March, 2019: Describe your walk by adding a comment below
Each time you go out and make observations for this project, describe your walk by adding a comment to this post. Include the date, distance walked, and categories that you used for this walk.
Suggested format:
Date. Place. Distance walked today. Total distance for this project.
Categories.
Brief description of the area, what you saw, what you learned, who was with you, or any other details you care to share.
Comments
3/3/19. Adamant, VT. 0.1 miles today, 1836.9 miles total.
Categories: birds
It was a lot warmer on the steps of the co-op this morning, thank goodness. I sat and watched the snow melt from the tops of the south facing drifts. I also got to see several chickadees, some blue jays, and a white nuthatch at the feeder across the way. A huge flock of over 60 crows flew by, heading north. I think they may be part of the gigantic crow flock that hangs out at the Vermont compost company in Montpelier. A raven flew by carrying some nesting material. That time of year already!
3-3-19, Hoffheimer Grotto, Warren, NJ 0.5 miles today, 447.25 miles total.
Category: as many species as possible
The Rutgers bioblitz has begun. It's 75 days with the intention of documenting whatever naturally occurring species you come across in your daily life. So when Katie asked me to take her to "the grotto" to work on her "fort" (of branches against some boulders) I wandered around trying to document everything that was showing through the patchy snow (we'd gotten 4 inches the day before but it was melting fast, but 6 more inches were on their way, and we left as the snow started falling again).
I have walked here many times so did not expect to find many new species. There were a lot of lichens I don't know, but only a few mosses that I couldn't at least get to family (I think). But there were two surprises: maddog skullcap (isn't that a great name?) and American pennyroyal. I don't see either often, and had no idea they were here.
With the bioblitz on I've also been spending a lot of time watching (and feeding ) birds outside my window. We finally have Carolina wrens again, and get about a dozen other species daily. The other day I even saw a chipmunk. I thought they hibernated all winter!
3-4-19. Greenwood Meadows, Warren, NJ. 0.75 miles today, 448 miles total
Category: as many species as possible
I took Katie sledding this afternoon. The kids here sled into a big catch basin for a 20-year-old development in town. It has about a 30-foot hill, no trees at all, and nothing dangerous to crash into. There were probably 30 kids there when we went, and I was definitely the only mom wandering around photographing weeds rather than watching kids (so nice to have my youngest be 12 and no longer in need of any kind of watching here).
I found a number of lichens, including some I don't know, and pussy toes, which I did not expect (under a pine tree where the snow had melted away).
3-5-19. Somerville, NJ. 1.0 mile today, 449 miles total
Category: unintentional and identifiable
I walked about four blocks in the "city" today, looking at sidewalk weeds and tree lichens, mostly. Not much interesting except the remains of a bald hornet nest. I did find both common groundsel and hairy bittercress in bloom, though. The red maples planted on the street are still tightly closed, though.
3-7-19 Brookfield, King Fisher, High Rock, and Willowbrook Parks, Staten Island, NY 1.0 mile today, 450 miles total
Categories: unintentional and identifiable
I drove out to Staten Island this afternoon to work on scouting locations for the upcoming City Nature Challenge bioblitz. This time I focused on parks in the center of the island.
First I looked at historic Richmond Towne but did not get out. It's very mowed grass, and didn't look promising, nature-wise, though there were interesting spots around the edges.
The first place I got out of the car was Brookfield Park, which I assume is an enormous landfill planted with grasses and scattered baby trees. It was basically grass as far as the eye could see through rolling hills, with a few scattered saplings and lots of paved paths. It was too windy to stay long and would be brutal in the heat of mid summer. Not sure I'll be back, though it looks like the north end of it has a wetland to it. Other than the unidentified grasses I found willow, reed, cattail, evening primrose, mugwort, bush clover, and bergamot.
Next was something of a pocket park in the very suburban part of Staten Island. It centered on a pond and was completely wooded and nearly undeveloped, with a few dirt paths (I took one) and lots of "thin ice" signs with attached wooden ice rescue ladders, something I'd never seen before. Here I found box elder, black locust, beech, white oak, ivy, Japanese honeysuckle, knotweed, poison ivy, rose, sweetgum, and false turkey tail. Only the fungus, poison ivy, and four of the trees are native. A pretty junky part but much more promising than the recently planted landfill.
After that was High Rocks Park, which is where the Greenbelt Conservancy has its headquarters. There is also a Girl Scout camp here (and a nearby Boy Scout camp, a privately owned campground, and a JCC day camp, all smack in the middle of Staten Island, who knew? Here it was a wooded ridge top (well, for Staten Island, Google tells me it was 235 feet). I found sweet birch, spicebush, beech, red oak, white oak, yew, Leucothoe (unusual for me), sassafras, sweet gum, poison ivy, black cherry, wineberry, hornbeam, holly, greenbriar, and a cherry. Far more natives here than at the other park. There's still 4 inches of snow on the ground, so I was mostly looking at woody plants.
I stopped by the Greenbelt Nature Center but did not get out, but it looks very promising, with wetter woods and a marsh. Then the last stop was at Willowbrook Park which has a pond and an enormous flock of geese and mallards (and a couple ring billed gulls and a pigeon) that were obviously expecting handouts. They were disappointed. The snow was melting here, especially around the buildings. I found alder (whose catkins were just starting to elongate a little), silky dogwood, ash flower galls, lesser celandine, rose, knotweed, honeysuckle, thistle, chickweed, several lichens, tulip tree, wintercreeper, peppergrass, dandelion, bittercress, mouse ear chikweed, speedwell, and a pair of house sparrows. A stranger stopped me in the parking lot to tell me about how three of the geese had been shot with a bow and arrow but recovered (with treatment) last summer.
All in all a very fun afternoon.
3-9-19. Highlawn Pavilion, South Orange, NJ. 0.25 miles today, 450.25 miles total.
Category: whatever I could ID in the snow.
Took a walk during a break in the reception at my nephew's bar mitzvah, at a lovely event hall on a cliff overlooking New York City. But there was still 4 inches of crusty snow on the ground and I was all dressed up, so I couldn't find much to photograph: a few trees (white oak, tree of heaven, a hickory) and a few curb edge weeds, where the snow had melted: Veronica, mouse-ear-chickweed, knawel. Still, it was a lovely ceremony and a very nice reception.
3-10-19. Bridgewater Sports Arena, Bridgewater, NJ. 0.5 miles today, 450.75 miles total.
Category: Identifiable and not planted
I was looking for somewhere not far from me that I had not walked in a while. I've walked here before but not posted it to iNat. There are woods that technically belong to the quarry which is removing the other side of the mountain here, but they haven't been touched in decades. I walked along the edge of them, crunching on the 4 inches of iced over snow, around the edge of the big parking lot at the ice skating rink here. Lots of lichens. No surprises, though I can confirm that the red maples are not blooming, the (planted) silver ones are, the elms are not, and the blackhaw is just starting to open its buds.
I think this week with the expected warmer weather we'll see the red maples bloom, and maybe the elms. It will be good sugaring weather, if I did that sort of thing, warm in the day and frozen at night, sunny, too.
3-11-19. Buck Gardens, Far Hills, NJ. 0.5 miles today, 451.25 miles total
Category: flowering, starts with D
I took both Molly and Carl (who's home from truck driving for the weekend) over to Buck Gardens because I know they have winter aconite on a south facing slope and figured the snow would have melted. It had, there, but the paths to it were treacherous and this was the first day the garden was open since the snow a week and a half ago. Still, the aconite and snowdrops and spring witch hazel were all blooming, and they have one of the giant pussy willows covered in huge "pussy feet". There were also skunk cabbage flowers melting holes in some of the remaining snow.
Molly was looking for D's but with Carl there I was rather distracted and we didn't do much. There was dogwood, doghobble, dawn redwood, and dwarf fothergilla.
The only naturally occurring plants I photographed were a moss (maybe seductive entodon), crowded parchment, beechdrops, and poverty oat grass, and we saw a honey bee as well.
3-11-19. Anse Noire, Martinique. 0.4 miles today, 1837.3 miles total.
Categories: bird
Here we are back in Martinique again for another week of sun. A few challenges this time around--I still can't lift anything, so my husband packed the car. It wasn't until we got to the hotel at the airport in Montreal that I found out my camera bag was still on the living room. Hmmm. At least my new underwater point and shoot made it into another bag. But I haven't figured out how to use it yet, and it's battery was flat dead this morning. Fortunately, we had also decided to do some recordings while we were here to play Martinique soundscapes when we get home. So I went and sat at the bottom of the trail to the cliffs and tried some recordings. I figured out that the cable on the end of my microphone is quite damaged. But still, I managed to make a few recordings. My favorite bird, a yellow warbler, greeted me as I arrived at my spot. A flock of other birds were up in a tree above me, but I couldn't make out what they were (my binoculars are also in my camera bag). Some hummers flitted by quickly, and then I was surrounded by several more yellow warblers. I even managed to get a recognizable photo with my phone, they were so close. The common gallinule is still hanging around, as is one of the muscovy ducks. I wonder if they're a pair.
Good luck with your Rutgers and City bioblitzes! Such fun! I misread one of your categories for the day and thought you were shooting unmentionables...
Oh, how annoying to leave your camera behind! Good luck with the underwater one. I'd better not tell Molly about the unmentionables; she'll be wanting to do them next (or maybe I'll wait a month and do Dutuchman's breeches, that seems to fit).
3-12-19. Anse Noire, Martinique. 0.6 miles today, 1837.9 miles total.
Categories: bird sounds, underwater
This morning I headed up the riverbed behind the campground a short ways. The riverbed was quite dry, but it seems to be an important corridor for the birds since it is relatively open compared to the surrounding forest. I recorded a Zenaida dove, a Lesser Antillean saltator, a bananquit, a Lesser Antillean bullfinch, then I heard some growling coming from the base of the rocky cliff behind me. My best guess is that I was sitting too close to a mongoose den. So I picked up and moved on a little ways. Then my batteries died on my recorder. I didn't bring any spare batteries and there are no stores in walking distance, so I guess I'll be recording on my phone for the rest of the week. I got to see some more yellow warblers, some purple throated caribs, and some Antillean crested hummingbirds as well.
Later in the morning, I went for a snorkel with my husband. Yesterday we tried to swim along the northern part of the bay, but the jellyfish were quite thick. We were creeping along in fetal position in our lido suits, getting stung constantly on all exposed skin, wishing we had full wet suits. But later we noticed that the red sediment in the water that was thick along the north shore didn't quite touch the south shore. So that's where we swam today and made it a good way out before getting stung. We saw a chain moray and a purplemouth moray. Also, some Christmas tree hydroids, some Caesar grunts, giant sea anemones and other anemones, mat zoananthid, Pinna carnea, social feather duster worms, lots of spiny lobsters, a white encrusted zoananthid. And we watched an octopus grab a lobster and eat its tail.
In the afternoon we went for a walk along the beach collecting sea glass and shells. In a pile of sargassum, I thought I found a large jellyfish and began photographing it. Then I realized it was a breast prosthesis. So there was my unmentionable object for the day!
3-13-19. Anse Noire, Martinique. 0.4 miles today, 1838.3 miles total.
Categories: bird sounds, underwater, shells
This morning I took my bird walk to the base of the trail that goes to the cliffs. I sat and listened for about 1/2 hour and recorded calls with my phone. In addition to the usual bananaquit, Carib grackle, and zenaida doves, I also got some clear recordings of some vireos, probably black-whiskered vireos based on how that's the only vireo species I've seen here. I think I recorded a thrasher as well. And some spectacled thrushes. There was also a mangrove cuckoo calling in the distance, but my phone didn't pick up his call. The common gallinule floated past where I was sitting, and I got a photo with my point-and-shoot. A mongoose checked me out several times as I was sitting, but I couldn't get its photo--too fast and deep in the brush.
Later in the morning, I went snorkeling with my husband on the south side of the bay again. We watched a large octopus interact with some bearded fireworms. It didn't eat the worms but let them crawl on by. We saw 2 chain morays and some lobsters. I was on the lookout for tunicates since I had just been reading about them in my reef creatures book, spineless chordates. I found several possibilities, but I'll have to wait to get IDs from my photos once I can post them (the internet here is practically unusable--I definitely can't load photos). I also found what I thought might be a nudibranch. But when I looked it up in the book, it seems to be some sort of Cyphoma, a shell-less snail. Pretty, though. Later in the afternoon, we walked the beach looking for seaglass and shells. We found a few, including some sort of limpet and maybe a pink cowrie. And a tiny red translucent crab.
3-12-19. Sunset Lake, Bridgewater, NJ. 1.25 miles today, 452.5 miles total
Categories: bark, buds, galls, fruit, green in winter, lichen, fungi, animals
I walked from a tiny wooded park through to the paved road around Sunset Lake, a private swimming pond that was so thoroughly posted (and surrounded by houses across the street) that I stuck carefully to the road. I still found a lot of species given that it's still winter, with patchy snow. Most interesting were the dozens of trees freshly chewed by beaver. In one section they'd put metal fencing around every tree, but three quarters of the lake had none. I did not see where the lodge was, though, and the whole pond has a visible shoreline, it must be up or downstream in the feeder brook (I'd guess up, as I came from upstream and the ground there was much wetter than the last time I came through).
I also saw a pair of Canada geese, several galls (ash flower, horned oak, cedar-quince rust in a juniper, and a mugwort stem gall) and there was watercress in one of the ditches that drains into the lake; it's not something I come across often.
3-13-19. Torpey Field, Somerville, NJ. 1.25 miles today, 453.75 miles total
Categories: green in winter, fruit, buds
I walked from the new football complex here past an old farm to a new floodplain park which is mostly just two parking lots and a soccer field carved out of a sea of mugwort. But at the farm there were blooming silver maples, and I'd seen Whitlow grass here in the past, which should be blooming now. I couldn't find it this time, though. There were a few budding hairy bittercress, though. Mostly it was just nice to get out on a sunny day and explore a section of the park I'd not been to before.
3-14-19. Anse Noire, Anse L'Ane, and Trois Ilet, Martinique. 0.3 miles today, 1838.6 miles total.
Categories: birds, weeds, underwater
This morning my husband and I walked up the stairs (100+) to the Anse Noire parking lot to meet a friend. On the way up, we did a bit of bird watching. Before we even left the campground we found an American kestrel perched in a tree. Then at the top of the stairs, another kestrel. In the parking lot, we watched some Carib grackles scavenging in the dumpsters as well as a chicken, but I think the chicken had an owner. There were also a few gray kingbirds on the telephone lines. Then our friend took us to Anse L'Ane to drop off her daughter at the ferry station to Fort-de-France. As soon as we stepped out of the car in Anse L'Ane I saw a Eurasian collared dove on a telephone line. Then we drove to Trois Ilet to run some errands. While she went in to the post office, I dashed around the post office parking lot shooting weeds. It brought to mind all the trips to the post offices all over the north east with my father. He loved to "collect" post offices, stopping at each one to take a picture and then going in to get a hand cancelled post card. I would while away the time while he was in the post office collecting weeds from around the perimeter of the parking lot. That's how I developed my appreciation for parking lot weeds. Anyway, the Trois Ilet post office parking lot did not disappoint. I found the lawn weed sedge with white heads and a euphorbia. And a rock dove on a roof across the street.
In the afternoon I went for a swim along the south side of the bay. I saw a striped gobi of some sort, a puffer fish, an anemone with short striped arms, a yellow fanworm, a yellow tubesponge, and a very large creature with a white chin lurking under an overhang. Maybe a skate of some sort.
3-15-19. Anse Noire, Martinique. 0.4 miles today, 1839 miles total.
Categories: birds, underwater
This morning I returned to the river bed to listen to birds, but this time staying clear of the mongoose cave when I sat down. I heard some zenaida doves, a mangrove cuckoo, a broadwinged hawk, a black-whiskered vireo, a spectacled thrush, some grackles and a saltator. A yellow warbler came to check me out, but not close enough for a photo, and he didn't sing either.
Later on I went for a swim with my husband along the south side of the bay again. I saw some algae hydroids, something green that looked plant-like (like an Opuntia cactus, but underwater), an orange shell, a blue ball (tunicate?), some Christmas tree worms, a furry sea cucumber, a lobster, a chain moray, and a small Venus' girdle, which is a really cool transparent ribbon-like ctenophore. Also some peach encrusting sponge.
3-16-19. Anse Noire, Martinique. 0.4 miles today, 1839.4 miles total.
Categories: tracks, birds, underwater
This morning I started out on the beach looking at tracks and found some gallinule tracks, muscovy duck tracks, and mammal tracks (probably possum). Then I climbed slowly and carefully up to the Anse Noire cliffs to listen to birds. The first place I sat in was full of ants, so I quickly moved, but only after getting some spectacular views (no camera, no singing) of a yellow warbler up close. I listened to some doves, grackles, banaquits, spectacled thrushes, and watched some saltators (I think) in a tree. I managed to get a pretty good shot of a perched dragonfly with my point and shoot. At first the camera refused to focus on it, going instead for the bushes in the background. So I estimated the distance between me and the dragonfly, then pointed the camera at the ground at about the same distance, focused on the ground, then held the shutter button as I pointed back to the dragonfly again. It worked--a clear shot! I gotta remember that hack! On my way back to camp I paused to watch the common gallinule swimming in the pond. Then a largish dark bird flew in and I got a few photos with my point and shoot. I don't know what it was, and I doubt the photos are good enough for the experts to do a photo ID. But maybe.
Later I went for a swim with my husband along the north side of the bay. I went out just to the edge of the bay where I saw my first jellies, then turned around so as not to get stung. I saw a very large banded butterflyfish, a crab inside a giant anemone, some underwater hermit crabs in interesting shells, a creature about 3" in diameter with a black-and-white face lurking in a hole, an octopus, a spotted scorpionfish, and a sand diver.
3-16-19. Eno Pond and DeCamp Trail, Lacey and Mantoloking, NJ. 3.5 miles today, 457.25 miles total
In May I will be leading probably two bioblitz walks in one day for Forsythe National Wildlife Reserve, so today I actually went and walked on the paths I hope to use. I'd tried before with Molly but the high winds were just to scary in the woods. Today was lovely. No snow on the ground (if still nothing new is growing). For me today was also exciting because for the first time I made it over 3 miles. When we started this project two years ago you (Erika) were walking 3 miles a day, and I was wondering if I'd ever be able to do that. Granted I only walked 1 1/4 in one spot and 2 1/4 in the other, but still it's my highest total yet. I have used it as a goal in Weight Watchers: walking 3 miles in one shot.
At any rate the plants: both sites are the pine barrens, where I rarely go, with very different species from those at home. At Eno's Pond there is a lot of Atlantic white cedar, pitch pine, and southern red oak, none of which are by me, as well as holly, highbush blueberry, black cherry, bayberry, and greenbriar, which I see more often (though they also have glaucous greenbriar, which I don't). Also unusual for me were: common dewberry, wintergreen (the Gaultheria one), a paper birch (which shouldn't have been there, and was dead), a whole lot of mosses, and some interesting lichen on holly bark.
deCamp started out with similar woods, though with less holly, but the lower section of trail is swampy. Unusual for me plants I saw here included most of the species above, plus: trailing arbutus (I've virtually never seen this, only in NH), chestnut oak, bracken, fetterbush (the Eubotrys one), some little heather family plants I can't ID, sweet pepperbush, sweetbay magnolia, swamp azalea, inkberry, maleberry, and some kind of gall on bayberry bushes.
I also found what I think is a cecropia moth cocoon and a narrow-winged mantis ootheca, both very exciting.
I use your trick with the camera focus fairly often on my point-and-shoot, though I usually end up focusing it on my belly or thigh and then the plant. I imagine passersby are wondering why on earth I'm taking selfies of my stomach.
I love hearing about all your snorkeling finds. I've snorkeled in the Caribbean only once, when I was a teenager, and found it fascinating. (I also burned the tops of my ears so badly they blistered). I would love to go back some day. Particularly in March.
I'm so eager to see spring start. On Friday on the rescue squad we were dispatched for a "mass-casualty, hazardous-materials" call at the local high school (which turned out to be some kid sprayed a small amount of pepper spray in the cafeteria and two girls had asthma attacks and 20 more had panic attacks) but at the start of the whole thing, while everyone was getting organized and figuring out what we were dealing with, I spotted a patch of Draba verna in full bloom and was completely distracted. Granted I pulled myself together and got down to the task at hand, but I kind of wish I'd managed to get a photo!
3-18-19 Thomae Park, Bridgewater and Washington Valley Fire House, Warren, NJ. 0.5 miles today, 457.75 miles total
categories: flowering, identifiable
I went back to Thomae because I remembered finding all of skunk cabbage, alder, and hazel here, and all three might be blooming. In the end I couldn't find the hazel, but the alder and skunk cabbage were indeed blooming, as was some elm. So next I went up to the fire house where I'd once spotted a hazel in the back of the flea market. That one was easy to find and was indeed also blooming. I also saw snowdrops in a friend's yard yesterday. Spring is really coming, hard as it is to believe.
Congratulations on a 3.5 mile day! That is fantastic! What an accomplishment! And in the pine barrens, where the plants are so incredibly interesting! I met with my PT person today. She said she thinks I can start trying some short walks 3 times a week. Maybe I can find some snow insects and tracks before our snow melts.
What a scary call at the high school! I am extremely over-the-top hypersensitive to capsaicin, so such an exposure would probably kill me. My allergist tells me my hypersensitivity is not immune-mediated so I can't call it an allergy. But simply breathing steam from cooked sweet peppers makes me cough so continuously that I can't breathe. If capsaicin were a pharmaceutical drug, they would call this hypersensitivity an allergy. But since it's not, there is no word for it. Sounds like the 2 girls with asthma attacks might have a touch of this no-name hypersensitivity. Apparently other people with capsaicin hypersensitivity have been treated successfully with ketamine. But there's very little documentation about it. And since the hypersensitivity isn't immune-mediated, an epi-pen won't do a thing for it. So I try to avoid political rallies, competitive shopping events, and people scared of bears. Sounds like I should avoid high schools as well. Good thing you nabbed a Draba verna at the site.
3-17-19. Anse Noire, Martinique. 0.4 miles today, 1839.8 miles total.
Categories: tracks, bird sounds, underwater
This morning I sat at the trailhead for the cliff trail to listen to birds. It being Sunday during crab season, though, local crabbers kept walking past checking their crab traps. Crabs are the local traditional meal for Easter. But you can't just catch them and eat them--you have to purge them by controlling their diet, feeding them just fruits for several weeks before cooking them. So now during Lent, everyone is out catching crabs to keep in cages in their yards for special feeding. Nevertheless, between passersby, I heard a black-whiskered vireo, a gray kingbird, several bananaquits, several zenaida doves and Carib grackles, and a pair of chipping yellow warblers. A belted kingfisher came by, and the common gallinule was swimming in the tiny pond in front of me.
Later in the morning, I went for one last swim, this time along the north side of the bay. As I swam along the cliff, I quickly encountered a few jellies, including an odd one with a red center--prey? And another largish one that might be a sea walnut. I gave up swimming along the cliff and just swam above the rocks in the shallows. There I found a small spiny lobster walking about in the open, a spotted goatfish, and a rainbow wrasse.
3-19-19. Hoffheimer Grotto, Warren, NJ. 0.5 miles today, 458.25 miles total.
Category: on my scavenger hunt list.
So I will be leading walks for two different bioblitzes this spring, and I was thinking about how to get people engaged, teach them about biodiversity, and get them to take and post a lot of photos, ideally not everyone shooting the exact same thing. So I made up a 45 item "scavenger hunt" using a lot of the categories I've used here over the years: colors, types of plants (and animals), leaf shapes, fruit types, bark, galls, etc. Molly and I tried it out today while Katie worked on her "fort".
We found termites and an entire deer leg (but no more of the deer) which had an interesting beetle on it. Also a lot of large black feathers and some bones that looked very large for a bird, though maybe about the size of a turkey drumstick. Molly found a face made of lichen on a rock, and I found a blooming hazel bush, so all in all very interesting, particularly considering how often I've been here with Katie lately.
3-20-19 East Branch Brook, Martinsville, NJ. 0.75 miles today, 459 miles total.
Category: scavenger hunt
I refined my scavenger hunt list and tried it out alone today, this time trying to find at least three things in each category. I walked up a hill and then down along the banks of a brook to a weir and back. The spring peepers were out in force, as well as another very loud frog that sounded to me like a huge number of upset chickens. When I got home I figured out it was probably wood frogs. Those I was able to get a photo of. (never saw the peepers). There was also a great blue heron, a basking turtle (that dove underwater before I could get close enough to ID it), a lot of mallards, and a pair of wood ducks! I see and hear them sometimes, but this was the first time in a long time I was able to get a photo. Plant-wise the exciting finds were bladdernut and wood stonecrop. And the alders and lesser celandine are blooming. Soon the entire valley here will be yellow with lesser celandine (which is terribly invasive but very pretty en masse).
3-20-19. Barre St, Montpelier, VT. 0.2 miles today, 1840 miles total.
Category: green
I celebrated my first walk of the season today by looking for anything green. The snow on the south-sloping lawns on Barre St has melted, and I found a few green leaves trying to poke up, including some wild strawberries. On my way back, I walked the other side of the street. Still more than 12" of snow there, so nothing green. No bugs, no birds, no lichens.
The scavenger hunt sounds like a great idea--great fun! Peepers already? Wow!
3/22/19. George Rd, Calais, VT. 0.1 miles today, 1840.1 miles total.
Categories: insects on snow
We had another heavy snowfall today, 6-8" when we were expecting more like 2". It took me 15 minutes to walk up our unplowed driveway, so that was my walk for the day. Since it was warm (over 25F), I searched for insects on the snow. I was quite delighted to find a soldier beetle larvae crawling about. No spiders, though.
3/24/19. Adamant, VT. 0.4 miles today, 1840.5 miles total.
Categories: birds, signs of spring
I took a short walk in Adamant today, from the store to the north end of Sodom Pond (still frozen over, with a good foot of fresh snow on the ice). With all that ice and snow, it looked like mid-January. But. The red-winged blackbirds were singing, and a Canada goose flew overhead, the first I've seen up here since November. I also caught a grackle at the feeder across from the store, as well as several bluejays and some chickadees. And as I was walking down the road, I found some pussy willows opening up, and some poplar buds as well. The alder catkins are still tightly bound, but maybe in a week or two they might show signs of life.
I hadn't thought to check poplar buds; they're not terribly common here, but I know where all of cottonwood, quaking aspen, and white poplar are located by me, and will have to see if any are open.
3/25/19. Stone Cutter's Way, Montpelier, VT. 0.6 miles today, 1841.1 miles total.
Categories: anything alive
I went for a stroll down Stone Cutter's Way in Montpelier this afternoon, looking for signs of anything alive (that I could reach with my point-and-shoot camera). A goldfinch was singing up in a tree, but it was too far away for the camera lens. I tried recording it, but I haven't had a chance to check yet whether I caught any of its song. In the meantime, no luck. Nothing living. No leaves, no buds, no weeds poking above the snow. No bugs. No lichens close enough to photograph without traipsing through deep snow. Finally, I found a dead elm, at least recognizable, if not living. I'll try again on Wednesday.
3-24-19. Fort Tryon Park, NYC and Elysian Fields/Sybil's Cave, Hoboken, NJ. 1.5 miles today, 460.5 miles total
Category: identifyable.
Carl decided to go to the city today, so I tagged along. Our first stop was the Cloisters, which involved climbing 200 feet up several flights of stairs built into the side of the hill in Fort Tryon Park. Not a whole lot is either growing wild or particularly leafed out or blooming here, but I found a few tiny weeds and a blooming cornelian cherry.
In the subway on the way back south we saw a rat and Carl had me post it on iNat as well.
We stopped in Central Park to look at Belvidere Castle, but it was closed for renovation, and that part of the park is so overused there's nothing but bare dirt and huge (planted) shade trees.
Then we took a bus over to Hoboken to go visit Sybil's Cave, a tiny cave carved in a cliff right near downtown Hoboken. Getting there involved walking right past the Elysian Fields where baseball was supposedly invented. The road went along the embankment with the cave, and the whole thing is made of green rock that I think is serpentine (which I have never seen before). There was not a great variety of plants here, but a lot of chickweed, what I think is a goldenrod, cleavers, and garlic mustard. There were princess trees and hackberry and several blooming elms. The cave itself is about the size of a closet or maybe a small bathroom, with the entrance closed off with a metal grate, but it was neat to see (though I was more excited about the green rock, to tell the truth).
3-25-19. Lord Stirling Park, Basking Ridge, NJ. 0.75 miles today, 461.25 miles total
Categories: whatever caught Molly's eye, buds.
Today Molly and I walked in a slight drizzle around the main pond at this park by the Great Swamp. There's a lot of autumn olive and rose here, plus linden viburnum, but also swamp rose mallow, alders, blueberries, silky dogwood, red maple, bayberry, steeplebush, joe pye, winterberry. We saw geese and a rabbit, as well.
3-27-19. Chimney Rock Park, Martinsville, NJ. 1.0 miles today, 462.25 miles total
Categories: buds, green, moss, lichen, flowering, bugs
I walked through the woods near my house where the best collection of wildflowers will bloom in just a few weeks. Today there was a single lesser celandine open and a cluster of snowdrops someone must have planted; that's it. You can't hurry spring, and then once it gets here I won't be able to hang on to it, either. but I sure wish I could!
Roses and barberry are breaking bud. Border privet is leafing out. Slippery elm flowers have not opened, though american elm is out nearby now. I found lots of new buttercup leaves, and a small patch of round-lobed hepatica leaves I've not seen here before. I'll have to watch for the flowers. There were several flies out and about on this bright, sunny, fairly warm (40s) day. Otherwise all the same stuff I've been photographing all winter. But spring is coming.....
3-27-19. Dock Watch Hollow Brook, Warren, NJ. 0.5 miles today, 462.75 miles total
Categories: buds, moss, fungi, flowers
This evening my kids dragged me out into the woods behind our house. The path back there has been blocked since Hurricane Sandy in the fall of 2012, but they've hacked a new one. There's a wooded brook back there, and they are building a bit of a fort against a fallen log. Katie particularly wanted to show me a "lichen" that was a very nice turkey tail. There's also an old car back here, that's been buried so long a good sized tree is growing out of it. There were lots of nice skunk cabbage flowers back here, and several crocuses and daffodils that I assume must have washed out of peoples' yards as I can't imagine any one planting them here. The crocuses are blooming, but the daffodils are not (though there's a mini one in a warm spot in my yard that opened today).
3-27-19. School St, Montpelier, VT. 0.6 miles today, 1841.7 miles total.
Categories: evidence of life
Today I went for a stroll past the Union Elementary School, on up to the library, and back. Such a thrill to be out walking again! There's still a lot of deep snow everywhere, but I managed to find a few signs of life. Mostly, I was a self-appointed bark inspector. I found several kinds of lichen (Flavoparmelia caperata and Physcia stellaris) and some long stringy moss on tree trunks. I also found several strands of black-raspberry growing out through planted yews in front of the phone company building. And a red elder bush with frost-burned buds in front of the same building. On the way back to the car, I managed to catch 2 chickadees.
It's so hard to imagine all the buds you're seeing now--crocuses! Skunk cabbage! ... Loved the story about the rat you chased down!
I never see red elder down here, and it's such a pretty shrub in early summer.
I remember at Middlebury the first green blade of grass would show up the week before finals, and everyone would run around looking for them. Here in NJ the grass stays green all year, it was so different to be somewhere that it doesn't.
So glad to hear you are out walking again! I hope tings continue to improve, and swiftly.
3-30-19 Sunset Park, Montgomery, NJ. 0.5 miles today, 463.25 miles total.
Category: green
Katie and I went down to Montgomery to see a robotics competition, and on the way home stopped at this damp, muddy, mossy wooded park. There are sculptures hidden in the trees here, but Katie had her "heelies" on (sneakers with wheels in the heels) and was worried about getting them muddy, so it was not entirely a success. I mostly photographed mosses, but rose and autumn olive are breaking bud, and there was some bittercress blooming.
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