Our Window on Nature

Sitting on our desktop there’s a weathered twist of wood that we like to think is American chestnut. We found it near the top of a North Carolina peak and carried it, sodden and heavy with the remnants of winter, all the way down to the motorhome. In spite of the fact that one of us was jabbed in the back every step of the way by a wooden elbow, you could legitimately call our botanical artifact a ghost — the ghost of a race of trees that once covered the Blue Ridge Mountains.

A few old folks remember seeing trees like this one, whose uppermost leaves fluttered more than 100 feet in the air. They speak of tree trunks measuring more than four feet around, and of branches so heavy with nuts that you could gather them up by the wagonload. They talk of the lumber turned into houses and fences and railroad ties, and of bark stripped off and sold for tanning hides. They recall when chestnuts roasting over an open fire was more than the words of a song sung around Christmas time.

Walk in the forests of the Blue Ridge Mountains today and you find only a few half-hidden trunks moldering into soil, and a few defiant saplings tilting like Don Quixote against impossible odds. (Read the rest …)

When we think of palm trees, we imagine tropical beaches and pineapples, and dancing girls shaking their hips to the rhythm of drums. Palms belong in Hawaii or Bali, or at least in the Florida Keys.

In California, however, native fan palms are surrounded by desert. Sound like a contradiction in terms? These California fan palm oases aren’t widespread, but rather are tiny pockets of vegetation, a carryover from a time when the entire area was blessed with a tropical climate.

Isolated though they are, you can still visit some of these palm oases on your next trip to the Southwest.

During the Miocene and Pliocene epochs, southern California, northern Baja, and western Arizona enjoyed warm and wet weather. Sunny skies still dominate those regions, but now water is limited to trickles and ponds. Beyond reach of the moisture, desert extends toward the horizon, giving life to a few mesquite trees, and patches of creosote bushes and bur sage. (Read the rest …)

Last month I lost my keys. That didn’t bother me nearly as much as not having my most-used naturalist’s tool readily available. On my key ring I have a small ten-power magnifying glass.

When I’m outside I usually have my binoculars, I often have a camera, but I always have my keys and a way to examine whatever catches my attention. I think that particular magnifier has probably traveled in my pants pocket for at least 25 years.

What can you do with a magnifying glass? Have you ever seen the delicate hooks that hold a bird’s feather in it’s streamlined shape? Or tried to figure out how a tiny tree frog manages to stick to the outside of a sliding glass door?

From the miniature scales on a butterfly’s wing to the texture of the bark from a trailside tree, the world seen through a magnifying glass will reveal details that most will never see. Try it on your next outing and, like me, you’ll never leave home without one. (My keys were found and returned, magnifier included.)

Sometimes instincts win out over logic. Many creatures have actions that just come naturally and they can’t help themselves. Ducks swim, frogs hop, birds fly. And beavers chop down trees.

In each case they are displaying their adaptation to a habitat, and if a beaver didn’t use its big teeth to imitate a lumberjack it couldn’t use the resulting lumber to build a lodge, make a dam, or store the tastier bits of wood for a winter meal.

Recently while exploring the banks of a local pond I found the distinctive marks of a beaver — chips of wood chiseled from the base of a tree, the clean cuts made by teeth designed for a specific job. And not just one tree, but on over a dozen, large and small. But the reason it’s happening right now is a bit of a mystery.

The pond is at its lowest level in the last ten seasons, and unless we get a deluge it’s unlikely that any water will overflow the banks this year. The only time I’ve seen beavers work hard at a dam is when there was running water to control, and their is no indication of dam-building at the only potential outlet. And it seems a bit late in the year to stock up the pantry, especially with such hefty pieces of timber.

But there might be another reason. The beaver isn’t the only forester working around the fringes of this pond. After years of neglect a local resident has taken on the job of clearing away much of the brush and brambles, cattails and small trees that have been encroaching on the fishermen’s access trails.

I think the beaver perceives these changes to it’s home turf as either a threat or a challenge. You can sense the competition when the base of some trees are half chewed through, and six inches higher there is the clean cut of a chain saw. Whatever the cause, this is one busy beaver. Perhaps he’s just trying to stock up on building materials before they all disappear.

The Beaver

Acorn woodpeckers leave very little to chance. Pessimists by nature, these birds devote their waking hours to storing insects and acorns from late summer through fall, making sure that they’ll have ample food for the coming winter.

In much of California and the Southwest, you can’t help seeing or hearing acorn woodpeckers. They’re common wherever you find a mixture of oaks, junipers, and pines. You won’t have to look hard for them either, because they’ll be sharing your backyard or campground. These birds rank among the noisiest of the woodpecker tribe, and their loud “jacka, jacka, jacka” announces their presence long before you spot the clownlike pattern of their facial feathers. More than most birds, they seem to take pleasure in the sound of their own voices.

Of course, they have a lot to discuss. Whereas typical woodpeckers move about in pairs, acorn woodpeckers live in groups of six to a dozen or more. It takes a lot of hemming and hawing, screeching and cawing to live, work, and raise young in close quarters.

As one might expect, such communal living produces distinctive behavior patterns. The most noticeable - and perhaps the most interesting - of these behaviors is the acorn woodpecker’s habit of storing food in communal granaries.

All North American species of woodpeckers are woodworkers, but none approaches the efforts that acorn woodpeckers make to build and stock their community larder. Find a dead snag in acorn woodpecker country, and it’s apt to be so riddled with holes that it looks like a sponge. (Read the rest …)