WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT NOTES

WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT NOTES
February 7, 2008

Weather
There is good news—it’s been raining! 5.42 inches have been recorded since January 1st. It all started in December actually, the day of our Winter Solstice Celebration, which had to be cancelled due to predictions of heavy weather. We’ve been getting a little rain once or twice a week. The ponds and swamps are filling up gradually, and the ground is getting frequent soakings. We shall see what this means for the spring wildflower bloom. What a relief!

Ponds and Swamp
The Upper Pond and Farm Pond have changed dramatically in the last ten days. Formerly there were exposed flats and banks, covered with newly-established plant life, with water only in the deepest holes. Now the flats are submerged and only four cement blocks are exposed on the Farm Pond “chimney”, which means the water has risen about eight inches.

Our busy new residents, the beavers, are clearly overjoyed by the new conditions. They have been actively plugging up the Upper Pond pipe with mud and sticks and water lily roots, and have also been stuffing the exposed end in the Farm Pond with mud and plant debris. As soon as Bill clears away their work, water flows freely through the pipe, which must be music to beavers’ ears, for by the next day the pipe has been blocked up again. We’re pleased to have the rain, but what a chore for Bill.

The largest of the two Farm Pond gators has become fond of a particular exposed flat, where he or she has been regularly seen basking in the sun. This flat is now covered with water, so the gator will probably relocate up the bank. Yesterday a third gator was seen in this pond, along with many more turtles than usual.

Big Bay Swamp is slowly filling up, and it is quite an improvement. Another 1 1/2 to 2 feet and it will be at its former level. Most of the sandy exposed bottom is now covered with water, and the water lily pads are floating and supported. Something new has appeared in the swamp, just this past month. With the rain, the small pools are filling up, and duckweed has appeared. It was not present at all before things got so dry, and now it is in every pool. It is a beautiful, bright green and tiny aquatic floating plant. We are not sure why it is now here.

The Listening Place
The Listening Place is a recommended stop on your next hike around Birdsong. From inside you can observe three active Great Blue Heron nests off to the right of center. The middle nest is located in a water tupelo tree and silhouetted above the tree line, so it is easy to find and then you can locate the other nests below the tree line on either side of it. These extraordinary birds are in courtship plumage with long, trailing throat plumes and distinct white faces that make them easy to find, even among the gray tangle of branches.

There is a lot of bird activity in and around the Swamp—lots of Red-winged Blackbirds are calling; Bluebirds are busy culling mistletoe berries; and Titmice, Towhee, and Carolina Wrens are active along the shoreline.

We hope you enjoy the new Listening Place chairs, donated by Lyn and Brooks Atherton. Lyn and Brooks donated a set of wicker chairs in memory of their friend Harriet Yon many years ago, but unfortunately these did not hold up and began to shed and come apart. Thanks to a new gift from Lyn and Brooks the old chairs have been replaced with some very comfortable chairs that will last a very long time. Do try them out—the headrests are getting rave reviews!

The Winter Landscape
It is mid-winter at Birdsong and the many frosts we have experienced have top-killed and dried out the vegetation very nicely. The woods are really beautiful, with all the dry grasses and leaves on the ground, in all shades of gold and peach and brown. We’ve been seeing deer and turkey, and their colors blend so perfectly into the background. On a sunny day it all comes alive in the light.

In the Gin House Field, our light burn in December left lots of good standing cover for wildlife and it is being enjoyed by scads of Sparrow species and mixed flocks of Bluebirds, Warblers, and Goldfinches. The American Kestrel is keeping an eye on all of them and moves from pine-top to snag throughout the field, observing. Unfortunately, there is very little clover coming up so far, most likely due to last year’s drought conditions through the entire growing season. Usually there are concentrations of germinating clover in the swales between the terraces, where the tiny seeds get carried by the rain, but this year there are none to be found.

Land Management
It promises to be a very different burn season from last year’s painfully dry circumstances. Due to the drought, the vegetation did not grow as tall or lush as usual, so we have less fuel to burn. Having burned so intensely the last few years to control brush, and now having less fuel, we don’t need to burn so hot this year. With the recent rains the ground is now saturated, so our fuel will be damper, and our early winter-spring burning will be less risky and much easier on our burn crews.

Plant Sale
We hope you will come to the Plant Sale. Board President June Bailey White has mobilized a great team of volunteers, all very enthusiastic, and many are active local botanists and gardeners. They are planning on having 1,000 mostly-native plants, trees, and shrubs for sale—all donated. Many of these came from the marvelous “pass-along” tradition so cherished in our local culture, where everyone’s garden contains plants given to them by friends or relatives, each with a story and a meaning. Betty Komarek’s garden is full of such plants, and she herself did a lot of passing along. In fact, this concept is central to Birdsong’s educational philosophy: get out in nature, out in the garden, take others with you, you’ll all learn something, take something to grow, and pass it along. Betty would just love this plant sale, and be potting up plants right and left which is what June and the volunteers are doing right now. Do join us: what a perfect opportunity—on Easter weekend—to find new plants for your garden, rich in tradition and meaning, to provide that uplifting sense of renewal that springtime gardening brings.
- KDB

BIRD SIGHTINGS
The Bird Window has been very active this winter. All of our year-round residents drop by for seeds, suet and a drink or a quick bath. Other visitors have included Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, Downy Woodpecker, Northern Flicker, White-throated Sparrows, Chipping Sparrows, Hermit Thrush, Eastern Phoebe, White-eyed Vireo, Blue-headed Vireo, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Yellow-rumped warbler, Pine Warbler, Black-and-white Warbler, House Finch, and Gray Catbird. Small flocks of Robins and Cedar Waxwings fill the trees behind the window and five or six birds at a time visit the pool briefly, then fly back to the trees only to be replaced by five or six more birds. Early in February the two or three American Goldfinch coming to the feeders brought more birds, and we now see from twenty-five to forty birds on the trough, stump and Betty feeder. We are also seeing small groups of Red-winged Blackbirds and Common Grackles squabbling over the suet and corn.

Mornings bring a cacophony of Red-winged Blackbird sounds from the trees along with the musical songs of Robins and the soft whistles of Cedar Waxwings. Flocks of these birds have been busy feeding on mistletoe, privet and cherry laurel berries. Behind the office one Mockingbird has tried valiantly to defend “his” pyracantha and yaupon holly bushes from these other hungry birds. Our recent warm weather triggered a lot of singing and if you listen carefully you can hear Cardinals, Catbirds, Carolina Wren, Tufted Titmouse, Chickadees, White-throated Sparrows and many others.

On other areas of the property sightings have included Kingfishers, Blue Herons, Great Egrets and numerous mixed flocks of small birds including Eastern Bluebirds, Meadowlarks, sparrows, warblers, and vireos. We have occasionally spotted a small flock of Bobwhite Quail and one or two Turkeys. Last year Big Bay Swamp was so low that the Wood Ducks departed Birdsong each evening for deeper water elsewhere, so we were thrilled to observe Wood Ducks arriving at dusk to roost in the Swamp on our January Twilight Walk. February first, a Purple Martin scout was observed on the gourd pole, preening and looking around, and a pair was spotted on February seventh. The rest of the colony could arrive anytime; it will be a pleasure to see them again and listen to their chatter.
-Chris Bittle, Naturalist

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