Bird Brains

Hairy Woodpecker
(I thought is was a Downy at first but it was pretty big)

     Once the leaves have fallen and the thickets have died back, the birds seem to become visable for the first time. They flutter from one naked branch to another. After a snowy night they flock through yards searching for feed or scraps. I know when the birds in the yard because my cat meows at the window. But I never let the cat out on busy bird mornings because these tiny feathered friends facinate me, especially in winter when there is so little to study.
     Birds are loved animals. Unlike their relatives, the reptiles, people don't try to run over them in their cars or chop their heads off. No one has a songbird phobia. They way they move and fly has facinated people for years. Children smile at flocks of birds.
     In the country we spot nuthatches, finches, and even a cedar waxwing. In town the chickadees, bluebirds and robins are common. Both locations we see cardinals, blue jays, and downey woodpeckers. When in the country my favorite bird to watch is the reb-breasted nuthatch. They make me laugh. They are full of energy, chirping and chasing one another from the birdfeeder. In the city I love the sight and song of a robin, especially when they are excited about finding a good crop of green briar berries.
     I have always loved birds. As I kid I told my mother that when I grew up I wanted to be a bird, perhaps a chickadee. She told me about reincarnation and suggested that I might have been a bird in a previous life. I proclaimed that I wanted to be reincarnated as a bird in my next life, even after she told me that would be a regression since humans were above birds on the road towards enlightenment. I didn't care. I wanted to be a chickadee.
     Humans have huge brains. We believe that we are smarter than any other animal. It is true that birds have very small brains, because they have to be lightweight for flying, but that should not be cause for a judgment of stupidity. Chickadees, for example, regenerate new brain cells each year. Each day they replace up to two percent of the neurons in their hippocampus—the part of the brain that deals with memory—allowing extra space for them to remember where they hid their seeds. By being able to replace its brain cells they have an extremely good short term memory without needing large brains. Perhaps birds are smarted than we give them credit for.  

Winter at Last

Last year winter never came to the Ozarks. We never got more than a light dusting of snow and the temperature hardly dropped enough to call it cold. Last summer was terribly hot and dry, so after another summer full of similar hot and dry weather, everyone has been talking about how mild the winter to follow might be. Long summers are harder to bare if there is no winter to warm up from. The cold and hot help balance each other.
This week I was pleasantly surprised that we got a cold snap and it snowed a little. I know most people are not big fans of winter (I actually don't mind it most winters) but I think we can all agree that winter is suppose to be cold and that type of normality is reassuring.
For northern states, snow is nothing special. But for the Ozarks, it is a rare and special occurrence, a gift from the heavens. Every year we get at least a dusting of frozen precipitation, but rarely is it more than a dusting. I am simply relieved that a little snow fell, that winter may actually set in this year. The cold will surely make next summer feel more tolerable.

Spring Peepers in December?

This past weekend, I woke to the sound of two spring peepers calling from amphibian ponds at Owls' Knob. Their constant peeping is a comforting sound to me in spring, but in December it is somewhat troubling. I recall having heard peepers in autumn but this is very late in the year for them to be calling.
These small chorus frogs hibernate under leaf litter in winter. They do not dig deep enough to prevent freezing so their cold blooded body drops below freezing temperatures. Their bodily functions shut down and their body partially freezes. To avoid exploding they force water out of their cells so it turns to ice in between the individual cell walls. They also create glucose, from energy reserves, that serves as a natural anti-freeze. With these adaptations their core temperature can drop to only 21 degrees Fahrenheit!
However, this December has had highs in the 70's and lows in the 50's. So the spring peepers are not retreating under logs, rocks, and leaf litter, but instead singing at the edges of ponds. I worry that they will use up precious energy reserves and not have enough glucose in their system to last the winter, (if winter indeed comes this year.) Hopefully these frogs are fat and just happy to be hopping on a warm winter day.

Salamander Tadpole

Yesterday, just before the cool winds and rains blew in, my uncle took me down to his salamander pond. We found many tadpoles, their gills are like the mane of a Chinese dragon. This one was also getting its front legs. These amphibians are becoming more and more rare. That is why my uncle has dug a special pond for them to breed. We are all excited each year to see the next generation of salamanders tadpoles growing strong. Read more about the Ringed Salamander here!

Ringed Salamander Tadpoles

Thanks

Today both my belly and my heart is full. I feel such gratitude and humble appreciation.
I often talk to my students about appreciation, particularly about their appreciation for the environment. It is a notion we toss around casually. But the sheer magnitude of what our natural environment does for us is overwhelming. The air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat, and everything we buy came from the earth. We are made of earth, from the earth, and one day we will return to the earth. I am thankful for that which gives me life. I am thankful for the life and love that is all around me... the life that is inside me.
After such a beautiful day I am in awe of such beauty and splendour and so grateful that I will be waking in the morning to greet yet another glorious day. Yet, I know that so many people are not as lucky as I. Sometimes I feel guilty because I can not relieve their suffering. While so many suffer, I am so blessed. So I can not forget to give thanks for all that I have been given. It is the least I can do!
This Thanksgiving I am filled with deep gratitude.
So many of our holidays have good stories behind them but have become materialistic and Americanized in some way. But Thanksgiving is the opposite. It has a sad story. It celebrates a empty day full of empty promises and lies. If the Pilgrims and Indians came together on this day to feast, it was only followed by years of war, a great exodus, and the decline of a nation full of indigenous cultures. But like all American holidays, the story has been forgotten. And on this holiday I am glad! For me and so many others, it is not a celebration of the past but an appreciation of the present. A time to bring families together and give thanks. We need more days like today!

How to Live?

I am in a constant struggle, a battle with myself. So much of me wants to raise my boy close to nature. Yet living in the middle of no where is so difficult, so lonley. Our culture is no longer built for the small farmer or the folks living close to the land. It is an industrialized society and if you want to live apart from that, be prepared to feel alone. The loneliness ate me up, but now the city eats away at me in a similar way.
Perhaps I am cursed to be stuck between these two worlds. I was raised in a constant state of change. We always had more that one home. My parents traveled often and since they were divorced my sister and me jumped between them as well. I want both... to live in the country and have a social life.
When I live in the city, I do not live in a way that I feel good about, but I am able to teach and help others. In the country I can not have much influence on the world, but I am living in a better way.
I think.
It is so hard to know how to live...

Owls on a Night Hike

Have you ever hiked in the woods without a flashlight? Not through your back yard to gather forgotten items or to the curb to put out the recycling or even across the farmyard to tend animals, but deep into the unknown woods, just too see what it out there at night? Before I started working at the Ozark Natural Science Center, the only time I wandered through the woods at night without a light was during bonfire parties, in which we were a pack of loud drunken fool, uninterested in the night's sounds. At the science center, I take children on a night hike.

I begin the hike with my flashlight on and lead the children into the woods. An adult is also at the back of the line shinning flashlight. Once the center is completely out of sight, I stop and turn off the lights. We talk in the dark about the night. Often a few children are afraid and I ask them what they are afraid of. They always say the same things and a debunk their fears one at a time.

"Wolves," they said.
"We killed off all the wild red wolves. They exist only in zoos or parks, so don't worry."
"Mountain Lions."
"Same fate as the wolves."

"Coyotes."

"Cowardice creatures. As far as I know, no one has ever been attacked by a coyote."

"Bears."

Black Bears are about as dangerous as coyotes."

"Blood sucking bats."

"None of those around here, perhaps a few blood sucking mosquitoes though. And that is just about the only thing I fear at night. Mosquito bites and diseases." (I also fear copperheads, but only in the summer months.)

By the time I have finished quelling their fears, their eyes have begun to adjust. I have a bag of tricks over my shoulder and a do a few nifty nighttime tricks to get their mind somewhere else.

Then, if the moon is not completely dark, we walk without a flashlight. I ask of complete silence and (amazingly) I often get it. Though most of the time we walk without seeing or hearing anything but katydids, we sometimes sneak up on a noisy armadillo or hear a barred owl calling in the distance.



Barred Owl



Last week, we took an extra long night hike. We were in to dark woods for almost an hour. The moon was half full and the few clouds reflected the light to make it seen even brighter. I took the group to an abandoned house on the property. It is a hike I do often during the day, but I have never been at night. It looked spooky in the darkness. A few children did not want to creep up to the empty windows panes and look inside, but most braved the journey.

On our way back towards the center we paused near a cedar thicket and heard an Eastern Screech Owl. The children all gasped in horror at once. I prefer the name Ghost Owls for this little creature, because I have never heard it screech. It's typical call has a hoot and then an eerie trill, almost like a ghost howl from a Halloween cartoon. I explained in a whisper that they were hearing is one of the smallest owls. I showed them with my hands how tiny it is, only about 8 inches tall. They relaxed. After explaining that this tiny raptor was less dangerous than a hawk, we walked slowly into the darkness of the cedar thicket. Three times we snuck up on the owl and I quickly turned on my light to reveal the bird before it few down the trail on quite wings. My brave group of 10 years olds were excited and thrilled to have had such an experience. 

As I drove home the next day, around dusk, I spotted a barred owl swoop across my path. I stopped my car and we watched each other. It sat in a colorful dogwood tree, and watched me watching it. I snapped a picture and the flash frightened it away. 

Owls have a spooky reputation. Perhaps it is their eerie nightly sounds. Or their huge knowing eyes. Or the way they turn their head to look behind themselves. Myths and legends have associated owls with either death or wisdom for generations. I am in awe of their grace and song. This year, for Halloween, I am invoke the spirit of the owl!



This Year's Jack-O-Lantern



Stress Relief

Like most moms, with a million things to do and worry about, I suffer from stress. I know that stress is not good for my baby or me, so I have been trying to find ways to lower my stress levels. I took an herbal tincture during the day and drank a glass of wine at dinner until I got pregnant. Now I am struggling with more subtle stress reductions techniques. Of course, yoga and Tai Chi helps, but it is hard to find time and floorspace for that with a three year old. In fact, too many yoga positions say to him, "human jungle gym!"

The only thing that works every time is nature! I had a mental break down on Saturday. I just snapped. I couldn't handle life anymore. So I drove out to Owls' Knob, 50 miles from a streetlight, siren, or 24/7 store. Way out there I don't have a cell phone or Internet connection, the radio waves don't penetrate my brain and no one is calling me up to tell me their problems. I slept two nights listening to crickets and even a few hardy frogs. I took long walks during the day, through the tunnels of red, gold, and brown leaves. I started reading an old first addition copy of Gone with the Wind (old books are more relaxing to me somehow, written and printed in a slower paced world). For hours I just sat with my son, gazing dreamily at the colorful leaves and listening to whatever nonsense he had to say.

What is it about staring into nature that makes me feel so calm? It doesn't logically make sense. I still have to make food, wash dishes, and deal with my son's mood swings. In town I have a yard, my street is quite, and I have more modern convinces. What makes the dramatic difference? Research shows that sunlight boosts the levels of serotonin in the brain and fresh air (particularly air that is near a body of water) contains negative ions which are also necessary to balance the brain's chemicals. It is not just the quiet or beauty that the wilderness provides, there is something chemically going on in my brain that changes my mood when I am outdoors.

But that still doesn't explain why the back yard is not just as good at the deep Ozark wilderness. Why is the park or the bike trail not just as relaxing as a walk through the crunching leaves of the old oak and hickory trees? Perhaps science will not be able to answer that question. Maybe it will remain a mystery. However, I can feel it and I know it to be true. The remote Ozark wilderness is good for my soul and necessary for my sanity!  

Hello Trees!



"Hello tiny flower!"



Last week, Zane and I went many places to admire the colors of autumn's leaves. First we went to the park. There the falling leaves were mostly from Osage Orange trees. My son was more impressed by the huge Osage Oranges fruits than the yellow leaves. He is an observant young boy, and very curious. I stopped often because he was busy examining a stick, tree, bug, or flower. He also took time to say hello to many of these things.


The following day Grand-ma, her friend Zan, Zane, and I went to Yellow Rock at Devils Den state park. The round trip hike is about 3 miles long and it is categorized as moderately difficult trail on the Devils Den website. But Zane is a trooper, so we set off on the hike. At first the rough terrain kept him completely occupied and moving briskly. Every rock was an opportunity to climb a mountain and jump off a cliff. Often he stopped to greet a tree. I am not sure why he has decided he must greet the trees or what makes one tree so inviting while he passes so many others by. I have learned that it is pointless to argue, not worth the fuss. So we waited and watched him as he said hello and good bye to many a tree.

Half way through our journey we rested on a large rock and ate snacks. Then we descended the hill and rounded the mountain towards Yellow Rock. Upon the huge rock, in front of the amazing view, my three year old was not so impressed. A leaf or a tree is tangible, but a view is just vast. He does not recognize the size and scope of an entire valley and the mountains beyond yet. So we only stayed on the rock a short while, before walking back.
On the hike back, Grand-ma had to carry the boy often. As she became tired, she devise a game that encouraged him to walk. Grand-ma and Zane would hurry ahead and hide behind the biggest tree they could find. As we approached, they would jump out and scare us. It delighted the boy and kept him moving. Even after the long hike, the three year old was full of joy and energy. So we went down to the river at the Devil's Den picnic area to let Zane do what he loves most: throwing rocks in the water!

The next day, Grand-ma drove Zane and I out to Owl's Knob for a much needed visit. All summer, during the intense heat and drought, finding the time and energy to go out to Newton County was hard. But the colors of fall lured us deep to the wilderness. We drove out the long way, along highway 16, where the hills were dotted with color and cyclones of yellow leaves circled the car. All day we walked around the mountain. All around the cabin a halo of yellow glowed. Sunbeams turn golden as they were filtered by the wide compound leaves of hickory trees. As I walked through the forest to the north the rock, yellows gave way to deep reds of tupulo trees and joyous oranges of maples. Along the edge of the pond brilliant reds from the sumacs are set off among deep maroons of water logged sweet gums. I took a stroll down the long driveway and collected leaves. My favorites were oaks and maples that had just been touched with hues of red, as if fairies had come a painted their tips on the night. 

When the day was done, we said good bye to Owl's Knob. Zane said good bye to the trees.

Perhaps there is something to learn from the boy who talks to trees. I am not saying we should all go out and literally speak to trees, but maybe we would all feel better if we took the time to stop and silently greet the world around us, understanding and appericating it better in the end.  



"Hello, tree... Good bye, tree!"



Autumn...

After such a long hot summer, the cool winds of fall are refreshing. Color is creeping into the green forests as the days become shorter. Normally I would be inspired; I am very fond of fall, but I have been out of touch this year. I am currently 15 weeks pregnant and having a particularly difficult time so far. As summer has faded, so has my energy. I have also been incredibly sick. Therefore, I have not been spending enough time outside. My camera has been abandoned and my thoughts left with summer's energy. In the coming weeks I hope to find more energy to write about this fantastic season.

Fat Turtle

I found a turtle between the compost pile and the garden. It was obese! I never knew that a turtle could become overweight. But the fat rolls that were unable to fit inside of this turtle's shell were disturbing. What's more is that I feel responsible! Three days in a row I looked for him when I took the compost out and I found him every time.
My compost pile is not well kept or protected. It is a heap of food that is covered with leaves and left for nature to do as it pleases. I never thought much of it before now. I figured that some wildlife might enjoy it, but I didn't see a problem with that. Most of my compost is fairly healthy. However, looking at this fat turtle I realize that he is addicted to what I throw out and because it is so easy to eat so much, he has become unhealthy. I don't think he can get all of his fat rolls into his shell; therefore, he is easy picking for a predator. I am ruining this turtle's life!
It makes me wonder how many other obese animals are hiding in the woods between our houses, waiting for us to take out the garbage or throw those scraps in the yard. How many dumpsters are all you can eat bars, tempting fat raccoons, foxes, rabbits, and yes, even turtles!
I will properly fortify my compost pile this weekend!    

Bark Scorpion Girl

Striped Bark Scorpion

At the Ozark Natural Science Center, before I take students on our first hike together, I always ask the students to each tell me what they want to learn more about. Most of them either name the first animal that comes to mind (bears, snakes, or deer) or they flip through their field guide and read a heading to me, even if they don't know what it means and are not interested in it. One cool fall day last year I got a surprising answer, "I want to learn more about the Striped Bark Scorpions," said a little girl with black hair and wide wandering eyes.
"Bark Scorpions?" I mused. "I'm not even sure we have them around here..."
"Oh yes, they are here. They live under rocks during the day and then climb trees at night in search for food. They hunt insects and stuff. They are only, oh, about this big..." she showed me a little over an inch with her fingers. "They blend into the bark, especially because it is night, so when you put your hand on a tree they sting you. But they won't kill you, its like a bee sting."
"Wow, I think you might need to teach me about them! Obviously you know quite a bit more about them than I do."
"I like to study them." Her gaze lowered and she seemed slightly embarrassed. Other students were snickering and rolling their eyes at her. At her age, being smart is NOT cool.
Throughout the rest of our time together, the girl continued to teach me things and I taught her what she didn't already know. She was full of questions and answers both. The bark scorpion did not come back up since I felt stupid not knowing anything about them.
This past week, while walking with fellow Ozark Natural Science Center teachers, during staff trailing, we flipped over a rock in the glade and found a stripped bark scorpion. Immediately I thought of the bark scorpion girl. As I asked teacher naturalist more about this species, I realized the girl had been right about everything she had told me, from its size to its habits.
"I knew a guy who picked them up!" someone said.
"I dare you to pick it up, Caleb," said Adam.
Caleb smiled.
"I will rub nose burn on my nose if you pick up the scorpion." Adam dared. (Nose burn is a plain little plant or weed that grows in Ozark glades. People who touch it get a stingy or burning sensation that rarely last more than 20 minutes. However, Adam found it not to be painful when he lost this bet and rubbed it on his nose.)
Carefully, Caleb crept up behind the scorpion and then quickly plucked it off the ground. The scorpion curled its legs in and froze in the giant's grip. While taking a picture of the only Ozark scorpion I have ever seen, I wished the bark scorpion girl was there to see it too.

Caleb Wardlaw Holding a bark scorpion