are eaten by a variety of small birds, including chickadees, kinglets, gnatcatchers, warblers and other species. Surviving box elder nymphs hatch in early summer and are red. Again some of them are eaten by a diversity of small birds. But survivors gradually become dark with red trim as they grow. Those nymphs ingest the juice of ash-leafed maple leaves along the waterways where that species of tree prevails.
Upon maturity late in summer, male and female box elder bugs come together for mating; then the males die. And only the females survive to overwinter to the next spring, when they carry on their species.
Female eastern box elder bugs congregate in sheltered retreats in October to pass the winter in comparative safety. Some readers might be lucky enough to experience one or more of those swarms on a sunny, October day. The bugs are attractive and don't cause any harm to people or their possessions. And they are a major, interesting part of natural happenings in autumn in the United States east of the Rocky Mountains. Their great congregations are another sign of fall.
Many of us call all insects "bugs", but only the family of insects eastern box elder bugs belong to are truly bugs. But the interesting box elder bugs inhabit bottomland, deciduous woods east of the Rocky Mountains, habitats where ash-leafed maples, their major food source, are common. And every October, when the amount of daylight each succeeding day is less and average temperatures continually drop, fertilized female box elder bugs, sensing the approach of winter, come together in spectacular swarms at tree trunks with cavities, fallen logs, rock walls and the walls of barns, houses and other buildings. They congregate almost wherever they can find protective crevices to slip into for the winter. But, although they don't bite or sting, nor eat anything through winter, most people don't like them around their homes, either outside or inside. Just the sheer numbers of box elder bugs are what those folks don't like. And some box elder bugs do enter homes by slipping under windows or through cracks anywhere in the walls. Being in the warmth of a house, however, is detrimental to these true bugs. Their metabolism is much higher in warmth and they run out of energy and die before winter is over. They don't get to lay eggs in spring. But box elder bugs in cold shelters retain energy to well into spring. They get to lay eggs and pass along their genetic codes.
Those same female box elder bugs emerge from their dormancy in sheltered places late in spring and lay eggs in bark crevices or on maple leaves, then die. Some of those eggs are eaten by a variety of small birds, including chickadees, kinglets, gnatcatchers, warblers and other species. Surviving box elder nymphs hatch in early summer and are red. Again some of them are eaten by a diversity of small birds. But survivors gradually become dark with red trim as they grow. Those nymphs ingest the juice of ash-leafed maple leaves along the waterways where that species of tree prevails.
Upon maturity late in summer, male and female box elder bugs come together for mating; then the males die. And only the females survive to overwinter to the next spring, when they carry on their species.
Female eastern box elder bugs congregate in sheltered retreats in October to pass the winter in comparative safety. Some readers might be lucky enough to experience one or more of those swarms on a sunny, October day. The bugs are attractive and don't cause any harm to people or their possessions. And they are a major, interesting part of natural happenings in autumn in the United States east of the Rocky Mountains. Their great congregations are another sign of fall.
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