Any opportunity to hear Gary Lincoff speak is a worthwhile investment. You’re learning without even realize it while being entertained.
Know Your Mushrooms
I’m not a DVD collector, so I don’t fork over the cash unless the product is worth watching over and over.
When I hear a Wood Thrush sing for the first time each season, it’s a moment of pure joy. This has been a remarkable year. I not only got to hear a few stanzas, I got more than a glimpse. I’d love to have gotten closer, but I’ll take what I can get:
This was on a hike in the woods.
It’s very odd to be wandering through an urban park, like New York’s Central Park and see more wildlife in a few minutes than I typically see on my usual Hudson Valley hikes.
I first thought this was a cat stalking the migrating birds, but a closer look revealed a raccoon on the way home from a night’s foraging:
As I worked on identifying migrating warblers, I was totally surprised to find that not only squirrels, but cardinals, robins, and even house sparrows would approach anyone with binoculars, expecting seeds.
You just don’t see that in a typical wilderness situation. (more…)
This writer really can’t add any words to enhance the value of this image.
Maybe this muddy track
belongs to this bear.
I’d stepped less than 100 feet off the trail for a short break. At first I thought the noisy animal was an unleashed dog. I’m learning to have my camera ready. I had just enough time to get this one photo and about 20 seconds of moving pictures.
I’m sure this strolling bear was aware of my presence, but thought I was on the trail.
One look at me, and the bear ran as soon as I snapped the photo. Good bear. Wise bear. A bear that fears people has a much better chance of survival.
All I can think of is how blessed I am to witness a moment like this.
Thanks to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s nestcam project, I’ve been able to watch time-lapse images of this cardinal on her clutch of three eggs.
The camera is within 20 miles of where I live. I’m surprised to see the cardinals laying eggs so late in the season. According to the accompanying discussion, the baby cardinals will fledge by October.
Sometimes I love the Internet. There’s no way I could get this close to a nest without disturbing the cardinal.
If the Canada goose had not jumped off her nest, I might have stepped on her. I love finding nests, but not when I create a disturbance.
I was delighted to discover Cornell’s Nestcam, which lets me watch the activities of several species of birds, revealing images I might not otherwise get a chance to see.
I was not the one to find the first morel of the year. Luckily, I’m very fond of my friend Zaac, who has a wonderful ability to spot an emerging morel in leaves.
I was surprised to see how much time this garter snake spent checking me out:
If you look carefully at the center of the video you can see the squirrel who climbed a honey locust tree to enjoy a black walnut. It took just under four minutes to clean the hull, penetrate the shell and enjoy the walnut. I wish I could work that fast.
The original footage is gorgeous, but to upload this image, I had to compress my avi file. Ah, technology.
Tags: Foraging, Mammals, Survival, Video
It’s odd to see maple trees with leaves just beginning to turn color in mid November. That grey blur is a squirrel enjoying a black walnut.
It has been unusually warm for several months, so the snow covered leaves are both beautiful and disturbing.When I was growing up, farmers used to say that the day of the month when the first snow falls is a predictor of the number of blizzards to expect. Like any folk wisdom, some years it worked out that way.
Ten blizzards would add up to a lot of snow, but if it relieved the drought, provided great skiing and ensured a bumper crop of morels, I would welcome a real winter.
Tags: Mammals