Trillium

Hiding in Plain Sight

2011-08-22T20:09:00.000-07:00

I attended the 50th Annual Blackwater Falls Wildflower Pilgrimage in early May, near Davis West Virginia. Atop Smith Mountain a group of participants came upon this newly emerged Luna Moth while searching for rare native plants.

Its wings drooped and its belly was swollen with fluid. Gradually the fluid was pumping into the wings to stiffen them for flight. But meanwhile, the moth was extremely vulnerable.

I marveled at the patterns, colors and textures as it grasped the end of the twigs fallen from the tree above. Suddenly my trance was interrupted by a beeping car horn. All the other participants had returned to their cars and were awaiting me!

I rushed to join them, but not before I noticed the spent blossoms and pods littering the ground. The petals were shriveled and the pods covered with a pale green furry down. Their resemblance to the moth, clinging to the twig and twisting in the spring breeze, was remarkable. How did the moth choose this spot and perfectly time its "birth" to mimic this cast off vegetation?

Shangri La

2011-04-21T05:22:00.000-07:00

Local native plant aficionados know of a certain secret place along the C&O Canal that enchants lucky visitors with an unusual diversity of native plants. Some of the plants are rare to Maryland and prefer more northern climes. The gully where these plants grow rests between limestone cliffs facing the river, and due to the undulations of the Potomac, has a northern exposure, which makes for a chilly microclimate. One of the best times to visit is April through May, to see a breath-taking progression of spring woodland flowers, called ephemerals, for their short-lived and delicate nature. Here is what a friend and I saw on March 20.

The first photo is Bloodroot. One of the first spring ephemerals to appear. It's roots when crushed supply a bright red orange fluid and is said to have been used as body paint by Native Americans and as dye by early European immigrants. The bloom emerges clasped by fleshly leaves that protect it from the wind and cold of April until just the right moment when the sun is warm and the air still.

Dutchman's Breeches, so-called for the resemblance to voluminous pantaloons hanging upside down as if on a clothesline. These flowers are pollinated primarily by bumblebees, since some muscle and size is needed to push through the opening of the flower. The bees sometimes bite through the "ankles" of the breeches to obtain the nectar.

Shangri La boasts a variety of ferns including Christmas Fern, Maidenhair Fern, Blunt-lobed Woodsia, Bulbet Fern. One of the most marvelous is Walking Fern. The leaves of the fern are long and thin, extend out in a more or less radial fashion, and the tip of the leaf literally plants itself it a new spot, growing another fern. In this way, it 'walks" over the surface of the mossy rocks where it grows.

Adder's Tongue or Trout Lily. Not blooming yet, but there were hundreds, maybe even thousands of these leaves emerging. The common name refers to the spotted appearance and shape of the leaves. In a few weeks I will return to see drooping yellow lilies polka-dotting the forest floor.

Sedum, a dainty succulent.

More Walking Fern.

And finally, a newly revealed Mayapple. Its leaves unfurl like the canopy of an umbrella.

Salamander Nursery

2011-04-21T05:06:00.000-07:00

These photos were taken on March 19, 2011 at an old pond situated in the woods at a nearby state park where I'm working as a seasonal naturalist. I have the pleasure of studying the different stages of nature as they occur in the various microclimates and habitats in the park. I had a hunch that salamanders might breed in this old pond as it functions quite like a vernal pool. Sure enough the pond was dotted with slimy globs embedded with black eggs. I wasn't sure if they were frogs or salamanders, but later I found that my photos matched the images of eggs laid by the Spotted Salamander. This is a common salamander, but one who could become endangered as its woodland habitat becomes scarcer due to development and as climate change makes vernal pools dry up.

Monarch Miracle

2010-09-18T12:15:00.000-07:00

This August I tried hand-raising Monarch caterpillars. So far I've released 3 and have about 4 to go. Some of them I obtained as tiny eggs, others as partially grown caterpillars. I harvest Common Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca) for the caterpillars from the roadside or nearby abandoned fields. Plants in the milkweed family are the primary host plant for Monarch larvae. The fluid in these plants is a white, sticky substance containing a toxin. The toxin is tolerated only by Monarch larvae and some other insects that have evolved to feed upon it. The Monarch larvae, and the ensuing butterflies, are permeated with the toxin, which makes them a foul-tasting, potentially sickening morsel. The distinctive coloration of the larvae and adults signals a warning to would-be predators.

After a couple weeks of nonstop eating and growing, during which they shed their exoskeletons several times, they secure their posteriors beneath an overhanging stem with a silky substance. Dropping their heads, they assume a position in the shape of the letter "J." Within 24 hours, the caterpillar convulses and the exoskeleton splits open and falls away a final time, revealing a chrysalis of green and yellow, still ridged with abdominal segments. Soon, these ridges smooth away, and and the chrysalis becomes a pendant of opalescent pale green, studded with tiny gold jewels. The black stem is called a cremaster. Using a microscope one can see that the topmost end of the cremaster is composed of many tiny protrusions topped with knobby hooks. They appear to attach to the strands of the silk in much the same fashion as the human invention of velcro. After about 10 days, the chrysalis membrane becomes transparent. The body and wings of the adult butterfly can be seen inside, appearing almost completely jet black, with the exception of the deep orange pattern of the wings. The swirling shapes remind me of an Art Nouveau design of tree limbs silhouetted against a blazing sunset. I have yet to catch the exact moment of emergence. I think they wait until I leave the room! When I return there is the fresh, rather droopy winged adult, clinging to the remnant of it's casing. Over the next couple of hours, the Monarch balances delicately on four legs, turning itself from side to side, flexing its wings, unfurling its proboscis and wavering its front legs. Monarchs belong to a class of butterflies known as brushfoots ( Nymphalidae). These butterflies do not walk upon their furry front legs, but hold them flexed and close to their thorax. As the internal fluids transfer to strengthen and rigidify the wings, the body slims. Once during this process, I witnessed a drop of deep red fluid fall to stain the table beneath. Finally the wings are laid open in full color and shape. They slowly open, close, open, close, then suddenly take a maiden flight. The Monarch remains rather sluggish and calm for a while, enough time for me to take it on my finger and release it in a field tall with goldenrod blossoms. The butterfly shown below is a female. The wing pattern of a female has thicker veins of black than a male and lacks small black dots on the hind wings. Entomologists believe that the black dots on a male are vestigal organs. Evolutionary precursors of the Monarch emitted pheremones to scent pouches to lure females for mating. This generation is the last of the summer. The late summer Monarch butterflies in the eastern U.S will participate in a mass migration of 1000's of miles to a special place in the mountains of Mexico. There they will overwinter together in clouds of fluttering wings, clinging to the trees. The people who live there hold a festival each year to celebrate the return of the Monarchs. Traditionally, the Monarchs are believed to be the spirits of the people's ancestors.

In the spring, those Monarchs who have survived the winter will mate and begin the northward journey, laying eggs, then dying. The generation from these eggs will hatch as caterpillars, metamorphose into adults, continue northward, again mating and laying eggs, then dying. By the third or fourth generation, the butterflies have reached their northern terminus and the summer is ending. They must return to Mexico, a place they have never seen, to begin the cycle anew or perish. How do they do it? No one knows.

We Are Watching You

2010-07-22T07:56:00.000-07:00

The end of a hot summer day was perfect for a nature stroll around the lake. When I take the time to sit quietly, creatures come investigate, or emerge from hiding. This green frog and bluebird both seemed as interested in me as I was in them!

Owl Prowl

2010-07-14T06:28:00.000-07:00

Excerpt from my journal--November 7, 2009

In bed all day hoping to elude the symptoms of a virus. I want to join 19 other people who reserved a spot to accompany Steve Huy, a bander of saw-whet owls to his mist net site. We convene at 9 PM. Feeling better I make a cup of black tea at the last moment to sustain me and rush out to the car, only to find that my kitchen clock has betrayed me and I'm already late to meet the others at the commuter parking lot. With my cell, I ring Carolyn, the organizer of these once-yearly jaunts, for directions to the site.

I've worn the recommended boots, scarf, gloves and jacket. I later learn that in the past some women have shown up in high heels! The night is cool, the sky dark enough to see many stars as I travel into the lesser developed south county. The shape of South Mountain crouches blackly to my left. Monument Road twists and turns up the mountain, round and round, up and up. The turnoff is onto a narrow blacktopped lane that continues steeply upward, weaving in and around trees. It goes on for some time, and just as I seem to be cresting the mountain, and see lights blinking in the valley below, I run smack into the butt ends of cars huddled by a utilitarian shed. A communications tower erupts on top, silhouetted against the starry sky.

The second I open my car door, I hear a very loud sound piercing the darkness. It sounds like the friction of large rhythmically moving mechanical parts. But the irregularity in frequency and the varying duration of each shriek makes me think of a neighbor's dog whose vocal chords had been surgically altered to eradicate an obsessive bark. Only in this case something has gone terribly wrong. The noise is that much more affecting due to the lack of information I'm receiving from my favored sense of sight. I later learn that this sound is a recording of saw whet vocalizations blaring at high decibels from a speaker by the mist nets further into the woods. Supposedly the owls come to investigate the "intruder" to the territory.

Carolyn greets me with a flashlight and we stumble to where Steve is speaking about saw whets and his project. As shadowy figures we huddle by a security fence. Steve tells us that before the banding project it was thought that saw-whets numbered only in the hundred thousands, but now are believed to be in the millions. They are very small owls, maybe 5 inches--in response to a question about their size, Steve says he doesn't keep that information in his head because it is in books, rather the "owls fit in my hand." He says that although the males are smaller than females, there is no easy or quick way to identify an owls sex, but he has banded several thousand owls now, and so usually has a general impression of an owl's sex based on his accumulated experiences.

Two shorter individuals in the front of the group ask questions and I recognize their voices, both fellow WV Master Naturalists. From their profiles, I see Carrie's ubiquitous baseball cap, and Ursula's fluffy hair cut--she is not a wearer of hats. My eyes slowly adjust to the faint light--from the stars, nearby "light pollution," and a just rising waning moon--enough to make out their facial features. At this level of light I see in monochrome. I read that owls I have have many more rods in their eyes than humans, so not only see much better in dim light, but in color too!

The question of the utility of banding saw-whets is questioned since they are so "plentiful." He explains that the well-being of saw-whets reflects the well-being of the boreal forest, and our ecosystem as a whole. Predators, including birds of prey such as the saw-whet, are at the top of the food chainand ecological disruptions often first present themselves at that level, since toxins accumulate as they rise through the food chain. Most of us have heard of the endangered falcons and other birds due to DDT use and the resulting thinning of their egg shells.

Steve says saw-whets travel in spring to breed in the boreal forests of Canada and migrate south in the fall. Those northern forests are crucial to a healthy ecosystem and the life cycles of many other birds as well. The boreal forests of the world are much vaster than the earth's rain forests. They are being diminished by the lumber industry and by climate change--as we lose the freezing temperatures, and the duration of the freezes in the north. Wood boring beetles are not being controlled by these seasonal changes, and so they proliferate and take the lives of more and more trees, reducing habitat for breeding birds.

Finally it is time to check the mist nets! The recording has been screeching away for an hour. We troop in the dark down a path. A sign in the stern wording of a government agency warns against tampering with the nets. I had never seen a mist net and always wondered what it looked like. Saw-whets are relatively low fliers. A series of poles rise to maye 8-10 feet at most. The poles are spaced about 12-15 feet apart. Each net is about 8 feet tall, but loops up at the bottom forming a trough. The bird flies into the upper part of the net, then falls into the trough, and is secured. Two or three horizontal swaths of netting are stretched between the poles to form tiers of alternating netting and troughs. The line of netting extends 50 or more feet in one direction with another line jutting off at an angle midline.

We take care not to entangle in or damage the netting as each net costs $500-600. The holes in the net are as large as quarters--surprising since I envisioned a mist net as being very fine. The threads in the net are indeed very fine, and tension placed on the net is very loose. I can see how a bird could fly into it, be caught up, and not harmed. Close by the nets, the owl call is deafening. Ursula, shouting in my ear, confides that she purposely left her hearing aid at home.

There are no owls in the nets, Steve announces so we troop back to the security fence for more waiting. It occurs to me that we are like well-meaning spiders awaiting prey. What is the word for attributing animal behaviors to humans?--a reversal of anthropomorphism.

Ursula tells me she has gone on owl prowls twice before. She describes Steve placing the little owls in mesh envelopes that hug them closely as they await banding. The owls do not struggle but calmly submit to the banding process. She describes them as beautiful and adorable, without tufted ears as horned owls have, but with facial disks like barn owls. Ursula, Carrie and I trade wildlife stories amidst other groups chatting in the dim light of the crescent moon. One couple lights up an iPhone looking at birding info and listening to bird calls--at first. Later I hear canned laughter coming from the device. The glow from the digital screen lights up their faces and distracts my gaze from the moon and stars.

Ursula confesses about driving to a Christmas bird count one year and an owl flying into her windshield. She stopped and picked up the dead owl, placed it in her car and took it to the birding group to share as found on the roadside. She did not tell that she herself had been in the moving vehicle that killed it. She tells of meeting Scott Wiedensaul when he came to a friend's home to band a species of hummingbird unusual to this area. She says he is a very nice, unassuming man despite his fame as an author. We share a chocolate chip cookie I brought and Ursula wishes for ginger snaps and hot chocolate.

Time to check the nets again. The moon is now high in the sky. We again trundle down the rocky path with our flashlights but the verdict is no owls tonight! It is 11 PM and I have reached my limit. We return to the cars and two groups leave. A few other folks remain, perhaps to wait longer for the owls to make an appearance. I am somewhat disappointed after having waited two years for this opportunity. But as a dirunal animal, I enjoyed the novelty of a noctural foray and the company of other nature lovers. It is said we must take on the characteristics of the creatures we study and want to commune with. To study nocturnal predators, we go out at night, we wait, we cast nets, we use lures and mimicry, we boost our sight with artificial light, we dress for the weather and terrain. Perhaps I will have better luck next time if I add more meat to my diet.

Ensnared

2010-06-08T06:28:00.001-07:00

It was such a beautiful evening, calm with slowly drifting fluffy white clouds in a robins' egg blue sky. I took a walk around the nearby lake, mostly looking for ferns. I spied an overturned, collapsed canvas camp chair that some one had forgotten. I turned it over with a mind to sit down and watch the sun set over the lake. Fortunately, one leg was broken so I slowed down enough to see what looked like a female Black Widow huddled in the middle of the canvas next to her web. I enjoyed the little shudder of danger she evoked.

Black widows (Latrodectus mactans) are pretty intimidating even at only 1/2 inch long. The contrast of the red on the swollen black abdomen shouts "beware!" The only other time I had seen one was in California and I believed they were not as prevalent in the more humid Eastern climate. They do prefer warm climates, but can be found as far North as Oregon in the western U.S and New York in the east.

L. mactans is the largest and most notorious of the spiders known as Cobweb Weavers. Species in this group are found worldwide except in the colder latitudes. All are poisonous. The Black Widow has a red hour glass on the bottom of her abdomen. Since this spider's hour glass is indistinct or broken up, and it's abdomen actually more dark brown, I believe it may instead be a Northern Widow (Latrodectus variolus). Both species live in this area. Black Widows are often found near houses, outhouses, dumps and trash heaps, usually under objects, as this lady was. Northern Widows prefer undisturbed woods, stumps and stone walls. There are also Brown Widows and Red Widows.

Most spiders do not readily bite, unless seriously provoked. According to The Golden Guide of Spiders and Their Kin, if you receive a bite from a Black Widow you will likely not even notice it -- at first. But as the venom circulates in your bloodstream, you will experience abdominal pain similar to appendicitis, as well as pain in the muscles and soles of the feet. Saliva flows then the mouth becomes dry. You sweat copiously while your eyelids swell. After several days of agony, you will recover, most likely.

There is no first aid for any spider bite, but physicians can dispense medication to lessen the suffering. Its best to seek medical care at the first symptom! An antivenom for widow bites exists but has it own dangers. Children, people over age 6o, or those with pre-existing health problems, especially heart disease, are especially at risk of complications from a widow bite. See http://uuhsc.utah.edu/poison/healthpros/utox/vol4_no3.pdf

This spider had certainly captured my attention. I was ensnared not by it's web but by the prospect of a comfortable seat, and then mesmerized by its deadly aura. I left the spider unmolested, the camp chair turned upright, it's broken status obvious to any other human roaming that wooded, rocky part of the lake shore. I expected the spider to find another place to hide now that it was exposed to the light and weather.

Next time I am tempted to go "dumpster diving," I'll be sure to watch where I put my fingers--and other parts of my anatomy.

The Beautiful Forms of Ferns

2010-03-08T03:57:00.000-08:00

I have a new resident in my household. A fern. It lives in a pot next to a window. Since I am attempting to advance my learnedness about the ways of ferns, I adopted a forlorn little fern from my local florist's greenhouse. I don't know its species or particular habits, but I do know that in general ferns like moisture. (June 2010, I have since identified this fern as a Boston Fern (nephrolepsis exaltata var. bostoniensis), a mutation of the species that is native to Florida, West Indies, and the Asian Pacific. It has long been cultivated on a commercial level for the florist trade, beginning in Boston--hence the common name. ) I try to keep it happy by placing it right next to the humidifier. So far it is thriving. It is putting out spindly runners (known as stolon) so I have placed another pot next to it, but so far no contact made. Living with the plant so intimately, I get to watch the birth of each new frond. (The entire frond is the fern leaf. )

Each new frond emerges from the center of the other fronds that encircle it. (Writing later--this is only my first impression, the new fronds also emerge around the perimeter of the clump of fronds, halfway in from the outside perimeter, or wherever. ) Each frond begins as a fuzzy question mark, with a pale green clench of tiny new pinnae within the swirl. Pinnae is the word for the fern leaflets that are placed horizontally along the frond stem. (Singular = pinna.)

The tiny clench gradually unfurls into a very long and narrow many toothed shape. This fern's fronds look to me like series of pennant flags alternating on a central pole, a flexible pole like a bamboo fishing rod. The pennants also bring to mind a double row of Tibetan prayer flags fluttering in a strong wind.

Each baby frond is like a very complex flag display that was somehow lovingly folded up by impossibly tiny hands. (Perhaps by fairies?) I have not yet been able to visualize how the frond grows longer and adds new pinnae at the same time. The tender fist of new pinnae remains, (or continually emerges?) at the end of the frond as it lengthens, finally disappearing as the last pinnae unfold. I wish I could aim a video camera to film the process and then speed it up like those old nature films. Fern time is quite different from human time. Last month, I visited one of my favorite places to go in February, when it seems spring is dragging its muddy feet--the National Botanical Garden conservatory in Washington DC. This time I was on a mission to see the 'prehistoric' plants--ferns, cycads, conifers. They have their own room in the gigantic greenhouse, where mist periodically descends from above. Here one finds exotic ferns from all over the world. Photography was challenging as my lens kept fogging up! Top photo and below show some of the graceful and beautiful forms that I found similar to those of my "pet" fern.

White-Tailed Deer

2010-02-02T06:29:00.000-08:00

I took these photos on a late afternoon drive on back roads. Temperatures were in the 20’s. The recent snowfall reflected the colors in the fading western sky. The Antietam National Battlefield, protected from hunters, was aswarm with herds of white-tailed deer. The young deer pictured were grazing in a family group directly behind a house. Their elders remained close to the forest edge, but three of these youngsters came running eagerly toward my car, their legs flailing like awkward stilts. But they halted abruptly, as if their mother had called out to them, still too far away for me to capture a good closeup. The expression on their faces here seems to say "why did mom tell us to stop? I'm looking but I don't see any dangers. "

I realize I tend to dismiss white tails as not worthy of my attention due to the overpopulation and frequent sightings. I am upset by the damage to formerly favorite places like nearby Catoctin Mountain National Park due to over browsing. Perhaps too it is a way for me to cope with the reality of all the hunting that goes on each fall—a way to distance myself. So I’m writing this post to correct my prejudice and teach myself something about these animals.

Once can imagine the ancient predators of these deer —cougars, wolves and indigenous human tribes. But they were extirpated from these parts--not all that long ago. Bear still live here and coyotes have arrived from the west but these animals can only take down a young fawn or perhaps an adult deer impaired with an injury or illness.

I am learning to respect hunting as a tradition, especially when the meat is preserved or eaten and other parts of the animal utilized. (Click here for a fascinating article about different traditional uses of parts of the deer.) From a naturalist standpoint, I know the deer population needs controlling so they don’t completely decimate the environment and I consider it potentially a humane activity.

I dislike it when I come upon the leavings of a slaughtered deer ditched illegally along the roadside or in a field, as Squirrel and I did on the Eastern Shore of Maryland this past fall--right at the entrance to a wetlands nature preserve. Disposing of deer carcasses in this way is a serious threat to human health especially if near water, and it also endangers the deer themselves because it can spread Chronic Wasting Disease, a serious problem in other states, but which I believe has not yet surfaced in Maryland. Deer carrion is a source of food for scavengers like vultures, hawks, eagles, and foxes.

I can hardly think of deer without remembering the impact of reading Felix Salten's books as a child. Many people are surprised to learn that the character Bambi was not an original creation of Walt Disney’s. Felix Salten was a highly successful and prolific author in Austria. His book Bambi: Eine Lebensgeschichte aus dem Walde was published in 1923 . It is a "coming of age" story about a young male roe deer. In 1928, the English translation, Bambi: A Life in the Woods was a Book of the Month club sensation in the U.S.

The Salten family was Jewish; in 1936 Adolf Hitler had Salten’s works banned. Salten and his family left Austria (which by then had become part of Germany) in 1938, settling in Switzerland. In 1939 he published a sequel -- Bambi’s Children: The Story of a Forest Family, which details the deer's struggle to survive while being pursued by "the thundersticks."

Now that I know Salten’s back story I will need to go back and re-read Bambi's Children--it must reflect some of what was happening in Europe at the time, similar to Richard Adam’s Watership Down. Based on Adam's battle experiences in 1944 Holland, Watership Down is about another easily dismissed animal, the rabbit.

The Bambi books are written in a simple but not childish style. The animal characters are anthropomorphized, but the descriptions of the forest and the facts of their lives are realistic. The Disney animated version of Bambi was released in 1942 -- it has moments of lyrical beauty. The movie’s artists took great care to accurately portray deer anatomy and behavior.

The original Bambi was a Western Roe deer (Capreolus capreolus), native to Europe, about half the size of our white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus virginianus) native to southern Canada and most of the U.S. However, these two species share many characteristics.

A male white-tailed deer on average weighs about 135 pounds, females 120. White-tails have a reddish coat in summer, a gray-brown coat in the winter. White-tails communicate in many different ways, including sight, sound and scent. They snort or raise their tails to signal danger to other deer in the vicinity. Deer can make a range of sounds that are unique to each individual, including bleating, squealing, snorting and grunting.

Deer prefer habitat where wooded areas intersect with open areas. They feed in both areas, and can use the forest for cover. The open areas may be croplands, pasture or landscaped yards. When portions of forested areas are cleared for residential development and roads, or conversely, when croplands are transformed into residential areas with trees and landscaping, habitat for deer is created. It is thought that roe deer proliferated during the Neolithic period when agriculture began clearing forest in Europe..

Capable of leaping over a barrier up to 12 feet in height, white-tails are heedless of most fences. As many a rural home owner learns to her frustration, white-tails feed on a wide range of plants. Attracted to woody shoots and stems (such as freshly planted ornamental shrubs or tree seedlings), deer also eat nuts, acorns, berries, mushrooms, leaves and grasses. Their favorite cultivated crops are soybeans and corn.

Perhaps we should thank them for grazing on invasive plants like honeysuckle, poison ivy, and green briar. As ruminants, deer can eat these highly fibrous foods due to a digestive system with a four chambered stomach. Partially digested food is returned to the mouth so they can “chew their cud” which is then swallowed again to complete the process. Cows, bison, big horn sheep, goats, llamas, camels and giraffes are also ruminants.

Hunters prize the bucks’ multi-pronged antlers as trophies of their prowess (the deers’ or the hunters?). These are termed antlers because they are lost and replaced each year unlike horns which grow continuously on animals like sheep and goats. Antlers on does are extremely rare but do occur.

One can often find shed antlers lying in the woods. Antlers begin sprouting on the male deers’ heads in late March and early April. Skin and blood vessels cover the bone of the antlers as they grow. This covering is known as “velvet.” In late summer, the males’ testosterone levels rise, the bone of the antlers hardens and the velvet dries and falls off. Deer scrape and scratch their antlers against trees and other objects to help shed the velvet. The color of antlers ranges from white to brown. Biologists don’t seem to be certain about why—perhaps heredity.

In October, the shortening length of the daylight hours triggers the breeding season. Male white-tailed deer use their antlers to establish dominance and fight for breeding rights with the does. By November most does are pregnant. In January, the bucks' testosterone levels drop and the antlers fall off. The males who are in the best physical condition lose their antlers last. Gestation ends in May or June when the fawns are born. Most fawns are single births, but does in good condition often have twins.

A white-tailed deer's home territory is usually less than one square mile. Family groups consist of a mother deer and her fawns. When a doe has no fawns, she is usually solitary. Bucks may live in groups of three or four, but are mostly solitary in mating season. The large groups I saw on my drive appeared to consist of several adult females with their half-grown offspring.

Newborn fawns lie still in a carefully chosen spot and are visited several times a day by the mother, to allow nursing and grooming of the infant. After a few weeks, the fawn is led by its mother to explore the world beyond and sample vegetative foods. A fawn is supposedly capable of living independently of its mother at only two months of age. But the young deer I saw were enjoying a lengthy association with their family group.

Many facts about deer taken from an article by Brian Eyler, Deer Project Leader, for Maryland DNR.

The 'Wild' Headwaters of the Conococheague

2010-01-21T01:40:00.000-08:00

Continuing on the exploration of my ecological address, I set off last weekend to find the origin of the Conococheague (pronounced locally as CON-OH-CO-JIG with the emphasis on the first syllable) , one of the namesakes for my USGS watershed. The Conococheague has an Eastern and a Western branch. The eastern branch begins in Michaux State Forest in Pennsylvania--its starting point lies very close to Caledonia State Park.

The more than 85,000 acres of forest are named in honor of Andre Michaux, a French botanist, who was sent to the New World by the King and Queen of France in 1785 to gather plants for the royal gardens. From the 1700's through much of the 1800's the land was owned by the iron industry. The forest supplied large amounts of wood for the charcoal needed to fuel the furnaces. Iron ore was dug from open pits, and transformed into "pig iron," for tools, stoves, and other necessities (including cannon balls for the Revolutionary War). Back then, a visit to these mountains must have been a very different experience.

The iron industry finally abated due to competition from new technology, and the area then became known as a center for forestry. The first Pennsylvania nursery for forest trees was sited here. In 1903, a forest academy was established -only the second in the nation to train professional foresters. Michaux still provides lumber and wood products--it is managed sustainably. These days water appears to be its most valuable commodity. But also recreation-- hiking, mountain biking, bird watching, cross country skiing--and fishing, boating. The Applachian Trail passes through.

The eastern branch flows west to Chambersburg before making a turn and heading south to the Potomac. The water that flows down the mountains and rises up from springs within Michaux are known for their purity since no industry or agriculture (other than intermittent selective logging) is present. So Chambersburg taps the water close to its source before it can be contaminated, treats it, then runs it to the city via gravity. Chambersburg is not required to even test for certain pollutants.

On my little trip "up" that way (north and at a higher elevation) I visited the old reservoir (below) which was drained a few years ago due to a leaking dam. (The Long Pine dam and reservoir nearby is much larger and quite fine for a day of meditative kayaking.). I'm not sure if this stream pictured is the Conococheague or considered another creek at this point, but certainly the water flowing here flows into the 'Cheague. The fisherfolk cast their flies upon the waters here now.

The reservoir bed is being restored to forest. My friend Bill, my forestry consultant, conjectures that the new trees in this photo (in the white protective sleeves) include water loving species like sycamore near the stream, and also varieties of eastern hardwoods like walnut and oak. I'm finding that when I search for information about my local watershed, it is often the fisherfolk, especially the fly fishing aficionados, who are most in the know, at least of those who aren't biologists, surveyors and designated water quality keepers. The fisherfolk are the ones on intimate terms with the creeks and streams, and the fish therein. If a creek runs through it, they are interested. Which makes me more interested in them and what they do. I just might have to finally look into fly fishing...

Not disposed to hiking on this day, I drove around trying to get as close to the beginning of the Conococheague as I could. I found this bridge and sign next to a mobile home park. Not a bad place to set up housekeeping-- at the foot of the mountains, at the headwaters of the Conococheague.

My Ecological Address Part One: Watershed

2010-01-08T06:13:00.001-08:00

I decided to blog my journey as I discover my ecological address. Essentially I will use myself as guinea pig, see what can be learned, and also see the [appalling] degree of ignorance I currently have about my ecological address. The Audubon site has links that help you figure out all the different ecological overlays for where you live. http://www.audubon.org/bird/at_home/Explore.html

The first category of links is Watersheds. I click on the link to the Environmental Protection Administration website, punch in my zip code and a map of my Watershed comes up. I knew I live in the Chesapeake Bay watershed and the Potomac River Valley, but more specifically I find that I live in the watershed designated as Conococheague-Opequon, by the United States Geological Survey, aka Cataloging Unit 02070004. Conococheague and Opequon are nearby creeks that drain into the Potomac. Sound like Native American words, as is Potomac. (A tangent to research but let’s keep focused here!)

There are links to various other sites. I can peruse multiple water quality studies and link to a range of water quality advocacy groups for my watershed. I try to read over one water quality study and rapidly begin drowning in technical terms. I’ll need to get help from a new friend who is a fish disease expert.

I learn that I live in what is known as the Upper Potomac River Basin (within the political state of Maryland,that is). A fact sheet on the total miles of wadeable streams in this area shows that the Fish Index of Biotic Integrity (FIBI), which is based on fish populations, is 55% poor, 31% fair and only 14 % good.

That does not sound encouraging.

Do you know the FIBI for your area? FIBI sounds like a particular concern for fly fishermen--indeed a group called Antietam Fly Anglers are the ones who posted the fact sheet. http://www.dnr.state.md.us/streams/pubs/upperpotomac.pdf

They have also posted a report from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on intersex fish being studied in the Potomac and its tributaries including the Shenandoah River. http://www.antietamflyanglers.org/docs/endocrine.pdf
This is when features of the female sex organs are found in the sex organs of male fish, and vice versa. It is believed caused by pollution in the water (endocrine disruptors).

Again, rather alarming. My drinking water comes from the Potomac River, it is “treated” but I need to find out more about how that works…

The EPA site is mind-boggling. There is an Envirofacts page http://www.epa.gov/enviro/
where you can easily find air quality, radiation, toxic waste emitters, compliance reports, etc all according to your zip code! I did not realize how easily available all this information is online. It is not something that is talked about everyday on your local news, in your local paper, or among your co-workers ‘around the water cooler.’ But it should be. Why isn’t it?

Well, just one hour of discovery and I have a multitude of more questions. Perhaps that is the point, once you begin knowing your ecological address you become engaged with the reality of the world in which you are living on a different level.

Of course as living, breathing inhabitants of our local ecosystem we are already unavoidably involved but we are disconnected from consciousness of it. I see that working my way through the Find Your Ecological Address project is going to be much more time consuming, complex and enlightening than I expected. Life-changing might not be too extreme a word. Pretty crafty, Audubon.

Pileated Woodpecker

2010-01-04T05:47:00.000-08:00

Here are some snaps of the Pileated Woodpecker mentioned in the post below. By the way, pileated means capped, from the Latin pileus=cap. It is pronounced with the long i sound as in pie.

Maps in Our Heads

2009-12-31T07:47:00.000-08:00

I realized this morning that one of the things that so delights me about nature is that it is completely free from the boundaries that humans have set for ourselves with our artificial states, counties, countries, private land, and other types of so-called ownership that have little relevance to the ecosystems they chop up into pieces. (I’m not against private rights to land among humans, but I’m for an awareness of nature’s rights, and a sense of stewardship and commons.) It is also this characteristic that has most threatened and challenged us, that we have struggled to control.

Birds fly hither and yon at their whim and in response to weather, available food, water, breeding territory, shelter, seasons. For example, a female pileated woodpecker visited the suet feeders on a friend’s deck during the recent big snow, giving us a flash to a prehistoric past. These woodpeckers wear a bright red crest that looks somewhat like a red Santa hat. It contrasts strikingly with the black and white bars and zigzag patterns on its face and body. The birds are what I imagine to be pterodactyl like—our largest woodpecker, they have narrow hatchet shaped heads that they must slant to the side and twist and turn to adequately scan for threats. We felt honored to see her up close. Pileated woodpeckers frequent my friend's territory because of the many dead trees that provide food and shelter. But designating any backyard deck as an Official Pileated Woodpecker Feeding Station will not draw these birds matter how many signatures are obtained.

The snow falling right now outside my window does not discriminate: it blankets, chills, and nurtures vast areas oblivious to where commuters rush, crops grow or children with new Christmas sleds watch the skies. Or where my property ends and your’s begins. It frustrates or thrills according to one’s frame of reference. Put snow in a giant frame called global climate and see what it brings up for you.

On a snow-covered fire road in West Virginia last weekend I saw the footprints of humans and dogs, but also raccoon, deer, squirrels, and even a black bear. The road according to human law was in a wildlife “management” area, but only I and my companion walked there because this fact made it accessible to us. The animals roamed at will on the road and off, over the mountain, through backyards, farms, wherever they wanted, wherever was safe from human interference.

I love maps. I remember one of the major features of the classroom when I was growing up were the maps showing the world and all the different countries. Each country glowed in a different color—pink, green, lavender, orange, yellow, all surrounded by the deep blue of the ocean and accentuated by the whites of the arctic and antarctic. We learned the shapes of the continents too. Sort of. There are different types of projections of the round world onto a flat surface--but none can portray the contours and ratios as accurately as a globe. The choice of those projections determines how a young brain (or an older one for that matter) conceives of one’s own country and its place in the world. Remember the map used in the King and I that showed Siam as gigantic and all the “enemy” countries as tiny. The exaggeration was cartoonish but point made.

Those bright colors on my school map said that country boundaries, the human politics, were the most important thing that we needed to learn. I haven’t been in an elementary school room for many years. But when I visited my grandson’s preschool last year, I saw--placed down low on the wall where the tiny students could study it at their leisure--a large world map that showed not country boundaries, but ecosystems and the animals that reside there.

Nature has its own system of territoriality, its own “politics.”. As we grope toward learning to live in tune with nature, finally realizing that it is crucial to our own survival, I’m wondering how our maps will change-- on our walls, and in our heads and hearts. I know my political address, but do I know my ecological address? Audubon has a neat worksheet to start discovering this at http://www.audubon.org/bird/at_home/Explore.html.

L is for Luna

2009-10-07T05:26:00.000-07:00

"The world today is sick to its thin blood for lack of elemental things, for fire before the hands, for water welling from the earth, for air, for the dear earth itself underfoot. --Henry Beston

The moon is one of those elemental things. Often I'm surprised by the moon blinking bright when I open the blind in the early morning dark or when it appears like a ghost in the midday sky, or on an evening drive as it rises slowly from behind the mountains like a hot-air balloon.

How removed is my awareness from the moon, its phases and cycles. How would my life change if I made an effort to be aware.? How would I apply this knowledge? What different choices would I make, knowing, anticipating each full moon, each new moon, marking the times of moon rise and moon set?

And conversely, how would my life need to change in order for this awareness to come naturally, to be an imperative of my daily requirements for living, to be noticed, observed assimilated as easily as I now note whether or not the sun shines? I plan to find the answers to these questions.

Alphabet Bloggers

Knee Deep in Moss

2009-09-30T02:56:00.000-07:00

"One touch of nature makes the whole world kin." --William Shakespeare

I have always loved to see moss cozying up to the feet of trees, draping over decomposing logs, and cushioning rock surfaces with luxuriant velvet.

A neat thing about mosses is that to get to know them in their natural habitat you must usually get down on your knees. Doing so immediately takes you out of your usual way of looking and perceiving and engages you physically.

Your hands and knees ground you at four points. Perhaps your trousers get damp and a little dirty. You feel the different textures of the leaf litter and inhale the perfume of the humus. You stroke the furry surface of the moss and it tickles your hands.

You marvel at the vibrant shades of green that seem to glow amidst the surrounding shades of brown and grey. Or perhaps the moss serves as an emerald background for jewel toned fall leaves.

The undulating surface when seen from your full height now becomes a miniature jungle of lush intricate plants. Moving your face ever closer, tensing the muscles around your eyes to sharpen your powers of sight, you attempt, but just fail, to focus clearly on the details you know are there. You bump up against the limits of the human eye.

You are literally brought down and humbled by this so-called 'primitive' plant. But you are also lifted up in awe. I find that nature frequently brings me to a kneeling posture, physically or otherwise.

Mosses have been much on my mind lately as our nature writing group has been reading Robin Wall Kimmerer's Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses. Kimmerer is a bryologist, a botanist specializing in mosses and liverworts--or bryophytes. She is also a descendant of North America's indigenous people. Her writing is scientific but also rich with mood, metaphor, myth and sensuality. She is the type of nature writer with whom I feel a kindred spirit.
Mosses will divulge many of their secrets, through the use of tools like hand lens, microscope, and field guide. Different families among the bryophytes are easily distinguished but species identification can be very challenging. I like to think of bryophtyes as a phenomenon, a clan of diverse members, sharing kinship not only among themselves, but as ancestors of other land plants. In some ways they are strikingly similar even to us mammals.

From Kimmerer's book, I learned that mosses are the 'amphibians' of plants. They are the ancient form of plant life that first transitioned from the water to land. Mosses live in communities or colonies with individual plants huddled together shoulder to shoulder. Their life style and reproductive cycle is dependent on this close proximity.

Moss have no roots to take up water from from where they are anchored--their substrate. They dry up, fade and shrink or plump up and green out depending on environmental conditions. The plant takes in CO2, water and minerals through its entire surface. Living close together helps them retain moisture not only for themselves but as participants in an ecosystem. Other organisms benefit. For example, many insects utilize the moist protection of mosses for their own reproductive cycle.

Moss plants occur in two life stages. In the gametophyte stage the plants are green and grow without sexual reproduction. When conditions are right, the gametophytes form microscopic male or female organs. The male structure containing sperm is called the antheridium. The female structure containing the egg is called the archegonium. This a reproductive innovation which mosses first developed. All land plants living today use this strategy of enclosing the egg within a protective womb.

Mosses produce no flowers so they ask for no help by animal pollinators. (Insects inadvertently do help the process along sometimes.) For the male sperm to reach and fertilize the female egg there must be a fluid vehicle. Rain, dew, mist or splashes are required. With sufficient moisture, the antheridum swells until it bursts. It also releases a soaplike substance that helps the miniscule sperm penetrate the surface tension of water droplets to better hitch a ride.

With luck the sperm is able to reach and travel down the neck of an archegonium to an egg.

Once fertilized, the egg is nurtured within the archegonium and grows into the second life stage--the sporophyte. Kimmerer explains science has discovered special cells in the female moss organ that work to transfer nutrients from the parent plant to the developing egg. She compares this function to human placental cells.

Mature sporophytes are usually brown or colorless with a capsule full of powdery spores elevated on a stalk above the green gametophytes. Special teethlike structures on the capsules are responsive to the level of humidity. They open to release the spores when the air is dry (and thus better for dissemination).

Those spores that find a hospitable home will form a new colony of moss, carrying the genetic material of the parent colony forward. The scattered colonies of particular moss species in a patch of woods are all close kin to one another.

Mosses are extremely adaptable--they are found in every ecosystem on earth. Species number over 22,000. Their variety is seemingly endless. Next time you go walking in the woods spend some time on your knees.

Alphabet Bloggers

The Art of Waiting

2009-09-24T18:59:00.000-07:00

Spiders that weave these funnel webs are in the family Agelenidae. This spot of woods in West Virginia was full of their mysterious looking "caves." The spider creates a net to catch the insects who careen into the supporting strands above. The cave is where the spider lurks, is alerted by the vibrations of the web, runs out to grab the hapless prey, then retreats to the safety of the cave to dine.

This particular spider was not happy with my attentions. She hunkered down to shrink her body size, ready to confront what was threatening her. In this case, it was only my camera flash, illuminating the shadows and her four-eyed face. Rudely, I didn't ask for her permission to post her image on my blog. She had no choice but to remain silent (unless she could spell words out in her web as Charlotte did.) But it would have a been a nice gesture on my part.

This spider had constructed one of the more impressive dens among the many scattered about the forest floor. These types of spiders live for one year. I like to think that through the cycle of seasons, in her struggle for survival, this spider added a wealth of experience to her instincts.

Imagine the knowledge the spider must have accumulated about insect habits and haunts. Imagine the spider selecting that "just right spot" for this web, maybe her final masterpiece. Imagine her manufacturing-within her own body-a never ending spool of silken thread. Imagine her slowly amassing and shaping the individual strands to create this fine mesh architecture.

Imagine the spider settling into her shady tent. Imagine her waiting hour upon hour for her meal. The sun rises, passes overhead and sets. Crickets chirp, the last butterflies and moths flutter their weary wings. Gnats buzz. In those long hours, does she sleep, does she meditate, does she simply wait--alert and poised to respond-- as only spiders can?

I learned very little about this individual spider and her clan by simply snapping her photo and walking on. If I had been patient, if I had practiced the spiderly art of waiting, perhaps I could have learned much more.

Just As They Came

2009-09-22T17:40:00.000-07:00

A rainy evening walk. A path in the woods by a lake.

Just words on paper. Just as they came:

Grace. Graceful living and dying. Acceptance. Quiet. Each true to its own nature.

The sound of rain on leaves. A tired sound. Late summer, early fall. A different sound, a variant drum. Does each leaf sound a different note according to its shape and size?

A Harmony. Cohesiveness. All are in tune and aware of coming winter. Aware of each other.

The shifts. Day/night, the angle of light.

The laurel. More glossy, thick, shiny. Recent rain? Water clings in oblong drops. Bubbles, irregular, rounded shapes. Spatters reflect the light, gray sky.

Gentle breeze, yellow leaves sprinkle like cherry blossoms.

Two older people walk the perimeter.

Spicebush red berries, river birch catkins. Moss and lichen.

The fallen leaves make shallow cups along the path. Hold rainwater. Reflect light like mirrors.

Soft steps. The ground moist. Dry dust tamped down.

Sounds. A cricket, a woodpecker. Rush hour traffic.

My foot hurts. Body shape. Gray hair. Lines.

Water level low. Mud exposed. Water striders.

Twirling leaves caught in web. Spider’s body and legs moving --

agile and purposeful as a weaver’s hands, a knitter’s needles.

The only frantic movement visible.

All is muted, colors, sounds.
Grays, blues, slate green, taupe, dove, sand.

Rotting wood, logs. Startle. A frog jumps.
Frogs singing, insects singing.
Light rain pinging on the surface of the water.
Rhythmic scribbles of light gray on dark. Ripple pattern.

Breeze like green breath.

ABC Wednesday

The Itch

2009-09-15T04:14:00.000-07:00

"In indigenous ways of knowing...a thing cannot be
understood until it is known by all four aspects of our being: mind, body, emotion, and spirit."

–Robin Wall Kimmerer

I started this blog to as way to encourage myself to write more, and to document a journey I am choosing voluntarily, but also one which is calling me and can’t be denied: to draw ever closer to nature, to form a deeper intimacy with nature, to form an ‘understanding’ using all four aspects of myself: mind, body, emotion, and spirit.

Intimate as a verb means “to make known” and as an adjective “on very familiar terms.”
I knew instinctively, but am just now able to articulate, that in order to create intimacy-I must be in relationship not just to snippets of “nature” as I encounter them here and there, but in a committed relationship, over time, to a particular place, a particular habitat, with particular plants, animals, seasonal changes, climate, and so on. And not just particular species of plants or animals, but particular, individual beings. (I'm thinking of Ernest Thompson Seton and his Wild Animals I Have Known, especially the wolf Lobo, and Julia Butterfly Hill and her relationship with Luna.)

And the time spent must be particular moments of my own “being,” that is, moments of ‘being’ fully engaged and present with these particular individual other “beings.”. And these moments must be strung together in clumps of continuous time, as large as I can make them, and must occur as frequently as possible.

Unfortunately, the phenomenon of blogging has started to detract from creating intimacy with nature. I find myself spending too much time looking at a computer screen and checking for comments.

Also, I have lost my way in learning the names of these beings. For example, I realized that it was important to learn native plant Latin names and/or common names. These names are a form of shorthand—a word or brief set of words that humans have agreed designate a group of beings who share certain fundamental characteristics that differentiate that group from other groups of beings. Species is a human concept, one that keeps shifting.

I hoped to use these words to document and convey to others my experiences of intimacy with individual plant beings in particular habitats at particular moments. Learning the names was fun at first, but rather quickly began to feel uncomfortable. I found it had become the primary goal, rather than simply a tool. The process of identification-looking things up in field guides- although fascinating, began to distance me from an experience of intimacy, rather than bring me further into it. Why was this happening?

Classifying species is the science of taxonomy. Taxonomy has a beauty all its own. It is essentially the arrangement of things or concepts in a hierarchical structure. It is something the human mind does automatically to order our experiences of reality. It is a way of seeing the world that is continually rewarded and reinforced by our culture. It has given us "dominion" over the earth. But it has its hazards.

Edward Abbey, in Desert Solitaire, wrote: The itch for naming things is almost as bad as the itch for possessing things.” And ponder these quotes from Walt Whitman:

"When I heard the learn’d astronomer; When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me; When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them; When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick; Till rising and gliding out, I wander’d off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars."

AND

You must not know too much or be too precise or scientific about birds
and trees and flowers and watercraft; a certain free-margin, and even vagueness - ignorance, credulity - helps your enjoyment of these things.

Philosopher Martin Buber wrote about the I-Thou relationship versus the I-It relationship. According to wiki wisdom: I-Thou is one of mutuality and reciprocity, while I-It is a relationship of separateness and detachment. I-Thou stresses the mutual, holistic existence of two beings. I-It treats others as objects to be used and experienced.

I have not studied Buber’s work-only read a summary of it. While he wrote mostly about relationships between humans, Buber recognized I-Thou encounters could occur between humans and animals or human and trees. He also suggested that in order to experience I-Thou, a person has to be open to the idea of such a relationship, but not actively pursue it.

Naming and classifying, which the human mind does brilliantly, is almost like a weapon --or more accurately-a sharp tool, that must be handled very carefully and according to certain protocols if one does not want to destroy intimacy with the being/object to which it is applied (or the real being itself!).
I want an I-Thou encounter with nature using not only the tools of my mind-my left brain, but with all of me, right brain, body, emotions and spirit.
Does this mean I will stop learning the names of plants and other living things in English and Latin or any other human language? No. But I won’t be so quick to scramble to identify things. I will tap into more than my itch to name. I will sit quietly, observe. I will allow nature itself to speak to me. And I will listen more carefully to the language without words.
Alphabet Bloggers

What We Leave Behind

2009-09-11T00:16:00.000-07:00

I'm reading What We Leave Behind by Derrick Jensen and Aric McBay. Its about the unsustainability of civilization due to our waste problem. Their subject matter is sobering, but the writing is so warm, self-deprecating, even humorous that is goes down smoothly. I can't recommend the book enough. Fascinating and very eye-opening.

I live in a condo so I am super conscious of all the waste. This is a good thing. Everything that comes in and goes out has to be carried (usually by moi) up and down a flight of stairs. (Well most things--there is the plumbing system.) I recycle but do not have pickup at my door. I must separate out the cans, bottles, and papers, place them in plastic bags, and drive to the recycling bins.

Usually I can drop things off on my way to work. I put the bags in the back of my mini SUV and often forget about them, driving around for days, sometimes weeks before dropping them off. Then of course I'm left with the plastic bags, but I try to reuse them. I also use ziploc freezer bags for various purposes, but wash them out and reuse, sometimes for years. It might sound obsessive, but it is very easy to do. They seem to last forever.

In my former life living in a single family home in a rural area I used to compost all vegetable waste. We didn't eat much meat but sometimes I'd add some chicken bones or fish skin. I did not tend the pile since I didn't garden. Without any attention at all, over ten years all our vegetable waste compacted itself, decomposed and the 5 x 5 bin encircled with chicken wire never filled up.
But now this waste goes down the drain after being chewed up by a disposal. At least it used to. My disposal is broken now so it goes in the plastic trash bag, then to dumpster, then is collected by a big truck and carried to the landfill. Where, enclosed and submerged with literally tons of other households' garbage, I think it turns to methane, a global warming gas.

In Jensen's book he explains the history of garbage, from ancient times to now. It began to be a problem as soon as soon as large groups of people began living in one place. In more recent times, refuse used to be collected as valuable by "swill children." Cities kept large corps of hogs specifically to process the refuse. Hogs roamed New York City and cleaned the streets.

Here in the 21st century, the bulk of my personal waste is junk mail fliers (which fortunately can be recycled) and packaging. I have listed my name on the DO NOT SEND lists on the internet and called companies directly to get the catalogs stopped. I can order online, but then that puts you on their catalog list again, so I usually have to call the company again. I do get the Sierra Club magazine as part of my membership and a few newsletters from professional organizations I belong to. I would prefer online versions. I subscribe to an online version of Orion.

Funny how a lot of good things we can do for the environment also saves us money. I've stopped ordering online except for books (I should use an independent bookstore instead)! But I mostly use the library. I do not subscribe to any actual magazine (although I'd love to get The New Yorker) because of the waste problem and also because I think about the boreal forest diminishing and song birds disappearing. (I'm not imagining this, it is actually happening.) Most of the trees are going to catalogs, I've read.

I am continually amazed at the amount of packaging that food and personal care purchases come encased in. The blister packs are the worst. I am starting to make purchasing decisions based on the amount of packaging. A simple cardboard box is appealing. Or no packaging at all at a farmer's market. I do almost always use cloth bags now for my grocery purchases. It took a few months to get that habit established. If I forget and do get a plastic bag, I save and reuse repeatedly, then recycle. Once I gave a thumbs up and called out to a lady with several kids in a parking lot using about a dozen cloth bags for her weekly shopping. She ignored me and probably thought I was harassing her.

It is easy to become discouraged when trying to make decisions that minimize environmental damage, slow down global warming and so on. Since our economy is based on consumerism, then as consumers we have tremendous leverage. What can we do with it? If we are changing our consuming behaviors due to our environmental awareness, we should probably let the companies know.

I guess I have some letter writing to do. But do corporations read letters?

Think Green Thursday

Derrick Jensen and Eric McBay, What We Leave Behind, Seven Stories Press,

Nothing Gold Can Stay

2009-09-01T04:17:00.000-07:00

Nature's first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold;

Her early leaf's a flower;

But only so an hour.

Then leaf subsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay.

--Robert Frost

This past month as the green has faded from the landscape,

a feeling of melancholy and loss has grown.

Was I only responding to the end of summer?

This morning I realized that August of this year

marks a decade since my father died.

Nothing gold can stay.

I love and miss you Dad.

Aspen Eyes

2009-08-29T09:15:00.000-07:00

The eye with which I see God is the eye with which God sees me. – Meister Eckhart

The Swan

2009-08-23T20:45:00.000-07:00

If I were to make a collage of my childhood memories, there would be many images of swans. I read and reread my volumes of Grimm Brothers and Hans Christian Andersen, eyes tracing every line of the old-fashioned pen and ink illustrations. I especially remember the story of The Seven Swans, bewitched brothers who could be restored to human form only through the long suffering loyalty of their sister. Her task was to remain mute while knitting seven shirts out of nettles. Who of us hasn’t felt kinship with the ugly ‘duckling’, hoping, as he did, to someday find that niche where we feel right and true and beautiful--swanlike. I owe my love of nature in great part to my paternal grandmother. The backyard of her modest home was separated from a large city park by just a narrow alley and hedge. It was magical to slip through a gap in the hedge, holding my grandmother's hand, and enter a vast world of huge trees, squirrels, fat goldfish, fountains and flowers. We spent hours walking the paths where swans glided to and fro across a lake. Nana died more than 40 years ago. She is forever connected in my heart with swans.

Grass Seeds

2009-08-23T20:10:00.000-07:00

More on the theme of seeds. The magenta colored seeds of this wild grass growing in a hot, dry, 9000 foot elevation in Colorado hang from a stem that abruptly makes a right turn.Growing next to them is this tiny grass whose seeded tip curves to form a shepherd's crook. What is the evolutionary advantage of these shapes, I wonder?

Diaspora

2009-08-07T10:41:00.000-07:00

Diaspora is a Greek word meaning the scattering of seeds. We are now heading into late summer and plants are setting seed. One of the things I most enjoy at this time of year is marveling at the variety of forms produced by seed bearing plants.

Seeds hold an embryo and carry the genetic material of a new plant. There are three methods evolved by plants to disperse their seeds-by wind, by water, and by animals.

The structures used by plants to get their seeds aloft and carried by the air currents of the earth are masterpieces of engineering. The designs include gliders, parachutes, whirlybirds, and spinners. Gliding seeds are said to have inspired the designs of some early aircraft. I like to think that spinner or whirlybird seeds may have contributed to one of Leonardo Da Vinci's concepts for a flying machine.

An outstanding example of the parachute design is the ubiquitous Common Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) a member of the Composite family. The seed (achene) is attached by a thin stalk to a radiating plume of bristly hairs (pappus). So equipped, the seeds become airborne in response to the slightest breeze. As is often the case with parachuting seeds, they are arranged in a globular puff. Another name for the dandelion is blowball. The word pappus is Latin for old man.

The Composite family includes sunflowers, daisies, coneflowers, chicory, and thistles. In members of this family, the pappus is modified in a multitude of ways, often to promote the effective dissemination of seeds. For example, in sticktights, the pappus is barbed so that it adheres to passing animals. The characteristic of the pappus is important in identifying the particular species of a Composite blossom.

In his last years, Thoreau was working on an exhaustive research project to determine all of the dominant patterns of seed dispersal within an hour's walk of his home in Concord, Massachusetts. He called it "learning the language of the fields." Thoreau was one of the first American field ecologists to apply Darwin's ideas of natural selection to the subject.

Thoreau died from a respiratory infection before he could finish his manuscript entitled The Dispersion of Seeds. The work is an argument against the then-prevalent theory that some plants grew spontaneously without any root, seed, or cutting from a parent plant. Typically, Thoreau combines keen observation with a view to a larger perspective. His description of the milkweed ends with these thoughts :

I am interested in the fate or success of every such venture which the autumn sends forth. And for this end these silken streamers have been perfecting themselves all summer, snugly packed in this light chest, as perfect adaptations to this end--a prophecy not only of the fall, but of future springs...Who could believe in prophecies...that the world would end this summer, while one milkweed with faith matured its seeds?
Alphabet Bloggers

Creature Feature at Cranberry Glades

2009-08-05T03:12:00.000-07:00

I'm just not ready to leave the bog. One might say I'm "bogged down."

The pitcher plant (species Sarracenia pupurea venosa)and the sundew are two of many plants I saw on my visit to Cranberry Glades (see previous post The Boreal Bog). These plants lure insects, trap them, then slowly digest them. I had to learn more-here is what most impressed me. If you are so inclined, while you read, ponder the Adaptation process that resulted in such elegant solutions.

Carnivorous plant species number more than 500 and grow all over the world. They often live in waterlogged areas such as swamps and bogs. These places are deficient in nitrogen and other trace minerals important to plant physiology. So it is thought that carnivorous plants have developed strategies to get some of those needed substances from the bodies of animals-such as insects, spiders, and even bigger prey. Their strategies often require glands that either fill with water or must remain moist. The details of their dining habits bring to mind the narrow escapes of heroes like Luke Skywalker and James Bond. If they could talk we might hear something like: "Welcome, Mr. Bug, hahahahahahaha!"

The Pitcher Plant

The leaves of the pitcher plant form cups, indeed another name for them is "hunter's cup. " Supposedly the rainwater contained in the cup is safer for a human to drink than the acidic bog water in which it grows. On the rounded lip of the cup are red veins that attract the attention of insects--possibly due to the resemblance to carrion.

Alighting on the slippery edges of the cup, an unfortunate critter then finds it easy to lose its footing and slide into the gaping maw. Perhaps it even experiences Vertigo. A spiky fur points downward to deter any attempts to escape. Imagine trying to climb the slippery walls while treading water in a deep cistern and you've got an idea of the insect's experience. But that's only the start of the macabre process.

In a sarracenia purpurea, the insect drowns and over time the water dissolves the insect's soft tissues. Special cells at the base of the cup absorb the nutrients. Some other species of pitcher plant actually contain a fluid similar to that found in mammals' gastric systems. That would certainly help digest something like a large rat. The biggest known pitcher plant does just that. The cup of the Nepenthes Rajah of Asia can grow up to 20 inches long, 6 inches wide, with an opening of 3 inches.

Biologists who do things like dissect pitcher plants are amazed at the quantity of indigestible exoskeletons that collect in a "boneyard" at the bottom of the cup. I wonder if the live insect can see the gruesome remains of previous victims at the moment of his or her descent into insect "hell." To an entomologist however, I'm sure those are Lovely Bones.

The Sundew

Sundews belong to the largest genus of carnivorous plants Drosera, with more than 200 species. The way the sundew hides menace behind whimsy, you might suspect it came from outer space. At Cranberry Glades, sundews dot the surface of the moss like countless simpering, "happy faces."

But each tiny leaf is far from being a Little Miss Sunshine and more like the product of a Bad Seed-- at least from an insect's point of view. There is a glistening drop of "superglue" at the tip of each of the fine hairs on this little damsel. Insects alight expecting a sweet reward of nectar. But touching even one hair can ensnare. The greater the bug's Frenzy to escape, the more it entangles itself in other hairs.

The rest of the hairs on the leaf then bend lovingly over the prize until it is clenched firmly as if in a many fingered hand. The process is not as fast as the abrupt snap of a Venus Fly Trap, but still amazingly swift--for a plant. It takes about one hour for the insect to be fully embraced in a deadly kiss. Pressed firmly against the enzymes on the surface of the leaf, the insect innards are liquified. Digestion may take several days. Afterward the hairs return to their original positions. For a time the hairs stay dry and the remains of the day are soon gone with the wind.

The biggest species of Sundew is South Africa's Drosera Regina with leaves up to more than 22 inches long. In Australia a sundew of similar size makes a banquet of frogs and lizards. Crocodile Dundee types boast of finding sundews growing in clumps that feast on the occasional rabbit or squirrel.

Darwin was the master and commander of evolutionary thought, but nevertheless was humbled by the sundew. He wrote to a scientist friend that "I care more about Drosera than the origin of all the species in the world." Its not surprising that the ingenuity of carnivorous plants continues to seduce and ensnare our fascination. We are willing victims.

ABC Wednesday For some fantastic images of these Cranberry Glade plants go to Squirrel's View.

Boreal Bog

2009-07-29T15:05:00.000-07:00

There are some who believe that the quality of our relationship with nature is profoundly important to our well-being. This hit home as I sat on the boardwalk that winds through the Cranberry Glades, a bog environment in the Monongahela National Forest.

The ecosystem of the Glades formed more than 10,000 years ago. On our continent, it is the southernmost occurrence of a habitat associated with the arctic tundra. Retreating from the glaciers of the Pleistocene Era, northern plant species moved southward.

While the glaciers did not quite reach the latitude of Cranberry Glades, those species migrated just further enough to settle in a welcoming spot--a bowl encircled by ridges at a 3400 foot elevation in what is now known as the Allegheny Mountains of West Virginia. The topography funnels water from rain and snow to form the bog. Cold air flowing down the slopes helps maintain the microclimate that keeps these species happy.
One need not travel to the rainforest to get a biodiversity thrill. An intact bog is full of marvelous and beautiful plants adapted to the acidic conditions.
John Eastman, writes in The Book of Swamp and Bog that experiencing a bog "may bring us as close to encountering true American wilderness as most of us will ever come." Eastman is an impeccable observer and researcher but also reverent. He comments that "experiencing the richness and complexity of wetlands cannot fail to revive and nourish one's own sense of wholeness to a degree beyond common expectation."

I had not yet read Eastman as I sat on the boardwalk. For the last hour time had been suspended as my friend and I wandered in awe through a botanical cornucopia. I photographed plants that I had never seen like pink orchids, cranberries, cotton grass, and carnivorous sundews and pitcher plants. Once or twice I stepped gingerly on the spongy ten-foot-deep layer of sphagnum moss that forms the water-logged surface of the bog.

I saw healthy eastern hemlock trees, their needles fat and glossy, their branches encrusted with white lichen. I glimpsed a shy doe through a screen of red spruce. Circular clumps of cinnamon fern dotted the landscape. Blue sky arched over all. I sensed the secret life of plants as an inaudible hum.

It seemed with each breath, my feeling of calm and "wholeness" grew. I commented to my companion that any person who would visit the Glades could not help but experience a healing of body and spirit.
The rare plant species I encountered at the Glades deserve the honor of individual posts. More to come. ABC Wednesday

Alien Invaders

2009-07-22T05:08:00.000-07:00

Alien species, non-native species, exotic species. These are plants, animals or other organisms that have been abruptly (compared to natural migrations) introduced to an ecosystem, usually by human doings-often accidentally, but sometimes intentionally. This phenomenon has caused dramatic changes worldwide, and continues to do so.

I recently learned that many of our most familiar "wild" flowers are non-native and have been around for centuries. Seeds hitched across the Big Pond with early European immigrants. Each summer I'm happy to see the 6 foot tall flowering spikes of fuzzy leaved Common Mullein that stand at attention like soldiers reviewing a parade. What country girl hasn't picked a bouquet of Queen Anne's Lace and marvelled at its umbrella of tiny white florets?

These roadside weeds are rather benign, but for an example of negative effects, one word: kudzu. A noxious vine, kudzu strangles and smothers everything in its path. It was aggressively planted by the U.S. government in the 1930's for erosion control before it was discovered that in our humid southern states it grows just too well.

European starlings (Sternus vulgaris) were brought to North America by a man who wanted to seed our continent with all the birds that are mentioned in Shakepeare! The descendants of the original 75-100 birds released in New York's Central Park in the 1890's now number more than 200 million. Starlings have voracious appetites, migrate in flocks of up to 100,000 birds, and have contributed to the decline of the bluebird, purple martin and tree swallow.

Not all non-native species are home wreckers, but those that are earn another moniker: invasive, although this term is passing out of favor in ecological circles. (Truth be told, a native species may be invasive as well, meaning it rapidly colonizes an area, such as the Maryland state flower, the Black-eyed Susan. )

By any name, an exotic invasive species does not "smell" sweet-- but through no fault of its own really. In its homeland, it probably evolved to be in relative harmony with its surroundings. But transplanted to a new environment, it may have few or no natural predators, no competing species, and other species may have no natural resistance to it. The result is imbalance and perhaps irrevocable degradation of indigenous flora or fauna.

Since species are interdependent, when one species goes it can take others with it in a chain reaction. This dynamic has severely impacted the vulnerable islands of Hawaii. Seventy three percent of U.S. extinctions have occurred in Hawaii. Feral goats, pigs and sheep are some of the worst offenders there.

We learned how wolves benefitted the ecosystem when they were eradicated (by homo sapiens) from places like Yellowstone. Without wolves, elk proliferated and began overgrazing vegetation, which in turn affected other species, increased erosion, and impaired water quality. The ecosystem there is now mending due to the much publicized, and controversial, re-establishment of wild and free wolves.

Growing to 60 feet, the American Chestnut was formerly a dominant tree throughout our eastern forests, until a blight hit it early in the 20th century. The culprit? -- a variety of chestnut brought here from Asia that had resistance to the blight. Scientists are working to develop resistant strains of our native tree in hopes of restoring the chestnut to its former place as king of the forest. Doing so could have a substantial impact on mitigating climate change.

It is sobering when I consider not only changes I've witnessed in a half century of outdoor wanderings, but just recently. This past spring I saw infestations of garlic mustard in shady glens along the Potomac, choking out trillium, mayapples (see photo left), jacks in the pulpit, and other delicate native wildflowers that were flourishing only a few springs ago.

From my childhood, I remembered the path at Cunningham Falls State Park as a magical tunnel formed by the delicately needled branches of eastern hemlock trees. Wanting to get an early start on sharing my love of nature with my grandson, I took him there when he was only one year old. The magic remained. While perhaps not as plentiful, the hemlock branches still drooped gracefully above us like tiers of shyly lowered eyelashes. My grandson is now almost five years old. On a recent solitary visit, I felt like a survivor on a battlefield. The skeletons of eastern hemlock trees littered the forest floor or stood gray and silent like ghosts.

In this heavily used park, where biodiversity has already been severely diminished by grazing white-tailed deer, I suspect the hemlocks may have been even less resistant to the Wooly Adelgid-an introduced aphid-like pest. To add insult to injury, Japanese Stilt Grass was making rapid headway in crowding out native Lady ferns. (Where's Waldo the fern?) The overall effect was one of barren sterility.

Young families walked past me as I stood shell-shocked. They were blissfully unaware of what they had missed. But I knew, and mourned their loss. Especially on behalf of the children.

At my feet, a huge black beetle scurried at a surprising pace across the path to avoid being trampled. He frantically pulled some leaf litter over his head and body, obscuring not only himself but his own vision. Although tempted, I didn't disturb him. I knew how he felt.

ABC Wednesday

A Terrible Beauty

2009-07-08T09:25:00.000-07:00

After following the gravel road for some time, my friend and I at last stood at the entrance to the virgin hemlock forest. The sign said "Untouched by human hands." Loggers had spurned the timber here as not worth the trouble. Spread out over more than a mile, the 126 acre protected tract of forest follows a steep ravine. Woven through its heart like a silver ribbon is a crystal clear mountain stream.

The trail was clearly blazed, but seemed seldom tramped by human feet. Huge windfalls remained where storms had felled them, and scrambling over the third barrier of wayward tree trunks, I got the message. Slow down. Walk with intention and reverence. This is a lost world, not the place for an idle stroll.

It did seem a holy and enchanted place, with a tinge of mystery, even menace. We might have traveled back in time when more ancient creatures claimed the earth. We breathed in the moist air, perpetually freshened by the respiration of green and growing plants. The forest duff beneath our boots was thick and undisturbed. We wandered at the broad feet of oaks, hickories, and tulip poplars that loomed into the canopy high above us. The silence was broken only by intermittent calls of unfamiliar birds and the soft music made by rock and water.

Monumental eastern hemlocks (Tsuga canadensis) clustered in the more open marshy areas where they had the best access to the light. Viewed from below, their perfectly straight, tapering forms looked like stately columns left standing in some gigantic ruined temple. Sadly, what had eluded the loggers had succumbed to the Wooly Adelgid, an introduced, aphid-like pest that is decimating hemlocks throughout the eastern forests. The oldest hemlocks here were already dead or dying, trunks stripped except for the highest branches, any remaining needles gray and sparse. The shrub-sized hemlocks and seedlings we saw along the trail seemed as yet unaffected. Admiring their glossy blue-green needles, I could imagine what had been lost.

Waist high ferns grew everywhere in broad swathes, luxuriating in the shady damp microclimate. An extensive patch of club moss raised its many "thumbs" like miniature candlabra. From a high place, I spied a circle of stop-sign red in a patch of sun by the stream below. Using my binoculars, I was able to make out a dinner plate sized mushroom.

After about an hour, we began retracing our steps, and stopped to rest on a log. A bird lighted on a nearby branch at eye level. It had an olive green body and a gray crown. A fat lime-colored catapillar wriggled in its beak. I tried to memorize the bird's markings and behavior for a later perusal of Peterson's Guide. We stood up to leave, with my friend stepping ahead into a sunny spot. Suddenly an extremely loud buzzing sound exploded from several feet directly in front of him. At once my every sense was on the alert. It was unmistakably a timber rattlesnake! (Crotalus horridus). My friend stood frozen as the snake began slowly undulating itself uphill to the shelter of another nearby log. I instinctively jumped up on top of the log we had been sitting on.

My initial reaction of fear almost immediately turned to a sense of privilege at the chance to see this reptile in its natural habitat. Emerging from the other side of the log, the rattler made no further attempt to escape. Although deadly, this species is apparently mild-tempered and does not usually strike without direct provocation.

The snake curled its almost 3 foot long body into a classic posture, facing us, visibly relaxing in the warmth of the sun's rays, displaying its rattle and head nestled within its coils. My friend took some photos while I used the close focus feature of my binoculars to take in every detail.

The snake looked almost unreal it was so vividly patterned. The scales stood out in sharp relief in the bright light. The triangle shaped head that houses the venom sacs, the coldly staring eye, the thick muscular body that one could easily imagine forcefully striking, the rattle held aloft in an insouciant dare--all combined to evoke danger and perhaps even 'evil'. But I found myself admiring the beauty of the animal and the evolutionary process that had gifted it with so many unique adaptations. Due to their retractible fangs and venom sacs-which they share with other pit vipers-and the warning buzzer at the end of its tail, rattlesnakes are thought to be the most highly specialized of all snakes.

Not being a specialist in reptiles, I still could tell this was a very healthy specimen, a successful hunter, and probably a successful breeder too. As I gazed at the rattler, I felt as if time itself was coiling into a spiral. How many generations of rattlers have existed in this ravine over the centuries, even millennia, preying on the small mammals, birds, frogs and other snakes who live here?

With that unsettling sound still "rattling" in our heads (a rattlesnake's warning can be as loud as 60 to 80 decibels from a few feet away), we continued back to the car, our eyes scanning the trail ahead of us much more carefully. My so-called 'reptilian' brain had been awakened. I felt my senses had become sharper and even more attuned to the primeval surroundings. The visit to the lost world would sustain me through many hours of office meetings and computer glitches.

Photos by Bill Stachoviak

Endless Variations on a Theme

2009-07-07T04:06:00.000-07:00

As my perceptions become more acute on this journey into nature, I am more and more in awe of the endless variety of plant shapes and patterns of growth and how/why they evolved. For example, I attempted to "key" out a huge white flowering "weed" found near the C&O Canal towpath near Harper's Ferry, WV this spring. Using the Newcomb's Guide to Wildflowers, I wasn't having much luck, until I realized the plant's resemblance to Queen Anne's Lace (an alien import). I broke off a leaf, crumbled it, sniffed it, even tasted it! Yep, that carroty scent. (Queen Anne's Lace is known as a wild carrot.) This led me to the right page in the book.

The plant was in the parsley family-a common species known as Cow Parsley (Anthriscus sylvestris) a native to Europe, Africa and Asia, that often grows to over six feet. Since Newcomb's Guide uses a keying method that is based on numbers of petals and leaves and their arrangement, I decided to count the stems in the umbel, and came up with 29. That seemed wierd, so I counted again. And again. Still 29. That brought up the question: what is the "math" behind nature's botanical design?

I had heard about Fibonacci numbers but had never studied them. Fibonacci was a mathematician in the Middle Ages. The numbers emerged as he studied the reproduction patterns of rabbits! The numbers are an infinite series, beginning with the numeral 1, where each successive number is the sum of the two numbers that appear directly before it. Design based on these proportions approximates the "golden ratio," also known as the golden mean, golden number or divine ratio. Expressed as a decimal, the golden ratio is approximately 1.6 , referred to as Phi.

Growth patterns that follow the golden ratio are rampant in nature. Two examples often cited are the spirals of a nautilus shell and seed head of a sunflower. The golden ratio is seen as well in the proportions of the human body--even the structure of DNA is a demonstration of the golden ratio. Not surprising that in classic art and architecture, the golden ratio was considered to be the foundation of beauty.

But back to Cow Parsley. The number 29 was not listed in the Fibonacci series of numbers. But there is another series that models the golden ratio, developed by Lucas, the mathematician who "discovered" Fibonacci's work. This series of numbers is also very prevalent in the growth patterns of plants. The Lucas series replicates the "sum of the previous two numbers" feature, but starts with 2 followed by 1. And there it was, my Cow Parsley's "29." Amazing what trying to identify a weed can lead to....! Now I see the golden ratio everywhere, as in the thistle bud at top.

Solstice Bounty

2009-06-22T04:35:00.000-07:00

On solstice Sunday I set off to do some errands and meander country roads. Before I went a half mile, I saw these bumble bees (probably Bombus impatiens according to my bee consultant) and a lone male Monarch Butterfly (Danaus plexippus) feasting on nectar in a patch of Common Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca). Later, at the entry to the hardware store, I feasted my eyes on flats of annuals, blazing in every color. On my way home, sweet local cherries at a roadside stand made for another kind of feast! It occurs to me that we have insects to thank for so much beauty and bounty in our world.

Our native pollinators like bumblebees, solitary bees, flies, wasps, beetles, butterflies and moths are important to the production of many crops, including sweet cherries. All grasses, many trees and other plants depend on the wind to distribute pollen. But up to a third of the foods that make up our diet depend on insects for pollination including apples, almonds, blueberries, broccoli, cucumbers, peaches, soybeans, strawberries, kiwis, melons, onions, pears, plums and squash. More than half of the fats and oils in our diet owe a debt to insect pollinators.

Certain bats and birds also go after the nectar in flowers, and by doing so, spread pollen. But insects far outdo them. The annual value of the services of native pollinators to U.S. agriculture is estimated between $4.1 and $6.7 billion. Flowering plants provide food not only for humans, but also for animals that in turn provide us with milk or meat. Without our wild pollinators, it is questionable whether humans could survive. Entire ecosystems rest on the relationship between plants and pollinators.

How flowers and insects co-evolved is a fascinating subject. Those plants that depend on wind for pollen dissemination must produce vastly more pollen than those plants that have helpers in the process. Plants have developed colorful blossoms, enticing scents, alluring shapes, and graphic markings to attract these helpers. For example, orchids are famous for their mimicry of female insects of a variety of species. They are able to lure male insects by their odor and appearance. Some plants are pollinated only by one particular species of insect. For example, Darwin predicted that the Comet Orchid of Madagascar, with a deep, seemingly inaccessible nectar source, would have an insect pollinator adapted to reach it. And eventually that insect was identified: a moth with a proboscis that unfurled to awesome proportions.

Biologists tell us that worldwide pollinator populations are waning at an alarming rate. Here in the U.S. more than 50 pollinator species are listed as threatened or endangered. They suffer from the loss and fragmentation of pollinator habitat and the overuse of pesticides.
It would be impossible to replace all the services of native pollinators with those of managed bees. Colonies of bumblebees and honeybees are used commercially in agriculture but are increasingly threatened by disease. Escapees may be spreading disease to native bees.

Anyone who owns property, has a tiny backyard garden, or even a balcony can assist in maintaining habitat -- food, water, shelter and nesting materials--for native pollinators.

When I learned about the importance of native pollinators it underscored how every part of nature is connected to everything else. Now I know that each scrubby pasture, overgrown roadside, or weedy vacant lot is not unproductive. It is home and pantry to multitudes of tiny lives that are crucial to our own existence.

Deceive and Perceive

2009-06-19T04:57:00.000-07:00

One type of animal camouflage is known as cryptic coloration. The colors of the animal mimic its habitat to fool the eye of predators or prey. Matching patterns of dark and light in order to blend in with the natural play of shadows, lines and textures in the environment is a highly effective strategy. Predator and prey have co-evolved in their abilities to perceive and deceive one another.

This young black rat snake Elaphe obsoleta obsoleta was coiled on the back of a wrought iron chair in the gazebo of our rented house in Great Cacapon WV this past weekend. My daughter entered to set the table for our evening meal and had quite a surprise. The snake makes a nice addition to the floral design, don't you think? However, my son-in-law removed the snake before we sat down to eat. I would imagine humans' ability to see snakes despite their attempt to camouflage themselves would be an important evolutionary advantage!

A childhood experience that made a big impression on me was the late summer evening when my father asked who wanted to accompany him on the short drive down to our small pumphouse. My younger sister and brother eagerly jumped up to go with him, but uncharacteristically for me, I hung back, preferring to stay on the porch with my mother. When my father returned he had a story for us. While my siblings had fumbled at opening the heavy car door, my father started toward the pumphouse. Directly in front of him were two stumpy mottled sticks lying across the path. Just before stepping on them, he realized what they were--a pair of copperhead snakes out for their evening hunt, or perhaps mating, but now attempting to camouflage themselves in the waning light. My father pointed out in a serious tone that if I had joined them on the errand, I may have jumped out more quickly than my siblings and encountered the snakes before he did. I believe this was the first time I grasped the meaning of the word "fate."

I don't remember if my father killed those particular snakes, but we frequently encountered copperheads, black snakes, and tiny ringneck snakes when I was growing up in Maryland. Sometimes the poisonous copperheads and even the larger of the nonvenomous black snakes (often 5 or 6 feet long) were slain if they encroached near our mountainside home. Mostly they seemed to stay in the nether region of overgrown briars and poison ivy between the driveway and the public road.

Our German Shepherd "Rinnie" would kill a snake by repeatedly grasping it in his mouth,violently shaking it from side to side, then flinging it away through the air.. He seemed able to avoid its jaws by this method. One time however, he was bitten on his paw by a copperhead. I remember pleading with my father to take him to the veterinarian as Rinnie began to show the effects of the venom. I rode along to the doctor's office in the back seat of our car with the dog's head cradled in my lap. Rinnie survived to hunt copperheads another day.

Despite the presence of these creatures, my siblings and I ran freely around the meadows and woods of our country property. For a while my older sister kept a milk snake in what I remember as a tall finely crafted wooden case with glass windows and a hinged door that latched with a metal clasp.

The local folk lore said that black snakes were a good thing to have around your house-they kept copperheads away. I don't know if this true. I do know they make pleasant pets, except for the problem of feeding them live prey. It would have been nostalgic to have caught the little rat snake for the enjoyment and study of my 4 year old grandson (and my own), if only I still had that beautiful wooden case. I do prefer to leave wild things wild and study them in their natural habitat.

The other photo is a Fowler's Toad Bufo fowleri seen at Eidolon Nature Preserve. It blended in perfectly with the leaf litter. My eye and camera snagged it only because it moved and disrupted the camouflage pattern. B. fowleri uses its earth toned skin to elude predators such as birds and small mammals. Like other toads, it can also release a foul liquid from the 'warts' on its back to irritate a predator's mouth. Another survival tactic it might use is to play opossum-it will lie belly up as if dead.

The genius of crytic coloration is the cuttlefish, a relative of the squid and octopus. It has special cells in its body that can change in color, pattern and texture almost instantly to mimic the variety of surfaces it encounters on the sea floor, allowing it to merge seamlessly with its surroundings. It has a very complex brain in order to control the up to 20 million cells that produce these optical illusions.

Friendly Ferns

2009-06-10T04:57:00.000-07:00

Herbert Durand's Field Book of Common Ferns, 1928 opens with:

To All Who Follow the Long Brown Path

Here are fifty fascinating ferns of the wild, whose ancestry antedates Adam by unnumbered eons, and whose myriads of fair and friendly children await your coming in every field and every forest, by every stream and on every mountain. Their ways are truly ways of pleasantness and the path to their dwelling place is a path of perfect peace. May this unpretentious Field Book of Ferns spur you to follow this path with eyes opened to the exquisite beauty that greets you on every hand

These friendly children greet visitors to Eidolon Nature Preserve in Morgan County, WV.

Clockwise from top left: Common Polypody, Ebony Spleenwort, Sensitive Fern, Bracken Fern, Rock with Southern Lady Fern. Durand writes that Spleenworts were so named due to the belief in their ability to treat diseases of the spleen, and that Common Polypody was a favorite remedy for the 'blues' and for 'fearsome and troublesome' dreams and nightmares. I call these ferns 'heavenly.'

To Be Born

2009-05-20T07:44:00.000-07:00

Have you ever seen a just-born child? The small figure is luminous--so infused with the energy of becoming that the outlines of his or her body appear to waver like a mirage. Even the most cynical of us can't help but be awed. The word miracle rises to the lips.

I had a similar experience on a dragonfly foray with a naturalist friend last Saturday.
We were at a low water bridge on the Cacapon River in Morgan County, West Virginia. It was one of those days in May that foretell the heat and humidity of July. We seemed to have entered a giant incubation chamber, for life was hatching all around us.

Cool water from weeks of spring rain flowed between banks of freshly leaved trees, newly sprouted grasses, and wildflowers budding or in bloom. The sun's rays danced through the air, setting all things green ashimmer.

Tiger and zebra swallow-tailed butterflies flitted in small clouds and flocked to sip at puddles. Their wings looked impossibly fragile. Not a tatter or speck of dust marred the patterns of creamy yellow, pale celadon and inky black. A drop of columbine red punctuated the base of each wing like the dot of a exclamation mark.

A green heron with a watchful eye rimmed in gold perched motionless on a snag midstream. Flashing scarlet helmets and bars of black and white, two male red-bellied woodpeckers alighted at the base of a sycamore. They hesitated, artfully askew on the pale trunk. I imagined them as bright enameled jewelry adorning the breast of a 1940's screen siren.

Dragonflies had recently passed through their metamorphosis from aquatic larvae to airborne adults. They cruised the river's edge like miniature hovercraft. Each was escorted, in perfect formation, by the image of a watery twin.

Low to the ground, tiny native bees meandered here and there to gather nectar. A brown water snake slithered through the shallows. All the while, the insistent murmur of American toads played as background music.

My friend snared an Applachian Jewelwing damselfly with her net. It was an immature male--still only half dressed in its armor of emerald green. She gently folded its wings to meet above the thorax and passed it to me. The finely veined gossamer was slightly damp and clung to my fingers.

The word nature descends from the Latin nasci "to be born." Capturing bits of data is often the goal of observation in the field. There is a special excitement as another piece of a giant puzzle slips into place. But what I most enjoy is seeing the world as if revealed for the first time. Deep in my bones, I sense the truth of how all of us--plants, insects, animals, humans--are made of the same stuff. We are born from the same mother. My heart flutters as I whisper a single word: miracle.

A Goose with a View

2009-04-28T18:14:00.000-07:00

While poking around in the woods next to the C & O Canal towpath for a good photo of Virginia Bluebells, I disturbed this Canada Goose (branta canadensis). He was immediately on the alert, honking in a threatening way, and eyeing me with suspicion. Movement above by his mate drew my eye to the top of the old railway support.

The female goose peered over the edge of the concrete to see what the ruckus was about but didn't move from her spot. I guessed she was nesting on the top of the structure.

The goslings are going to have quite a drop when they are ready to venture forth. But you have to admire this mama's ambitious choice of site. The eggs should be well protected from skunks or raccoons. However, crows and ravens also consider goose eggs a tasty tidbit--might the eggs be more exposed in this spot? Once the goslings leave the nest, (if they survive the drop) the Potomac is a short stumble down a bank and they will be waterborne.

Typically the female Canada goose chooses the nesting site, builds the nest and lays the eggs, while the male defends the territory from other animals including other geese. Isolated spots with good visibility are preferred. Despite being trailside, this pair's nest is over 10 miles down the towpath from Williamsport, with a grand view of the river and any cyclists or nosy amateur naturalists approaching from either direction.

Canada goose nests are not elaborate and are rather quickly thrown together: weeds, twigs, pine needles, grass or moss are assembled in a mound then rounded out and molded into shape by the goose's body as she nestles in. The average clutch has five eggs but might include up to nine. It would have been fun to watch the nest building process at this spot.

Canada geese are monogamous and most pairs mate for life. Life spans can range to over twenty years. I wonder if this pair has successfully nested here before. If so, do the other geese recognize that they have "dibs" on this site? Or perhaps they are upwardly mobile newly-weds producing their first brood. They remind me of the red-tailed hawks who famously nested high above New York's Central Park adjacent to Woody Allen's penthouse--with their very own 'deluxe apartment in the sky.'

Up Close and Personal with a Jumping Spider

2009-04-04T01:22:00.000-07:00

Nature is everywhere if you only look. I took a brief walk in the city park at lunch. This spider was hanging out on the garden gate next to the museum. A baby spider was rappeling down from the lock on a strand of silk. The spider here was perhaps the doting mama.

Jumping spiders (Family Salticidae) are easily distinguished from other spiders by their four big eyes on the face and four smaller eyes on top of the head. Around the world there are probably more than 5000 species of jumping spiders.

I leaned in close for a better look. Instead of trying to hide, the spider turned to look directly up at me. I could see its eyes and furry whiskers. It appeared as interested in me as I was in it. Our eyes locked. Here is what I saw.

I had never felt "seen" by a spider before. I felt disoriented as if the tiny world of the spider had suddenly expanded and I had shrunk to the spider's size. It seemed some sort of communication passed between us.

The spider's behavior made sense when I later learned that jumping spiders have much better eyesight than other spiders and most, if not all, insects. Jumping spiders' large pair of eyes in the center front give them excellent color vision and a high degree of resolution. Even more amazing, the shape of their retinae indicates they may have telephoto vision. I was looking at a hunter with some high tech equipment!

Jumping spiders can spot and stalk insects from long distances. Their excellent vision is also an important part of their 'interspecies' communication, particularly in courtship. Males dance before females, displaying contrasting or brightly colored markings on their bodies.

The caption for the photo of one jumping spider that I found on the 'web' said that it lived in the space between the photographer's gate and fence post in his back yard. And here was "my" spider frequenting the same "habitat." Imagine all the humans who walk through this gate, oblivious to the ferocious sentry on watch!

When I returned to my office and sat down at my desk, a baby jumping spider about a third the size of mom appeared in my lap. It must have hitched a ride on my pants' leg while I was transfixed by its parent's gaze. Somehow even a spider baby is cute. I attempted to slide it onto a post-it note but it sprang onto my thumb. I released the baby out of my window to fall onto the grass below. It had traveled in my car with me and was now several blocks away from the park. Happy hunting, little spidey!

The Unseen Gardener

2009-03-23T18:26:00.000-07:00

The first night at a recent women's retreat we started off with an imagery exercise. We each shared a memory of a time and place where we had felt safe and protected. My place was the small flower garden my daughter and I discovered behind the herb shop in Cambria on the California Central Coast.

For weeks we had been hiking and walking the coastal hills with wild, wide open views of dramatic surf, cliffs, and rock formations, so different from the pastoral scenery of my native Maryland. For those same weeks we also had been dealing with medical testing procedures and a progression of ever sobering results. The day we visited the herb shop was sunny and beautiful, and only a few days after my daughter's mastectomy.

The warren of rooms in the fragrant shop led to a door opening onto another world. Imagine Dorothy's first glimpse of Oz. The enclosed garden with its messy profusion of flowering herbs, trellises, and lovingly placed benches felt welcoming and reassuring. My daughter and I were soon basking in the sun, out of the wind, hidden from the views of passersby. I also felt hidden from the hugeness of the coastal intensity, the hugeness of an impassive God's eye.

I noticed tiny bees lazily visiting each blossom of a low lying plant at my feet. The smallness, the delicacy, the friendliness of the scene soothed a sharp sense of helplessness. I had been feeling vulnerable and insignificant in the face of giant forces that threatened to overwhelm me--my daughter's cancer and the awesome seascape. But here was a human-scaled space where we could rest, breathe, and be at home. The garden maker's intention to delight and enclose with beauty felt nurturing, even though the gardener herself was unknown and unseen. I knew then that my daughter was going to heal. And she has.

Pixie Cups in the Enchanted Forest

2009-03-22T08:20:00.000-07:00

Tramping about in the spring woods, I was excited to look down and see this fruiting lichen on a rock next to a small pond. A little research on the net identifed it as cladonia carneola, also known as "crowned pixie cup." According to http://www.lichen.com/index.html this lichen has a "squamulose" base. Squamulose lichens have scales called squamules that are usually small and overlap. The cups, called "podentia," are fruiting structures to dispense spores. Fruiticose lichens are more three dimensional--they grow upward or hang down.

Lichens grow extremely slowly. Some lichens are thought to be the oldest living things on earth. I found out that lichens are symbiotic organisms. The dominant partner is a fungus and so incapable of making its own food. It has to partner with another organism that can perform photosynthesis, such as algae or cyanobacteria. some fungi partner with both organisms at once. The spores that are emitted from these cups will have to seek out partners in order to survive. Kind of gives new meaning to the concept of "codependency" doesn't it?

Part of the thrill for me in learning natural history is with the new vocabulary words. How wonderful are these? Squamulose, fruiticose, podentia! And I'm loving the Latin-cladonia carneola, can't you hear the Italian lilt in those syllables?

2009-03-06T04:48:00.000-08:00

Reading Thoreau and Edwin Way Teale. How thrilling to feel we are communing across the decades when I observe something of nature, try to describe my perceptions in words, then shortly thereafter read what they have written in the same vein that validates my experience.
On a birding outing on the Potomac recently I saw a young eagle fly overhead, and described its "princely glide" to capture its seemingly self assured and stately motion. Teale referred to sighting an eagle gliding back and forth in a manner so steady "it appeared as if riding on rails." On the same trip I spotted the facing silhouette of a bluebird perched in a faroff canopy, but couldn't identify it without using my glasses to see the blush breast and blue wings. Teale wrote of the bluebird's "round shouldered" attitude which was spot-on with what I saw. Next time I'll recognize it without my glasses! (Field glasses, that is, I will still need my prescription lenses or contacs!)
Reading "Walking" last night Thoreau comments on seeing ducks on the water in spring. First he "saw one bird, then suddenly there were three." That is exactly what occurred when I saw the Hooded Mergansers on the Shenandoah. One bird was visible since the other three were diving unbeknownst to me. I glanced down to raise my glasses, the divers had surfaced! It is reassuring to know these writers whom I revere saw and appreciated the same animal behaviors that are available for me to witness and enjoy.

The Predator

2009-03-04T04:54:00.000-08:00

In retrospect, I realize why the crows may have been especially watchful. That day, I also saw a large black and white house cat emerge from the brush, carefully peer back and forth for oncoming vehicles, then cross the road, headed for "no man knows where." Through the binoculars, it did look very tigerish--well muscled and fully capable of pouncing on a crow!

Bird Sighting on the Shenandoah

2009-03-01T13:48:00.000-08:00

I went bird watching this afternoon along the Shenandoah River. A dank, dark and dreary day. The light filtering through the monotonous cloud cover was flat and made everything else look rather flat too. The river was slate grey lacking any blue or green to reflect. Wild life was few and far between but I did make a few sightings and practiced identification.
I used my car as a blind, pulled off whenever I saw motion on the water, and rolled down my window to use my field glasses. This worked well, as the birds seemed to feel totally unthreatened. I saw many groups of Canada Geese waddling along the shore, upending in the water, or standing motionless on the flat rocky areas midriver. I also saw two species of diving ducks.
Two pairs of Hooded Mergansers were feeding out in the middle of a wide expanse of the river. Each duck completely submerged beneath the water when it dove, but one drake was always left alert and watching, like the periscope on a submarine. The Hooded Merganser drake has striking black and white bars on his wings and shoulders. He has a sail shaped white crest flaring back from his black head. The crest can be that can be raised or lowered which was startling and confusing as I tried to make out the "shape" of the birds head--it kept changing! This was the most exciting find as these birds are "fairly common" as opposed to "common."
At one spot protected from the wind by high banks, several species were congregating in leisurely groups where a cluster of flat rocks formed an ersatz archipelago. Five or six pairs of Common Mergansers appeared to doze with their bills turned back and hidden under their wings, while other pairs paddled calmly back and forth nearby. Mingled in were the everpresent geese, and mallards. Mallards are "dabbling" ducks per Peterson, so now I have the word for their bobbing pattern of feeding, they quickly upend to snap a morsel than right themselves like a rubby ducky in a bathtub. I have seen them diving too when a tidbit is out of reach.
I saw one little shore bird skittering along nearby--It was pale colored and seemed to have 3 dark rings around its neck, but the most similar looking bird in My Peterson Guide of Eastern and Central North America had two rings: a Kildeer?
I tried to interpet the behavior of three crows that flew down to the rocks after surveying the scene from a nearby tree. They appeared to be honing their beaks on the rocks, or perhaps attempting to scrape some substance off of them? One crow would be "honing" while the other two kept watch in different directions. A small mess of starlings fussed around this scene as well, flying up to perch in the trees, then soaring across the rocks, alighting briefly, then back up again. The Mergansers, although "common" were very beautiful. The males had immaculate white breasts and flanks, glossy black-green heads and bright red bills and feet. The females had ruddy brown feathery crests that I found in very good taste with their dress of muted grey.

This site has a great photo of the Hooded Merganser and you can listen to its call. Sounds like a frog, very strange! http://www.ducks.org/hunting/waterfowlGallery/61/index.html
Here is some interesting information about the Common Merganser. They are the first duck to move north in the spring and the last to go south in the fall...
http://www.seaduckjv.org/infoseries/come_sppfactsheet.pdf