Blog updates

Way out on our meander of the South Branch we're still suffering intermittent power and Internet access in particular.  The folks at Frontier are very nice and helpful, but have their hands full this month.  So, I have a backlog of images stored on Google+ (add me if you'd like) and promise to have them posted by July 29.  

Vegetable Garden Calendar

I found this on the Homesteading Self Sufficiency Survival Blog (don't read too much into my following that blog), but haven't determined the source.  I'm interested in whether you think it's above or below our 39th parallel.  Down here by the river at 570 feet above sea level, I consider May 1 to be frost-free, but friends on Dan's Mountain and Jersey Mountain add as much as two weeks to that.

TinEye Reverse Image Search

As a former field biologist, friends often ask if I recognize this or that critter.  The one pictured here was new to me.  But after down;loading the photo or copying the URL, I went to tineye.com and within a minute or two I found the same picture labeled, "Blue Seaslug".  A wikipedia search confirmed it was Glaucus atlanticus.

Nesting Turkeys

Ruth Martin stumbled onto this nest of turkey chicks at Church View Farm, near Three Churches, WV.  She was mowing a nature trail and the hen was startled when she passed by and flew away. Later, she and her husband Steve walked back to take a look and found about a dozen eggs in the nest. Last night they walked back again, the hen took off, and they heard lots of peeping. All of the eggs were hatched, and Steve and Ruth scattered too, waiting to see the whole family later in June looking for insects around the farm.

Indigenous Roses

The Carolina Rose (Rosa carolina) is native to the Eastern U.S.  We've been spotting these along the trails just above our wetlands .  You can find it from hardiness zones 4 through 8.  The shrub (actually classified a sub-shrub) grows from 3 to 6 ft high with 2 inch pink blossoms appearing once annually in spring or summer.  The hips appear in fall-winter.

Carolina Rose (Rosa carolina)

Daylilies

You're probably seeing daylilies showing up in gardens and elsewhere this week.   Asiatic daylilies are in genus Hemerocallis, and are considered to be an adaptable perrenial staple for many gardeners.  I've read that they're considered by some to be invasive, and I've seen little clumps in remote places occasionally. I like them for the same reason I like the mallows: they produce a new flower almost daily (although each flower lasts for only about 24 hours).

Bees and Poplars, Poison Ivy, and Propolis

I need some feedback from Mid-Atlantic bee experts (or specifically you folks in the Eastern Panhandle or Western Maryland).

Yesterday I recorded bees returning loaded with a very orange pollen.  My friend thought it was from poplars.  Tulip trees (Liriodendron tulipifera) are sometimes called Tulip poplar or yellow poplar by older foresters and the lumber industry, and I knew of only younger Tulip trees nearby.  Cottonwoods (Populus deltoides) are in the same genus as aspens, the true poplars in the Salicaceae family.  We have a giant cottonwood down by the river and of course, they produce seeds like no other tree, but their pollination should have been complete many weeks earlier (March or April).  You'll hear us confuse this in the video.   Now that I've done some reading, I'm guessing he was talking about tulip trees, not cottonwoods.

But the next day I was building a new horse trail / walking trail and heard a lot of buzzing.  When I went exploring I found honeybees pollinating the Poison Ivy (Toxicodendron radicans and formerly Rhus toxicodendron and Rhus radicans).  I haven't finished researching this, but I've learned some believe that the raw honey helps build a resistance to the allergic reaction from exposures to the plant oil.  Interestingly, I've also read that many people are allergic to the Cashew tree (Anacardium occidentale), in the same Anacardiaceae family as poison ivy, and that makes them more expensive to harvest.

So after further exploration, I now think the orange material these bees were transporting is propolis from the cottonwoods.  According to the well-researched Wikipedia article, propolis is believed to reinforce the structural stability of the hive, reduce vibration, make the hive more defensible by sealing alternate entrances, prevent diseases and parasites from entering the hive, inhibit bacterial growth, and prevent putrefaction within the hive.  And while bees usually carry waste out of and away from the hive, they sometimes seal larger invaders in propolis, essentially mummifying it and making it odorless and harmless.

Red-Winged Blackbirds

I saw the first Red-winged Blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus) in the lower fields today.  These birds sometimes winter as far north as Pennsylvania, but in Hampshire County they are always a signal of Summer.  The females are non-descript and resemble a very large sparrow.  In fact, I've spent an embarrissingly long time trying to determine what large sparrow I was seeing only to later realize it was a female RWB.   Of course, the males are unmistakable.  

Capturing a Swarm

The old hives are gone.

I burned our old, unused hives last week in preparation for three new nuc (for nucleus) boxes this afternoon.  Brian Umstead offered to replace my old hives because of our setting, and I welcomed the opportunity.

I've researched native pollinators and done workshops on building habitats, but I'm relatively new to honeybees.  In 2005, one of my ninth graders, almost apologetically, asked if he could build an apiary for his project even though there was no control, or independent or dependent variables.  I said, "Of course." and we talked about mentors and training classes with local beekeeping groups.  


After I left to teach at Virginia Tech, he and other students convinced the principal and the school system administrators to keep hives on the roof of the school.  I regularly use this as an example of the importance of student autonomy in project-based learning.  But beyond that, and a few lessons in harvesting honey from Steve Martin at ChurchView Farm, I don't have much  experience with honeybees.

Above:  Brian captures the swarm with sugar water.

Below:  Luring the remaining bees into the hive in the new 

location.

So just as we were finishing, Brian suggested trying to capture a swarm and installing a larger hive.   I grabbed one of the taller ladders and we drove over to Foxwalk Farm.  Brian put on a suit and climbed up with a sugar-water soaked comb to lure the bees from a cedar tree.  A couple hundred climbed on, and I swapped the comb with a fresh one.  But after a short while, it became clear that to get the swarm to come as a whole, we'd need to remove the whole end of the branch they were swarming.  I did the cutting, so I only caught some of the events on video.

We clipped the branches around the swarm and stuffed them all into a box for traveling back to our farm.  The challenge then became removing them from the branch. Eventually, we had to just knock them off, then help those inside the hive attract the rest inside.

We're concerned that we might not have much of a Black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) bloom this year, but we have an abundance of early and late blooming raspberries, and then Osage orange (Maclura pomifera) that will hopefully keep them interested in staying.

In case you're wondering, the louder, constant hum you here in the background is not the hives, it's Diane mowing on the bigger tractor.

Mating Wood Turtles

We see wood turtles (Glyptemys insculpta) in and just above the annual flood plain nearly every week from April to October and beyond, but this is the first time I've seen them mating.

Snapper

We found this very mature snapping turtle (Chelydra serpentina) near the top of the sand/silt bank to the smaller channel of the South Branch.  The back of her shell was covered with mud, but otherwise we didn't see evidence of egg-laying nearby. If this turtle was laying eggs, it would be about two to six weeks earlier than predicted. Like many reptiles, snapping turtles can store male sperm for several years, possibly because they may sense when conditions are better.  That may be giving them too much credit. If eggs are incubated from 75-80 F (24-26 C), they are nearly always male; but if the surrounding environment is significantly cooler (20 C) or warmer (30 C), they're nearly always female.

Last year we found a snapping turtle that seemed to be struggling up a steep slope.  I've been handling these turtles comfortably since I was a pup, so I lifted it to the top of the steep slope, immediately discovering that it had just deposited about 12 ping-pong sized eggs.  I tried to put her back, but she wanted nothing to do with the nest.  I felt terrible whenever I thought of it, even though I really don't want a bunch of snapping turtles in our ponds.

Spotted Salamanders

After the last big flood, someone must have decided it was easier to bury flood debris rather than remove it.  I'm told FEMA flood insurance often prescribes that, and some floodplain owners have had to watch dozers bury entire trailers in their lower fields rather than pay for big trucks to remove them.   But there is an upside.  It seems that one of every three or four times I discover buried debris, I find big spotted salamanders (Ambystoma maculatum) using it as an underground cavity.  I first learned of these when a good friend and biology major in college had one as a pet, because her father studied the ability of newts and salamanders to regenerate their eyes at the University of Pennsylvania back in the 1980's.

It's Invasive Time! (Already)

Our interns Jamie and Mary pulled lots of invasive cattails (Typha spp.) from the wetland frog pond last year, but they're back.  I can't remember ever seeing new shoots this early in April.   I got a few by the roots, but I'll bet at least two dozen broke off, leaving the rhizome beneath the surface.  I've never done it, but you can grind the rhizomes to make a flour, and eat other parts too.

An unusual wind map

I was awakened by the wind, so I thought I'd share this unusual wind map. Click on the image below to see the dynamic version.

Chestnut leaves!

American chestnut leaves on March 14, 2012

I keep a few little American chestnuts (Castanea dentata) growing in pots for school visits and other demonstrations.  After two 80-degree days this week, I noticed today that one of the little chestnuts had leaves!

Trees in pots are more influenced by ambient temperatures.  The temperature extremes in regular soil are buffered, whereas potted soil can be warmed almost uniformly.  So, for the same reason that potted plants' roots are vulnerable to extreme cold, this little tree's leaves emerged as a response to warming, presumably triggered by a drop in abscisic acid and a corresponding increase in gibberellin levels.

Experiments in Spring Flooding

February 26, 2012

By inserting a modest weir and natural rocks in our smaller channel (lower left of top photo) before anticipated minor flooding, we hoped to reverse slow erosion and instead foster sediment deposit so we can add willow stakes and silver maple and sycamore seedlings.

The idea is to slow, stall or gently reverse the flow along the area vulnerable to erosion.  Before we began work, the channel-left bank (river-left or channel-left is always from the perspective of someone traveling downstream, so that means the bank on the right from the cameras perspective in these photos) had a five foot to eight-foot dropoff.

In the second photo you can see the swift flow in the center channel, with pooled water in the area of concern.

I'll share "after" photos when the water recedes.

First sightings - Robins, Narcissus and Bluebirds

American Robin Bill Purcell.  Next.

fronteraaudubon.org

I travel between Zones 6b and 7a several times a week, so I can often predict what's coming for Hampshire County at least one week in advance.

Last week I saw  American Robins (Turdus migratorius) and Daffodils (Narcissus spp.) in the city.  On a long walk on Saturday in Hampshire County I saw the first robin, many daffodil leaves, and another member of the thrush family, Eastern Bluebirds (Sialia sialis).  


This morning along the South Branch, there were robins and bluebirds everywhere.

Daffodils - February, 2012

Eastern Bluebird parents. Paula Apro of Eastford CT. 

First Crocuses

Shoots from bulbs are triggered almost entirely by sustained increase in temperature of the surrounding soil.  So in mild winters like this one, it's likely they will appear earlier this Spring.  We saw daffodil shoots (Narcissus sp.) over the weekend, and we saw our first crocus blooms (Crocus sp.) this morning.


Crocus is a genus of perennials in the iris family with about 80 species. Crocuses are native to Europe, the Middle East and Central Asia, and south to North Africa.  They are successful at nearly all altitudes, and that's one reason why they do well in the mid-Atlantic.

You've probably seen photos of crocuses blooming in the snow, and it sounds like we'll get the chance to see that tomorrow.

Frosty Mornings

First light on a frosty morning.

Diane and the dogs crossing the big field.

My oldest dog Korry stops back to check on why I'm kneeling.

Most people in the mid-Atlantic region will tell you that witnessing the change of season is important to them.  Of course, that's an underlying theme of this blog.  Based on my current understanding of others' interpretations of climate change data, we may have an increasingly warmer climate, but that will likely be experienced through irregular weather patterns, more snow rather than less, and increases in both flooding and drought.

As an educator, I also align more with those who are putting their energy into climate adaptation, rather than what may or may not be possible in reversing climate trends, which may be entirely due to anthropogenic causes.      I don't look forward to droughts or floods, but I certainly look forward to more snow.  I'm surprised we're still seeing temperature swings in January of 30 oF or more.

But for now it seems will have to settle for frosty and foggy mornings rather than snow.  

Eagles in the City

I was commenting that it has been more than three weeks since we've seen a Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) along the South Branch.  Then today I received an email from my neighbor Greg in the Clarendon neighborhood of Arlington, VA (most densely populated county in the U.S.) that there was an eagle in his tree, and our neighbor Joan got these two great photos.







Best of all, there is good reason to believe the eagle may have been surveying Greg's flock of plastic flamingos, although I wish it would pick off some of the neighbor's free-roaming cats.   What might this mean for the Arlington Egg / Backyard Hen Initiative?  I learned there was another eagle spotted above the Arlington Career Center last month.