Motherly Musings

Sandhill Crane Family

The older I get, the more I appreciate moms. And being the product of a long line of mothers (as most of us are), as well as being a mother myself, I think I am in a position to have something to say about the topic.

There are all sorts of ways to mother, ranging from simply depositing eggs and moving on, to full on over-involvement and smothering. I hope my kids see my own personal mothering style as falling somewhere to the "more involved" side, but just short of driving them crazy. There are moms who do everything alone and those who have a nurturing partner, or a posse of friends and family to share in the important task of raising young. There are moms who just aren't up to the job, but there are also those who step into the role of being a mom, even though the children are not their own offspring. There are good moms and bad moms and everything in between. In nature it is less a matter of good or bad mothering, but rather adaptations and strategies for successfully passing on one's genes. In some species, quick development or mass quantities of eggs may lead to success, while in others, shared parenting or lengthy maturation and nurturing may be necessary. Humans fall into the lengthy nurturing and shared parenting category. But no matter what kind of mother, it is a tough job. It takes smarts, strength, tenacity and nerve. Motherhood is not for wimps.

It all begins in much the same way, with an encounter: a coupling, maybe just a moment of passion, or possibly a beautiful relationship.

Mating Red Shouldered Hawks

Mating Ladybugs

Then comes the urgent matter of preparing a safe place for that next generation. Butterflies search hard for the perfect host plant on which to lay their eggs. The hatching caterpillars will eat the plant they are placed upon, and as they grow they become targets for predators. The plant itself may provide a chemical defense for the caterpillar, as in the case of a Pipevine Swallowtail or a Monarch Butterfly. The mother butterfly needs to pick wisely because after she lays the eggs, her work is done.

Gulf Fritillary Eggs and Caterpillars on Passion Vine

Likewise, with toads and frogs, many of whom lay their eggs after lots of singing and fanfare, but hop away after the deed is done. With luck, the puddle doesn't dry up or the eggs aren't eaten before they hatch. It's a risky business, which is why they lay so many.

Southern Toad Eggs Strands in a Pond

Some ray and shark embryos are encased in hard egg sacs called "Mermaid's Purses" that they lay and leave on the ocean floor. The young animal hatches from the egg and the empty "purses" sometimes float on the waves to the shore, like the one pictured below. The Common Octopus, on the other hand, lays clusters of eggs (200-500,000) in her lair and stays with them, fluttering moving water over the eggs to keep them oxygenated and safe while they grow. She doesn't leave them, even to eat, and may consume some of her own arms while she waits. When the eggs hatch, the mother octopus dies soon after from exhaustion and starvation.

Mermaid Purse

Woodpeckers and other cavity builders like Nuthatches scope out the right tree and then spend hours excavating and spewing out sawdust with only their bills as tools. Gnatcatchers and Hummingbirds construct nests made of lichen and spider silk, while Boat Tailed Grackles hide their grass and stick nests in shrubs and Gentoo Penguins make rock nests on the ground, with the Skuas watching nearby. In these cases, both parents work together to build the nest and care for the hatched chicks.

Nuthatch Excavating a Nest. Note dust plume to the left.

Pileated Woodpecker pitches out the debris from a nest cavity

Gentoo Penguin Nest Colony, with some chicks hatched already

Boat-tailed Grackle Sits on Nest

Blue-grey Gnatcatcher sits on nest constructed of lichen and spider webs

And then the waiting begins. Sitting and warming and guarding the eggs. Or in the case of Alligators, letting the heat from the decomposing grass nest warm the eggs while the mama watches nearby. Animals that give live birth must eat for two or three or more as the young inside them grow larger and larger, kicking and squashing bladders, changing their mother's body with the chemistry of hormones and the impact of sheer volume. Being pregnant is uncomfortable.

Blue-footed Booby nesting on the ground. It is sitting on one egg while guarding a hatched chick.

Sometimes careful tending and watching is in all vain and the eggs or young are taken as food for another creature. Birth itself is perilous and painful, sometimes taking the life of either mother or baby. The newborn babies are so small and vulnerable. I am not sure if spiders or frogs notice or care if their young are eaten. But birds are noticeably disturbed when a chick is taken or dies, and mammals like dogs and elephants will mourn and become depressed at the loss of a baby.

Yellow Rat Snake has cleaned out a woodpecker nest (count the eggs)

Mother Sea Lion mourns newborn dead pup.

Tiny Opossum Baby fell off the mother and didn't survive, despite our efforts.

Result of a raid on a nest

Skua and Chick near the Gentoo Penguin colony. Skuas eat penguin chicks.

Despite the best efforts of the watchful parents, Otters ate most of these Black Swan chicks.

Successful hatching and birthing brings about the next challenge of keeping the baby fed and safe until it is ready leave the nest. Those tiny hatchling octopuses and toads will have to make it on their own. But birds and mammals rely on parents, sometimes both mother and father. According to one article I read, Chickadees need over 9000 caterpillars to raise a batch of chicks, so two parents and abundant caterpillars come in handy.

Hungry Swallows see Mama

Nursing takes calories and mama mammals, such as Monkeys, Manatees, Maras constantly search for food. Try eating enough to nurse a baby Rhino! Or an elephant!

Nursing Monkey

Mama Manatee

Mara Family at the Bueno Aires Zoo

Baby and Mama Rhino at the Berlin Zoo

Parents guide the youngsters as they learn to forage for themselves, watching carefully and warning them when danger is nearby. Beware a protective mother bear or alligator!

Mama Bear and Cub in Desolation Canyon, Utah. We had to be very careful not to leave food in the camp because the bears were hungry and knew that people had food in camps.

Turkey Family teaching chicks to forage

Watchful Mama Gator

And then the youngsters try life out on their own. Sometimes they take missteps and have close calls. Often they have protection from a herd or from helpful people. But eventually they are really ready to spread their wings and be independent.

Robin Fledgling

Twin Armadillo babies whose mother had been hit by a car. They were in the care of a wildlife rescue organization.

Wild Horse herd stands guard around newborn

Baby White-breasted Nuthatch I rescued from my curious dogs. It flew away later.

Baby Black Racer sunning on the sidewalk and shooed away from pedestrians.

Baby Snapping Turtle on the trail. I moved it out of harms way but couldn't tell if it was injured, sick or just small and tired and lost.

Speaking as a mother, I find this whole business of raising children to be at the same time very hard, scary, wonderful and rewarding. I adore my daughters and am in awe of the capable and fabulous adults they have become. I don't know if other creatures feel the same after their young have left the nest--whether or not they have longing memories of snuggling sweet smelling babies or spend long nights worrying about them when the going gets tough. I do know that there is a strong instinct to protect our young, to ensure the success of the next generation. Though my daughters are grown, I still feel protective, worrying when they are sick, stressed or sad. I continue to have great hopes for their futures. I imagine that I will feel the same way for the rest of my life, as I imagine my mother feels for me, and her mother before her. Like I said, I come from a long line of mothers, and for that, I am very thankful.

Newly emerged Black Swallowtail, getting ready for its first flight

Fledglings

When you live in a college town everyone feels the rhythm of the academic year. Summer is relatively quiet. Come August, though, excitement builds as students arrive. The stores and roads are busier, nighttime near campus is rowdier, and everyone wears school colors as the football season begins again. There is a lull during the winter holidays, but the bustle returns once the Spring semester gets underway. In March and April the mood becomes more serious. Shorts and flip flops are replaced with business clothes and briefcases as the soon-to-be graduates apply for internships and attend job fairs. Graduation weekend comes at the end of April or beginning of May and proud families commemorate the event with photos of their young adults taken in front of the local landmarks. Hope and possibility fill the air. Young people step up and try their wings and their parents step back and trust that their offspring have learned what they need to make it on their own.

Common Gallinule and 6 Chicks, Growing Fast!

I am happy to say that our own daughters fledged successfully several years ago, but I remember each and every benchmark along the way. Pre-school, elementary school, middle, high school, and college, lessons, clubs, summer programs, student loans and study abroad, dating, marriage, jobs. We tried to teach them how to be kind and ethical people, did our best to keep them healthy, and worried about them when they were not. Together we navigated the emotional ups and downs of growing up--making and losing friends, moving, academic pressure, boys, and just the general unease of the teenage years. I remember at each stage agonizing over how to let them go and do what they needed to do without having their parents by their side. I never stopped worrying. But we gave them independence, little by little. And, just like when you are learning to ride a bicycle, when we let go, they glided off as smooth as can be.

Successful Fledgling--Mockingbird

In our yard, and pretty much everywhere I go, birds are nesting, chicks are hatching and fledglings are fledging. The butterflies are laying eggs, caterpillars are munching host plants, and chrysalids are already appearing on unfortunate places like my front door. Spiderlings have emerged from eggsacs left by their mothers before the cold weather killed them. Paper wasps build nests under leaves. Softshell turtles lay eggs on the banks of the water. Tiny offspring of watersnakes that mated in March have hatched and are fending for themselves. Mama gators watch last fall's young, even as they prepare nests for the next clutch. Parents of all shapes and sizes will be guarding, feeding and preparing their young in the best way they can so they can reach maturity and continue the cycle of life.

Spiderlings on Lyreleaf Sage (Salvia lyriata)

Mama Gator and Young

Hungry Titmouse Chick

Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher on a Lichen Nest

Blue Grosbeak Nest with Eggs

I am constantly filling and refilling the suet feeders in our yard because exhausted bird parents stop there to inhale some quick energy when they get a break from sitting quietly on a nest for days and weeks, not moving or making a sound so as not to draw attention to themselves. Or between flights back and forth taking caterpillars to their hungry young. A recent article about the importance of native trees in the landscape said that a Carolina Chickadee would need 5000 caterpillars to feed each clutch of eggs! Pity the poor, exhausted Chickadee parents. Hungry baby birds make such a ruckus calling for food that it's a wonder they don't all get eaten by predators. At Paynes Prairie, the poor Great Blue Heron adults hunt and hunt to feed themselves as well as their offspring that have nearly reached adult size. These babies are hungry and they sound like fighting bobcats screeching in the trees when mother or father return with food. It's full time working feeding baby birds!

Hungry Herons

White Eyed Vireo on Nest

Carolina Wrens Need Food Now!

Mama Thrasher and her 3 Hungry Chicks

Boat Tailed Grackle is Hungry!

Baby Crow gets the Last of the Suet

Daddy Cardinal Feeding Young

This Mississippi Kite Chick Cries All Day Until the Food Comes!

The perils are great as the young hatch and grow. My friend Rex Rowan talked about this in a recent blog post titled "A Hard World for Little Things". (His nature blog, Field Guide, is fun and interesting, and very informative, and I recommend it to everyone, not just Gainesvillians.) The young are in danger from day one. Eggs of every kind are a quick and easy source of protein and lizards, snakes and raccoons all know it. Once the eggs hatch, the young, be they chick or larva, are choice targets. They are small and vulnerable, and easy pickings for birds, cats, coyotes, hawks and crows. As I mentioned, hungry chicks make a huge amount of noise and attract predators. They are still in danger, even after they learn to fly, because they are young and inexperienced, just like their human counterparts. Juvenile birds don't sense the cat stalking or hear the whoosh of the hawk, or they fly into the window, or in front of a car. And then there are the Brown Headed Cowbirds, nest parasites who lay their eggs in other birds' nests, letting them raise the Cowbird's young at the possible expense of their own. The parents become targets, too, when they stop to lay eggs or fly back and forth with food for their young, or chase of predators. A tiny Mockingbird will gladly take on a Crow or Hawk if it is threatening the nest. It's tough out there.

This Black Necked Stilt Bravely Challenges an Alligator Heading Toward its Nest

Stinkbug Eggs

Downy Woodpecker Feeds Sawfly Larva to Young

Tiny Bluejay is Noisy and Easy to Catch

Tiny Clapper Rail 

Northern Parula Feeds Giant Cowbird Chick

Mother's Day is this Sunday and I'd like to honor of all the Parents, Mothers and Fathers and supportive caretakers out there (it does take a village!), doing their best to raise and fledge the next generations. It takes a lot of work to get our young ready to launch; lots of love, patience and time. And the gratification comes in the end results. In the words of Barbara Kingsolver, "But kids don't stay with you if you do it right. It's the one job where, the better you are, the more surely you won't be needed in the long run."  Happy Mother's Day, Everyone.

Osprey Family