Far be it from me to state the obvious, but not all Ladybugs are ladies nor are they bugs. They are beetles (true bugs are half-wing insects such as stinkbugs) which use both the men’s and the ladies bathrooms. To be a male ladybug is akin to being a boy named Sue. According to tradition, the name originated in medieval times to honor the crop protecting abilities of these aphid-eating insects. They were viewed as gifts from the Virgin Mary and thus named “Bugs of our Lady.” Later shortened to Ladybugs, the name stuck.

As far as I know, there are no church parishes named “Our Lady of the Bugs” in existence, but I would not have any problems attending mass at such a church. Over the course of human history, Ladybugs have always been painted in a positive manner. From “Ladybug ladybug fly away home” to “Bishop bishop Barnaby” they have long been a part of childhood rhyme. I’ve yet to see a Halloween without at least a few kids dressed up as Ladybugs and have never have seen a child attired as a Dung Beetle. Adult gardeners still appreciate their pest controlling presence and deliberately release them by the thousands (ladybugs not dung beetles).

There is no one species of Ladybug. There are at least 60-70 species in North America alone. Only one has a bad name, and we’ll get to that in a minute. I recently plucked a frigid little Twice-stabbed Lady Beetle off my sliding glass door. A black Ladybug with two circular red spots, this insect was probably seeking shelter under my siding shingles and was temporarily stifled by the sub-freezing temperature.  Come to think of it, I will now have to call this the Twice-mentioned Ladybug because I already featured this species in a previous blog (April 2012).

I did turn the creature over to reveal the compact form of these beetles – something I did not do in my earlier posting. True to the color code expressed on their elytra (hard outer wing covers), they have a black body accented by a smart red abdomen.

As a rule, ladybugs such as the Twice-stabbed Twice-mentioned type are still held in high esteem, but their reputation has been tainted by the activities of the Multicolored Asian Lady Beetle (or MALB for short). Asian Lady Bugs, in fact, bring out some very odd literary and social behavior in humans who are once-bitten twice shy.

Identifying a MALB seems to be a relatively simple process if you accept the internet as your guide. According to on-line literature, native ladybugs are orange with 4-6 spots and MALBs are burnt-orange with 16-18 spots. Of course natives such as the Twice-stabbed , which are black with only two spots, and 7-spotted Ladybugs (with seven spots believe it or not) screw up such simplicity. Add to this the fact that MALBs come with a multiplicity of shading and spotting options. Individuals within any grouping will have anywhere from zero spots to 20 or more – backed by yellow orange to burnt orange coloring. If your ladybug has a whole lot of spots, say 8 or more, then you can say that is a MALB with 67.5 % accuracy (see beginning photo).

An invasive species, the MALB isn’t really all that bad. They eat aphids and perform the same beneficial duties as their native counterparts but because they bite, stink, and swarm they are black-listed. The worse thing that anyone can truly say about them is that they offer discomfort. They will take a nip of human skin or exude a noxious fluid from their leg joints if handled roughly, but that is a defensive thing. Advice given at one website advises handling Asian Ladybugs “with extreme caution” surely overstates the case. One handles dynamite and nuclear wastes with extreme caution. But another website declares, in all seriousness, that “Ladybugs do not feed on people” so this should set our minds at ease.

Perhaps the most obnoxious of MALB traits is their propensity to invade houses in the fall when they seek over-wintering shelters. Sometimes millions of them can find their way into our attics. Shifting outside temperatures often force them into our living spaces. You’d think, by the reports, that we are due for another Alfred Hitchcock movie replacing the birds with the bugs. “A huge swarm enveloped my house last fall,” claimed one writer, “causing me to fall off the porch and break my shoulder.”  OMG, lock down the shutters and brace for the MALB invasion sent down by our Virgin Mother!

Normally whenever pesky insects are involved, pesticides are called for. In the case of Asian Ladybugs, however, this is not advised even by most bug control companies. “Warning: Pesticides are poisonous” states an official web source as if we didn’t know that already. I was just pouring myself a bowl of hot pesticides for lunch when I read this shocking revelation and was forced to put it outside for the cats to eat.

How does one control these things, then? Are we to allow them to bother us with impunity? The answer indeed may well be “yes” unless you take the best advice gleaned from web sources. Although ignoring them or putting up with occasional problems is one answer, vacuuming appears to be the best response to home invading ladybugs.  Suck them up and toss them out into the snow to freeze to death. If you do take this route I would suggest that you rush down to the Our Lady of the Bugs chapel and pray for forgiveness afterwards.

There seems to be every reason in the world to overlook Red Cedars. They are exceedingly common, grow in waste habitat, are prickly and very un-friendly to the touch, and lack the grace and symmetry of other evergreens. Although this is hardly the plant’s fault, even the name is misleading because they are not Cedars at all. They don’t even produce cones in the proper sense of the word. But, having laid all this out, I would have to counter by saying that all these “faults” are actually the admirable traits of a tough workingman’s tree. As long as Red Cedars are in your face you’d might as well acknowledge them.

This is a good time of year to do so. Nature is pulling back her troops and our outdoor walks are often devoid of animal excitement.  Winter evergreens, because they remain clothed in greenery, stand out amongst their naked deciduous neighbors. What would Christmas, and the month of December, be without them? Well, it would still be Christmas no matter what, but you get my meaning.

The Red Cedars are evergreens – ugly ones to be sure, but still evergreens. In form they are ragged, lop-sided, and decidedly un-Christmas Tree like. They are not Cedars, but actually members of the Juniper clan. Scientifically they are called Juniperus virginiana and you can’t argue with SCIENCE. The root words (pun not intended) basically mean “youthful and productive.” You could argue that the name means evergreen and thus Red Cedars are the original evergreen. There would be no one to argue that point with, but so what. The other part of the scientific name means “from Virginia” which merely indicates the location where it was first described.

If you glance at the lowly junipers growing next to your front porch you’ll get a better understanding of the typical Juniper profile. The fact that red Cedars strive to be wild trees, rather than domesticated shrubs, is an admirable thing. Red Cedars do the “tree thing” quite well. The trees are slow growing and can live for hundreds of years if allowed. Their tightly grained reddish wood (thus the “Red” Cedar part) is very tough and aromatic. Its oily insect and rot-resisting nature suits it well for making cedar chests and fence posts.

Because Juniper berries are used to flavor gin, the odor of Red Cedar foliage and berries might remind some of you alcohol minded individuals of cocktail parties.  If so, I would recommend shoving a clump of prickly juniper branches into your mouth. You may find it preferable to drinking a martini or a gin ‘n tonic. Since Drano is a far better substitute for either of these beverages, you needn’t destroy any Red Cedars in order to get the full effect.

Technically junipers, and therefore Red Cedars, do not have berries. They are cone-bearing. The cones, however, are very berry-like so we might be getting into a meaningless conversation on this one (that is unless you are consuming gin at the time – in which case all meaningless conversations become profound).  Red Cedar cones are blue, blushed with a waxy coating, and fleshy. They pop under gentle finger pressure and contain anywhere from one to three seeds – just like berries.  As wildlife feed they have minimal value although seed-eating, alcoholic tending, birds will probe for the seeds.

Only the female trees dress up for the Christmas season because only they produce cones.  A blue-speckled winter Red Cedar tree has a festive holiday appearance. Both sexes can produce another ornament of sorts and this one is worth seeking. Large kidney shaped (and kidney colored) galls will begin to appear on some trees in mid-summer and will be fully grown by the time winter rolls around. These growths are hard and woody with a dimpled surface much like that of a golf ball. Caused by a fungus, the galls are one of two different expressions of something called Cedar Apple Rust.

Red Cedar and Hawthorn Trees (haw apples) are shared hosts in the life cycle of the impossibly named Gymnosporangium juniperi-virginianae. You’ll recognize the Red Cedar’s scientific name in the name of the fungus. Over-wintering in the Red-Cedar galls, the fungus sprouts in the springtime. Long gelatinous icicles ooze from each dimple and eventually produce airborne spores. These spores infect the leaves and fruit of hawthorns and create rusty leaf spots. The Cedars are re-infected the following summer via the spores produced on the hawthorn growths and on ad-infinitum. Neither host is truly damaged in the process.

The fascinating part of this discussion (if indeed there is any fascinating part about it) is that the Cedar Apple fungus cannot overwinter on a hawthorn. It must migrate to the safety of the Red Cedar in order to survive the season. But, it cannot sustain itself on the Cedar for very long so must continually jump ship in order to stay alive. Therefore the rust remains “youthful and productive.” And, further therefore and on ad-infinitum we have come full circle in this discussion of the youthful and productive tree from Virginia.

The Red Cedar may not be pretty, but has a pretty good story to tell to those who stop (and put down their martini glasses) to listen.

Who am I?

Like the bear going over the mountain, I sometimes I go walking just to see what I can see. There are no mountains at Crosswinds Marsh but that is the place I chose for my most recent blind foray. In the wake of a deeply chilled night the place was ice covered and frosted. It was a place of white shadows and white birds. Hundreds of Ring-billed Gulls mingled with a scattering of ceramic Mute Swans. The foreheads of twenty or so foraging Sandhill Cranes provided a flash of red to the scene. Great Blue Herons, refusing to yield to migration pressures, claimed the boardwalk rails as their fishing platforms. This being Crosswinds, there were also Canada Geese in numbingly huge numbers.

I barely give notice to the honkers because they are as numerous and common as the cat-tails. Because cat-tails are not weeds, I can’t state that geese are like weeds, but I am tempted. Scanning their numbers, the hope is to spot an occasional Snow Goose among their numbers. Last week I did see one such fowl here.  This time, my attention was drawn to the big-butted domestic Goose mingling with the horde.

 The Graylag in Question

The bird has been here for many years. It “hangs” with the local geese and no doubt considers itself as a true Canadian (in fact looking a whole lot like the mayor of Toronto). In basic appearance, this goose is the spitting image of the wild Graylag Goose from which it, and most farm geese, are descended. It is much thicker than its wild cousin thanks to decades of breeding as a table bird. In other words, that big behind is not the result of evolutionary accident or lack of exercise.

Parent or Bystander?

Short necked and orange billed, the bird stands out in the sea of thin-necked black-billed Canada Geese. On this morning it was in the company of a dozen Canada Geese. One of the swimmers next to the chunky domestic demanded attention, however. This goose (see beginning and below) looked Canada-like in general terms but had a pinkish-orange bill, orange legs, a white bordered face, and a watered-down version of the white chin patch. The neck, while dark, was brown rather than black and the border line where it met the chest was indistinct.

The Hybrid in Question

The features of this goose were typical of a hybrid between a Canada and, dare I say it, a Domestic Graylag Goose. Such a cross is well documented in the literature. It looks like neither bird but consistently displays the features of both. The white face could come from a hidden gene in the domestic bird. It appears that our Crosswinds domestic is an intimate – really intimate – part of the gang. But, I might be jumping to conclusions with that remark. There are three possibilities here. Consideration of the truth involves a brief look at the phenomenon hybridizing geese.

Hybridization is relatively common among wild geese. Even though they are made up of many separate species, they are not far enough along on the evolutionary timeline to be completely incompatible. Genetically there are not enough barriers to prevent red-headed step children or mailman’s kids. Behavior acts as the best separator but there is evidence that many of these hybirds…er, hybrids… occur when a male of one species forces itself on the female of another. This is why we don’t go into this subject with children.

The Crosswinds hybrid can be explained as the result of a Domestic Graylag or a White-fronted Goose mating with a Canada Goose. The most common explanation is the former (and given the fact that a Graylag is present, seems the 90% answer). White-fronted X Canada hybrids are much less common in our area because White-fronted Geese aren’t common here. But it can’t ruled out. The white face and bill features are suspicious. The bill especially looks exactly like that found on immature White-fronted Geese – with a black “nail” or tip on a pale pinkish/orange beak. I’ll have to stick with the 90% answer because I can’t do a blood test.

Actually that blood test would come in handy to answer the third possible scenario. Young geese tend to hang out with other birds that look like their parents. If a goose was raised in a family with a Graylag parent, it will naturally seek the company of other Graylags later on. It is possible that this hybrid bird came from elsewhere and decided to join in with the big-butt bird at Crosswind to be with its own kind – whatever that kind is. Therefore we can’t pin the domestic Graylag as the guilty party in this child’s existence.

There, now I’ve taken a simple thing and turned it into a complicated mess. Other than bleeding the poor hybrid to death, we can only hope that somebody out there will come forward to the bench with proof that they saw the porky domestic in the company of a clutch of fuzzy young hybirds earlier in the summer. Of course, the conspiracy theories would never cease even if that happened. Rather than kill the fowl, let’s kill this blog and pretend it never happened.

A Bird In-between

Even though life in and around Dollar Lake will continue on pace through to next Spring, our role in it has come to an end for yet another year. It was time for my wife and I to close the place up for the winter and bid it adieu until next April or so. It is a rite of passage as time-honored as the falling of leaves and the annual felling of deer.

For the resident White-footed Mice this initiates a season of celebration. They can cavort unmolested for 24 hours a day and blithely use the space behind the couch pillows as an eating lounge – without picking up the left-over acorn shells.  The mystery creature that lives between the walls can now scratch away at night without evoking fearful comments from the female human bedded within. I trust that the lone ladybug that spent her weekend flying fruitlessly from light to light will now be able to settle down and squeeze itself into some crack for the dark lightless duration.

Even though I call our place the Muskrat Lodge – a small hummock placed along the shore occupied by a dues paying member of the Muskrat Defense League -the lake has been relatively muskratless this summer. Sure they made an eating platform under the dock this Spring and occasionally scattered some cat-tail chewings in the near shore water, but the ‘rats themselves rarely showed in the light, or even the dim light, of morning or evening. They retained their full membership in the nocturnal night club set.

As if on cue, however, one of the little fellows put in an appearance on the final full day of our cabin season. While a thin veneer of ice glazed most of the lake surface, this lone ‘rat pursued water plants in the open shallows at the north. Alternately dunking under and returning with a mouthful of tender plants, he perched atop the remains of a Spatterdock root to eat his fare. In typical muskrat style, he frequently stopped to groom or scratch at a pesky underarm spot.

I am certainly not saying that the ‘rat cared one wit about the human standing on the dock other than acknowledging that there was a human standing on the dock. When the creature spied me and directed a sustained stare in my direction I did not imagine it to be a farewell glance. No, it looked more like an “are you still here!” type of look. I am, after all, the useless part-timer in his world. At least our neighbor puts out corn.  He plunged into the drink and retreated to the secrecy of the real muskrat lodge on this lake.

This morning, our packing up morning, the muskrat was back. In a lake as tiny as Dollar, his small erect form on top of his feeding spot gave him beaver-like proportions. He was a noble beast in a less than noble lake. For the moment he was the largest rodent in the area – out sizing the cabin mice, the shed chipmunk, and the yard grey squirrels. I never gave him a chance to snub my goodbye waves because he dunked early and disappeared from view before we closed and locked the doors.

It was only in the last few moments before leaving that I discovered the cause of his pre-mature exit. In short, he had been de-throned by a visiting monarch. A mature Bald Eagle drifted down from the tree line and made a low pass over the lake adjacent to our dock. It settled in the lofty branches of the scraggly White Pine directly opposite our cabin and scanned the place for potential prey. Bald Eagles are primarily fish eaters but they often add muskrats to their diet. Given the crappy nature of the Dollar Lake fishery I suspect that ‘rats might be the primary prey for such a visitor (thus the uber nocturnal ways adopted by the local ‘ratery). We snuck away without disturbing the bird and left the lake to its wild ways for another winter.

It is hard to say goodbye to the drooping cat-tail leaves and extended coffee mornings on the porch. It is equally hard to bid departure from the flaming red Michigan holly bushes in the surrounding countryside and the deep green Balsam Firs. But, you know what they say about absence…..

The urban beavers of the Conners Creek colony become diehard nocturnalists during the spring/summer season. They spend the daylight hours loafing within the dark confines of their lodge and only venture outside when darkness covers their activities. Any human attempt to observe them at that time of year will be basically beaverless.

Urged on by the preparation needs of the impending winter, however, the beavers will linger about for a few hours after sunrise and before sunset. At this time of year they add material to the top of their lodge and stock their underwater stores of cottonwood and willow twigs. After several beaverless springtime efforts, I chose to concentrate on the fall season in order to catch a few daytime glimpses of the creatures. I was successful for the most part.

The only reason I qualify my success is due to the fact that I can only attest to the presence of one beaver this time. That particular beast, however, was the familiar notch-tailed adult that I recorded last season.  All of the beavers at this lodge look pretty much alike apart from the smaller young. “Notch”, with a huge divot in her tail, is the exception and one glimpse of that damaged appendage is enough to individualize her. Admittedly, this her could be a him, but because it is easier to say beavher than beavehe I will stick to the feminine designation (wow that was stupid wasn’t it!).

Although I was familiar with her, she was much less tolerant of me this time.  It was raining and I was wearing a bright yellow raincoat upon my second visit of the season. This caused her to immediately drop what she was doing (de-barking a dogwood twig) and swim over for a closer look. Once satisfied at my identity, rather than return to her routine, she sounded the alarm and dove with a loud tail splash. She bobbed to the surface about ten minutes later but still retained that “creeped-out” look on her face and ultimately opted to end her day long before the 9:00 hour.

Over the course of subsequent visits, actual sightings have been few and far between, but it is apparent that the beavers have been hard at work on the lodge. Mounds of fresh mud, water plants, and gnawed sticks have been heaped upon their shelter. A comparison of the photos- taken one week apart -reveal just how much work has been accomplished (see below). Yes, the Conners Creek beavers have been as busy as….o.k., I won’t say it.

Oct. 31, 2013 Nov. 5, 2013

Apart from natural material, a few items of urban “junk” are pile atop the lodge. What looks to be a boat hoist strap of some kind was soon buried by mud. A rake, complete with handle and times, was added to the lower portion of the structure (see below at center). This time has not been yet been covered up. I secretly wonder if Notch has been employing the tool to dress the surface of the lodge and thus her nervousness stems from the possibility that I might find out.

Oddly enough, I saw more muskrats than beavers about the lodge this autumn. Seeing at least two individuals repeatedly enter and exit the structure has been enough to convince me that they are living with their larger cousin. It is not unusual for these two creatures to share a lodge – in fact, such a thing seems to be the norm. Beaver-cams (cameras installed inside beaver lodges) have revealed this again and again.

It seems that a pair of ‘rats have set up living quarters within the larger space of the lodge interior and are adding to it daily. They are performing this function as if they themselves built the original mound.Gathering mouthfuls of water plants, they plunge into the entrance and appear for another load several minutes later. Given the vast open space within a beaver lodge interior I am thinking that the muskrats are utilizing a corner apartment carved out of the mud and sticks.

As if to display their complete comfort with this arrangement, the ‘rats raised at least one family in the Conners Creek lodge.  A young muskrat took a brief foray from the confines of the family apartment and put in an appearance among the Cottonwood sticks (see below). The tiny creature was still clothed in fuzzy gray underfur pajamas and was yet to gain its smoother covering of guard hairs.

Because both animals are basically nocturnal they likely spend a lot of time together inside the lodge. Most of this time is spent sleeping, but one wonders what the beavers would have to say to their tiny tenants during these times. I would think the conversation would be simple and polite between the two like-minded creatures. The beavers would withhold comment when the muskrats occasionally break their vegetarian habits and imbibe in a meal of fish or clam and the ‘rats would have to change the subject upon seeing the beavers eating their own poop (which they do doo).

Late fall signals the time to winterize the Dollar Lake cabin. It’s time to flush the pipes, put the porch furniture away, and cover the inside furniture with drop cloths. For us human occupants it is time to prepare the place for months of relative un-occupancy. I say “relative” because in the absence of humans it becomes a mouse kingdom. There are times when I feel that we are the intruders. We move in, muss about for a few days at a time over the summer, and force the original residents into a shadowy reclusive existence. They must sneak about under the cover of darkness lest they attract unwanted (and potentially deadly) attention from the “two-leggers.”

Other than the presence of a few filched peanut shells and scattered droppings, the White-footed Mice of the “Muskrat Lodge” (our quaint name for the cabin) do their best to remain incognito most of the time. They begin their winter cabin preparations about a month before we do, however, and the two activities are diametrically opposed. We empty our cupboards while they proceed to fill theirs.  We remove the boxes of Pop Tarts and Spaghetti Noodles and they bring in acorns- lots of acorns.

The cabin yard is host to three different kinds of oak trees; Red, White, and – as I was to find out – a Northern Pin Oak. For a nut-lover such as a White-footed Mouse, the seasonal bounty is an answer to all manner of squeaky prayer.  Nuts spell survival. This has been a banner year for acorn production and it is the job of all self-respecting cabin mice to cache as many of these survival gems as possible.

For them, “our” place becomes a giant warehouse burrow with countless niches. While we may never find the behind-the-wall or under-the-whatever caches, we did uncover two of the locations.

Pulling away the cover quilt on the bed, 14 acorns populated the space between the pillows. A much larger stash was uncovered in the bathroom.  There were 40 nuts piled in the corner of the bathroom drawer next to the disposable razor and the allergy pills. A single acorn sat atop the rolled tan hand towel on the upper tier between the green floral and brown ones and yet another was nestled in the lower tier between the moss green and blue & white floral.

In all, I found 56 acorns. I assembled the caches and piled them collectively on the coffee table for examination.  This collection obviously represented a selective process. All were capless, and uniformly sized, with the exception of the lower tier nut which was significantly larger. Striped and slightly fuzzy, they were quite handsome – certainly by mouse standards and possibly even by human standards.  I went outside to investigate the mouse’s marketplace to find which department offered this exact product.

Most the oaks in the immediate yard are White or Red oak variety. The ground is littered with them but they were not represented in the cabin mouse’s cache at all. A smaller tree, whose trunk is located about 15 feet from the south side of the place, proved to be the source. It was a Northern Pin Oak. I am ashamed to say, as naturalist, that I hadn’t bothered to identify this tree before.  Since this tree was not the closest one to the cabin, I can only suspect that it was a matter of taste and portability. “I’d walk a mile for a Northern Pin Oak” is apparently a popular cabin mouse ad phrase with the additional “and, I can walk a mile with a Pin Oak Acorn” as an amendment. Northern Pin Oaks are mouse-sized bites of survival.

I felt guilty in removing the nut piles (for some odd reason my wife refused to sleep with the nuts rolling around the pillow). Although the pillow acorns involved multiple short journeys – one nut at a time- between 10 and 15 feet, the bathroom collection represented a much more majestic effort. As far as I can figure, this trip involved 42 wall-hugging round trips of about 80 feet each; out the bedroom, right along the side wall under the corner table and then left along the wall towards the front door, past and under the wall furnace, a dash across the kitchen floor and a righty into the bathroom, a three foot ascent up the side of the bathroom shelf and into the drawer. One half of each trip with an acorn stuffed within its maw.

So, as a peace offering of sorts, I piled the acorns in the far corner of the living room as we left on a two week absence. I’m hoping the cabin mouse (or mice) can find a way to creatively re-distribute their wealth around their house.

Squirrels are dramatic creatures. It is easy to undersell them as nut-fixated simpletons who are constantly over-reacting to all manner of real and perceived threat. There is the road-crossing thing to consider as well. But we as a species can hardly point an accusatory finger. One observation trip to watch Walmart customers should confirm that we should be very humble when it comes to touting the superior human condition. I go to Walmart, by the way, so I am admitting that this pot is as black as the kettle.

On this note, Shakespeare didn’t invent the “pot calling the kettle black” imagery, but my use of it does bring up a literary thought (he did say that “the raven chides blackness” which evokes the same idea).  Imagine, if you will, a Shakespearian world of Squirrel drama and perhaps you’ll see these rodents in a new nobler light. Shakespeare populated his plays with all manner of fools and squirrel-like characters. If he had written actual squirrels into the roles then things would be different. “Romeo, oh Romeo where is thee my nut” might have made it into the mainstream. Playing Sciurus in “Roads Half Crossed” would be a choice role for aspiring actors.

As an example, let me forward a discussion of squirrel feet. In his play Troilus and Cressida, the Bard has Ulysses state: “The elephant hath joints, but none for courtesy: his legs are legs for necessity, not for flexure.” I other words, elephants are made to do elephant things (such as march in a line like in the Jungle Book).  Might he have used a Fox Squirrel’s amazing front foot as an example as well? “The squirrel has toes, but five is not his number: four the nut deed it does better than our five.”

Equipped with long toes, Fox Squirrels (as all tree squirrels) have evolved so that their fifth toe has become a rubbery nub. They also have two thick pads on their “wrist.” With this combination they are able to secure circular and orbitcular (whoa, that was definitely not a Walmart word) objects –aka nuts – with security. So held, the teeth can then do their thing and they can manipulate their food with precision and dexterity. An elegant piece of prose the squirrel foot is.

Ah, but squirrels do not just grab nuts with their sinewy fingers.  Over the course of the summer I witnessed one of my Red Squirrels feasting upon a muskrat skull. This certainly evokes that famous scene in Hamlet where Horatio and the prince examine Yorick’s skull. Seated on her favorite walnut devouring perch, the reigning queen Red Squirrel occasionally selects a muskrat skull from my pile (that’s another story) and devours it. Like all rodents they crave calcium and will eat any bone material they find. This is why shed deer antlers are so hard to find, by the way – thus the un-written line: “My resolve, like a shed horn in a squirrel wood, shant last.”

I find the muskrat/squirrel scene an especially poignant one because the two animals are cousins, although she could not have known the ‘rat in question. The Red Squirrel’s own skull is a smaller scale version of the muskrat’s noggin. Four self-sharpening front incisors are followed by a toothless gap and a double row of flat molars.  The incisors are frequently rubbed together with a forward motion of the lower jaw and their edges are thus honed (compare the two photos below). Sharp teeth cut through nut shells like butter. Squirrels, therefore, gnash their teeth on purpose. “Heavily my buck teeth grind -not of nervousness but of need.”

I stumbled upon on the dead body of one of my front yard Fox Squirrels last week. It was freshly dead with only a bloody nose. Because it was far from the deadly road that had claimed another squirrel the week previous, I could only conclude that it fell out of the Red Maple under whose branches it lay. Yes, squirrels do slip and fall to their death on occasion. Perhaps it was driven to madness by the government shutdown news or distracted by the recent death of his sibling. Whatever the cause, it tumbled to earth and remained there.

I’m not sure if any Shakespearian character ever fell to his/her death (thus revealing my squirrelish understanding of the genre) but I certainly know that ghosts and spirits abound within his world. Hamlet’s father appears as a ghost, for instance. Gazing upon the small dead rodent before me I wondered what afterlife, if any, is enjoyed by such creatures. Heaven must have animals in it. There are cats are in Hell, why can’t there be squirrels in heaven?

I picture my beast, now noble, entering into the heavenly fold at the base of a tremendous Walnut tree – a Walmart of nuts – which is piled with an endless cornucopia of orbicular pleasure. Shakespeare has Hamlet remark: “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”  If he’d written “There are more nuts in heaven and earth etc.” I suspect our world view of squirrels would be much better than it currently is.  “Sleep well my sweet prince.”

The bird was sitting so still and located so high up in the branches on the opposite shore that it was hard to spot. With Zen-like concentration the young Osprey was patiently fishing the River Raisin. It took me quite a while to spot it because I was directing my Zen at the rippling water, a nearby Fox Squirrel, and a cluster of tiny flitting warblers in the willows. While the sight of an Osprey isn’t unusual, the sight of one so late in the season is notable.

These elegant fish eagles are migrants and most of the population would normally be well on their way south by this time.  When I say south, by the way, I mean SOUTH as in South America. They over-winter in the rain forests of Venezuela, Columbia and the Amazon – actually spending more time in the tropics than they do stateside. Since this destination is nearly 3,000 miles, and nearly a month, away from the Sycamores of the Raisin, it is not advisable to delay departure.  This sighting prompted me to look into the migration records and see just how “out of season” this bird really was.  The ultimate answer in this case borders on the fine line between fashionably and significantly late.

Fortunately, there are a lot of folks out there banding and tagging Ospreys. The answer to a question regarding Osprey promptness is only a computer key click away. With the current transmitter technology at play, it is possible to remotely track an individual on a daily basis and there are numerous sites which display these results (check out www.ospreytrax.com for one fine example). This also means that I can just sit at my computer in my “jams” and benefit from the hard work of others in order to share the following facts.  Based on my extensive cyber-searching, I can state that a majority of the eastern Ospreys are booking to Brazil by late September and the first week in October.

One individual from the Ohio Valley was headed south by Sept. 20 and smoking cigars in Cuba by the 27^th. It crossed into Columbia by Oct. 5 and arrived at the Amazon River basin in Brazil on October 14. Another bird left Martha’s Vinyard on Sept. 20 and settled in for a long stay in Venezuela by Oct. 15. Among the later records, an Oct. 4 departure (again from the Martha’s Vinyard) resulted in a flyover of Cuba by the 15th.

Closer to home, the hawk watchers at the Detroit River migration site at Lake Erie Metropark  typically see a few southward bound Osprey crossing over from Canada through mid-October with a few stragglers extending into end of the month.  To date, they have recorded only 8 birds for this season with half of those peaking around Oct. 10. Last year only 18 birds crossed over and most were through by Oct. 12. It is notable that two birds came over on the last week of October. See, I told you this fact and figure stuff can be infectious.

It has just been reported that a transmitter banded bird, “Monroe Spark” raised on a nest in Northern Monroe County, was already texting that it arrived in Cuba as of Oct. 18, 2013 and was Haiti bound (the same day I spotted my Osprey on the Raisin). My bird, therefore, was a late bird by even Monroe, Michigan standards. It is tempting to use the phrase “young and dumb” to describe such a late leaving lagger however that would ignore the fact that “Spark” is also a young bird.

Before closing, I probably should explain how I can state that my un-named bird was a young Osprey. Let’s name him “Late” just for the heck of it. Without banding evidence, it is impossible to judge age beyond a few years (they can live 20 + years and travel over 100,000 miles in a lifetime).  Immature birds – aka young of the year -have dark orange eyes, breast speckling, and significant white scaling on the dark back feathers.  Adults have intense yellow eyes and solid brown backs (females can retain some spotting/buffiness around the upper chest).  Most of the young birds like “Late” stay down in the tropics a few years before returning to breed.

Finally, there is the issue of the fishing line dangling near “Late’s” perch. I didn’t notice this until looking at the images after the fact. From the angle of view it looked as if the line might have been entangled around the bird’s foot. As fisher birds, this is an all too frequent problem for Ospreys. Such a situation might be the cause of “Late’s” lateness, I thought.

I returned to the place by the river later in the day. The Osprey was gone and the fishing line was still hanging in place. It was probably dislodged from an earlier fish catch and was not entangled on the bird’s foot. Did “Late” finally leave for good? I can only hope that I should be receiving a post card from Brazil sometime on the week before Thanksgiving. It will read  ”Acaba de llegar. Disfrutando el sushi aquí. Firmado Tardío (Late).”*

*Just arrived. Enjoying the sushi here. Signed Late.

As a traditional Naturalist, I have always advocated bringing along a pair of binoculars on every field trip as a basic tool of the trade. In fact, I’ve even stressed the importance of always keeping a cheap pair with you – you know one that you can throw around a bit and don’t have to “protect” – just to be ready for those surprise situations when some critter or vista pops up unexpectedly.  A few degrees of magnification can spell the difference between turning a Robin into a Sharp-shinned Hawk, or panther into a house cat.  Lately, however, I’ve been re-thinking the idea a bit.

I still own binoculars, and use them on occasion, but find that I increasingly depend on my digital camera as my “go-to” nature study tool. I can use a camera as a binocular because they now are amazingly smart and optically breathtaking. I can use the images for identification and employ them to help others as well.

I was, shall we say, “introduced” to this concept several years ago on one of my public nature walks. One of the participants used his digital zoom camera to reveal that the Robin which I had confidently identified in yonder tree was actually a Sharp-shinned Hawk. His picture of the bird, even though it wasn’t all that great as a photo, clearly showed the red eye and buffy chest.  I ate crow and used the incident as a teachable moment. We clustered around the tiny screen and I was able to point out the key features. I also decided to carry my own camera on all my future walks – both public and personal – from that time forward.

Rather than drone on about this idea, let’s put up a few recent examples for display. This past weekend, I led a nature study group on a field trip at a local park. Several unidentified dickey birds were twittering back and forth in a yonder cluster of Cottonwood trees. They weren’t Robins or Sharp-shinned Hawks, but some larger dark bird among a host of smaller ones.

A few zooms and clicks of the camera and the birds magically transformed into a female Red-winged Blackbird and some winter phase Goldfinches. I gathered our gang to point out the field marks on the small screen so they could naked-eye these same field marks on the real birds before us. The female Red-wing was preening, so her head was plunged into her feathers, but her breast streaking and head markings were clear enough. “Red wings are true migrants,” I announced in my naturalist-as-leader voice. “Nearly every individual migrates out of the region for the winter and when they return they are the first sign of Spring.”  The Goldfinches were in greenish cast but their black wings sported a diagnostic set of white wing bars. I never had to reveal that I initially thought that the birds were Butterbutts (Yellow-rumped Warblers). How smart I appeared.

Neither of the photos (shown above) were of calendar quality, but good enough for field work.

At least three migrant Monarch Butterflies coursed by.  One landed nearby and a quick camera shot allowed me to display an extreme close-up of the wing venation. Lack of a gland spot on the hind wing was proof enough that it was a she and not a he. I did suggest that she was terribly late and probably would never make it to the mountains of Central Mexico, but at least she would look pretty while dying.

The Monarch incident was actually a case of bringing a close object even closer and this is the type of digital magic that a camera can also do. Further down the trail, I used my nature study tool to enlarge a tiny Eastern Tailed Blue Butterfly to the point where all could see his black and white antennae segmenting and the hairy fringe on the wing.

Not to be outdone by any finch, fowl or ‘fly, a sizable female Praying Mantis patiently stepped onto my palm and accepted the ride up to the collected gaze of the nature study group. In this case, our nature study endeavor involved direct eye to eye contact – the best of all natural experiences. Yet, even here I opted to take a few intimate portrait shots while she presented her noble profile against the autumn sky.

These shots showed the fine detailing of the “forearm” serrations, foot structure, and wing venation with nearly microscopic detail. Perhaps the most important thing to mention, in this circumstance, is that I chose to wait until after the beast had flown away before displaying these images. Ms. Mantid hung around for quite a while before propelling off into the Goldenrods. No matter what, it is always best to pay close attention to the real thing when it is there.  Nature study is all about the moment.

It has long been known that the camera captures moments but in its digital form it can also be an extra eye to enhance the moment as it occurs. I declare it an essential nature study tool.  If use of this device also happens to enhance the illusion that I am smart, who am I to argue with technology?

It wasn’t the bottom of the 9th, but more like the top of the 5^th when I finally quit the Tiger Baseball playoff game for the night. It was getting late and they were playing the A’s in Oakland and, well…it was late and “we” were winning , so please don’t get on me about being a true fan. Hey, did I say it was late? Well it was.  At any rate, I turned off the television and wheeled around to turn off the light when I saw someone looking at me through the sliding glass door. His face and the better part of his body, was pressed up against the glass. And, I should mention, he was completely naked.

If the sight had been that of a human Peeper (as in a Tom), the sight would have elicited a cascade of inner Psycho music and an immediate bowel-emptying incident. But, the Peeper in this scenario was a frog – not a Peeper (as in Spring) but a Tree Frog (as in Gray). I must admit that I jumped a tiny bit before fascination took over and I ran for my camera. Sure, late night frogs trump late night Tigers in this man’s world. It wasn’t really that late.

Technically there are two kinds of Tree Frogs in our region and both go by the name of Gray Tree Frog. Both climb trees, have pebbled skin, and trill like miniature raccoons. The Cope’s Gray Tree Frog is nearly identical in appearance to the standard Gray Gray Tree Frog except that it has a nasal quality to its voice along with a few more slight, but biologically significant, differences. My peeper was of the usual Gray Gray Tree Frog type.

Grays can alter their skin color from gray to green depending on their daytime camouflage needs (thus the scientific name Hyla versicolor). In spite of the name, the mottled green mode can be considered the default coloration since night hunting doesn’t require any camo. The belly view presented a display of the bright yellow inner leg patches typical of the species and also revealed the sex identity. It’s all about throat shading, you see. Males have dark throats while females have light ones. This peeper wasn’t a Tom after all, it was a Tomisina.

The creature was stuck to the glass like one of those plastic goo-balls. Although there is a slight possibility that she was trying to watch the Tigers game, I am fairly confident that it was seeking the insects which were attracted to the light. Regular old American Toads frequently hop about in the dim glow of the night window for the same reason. They, however, are earth bound fellows who can only dream of doing what their arboreal Anuran cousins can do. The only way that an American Toad could hope to stick to the window glass in this manner would be as Potato Gun ammunition (or if the house suddenly accelerated forward at 60 miles per hour). Gray Tree Frogs are equipped with so-called “sucker discs” that enable them to climb trees, branches, and slick surfaces such as glass.

It is actually better to refer to these structures as toe pads because they are not suction cups in the true sense of the word. Detailed micro photography of tree frog pads shows them to be covered with thousands of hexagonal structures separated by tiny crevices (see here) Mucous glands line the bottom of each crevice. In a remarkable case of natural form repetition, basalt formations such as those found at the Giant’s Causeway in Ireland duplicate this structure in mega scale (see here).  The surface of the Tree Frog columns are covered with tiny bumps, so they aren’t exactly like the Irish rock example. And, as far as I know, there are no mucous glands at the bottom of the Basalt columns but hopefully you can get beyond all that. Next time you are in Ireland you can hop across the crackled rock surface screaming “Look everyone, I’m a wee little leprechaun and am standing atop a tree frog toe pad.”  Please let me know how that goes for you in the case you get such a golden opportunity.

The little Gray Tree Frog lassie was able to climb the dry glass (oddly enough, an overly wet surface decreases this effect and the frog will slide) through the action of the sticky mucous and the multiple hex cells. Pressure creates suction. Release of same enables the walker to lift off and re-apply. Toes widely spread, each pad is allowed to make full contact for full effect.

Overall the effect is somewhat creepy when viewed by a sleepy human. I do wonder what this sleepy human looked like to the wee window frog. “Look everyone,” he might say, “I’m a wee little hopper and I’ve climbed the magic window and looked into the face of a two legged giant with three eyes.”