We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
They are a bummer for surfers and we body-surfer fanatics, but I guess it is a conservation success. Historically, they were abundant up there until the fishermen shot all of the seals.
The restaurant is now open, but sharks can't tell a seal from a person. Why would they care anyway? Sharks are not humanitarians.
Wolves were exterminated in the Northeast US centuries ago. In the 1800s, the sheep farmers hated them, put bounties on them, and killed every last one.
The piece of New England where we were trout fishing yesterday was packed full of mostly-migrating warblers. A migrant trap. In a week, most will have gone north to breeding grounds.
This stream valley is a first-growth woodlands, plenty of underbrush (Shadbush, wild azalea, Mountain Laurel, etc.) and some small swamps full of swamp critters. A few pasture giant trees still standing. Probably was pasture 70 years ago, with woodlots on the slopes. Instead of cattle tramping through the stream, it's back to nature with otters, beaver, and a new forest.
Warbler migration time in May is big fun for birders. One reason is because they are in breeding plumage. Another is because they pass through in great waves, unlike fall migration back to South and Central America. A third reason, I guess, is because all of our other passerine migrants arrive at the same time as the warblers.
My goal would be to ID warblers by their song instead of trying to catch them by binoculars. They flit through the new leaves so frenetically, and some are so high, that it's just annoying. They have moved by the time you get the binocs up.
If I could memorize most of their tunes (and all other passerines), I'd consider that a huge life accomplishment. I could walk through a place like a blind person, still "seeing" everything.
As I have said, the most warbler species I have ever seen in one day (24) was in NYC's Central Park in a May some years ago. Here's a sample of what birders do in May, on the US Central Flyway in Ohio -
Before I dig a little into this topic, a perspective and a few definitions.
Every Eastern gardener knows well how much nature wants to turn your garden into a grassy weed-patch, then into a woodland. Humans force nature to obey with great difficulty. Everyone who sanctimoniously bemoans deforestation in South America and Africa should first look out their window to see one's local deforestation.
Our Great Plains, it is believed, were at least partly the result of Indian burning practices and wildfire. And the Scottish moors? Much is the result of deforestation too, but they are beginning to re-plant. Permanent deforestation is definitely a bad thing from a conservation standpoint, but often not from a human economic standpoint. Manhattan Island is now pretty nice without the forest.
Clear-cutting, as opposed to selective logging, involves cutting almost every tree down in an area, with the intention that things will grow back. It is an efficient form of silviculture because, when the woods grow back whether re-planted or just re-seeded by Nature - most of the new trees will be ready for harvest at the same time. Unlike deforestation and selective harvesting, clear-cutting restarts the clock of natural forest succession, just as does forest fire or severe wind damage. Fire is a key to woodland health and diversity: we see the unhappy consequences of fire suppression in the West, with apocalyptic fires due to fallen dead trees rather than routine smaller fires which efficiently recycle forest litter. In an era of unnatural and probably foolish fire suppression by government (essentially a subsidization of the lumber industry and the vacation-home real estate business), only clear-cutting can imitate the normal cycle of forest succession and renewal, habitat diversity, and thus the species diversity, that conservationists seek.
(An aside on the subject of forest succession. This much-studied topic is difficult to discuss in any general way, because every habitat, region, latitude, altitude and soil has its own pattern of forest succession following disturbance. There are even areas where the normal climax forest is never achieved, as in some areas of the South where fire maintains fire-resistant pine forest in areas where deciduous trees would otherwise be the climax forest. Each stage of forest succession has specialized species which are adapted to it - and to it only. One example, from Ohio. I will need to do a piece just on the subject of forest succession, sometime.)
Which brings me to the subject of environmental concerns. I think of environmentalists as being of either the sentimental-esthetic sorts, the politically-motivated sorts, and the hard-nosed scientific sorts. This might be an unfair depiction, but I think it holds up much of the time. Mature forests are wonderfully attractive to the human eye, but, in most US ecosystems they have little biodiversity and support fewer species of plants and animals than transitional woodlands or woodland edges. Also attractive are lovely rolling green meadows, but they are about as natural as lawns, and it requires plenty of gasoline and machinery to maintain that unnaturally scenic, clean-cut condition.
The controversy, it seems to me, derives from the emotional, not the factual. It's my conclusion that clear-cutting, judiciously applied, preserving contiguous areas of mature forest and without destroying streams with erosion, best duplicates the natural condition of the life cycle of woodlands, which, in nature, are always a work in progress and never complete.
Nature is a dynamic, changing thing, but the human infestation of the planet begs for thoughtful stewardship, and sometimes that means compensating for our actions: it's our big garden, now.
Photo on top: An example of deforestation in the form of a Vermont hayfield
Photo below: Smokey the Bear, Capitalist Tool in the service of the lumber industry!
Around here, anyway. It means they have laid their eggs, and do not wish to advertise their presence. It's not just Robins, it's all of the songbirds.
All the same, for the next several weeks the crows will be swooping everywhere to steal the songbirds' eggs and nestlings. They know how to find them.
In other breaking news, our wrens are back this morning. Welcome home, little friends.
Have not seen a warbler yet but our trees have not leafed out yet -still just tree flowers. Not ornamental, just yellowish tree blossoms spewing pollen.
Ribbon Snakes are long (up to 30 inches), skinny members of the Garter Snake family, found across the Eastern half of the US.
We saw one slithering along a pond edge in New England two weeks ago. They like to hunt near water and marshes for bugs, tadpoles, etc., but I've seen them sunning on woodpiles a ways from ponds.
I thought I knew quite a bit about North American (mostly meaning east of the Mississippi) forests. Nope. This helped me be a far more informed hiker.
This is a sequential series of 3. I had to watch it all twice. One of the best youtubes we've ever posted. I lied - I watched it 3 times because it was so absorbing.
Right now our White-throated Sparrows have headed north along with the Juncos, and Song Sparrows have arrived for the summer and their breeding season.
They live all across the USA and most of Canada. A cheerful song.
Mrs. BD and I took a 5-mile woodsy hike last weekend and passed many vernal pools and small ponds with the early springtime chorus.
Like owls, you hardly ever see these critters but they let you know they are there in April. Mating calls of common early Spring frogs of vernal pools and shallow marshes:
The tiny Spring Peepers dominate the chorus. Man, have I loved that sound since earliest childhood:
You will probably hear a few Wood Frogs:
You might hear a Cricket Frog:
And the mating trill of Mr, Toad: Bufo Americanus:
Large natural fresh-water ponds with marshes are scarce in the northeast US. If you know of one, where is it and what is it like? I've seen a few in MA, but most were post-glacial and have since filled in as bogs or wetlands or grass, if not trees.
With the return of the beaver populations, fresh habitat is available for all of these critters. I like man-made marshes too.
Funny - I've never seen a Mallard in a tree before.
As weather warms up (not yet) they have a very sweet call before they depart to breed in the coniferous parts of Canada.
A similar bird, the White-Crowned Sparrow, is rarely seen here because they migrate from their breeding gounds on the tundra to winter further south. They do not seem to stop by for a rest.
A friend sent his photos of Snow Geese wintering around Lake Wyandotte in Kansas this week. They are abundant. In fact, they are accused of destroying the tundra. Last I heard, during hunting season there is no limit in many states.
Unlike Canada Geese whose feathers can bounce off birdshot at distance, Snow Geese, in the words of a friend, "go down like a prom dress."