Turkey Vultures

What: It's FOY (first-of-year) season, and the skies are abuzz with the wing beats of our first returning migrant birds. Apparently, they didn't hear about our record-setting cold weather. I love the first flocks of vultures returning north. They come with the male red-winged blackbirds, the waterfowl (if only our ponds would thaw!!), and the courtship behavior of our over-wintering birds like chickadees.

I spotted this committee of vultures (see my post on collective nouns) over the St Joseph Cemetery on Archibald St in Burlington on Saturday afternoon. There were at least 15 birds.

Over the next few weeks we'll see more and more birds returning to the state. It's an exciting time of year - I'd love to hear what other folks are starting to see as the days get longer and (hopefully) warmer.

The eerie glow of night

What: A beautiful respite from life brought me out to say hello to the moon. There's something about looking up that takes the breath away, as though the simple shift in perspective, lifting the gaze from one's feet up past the heart and into the heavens, shakes the body in a way that makes one's autonomous system, the unthinking mechanism that keep us alive, just shut down. For me this comes out as a small gasp when delighted by the gift of suddenly seeing the warm gaze of the sonorous moon. The sight is an ancient reminder of every moon that has cycled around the earth since there was a moon to rotate around the earth. It made me feel delightfully small, delightfully free.

The moon is waning from our blue moon (the second full moon within a calendar month). And I found particular fondness for the moon's waning bodice, which hummed a vibration softer and warmer than the cool glow of the electric lights presiding over the Lake Monster's game. With a long shadow casting over my shoulder I snapped a few shots, impressed at the brightness of the moon, its details washed out in each photograph. Looking at the photos, I'm fascinated and intrigued by the patterns of distortion that come out, from the lens flares to the double image of the moon (above).

Where: Overlooking Centennial Field on the last games of the year.

Wood frog eggs (revisited)

What: Wood frog (Lithobates sylvaticus) eggs in a small side pond along Wool Pullery Brook. 

Ecological notes: Our cold weather the other night left a thin sheet of ice. The eggs above the water line froze and collapsed the next day when the weather warmed up. You can see this on the photo on the right. The other eggs seem to still be fine, though haven't shown much sign of development since I first spotted them (March 23rd).

Where: This little pond exists because the beavers dammed up the brook downstream raising the water table and flooding this little depression. If the beavers raise their dam just a couple of inches the pond will be connected to the brook and the fish might make quick work of the tadpoles.

Other notes: Wood frog eggs usually hatch between 10 and 30 days after deposition so we're still on schedule. The eggs are white below and black above. No algae has developed on the eggs yet (again probably because it's been so cold).

Shrubs bursting

What: Leaves on Red elderberry (Sambucus racemosa), Tartarian honeysuckle (Lonicera tartarica), and Black cherry (Prunus serotina), respectively, bursting.

Ecological notes: Trees in the understory are often the first to leaf out. They risk hard frosts (like that 19 degree night we had the other day) in order to photosynthesize before the canopy trees leaf out. As a generalization, larger trees can store more energy relative to body size so they have a little more of a buffer on how long they can overwinter, plus they're in prime real estate during the summer to make for lost time photosynthesizing.

Where: All over Burlington the green is starting to return. First in the grasses and celandine poppies, then in the shrubs. By now the ostrich fern is starting to pop up as are the wild leeks.

Other notes: Already I've seen blossoms on red elderberries (at Red Rocks in South Burlington). My ornamental elderberries (Sambucus canadensis) haven't put out flowers yet and the emerging leaves do not have the same reddish tinge to them as the wild ones do. The red is caused by the same pigments that make the leaves red in the fall (non-photosynthetic vacuolar pigments called anthocyanins). It's possible that these require little energy investment chlorophyll takes lots of energy to produce) and the plant can produce the structural part of leaves initially and then chlorophyll once the fear of frost is reduced.

Siberian Squill

What: Siberian squill (aka Scilla siberica) is always the first flower to pop up in early spring (last year April 2 they first appeared). This little patch in my backyard actually came up about a two weeks ago (March 17)! The little blue flowers (in the same family as asparagus) are up before most insects, so pollination is done largely by overwintering adults of members of the bee family (and on warm days).

Ecological notes: While this plant has escaped from cultivation, it's still a nice addition to my backyard - telling me when the ground has thawed (I see it around the same time I begin to hear the earthworms crunching the leaves at night). It's also a spring ephemeral, meaning that it's whole life cycle takes place before the trees leaf out. Otherwise it's dormant and spends the rest of spring, summer, and winter as a seed or bulb.

Where: I have sandy soils that seem to accommodate this little guy quite well. They're perennial (like lilies, they have bulbs - not sure if they're edible). Because they rely on insects for pollination I would suspect they rely less on seeds than on vegetative reproduction - a cold spring would mean an absence of flying insects.

Other notes: The leaves seem waxy, but are incredibly week and will yellow pretty quickly if I walk over them. It's name probably derives from the Greek word for the plant (since the word was used in latin to convey shrimp like). The genus is Eurasian, so this plant's name is derived from other similar plants that might more closely resemble shrimp. Maybe the dangling flower was reminescent of some squid-like critter?