Show time! As temps rise, spring show begin
Spring at Redbud Glen, which is a high (1,300 feet), dry, 3.5 forested acres, hardly compares with the lush, hugely biodiverse 32 acres I lived on for more than a decade in Rappahannock County’s Old Hollow. Thousands of bloodroot and myriad other owers and fungi would bloom in the rich, damp soil on Oventop Mountain every spring. Flocks of migrating birds would stop over, and more species would stay to breed.
While the mature oak-hickory forest here at Redbud Glen is beautiful and attracts some interesting species, it lacks diversity of herbaceous plants on the forest oor and a midstory of shrubs that many avians need to breed. A small band of deer appear to be the removal crew, particularly of young, woody saplings.
Other than a small population of rue-anemone, a delicate little spring ephemeral ower, few native plants have bloomed here. Despite its new name, Redbud Glen has only two mature redbuds, which are a bit leggy due to lack of sun. But they are also prolific, with dozens of saplings, some of which need to be moved to more suitable spots so they can thrive.
A beautiful native shrub, blackhaw viburnum, bloomed before the redbuds, sporting large, white, pompom owers that brightened the forest wherever it could nd enough light. A native dogwood next to my bedroom appears to be close to death, with fewer and fewer blossoms each year, and a lone serviceberry in the forest is so starved for light that it took me weeks to realize that blooms had appeared on only a couple of branches.
Finally, after a chilly spring, temps in the 80s on April 19 triggered the redbuds’ ower buds to nally open. (Why try to lure in pollinators when it’s too cold for them to be about?) The same day, migrating birds also suddenly arrived, including several warbler species. Some species went on to other breeding grounds; a few that usually breed here stayed. That day and the next, I submitted my longest eBird checklists so far this year: 40 species on the 19th; 43 on the 20th (see sidebar at rappnews.com/wildideas for highlights). After that, the new arrivals slowed down to a trickle.
Many of the birds that breed here are, not surprisingly, cavity nesters. But after having to evict our eastern bluebird pair from two unsuitable sites they chose, Julia (my housemate and owner of the property) had a nestbox put up for them. The bluebird pair readily selected the site and started building a nest, but we’ve yet to see either of them carrying food or, especially, a fecal sac — a sure sign that chicks are in the box.
Last year the bluebird pair edged two broods, and we also saw the fledglings of three other cavity nesters: white-breasted nuthatch, tufted titmouse, downy woodpecker and redbellied woodpecker — all year-round residents and cavity nesters. But were they nesting yet, too?
One day, I saw a titmouse zipping low through the forest past our deck with a piece of what looked like clear plastic — nesting material, albeit not environmentally friendly. The next morning, my dog, Mollie, and I were on the upper porch watching the birds at the feeders nearby. Thinking of the titmouse, I pulled out a few bunches of Mollie’s shedding undercoat and stuck the cottony wad on a white-oak branch near the one that holds a feeder.
Within a few minutes, a titmouse arrived and took most of the hair. Now (April 29), I’m still putting out wads of hair, with a white-breasted nuthatch and a Carolina chickadee also taking advantage of this one-stop shopping opportunity. Although I added some dust bunnies made up mostly of dog hair from both our dogs, the titmice seemed to prefer Mollie’s cleaner undercoat — not surprising, since titmice are known to snatch hair straight o fur-bearing mammals. Still, the titmouse seemed to think the hair needed sorting out. I had put it on a thinner branch, and as the bird worked through the hair, it couldn’t secure its position. Instead, it kept swinging around the branch like a gymnast on the high bar about to dismount.
Now I just need to sit in the forest and watch the behavior of the birds that I now know are nesting. If they keep coming and going from a tree cavity, their nest is probably in there. Meanwhile, in photographing an eastern tiger swallowtail butterfly nectaring on a bright-red azalea in front of the house, Julia spotted a cardinal’s nest — with three eggs in it. Now we have two nests to watch. With luck, maybe more.
Key to successful reproduction is good food, and spring oers a real smorgasbord for birds and squirrels, with leaf buds and ripening seeds available from every bush and tree. Insects, like woolly aphids, also now fill the air, providing inflight meals. And the larvae of lepidoptera and other insects are essential to feeding the young chicks of most birds. While butterflies are pretty scarce here, moths abound.
After the loss of their brood last year, the red-shouldered hawk pair that nested here went elsewhere, which could explain the bumper crop of squirrels competing with groundfeeding birds. But there is one rodent we’re glad to have — a chipmunk (or perhaps a pair working as a tag team) that comes regularly to ll its pouch with seed and then scurries on back to its nest, which I have yet to nd.
On the amphibian front, the chorus of spring peepers has replaced that of the upland chorus frogs, which started much earlier. And eastern gray tree frogs had begun their loud invitations from nearby trees by mid-April. Occasionally, on warm, rainy evenings, I hear an eastern toad or two trilling.
So far, fungi have been scarce this year, not surprising considering the low rainfall since last fall and the chilly days this spring. Other than devil’s urn — a black cup mushroom that’s tough and reliable, and a few lone gilled mushrooms, we’ve been mushroom poor up here as well. With more rain usually comes more mushrooms, and I’ll continue to look for them in my daily wanderings in our little forest.
► For more Wild Ideas, visit rappnews. com/wildideas and my blog site, wildideas.us.