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This week is peak Common Nighthawk southbound migration in the Northeast US. We urge you to learn about them, watch the evening skies for their passage this week, and to join a local nighthawk watch if you can!

Denise and I are leading a public watch for for the Hudson-Mohawk Bird Club at the Albany Pine Bush Discovery Center parking lot at 6 PM this Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. (Aug 25, 26, and 27). Bring a chair and binoculars if you can, and join us if you can!

Peent. Peent. Peent. The sound of the Common Nighthawk (Chordeiles minor) brings back fond memories. My first sighting was when I was 10, over a large overgrown field on Long Island. A more vivid memory was from central Iowa, where they repeatedly flew low over the outdoor sports courts, feeding on flying insects, while my friends and I were enjoying the many warm summer evenings. We loved seeing and hearing them and it was a great summer memory. What I didn’t realize then was their foraging technique, as they feed entirely by flying into insects, mouths wide open, so the insects go “straight down the hatch” to be killed by contact with digestive juices (Laura Erickson, Birdwatchingdaily.com).

Nighthawks are not hawks at all, but rather “goatsuckers” or “nightjars,” members of the avian order Caprimulgiformes and family Caprimulgidae. Other members of this group include Whip-poor-wills and Chuck-will’s-widow.

Sadly, they seem to have disappeared from much of their breeding range, which still encompasses most of the continental United States. In urban settings, nighthawks often nest on flat gravel roofs instead of the typical ground locations for this species. Dubbed by past Hudson-Mohawk Bird Club (HMBC) President Frank Murphy (and many others) as the “Uncommon Common Nighthawk,” multiple online sources document a steep decline in North America over the past 50 years. Causes of this worrisome plunge are poorly documented but may include loss of habitat, use of pesticides (which reduce the numbers of insects that are the sole diet of the nighthawks), urban populations of crows which eat the eggs of city Nighthawks, and collisions with vehicles.

Wintering in South America, and with one of the longest migrations of all North American birds, Common Nighthawks get an early start south starting in August. And that is when we, here in New York’s Capital Region mostly get to see them. Most of the southward migration in our area is from mid-August to early September with the peak around August 24-25th. For the past 15 years, the HMBC, in collaboration with the Albany Pine Bush Preserve, has been counting common nighthawks from the parking lot of the Albany Pine Bush Discovery Center on New Karner Road. Most nights we have seen at least a few passing overhead and sometimes around 100 individuals over a two-hour period. Often they are too high to photograph, but occasionally they come low enough for a good look and even a good shot! The photos herein were from such a view in August 2016; it almost took me back to those summer evenings in Iowa so many years ago…

How many will we see this year? Join us, or find an area with an open view of the sky in the evening, and watch for these fascinating and disappearing birds. Let us know what you see!

Sources: Wikipedia, American Bird Conservancy, Audubon Guide to North American Birds, Cornell Lab’s All About Birds, Species at Risk Public Registry, and HMBC.

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Monarch butterfly caterpillars (larvae) only eat milkweed. Monarch moms know how to find it, and lay one egg at a time, generally on the underside of a leaf. We love Monarchs, and love milkweed too. We now have about 100 milkweed plants in our pollinator gardens, of various ages and sizes. When new ones pop up in our lawn, between the bricks on our patio, or in our vegetable garden, I carefully move them to one of our milkweed areas!

Monarchs are finding them. We see a Monarch or two every day in our yard. Sometimes they are nectaring, drinking at flowering milkweeds and other plants, but other times they are laying eggs! They land on a milkweed leaf, clutching it with their legs, and curve their abdomens to reach the underside of the leaf, attaching a single lovely, pointed, ribbed egg.

We’ve found nearly 25 eggs this month, often on our smaller milkweeds. Perhaps the Monarchs seek out the more tender young plants for their young to feed on. Risks to eggs and young caterpillars in the wild are many; few of the 500 eggs each Monarch lays grow to be an adult. So, we decided to help them, to help this iconic struggling species, which is facing challenges of climate change, pesticide use, loss of milkweed, and loss of wintering habitat in the mountains of Mexico. We brought them inside, to our milkweed-filled butterfly habitat on our dining room table!

Monarch eggs hatch within 3-to-5 days. About a day before they hatch, the tip of the egg appears dark; this is the head capsule of the caterpillar inside.

The newly hatched caterpillars are tiny, only about 2 millimeters long (less than one-tenth of an inch). Their first meal is their nutritious egg shell.

Then they get to work on the milkweed. For the next roughly two weeks, the caterpillars eat. And eat. And eat. They eat milkweed by day and milkweed by night, rarely even stopping to rest! And they grow, and grow quickly they do!

As they grow, they shed their skin, four times to be exact. Each caterpillar growth stage is called an “instar.”

When the caterpillars are done growing, they stop eating and start searching for a place to start their next great step along the journey to a butterfly: pupation. They spin a silk mat on the underside of a horizontal surface, which is sometimes a milkweed plant, and attach themselves, hanging down in a “J” shape. Here they remain for 12-24 hours, largely motionless, as changes we cannot even see are underway on inside them.

Then, after the “J” relaxes and the tentacles wilt and droop, with a bit of motion the caterpillar molts for the fifth and final time, shedding its skin and revealing the next step in its metamorphosis!

This precious chrysalis will undergo massive transformation over the next 10-14 days…stay tuned!

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Late last month, our area in “Upstate” New York received record rainfall, 7 to nearly 12 inches from a single storm. Sadly, roads were closed, property was damaged, and people were affected. At a local park, large areas of lawn were underwater.

Two days after the storm came a report of Pectoral Sandpipers in flooded fields at the park. Quickly heading over there, we encountered multiple ponds where only meadows had existed before. Geese and ducks were present, as were about 40 of these regionally uncommon Pectoral Sandpipers and other shorebirds! As we chatted and caught up with fellow birders, we photographed the opportunistic birds!

The next morning we went back. The ponded areas had partially receded and most of the shorebirds were gone. A lone Greater Yellowlegs was present. What we did find were highly opportunistic peripatetic Wandering Gliders, lovely golden colored skimmer dragonflies with an extensive range. Flying back and forth, singly and in tandem, mated in the air and while ovipositing, they were a joy to see. But, we wondered if this made evolutionary sense as the ponds will likely completely dry out well before the eggs would hatch and the dragonflies would complete their water-requiring nymph life stage!

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One of the highlights of our recent trip to Iceland was a visit to the tundra. I was fascinated by how many plants occupy this seemingly barren habitat. One of the reasons the tundra appears barren, I think, is that its plants grow so close to the ground. For instance, here is a stand of willow trees.

Trees on the tundra experience very brief growing seasons, followed by very cold, windy winters. Their diminutive size may be both the result of and protection against their harsh environment. In any case, the tundra ground is covered with these tiny trees, short flowers, and thick, soft mosses, all growing on the lava rocks.

Maybe because there are so few actual tall trees in the country, there is a saying in Iceland: “If you get lost in Iceland, just stand up.” It’s meant as a little joke, but the saying struck a chord with me because I think that its truth extends far beyond short trees and tundras.

When the world seems to be closing in on us, when we are overwhelmed with the many details of daily life; small details that seem to take on greater size and power the more we think about them, maybe we need only to stand up. Maybe we just have to cast a longer view, see the whole, larger picture of our reality in life size.

Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night with a nagging worry? Isn’t it amazing how that one worry can lead to others, until, in the dark of a long night, they seem to grow and grow, until sleep is next to impossible and we are lost in a forest of anxiety? But somehow in the morning, when we literally stand up from our bed, doesn’t that one issue seem to shrink back to its actual size? When we are no longer lost, when we see the whole picture of our lives, doesn’t a path forward often appear to us? The path may be barely visible at first, but the more we stand up, the more we take in all the possibilities life offers, the path may become more and more distinct, and our destination more clear.

For my part, I want to try to remind myself to stand up. I want to give myself a chance to see the path before I fall down among the trees. This, I believe, is a skill to be practiced and learned, especially for those of us who may be more inclined to panic rather than to look forward, above the rocks, the shrubs and tangles, to the welcoming sea ahead. But remembering that saying may help. “When you get lost, just stand up.”

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Every encounter with an American Mink is unexpected, special, and frustratingly brief. Often, there’s only time to glimpse, or I just watch in utter surprise and fascination. Photos are thus even fewer and farther between. These shy predators are found across much of North America and, via introduction, several other continents. Energetic and semi-aquatic, mink do not hibernate and need to hunt year-round to maintain their high caloric intake.

All of my US sightings have been at my favorite local spot, the Five Rivers Environmental Education Center near Albany, New York. Sometimes, ripples in the water give a clue to one’s presence; other times a mink simply crosses a trail near one of the many ponds.

One late winter morning, a mink was out on the ice on one of the ponds!

But it was not until we were in Iceland last month that Denise and I had that dreamed-of encounter with cuteness. Near our hotel on the long Snaefellsnes Peninsula in western Iceland, we were walking down to the water when Denise spied a mink popping up from among the rocks! It quickly disappeared, only to re-emerge soon after with a large flatfish in its mouth! Most likely a European plaice, this bottom-dwelling marine inhabitant was not having a good day, but the mink had its dinner!

However, cute as they are, mink in the wild are both destructive and wholly unwelcome in the wild in Iceland. Brought there in the early 1930s for captive fur farms, they promptly escaped and joined the Arctic Fox as the country’s sole mammalian predators. Mink prey on puffins, taking them right from their burrows, and build dens in the lava rocks along the shore (as we saw), feeding on fish. A single mink can even wipe out an entire eider colony. A country-wide bounty was established in 1939 and still exists, as, clearly, do mink in the wild…

Sources and resources:

https://hakaimagazine.com/features/the-mysterious-decline-of-icelands-american-invader/#:~:text=American%20mink%20were%20first%20introduced,1988%2C%20Iceland%20had%20more%20than

chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://nsv.is/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/American-mink-in-Iceland.-History-management-and-a-way-forward.pdf

A tale of conquest and crisis: invasion history and status of the American mink (Neovison vison) in Iceland Robert A. Stefansson,1 Menja von Schmalensee,1,2 Jakub Skorupski3. Acta Biologica 23/2016 | www.wnus.edu.pl/ab | DOI: 10.18276/ab.2016.23-08 | strony 87–100

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It’s mid-summer in upstate New York. White-tailed deer seem abundant, as they do in all seasons here. Recently, I had the privilege to come across a doe and her twin fawns at Five Rivers Environmental Education Center near Albany (above).

Soon the bucks will be growing their bony antlers, initially covered with velvet as in the photo below from one August morning.

As summer moves into mid-autumn rut, their thin, reddish-brown summer coats are replaced with thicker, gray-brown insulating winter coats.

Their diet transitions as well, from spring and summer grasses and leaves to autumn “mast” such as acorns, berries, and apples, to woody winter twigs, buds, evergreens, and tree bark, and what they can find under the snow.

Spring marks rebirth and new life, as the cycle renews.

Enjoy our lovely deer in every season!

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National Moth Week begins this Saturday, July 18, and the hummingbird moths have arrived just in time! We saw several of both the Hummingbird Clearwing (above and below) and Snowberry Clearwing (below) just this morning at pollinator gardens of Five Rivers Environmental Education Center near Albany New York just this morning! Enjoy - and check your flowers (especially wild bergamot) for these fascinating day-flying moths!

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In the summertime, people often ask us about something they have seen in their flower garden. Terms such as “flying shrimp,” “flying lobster,” and “miniature hummingbird” all lead us to respond – “you’ve seen a hummingbird moth”!

These fascinating diurnal creatures do resemble hummingbirds in multiple ways, as these arthropods hover and drink nectar from tubular flowers. While their body structure and function are quite different from birds, they achieve the same endpoint. Even their method of obtaining nectar is similar- yet different – a hummingbird’s beak compared to the moth’s proboscis – but the result is the same: A great example of “convergent evolution”!

We use the term “hummingbird moth” a bit loosely, as there are actually several species here in upstate New York. The two that Denise and I have observed and photographed in New York’s Capital Region are Hummingbird Clearwing and Snowberry Clearwing. Watch for them around beebalm, wild bergamot, and other flowers in your garden and various public gardens across the region.

The Hummingbird Clearwing (Hemaris thysbe), pictured above and below, has a greenish back, rusty legs, and rusty abdomen and a wingspan of about two inches. We commonly see them in July and August in flower beds such as the wonderful pollinator garden by the visitor center at Five Rivers Environmental Education Center in Delmar (near Albany) New York.

The similarly sized Snowberry Clearwing (Hemaris diffinis), below, has more black on its body and dark legs (image below); it can also be found at the Five Rivers’ pollinator garden. In fact, this is a good place to compare the two species.

With five species in the genus Hemaris, in total there are more than 120 species in the larger taxonomic group: family Sphingidae, which is known as Sphinx Moths or Hawk Moths, some of which are much larger than the small hummingbird moths described above.

As the summer continues, I urge you to get out there and check the flowers for these little “flying shrimp” and watch how they are eating and appreciate their role in pollinating the flowers!

Thanks for reading Naturelogues: Stories and photos from nature! I invite you to subscribe for free to receive new posts and support our work.

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Now in early July, there is a sense of calm in nature. Bird song is reduced. The flurry of migration is over; summer resident birds are seemingly content with their nesting, either tending fledged young or already working on a second family. But the dragonflies are back! And my attention now focuses on the many lovely “odonates” (dragonflies and damselflies) which grace our regions skies, ponds, and meadows.

Huge Common Green Darners zoom over the ponds, never stopping. But Common Whitetails, Blue Dashers, Eastern Pondhawks, Widow Skimmers and more alight on branches and stems near the water, offering a better chance to be observed and photographed. Pairs of Black Saddlebags fly over the water! And in the fields, Halloween Pennants, almost resembling butterflies, land on outstretched perches. The dragonflies are back, and love in the air.

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Iceland! I’m still trying to absorb it all after two wonderful weeks there in mid-late June. Wonderful, kind people, stunning scenery, waterfalls everywhere, thermal features similar to our Yellowstone, the junction of two tectonic plates, and cliffs full of Puffins, Razorbills, Murres, and more. In coming weeks, Denise and I will endeavor to put some of it into words, but for now, a few photos that attempt to capture its vast diversity!

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Bright flowers

Colorful Birds

Butterflies

Green fields

Dragonflies

Rainbows

Night Skies

Frogs

Tadpoles

Salamanders

Snakes

Hopscotch Grids

Strutting Pigeons

Flickering Fireflies

Mischievous Squirrels

Splashing Children

Outdoor Concerts

The Music of Ice Cream Trucks

Crashing Waves

Cicadas

Jump-rope Chants

Basketballs Thumping on Pavement

Rainfall on the Roof

Laughing Children

Birdsong

Singing Crickets

Whining Cicadas

Fragrant Roses

Sweet Honeysuckle

Sun-warmed Mint

Hamburgers Grilling

Freshly-Mowed Grass

Wet Garden Soil

Sun on Bare Skin

Cool Forests

Sand Under Bare Feet

Bonfires on Cool Evenings

Immersion into Cool Water

Sweet Corn

Marshmallows Roasted on Open Flame

Ice Cream Eaten Outdoors

Cool Water in a Tall Glass

Crisp Fresh Lettuce

Cold Watermelon

Every single day of summer, Every single long summer evening, taken in with grateful senses; each one is precious.

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My initial column from March ended with the hope that the “other” species of Bean-Goose, a Tundra Bean-Goose, the one I’d missed in 2021, would show up again here in upstate New York! Although that hasn’t happened, I was thrilled to see one on May 21 of this year nearly 5,000 miles away on remote Adak Island in Alaska!

It was with a flock of Aleutian race of Cackling Goose, and ultimately moved far enough away from the others for a clear view and photo! (above). And it was on the tundra! Yay!!

Column from March 12, 2026

St. Paul, Alaska, in the middle of the Bering Sea. June 1992

The date was June 9, 1992, and the place was St. Paul, Alaska, a remote island in the middle of the Bering Sea. A group of intrepid birders were eating breakfast. Suddenly, one of our guides stuck his head into the room and hollered “BEAN GOOSE”!!! The restaurant emptied like it was on fire, as people rushed to see this rare spring migrant. I was able to see the back end of a large, rapidly departing goose as it disappeared over the horizon!

Back then it was simply called “Bean Goose.” Subsequently, it was “split” into two separate species, Tundra Bean-Goose and Taiga Bean-Goose. The names are interesting, reflecting two distinct and significant habitats. Arctic tundra is farther north and treeless, while taiga has dense conifer forests. According to our guide, queried years later, the one we had seen on St. Paul Island was a Taiga.

Five years ago, in 2021, a Bean-Goose visited our part of the country, the greater Capital Region of New York State. It was a Tundra, the species I’d never seen. Initially, I wasn’t able to go look for it, as I was out of the area getting one of those difficult-to-schedule, newly available Covid vaccines! Then I was home, recovering from its side effects... All this time, the goose was around, and being seen - and tracked- by birders from near and far. The next day, it was still in the area, and I felt well enough to go. Our friend Alan was watching it, and Denise and I were heading up the interstate...but alas, when we were only 10 minutes away, he texted with bad news. The goose had flown away!

So, no Tundra Bean-Goose for us. But in mid-winter 2025, a Taiga Bean-Goose showed up in our area, providing a very distant view on the Hoosic River. The photo below shows the location; trust me…there is a Bean-Goose in the distance!

Most recently, and almost exactly a year later, another (perhaps the same?) Taiga Bean-Goose showed up at a local farmland, about 35 miles (as the goose flies) from the previous year’s location. Word quickly spread, and other birders and I were fortunate to get a closer look and photos of this rare visitor!

Now, if only another “Tundra” would show up!

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I love the green of a field in June. Grasses and ferns racing up toward the sun, wild flowers finding their little spaces of light and soil, all in a hurry to rise, bloom, and produce seed in this, their time.

Now, in early June, I can’t help but notice the abundance of bright gold buttercups along the field’s edge. Every few feet I find another bouquet, their yellow faces turned toward the sun.

I’ve always thought of June as the month of daisies and clover, and fragrant wild roses; but this year I have a new fascination with the tiny buttercup. Part of the genus Ranunculus, these shiny little wildflowers are considered weeds by many gardeners. But they are an integral part of the ecology of the field habitat.

Overnight, or during a rain, buttercups will close up their petals, protecting their pollen from moisture. The folded petals create safe and comfortable sleeping quarters for small insects, like the little bee seen sleeping in the bottom photo below.

As the morning warms with the June sun, the flowers open, and the small insects wake. They move about, stretching their wings, before flying off into their day.

But all during the day they return to the flowers, eating nectar and collecting pollen.

The bees are themselves fascinating. Part of a very large genus called Ceratina, they are called Small Carpenter Bees, and their various species occur worldwide, except for Antarctica. These are tiny bees, and beautiful in their iridescence.

They construct nests in the hollow or pithy stems of dead plants (a good reason to leave some of last year’s plants in the garden!). Here they raise their young. The female bee shapes little balls of pollen mixed with nectar, lining them up inside the excavated stem. On each ball she lays one egg, so that when the eggs hatch, each larva will find itself atop its first meal, courtesy of the meadow flowers surrounding it.

Of course, as in all healthy relationships, there is a mutual benefit to both parties. The bee and its young are fed, and the flowers are pollinated as the bee feeds on one flower after another, spreading pollen with each visit.

But there are other denizens of the field-edge, and these too are looking for a meal. Look carefully at the buttercup pictured below.

Yellow flower, yellow spider. A very hungry bee might miss the predator. And when that happens, the spider is ready to strike. Everybody has to eat.

The life of a tiny bee among the wildflowers may be filled with the comfort of a cozy sleep in the petals of a buttercup, nourishment taken from nectar and pollen, and the fulfillment of building a safe home for the next generation. And that life can end suddenly, at any time, when the welcoming flower is much more than meets the eye.

So, a little bee lives its life fully until its life ends. The crab spider that eats the bee lives its life fully, until a hungry bird ends it. The buttercup lives its life fully, produces seed, and then its life ends. And so it goes, in the meadow and in the world as we know it. To live a life fully, in mutuality, is what we are all meant to do. To do our part in whatever patch of the grand fabric of life we find ourselves, and to do it with the joy of a small bee waking inside an unfolding flower, warming with the sun, and flying into the waiting day.

For more about the Small Carpenter Bee: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceratina

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It is May 2026 and we are standing in the bitter winds on Adak Island, Alaska, looking for rare birds. At 275 square miles, it is the 25^th largest island in the US, but has less than 200 permanent residents. Row after row of dilapidated buildings, many from when the US Navy pulled out 30 years ago, are juxtaposed against a small number that have are maintained and usable for visitor housing. To call it desolate and bleak is to be kind.

The Adak airport (ADK) is the farthest west airport in the United States. It’s more than halfway out the Aleutian chain, about 1200 miles southwest of Anchorage, and the same distance north and west of Honolulu. Its lifeline is twice weekly 737 service from Anchorage on Alaska Airlines. Adak is kept running by a small but intrepid group of entrepreneurs who manage to support visiting hunters, tourists, and birders who are driven to explore this outpost at practically the end of the earth!

Birders come here for two reasons. One is to take a boat ride on the Bering Sea (think, Deadliest Catch) to see the range-limited Whiskered Auklets which live and breed in the Aleutian Islands. Tiny seabirds, one of species of “alcid,” they present a significant challenge to anyone wanting to add them to their USA (or world) life list. The other draw is the possibility of birds from eastern Asia being blown off course during migration, and stopping off on Adak for a rest or perhaps refueling. While the famed migrant hot spot of Attu, at the western end of the Aleutian chain (featured in “The Big Year”) has gone from highly challenging to nearly impractical to reach, Adak has become one of the go-to places to search for these errant migrants, not routinely found in North America.

After landing on Adak’s single runway, we walked down the outdoor stairs and into a tiny terminal with a sign” “Welcome to...Adak...Birthplace of the Winds.”

The first news was of an Island-wide power outage. The single power plant had broken down. Repairs would not occur until the next inbound flight in 4 days, at the earliest. Thus, we had to switch lodging to townhouses with portable generators, which, we learned, would be turned on later that day. Dropping our bags in cold, dark rooms, we had some lunch and headed out birding. Again, that is why we were there, and what we did!

Over four days, ably led by our guides Stephan Lorenz and Claudia Cavazos of High Lonesome Bird Tours, my birding buddy Steve and I, along with nine other hardy adventurers, would explore much of the northern part of the island, chasing radio and face-to-face reports of rare birds, checking and rechecking places like Clam Lagoon, an unoccupied school, the beach at the runway lights, the harbor, Sweeper Creek, Contractor Marsh, and various abandoned Naval facilities.

Often spring birding on Adak offers perhaps one chaseable rarity per day. However, this year was different, unusual, exceptional... Adak was literally teeming with rare migrant birds! Likely carried by the strong westerly winds of the intense storm that hit Adak a day or so before we arrived, it was intense, nonstop action as we chased, and found each one! Excitement built with each new sighting: small songbirds such as Hawfinch, Brambling, Fieldfare (a thrush), shorebirds including Wood Sandpipers, Terek Sandpiper, Eurasian Whimbrel, and dozens of Red-necked Stints. Rare waterfowl were there too, including Garganey, Falcated Duck, and, a personal avian “nemesis,” Tundra Bean-Goose!! All of these I got to see, and some I got photos of. The others will remain forever etched in my memory. Two I missed, leaving something for a future trip to remote Alaska!

Rapidly changing weather is a hallmark of Adak...it can be sunny and fairly pleasant with little wind one moment, and freezing cold with rain or mixed rain and snow driven by high winds the next. We were told to bring every bit of cold weather gear we had, and it sure was needed!

The last big focus was the tiny Whiskered Auklet, which required a 4-hour boat trip in the Bering Sea. Known for its own high winds and higher waves (again, think Discovery Channel’s “Deadliest Catch”), sea conditions were initially tumultuous from the abovementioned storm, wholly precluding a voyage. But by our third day, the winds had died down, the seas flattened out, and we took our Dramamine and headed east to the breeding grounds of the auklet. Not wanting to disturb their island nesting, we searched their offshore feeding grounds, coming upon an amazing estimated 5,000 birds, mostly in large flocks of hundreds at a time. We photographed the large groups, and were extremely lucky to see a pair in the water close to the boat! Although the wind and seas had picked up a bit for our ride back, we were thrilled to have a Laysan Albatross circle around us on its nearly 7-foot wingspan...

On day 4, we once again gathered at the tiny airport to welcome our plane and say our goodbye to the wonderful birds, people, lands, and winds of Adak!

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Our universe is nearly 14 billion years old. Earth, a child of the universe, is about four and a half billion years old. Neither sprang into being fully formed, and neither is fully formed yet, all these eons later. Both are ancient. Both are evolving, and always new.

We can see this phenomenon of “ever ancient ever new” in the natural world as we make our way through our days. Recently, Scott and I were finishing a hike, and right at the edge of the woods was a maple tree, tall and stately. Certainly not ancient compared to the Earth in which its roots spread, but it was an old tree, its bark rough, its trunk thick, and its branches reaching up into the sky.

Among the trees that surrounded it, this tree appeared to be an elder. Ancient, relatively speaking. And yet, when I looked closely at those sky-scraping branches, I saw something brand-new. Newly-emerged leaves, delicate and tiny, were shining in the afternoon light.

I thought about those leaves, unfolding to the sun, just beginning their lives as part of this tree which is ever ancient, ever new.

Isn’t it the same with us? Aren’t we humans, as we age, ever new with each new thought, each new friend, each new experience? Aren’t these things like the young leaves on that old maple? I think so. I met a very old man recently, when we gave a program about the Galapagos at an assisted living facility. He had sat watching, but hadn’t seemed that engaged in the program. But afterward we accompanied him as he slowly made his way up the hallway with his walker. He turned to me, and in a very quiet voice said, “There are black sand beaches in Hawaii, too.” And that began a conversation about volcanic islands, and about how similar the Hawaiian and Galapagos islands are. And when I looked at his face, I saw something new in those wizened eyes. Interest. Curiosity. Ever ancient. Ever new.

Like new stars being born in our ancient universe, like newborn leaves emerging from ancient branches, each encounter we experience offers an opportunity to learn, to evolve, to become. Like the universe, like Earth, like that tree, we are never complete, never static. We are ever new.

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I was cleaning up the bathroom sink, polishing the vanity top, and generally spiffing the room up, when I suddenly became aware that I wasn’t alone. There, on the wall, sitting very still, was a yellowish-tan house spider.

At first I was startled. And then, grabbing a magnifying glass, I took a closer look at my guest.

I saw those eight delicate legs, one of the traits that sets it apart from the insects, its six-legged cousins. Each leg clung with the lightest touch to the vertical wall, using microscopic hairs called setae, that have a special ability to cling to surfaces. Looking carefully, I saw stiff looking little hairs all along the spider’s legs. Some of these hairs are chemoreceptors, and the spider uses them to taste and smell. It’s one of the ways it locates food. Some of the hairs act like the whiskers of mammals, sensing the very small movement of air that indicates prey may be nearby.

Then I got closer, looking carefully at the spider’s two-part body. Unlike insects, which have head, thorax and abdomen, the spider’s head and thorax are combined into a cephalothorax. And right in the front, where I would expect them to be, are it’s eight bright eyes! I love looking at spiders’ eyes.

I noticed the soft pelt of its abdomen, covered with even more hairs that help it taste and smell, and sense when prey may be near.

With all these sensory hairs, did my new little friend sense that I was near? Was it frightened by something so much larger than itself? I don’t know. It didn’t scurry away, but maybe it was frozen in place by fear. Or maybe, since it is a house spider, and has shared space with us its entire life, it’s used to navigating around giants. In any case, when I left the spider it was on the bathroom wall, and when I returned later, it had moved on.

It seems that this house, which we think of as ours, is also home to a few spiders. They complete their entire life cycles here, under the roof we share with them. They use their extraordinary abilities, climbing vertical walls, walking upside down on the ceiling, sensing prey like moths, ants, mosquitoes and flies, even in the dark, using their amazing sensory hairs. They spin webs which we often sweep away, and then spin them again. They mate, have babies, and die. All within the walls of this home we share.

It is an amazing world, even indoors. Maybe you see spiders in your house too. Next time you do see one, take a close look, and get to know the fascinating creature that calls your house its home.

(A note on spider bites: House spiders are not aggressive, and usually only bite humans when escape isn’t possible, like when the spider is caught inside the clothing we are wearing. Their prey is very small, so in the unlikely event that they do bite, their fangs are too small to penetrate human skin. The only harm they might cause, barring allergic reactions, would be a small welt similar to a mosquito bite.)

For more on these interesting housemates: https://extension.psu.edu/common-house-spider/

And for a lot more on the anatomy of these interesting creatures: https://www.uky.edu/Ag/CritterFiles/casefile/spiders/anatomy/spideranatomy.htm#:~:text=All%20spiders%20have%208%20legs,they%20possess%20fangs%20and%20chelicerae.

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“Ee-oh-lay”! The ethereal, flute-like song of the Wood Thrush greeted me as I started my walk at Five Rivers Environmental Education Center in upstate New York on May 5. They are back! One of my favorite sounds of spring. Wintering in southern Mexico and Central America and returning here to nest, four of them would grace my morning!

Reading up on their biology reveals the complexity of their vocal repertoire. The commonly heard three-note portion is but the middle part of its full song, and it has a library of some 50 songs to choose from! Wood Thrushes can even sing duets with itself, generating pairs of notes in harmony from both branches of its y-shaped voice box, or “syrinx.”

While scientists study and explain the bird’s vocal mechanics, oft-times it is the writer who best describes the experience. Henry David Thoreau says: “I admire the moderation of this master. There is nothing tumultuous in his song. He launches forth one strain with all his heart and life and soul; a pure and unmatchable melody and then he pauses and gives the hearer and himself time to digest this. And then another and another at suitable intervals.”

And for this author, there was an added bonus! Wood Thrush has been one of my photographic nemeses! Every time I heard one sing, either I couldn’t find it, or it was so far, so high up, or so backlit as to be impossible to photograph! But on this day, just arrived, and still minimal leaf-out to block the views, they were actively singing from visible perches! It was truly exhilarating to look through the camera at a bird I might finally “capture”!

May everyone enjoy the haunting sounds and lovely sight of the Wood Thrush!

Sources and Resources:

To enjoy its lovely song, visit the Cornell Lab at https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Wood_Thrush/sounds

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Wood_Thrush/overview

https://www.lib.montana.edu/acoustic-atlas/acoustic-atlas-blog/posts/writing-sound-thoreau-and-the-wood-thrush.html

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As a birder, early May is an exciting time! New birds are arriving in our yard almost daily, and forays to favorite field birding spots yield the sights and sounds of favorite species fresh from their wintering grounds. Some waterfowl, having an early start, already have young! Below is a pictorial tribute to these wonders of nature!

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We have dear friends in Tucson, Arizona. Living in the desert as they do, they are accustomed to the yearly spring blooming of the Palo Verde trees. As their name (green stick in English) indicates, these trees contain chlorophyl in their trunks, bark, and branches. So, when the summer drought comes, they drop all their leaves and can still feed themselves.

But during the spring, these abundant trees are festooned with gorgeous yellow flowers. So, if you are lucky enough to be in that part of the beautiful Sonoran Desert in spring, you will find yourself surrounded by yellow. This feast of yellow has led our friends to call spring “yellow season.”

It occurs to me, as I stroll along my own neighborhood and hiking paths during April, that the desert doesn’t corner the market on yellow during springtime. So many of the early flowers are yellow, or have yellow in them, that here we might call early April yellow season as well.

Forsythia bushes, like great yellow torches, bloom in many yards. Dandelions pop up everywhere, like golden coins strewn on green grass. Along wooded trails and forest edges we find sunshiny coltsfoot and shy trout lilies. Bloodroot flowers, some with their leaves still clasping them, have bright yellow centers. And the willows that promised spring even when snow was still on the ground are now covered with yellow flowers.

With all this yellow around me, I became curious about the color, both the science of it and any symbolic meaning it might have. I found a fascinating article, which you can read here. It seems that of all the colors, yellow reflects the most light, and is the first color we notice as humans. Maybe that’s why so many pre-school children love to color big yellow suns! The color yellow can act as a mental stimulant, having the capacity to both energize and overwhelm us. Maybe like children overstimulated at an amusement park, we can get too much of a good thing with yellow. But it makes sense to me that after a long, cold, and gray winter, we need the energy that yellow provides. It speaks to us in optimistic tones, bright like the sun it reflects. We need optimism now, and we need to be energized to bring good into the world. These little flowers, in their own way, are doing just that.

So I plan to enjoy the bright energy and joy of yellow season this year, and I hope you will too!

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Driving at night in the high Mojave Desert of the southwestern USA, one encounters gangly, oddly shaped trees, their arms reaching out from the darkness. We are not the first to notice them. In the 1800s, Mormon settlers named them after the Biblical figure Joshua, believing the plants’ outstretched limbs guided their westward journey. More recently, famous author Tom Wolfe in The Right Stuff described them as “twisted freaks of the plant world that looked like a cross between cactus and Japanese bonsai,” which “at dusk…stood out in silhouette…like some arthritic nightmare.”

How many trees have an entire US national park named for them? Only two come to mind, Redwood and Sequoia, both in California, and named for the tallest and largest living things on earth, respectively. It’s not a tree, but Saguaro National Park near Tucson, Arizona, is named for a large succulent plant, the iconic symbol of the Sonoran Desert.

Like saguaro cacti, Joshua “trees” are not trees either, but succulents which store water. They are not only the namesake plant of Joshua Tree National Park but the iconic defining feature of the high Mojave Desert. Once classified as a lily, DNA evidence has shown them to be Agave family. More specifically they are yuccas.

Joshua Tree National Monument was established 1936 under the Antiquities Act by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Originally 825,000 acres, it was reduced in size to exclude some mining areas in 1950, but subsequently expanded and upgraded to full national park status through the California Desert Protection Act of 1994.

Joshua trees typically live 150 years but can occasionally reach 500 to 1000 years, although they can be difficult to “age” because they don’t have growth rings like trees. They grow their first branch when they reach 3 to 9 feet, and can reach heights of 70 feet, although 20 to 40 feet is much more common.

Similar to seeds that need a cold period to germinate, Joshua trees require a dormant period of cold weather before they flower. Once they do, they depend solely on one tiny insect for pollination: the yucca moth!

If you find yourself in the high Mojave Desert of the southwest, take a careful look at these “trees” – we think you’ll find them as fascinating as we do!

Sources and Resources:

Cole et al, First Recorded Observations of Pollination and Oviposition Behavior in Tegeticula antithetica (Lepidoptera: Prodoxidae) Suggest a Functional Basis for Coevolution With Joshua Tree (Yucca) Hosts.

Annals of the Entomological Society, accessed via https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5846705/

National Park Service. https://www.nps.gov/jotr/index.htm

National Wildlife Federation. https://www.nwf.org/Educational-Resources/Wildlife-Guide/Plants-and-Fungi/Joshua-Tree

The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe. Bantam Books, 1979

USGS, ‘Eastern’ Joshua trees and their sole pollinators, ‘eastern’ Yucca moths. https://www.usgs.gov/centers/southwest-biological-science-center/science/eastern-joshua-trees-and-their-sole-pollinators

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