There are two definitions of the word Bluet. One refers to failure – as in “I had my chance but I…” – the other refers to a group of slender Damselflies. Although I am an expert in the former, I will be talking about the latter in this blog since this is a nature themed endeavor. Dwelling on failure would be a way for me to “bluet” in terms of this writing forum. No, I’d rather talk success and this is where the Damsels come in. This is the height of their breeding season and the sight of successfully bred Bluets is beautiful.

A walk down to the lake this time of year always yields dozens of Familiar Bluets. These insects are not just familiar in terms of presence, but they are actually called Familiar Bluets (Enallagma civilie – let’s all say it: En-all-ag-ma  siv-il-ee). One could be un-familiar with Familiar Bluets, so as not to be accused of blueing it let me state that these insects are members of the Damselfly clan. Closely related to Dragonflies, damsels are typified by a fragile frame, widely spaced eyes, two pairs of wings which are narrow at the base and widely spaced…wait a minute, I already said that one. Anyway, within the Damsels there are those called Pond Damselflies that hang around still bodies of water and rest with their wings folded parallel to their bodies. Bluets are Pond Damselflies.

There are many kinds of Bluets and all the males are small and predominantly blue – thus the name and a potential source of much confusion. The females are not blue – they are green or pale tan. What about the ladies you ask? Isn’t naming a species group after a male trait rather sexist?  Frankly yes it is, but since Greenlet or Tanlet were never proposed you’ll have to let it go. Remember, however, that members of this order are all called Damselflies and not Guyflies. If you will indulge me for one more layer of trivial information, male Familiar Bluets are identified by having solid blue 8^th & 9^th abdomen segments and a mostly black 7^th segment preceding it.

All this segmentation banter brings us to the final segment on the male Bluets’ little blue body which is equipped with a set of handy claspers.  Successful breeding, in terms of Damselfly life, depends heavily upon these devices. I will not get into the details of the reproductive process, but it involves a male Bluet grabbing a female Tanlet by her neck using his claspers. Held thusly, the female curls the tip of her abdomen up to the male in order to mate. Once this is accomplished the male does not release his mate but instead accompanies her on her subsequent egg-laying foray.

I have pictures of this egg-laying portion of the process to show you. It looks awkward, but there is method in this madness as far as the male is concerned. The freshly mated Damselfly tandem make for the weedy shallows and seek a perching place where the aquatic vegetation pokes above the surface.  The female “perches” while the attached male hovers to stay in position. She lowers her abdomen into the water (often submerging completely) and inserts tiny oval eggs into the soft tissue of the water plant. The terminus of her abdomen is equipped with a knife-like ovipositor for performing this feat as she blindly feels her way along the stem.

In the terminology of the trade, the male Damselfly is said to be “guarding” his female when they are linked. It would be easy to look at this maneuver and declare that he is keeping her from going under. “I’m here to help you, honey,” he appears to be thinking (they can’t talk, you know), “you just take your time and I’ll sweat it out….I’m doing fine….you just take your time.” In truth he is actually insuring that rival males do not come along and mess up the process. In other words he is not guarding her as much as he is guarding his investment and insuring that his seeds are the ones being planted. The female doesn’t need the help – in fact, being held by the neck might even make things harder for her. “Yes, honey dear…akkk… would you let up a bit, you are choking me. If you would just trust me I ….akkk.”

Let’s not anthropomorphize this act any further lest we get into a feminine rights issue. The act of clasping and guarding is simply a part of Bluets being Bluets and nothing more.

When I last posted about our Dollar Lake Hummingbird the little verdant queen was just beginning the long process of egg-sitting (See “Nest in a Nutshell”). It was the end of May and the next step following a prolonged week of nest construction.  I opted to track her progress over the course of the next month and bring the story to its natural conclusion. This posting takes form as more of a photo essay – as opposed to a detailed journal of events – because of the sheer wealth of pictures I was able to snap. Thanks to the aide of an improvised mirror taped to a boat oar and the ability to stand on my shed roof, I was able to gain a number of perspectives on the situation.

The female Hummer was amazingly patient during the process and she “allowed” me close approach without undo anxiety on her part. The same cannot be said for the local bird population. Any bird approaching within a few dozen feet of the nest was dive-bombed.  She harassed a Water Thrush, several Robins, and a confused looking Rose-breasted Grosbeak over the course of my sporadic observations.

June 22

Her incubation period consisted of short episodes of brooding and frequent trips away from the nest to feed and preen.  A mirror check during one of her forays, some 21 days after the first signs of incubation, revealed a naked chick lying next to an un-hatched egg. The hatchling cradled its fellow egg with a wing stub as if to comfort its future nest mate. The second egg remained un-hatched, however, and it was eventually crushed and removed. This single chick would have full possession of the space and the full attention of the female for the next few weeks.

June 30

July 4

From the moment of hatching the parent bird began a strict regimen of feeding and foraging. When the chick was very small (small being a relative term for such a miniscule bird!) the female added brooding periods to her schedule and she was sitting on her charge as nightfall each evening. Within a week, the wide-eyed chick nearly filled the nest cavity and was covered with a layer of pin feathers. There being little extra room, the birdlet would sit with its neck bent upward and the beak pointing strait up.

The female was no longer brooding her young  at this stage ( I think the nestling’s vertically pointing beak having something to do with it!) but was devoted to a twenty minute feeding and foraging routine. Feeding events were short and never lasted more than 15 seconds or so. She clung to the edge of the nest while inserting her bill into the begging mouth of the chick and pumping a pre-digested mix of insects and nectar directly into its gapping maw. The uncomfortable angle required the female to extend her neck to an “unhummingbird-like” length in order to get the tip of her beak into proper position.

As of July 4, and some 12 days after hatching, the nestling sported a full covering of green-tinted feathers mimicking the plumage of its mother. A full set of wing feathers made for a difficult fit into the nest and the place was getting tight. Hummingbird nests are flexible by design and are built to conform to the growing young like a body sock (imagine the normal contingent of two young in such a structure).

The chick was constantly wiggling and turning about (see movie) as the days progressed – spending time preening, peering over the edge, or picking away at flyby insects (a particular blue damselfly was a special temptation). Confined as it was in a tight bag, the young bird instinctively maintained sanitary conditions by periodically waddling it’s posterior over the edge of the nest and forcibly ejecting a stream of dropping into the void.

The time was fast approaching when the bird would itself launch into that void.  Bouts of wing stretching evolved into extended stationary flight exercises in preparation for that very moment. On the morning of July 6, the nestling was beating its appendages so vigorously that it nearly lifted itself out of the nest and the effort tired the little bird out so much that it settled back deep into its cup for a long rest.

Testing out the Equipment

I did not witness the actual departure, but I know that the bird left the nest sometime over the course of the 6^th. The nest was empty as of 8 pm that evening and 14 days after the egg hatched. My involvement with the hummingbirds ended on that day. I spotted the shadowy form of the female several times as it hovered around the spruce tree located just beyond the shed roof and 50 feet from the nest. I suspect the young hummer’s first flight took it over to the protection of the evergreens and well away from my prying eyes.

The empty nest

There some things I will probably never know about this situation – for instance whether the nestling- turned -fledgling was female or male, or why one of the eggs did not hatch – but being witness to a few weeks a hummingbird life was a fascinating glimpse into one of nature’s little lives.

A Frazzled Female

My wife and I can attest to the multitude of Black Bullheads in Dollar Lake. They are about the only fish we can catch and the reason why we’ve given up trying as of late. So, it is no wonder that great bunches of their offspring should start appearing in early summer. They congregate in the warm shallows beneath the water lilies and roll about between the cat-tail stems. Roll is an appropriate word when applied to young bullheads because they stay together in a ball-like cluster for some time.  The fishlets stay so close that they move as one organism as they feed. There were two such bullhead balls off the dock the other day.

The process of making a bullhead cluster began earlier in the spring when a pair of bullheads linked up and decided to have some little bullies. The female laid a gelatinous glob of eggs (containing ten thousand or so bullhead seeds) which the male dutifully fertilized. She attended to her brood for a day before turning the whole affair over to the male (in other words she went to the mall and never returned).

The male Bull ventilated the glob with a beating motion of his fins until they hatched out. Normally this would be the point where the little ones scatter and get eaten by all the other big bad fish in the lake. But, in this case the male continued to guard his clutch like a whiskered mother hen. He watched over them until his charges put on some size and bravely abandoned them at the point where they started to look edible.

Given this type of head start, you’d think the baby bullheads would get the idea that it was time to venture forth on their own. Instead, they continue to stick together and pretend that dad is still hovering about. Feeding on micro crustaceans they mill about in a continually morphing ball of hungry little mouths and gobble up all in their path. The fish hovering beneath the surface at dockside were at this post parental stage.

It became my mission to get a detailed look at one of the them. It was like looking inside a bag of potato chips to make out the outline of an individual chip, however.  So, crouched into heron position, I waited for them to get within reach. The moment came and went several times before I launched a grasping hand with middle-aged swiftness and missed. Or so I thought. One of the fry became stranded on top of a lily pad in the confusion and I celebrated the catching of yet another bullhead from Dollar Lake.

Perfect in every detail, the baby bullhead looked a shrinky-dink version of an adult. It was barely an inch long and dully equipped with stubby sensory whiskers. The dorsal and pectoral fin spines – things to be avoided on large bullhead – were large by proportion on this small frame.  Such structures, along with a pair of spines on the gill covers, make even micro bullheads hard to swallow and it is obvious that nature wastes no time in getting these defensive weapons ready for service. The fish was fat and the silvery distension of the belly provided proof that it was thriving on a diet of micro invertebrates.

Because I could not keep any water in my palm, I quickly threw the gasping fish back into the drink to join his ball’o bullhead brothers and sisters. Soon it will separate from his siblings and grow into an independent creature. When next I see the thing it will be up to his whiskers on my hook and I will not be nearly as pleased as the first time we locked eyes.

Like herds of tiny bison wandering across a floating plain, thousands of slow moving creatures shuffle their way across the nearly continuous surface of Spatterdock leaves.  From their perspective among the lily leaves the towering flower heads loom like multiple Seattle Space Needles. Perhaps one of the most common critters of Dollar Lake, Water Lily Plant Hoppers make up in numbers what they lack in size or visual appeal.  This is not to say that they are boring, but let’s just say they are easily overlooked. There are some 17 species of this type of insect but we’ll have to be generic about this beast – they are Lily leaf Plant Hoppers.

Their existence is confined to the upper surface of the floating leaves and at times they number in the hundreds per Spatterdock and White Water Lily leaf. Like their giant cousins the Cicadas, these insects treat their host plants as giant box drinks – piercing and siphoning off the fluids with a needle-like mouth.  Unlike cicadas they are soft-skinned, flightless, and colonial. I would take it a step further and say that they are silent as well, but since scientists have recorded some land-dwelling hoppers making micro “love” calls I can’t attest to the muteness of these aquatic hoppers. Living on a crowded space as they do, their communication probably consists of “hey you, watch where you’re going” or frequently exchanged barbs such as “oh yeah, your mother is nothing but a plant-sucking Hemipteran.”  “Yeah, same goes for you…you short-winged son of a Spatterdock!”

Life in a Lily Hopper colony is a pretty tame affair. Since they live on top of their next meal there is no need to actually seek nutrients. They eat, grow, shuffle and then eat some more. Oh, they shed on occasion also, but do not do so all at the same time since the members of the group are in a different phases of the growth cycle. Small windrows of variously sized skin casings accumulate on the leaf between rain showers and at times it appears as if there are twice as many hoppers as there really are (all are standing beside their former selves).

A buffering layer of lily pads extending out into the deeper water shields the dockside colonies from the daily effect of mild wind and waves. Higher winds and pelting rains often flip the leaves over and dump the top-side hoppers into the drink.  Light airy critters that they are, they can walk across the water surface to seek a tighter shelter.  A regular army of visitors land among them – Flower Flies, dusted with Spatterdock pollen (or is it spattered with spatterdock pollen?), leaf-eating beetles, and aquatic China-mark caterpillars that crawl over the dry surface on occasion. Water Striders are probably the biggest threat to hopper life.

As the Plant hoppers treat their leaves, so too the Water Striders treat soft juicy creatures such as plant hoppers. Fortunately, they seem to prefer other prey such as small flies or the random air insect that falls to the water surface, but the ever-present hoppers serve as the liver in the fridge (there when nothing else is available).

Striders glide around the pads and often pull up on the surface to rest.  For them, as it is for the hoppers, the leaf and water form one continual surface. They are aquatic but would drown if trapped beneath the meniscus layer.  This time of year many of the striders are adorned with fat red mite larvae. The mites cluster around the head end and give the poor water striders the appearance of someone driving after all the air bags have gone off. Scientists classify them as ectoparasites because they mooch off their host without harming them or entering their innards.  The pesky mites will drop off when mature and finish their life cycle under the water and the striders will rejoice in shedding their acne.

As for the Hoppers, they will continue their pad existence throughout the summer into fall (overwintering, I suspect, as eggs). It is a good life punctuated only by occasional strider grief or the discomfort of wind and waves.  The Spatterdock Plains are a micro world of plenty and small drama.

Their introduction to the outside world was not on the best of terms. It was raining cats and dogs when my local family of Tufted Titmouses revealed their presence in the front yard.  The tiny grey nestlings must have just scrambled out of their nest cavity on the morning I spotted them and the bunch looked to be wet and miserable.

Now, for the record, I’m not sure how to refer to a grouping of Tufted Mouses. Frankly, Titmouses sounds awkward but Titmousii or Teats sounds even worse so I’ll just say Titmice. The brood of tiny titmice was spread across the front yard between the crabapple and a large Red maple. The parents were actively feeding all of them and the place was a hub of activity for several days running. Each of the young birds (perhaps four or five) were uttering continuous “chup-chup” calls and it was all the adults could do to keep up with their constant pleas for food.

Adult Titmice are Chickadee-sized birds with plain gray backing, white breast with rusty flanks, large black eyes, and a name-earning crest atop their noggin. They are common feeder birds throughout the year and their loud “Tee-boo tee-boo tee-boo” calls are a regular part of our landscape. Because they are little gray cavity nesters, however, their nest sites are very difficult to locate. Titmice don’t (or won’t) excavate their own cavities and rely on abandoned woodpecker holes for their brood raising needs. In short, this is to say that I had no idea that my local Titmice were in a family way until their loud brood of nestlings erupted onto the scene. The nest must have been very close indeed.

Wet drippy little titmice do not make for a pretty picture. The birdlets made no attempt to get out of the rain either. Perhaps, being newly out, they thought it normal. Only one of them found a decent sheltered perch on one of the maple limbs. The others bumbled their way from the car roof, to an upside-down position on a Cedar branch, a wagon wheel spoke, and the split rail fence. They were noisily announcing and exposing themselves – afforded protection only by the rain.

The downpour didn’t hinder a Blue Jay from performing an assassination attempt. The Blue bomber swooped down on one tit-chick as it assumed a Capt. Morgan stance on the top of the old scythe handle leaning against the cedar rail.  The nestling appeared shocked after the first attempt and downright indignant when the Jay returned for a rear-assault.  All baby birds look indignant but this one definitely looked miffed. I barely had time to snap a shot as the Blue Jay grabbed some of the tail feathers and gave the nestling a mighty jerk. In the photo it came off as a blurry ghost with a neck bib.

I’m somewhat ashamed to admit that I was looking forward to witnessing the actual assassination. It is something that you read about but rarely witness – something that event the mainline nature shows tend to cut since people don’t like seeing baby birds die. It is a fact that most of them are plucked, picked, gobbled, or otherwise converted into predator scat before reaching adulthood.

Alas, the Blue Jay gave up her efforts and I was left with a live wet baby bird in front of me.  I did feel cheated when a few days later I found one of the Titmice chicks dead at the base of one of the Maple trees and could only blame the act on a Blue Jay (as much as I would have liked to pin it on one of the marauding local cats).

The parent Titmice fed their charges with a variety of insects and, what appeared to be, a few seeds. They literally shoved the food directly into the young bird’s throat. One especially large chunk of seed (perhaps a peanut fragment) was inserted and pulled several times before the nestling finally downed it.

Between feedings the nestlings cat-napped or drifted into un-easy bouts of sleep. The parents only found their well-deserved respite at sun down when the babies finally closed their over-sized yaps and took time to contemplate their uncertain futures. Nearly 80% will not have a future so it is best we enjoy them in their present.

Last year, you may recall that I brought you news of a fine family of Five-lined Skinks living about the property near Dollar Lake.  The crew- perhaps a half dozen in all – were all young’ns based on their bright blue tails. I won’t re-pave old road by telling you the whole story but young skinks possess electric blue tails which lure predators into grabbing their non-fatal end if attacked. The tail breaks off and the lizard escapes. This leaves the attacker with a wiggling piece of tail meat. It is a great trick (especially given the fact that the tail can be re-grown).

I do wonder if one could survive on a diet of skink tails – they would be a harvestable resource and probably a good feed if cooked with butter. Do skink tails dance when heated in a fry pan? Could skink farming be part of a future food wave? Will Skink Snacks ever make the supermarket shelves? Just a thought, sorry I can’t stop myself from expressing such things. Anyway, back to the main subject.

Like smoke to fire, young skinks imply the presence of older skinks No mature skinks were ever spotted last year, however.  I presume that baby skinks are far less cautious than the adult ones (as is the case with all baby critters and thus the reason most baby critters do not grow up).

This spring was different in that I finally happened upon one of the ‘da big skinks down by the lake. It was, in fact, a big daddy skink sunning itself on a Cedar tree next to a cavity in the trunk. The creature was reluctant to leave the warmth of the sun and did little in the way of movement as I watched it – although it did briefly duck back into the cavity at my approach. Given that this is supposed to be an educational blog, as opposed to a “what I did and how I feel” blog, I should endeavor to point out some of the details that marked this lizard as an adult and a male. The adults look completely different from their young.

Firstly, the age of this lizard was easy to call because, apart from the larger size (approx. 7 inches), it lacked clear striping. As they approach adulthood, Five-lined Skinks devolve into no-line skinks. Their bright striping décor fades as the background color changes from deep blue-black to pale yellow-brown.  The blue tail of infancy pales to gray. Folks are not quite sure why this occurs since the tail remains detachable. It could be assumed that big skinks are accomplished predator avoiders by the time they ripen and the blue-tail thing becomes an un-necessary (and slightly embarrassing) mark of immaturity.

During the spring breeding season the males attain a reddish cast to their heads and cheeks. This feature is a distinctively masculine trait meant to attract the “ladies.” Unfortunately, to the human observer it looks like a lizard with an infected head or one that has been wacked repeatedly against a tree limb. It looks somewhat painful but is eye-catching. The females never get reddish heads.

Females lay their clutch of 15-18 eggs in wood debris or in tree cavities. There might be some possibility that the Cedar cavity might also serve as a nesting hole but because the males do not participate in brooding the association would be purely accidental.  We’ll see if a cluster of blue-tailed babies pour out of this hole later in the year.

My sunning male skink remained relatively immobile over the course of ten minutes and I eventually moved on to watch some drying paint. It was gone by the time I returned and has not been seen since. The summer is young and I am reasonably sure that it will be giving me the skink eye from the shadows for the balance of the season.

It is near impossible to spot a hummingbird nest in the wild. So it was a fortunate mix of timing and placement when I spotted a female Ruby-throated hummer flying up to a maple branch suspended near our porch at Dollar Lake. The tiny bird perched near an equally tiny bump on the branch. This spot proved to be her nest construction site and I was provided a front row seat for the ensuing process – and quite a process it was.

In all, the entire effort took well over seven days and I was present for at least three of them. Considering that the final structure was only about the size of a walnut (or about the circumference of a dollar coin), this betrays the complexity of the construction and the sheer determination of the builder.  This female chose a typical location on an overhanging branch, about 15 feet from the ground with ample open space beneath. Her chosen spot was at a point where the branch bent downward and a few over-arching leaves provided some overhead protection.

An average day began at sunrise and consisted of repeated forays for nesting material until around 8:00 p.m. (at which point she would retreat to some unknown roosting site). Arriving at the nest, she would insert/weave/ apply her chosen material and perform some variety of wiggle dance. Her dance steps depended on the material. For instance, upon arriving with a clump of Aspen down this material was placed into the center and packed down with a series of foot tamps accompanied by a metronome-like rocking action. Spider silk was applied while sitting in the cup, reaching over the edge, and applying the strands around the outside perimeter. Lichen bits were individually placed and secured into the silk with a few pokes.

In all, the Hummer spent little more than a minute at the nest and anywhere from 2 – 15 minutes on her gathering missions. Longer absences were probably used for food gathering at the local Columbines.

Each forage trip sent her in a totally different direction from the previous foray, although she tended to repeat forage themes. A trip to gather spider webs was followed by a few more with the same material in mind – but never the same web location twice. On one venture she investigated all the webs on the cabin porch just a few feet from where I was sitting. Hovering inches away from a web spanning the space between the vertical rails, she darted in to snatch a few strands at a time. She then directed her attention to the cobweb in the upper corner of the window before returning her silken findings to the construction site.

The silk was laid on with a back-and-forth wiping action of the beak. Application of the spider silk was aided by flicks of the long tongue to pull the threads into place. This latter action would have gone un-detected without the stop-action record provided by the camera.

The silk endeavors were followed by a bout of lichen picking in which she plucked small bits off of bare tree limbs and trunks. Tufts of cat-tail down were pulled off of the winter worn heads lingering atop the old stalks down by the lakeshore.  Aspen down – flying through the air and drifting on the ground like January flurries – were also added in liberal amounts to the soft central core.

By the end of the first few days of activity, her nest was mostly a light-colored mass of silk and fiber with a few darker lichens for effect. Upon my return a full week later, I found her nest to be thoroughly adorned with a layer of cryptic blue-green lichens. The nest blended perfectly with its host  branch both in color and contour. She was sitting in the nest at that point – perhaps even on eggs- but it was not yet “complete” in her mind. Once or twice every hour she would venture off the clutch to gather up yet another bit of lichen or tuft of down for that final touch. On the following day, she looked to be really done (as in really truly done) and did not attempt to add anything else to her miraculous little structure.

After 14 or so days of incubation and relative inactivity, her charges will hatch and she will resume her frantic pace while feeding her micro family. This, like her act of nest construction, she will do without any assistance from the male what-so-ever.  A hummingbird’s work is never done.

Not every experience with the dig team at the Adams farm is worth in-depth reporting. All of it is fascinating for the participant but because the pace of archaeology is slow by nature – measuring, re-measuring, charting, and then more measuring – “events” are few and far between. Yesterday the pace was interrupted by a few definitively non archaeological events and a fascinating sideshow.

Our team was working in the woods under the comforting shade of a stately oak tree. We uncovered a thousand year old scatter of Woodland pottery and a small symmetrical fire pit. The pottery consisted of finely cord-marked body sherds evenly distributed over a single layer. Even though they appeared to be the remains of a single shattered pot, they represented a number of vessels (thus deflating our dreams of assembling the mass into one single museum quality piece).  The fire pit, shaped like a deep cereal bowl, contained a scatter of charcoal, a nut shell, a few chunks of pottery, and a nice flint flake. Under Dr. Mohney’s direction we bagged the remaining soil from the feature into a gallon sized ziplock labeled “FLOAT”. This soil will be subjected to a flotation procedure where water is used to separate tiny pieces of organic material.

One of the class members brought along her family’s collection of points for Dr. Mohney to examine. Among the dozens of projectile points laid out on the truck hood was a gem – not a mineralogical gem but an archaeological gem.  A rare Fluted point – a thin masterpiece made of dark mottled flint – represents the first period of human occupation in the Great Lakes some 10-12,000 years ago (they are the oldest points found in the New World). Thinning flakes, taken out of the point’s base, are the fluting features which probably aided in attaching these projectile points to an atlatl spear shaft.

Although we can’t completely rule out the possibility, we don’t expect to find a fluted point at this site but…..  Once, an especially vindictive archaeologist snuck one of these (a replica, of course) into a sifting screen and then proceeded to chew out a lazy student for not noticing it. Cruel, but funny. I took several pictures of the above-mentioned fluted point (see above) if only to document it and insure that if it shows up in our screen we will be able to identify it!

Something odd did show up in one of the screens during the dig. It wasn’t a fake point but instead a bumpy yellowish item which broke up into several smaller, though sizable, pieces. We gathered round and unfortunately I was asked what it might be. After looking it over, touching it, and smelling a broken portion my little grey cells tentatively declared it a Truffle (see below and here). Never having seen a truffle before (or knowing whether they are even found this side of the pond), I was on thin ice and wished for a pig to wander by to provide some confirmation.

Fortunately my suspicion turned out and my pseudo-intelligence streak continued.  Truffles are underground fungi in which the fruiting body has no stem and the spore bearing surfaces are encased. They grow in a freeform style. There are many species of Truffles in the world and the black French variety can command thousands of dollars per pound (one 3 ½ pound example sold for $330,000). Most other varieties are not nearly that precious and many aren’t even that tasty.  Mine was probably a White Truffle.

Another mystery item turned up in yet another screen that elicited another “what is it?” call out. Before I reveal the final answer let me just say that a red herring was involved in this affair. A crayfish was uncovered along with the same shovelful that brought up this lump of somethingness. “Yes,” the students working that square, “that crayfish was in with that weird green stuff.”  I, assuming that the crayfish was of the burrowing variety, also assumed that the “weird green stuff” was associated with his now destroyed burrow. That was the red herring aspect: if it was a crayfish it must have been in a burrow at the time.

I probed and poked at the greenish blob which looked like, and had the texture of, a blob of bleached avocado paste that had been rolled in the sand. There were a few fragments of green leaves mixed in. It definitely did not smell of avocado, however. It was musty with strong hints of poopiness but this seemed natural if it was accumulated crayfish poop. That was my first diagnosis: crayfish poop accumulated in a crayfish burrow.

How wrong I was. It took a while before I finally put two and two together and came up with five (which is the number of minutes I wanted to scrub my hands with industrial disinfectant after coming to this realization). The crayfish was a burrowing crayfish alright but the avocado paste was actually cat poop.

At some time over the weekend a cat, with a bad case of the runs, came along and used the nice sandy archaeological pit for his potty. Our crayfish was probably bumbling along later that night, fell into the partially excavated pit and, discovering that he could not escape, resorted to eating the blob of deliciousness as prison food (Hey, this stuff tastes like sh..).

The crayfish and his meal came up in one of the first shovelfuls of the day and prompted several minutes of fingering, sniffing, and photo taking. I later examined one of my detailed documentary shots of the mystery blob and it clearly shows that the thing has dozens of long hairs sticking to it. I did not see those when I was handling it.

I have spent the last 24 hours washing my hands and trying to recall if the students operating that particular crayfish pit showed any signs of giggling or snickering eye contact during the course of my fecal examination.

Like life, an archaeological screen can turn up a truffle, a treasure, or a turd depending on any given day.

A class, under the direction of Anthropology Professor Dr. Kenneth Mohney, is participating in what might be considered the best field course ever. They are students from Monroe Co. Community College and, thanks to the Adams family of Temperance, they have the opportunity to dig an actual site. This is the kind of hands-on stuff that trumps book learning any day. Of course you need the book learning in order to perform the field work properly, but there is nothing like getting your hands dirty to drive a point home.

It was through the prompting of a friend that I became involved in this dig as a volunteer. I say that  I’m “helping out”  but there is some guilt because I probably get more out of it than actually contributed. So far the urge to squeal like a small child at some of the discoveries has been avoided, but the season is young.

The dig season just began last week and will continue through late June, so there will be more to report in the future (and more incidents of squeal suppression, I am sure). For now I can summarize some initial findings and lay out some background. Normally the background stuff is not especially compelling, but in this case it is crucial to the whole thing. It was the gracious invitation of the Adams’ to open their property to the project. On the land since the 1830’s, the family has long held in interest in their own history as well as the prehistoric past. Both Craig and his father Don are regulars at the dig site – peering in with excitement as the layers of soil are uncovered.  Last year Craig put on a big cook out for the crew at the end of operations.

Don, a youthful man of 83 and quite a scholar in his own right, is able to point out which areas have been previously plowed and which have not (important info. for archaeologists). He pointed to the row of stately Red Pines that border the site and recalled when they planted them some seven decades earlier. Craig brought out a small paper bag and proudly revealed its contents. It contained carefully wrapped examples of “arrowheads” picked from the ground over the years. This humble, yet significant, collection tells a 10,000 year story of occupation.

Only one of the items was a true arrowhead. The rest represented spear points, dart points, and knives – or in the parlance of archaeology: “projectile points.” Included in the collection was a sizable pile of flint flakes – left-overs from the manufacture of stone points. There are hundreds of flakes cast off during the process of making one piece and each can tell a tale if asked. For instance, the black flakes represent a flint source called Upper Mercer in Ohio, while the dirty white ones represent local material from Stony Creek. One large shiny flake – an edible looking shade of caramel – is likely from a location on Lake Huron called Kettle Point.  All this flint reached this location through trade networks.

Among the more complete artifacts (see below), a pair of black Mercer flint spear heads hail from the Early Archaic period and date to around 8-9,000 years ago. Two square based points are of the style popular in the late Archaic around 3,000 years ago and the only arrowhead of the bunch, a triangular thing, is the baby of the bunch at around  1,000 years of age.   A large knife, made of marbled Ohio flint, had an edge that still could slice through sinew or leather.

Early Archaic Point

Late Archaic Point

Woodland Period Arrow Point

The promise of the dig is to uncover the background history that goes with these artifacts. More flakes and a partial projectile point have been found. To date, a few post-hole molds have been discovered which indicate that at one time a wigwam type structure might have been in place.

Late Woodland Pottery (ca. 1,200 years ago) comes up in nearly every square. The pieces range from small to tiny but reveal details of a decoration style known as cord marking. A small paddle, wrapped in a basswood twine, was used to pat the exterior of the pot as it was being formed from moist clay. These marks are distinctive. The pots of the period were often massive in size but there is no hope of gluing all these un-matched pieces together anytime soon.

Woodland Period Pottery (and a few flint flakes)

My naturalist instincts are continually called into play as the dig uncovers various soil insects – of very recent vintage I might add. One especially interesting find (see below) was a soil cocoon of some small species of moth – possibly a cutworm?  Last fall a caterpillar dug into the sandy soil and excavated an earthen chamber about the size of a grape and lined it with silk. There it pupated and awaited the rising soil temperature as a signal to emerge as an adult. Instead, the archaeologists trowel prematurely opened the door. The shiny chestnut brown pupae wiggled in protest as I placed it back in some undisturbed soil.

It is expected that the place will be forced to tell many more historical secrets before the month and the dig proceeds. There is a local story about some gold hidden somewhere on the property – prompted by a shiny cast coin found many years ago by Craig Adams. He pointed to the exact spot located only steps away from one of the open pits. I will return, if still welcomed, to find the true riches of the site  in the form of broken pottery, fragmented flint, and soil stains.

“A cowbird need keep a sharp eye, for the threat of a falling cow pie”

Cowbirds are universally hated by bird enthusiasts and their name is usually enunciated with a sneer – along with a few unprintable prefixes. Granted, their negative reputation is deserved. As nest parasites they are responsible for pushing some songbird populations into the red zone. Depending on whom you talk to, or read from, these birds successfully parasitize some 140 plus species and their activities have the potential to push some, such as the Kirtland’s Warbler, over the brink. Their badness stems from their goodness, however. They are very good at the bad thing they do and we – as a species – are partially to blame.

Up until about 200 years ago, Brown-headed Cowbirds were content to follow the roaming herds of Bison over the Great Plains. They fed upon the insects kicked up by the stomping hooves and those attracted to their steaming piles of poo. As the eastern lands were cleared by European settlement and populated with bison-like herds of cattle, the birds spread east of the Mississippi. In other words we created ideal cowbird habitats across the landscape and the birds accepted our un-intended invitation. In their new stomping grounds these blackbirds are bad news because they are victimizing woodland birds unaccustomed to deal with this behavior.

Now that I’ve got all this sordid history out of the way, we can now look at these foul little fowl without guilt. Yes they are “bad” and yes it would be nice to push them back across the mighty Miss, but that ain’t going to happen anytime soon. So, let me be the first to say these G… D… Cowbirds are entertaining little creatures to watch. Springtime is the best time.

On a bright sunny morning along the Lake Huron shore my attention was drawn to a cluster of Cowbirds engaged in courtship. A group of three males were in display mode in the lofty upper branches of a dead tree while two females engaged in their own up-frontery on a lower limb. The males were not displaying to the females but to each other.

Male Brown-headed Cowbirds are easy to identify (see above). They are small, slightly glossy, black birds with brown heads. One way to remember this is to remember this ditty “To paint the head of a cowbird, you must start with the color of cow turd.”  The females are about as plain as you can get – in fact, the color of dried cow patties (if we are to keep this thing within proper scatological imagery).

The first step of cowbird courtship etiquette is to clear the room of competing suitors and my Lake Huron cluster was in full performance mode. The three males alternated between bouts of “bill pointing” and “toppling forward bows.” These two behaviors are meant to establish a dominance system within the brotherhood. Heads up and bills pointing heaven-ward the three attempted to look as thin and tall as possible. Then, one by one, they puffed up into a ridiculous ball and fell forward to the point of nearly falling off the limb. This display was accompanied by a bubbly gurgle that has been described as “bubko lum tsee.” The “bubko” part is liquidy and soft while the “tsee” portion is higher pitched.

The females were also bill pointing much of this time. As a rule, the gals do not get into the toppling thing instead they satisfy themselves by calling each other words that rhyme with ditch and more.

After about 15 minutes the cowbirds flew away, but all in the same direction. At some point in time all this bubbling and tipping will result in a clear definition of which males can pair up with which females. The males will turn this same toppling bow behavior toward impressing their females. Brown-headed cowbirds are basically monogamous and once a pair of birds hook up (as in “hey baby I like the way you topple”) they pretty much stay together for the balance of the season. Their orphan offspring will be individually raised by the likes of Yellow Warblers, Chipping Sparrows, and Vireos but they will be genuine little brown-headed bastards with cow poop in their veins and a bubko lum tsee in their hearts.