Articles

This Week in the Woods

The month begins with a few days of sunshine and very spring-like warmth. There is a new bustle of energy in the yard as birds flit and chase. It is the beginning of the war for my yard.  The first skirmishes are between the Dark eyed juncos, small birds with a dark hood who forage mostly on the ground.  One flies up to a prominent perch and starts a bit of song and immediately a second bird, presumably another male comes hurtling out of the Maple to drive the singer away.  For the next hour the two birds take turns chasing each other  until finally they both land close to each other and  it’s a show down.  They face each other on the ground like gunfighters, beak to beak just six inches apart and try to stare each other down.

Clearly the message is, Ok partner, this yard ain’t big enough fer the two of us, make your move. Suddenly they are flying into each other in a chest bumping contest which elevates them about a foot off the ground before they separate. Apparently this settled the matter, at least for that moment and one flew off chased by the other.  I assume it was the winner who returned, perched and trilled his victory from the top of the Red-flowering currant. Today the battle was won, but the war has just started.

The mornings are now flowing with Song Sparrow music and any day now the House finches will start up and the annual spring bird band will begin. Before the month is out, the tree frog chorus will be in full swing, grooving loudly on the warmer nights.  In the dark woods behind the house, there is an awful squalling coming from a pair of amorous Barred Owls who are nesting. For the next several weeks their “who, who who cooks for youuuu” calls will ring in the forest, causing nightmares and restless sleep for the small mammals hiding under the ferns.

I turned over an old board and whisk, out shot several small deer mice who had been living in an untidy ball of ripped up rag. I was able to capture one, it was fully furred and seemed perfectly capable of life on its own, although it was a tiny thing. I carefully put the board back, and then checked several times later but they found other, safer housing. Or maybe not, it’s a wild world, and a  young mouse does not get to make very many mistakes.  Deer mice are the most common forest mammal, although rarely seen because they wisely find the night a better time to forage for seeds and plant buds. Since there is an Owl hanging around it is likely there is a healthy mouse population in the area.

The Great blue herons are returning to their bulky nests in Kenmore, looking for all the world like awkward old men hanging around in trees.  There is just something just wrong about this huge gawky bird in a tree. Herons are colony nesters and often dozens of nests are found in one area. This concentration is leading to their decline, both from real estate developers who whack their forest nest sites with impunity, and from Bald eagles, whose numbers have grown and who poach young from the nest sites. Like too many other creatures, their population is dwindling and this decline will possibly set up a conundrum for wildlife policy makers. Now that Eagles have recovered their population, and their predation is causing a serious decline in Herons, which team do we root for?  And how do you keep a hungry eagle from eating  threatened heron babies?

There are fresh bear tracks in the woods as the sleeping bruins are up and about wandering in search of something to eat. Often these early bears strip the bark off smaller coniferous trees to nibble on the tasty sap and cambium layers. What a bear can do to a tree farm in a weeks foraging is a disaster for the growers. One of the other food sources for early bears are the beetle larva inside rotting logs.  The bears use their sturdy claws like a can opener, and rip and shred fallen logs in search of tiny fat morsels.  A local farmer was distressed to find that the favorite horse that had died and was buried deep in the back forty, had been dug up and the remains unceremoniously spread all over. The grave robber was a bear, who probably got pretty excited to find such a huge buried treasure.

While basking in the early February sunshine there was a familiar buzz and two huge bumblebee queens were out, feeding on an early blooming garden shrub. These are probably outliers, early risers who hope to make it through the next couple weeks until the Salmonberry and Red flowering currant flowers open.  For more than a decade my garden has had two January blooming shrubs, both of which have grown quite large. One of the impacts of our suburban landscape decisions is how our plantings supplement the populations of native insects and birds.  A  yard that has a series of blooming plants works well for many kinds of  native bees and other insects. These in turn feed local birds. And  so its not an accident that the Juncos, Robins, Towhees and others are battling for my yard for their territories. If the rising sap of spring makes you want to get out and do some yard work, do a little research and add some wildlife attracting plants to your landscape. And then let me know who shows up.