Of Water, Sand, and Pears (Part 3 of 3)

4/15/11

At this point I had procrastinated a bit too much and needed to hustle back. But that didn’t stop me from getting distracted along the way. I went by a different route through the same prairie I had entered via. Smack dab in the center is an oasis of sorts. There was a sudden stand of trees, mostly oak (Quercus sp.), that created enough shade for there to be temporary stands of water. While there was no water the at current time

this fact was evidenced by the plethora of wetland plants beneath the still leafless canopy. How this stand came to be though is somewhat of a mystery to me. It is a fairly large distance to the nearest tree or wetland and while the seeds of the wetland plants could have easily traveled there on their own they could not have survived unless the trees were there to create the shelter that prevented the water from drying up like in the rest of the prairie. One theory I can think of is that the stand was the result of formerly higher water levels of Long Lake which could be supported by the age of the trees. Another possibility is that there was enough runoff of rainwater (carrying with it seeds) from the surrounding dunes and prairie that reached the basin in which our oasis sat before it all soaked into the ground.

As I hit the main road back to the train station I began a forced march/jog back. Along the way I spied three turkey vultures scoping out the land around Loch Long. It was also not far from here that I

discovered a completely, and I mean COMPLETELY, flattened Beaver (Castor canadensis). Two bad omens in a row? I’m not superstitious but one can’t deny that sometimes phenomena of nature link uncannily with real time events. Case in point: all out of breath and strength, I set foot on the platform the very same moment as the granulated wheels of steel began creeping forward. Luckily there was no one on the platform any more to see me brandishing my staff irately at the back side of the increasingly smaller hunk of shiny metal. 

Reading over this again I guess it seems like it was a…well…whatever kinda day. No dramatic bird or plant finds beyond personal discoveries of fairly common biota. But the day was profoundly satisfying! I can’t explain it fully. The feeling of just being present in the large open space, of prairie especially, was one of breathless but relaxed joy. It was a beautiful day. Despite the annoying (and somewhat painful in the case of cacti) prickles through the day, it felt great to be out trekking across the sandy landscape.

Thanks for reading! See you on the shifting sands…

Edward Warden

Of Water, Sand, and Pears (Part 2 of 3)

4/15/11

At long last, I entered the park. I could smell smoke and in fact saw a plume up ahead. I proceeded up a wooded dune that formed the northern shore of the lake and found that most of the area had been burned. This was actually a good thing as controlled burns of savannah and prairie

ecosystems keep them healthy. I’d wager based on the condition of the ash and the still smoldering dead logs that I showed up literally the day after the burn. There goes any hope of wildflowers, more than likely next week they’ll be coming out. Anyhow, I went ahead and enjoyed the trek and unique condition of the environment. Soon, I stumbled upon a new sight…Prickly Pear (Opuntia humifusa)!!!

 This is the only locally native cactus. It’s one that I’m well familiar with but had never successfully found in the wild. Well here it was somewhat yellow and wilted due to the recent fire. There weren’t many and they were pretty stressed as it was so I decided to high tail it out so I didn’t add any undue stress.

Soon the dunes, while still skirted by a savannah covered dune to the west, opened up to reveal a dry prairie. It was here that my perception that the prickly pear was scarce, was dashed. The entire prairie was livid with the little dark green pads. They were basically the only plant currently living. A note of caution about these

 little dudes: do not touch these cacti thinking they are spineless without gloves on. True they may have few to no spines at all but the hairs that occupy the slots where spines would be are a nightmare! But should you be stupid like myself and decide to learn this the hard way, soak your hands with water and then proceed to rub until the water weakened hairs are rubbed out/off.

From the still dormant plant material I could tell that this prairie, not surprisingly, was dominated also by the copper red, hip height Little Blue Stem (Schizayrium scoparium) a staple of dry and/or sandy prairies. Soon enough, I reached the lake shore and came face to face with a massive dune. I’m not sure whether it was a good thing though that there was a stair case that ascended this behemoth of the beach. It was good in that I wasn’t going to be treading on any precious flora or adding to erosion but bad in that it sucks a bit of the fun out of working you’re butt off to get to the top. Well up the stairs (which proved somewhat tiring anyway) I went and what a breathtaking view it was down into the prairie below and the savannahs beyond.

Honestly I don’t know how to fix it but the pictures somehow do the depth and distances injustice. It was up here that I thought I saw a Merlin (Falco columbarius) which is a small falcon and definitely saw a kingfisher (Ceryle alcyon).

To Be Continued

Of Water, Sand, and Pears (Part 1 of 3)

4/15/11

 

            The black asphalt of the newly laid road was as dark as the night sky. The gibbous moon was bright. So bright in fact that, once I had slipped beyond the glowing fingers of the orange lights of the train station, the night road ahead of me was lit so well that the shadows of gravel was discernable, made the new steel shoulder rails shimmer electric blue, and gave the street paint an ethereal hue. I felt like I was proceeding down some magic causeway and, despite the darkness, of the good and welcoming kind… or maybe it was of the menacing type beckoning me forward but nothing bad happened so I’ll assume the first. As I approached the area where I’d set for the night, the smell of skunk became more and more poignant. Luckily it never got any stronger and it showed (or smelled) the hallmarks of having been several hours old. Occasionally the rustle of leaves indicated the presence of some mammalian life and I often held my breath and hoped it wasn’t the perpetrator of the former smell. It proved a tame natured company. From the nearby marsh came the faint continuous chirping of some frog species.

Birds were not strong in accompanying my morning ritual of putting the phone alarm on snooze. Lacking in woodpeckers it seems there was only a handful of Blue Jays (Cyanocitta cristata) and Tufted Titmice (Baeolophus bicolor) greeting the warm, cloudless morning. I decided that I would explore the area near Ogden Dunes township, the much smaller west section of the national park. In order to get there I had to trek along the road and tracks at the south shore of Long Lake which prevented me from simply walking in, unless of course I was willing to take a swim. The hike revealed some field sparrows (Spizella pusilla) searching for nibbles in the cause way between the tracks and the wall of cat tails (Typha latifolia) and Pragmites (Phragmites australis) at the edge of the lake. It also briefly revealed a Sora (Porzana carolina) doing it’s characteristic descending trill.

Soon I rounded the lake on a road leading into the park area. Every few yards I walked, American Coots (Fulica americana) flew away from the lake edge. Coots, unlike ducks, actually rise out of the water and skitter along

the surface to take off. Several times I tried to capture this in photos but failed either because I reacted too slowly, they were pretty fast in their flight reaction, and or the photos were a blur. It was also along here I found a Belted Kingfisher (Ceryle alcyon) and, I got excited about this one, a Great Egret (Ardea abla)! I tried to get a photo of the last one but sadly it gracefully lifted off before I was even aware of its presence, glided into a nearby growth of cattails and disappeared. I was unable to relocate it.

To Be Continued

Off the Dry Path (part 3 of 3)

4/7/11

   

At the end of the road a path began that walked the line between the edge of the bog and an oak savannah. Here there were more signs of plant life emerging the most note-worthy being that the Redbuds (Cercis canadensis), a small tree with gorgeous red flowers, were about ready to bloom. It was also here that I was privy to a conversation between Soras, a definite identification this time. I was unable to see them despite what seemed like a distance of only 20 feet or so and persistent calling but all the same the short high pitched peeps gave the whole misty landscape, with the forest at your back, a mysterious feel.

   

The time to turn back and catch the train home had come, so with much reluctance and indignance about how short a distance I had covered compared to what I had planned to, I started the trek to the tracks.

  
 Nature every now and then has a way of toying with you. In this case the entire day had been relatively cool, to offset the body heat I was producing but all of a sudden the mist lifted, the sun came out and the temperature shot up. It was a grueling and sweaty return trip. It’s always funny, upon reentering society, to watch people generally avoid looking at the dirty, oddly dressed, and exhausted hiker sitting on the bench with a goofy smile. 

In many ways the day could be called a “slow” one by many. One of my birding friends asked me a few days before what would be the good of going out to the dunes at this time. Getting some extraordinarily amazing or rare bird would have been nice but the time of year is not very ideal and the weather was not conducive.

From a birder’s perspective there was nothing terribly interesting about the day’s trip. Not to bash all bird watchers, NOT AT ALL; I am a birder and always will be. Birds are my strongest area of natural expertise and it was birders who have set me on the path I am on now. That said, for me even without amazing finds or massive migration fall outs, this was a wonderful trip. This is the way nature runs. It always delivers in different ways that make you look at different aspects of the environment you’re in. In this case the weather had as much to do with the flavor of the morning and day as did the plants and animals.

Thanks for reading. Spring is here! See you in the field.

Edward Warden

 P.S. Don't be a ding-dong like me and try to eat the seed heads of cattails, it's SO not worth it

Off the Dry Path (part 2 of 3)

4/7/11

I figured today I’d direct my expedition toward Cowles Bog. Hiking the rail-side Calumet trail was fairly uneventful other than the constant buzz and hum of mist hitting the high tension power lines that run along the tracks and trail. The bird activity was really chill, with the occasional woodpecker, titmouse, robin, and a lone Eastern Towhee (Pipilo erythrophthalamus) also known as ground robin.

It was maybe a half mile down the path that I came across a relatively well beaten path which perked my interest. I naturally decided to explore. As I moved along I came across an increasing number of evergreens which from a distance looked like Fir trees (Abies sp.) but were actually Spruces (Picea sp.) and in pretty fair condition. There was also a great amount of rose plants (Rosa sp.) which made the majority of the live underbrush and could prove very difficult to move through but my staff was handy in helping temporarily move the thorny limbs aside.

As I proceeded deeper, which for the record there wasn’t much of a path anymore, I found the ground getting wetter and the vegetation changing accordingly with the rose bushes giving way to budding Skunk Cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus), a plethora of moss, and evergreens and oaks (Quercus sp.) changing to Green Ash (Fraxinus pennsylvanicus). Soon the ground became far too generous with the depths it allowed my boots to reach and inspection of the horizon revealed that the trees abruptly ended and a wall of cattails (Typha latifolia) was further ahead. I was confident at this point I was indeed approaching a bog but this was not the ideal way of doing it both for the sake of habitat I would disturb and my own by not getting randomly trapped in muck with no way of being found. I veered back toward the main trail and, with all my nimbleness and best efforts, gracefully crashed and stumbled through a wall of dead branches blocking all ways back to the main path. Along the way I heard a Pileated Woodpecker (Dryocopus pileatus) knocking and while I was not able to get a good view of the bird I did get a good view of one of its abandoned nest projects.

  

     I proceeded once again beside the train tracks and soon reached the trail head, well actually road, of the Cowles bog trail. By now the mist had lifted a little, and I was able to see quite a distance. The best part? There was quite a distance over the bog to observe! This bog was huge with the trees on the opposite side like twigs emerging from the mist. While much of it may have seemed like a monocrop of cattails, which admittedly it was, it was still mind boggling how beautiful and vast this area was.

While I was not able, in the interest of time, to walk the entire path another indication of the bog’s size was that I never did find the center. One of my hopes of coming to this area was also to chase down the Sandhill Cranes (Grus canadensis) that eluded me last time but I was disappointed in this; I hadn’t even heard them call once throughout the day. In fact the Red-winged Blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus), which usually are a staple of any wetland, were pretty scarce. Moving a short way along a constructed path into the heart of the bog ended up scaring, on two occasions, the same species of bird which I cannot positively identify because by the time I had noticed the bird’s presence, it had already taken off and flew into a new, inaccessible, area. I suspect based on the habitat, flight pattern, the call, and what little I did see of the plumage though that they were Woodcocks (Scolopax minor). By the time I turned around to return to the road I had reached a point where my staff sank a foot into the muck before hitting anything solid.

To Be Continued

Off the Dry Path (part 1 of 3)

4/7/11


It was a semi-interesting ride on the south shore train where one of the conductors who recognized me from last week tried to hook a young lady up with, “a handsome young man who’s going camping.” No chemistry. Upon exiting the train I headed south accompanied by the frequent short buzzes of Common Nighthawks (Chordeiles minor). It was impossible to see the generally high flying birds, not even the white flashes near the wing tips, but in some ways I found the familiar calls a comfort in the darkness of the night. It was cloudy so star gazing wasn’t really an option. The moon was not out so like last time I stumbled down a nearly invisible road. Sure, I had a head lamp and a secondary light but I wanted to keep things as natural as possible. The second reason is that you can actually see farther when you don’t have lights on. Obviously that visibility is lacking in color but the distance to which you can see individual objects is significantly farther than when you have lights shining and glaring out everything beyond ten feet from you. If you give yourself a few moments of adjustment, the fear you initially experience goes away when you turn the lights out.

I found a suitable sight to plop down in behind a ridge and zonk out for the night. The calls of the nighthawks died away as they glided toward the distant lake hunting for insects. Once the tent was up and I had zipped myself in, a chipmunk twittered suddenly, paused, and began to squeak at regular intervals of every 5 seconds no farther than 10 feet from me. At first this was interesting color to the night but pretty soon it became mildly annoying as it seemed there was no particular end in sight. It seems though I may have been rescued by another predator of the night, owls. The chipmunk suddenly stopped, creating a sound vacuum moments later filled by the faint chirping of what sounded suspiciously like begging chicks. This was only a momentary intrusion to the omnipresent silence. Sleep, dancing with the distant sound of Coyotes, soon took hold.

I woke up thinking, “crap it rained so much my tent couldn’t resist it all,” as I moved quickly to move my sleeping bag away from droplets hanging on the tent roof. As it turns out, not rain, but a heavy mist. And let me emphasize the heavy.

This made seeing things at a distance at lower elevations farily difficult, but being that the stuff immediately in front of you was still visible the mist was hardly a nuisance but an unexpected and quite awesome twist to the day. Little did I know the day would be soaking wet in just about every way, starting with the mist on my tent and sleeping bag. My curiosity about the possible owlets from last night had to remain unsatisfied as a brief scoping of the area’s evergreens turned up nothing leaving me no way to confirm that it was indeed the activity of owls that I was hearing. There was a handful of birds calling, primarily Tufted Titmouse (Baeolophus bicolor), Robins (Turdus migratorius), and Red-bellied Woodpeckers (Melanerpes carolinus).

To Be Continued

Mt. Baldy (not quite) Part 4 (final)

Apparently after significant cutting back, I still had a monstrously large post, so this is the fourth of four parts about Thursday, March 31, 2011

3/31/11

At this point I needed to be heading back to catch the train so I wouldn’t miss class. I popped a snack in my mouth and took off. For all intents and purposes my day was over and I was treating it as such. I was pleasantly surprised when an odd call beside the road proved to be an Eastern Towhee (Pipilo erythrophthalamus) in the underbrush, a very striking bird that I get see only infrequently. But then things took a turn. That’s not to say things went from awesome to bad, but more like an unexpected and rare change in class from aves to mammalia. As I was crossing a bridge over a small river not far from the edge of the forest I saw something moving. As the slender, fuzzy brown animal moved along a large dead log straddling the river and twisted onto the bare, light dappled shore, I proceeded to pull out the packed binoculars and camera to discover what I think was a Marten (Martes americana)!

I’m not very good or experienced with mammal identification (yet) so if anyone knows better, please do speak up.

            At this point I was really set. I mean, what more could I ask for? The day had been awesome and I was headed home for my favorite classes and some rest. But the park hadn’t quite finished with me yet. I finally exited the forest and found myself on the train tracks but still had to hike some distance to get to the station. All along the tracks is a ditch filled with water and cattails (Typha latifolia). It turns out that even this ditch had been the beneficiary of some park magic. As I walked along I come across an area full of calling frogs. Their chorus put a little extra pep in my step as I hurried now on sore feet to make the station in time. It was also in this area though that I ran across calling Sora’s (Porzana carolina) a type of rail. I was unable to obtain photos but I was they were in beautiful spring plumage and their single high notes added to the “pep-in-your-step” song of the chorusing frogs.

            To cap everything off, and yes this is the last thing, I probably had the best example of a “eu-reak-a” moment ever. In one of the shallower and shaded marsh areas I came across a plant…actually hundreds of plants….of a species I had always known about but never seen in real life. EUREKA! I’d found it! But also, dang, you certainly REAK too. The plant? Skunk Cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus).

True to its name, something that doesn’t happen often, skunk cabbage smells foul and the reason is so that flies will be attracted to its flower (the cabbage part) and pollenate them.

            This day toppled my expectations big time. As the spring encroaches and becomes more evident things are only bound to get better. With more and more different species of birds singing, reptiles and amphibians coming out of hiding, insects exiting dormancy, and flowers of many colors blooming I’m very excited to be returning and documenting everything.

I hope you enjoyed reading this and hope to see you all in the field!

Edward Warden

Mt. Baldy (not quite) Part 3

Apparently after significant cutting back, I still had a monstrously large post, so this is the third of four parts about Thursday, March 31, 2011

3/31/11

            As I passed through this area and proceeded in the general direction of Mt. Baldy accompanied by the occasional outburst of crane trumpeting, I came across a dead coyote (Canis latrans) which clearly had died during the winter since the carcass had not been molested yet. In some odd coincidence the quality and health of the wetlands noticeably began to decrease as I proceeded past the deceased canine. The north side of the road soon became oak savannahs. I noticed after I had mounted one of the dunes on which these savannahs sat something peculiar. Ascending the hill/dune from the south, the dominant plant was red and black oaks and there were clear signs of periodic fires occurring but as soon as I reached the top the entire north face was suddenly of the white oak variety and almost no sign of previous fires.

Red and black oaks are more fire tolerant than white oaks. While I’m no expert, the only explanation I could come up with was that winds coming off the lake, which was to the north, were preventing fires that occurred from cresting the hill/dune and proceeding to burn the north face of the hill while the south face was not spared. This dynamic creates conditions suitable for white and black/red oaks respectively and hence the immediate vegetative change at the peak. Maybe as the year progresses and other plants emerge I’ll notice a similar dynamic of fire tolerant and intolerant. It was also within these savannahs that a decent number of White-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) were present. Compared to the ones found in Chicago parks these were very skittish, which I guess isn’t terribly surprising considering that urban deer tend to be more comfortable with humans out of necessity.

Upon reaching a cross roads I was treated to some excellent views of a great blue heron (Ardea herodius) in flight and then the state endangered Red-headed woodpecker (Melanerpes erythrocephalus) but the woodpeckers, like the tufted titmouse, were not cooperating with my camera. At this point I turned toward the lake and rapidly approached some massive dunes. At this point I completely lost interest in birds, though it seems as if there was nothing but a lone Belted Kingfisher (Ceryle alcyon) out there anyway. These dunes were massive. Towering and rolling into one another becoming successively higher after every dip with highlights of white sand, these dunes were dominated by Marram grass (Ammophila breviligulata) and, to a lesser degree, little blue stem (Schizachyrium scoparium). There was no sign of new growth yet so small sand colored waves of last year’s grass layered ripples on top of the rolling effect of the dunes.

As you approach the highest dune the Marram grass gives way to a small number of dogwoods (Cornus sp.) which in turn yield to woodland. In this way the ecesis (establishment of vegetation) of the dune takes place via Marram, a pioneer plant, to dogwood, to the climax stage of a wooded psammosere (sand based environment). But why the lower dunes proceeding in the same direction I was traveling were all woodland is beyond me.

To Be Continued

Mt. Baldy (not quite) part 2

Apparently after significant cutting back, I still had a monstrously large post, so this is the second of four parts about Thursday, March 31, 2011

3/31/11

Thursday dawned with the sweet songs of birds. But what made this different and shocking was that I was hearing possibly hundreds of birds. No joke. One thing that I learned over the course the day is that you can’t avoid birding by ear. You almost never see a bird before you hear it. This was especially true for the woodpeckers who made the majority of the morning noise. From the raucous gurgle of Red -bellied Woodpeckers (Melanerpes carolinus), the high pitched tweets of downy woodpeckers (Picoides pubescens), to the distant hyena like Northern Flicker (Colaptes auratus), all accompanied by Robins (Turdus migratorius) and Tufted Titmice (Baeolophus bicolor). It felt as though the last one was teasing me all day since every time I got close enough to attempt to capture it’s photo it flew to a just far enough tree and proceeded to sing while I chased after it. But one can hardly get angry at the gorgeous little sky blue and white bird with it’s simple but melodious song.

I decided today’s goal would be to make it out to the famed Mt. Baldy all the way at the east tip of the national park. I began by heading in the direction of Beverly Heights. This took me through marsh habitat the likes of which I’ve never seen.

Before I even entered, I heard Sandhill Cranes (Grus Canadensis) singing in the distance which I tried to follow while staying on a general course for baldy. It should be noted that if you haven’t heard Sandhill cranes trumpeting in the distance your soul is missing a piece. Somehow it gives you a jubilant, triumphant, and ecstatic feeling. But that’s me.

…Anyway…

This marshland had varying levels of quality from fairly messy to clean, but overall fairly healthy and in every case the area seemed completely devoid of non-native and invasive plants such as Phragmites (Phragmites australis) and reed canary (Phalaris arundinacea). It was here also that I probably saw the most birds. With the constant overlay of Redwing Blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus) there were occasional Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) glinting emerald plumage in the morning sun,

a Red-tailed hawk (Buteo jamaicensis), Song sparrows (Melospiza melodia), Chipping sparrows (Spizella passerina), a Bufflhead (Bucephala albeola), and a great deal of fowl in the form of Northern Shovelers (Anas clypeata),  Blue-winged Teals (Anas discors),

 


Lesser Scaup (Aythya affinis), Canada Geese (Branta canadensis), Mallards (Anas platyrhynchos) of course, and plenty of wood ducks (Aix sponsa). The diversity of ducks is a pretty decent sign of the health of the marshes considering that they all feed in different sections of the food chain; shovelers eating surface invertebrates and biota, bufflhead and scaup diving for fish and shellfish, and mallards dabbling for aquatic plants. The large presence of wood ducks makes a great deal of sense in this heavily wooded marsh; it likes marshes but nests in the cavities of trees making this habitat perfect.
To Be Continued