Honoring a departed furry friend

In the midst of reporting about all the fabulous things that went on during the Midwest Birding Symposium, I have to break the flow and address another topic.

Two weeks ago we lost one of our pups, Jupiter. She died in her sleep during the day, and we found her, peacefully gone, in her bed under the house when we got home from work that day. Needless to say, there is a hole in the fabric of our little rural family, but we are coping. She would have been 13 at the end of October. She is survived by her brother and litter-mate, Emmett.

Her death was not unexpected, but still a shock nonetheless. She had been experiencing periods of lethargy and just not being herself sporadically for the last few months, so we were prepared for the fact that her time on this earth was nearing its end. Ironically, she had just been to the vet days before, and the vet noticed nothing out of the ordinary during the routine physical (she was feeling pretty good that day).

We buried her up on the hill, alongside 2 cats that went before her, in our pet cemetery.

Here is a tribute in pictures to our sweet, lovely, beautiful girl.


Taking a nap in the snow


looking up at Dave


Perhaps a squirrel up in a tree caught their attention?


"Hi!"


Who doesn't like to hang out in a nice leaf pile? From the ring around her nose, looks like she had been digging recently.


I call this her "glamour shot."


Hanging out with me oh so briefly while I was taking pictures in the woods.


This is one of my absolute favorite pictures of Jupiter.


Family portrait, November 2008

Rest in peace sweet girl. We miss you.

Close encounters at the Midwest Birding Symposium

I mentioned in my last post that the Midwest Birding Symposium is not only about the birds, but also about the people.

One of the highlights of the weekend for me was attending a presentation by Julie Zickefoose based around her book Letters from Eden.

Not only did she read passages from her book and tell personal anecdotes, but she, along with her husband Bill Thompson, III, sang us a few songs at the end of her presentation. She's got one soulful voice.





In addition to her presentation, I was honored to have a chance to meet Julie and have her sign my copy of Letters from Eden. She was even kind enough to pause for a photo...


Your blogger with Julie Zickefoose... artist, author, NPR commentator, mother, wife, Science Chimp extraordinaire, my personal blog hero and fellow southeast Ohio hills dweller. That's some of her artwork on display behind us. It was a real treat to see her paintings up close!

I also got to meet Julie's sweet kids, Phoebe and Liam, and hubby Bill (AKA Bill of the Birds), a super-star of the birding world in his own right.


Bill up on the big screen during his welcome speech.
Additionally, I got to meet up with some other bloggers, like Nina from Nature Remains (don't know why I didn't get a photo!), Mike Bergin of 10,000 Birds and the Nature Blog Network, and Sharon Stiteler (AKA Birdchick).


Here's Mike sitting at the Live Blogging "booth" at MBS. Looks like he just finished a post on 10,000 Birds about the symposium!
My blogging buddy Kelly (Red and the Peanut) was there, too. You may remember that Kelly visited us in Athens in July, and we went birding together up in the Hocking Hills one day. Well, we went birding together up on Lake Erie, too, making a dash for Magee Marsh one evening, trying to beat the sunset and only barely succeeding.


Here's Kelly at the entrance to the boardwalk at Magee Marsh. We were losing light fast!
When talking about the people at the symposium, I cannot neglect to mention my dear hubby Dave, who spent a lot of time "enjoying the scenery" while I snapped pictures or ran off in the opposite direction from where we had just been walking so I could talk to someone. I owe him many thanks for being so patient while I indulged my hobbies.


Dave enjoying a Lake Erie sunset at the Marblehead Lighthouse State Park
Another IBP (Important Birding Person) at the symposium was Kim Kaufman, executive director of the Black Swamp Bird Observatory. While I didn't actually meet Kim, she was an active participant in the bird banding demo that we attended on Saturday morning at the BSBO.


Kim holding 2 thrushes of the Thrush Tripleplay (more about that in a future post).
This makes for a good segue into the close encounters I had with birds during the symposium. Yes, I did see some birds while I was there (although I did not manage to see the Kirtland's Warbler that showed up Friday morning at East Harbor State Park!). Here's a preview of the close-ups that I got during Saturday morning's bird banding demo...

Black-throated Green Warbler (get your confusing fall warblers here!)


Brown Thrasher


Ovenbird (the gentleman holding the bird had to tousle it's head feathers a bit to get the characteristic orange feathers to actually show)

Coming up... a detailed look at bird banding, and I look at some of the life birds I snagged during said demo! I told you this was one fun weekend!

Back from the Midwest Birding Symposium

Late this afternoon we got back from the Midwest Birding Symposium, and let me tell you, we had a blast! I have so many pictures to share, so I still need a little time to get images and stories arranged for presentation.

But what I can tell you right now is that while the Midwest Birding Symposium is about the birds...


flocks of Canada Geese


left: Great Blue Heron at East Harbor State Park
right: Hatchling-year female Northern Cardinal being banded at Black Swamp Bird Observatory

... it's also about the people:


Bill Thompson, III, giving the welcome address.


Author and sound recordist Lang Elliott, sharing sonograms of his recordings.


Julie Zickefoose and Bill Thompson, III, preparing to sing us a song at the end of her Letters from Eden talk

... and the sights and vibe of the whole event and area where it was held:


left: Lovely flower in someone's yard along the Lake Erie coast
right: Lighthouse at Marblehead State Park


MBS welcome sign at the pavilion in front of the pier.


Hoover Auditiorium, empty because it was lunch time.


A bird-themed vanity plate, which was quite a common sight.

Dave and I had so much fun, we're already talking about going to the next MBS in 2011. Stay tuned to future posts for some of the reasons why!

Live from the Midwest Birding Symposium

Hi there, LIVE from the Midwest Birding Symposium in Lakeside, OH. So it turns out I was wrong about the availability of internet connectivity up here - this place has wi-fi to the gills! Anyway, I'm sitting in the South Auditorium on the Lakeside campus next to Sharon Stiteler (aka Birdchick), with Mike Bergin only (10,000 Birds, Nature Blog Network) feet away. They gave a talk yesterday about nature/bird blogging, where Mike apparently gave me a shout-out - but I, unfortunately, was not in attendance at his talk, so hopefully he didn't say anything BAD about me!! (Kelly, back me up here, okay?)

Anyway, this morning, I went to a bird banding demo at the Black Swamp Birding Observatory, where I saw many beautiful birds in the hand, and got quite a few life birds, as well! I don't have those photos downloaded yet, but here are some shots taken Thursday evening from the pier near our hotel.


Bird cruise... that I did not go on...


Gulls are all over the place, which you might imagine at a lakeside location.






Look up, and you are likely to find a gull perched on a post of some sort.


Gull sunset

Gearing up for some good birding!

Just a quick note to let you all know that I'll likely be MIA from the blogosphere until Sunday or Monday. Heading off to the Midwest Birding Symposium today up in Lakeside, Ohio!


I look forward to seeing LOTS of new birds, including shorebirds and migrating birds of all kinds. Not to mention the fact that I'll be hearing talks by some well-known names in the birding world... Bill Thompson III, Julie Zickefoose, Jim McCormac, Lang Elliott, Mike Bergin just to name a few (sorry I didn't provide any links here... in a bit of a rush). And I'll finally get to meet some of my other fellow Ohio bird/nature bloggers! I might get a short post out while at the symposium, but I don't expect to have much internet access while I'm up there.

See you when I get back!

Hickory Horned Devil, encore presentation

I don't resort to many re-runs on this blog. This is a post originally put up almost 1 year ago, but honestly, I didn't have much of an audience at the time, so I figured it's worth another run since the subject matter has a bit of "weird" factor. Also, I now know there are enough nature nuts out there who can really enjoy (or at least tolerate) this post. Have fun!

---

Originally posted September 16, 2008:
One great thing about living in the woods is that it's a veritable Discovery Zone. I see so many new things in our woods, and if I'm lucky, I'll see it more than once. For example, spotting frogs and toads is not too uncommon around here. And just the other day, for the second time, I spotted a Red Eft. These pictures were actually taken over 3 years ago, but at least you can see what I'm talking about. The one I saw the other day I actually managed to pick up to let it run around on my hand for a minute.

I am SO outta here!

I also picked up a frog the other day. So it would only seem natural that I would want to pick this up.

Gaaaah! What the...?!


Enhance!

Dave found this the other day, wandering around the base of one of our Shagbark Hickory trees. I wasn't home at the time, but he knew I would want to see it, so he contained it for a bit until I got home. At first I was freaked out, as he told me I would be, but then fascination took over. He had already done some Googling and found out that it's a Hickory Horned Devil.

Here is a description, as found on the Ohio State Unversity Extention Fact Sheet on Giant Caterpillars: "This caterpillar is the larva of the Royal Walnut Moth, also known as the Regal Moth. The larva is not one for a timid person to suddenly discover. It has a scary, frightful appearance resembling a small dragon with up to five pairs of long, curving hornlike structures over the back of its thorax with the rest of the body covered with shorter spikes. The body color ranges from deep blue-green to tan with orange spikes tipped with black. Shorter spikes are black. Though very ferocious appearing, it is quite harmless to handle. They are enormous in size, being five to six inches long and nearly 3/4-inch in diameter. They feed for a period of 37 to 42 days on the leaves of hickory, walnut, butternut, pecan, ash, lilac, persimmon, sycamore, sumac and sweet gum. Larvae mature in late summer, wandering around searching for a place to burrow underground to pupate. Overwintering occurs in the pupal stage."

By the way, I have to take this opportunity to plug state extension offices. Do you want to know what that funny bug is crawling around your house? Do you want to know why the leaves on the Sycamore trees around the county are turning brown prematurely? Want to learn how to raise cattle? Want an analysis of your soil? Your local extension office can help you with these questions. For folks in Ohio, check the Ohio State University Extension website for all kinds of helpful stuff, including links to county offices. For those in other states, just type in "your state here extension offices" in any search engine and you should come up with something. I have found the Athens County Extension office's weekly online updates to be a valuable resource. Now back to the show.

We had seen some pictures of people holding one of these devils in their hand, and I was determined I was going to do the same.

Or maybe not. This was NOT a happy caterpillar - every time I touched it, it would thrash about, and that really freaked me out. I knew it wouldn't hurt me, but it was still alarming just the same. Dave thought it was too bad he didn't get a picture of me when I jumped the first time I touched it. This is as close as I got to holding it. Also, these pictures give you a better perspective of just how big this thing is.

-by the way, I'm not really scared here - just hammin' it up for the camera (imagine that)

Will we ever see one of these again? Who knows. Maybe I'll be a little more brave if there is a next time. Hey, at least I touched it. That's more than I can say for the guy who took all the pictures.

So what makes a creature like this develop such ferocious-looking characteristics? Are there other caterpillars out there that are equally (or more) alarming in appearance? And for those that don't look intimidating, what is their defense against predation (assuming that's why the Hickory Horned Devil is built this way)? Poison in their flesh? Something else?

Other fascinating facts: The adult moths have no mouth parts and so are unable to eat. But they don't need to. Once they emerge as an adult moth, they mate during the second evening after their emergence, eggs are laid the third evening, and then they die. Can you imagine what it would be like to eat like mad as a baby for a few weeks to a few months, hibernate for 1-2 years, emerge full grown and in a completely different form, have sex on day 2, deposit eggs, then die, THE END? This is one of the great mysteries of the animal world that I can't wrap my brain around. I also wonder if the passage of time seems eternal to these small creatures with short life-spans. Maybe an hour seems like days. Or maybe they have no comprehension of time whatsoever, other than the natural rhythm set for them by their ancestors.

Nature's Discovery Zone frequently reminds me about how much I DON'T know, and makes me relish each day as an opportunity for new knowledge, and new questions to ask. I was always fond of school, and I love learning new things. As I grow older, I become more and more excited about being a student of life.

---

Back to the present... earlier in the summer, when I was out photographing some cool moths (like the Io and Polyphemus moths), I was really hoping to spot a Royal Walnut moth, but alas, it did not happen (I didn't even see any Luna moths this summer, which is unusual). Perhaps another summer down the road I'll finally get to see the more beautiful manifestation of this creature!