Beech leaves

The woods on our property consist of a diverse mix of deciduous tree species. I've never attempted to do any kind of survey, but would like to some day. Until then, I cannot say with certainty what the "dominant" species is/are, but we have many specimens of large trees such as oak, hickory, maple, beech, and buckeye as well as a variety of understory trees such as sassafras, redbud, dogwood and paw paw. Trees occurring in smaller numbers are aspen, tulip tree and sycamore. Heavy winds a few weeks back pretty much wiped the branches clean of their dapper autumn-colored leaves, but there are a few lingerers. But even those hangers-on will be bare within a few weeks, save for most of the beeches and some of the oaks.


The beech trees always grab my attention, and a lot of this has to do with the fact that they encircle our house and their leaves are right at eye level from almost any window that you look out of. As fall marches into cooler days and nights, and frost and cold rains start to come into the picture, I attempt to be vigilant in watching their leaves because every year they catch me by surprise. One day they're green and then - POOF! - they've changed. And then a few days later they've changed again. As fall progresses into winter, the leaves hang on the beech trees, but they change in character. They become more and more paper-like. They go from brown to beige. Winter winds whip them ragged, but still they will hang on until the last possible moment in spring. Other tree species will be sprouting new, green growth, while last year's beech leaves will still be there, almost transparent now, clinging to a season that was over months ago.


Today I went out with my camera and attempted to capture the differing stages of change among our beech leaves. This is something that grabs my interest - the leaves on some beech trees seem to turn faster or sooner than others. I've tried to make loose correlations to the age or size of the tree, but have come up with nothing conclusive. At this point, there are very few green leaves left. Most are a nice yellow or orange, or a mottled combination of the two. Some are brown, and a few have even gone into what I call the "paper" stage - they are dry and rolled at the edges, already well on their way to their winter "look."




There is a term, I have learned, for dead leaves that cling into winter. It is marcescence. Okay, so there is a name for it, but no one is quite sure why it happens. The most common theory that I came across had to do with protection from browsing animals such as deer or moose - having these papery and likely unpalatable leaves at the end of the branches could save the tender buds from being eaten. But if that were true, wouldn't all trees employ that same strategy? So many questions, so many things still unknown.

Raptors at the Midwest Birding Symposium

There are so many things to see and do at the Midwest Birding Symposium that it's a challenge to fit it all in over the duration of the event. One thing I have made time for in both years that I have attended was a stop at the display set up by the folks at Back to the Wild. At Back to the Wild, they rehabilitate all kinds of native Ohio wildlife, but the stars of the show at the Midwest Birding Symposium, as you might guess, are birds. Specifically, raptors. In addition to rehabilitating injured wildlife, they also provide educational opportunities to the public, such as their display at MBS. They brought along a whole host of owls, hawks and other prey birds, several of which I will share here.

Seeing wild, uninjured Bald Eagles was a pretty easy thing at this year's MBS - I saw at least one flying high in the sky every day that I was up there. The Back to Wild folks brought 2 Baldies with them this year.


There's no denying that Bald Eagles are regal and majestic-looking. Sadly, their voice doesn't quite match up to their appearance and reputation (the long "KEEEEEEEeeeeer" sound you hear dubbed in the movies when a Bald Eagle flies over is actually the call of a Red-tailed Hawk!), but we did get to hear one of their 2 Bald Eagles vocalize a little bit. That was the first time I had heard that in person. As luck would have it, the next day I heard that vocalization yet again, only this time from a wild Bald Eagle flying overhead as a group of us was walking through the woods. That was pretty cool!
At the other end of the size spectrum was the smallest raptor on display, this cute little Saw-whet Owl.

These itty-bitties are pint-sized compared to the Eagle. There's nothing in this photo to give you a sense of scale, but I bet this owl is smaller than your head.

"This is my good side!" says the wee owl.
As enamored as I was with the Saw-whet (I would have loved to take him home in my pocket), I was also quite enchanted with this Peregrine Falcon.


This is what a Peregrine looks like when you catch him mid-floof.

Time for a little stretch.

Want to see raptors like this up close and personal? Then you should pre-register for the 2013 Midwest Birding Symposium, which will once again be held in Lakeside, September 19-22. Click HERE to pre-register. C'mon, you know you want to!

Respite

I'm currently taking a respite from social media (blogging, Facebook). I'll be back, don't fret. Just need a little break.

In the meantime, please enjoy one my favorite signs of fall: asters. These grow at the edge of our driveway every year. This is most likely Panicled aster, Symphyotrichum lanceolatum, also called Lance-leaf aster. Same shot, presented 2 different ways.

Midwest Birding Symposium 2011 - photo highlights

Well, this year's Midwest Birding Symposium was a huge success. I had lots of fun, but still didn't get to spend enough time birding, nor did I spend enough time with my friends. But there's always 2013. That's right, the date has already been set for the NEXT Midwest Birding Symposium, which will take place once again in Lakeside, Ohio, on September 19-22, 2013. Mark your calendars now!

But, I'm getting ahead of myself. Sorry I didn't blog during the event. I did post some photos to Facebook and Flickr, but for those of you who don't follow either of those social media outlets, here are some of my best photos from the event.

Sunrise at Marblehead lighthouse. I birded at this location, but the main attraction, I must admit, was the chance to view something as beautiful as this.

The same morning I was at Marblehead I took this photo of a juvenile Bald Eagle. Sorry for the photo quality. One of the greatest things about the symposium this year was that I saw at least one Bald Eagle every day I was up there. Pretty cool.

On Thursday evening we took a sunset cruise on the Goodtime I. This is the view as we were preparing to leave the pier at Lakeside.

While on the sunset cruise, we looked for gulls, terns, and other water birds. Here, a smattering of Ring-billed Gulls follows behind the boat.

A Ring-billed Gull caught in the beautiful light of dusk.

Sunset on Lake Erie.

Great Egret flies over the water at Meadowbrook Marsh. This is a relatively new birding hotspot in the area. I'll tell you more about it in an upcoming post.

It's a bug-eat-bug world out there

Shortly after returning from a recent expedition to seek out the fantastic Amorpha Borer Beetle in Scioto County (click the LINK if you missed my report of the successful mission), I was talking to my mom, who asked, "So, when did you get so into bugs? I thought you were into birds. What happened to the birds?" A perfectly legitimate line of questioning for a girl who started out interested in "just birds and flowers, thank you very much." In answer to my mom, and to the rest of you, if you care to know: a number of things have contributed to my burgeoning interest in insects. Having macro capabilities on my camera has probably been the most direct influence. My macro methods are a bit crude, but they do the job for me. Once you start photographing flowers at a macro level, you see things you've never noticed before, and it's only a matter of time before you start appreciating insects from a whole new perspective. Having friends who are into insects helps, too.

I should also mention that studying birds and botany has been a gateway to so many other aspects of the natural world for me. At the upcoming Midwest Birding Symposium, I look forward to hearing my friend Jim McCormac's presentation, "Birders Going Beyond Birds," which will address this very topic!

So, let's take a look at how I view insects as a birder. From a birding perspective, I think about insects as being food for birds: worms for robins, caterpillars for cuckoos, vireos, and warblers, cicadas for Mississippi kites, and those are just a few of many examples I could give. Part of the reason so many birds migrate is because once bugs die off for the year in the northern climes, their food source has dried up, so they better go somewhere else where the eatin's good if they want to survive.

Up until recently, I haven't really thought about bugs from a much broader perspective. So it has been a slow realization to me over the last 6 months or so that, while birds are serious insect predators, perhaps the bigger threat to insects are... other insects. Whether it's falling into the waiting jaws of a praying mantis, getting caught in a spider web, or perhaps the more gruesome fate of having some other insect larva eat you from the inside out (that's what parasitism is all about folks), it's tough to make it as an insect! The following snap-shots were taken during the beetle expedition in Scioto and Adams Counties. Obviously, we saw lots more than just the Amorpha Borer Beetle.


This is a very tiny (think size of a fingernail tiny) robber fly, commonly known as a gnat-ogre. They stalk their prey by hanging out on the tip of a blade of grass or the very edge of a leaf. This gnat-ogre looks to have just gotten started on a meal, and didn't seem to mind having some cameras shoved in its face.

Next up we have a grasshopper-hunting wasp, which is to say a species of wasp that specializes in hunting grasshoppers. The grasshopper blends in pretty well with its surroundings, but the camouflage apparently was no match for the keen eye of the wasp.

Since the grasshopper blends in so well, I thought it might be helpful to isolate the two actors in this scene: wasp is circled in pink/purple, grasshopper is circled in green.

Here you can see that the grasshopper is almost twice as large as the wasp, but she carried it with relative ease, at least to our eyes. We watched her haul this grasshopper several yards toward her burrow in the dirt.

She repeatedly stopped on top of the grass in an effort to locate her burrow, which she eventually found. We watched her excavate the burrow in preparation for the grasshopper (which she presumably would bury inside, where her young would eventually hatch and have a feast waiting for them). After observing that she had trouble finding her burrow, we also noticed she had difficulty relocating her prey after she had excavated the burrow. We finally surmised that our presence may have been the thing that was throwing her tracking off. We had originally hypothesized that she was using some kind of scent queues to help her find burrow and prey, but perhaps she was using visual cues instead, and our movements kept throwing off her bearings (i.e. her landmarks kept changing). At this point we backed off and left her to her job in peace. (Our apologies to you, Mrs. Wasp.)

Here, a praying mantis looks on innocently after it has just caught some species of ambush bug. We watched the ambush bug walk right into the mantis's well-camouflaged trap.

A face that only a mother could love. I've never seen mantis mandibles up close until now.

Chomp! Once again, a very cooperative subject, busy with its meal and obviously not feeling threatened by all the big creatures looming toward it with cameras.
I have some other buggy stuff to share, but we'll take a break and deal with birds for the foreseeable future. Stay tuned for reports from the Midwest Birding Symposium!

Counting down to time on the Lake

I'm getting anxious for the Midwest Birding Symposium. As I write, it's just a few hours over being 9 days away. I can't believe it will be here so soon! And trust me, I really cannot wait!

This year I hope to spend a little more time out in the field looking for birds, and to that end we'll be heading up a little early to check out places like Magee Marsh and the Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge. Don't get me wrong, there will be birding field trips going on during the symposium, but I learned my lesson at the last symposium 2 years ago: allow extra time for exploring on my own!

While I hope to pick up some new water and shore birds while I'm there, I will also welcome opportunities to see the more common birds, like the ever-present gulls and herons.

Lone gull flying over Lake Erie

Gull silhouette

Gull wanna cracker?

Great Blue Heron in early morning light
Yes, the birds are the main draw for this event, but don't forget the sights, too. And local businesses!

We love this place for the food and the atmosphere. They will be seeing plenty of us.

Be sure to check out the Marblehead lighthouse.

And make time to enjoy as many Lake Erie sunsets as you can.
There's STILL time to sign up for the World's Friendliest Birding Event, AKA, the Midwest Birding Symposium.

If you've already signed up, please come join myself and the other Official MBS Bloggers in the Den of Blogniquity in the north end of Wesley Lodge. We'd love it if you would stop by and say "hi!"