THIS is a Woodpecker!

I always thought the Red-bellied Woodpeckers were a fair sized bird until this morning, when one of their relatives landed on the suet feeder. This is a Pileated Woodpecker, who makes the other woodpeckers look a little small. There was a Downy on the other feeder that looked about as big as this one's head.

Fall Color

Migrant ducks finally started appearing at Huntley Meadows Park not too long ago- this is a male Pintail, one of my favorite ducks. I think this is a very classy color scheme. I hadn't even realized that they have a very pretty green marking on their wings, which can be seen if you click on the photo. The female Pintail is a little drabber.

Progress Isn't Always Wonderful

It's been a while since I've posted- I've been traveling a lot. This week has been pretty wild weather wise- lots of rain and temperatures in the 60's early in the week and temps in the low 40's today. Running some errands in Tysons Corner Tuesday and had a surprise land on the windshield as it was pouring rain- a Red-banded Hairstreak like the one pictured. A little late for this species- they're normally gone by September.

In other news, the yard has been put to bed- dead growth pulled up, a nice blanket of shredded leaves put on various beds, a native wildflower bed with various Monarch attracting flowers has been planted, a packet of Purple Milkweed seed (I tried raising some from seed this year but one species didn't germinate, so we'll give Winter a chance to give the seeds a nice freeze) has been put in
nearby, and a few more Crocus and Daffodils have gone in in various spots.

The bad news is that an overgrown and abandoned area near us that was a haven for various sparrows and Goldfinches is now under construction, so we'll see what that does with the feeder population this Winter.

Nature Ride

An interesting ride on the Western Maryland Rail Trail yesterday- started by seeing a Box Turtle walking across the trail, got to the west end of the trail and rescued a Wooly Bear caterpillar (it was probably safe, but I moved him anyway) and then on the way back to Hancock on our first leg we almost ran into a flock of seven Wild Turkeys. We couldn't have been more than five feet away from them, which for Wild Turkeys is pretty amazing. I suspect this was a bunch of juveniles, born this year, so they haven't smartened up yet. Right after that I moved a small Black Rat Snake off the trail- it was probably absorbing a bit of warmth from the nice warm asphalt. Didn't even try to bite (I've been nailed by a few of them- it draws blood) but seemed to think my nice warm hand was a good thing. The icing on the cake for the day was when I had a Mink run across the trail after we had lunch- this was a first for me.

Dinner Guests

We had dinner guests tonight- five juvenile Raccoons showed up to see what was for super. They decided the suet feeder was it. After a bit one of them reached out to the cord the feeder is on and hauled the feeder up "paw over paw" so all of them could nibble away. I was about 10 feet away- they kept making little "chuck" noises at me as they fed. We finally chased them away after they munched for a while.

Perchers and Flyers

I like perchers. Dragonflies are divided into two types- perchers and fliers. Perchers are dragonflies that have a territory that they'll patrol from a perch, spending quite a bit of time perching and watching. I have many, many pictures of perchers. They're cooperative- if you find a perching species, focus on the perch the dragonfly is on. Even if it leaves, most of the time it will patrol a territory and return to it or a nearby perch. That allows you to let the camera autofocus and get sharp shots.

Fliers, on the other hand, never stop moving unless it's dark and they find some place to perch, usually up in a tree where they're (1) impossible to see and (2) it's too dark to shoot anyway. As I was doing some dishes in the kitchen today I looked out at the pond and noticed we had a visitor- this Shadow Darner, a species that has visited the pond in the Fall for the last few years. This darner is a flier, which means it never stops moving. It took me about 40 shots, using manual focus (an interesting exercise), to get this shot, which was barely in focus. As an interesting note, as I was trying for the shot another darner came in and there was a brief dogfight before the other darner departed.

Bird Banding at ESP

Went out to Environmental Studies on the Piedmont today for a meeting and a tour of the property. Just before we climbed aboard the ATV this little Magnolia Warbler decided that it would rather be inside than outside and zipped through the door someone had left open (me). Tom Woods, the Director of ES, caught the warbler and gave Kevin Munroe and I a nice demonstration of how birds are banded. Tom did mention that normally it takes a little more time to catch the birds and you have to go outside to do it...

More shots of the banding procedure here:

http://www.pbase.com/harry1/banding

Magical Morning Moment

Back from being away for a few days and doing the morning ritual of filling the feeders- new suet cake, fill the sunflower seed feeder, and make up a new batch of sugar water for the hummers. Suet feeder has a Red-bellied on it a few minutes after I go inside to get the cooled off sugar water for the hummingbird feeder. I head outside to the deck, take the hummingbird feeder down, unscrew the bottle and turn it upright to fill it, and as I'm doing that a female Ruby-throated Hummingbird appears six inches away from the bottle and hovers, close enough so I can feel the breeze from her wings. She flies away, but just to a branch a few feet away to watch me putting the feeder back up on its hook. They're starting to fuel up in preparation for their long migration across the Gulf of Mexico south to Mexico; they'll lose a third of their body weight during the flight.

Argiope aurantia

A what? This is a Black and Yellow Garden Spider, just discovered in the back yard. Big guy- probably 2" across. An interesting fact about this spider is that it eats the center of the web every night and reweaves it. The web looked especially pretty this morning with a coat of dew on it. Harmless to people, but a fly might not survive a meeting with it.

Monarch News

In the butterfly news, more Monarch caterpillars were discovered on some Purple Milkweed plants I grew from seed this year. I decided to transfer the three that I found over to the Swamp Milkweed nearby so the Purple can get a good start this year. We're going to get the yard certified as a Monarch waystation- one of the requirements is that food plants are available. We have Swamp, Purple, and Indian milkweed plants as well as Butterfly Weed, another type, and this Fall I'll put some Common Milkweed seeds down at the top of the hill.

A Whatzit

Had an odd moth show up on the milkweed the other day- I've seen a few of these but was unable to get back with the camera before it flew off. I was pretty thrilled to get a new insect until I found out what it is- a Squash Vine Borer moth. This is a pest that lays eggs on squash vines which then hatch out into a caterpillar that burrows into the vine and eats it from within, killing some sections of the vine. As I found it four feet away from the squash patch this is not a good thing. Fortunately most of the vines are rooted in a few different places, so we won't lose much. We did just pick a nice healthy Butternut Squash and the season won't last too much longer, so it's not a major catastrophe.

Cycle of Life

Just noticed that there's a few small holes in some of the Swamp Milkweed leaves next to the back gate. Hmm. Do we have a vandal desecrating the milkweed? Let's put on our Sherlock Holmes hat and see who or what might be causing this. Step one: turn leaf over. Step two: look at underside of leaf. Step three: identify vandal. Yup, the usual suspect. Small, striped in black/yellow/white. Parent was around a few days ago- this is definitely a Monarch caterpillar. This one is about 3/8" long, but by next week will be double that size. The cycle starts again!

Sometimes the smallest and most unobtrusive butterflies can show some real beauty (or oddity). The first shot is an Eastern Tailed Blue- one of our smallest butterflies (they're about the size of a thumbnail). Normally they're seen fluttering around close to the ground, with only the pale blue outer surface of their wings visible. I've rarely gotten a shot of these little guys with their wings spread, but it's worth the wait- look at the second shot.

The third shot is of a Skipper butterfly feeding on some Swamp Milkweed. Click on the picture and check out that long tongue, which must be good for getting into the milkweed blossoms!

Wildlife on Monarch Lane

After mentioning the other day that visits from Monarchs had been pretty rare, I noticed that whenever I looked out in the yard today there was a Monarch feeding on the Swamp Milkweed. This leads me to believe that sometime soon something very small will start appearing underneath the milkweed leaves- the small object seen in the picture. This is a Monarch egg- about the size of a poppy seed. As mentioned before, as soon as the caterpillars hatch they start growing at an incredible rate. The Swamp Milkweed is still in full bloom, much to my surprise. It's probably because it's a bit shadier in our back yard so it blooms later than most of our local milkweed.

In other news, we have company- granddaughter Immi. Last night we ate outside on the deck, and Immi saw her first hummingbird- the hummingbird feeder was six feet away from where we were eating and the hummers were visiting the feeder as we ate. Also coming to the sunflower, thistle, and suet feeders next to that were three species of woodpeckers- a pair of Hairy Woodpeckers with one or two of their offspring (a pair showed up this winter and I hoped they would stick around), several Downy woodpeckers, and a juvenile Red-bellied, dressed nicely in almost all gray. I'm assuming it'll acquire adult plumage withing the next year.

Two Encounters

One close and one a little further away. The first is a family of swans on a pond near where I was doing a butterfly count the other weekend. These are not your Mute Swans found in city parks and the like; these are Trumpeter Swans.

Second shot is of a visitor that's been a little rare this year- a Monarch butterfly. We haven't seen too many of them this year, and the ones that have appeared on the Swamp Milkweed in the back yard have been feeding but I haven't seen any of them laying eggs yet. When that happens the caterpillars grow at an unbelievable rate- before you know what's happened several of the milkweed plants have been decimated and we start finding the chrysalises here and there. I'm guessing at least 35 of them emerged in our yard last year and headed south.

What's Up?

This is the little plot on the side of the garden- always interesting to see what comes out of the compost pile. Seen in the top picture, left to right, are an odd pair of heirloom tomatoes from Russia, Purple and Indian Milkweed plants in pots which are about to be transplanted, an Avocado, another regular red tomato, a Ginger plant, three different members of the squash family (Pumpkin, Delicata, and Butternut Squash) and a row of ornamental beans along the fence. All the squash plants originally started in the compost pile. The second picture is, I suspect, a pumpkin- it's about 10" or so around right now. The little light colored patch near the gate at the bottom of the fence is a Cicada Killer burrow- there's a few more in and around the plot.

Also noted recently were Goldfinches feeding on something on the Swamp Milkweed- they're so light they barely make the milkweed stems bend down. They also get busy on the Black-eyed Susans and various other daisy like plants at this time of the year taking the seed heads apart.

Noted at or near the feeders this morning were Hummingbirds, Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers, Mourning Doves, a Towhee, Carolina Chickadees, Titmice, and a Song Sparrow.

Nocturnal Visitor

Finally got a good drenching thunderstorm this evening- rain barrel has been dry for too long. It fills up very quickly when we get rain, and the rainwater is good for watering the tomatoes, which we're starting to pick quite a few of. The Yellow Pear plant is now two feet over my head and being supported not only by its cage but also by a nearby bush it's leaning on. As though to celebrate the rain, a large American Toad appeared on the front sidewalk. I decided that he would be happier in the backyard with a bit more cover and all sorts of nice things for him to eat, especially slugs. He expressed his displeasure at being picked up by urinating copiously all over my hand. Posted by Dirck Harris at 7:54 PM

Got Them Summertime Blues....

Blue eyes, blue body, and blue wings, that is. First shot is a Swamp Darner I found on the bike path this morning while I was out riding- this is one of our larger dragonflies. It was in the process of expiring due to unknown causes, so i brought it home with me, took a few closeups, and dropped it off at Huntley Meadows so they could use it as a teaching aid.

The next shot is a Great Blue Skimmer, also fairly large. This species is abundant at Huntley- they were busy chasing each other around being territorial in the Cattails. They're also very approachable, so getting nice shots of them isn't hard.

The last shot is a Red-spotted Purple (the red spots are on the underside of the wings) on the boardwalk. For a change we're having a warm day with relatively low humidity, so the boardwalk in the afternoon was bearable.

Morning Discovery

Made a nice discovery as I was loading to bike on the car for a little sweating practice on the trail this morning. Walked past a clump of Hostas and noticed a big dead leaf on one of them. Took a closer look and discovered this Polyphemus moth clinging to a leaf. The wingspread on this moth is almost as wide as my hand is long ((click on the picture and you'll see an almost life sized picture). The adults don't feed, and have a pretty short lifespan- the females emerge and emit a pheromone at night that attracts males from quite a distance away. It's odd to pick up a moth this big and discover that you can actually feel a little weight to them. I suspect this specimen is near the end of its lifespan, seeing some fraying at the edges of its wings.

Buzz Cut?

I've been having an interesting time watching our colony of Cicada Killer wasps for the last few weeks. Lots of little territorial battles going on around the side gate, all in about 20 square feet. You can walk right through a group of them and they'll completely ignore you- but the ignoring got a little weird when two of them that were chasing each other flew so close to to top of my head I felt the breeze from their wings as they flew by. Note to self: wear hat when observing.

A Small Tragedy

Just heard a group of Robins squawking across the street, and saw one of the local cats running with a juvenile Robin in its mouth, still flapping, with the parents frantically in pursuit. I love cats, but this one's preventable, folks (we have three in the house, two of which used to be outside cats). There's nothing that can be done about this, unfortunately- this is a hot button issue for some cat owners and reason doesn't enter into it.

More information:

http://www.sibleyguides.com/conservation/causes-of-bird-mortality/

Backyard Killers

Cicada Killers, that is. This is a wasp species that preys on Annual Cicadas- the females find a cicada in the trees, sting it, and then pick the cicada up, haul it up a tree, and launch themselves into the air to get back to their burrows. It can take them a few tries and several climbs to gain enough altitude for the flight. Once there, they drag the cicada down the hole, lay an egg on it, and then seal the hole. The egg hatches into a larvae that eats the cicada and them metamorphoses into an adult wasp. The cicadas are a bit larger than the wasps, who are themselves about an inch and a half long. At present there's three or four males (this is one of them) squabbling over territory near the side gate. They will check you out if you walk near the fence but are actually not aggressive towards humans. As they're the size they are, though, and with the bright black and white abdomens, they definitely get your attention, especially when they buzz past you a foot away. Occasionally as they're chasing each other they'll collide with the siding on the house with a very audible "thunk".

Skimmers at Work & Play

The Slaty Skimmers were busy making more skimmers at Huntley Meadows on a hot and humid Sunday morning. I've never seen them as abundant before- saw at least four or five mating pairs (like the pair pictured- the male is the dark blue one) and there were many, many more zipping around chasing each other. I saw about six or seven males in one spot vying for a single females attention. Dragonflies form a wheel position when the male grabs the female by the back of the head and the female bends her abdomen around to pick up a sperm packet from the male. Also seen were a few Spangled Skimmers (bottom picture).

New Arrival

The Red-bellied Woodpeckers have been very busy at the sunflower seed feeder in the last few weeks. Looked outside yesterday and saw an unusual mostly gray woodpecker on the suet. Took a closer look and realized why the Red-bellies have been so busy- it was an immature Red-belly, so that explains why the adults have been so busy. Many mouths to feed.

Dancers in the Yard

Very small ones, that is. This is a Variable Dancer damselfly- about 1 1/2" long. There's at least three species of damselflies in the yard right now, this being one of them. The males are a beautiful violet shade as seen here. They're a ferocious little predator for their size- I was out by the pond one day and saw a little gnat or midge of some kind flying across the water. A damselfly appeared out of nowhere, grabbed the bug in midair, and flew back to a leaf to eat its prey.

Lots of things in bloom right now- Echinacea, Yarrow, some of the Hostas, Shasta Daisies, and the big stand of Monarta up at the top of the hill. The Monarta has a tendency to get carried away and sends out runners; last year I pulled a bunch of it up and this year it looks as though I didn't do anything at all to it. The Joe Pye Weed is up to eight feet or so, maybe a little taller, and is about to bloom.

Backyard Songbird

Ever been sitting in the backyard on a nice humid evening and had a really loud bird of some kind start trilling? And you can't for the life of you find the culprit? Well, I was doing some pruning in the backyard and found the usual suspect. This is a Gray Tree Frog, seen here (if you click on the picture) a little bigger than life size. This one was probably about 1 1/2" long. The sound they make is out of all proportion to their size.

Send Us Some Rain, Please

Lots of mudflats at Huntley Meadows this afternoon, as rainfall has been a bit absent. As I was on the boardwalk I heard a person remark that Huntley "was in the summer doldrums". Things I saw: Heard a crunching sound from the Cattails. Looked over and saw some moving vegetation, and then a Muskrat appeared, chopping down a Cattail. The stalk disappeared, and then the Muskrat appeared directly below me, probably only three feet away, dragging the Cattail off somewhere. This was the fourth one I'd seen today. There were turtles all over the place- Eastern Painted, big Snappers moving through some shallow water, a few Red-eared Sliders, and one tiny Snapper moving through some mud in search of something. Dragonflies were hawking about- Common Whitetail, Needhams, Blue Dasher, one huge unidentified one, and the first Great Blue Skimmer I've seen this year. Frogs all over the place- as there's so little water, the Leopard frogs really stand out- they're attractive in their green or brown phases. Several species of swallows- Rough-winged, Barn, and Tree. Four or five Great Egrets, and to top it all off, what I thought was a possible Anhinga, an extremely rare visitor (thanks to Kevin Munroe, who went out with a scope later and confirmed that it was actually an immature Double-crested Cormorant). These are the doldrums?

Today's News

The Daylilies are coming into full bloom on a beautiful spring morning. We've had a string of 90 degree or higher days thrown at us and to make up for it yesterday barely got past 80 or so with very low humidity. The Stella D'Oro lilies have been in full bloom for a few weeks; the regular ones shown here are just getting there. The ornamental beans over near the fence have grown a foot in a few days and are starting to wind their way around the string I just put up for them. All the tomatoes have really taken off- several of the earlier planted ones are now at about three feet and climbing. I'm trying to keep them pruned and have been removing suckers- as we have eight plants there is going to be a good supply of tomatoes.

All the Purple and Indian Milkweed seedlings that were growing down in the basement under plant lights have been repotted and moved outside, and appear to be doing well. Some of the Purple Milkweed seedlings will be donated to Meadowlark Gardens when they've gotten a bit bigger. The Elephant Ears have all sprouted and in a few more weeks will be displaying their three foot long leaves at the plots near the driveway and beside the pond. They make the yard look very tropical.

On the ornithological side of things, we discovered a Cardinals nest with two eggs in it near the deck. Checked on it this morning and the eggs have disappeared- possibly a Crow or a Blue Jay found them and decided they'd have a snack.

Send me a Sign? Certified!

No, not that kind of certified. Got this sign a few weeks ago from the "Audubon at Home" program. We had a visit from an Audubon at Home Ambassador from the Audubon Society to look at the backyard and tell us what we needed to do to become certified. Requirements for the program are that you provide food, shelter, water, and have a certain number of target species visiting the yard. After a tour of the back yard and going over the checklist of target species (certain birds, amphibians, butterflies, etc.) it was determined that the visit was mainly a formality. A nice moment during the visit was when a male Common Yellowthroat (a warbler) landed in the yard minutes after I explained that we didn't see warblers in the yard very often. More information on the Audubon at Home program can be found here: http://audubonva.org/

In other news, my last post mentioned that feeder activity had lessened. Well, the last few days it's really picked up- the Hairy Woodpeckers that came back one at a time decided they like the new suet cake I put out this morning and both of them showed within minutes of my putting the cake out- I watched the male break off a chunk of suet and feed it to the female. Also liking the suet yesterday was a large male Common Grackle who did something interesting. Perching on the suet feeder spinning around like they usually do (the Woodpeckers seem far more stable) he broke off a big chunk of it, ate a few pieces, and then took the remaining portion down to the pond where he swished it around in the water for a bit before flying off with it, probably to feed a baby.

Also noted were quite a few visits by Hummingbirds- I was standing near the feeder at one point and heard the whirring sound of one of them coming to the feeder not more than three feet away. For something that small they're pretty fearless.

Mother Nature...

...can always surprise you. From the last post: "The Hairy Woodpeckers that were visiting the suet feeder regularly didn't appear to like the construction, and haven't been back since."

Well, we were eating supper last night and I looked over at the suet feeder. Hmm. That Downy Woodpecker looks a little big, and a little too dark. It was a Hairy, not a Downy, on the suet. Maybe they just wanted to make sure the construction had definitely stopped.

Anybody Seen Spring?

Yesterday as I was driving down Gallows Road the car thermometer indicated 102 degrees. That's not far off what the actual temperature was- it hit 98 yesterday. Today is a bit more moderate- humidity is down and we actually have the windows open. Spring seems to have vanished. We had a new deck put in during some rainy weather, and some areas of the yard turned into a mudhole. A little first aid to some of the spots has been necessary. Of course, right after the deck was put in we've transitioned to near-drought conditions. A lot of the rainstorms have gone right around us, so I've been doing some watering, especially for the tomatoes.

The Hairy Woodpeckers that were visiting the suet feeder regularly didn't appear to like the construction, and haven't been back since. Visits to the feeder have slowed down- I'm assuming that there's more food available elsewhere. On the other hand, there's a Mourning Dove nest next to the house in an evergreen next to the heat pump with a dove sitting on it. Catbirds are still regular visitors to the yard- even if you can't see them their odd calls still resonate in the bushes. I suspect they like the Forsythia for the dense cover it provides.

The pond got cleaned out last week- you couldn't see the bottom due to algae growth and the leaves and other debris (oak flowers among other things). As the Cattails are now well over six feet tall they're competing with the algae for nutrients and the algae is losing, so the water is going to stay clearer. While I had the pond drained I took inventory of the fish in it- we still have the big white Koi, two Goldfish (one big, one small- something got the other bigger Goldfish) and four or five Green Sunfish, which have picked up a good bit of size. They were put in the pond to control the Goldfish population. It's amusing to throw worms into the pond- sometimes the Goldfish get them, but most of the time there's a flash of a sunfish darting out from cover and inhaling the worm. We put three Water Hyacinth plants in the pond recently and one (seen above) has bloomed. When it gets warmer in July and August the Water Hyacinth will grow so fast it will cover the entire pond if we don't keep hauling bunches of it out and throwing it in the compost pile. Damselflies of at least two species have reappeared in and around the pond, and one female Blue Dasher Dragonfly has put in an appearance. Last week as we came home there was an Ebony Jewelwing (see above) flitting through the front yard- they're occasional visitors.

On the land side, the Joe Pye Weed is now up to about six feet. Two years ago when I planted this it only reached about four feet, so I thought it was a dwarf version. I came back from Iowa last year in July and it was at least eight feet tall, covered with pink flower heads, and had at least twenty Tiger Swallowtails feeding on it. I've also succeeded in raising two additional milkweeds from seed- Indian and Eastern Purple, so if the seedlings survive there will be additional attractions for the Monarchs.

By the way, if you click on the photos above you get a bigger version.

More red.

The Poppys are just about gone. They bloom and fade away in just a few days.

Red-eyed Monster?

No, just a Coot at Huntley meadows (click on the picture to get a better look at those red eyes). There was a pair of these near the boardwalk, allowing some nice shots. Coots are in a family of odd waterbirds- they're not ducks. Mainly vegetarians. They're also divers- they disappear suddenly and then pop back to the surface with water rolling off their backs. If you see one out of the water their feet are huge- looking as if they borrowed their big brothers shoes.

Completed a Birdathon for Audubon naturalist Society yesterday- went out the door at about 7:00 and by the time I rolled back in at 8:00 in the evening I had recorded 70 species of birds, ranging from Bald Eagles to Ruby-throated Hummingbirds to Yellow-billed Cuckoos. Spent time at Huntley Meadows, Mason Neck State Park, and Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge.

Spectacular Visitor

Just had a Scarlet Tanager drop by the pond to take a bath- bright red body with black wings. He made the male Cardinal next to him look dull. Couldn't get a shot, unfortunately.

Another (Small) Migrant

First Ruby-throated Hummingbird of the year appeared today at the hummingbird feeder- a male. This tiny little guy has just flown non-stop across the Gulf of Mexico, losing a good percentage of his body weight on the way. They feed on nectar and small insects. The feeder only went up yesterday.

Narrow Escape

This male Box Turtle had a narrow escape today. I was coming back from Home Depot and spotted him upside down right in the middle of a very busy Rt. 50. By the time I slammed the brakes on and pulled off to the side, the light in back of me had changed and both lanes of the road were filled with onrushing cars, several of which drove over him. By the time I ran back to where he was, waving one oncoming car over to the next lane (the driver looked at me as though I was insane), he'd been clipped and was upright again. Amazingly enough, he was untouched. He's in a box right now at home and will be released shortly in a safer spot.

First There's Blue

This is a migratory Columbine. We received a few clumps of Royal Lily Hostas a few years ago that had these blue Columbines mixed in with them. They happily lived amongst the Hostas for a few years until the Hostas grew thick enough to crowd them out. They have since moved sideways, and are now happily colonizing more parts of the yard. These are the first colors to come out- there's some pale pink ones just coming out, the smaller native ones are just budding, and the huge clump of double ones up on the hill are also just starting to bud.

Also poking their first shoots up are the Swamp Milkweed and the Butterfly Weed, both milkweeds. There will hopefully be three more varieties if some seeds I have in the refrigerator germinate when planted in two weeks, so the Monarchs will be happy. Ajuga, Creeping Phlox, and Violets are in bloom. The Monarda is up about six inches, and the bank of white Azaleas is in full bloom across the back of the yard.

On the fauna side of things, a new species of dragonfly paid a visit to the pond today- a Painted Skimmer.

Spring Migrants (Part II)

First Gray Catbird appeared in the backyard yesterday- heard it before I saw it. Catbirds like to sit in the middle of a bush and do imitations of other birds calls, as well as some weird chuckles and other sounds, including the trademark "Meow", from where they get their name. We had an Audubon at Home Ambassador visit today so we can certify our backyard as a wildlife habititat. One of the requirements is that you have to list certain species- as if on cue a Common Yellowthroat Warbler appeared during the visit and began foraging around in the yard, showing one of the target species (they don't normally hang around in our yard).

Saw another Catbird down at Huntley Meadows today, where Spring has exploded. Seen were: Common Yellowthroat (warbler) Gray Catbird, Swamp Sparrow, Osprey, Red-winged Blackbird, White-eyed Vireo (heard), Green Darner Dragonflies laying eggs, Green & Bullfrogs, Eastern Painted, Snapping (a pair mating), and Red-eared Slider turtles, and various other species.

Spots

Spent an hour at Huntley Meadows today on a glorious Spring day. A nice catch was a group of three Spotted Turtles sunning themselves within three feet of each other- they're not common so seeing three together is unusual. While on the observation tower watched this Carolina Chickadee feeding on new leaf sprouts for fifteen minutes or so. This was a new behavior to me as I thought they shifted over to insects at this time of the year. this one was really going to town on the buds.


In addition to the residents, heard two new arrivals- the familar witchedy-witchedy-whitch of a Common Yellowthroat (saw it moments afterwards), probably the most common warbler in the park, and heard a White-eyed Vireo making their odd call somewhere in the brush. Also saw the first dragonflies of the year yesterday at Huntley- six or seven Green Darners, usually the first of the dragonfly species to show up every year.

Spring Migrants & A Release

A visitor just arrived from the south- a Brown Thrasher. Saw something running around at the top of the hill that appeared to be too big for a sparrow, so ran and got the binoculars. Caught one of these (the picture is mine, but it's not the actual bird) foraging around underneath a bush, flinging twigs and leaves around. Most people take these for a Thrush of some kind- they're actually in the same family as Mockingbirds and Catbirds and aren't related to the true thrushes. They have the same tendency to sit in the undergrowth and mimic different birds, and thus are part of the mimic thrush family.

In other news, the little Brown Snake that was living in a plastic bin in the basement was released into the wild (our backyard) yesterday during an 85 degree day.