The Season's Bounty of Wild Foods

American Mountain Ash laden with berries

To a Gray Catbird, Mountain Ash berries taste just fine

The amount of food available to wildlife can vary greatly year to year. Last year at the nature preserve and generally throughout our region, the nut/seed/fruit production of wild plants was quite poor and consequently much of our wildlife had difficulty overwintering – many species didn't even try and instead opted to spend the winter elsewhere.  In fact last winter it was a bit of a challenge to find foraging flocks of chickadees, nuthatches and woodpeckers in our woods – there was just too little food for them to find.

Wild Grapes provide food for woodpeckers, thrushes and even foxes

This year's crop of beech nuts is not huge but it's noticeably larger than last year's

What a difference a year makes. This fall the woods and pastures are pretty much teeming with wild foods. Most obvious are the apples, butternuts, grapes and maple seeds, but there are many other edible resources just waiting to be eaten or stored. Some of them will not last into the winter – they are just too popular. For instance, dogwood berries go particularly fast, while berries of the viburnums tend to be less preferred. The rate at which the berries disappear has much to do with their fat content; those that contain a relatively high amount of fat are unlikely to last, while those with less fat may remain on the plant long into the winter.

Before migrating, the Brown Thrasher fills up on wild berries

Berries from Silky Dogwood never last long

The Nannyberry's fruit tends to remain on the bush for a long while

Cranberry Viburnum berries also tend to last  well into the winter

I noticed that for the first time in a few years our Virginia Creeper vines have produced a crop of berries. Those berries also seemed to be going fast. The other day I noticed a few migrant songbirds stopping to have their fill of the small grape-like fruits. One parent Red-eyed Vireo had its adult-sized offspring in tow. The younger bird was fully capable of foraging for himself, but he knew that his raspy begging call was still capable of getting a parent to serve up another berry or perhaps an inch worm.

Rose hips from Multi-flora Rose are often a food of last resort for birds

Choke Cherries are popular - though not as popular as wild Black Cherries

Invasive silverberry bushes are newly arrived in our area - we shall see if their fruit is popular

The wild food supply is as important to migrating birds as it is to those that overwinter. Migrants need to pack on the calories in a big hurry in order to fuel their long journeys south. Luckily for them, as we make the transition from summer to autumn there are still lots of active insects, so they can take advantage of that food resource as well.

A crumpled Yellow Birch catkin reveals many small edible seeds

Seeds from Box Elder and other species of maple tree provide excellent food 

Ash seeds are popular with Rose-breasted Grosbeaks and other finches

Every late summer we do an assessment of the nature preserve’s food supplies in order to predict what species of birds are other animals may be able to spend the winter. This year we are apt to play host to a large number of robins and waxwings. They can sustain themselves primarily on wild grapes and the berries of American Mountain Ash, viburnum and Buckthorn. Seeds of maple, ash and birch will be utilized by foraging chickadee/woodpecker flocks. Woodpeckers, Blue Jays and Turkeys will also reap great benefits from the season’s ample crop of beechnuts and hickory nuts. The Jay may eat some beech nuts on site, but many will be stored in dozens of individual cache sites around the forest.

 

Bitternut Hickory nuts are very plentiful this year

A hazelnut partially removed from its leafy sheath

American Chestnuts are beginning to drop out of their large spiny sheaths

The Burr Oak acorn has a very large cap which covers nearly the entire nut

This has been the finest year for wild apple production in some time

Hawthorn apples or "thorn apples" are about the size of crab-apples 

A consequence of a decent wild food production year will not just mean an increase in fruit and seed eating wildlife populations. A spike in Chipmunk and other small rodent numbers will be welcomed news to scores of predator species including hawks, owls, fishers and foxes.

Don't mind the crumbs, a Red Squirrel likes to eat his butternuts on this bench

The White Spruce trees in our reforestation fields are covered with pinecones

Finches and the Red-breasted Nuthatches will take advantage of the pine seeds

Monarch Migration - No; Green Darner Migration - Yes!

A migrant male Monarch Butterfly - a rare sight this summer

Monarch Butterfly migration was a complete bust this season. My unofficial count for Monarchs flying through the nature preserve so far is around 4 individuals total. By contrast last year was amazing - thousands of the iconic species passed through during the late season peak bloom of goldenrod and asters. Of course, though an individual Monarch will make the epic journey to Mexico, it takes a number of generations for its descendants to repopulate the northern parts of its range.

A massive bloom of Asters and Goldenrod help fuel the Monarch's long journey

A lack of Monarchs this year shows that there are potentially serious problems on the breeding grounds in the US and Canada and/or on their wintering grounds in Mexico. Deforestation on their crucial wintering grounds is likely the main cause of their decline, but an increasing use of genetically modified crops in the US is being pointed to as  another significant factor. As herbicide tolerant crops can now be doused with herbicides like "Roundup", vital milkweed stands are disappearing - and with them the Monarch's livelihood.

Monarch caterpillar on a Milkweed seed pod in 2012 - we found no caterpillars in 2013

Milkweed is popular with other insects like this Swamp Milkweed Leaf Beetle

Milkweed Tussock Moth Caterpillars also munch on milkweed 

A migrant Green Darner Dragonfly perches along a meadow trail

While Monarch numbers have been low this year, the number of migrant Green Darner Dragonflies has been up sharply – and yes, the Green Darners do migrate. Around a dozen species of Dragonfly migrate in the US. That's especially interesting considering that less than 50 species out of over 5,000 species of dragonfly in the world are known to migrate.

Dozens of Green Darners perched alongside the meadow trails

The dragonflies were zigzagging back and forth over the trail  catching prey

At the nature preserve, on several trails that pass through large meadows, Green Darners line the sides of the trail and take to the air when someone walks too close. The darners blend in so well with the vegetation that it’s really difficult to pick one out until it takes flight. Given that, it was somewhat frustrating trying to get pictures of them as they perched. The swarm of darners flying over the field was also also hard to photograph. There were at least 50 of them zooming back and forth all over the meadow, scooping up smaller flying insects on the wing.

The female Green Darner lays eggs into the water while the male clasps her neck

A shed dragonfly nymph exoskeleton still hangs onto a leaf  

I know that the 2013 breeding season was excellent for dragonflies locally, but a healthy number of migrants tell us that they also did well on breeding grounds in the Adirondacks and Canada. This year, the early part of the breeding season was particularly wet in parts of the Northeast, and so it makes sense that these wetland dependent insects would've fared well. Pools of water that are rich in insect larvae (including mosquito larvae), but not rich in predatory fish are ideal for dragonfly larvae to develop in.

A Green Darner is more slow to take off on a cool morning

Other dragonfly species like this Black Saddlebags were seen with the darners

Meanwhile, Red Saddlebags were still breeding at the Frog Pond

Dragonfly migration is very similar to bird migration. Just like most migrant birds, the dragonflies don’t make their entire journey in one “bound”, instead they utilize migratory stop-over sites. Apparently our habitat-rich nature preserve is one such site – at least it is this year. Since the dragonflies use the same migratory flyways that birds do, at some hawk watch sites across the eastern US, this year there should be thousands of Green Darners passing over. It’s thought that American Kestrels especially take advantage of these dragonfly swarms as a source of food to help fuel their own southward migration.

Underwater Beavers and More

Spring Farm's beavers are seen underwater for the first time

Recently, I've tried to take some underwater video of our beavers. It’s proved to be somewhat difficult since the beavers are not sure to make of this strange apparatus that I’m immersing in the water near them. Perhaps more disturbing to them was the fact that I was sitting on their dam, but I had to do that in order to get the camera into deep enough water. Anyhow, they didn't appreciate it and half of them refused to come out during the “operation”.

 

Julia swims close to the bottom of the pond

She bites off a poplar branch while remaining underwater

Julia returns to the surface

After a few sessions I did finally manage to get a few shots of them. Tippy, one of the yearlings was the most accommodating. Julia, the colony’s matriarch had pretty much seen everything at this point – and she may in fact be the most videotaped wild beaver in the history of time. Still, she acted as if I had transgressed some unwritten agreement and she wasn't overly pleased about it.

The beavers' wide foot paddles provide their primary propulsion 

Tippy swims in toward the camera

A little too close now

Tippy grabs the camera and takes it to the surface - Hey!

The cliche thing to say is that beavers move awkwardly on land, and I guess they do, but honestly, once you get used to the way they walk, it doesn't seem that strange anymore. In fact they are capable of walking long distances and they can even run in short spurts.

 

Julia Feeding at the surface

Whatever you thing about their locomotion on land, beavers really do fly in the water. Their bulky bodies are stream-lined and move as gracefully as any seal or otter.

Julia stopped to smell the air while traveling over-land between ponds

In my ongoing efforts to keep tabs on our beaver colony, I had set a trail camera up on one of the foot trails so I could monitor their movements between 2 ponds. I was most interested in determining which beavers were making the overland trip and at what time of the night they were doing it. Unfortunately, too often the camera wasn't being triggered until a beaver was just about out of frame and so I wasn't always able to determine which beaver was traveling, but I could get the time that an individual passed through. As expected, it was always at different times. Beavers apparently don’t like to be overly predicable, which makes good sense for any prey species.

 

A yearling caught by the trail-cam as it makes the journey by day

One constant seemed to be that they would not stay overnight at Wick’s Pond, which makes perfect sense since to my knowledge there is no lodge or burrow at that pond. So the excursions that they made over to the far pond would usually take place sometime in late afternoon or early evening and the trips back home to the beaver pond would be in the evening or as late as just a few hours before dawn. Occasionally more than one beaver would travel together, but more often a beaver would brave the overland journey alone.

 

The Mallard family decides to turn around when they see a rabbit

Other animals made the same journey. A family of Mallards were caught on camera nearly every day for a couple of weeks. Ducklings followed closely behind their mother. All were ready to turn on a dime and rush back if any predator appeared on the foot trail. The camera caught one such event when the ducks spied movement in a trail side bush up ahead of them. The whole family did an about face and sped back to the other pond. The “predator” in this case turned out to be an Eastern Cottontail Rabbit, but when your’re a small unflighted duck you can never be too careful.

The Great Blue Heron that regularly hunts at both ponds

The beavers, as large as they are wouldn't always trigger the camera, but the waddling train of ducks never failed get the film rolling. Muskrats also were seen a few times, One clip showed a mother Muskrat wait for her small kits to catch up with her before proceeding up the trail.

 

The beaver dam is covered with a late-season mix of wildflowers

Mad-dog Skullcap blooms by one of the old ponds

Pickerelweed does well this year at one of the ponds 

Back at the main beaver pond – the beaver dam is alive with color, as a profusion of late season flowers cover its span. Currently this is the only one of our large beaver ponds which is receiving any maintenance. Every night the beavers plaster a fresh load of mud against it in order to keep it as water tight as possible. Of course, no beaver dams are ever completely water tight – and the sound of water trickling through in many places is a hallmark of an active beaver dam. One of the great services beavers provide for wildlife and for the environment in general is to provide water filtration services. It has been shown that when a stream passes through a beaver dam, the water comes out much cleaner – silts and pollutants are largely removed. When the water passes through a series of beaver dams the amount of filtration is greatly increased.

Post beaver dam stream water is much clearer and cleaner - better for stream life of all kinds