Baby, It's Cold Outside! And Then It's Warm Again. Then Cold...

Big Snow in the Yard

I'm trying to get used to Georgia winters. After 19 years in more temperate Florida, our move to Georgia has me learning how to do it all over again. I haven't driven in ice or snow since 1996, and I've been nervous about even walking on the stuff since breaking my ankle on the ice a few years before that. Yes, I know that Georgia doesn't get that much snow and it doesn't get as cold as, say, North Dakota. But yesterday I pushed a disk of ice half an inch thick off of our birdbath. That didn't happen very often in Florida. I am not unfamiliar with cold winters, having grown up in the mountain west and spent 7 years in Wisconsin. But this time it is different. I'm afraid that, as they say in Florida, my "blood has thinned" and the cold days just feel really cold! Also, the weather is so variable that I don't get a chance to settle into a winter groove. One day it is sunny and in the 60's, and then a front rolls in and we have freezing rain and snow. And then it's back to the 60's again. Lucky for me, I held onto my warm sweaters, hats and scarves when we moved from Wisconsin. And my shorts and flip flops from Florida.

Icy Birdbath

So far this winter we have had a couple of small accumulations of snow, maybe 1-2 inches. And we've had some ice. We don't own a snow shovel yet, and don't know if it will really be necessary, but after the last ice which sent our poor clueless Florida dogs sliding off the porch and down the stairs to the driveway, I invested in some Ice Melt. The city does not own snow plows, so snow or ice on the roads will close everything down. It's kind of fun. Really, it would be just fine to go out and continue life as usual, minus driving. (I've been told that people don't know how to drive in snow and ice and it's better to stay off the roads). People play tennis and golf all winter, except maybe for the snow/ice days. When it's really cold, we prefer to hunker down in the house in front of a warm fire, but we still get out. I was rewarded last month when I braved the cold to take a brisk nature walk on one of the first freezing days of the year. I went out in search of "Frost Flowers". They are not really flowers, but are ice formed when moisture inside plants expands in freezing temperatures and extrudes through cracks in the hollow stems. Most of the Frost Flowers I've seen here were coming out of Frostweed (Verbesina virginica), but I've seen them on Salvia in Florida during an especially harsh winter. I found these ones in the restored Piedmont Prairie at Sandy Creek Nature Center and every Frostweed plant had a little bouquet of ice at its base. It was beautiful. Frost covered the leaves and grass on the ground and everything looked sparkly and magical. By noon, the temperatures were back in the 40's and 50's and the frost was all gone. 

Frost Flowers

Frost Flowers

Frost Flowers

Sparkles

Around town most of the trees are bare, which makes it easier to see birds on the branches. I spotted a Red-bellied Woodpecker excavating a nest in a leafless tree across the street from our house. In contrast, the bushes (mainly camellias, azaleas and rhododendrons) are green and leafy and dotted with blossoms and buds. Our holly bushes are covered with berries, too. Yet another example of the confusing climate here. It is not as green in the winter as Florida and not as stark as Minnesota. The birds, squirrels and chipmunks don't mind either way. They're on the hunt for food all day, cold or not. On the warmer days, it is fun to watch the Chickadees and Goldfinches scour the bushes, searching old camellia blossoms for hidden bugs. And the Robins and Cedar Waxwings gorge on the holly berries. The critters have me working hard keeping the bird feeders full. Every few days I put out scoops of hearty sunflower and other mixed nuts, suet and thistle seed. We usually have 20-25 species of birds feeding on any given day. The cold weather makes them very, very hungry and they need to fatten up before breeding time. I figure that they can use all the help they can get. We humans keep destroying their habitat and removing their food sources, so putting out some seed seems like the least I can do. A little feeding oasis in our yard will help give them a needed boost, and as a bonus, I get to watch them.

Brown Headed Nuthatch Refueling

Red Bellied Woodpecker and its Nest

On the colder days I do most of my birding from the comfort of my kitchen window. I am sorry to admit that my idea of a keeping a Georgia almanac has not panned out. I tried to make a daily record of weather, temperatures and wildlife seen, but I am just not that methodical or disciplined and I pooped out after just a few weeks. I did watch our birds all weekend for the Great Backyard Bird Count and made several reports, all from inside the house. But the times that I convince myself to bundle up and go birding away from home are almost always rewarding. And the birds in the woods are a little more varied than the regulars in my back yard. On my last excursion I saw flocks of Golden Crowned Kinglets and a couple of Brown Creepers, both new birds on my list. Today will probably be a good day to get out again. It was dark, dreary and frigid yesterday, but today the skies are clear and blue and I don't need my extra layers. And if I go out exploring I will feel like I earned the cookies and potato soup that I cooked up yesterday to beat the cold. Sounds good to me.

Golden Crowned Kinglet

Ginger Cookies, Hot From the Oven

Spanish Moss

Bearded Tree

Last week we took a quick trip to Gainesville (my first since we moved) and I was hit with the realization that Athens does not have Spanish Moss! Driving down I-75 and into Florida, we passed some magic line where the vegetation changed and then there were Saw Palmettos and Palm Trees. Suddenly Spanish Moss Draped Bald Cypress and Live Oak trees appeared on both sides of the road. I'm not sure I had thought about the presence or absence of Spanish Moss in Athens much before last week, but there it was. This is not to say that Spanish Moss doesn't grow in Georgia. It does. Think Okeefenokee Swamp. And certainly no picture of Savannah is complete without Oak-lined boulevards, draped with the gray-green moss. But after doing a little research I learned that Spanish Moss prefers to live in the warm, humid Coastal Plain, which covers pretty much all of Florida and the coastal regions of the Southeastern US from Texas up to about the Carolinas and down into Central and South America all the way to Argentina. Athens, however, though very close, is located in the cooler, drier Piedmont region, and therefore, no Spanish Moss for us. Spanish Moss also likes to grow on Live Oak and Bald Cypress, which we don't really have up here in the Piedmont, either.

Mossy Campground at Paynes Prairie

Spanish Moss (Tillandsia usneoides) is an interesting, and often misunderstood plant. Some people think that it looks creepy, that it kills trees and that it is full of bugs. None of this is true. It is not a moss, nor is it Spanish, but is actually a type of Bromeliad, related to Pineapple. Spanish Moss is not a parasite and does not harm the trees it lives in, unless the clumps get too big and heavy with rain and pull down a weak branch. Spanish Moss is an epiphyte (an "air plant") with no roots, that hangs in long drooping chains from the tops of trees, taking its moisture and nutrients from the humid air and rain. Early French explorers called the plant "Spanish Beard" to insult their rivals. In turn, the Spanish called it "French Beard". Reminds me of the French and English knights in Monty Python.

Spanish Beard

I think Spanish Moss is beautiful, soft and gray, hanging down and waving in the wind. I enjoy watching large clumps tear off and fall softly to the ground in a light breeze. Sunlight shining through gray curtain is very pretty. Spanish Moss blooms in the springtime with tiny flowers. It reproduces from seeds or grows from broken-off sections. When the plants die, the gray-green scaly outer layer sloughs away leaving the thread-like fibers that people have used for millennia to fashion into cordage or cloth and to temper clay pottery. The fiber was also used in the past to fill cushions for car seats, for horse blankets and was even made into pads for evaporative "swamp" coolers used out west. Spanish Moss was used medicinally as a tea for fevers and other ailments. Click here for a link to an article about a woman in Tampa, Florida who is keeping the dying art of Spanish Moss weaving alive.

Wet Barred Owl Drying in the Spanish Moss

Spanish Moss Flower

Spanish Moss Fiber

I have been told by reliable sources that Spanish Moss does not harbor chiggers. I've never seen "red bugs" in the moss and haven't had any trouble with them, though I have been run into chiggers in grass many times. I know their itch all too well! But there are still people who insist that they've gotten chiggers from Spanish Moss, so I'll let them keep thinking it. Maybe the moss was on the ground. Many other kinds of animals from bats to birds to snakes to spiders make their homes in Spanish Moss. It makes good nesting material, too.

Camouflaged Spider in Spanish Moss 

Carolina Wrens use Spanish Moss to make a soft nest

So after so many years of taking Spanish Moss for granted, now that we've moved away from Florida, Spanish Moss has a new, distinctively "Southern" look to me, more southern even than my home in Georgia! It evokes images of bayous and swamps, gators and wading birds, steamy summer days and the slow droning buzz of cicadas. Spanish Moss means exotic travel and adventure, which is quite an interesting change.

Images of the South

30 Days in June: Day 2, Morningside

One of the Fantastic Grandaddy Live Oaks at La Chua Trail

After I missed all the excitement at La Chua on June 1, I decided to go back and try again on June 2. Unfortunately, I did not get out early enough and the construction team had closed the trail again, this time entirely. Some of my earlybird friends got out to the platform before the construction started for the morning and were able to see the Phalarope again. But I was not so lucky. I did add a Black Vulture to my list and decided to change plans. It was a nice, overcast day and seemed like a perfect day to be out, so I headed to Morningside Nature Center to see if I could find Nuthatches, Bluebirds, Summer Tanagers and maybe some Owls. I had been there just a few days before and the Nuthatches were making their little squeaky rubber duck sounds from the treetops. Of course, in the perverse world of June Challenge, the Nuthatches were nowhere to be seen or heard. I'll have to come back and try again. But I don't mind because Morningside is one of my favorite places and I hope to get there several times during the month. I did find my Bluebirds in a recently burned sandhill at the back of the park. There were quite a few of them tussling. I think they may have been fledglings, catching bugs in the cinders from the prescribed burn. The area was just starting to green up after being burned and it looked stark and pretty at the same time. Morningside is a great place if you need to find Towhees, Great Crested Flycatchers, and Woodpeckers of all sorts. I had hoped to see Owls but did not find any. When I worked at the park we occasionally saw Barred and Great Horned Owls in the daytime and I figured it was worth a shot. But no luck. I had also hoped to see a Screech Owl because I found one nesting in May. But I have visited the box several times and have seen no sign of it since the initial sighting. The young may have fledged or maybe it just found a new nest. Owls are always one of my weak points in the June Challenge. Along with shorebirds, warblers and sparrows. I have many weak points.

Stark and Beautiful

Longleaf Pine Greening Up

Red Headed Woodpecker

Screech Owl from May

I had also hoped to find a Gopher Tortoise, but did not see any this time. I understand that there was someone poaching the turtles in the park for a while and I don't know if that made a big enough impact on the population, but I haven't seen one at Morningside for a while. Of course, I used to be there more often, too, so it may just be situational. The prescribed burn made the many, many pocket gopher mounds more visible. I hope that I can see a pocket gopher at least once in my lifetime so that I can know they are real. I'm not sure if I believe in them. I did see plenty of lizards zipping through the leaf litter. And as I walked down the East Perimeter Road, a Coyote ran towards the work farm. It was too fast for a photo. I have never seen a Coyote at Morningside before, and it was very exciting, though I have seen scat and other signs.

Six Lined Racerunner--They Make a LOT of Noise Scampering!

I visited an empty Vireo nest off of the north boardwalk. I saw birds sitting on eggs in the nest several times when I was in the park in April and May and it was nice to be able to look carefully at the details of the nest this time without worrying about upsetting the parents. What a beautiful piece of work! Surprisingly, there were no mosquitos around the boardwalk and I was able to sit and enjoy the sounds of buzzing cicadas and Red-Eyed Vireos.

Empty Vireo Nest

In the June Challenge, unlike other birding records, you must actually see the bird in order for it to count on your list. This is a good thing, because I could easily have added another several species to my list just from the sounds made by one noisy Mockingbird. I listened to it for almost 5 minutes and heard it mimic a Carolina Wren, Bluejay, Great Crested Flycatcher, Osprey, Titmouse, Woodpeckers, and Mississippi Kite, just to name a few. Those Mockingbirds can be very tricky.

Though I didn't add many new birds to my list, I had a peaceful and very satisfying visit to Morningside. Then I went back home and saw White Winged Doves in our front yard feeder, bringing my count total to 55.

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