Ponds & Streams
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June 21, 2012 — Walk
Least skipper moth 
Green frog 
Nosy woodchucks 
Damselfly (bluet?) laying eggs 
Baby pine forest 
Why couldn’t I get the focus right on this little showman? 
Lady Catbird 
Plumpkin Specklebreast — a juvie robin 
Daisy among the chokecherries -
Hidden
My daughter spotted this yellow warbler nest on a walk we took this morning. It’s a great example of something I’ve marveled about before: more eyes = more wonders. It seems like you would see more going alone into the woods because it’s much quieter and less disruptive. But you never know what you miss for the lack of additional eyes. I’ve seen some neat things by myself, but this one I’d have missed entirely!
The girls are excited about going back each week to investigate the nest activity.
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Celebrity Herons
We went to Sapsucker Woods the other day and saw the bowl-full-of teenagers (a.k.a. herons’ nest) chatting and looking around out in the pond.
Then we noticed what they were viewing from their balcony seats. Down in the pond, one of the adult herons looked to the right…
…and looked to the left…
…and looked at us.
"Oh goody. Another photographer." So very patient. We waited and watched and were eventually reminded that all things come to those who wait.
In addition to its children watching from the nest, there is a dragonfly watching the whole show in the right foreground. Someone else was watching, too.
Who was in his turn being observed by others…
Frog Paparazzi One of the funniest things I saw was a frog literally racing across the lily pads directly in front of the hunting heron. I saw at least two frogs do this. Were they adolescents daring one another to ring the doorbell of their grumpy neighbor? The stakes were pretty high for the frogs! But apparently the heron had an appetite for fish.
While watching the heron, several different dragonflies demanded our attention as well. There were this one,
this one,
this one,
and these two shameless exhibitionists. The female is laying eggs, we guessed.
We heard many more birds than we saw. But this is a new one for me, a great crested flycatcher.
The other new sighting for me was a pair of American redstarts. I’ve seen the male before, but not the female.
We were very hot by the time our stroll ended, so we ate the lunch we’d brought and drank gallons of water before heading back home. Older Daughter enjoyed the heron fishing the most, Younger Daughter liked the frogs, and I liked the redstarts. So there was something for everyone and more besides — as usual!
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Walk at the Pond
The sun was out yesterday morning, and I urged the girls on in their schoolwork, dangling the carrot of a walk in the sun. They rose to the challenge, and we headed off in good time.
First to sound the alarm was this guy: “Humans! Humans!”
Apparently he was ignored, because just beyond him we saw a couple of green herons.
This one looked pretty typical... 
...till the wind blew and gave it a punk makeover. There was a whole cavalcade of geese camped out on the berm across the pond. They made an impressive racket as they took off. We could almost feel the wind from their beating wings.
There were some other water birds around too.
There were several great blue herons there — 4 or 5. They may be feeding young at the heronry down the river.
The bracken was particularly lush…
And there were some wildflowers around. Learning the names is helping me to feel more like I belong in this place.
Forget-me-nots 
Blue flags 
Bramble (I think) 
Mystery flower Back at the car, the oriole that usually hangs out in Old Man Willow was humming his way through lunch. I thought that the Burgess Bird Book named the oriole “Glory,” but it’s actually “Goldie.” I prefer Glory. It doesn’t get any more glorious than this colorful bird with his agreeable warble.
Glory the Oriole 
By then the sun was retreating behind a bank of clouds, so the flash of fire from Mr. Oriole was all the more welcome.
When we got home, Younger Daughter requested tree swallow coloring pages. Older Daughter requested a library book on caring for injured robins (for reasons I’ll share in a later post). I’ve been slacking on official nature journal pages, but I think we should probably get back into them. They’re not necessary for learning, I don’t think, and only sometimes are they an aid to seeing. But they do document the experiences of our various walks together. Someday I want the girls to have them to look back through. Once they learn the name of a flower or the habits of a bird, they will remember. But the particular treasures of particular walks may fade or get mixed up over time.
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Evening
Last night, my older daughter and I went for a walk at a nearby preserve called Brick Pond. We loved seeing this rainbow!
Other sights: great blue herons, green herons, wood ducks, a mallard and her brood, a killdeer, a muskrat, geese with goslings, tons of polliwogs, and an enormous bass. It must have been 6 or 7 inches deep, from the top of its head to its chin. There were a couple of kingfishers at work, and we heard yellow warblers and a Baltimore oriole. Two deer fled when they saw us coming. The first blue flag of the season bloomed by itself among some ferns. Any number of familiar birds — robins, catbirds, red-winged blackbirds, grackels, chickadees, woodpeckers — discussed us. Some kind of flycatcher fluttered overhead, but the light was too poor to identify it — or to take many photos.
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Yellowthroats and Other Wonders
Yesterday we visited the Nature Preserve managed by the State University here in town. It was our first time back since the trees were just starting to bud, and the bright green of maples gave the woods an enchanted feel. Tossing leaves dappled the ground with shifting shadows.
Younger Daughter (8) spotted this tiny flower first thing. When I got home I looked for it in our Peterson’s First Guide, but I didn’t find it.
*Edited to add: I think it’s called bird’s-eye speedwell! Hat-tip to Ramble.
We visited the vernal pool that was so active in early spring with salamanders, wood frogs, spring peepers, and the eggs of all three.
We saw a few salamanders, frogs and turtles, but compared to before, it had the air of a place winding down. It was much quieter. But some species were still busy reproducing. We saw this enormous spider hustling along with its egg sac. Given that I’ve just reread Tolkien’s Two Towers with its memorable Spiderish Monster, I named it Shelob.
The resident brown creeper was there, too.
We ventured on past an abandoned beaver lodge and numerous stands of fern.
At the pond, a song sparrow greeted us, and directed our attention to a goose practicing her figure skating.
There were a few water snakes, sunfish, bullheads, a Baltimore oriole, yellow warblers, and catbirds buzzing about. We also saw a water-loving mammal munching among the grasses. It was leaner and quicker and darker than a muskrat, so we guessed it was a mink. Out across the water, a hermit thrush or wood thrush was singing, and two red-tails were circling together over a spot on the hillside. I’m guessing they may have a nest there.
A common yellowthroat was trumpeting his “wichity wichity wichity” call, and he let me get a few pictures, quick though he was.
There was another photographer there, one with a 200-500 lens. Mine is a 70-300. He suggested getting a hood and a polarizer to cut down on glare. I actually have a polarizing filter; it came along with the plain UV filter I bought when I first got my lens. I tried it out after I got home, but as before when I’d tried using it, I wasn’t impressed. Maybe it’s not the best quality. I don’t have a hood, but I’d like to try one. I noticed that last weekend at the Migration Celebration, quite a few folks were using them.
On the way out, I enjoyed these flowers. They’re quite tiny, and like many of the other spring flowers they’re plain white. I wish my picture had better focus (I couldn’t move far enough away for the lens), but even as is it has a certain dreamlike quality.
