It’s been an odd winter to say the least.  One day it’s -10F outside with 20mph winds and the next it’s 51F and sunny.  To follow that, we experienced a ‘snow squall’ this week which lead to some pretty intense ice.  I don’t know about you, but when the weather behaves so unpredictably, it often leaves me feeling a bit uninspired to go outside.  It’s harder to plan outdoor adventures and leaves me in a bit of a nature slump.

It happens!  These slumps provide a great opportunity to reset and start daydreaming about what’s around the corner.  While I probably stayed inside more this month than any other month in the last year, I did manage to sneak away on a few nice days to spend some quality time outside.  So with that, let’s see what’s happening out there!

When it’s the middle of winter and there’s a nice sunny day without a lot of wind in the forecast, I like to try and get out on a frozen lake.  This time of year, many of the lakes are still frozen over, but always be cautious while out on the ice and look up ice reports before going out.

Recently, I went out ice fishing with my family and caught some of the smallest bluegill I have ever seen in my life.  While they were tiny, they were plentiful, and that makes for a great evening on the ice. My son likes to kiss the bluegill he catches on the lips before returning them to the water.  It’s something he’s always done and it cracks me up every time.

While out at Patrick Marsh, I came across some very tiny tracks in the snow (pictured above).  It appeared that whatever made the tracks were jumping like a kangaroo with both feet planted before leaping.  You can also see a very thin line in the snow behind these footprints.  That thin line is the critter’s tail hitting the snow as it lands.

If you haven’t guessed it yet, the tracks definitely belong to some sort of rodent.  Wisconsin has a few rodents that leave similar tracks so it’s very hard to identify them down to a species (at least for me).  My guess is that it’s likely a meadow vole.  I’ve seen loads of meadow voles out at Patrick Marsh and have even caught a couple while doing restoration work in the summer.

I ended up following the tracks to a tiny hole in the snow (pictured above).  It was about the size of a quarter and I noticed that there were little ice crystals around the edge.  These ice crystals are referred to as ‘hoarfrost’.  This is a type of frost created by air that is brought to its frost point by cooling.

So why was it around this hole in the snow with animal tracks leading to it?  Animals that live under the snow in winter stay warm because the snow actually insulates them.  As they breathe, the air rises and starts exiting the hole.  Once the warm air hits the freezing temperatures outside, it makes this beautiful frost pattern around the entrance.  This is an easy way to tell that a critter is actively using their home under the snow!

Lastly, I’ll leave you with this photo that I pulled from the trail camera in my backyard.  My wife Carolyn let our dog out late one night about a week ago and noticed movement from our bird feeder out of the corner of her eye.  I immediately reached for my trail camera to see what it was and the next morning we discovered that we have flying squirrels that visit our yard!  In case you’re wondering, their late night snack was sunflower seeds.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening.  However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it!

See you next month!

It’s a new year which means new adventures await.  For many of us, winter isn’t just a time of hibernating and planning for the spring, it’s a time to get outside and enjoy nature.  Whether it’s cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, birdwatching, or having evening bonfires, there’s plenty to do this winter!

One of my favorite things to do is search for signs of wildlife in fresh snow.  If I’m lucky, I can even snap a picture of the animal tracks before my son stomps through them or makes a snow angel on top of them (he apparently thinks this is hilarious).  So with that, let’s get outside and see what we can identify in the snow!

I don’t know about you, but whenever I find tracks in the snow that I cannot immediately recognize, I always jump to the rarest creature.  For example, I recently found the tracks pictured above and while I felt like I had seen them before, I just couldn’t place them.  Naturally, I figured they simply had to be the tracks of a wolverine, fisher, porcupine, or even baby Sasquatch.

There’s something exciting about not being able to identify a set a tracks because they could have come from anything!  Well, not quite but it’s still exciting.  So I went home and pulled out my animal tracks and sign book and sure enough, the elusive and rare creature that made the tracks was from an opossum.  I confirmed this by posting on the Wisconsin Naturalists Facebook page.  This is a great resource that I encourage you to check out if you have nature questions.

When I found the tracks pictured above, what struck me most of all was how jealous I was that whoever made the tracks didn’t sink into the snow like I was.  These tracks just looked effortless, like the creature was simply gliding across the snow.  Meanwhile, I was huffing and puffing through the snow while sinking in around mid-shin.

Having a dog of my own, I’m pretty familiar with canid tracks.  These tracks were a lot smaller than Tucker’s (my black lab), but they have a similar classic dog-like shape.  I narrowed it down to fox or coyote and snapped a picture so I could identify it later.  I followed the tracks which led me to taking the picture below.

Note how the tracks are no longer gliding across the snow.  They actually go quite deep and lead to some sort of hole.  If you haven’t guessed it yet, these are the tracks of a hunting coyote.  Coyotes have incredible ears and can hear rodents like mice and voles beneath the snow.  They tiptoe across the snow with ears pointed down and once they’ve narrowed down the approximate location of the critter below, they pounce!  Watch a video HERE of a coyote hunting.

In the photo above, you can see the four feet in the snow (bottom half of the photo) with the two at the very bottom being the coyote’s back feet.  Note how much deeper they are than the front feet.  These deep impressions are created from the jumping motion and the hole at the top of the photo was where the coyote landed.  So cool!

Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening.  However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it!

See you next month!

Happy first week of winter! This is usually the time of year when I picture the landscape to be covered in snow and my windshield covered in ice.  While I’m sure there are many who are glad that the snow has held off as long as it has, I would settle for a light dusting right about now.  For me, snow makes it seem less cold outside.  I’m not sure why, but when it’s 25F with no snow, it just seems so much colder.

While we all begin our own hibernation and settle in for winter, let’s see what’s going on outside.

Have you noticed that oak and beech trees tend to lose their leaves much later in the year than other tree species?  It could be January or February and somehow these trees are able to retain their leaves, which is incredible!

Scientists call this retention of dead plant matter ‘marcescence’, and there are a few theories as to why it happens.  One theory is that it deters critters like deer from feeding on the buds below the leaves.  This gives the tree an advantage in the spring since it has more buds available for growth.  Another popular theory is that the trees retain leaves all winter to slow decomposition of the leaves.  Once spring arrives and the leaves fall, it provides nutrients (like compost) to the soil at a time when the tree needs it most.  Especially oaks and beeches, which tend to grow in drier and less nutrient-rich soil.

The next time you’re out in a damp wooded area, keep an eye out for various species of moss.  I often find them growing on rocks or on the base of tree trunks.  You wouldn’t normally think winter would be a good time to find moss, but did you know that it can photosynthesize all year long?  Depending on the depth of the snow, moss can even photosynthesize under the snow!

Now that most of the leaves have fallen, this is a great time of year to go nest searching!  The sheer number of nests that I notice when out on hikes always amazes me this time of year.  Some of the easiest nests to find are those that previously belonged to robins and goldfinches since they tend to nest closer to the ground than many other species.

The nest pictured above was created by a goldfinch (I believe).  They’re usually pretty small (2-3″ diameter) and are almost always constructed high in a shrub where 2-3 branches intersect.  If you find a bigger nest that was built using sticks and mud, that’s a good indication that a robin made it.  Both types of nests are extremely durable and can often remain intact all winter long.

Similar to the oak leaves that manage to hold on all winter long, various tree and shrub species are able to retain berries throughout the winter.  This is great news for cedar waxwings who feast on berries all year long.  An interesting fact that I just learned is that brown-headed cowbird chicks that are placed in cedar waxwing nests often have a very difficult time surviving because of the berry-heavy diet provided by the cedar waxwing mother.  Waxwings really do love berries!

Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening.  However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it!

See you next year!

The leaves are falling, the days are getting shorter, and the temperatures are finally starting to drop.  For many, these changes signify a new chapter of the year.  A chapter filled with watching football, hanging out with family, or even sitting in a tree and hoping a deer walks by.

For me this time of year is an exciting one, especially if you’re outside.  Right now is when prescribed fires and prairie plantings are happening.  It’s also just a great time to get outside and explore.  There’s a lot more going on out there than it seems.  So stop raking leaves for just a minute, and join me on a quick tour of what’s happening outside!

I will often head out for a hike with the goal of reaching a destination.  Maybe that’s hiking to the end of a trail, finding the top of a bluff for a nice view, or racing back to the car because I forgot the snacks for my four-year-old in the back seat.  While these are (mostly) great hikes, I find that I enjoy the slower hikes best.  The ones where you stop and just look around for a while.

Last week I did just that when I found this milkweed seed (pictured above) that flew right into me.  I stopped to look at it and was floored by how pretty it was.  The way the fluff moved with the wind and how the seed blended in with the surrounding oak leaves.  It was perfect, and I hope it made it to wherever it was heading (before I got in the way).

Despite the cold weather, you still might find ferns scattered around that do not seem to be phased by the temperature.  I recently found this fern, which I believe to be a ‘lady fern’ on a hike.  Since it was one of the few plant species that was still green, I went to go check it out and discovered hundreds of tiny spots on the underside.

These spots are tiny spores that get released to help the plant reproduce (sort of similar to mushrooms).  This is one of the ways ferns reproduce since they do not produce flowers or seed.  Ferns can also reproduce underground through rhizomes.  It might be too late this year, but the next time you find a fern, check out underside of the frond to see these beautiful cinnamon-colored spores.

Have you ever seen something that looks like a pinecone, but it’s on a tree that is very clearly not a pine tree?  If you have, you were probably looking at a type of alder.  Alders are one of the few tree/shrub species that have leaves which do not change colors in the fall.  They remain green until they fall off.

Once the leaves fall off, it’s much easier to notice the odd pinecone-looking things attached to the stems.  They are in fact cones, and they work very similar to those you would find on a pine tree.  Inside the cone are lots of little seeds that emerge from the cone to help it reproduce.

Lastly, I’ll leave you with this photo of a prescribed fire out at Westport Prairie (above). I recently had the privilege of helping out with this prairie fire that warmed me up on a pretty cold day.

This is one of the best management tools you can use to help keep prairies and oak savannas thriving, and is a common sight this time of year.  The native plants have evolved with fire throughout the years and have deep roots that remain unharmed from the heat of the fire.  This differs from the weedy shrubs and saplings that have shallow roots which get roasted by the flames.  When spring arrives, the ground will be charred black which allows the ground to warm up quicker and gives the prairie plants a head start for the year.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening.  However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it!

See you next month!

Happy almost Halloween!  The leaves are falling, porches are filling up with jack-o-lanterns, and children everywhere are about to get their sugar fix.  I can remember using a large pillow case as my trick-or-treat bag as a child.  I never came close to filling even 1/8 of it, but oh how optimistic I was.  Now that I have a four-year-old of my own, I cringe at the thought of him eating that much candy… I suppose it’s okay, as long as he saves me a few Reese’s PB Cups.

While many of us are preparing for fall festivities, let’s take a quick peak at what’s happening out in nature!

This time of year you may see wild turkeys across the landscape.  I see a lot of them along forest edges and harvested agricultural fields.  If you’re real lucky, you might also see a hen with her young.  I snapped this photo the other day while driving to Westport Prairie.  The turkey family was crossing the road and weren’t nearly as shy as I thought they would be.

Hens will often begin building nests in April and will start laying eggs in May.  They usually lay around 12 eggs (1 per day) and the chicks (called poults) hatch in early/mid-June.  Hens will take care of their young through the fall until they venture off on their own.

While cleaning up some fallen brush, I noticed a charred log that had a flash of yellow on it.  Upon closer examination, I noticed that there were four unharmed corn kernels inside of a small hole in the log.  It’s fairly obvious that this was the work of a squirrel caching food for the winter.  What’s less obvious is that this squirrel may have been attempting to make popcorn in the woods…

Recently, while volunteers were helping construct a boardwalk at Patrick Marsh for a local Girl Scout project, we discovered this little treefrog in the vegetation.  It’s a surprise to many that Wisconsin actually has two species of treefrog.  This species, the Eastern gray treefrog lives in and around wetlands and has the ability to change its skin color depending on the temperature.

This time of year, treefrogs are getting ready for winter.  Did you know that as the temperatures drop, treefrogs (as well as many other amphibians) increase the amount of glycerol in their tissues?  Glycerol is a type of alcohol with a lower freezing point than water, which acts as an antifreeze for the frogs.  Resting in a semi-frozen state under the snow isn’t how I’d like to spend my winter, but I’m glad it helps keep our frogs around!

I’ve been receiving a few emails lately about giant puffball mushrooms out at Patrick Marsh, so I had to take a trip out there to find them myself.  They weren’t hard to miss… I’ve seen plenty of these in the past but none this large.  It honestly looked like someone left a bunch of volleyballs in the prairie.  I’ve read that they are edible if you can harvest them at the correct time, but definitely do your research before eating any mushrooms you find in the wild. Someone’s watching….

Have you ever had that feeling like someone’s watching you?  I’m guessing that’s what my father-in-law must have felt while out camping in the Adirondacks this month. He sent a photo of this bizarre mushroom that looks almost exactly like a man’s face… While there is a species of mushroom named ‘Old Man of the Woods’, this is not that species.  Could have fooled me! Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening.  However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it! See you next month!

Happy first official week of fall!  While I’m excited for cooler temperatures, colorful leaves, and apple picking, I feel like I’m not quite ready for summer to be over.  Neither are the last of my almost ripe tomatoes desperately clinging to their vines in my garden!

The transition from summer to fall is always an interesting time of year, so let’s see what’s happening outside as our days slowly get cooler and shorter.

This time of year goldenrods and asters are in the spotlight.  Their gold and purple colors can be seen carpeted across natural areas.  While these late summer and early fall flowers can be breathtaking, one of my favorites that blooms this time of year is downy gentian (pictured above).

You’ll need to search in drier soils if you want to find downy gentian.  It also helps to have a nice sunny day since these flowers close up in the evening when it cools down and when it’s cloudy.  The deep blue-violet color is enhanced even further with the brownish green vegetation that surrounds it.

This time of year, insects are still very plentiful.  A lonesome monarch might be found flitting around, bees can be seen napping in flowers, and crickets are still filling the evening air with song.  On a recent hike out at Westport Prairie, my son Jay found this terrifying creature (pictured above).

I have to admit that I was too scared to pick up an insect with what looks like an enormous sewing needle on the back end of it.  Without hesitation my son picked it up and put it on his shirt while walked around looking for flowers (I’m not sure where he gets that from).

The bug was a straight-lanced meadow katydid (very fitting name) which we later identified at home with our insect identification book.  Apparently, the ‘lance’ is an ovipositor making this particular insect a female.  She uses the ovipositor to help bury her eggs in the soil.  I’m less scared now, but still not picking it up.

I recently took a trip up north with my family and we went on a few hikes like we usually do.  On one of the hikes, we found this odd alien-looking thing next to a log.  I figured it was a mushroom of some sort, but I’m terrible at identifying mushrooms so I took a picture of it and uploaded it to my nature identification app.  The app said it was a crab… It was very much NOT a crab, so I did more research (here’s a friendly reminder to not always trust your app).

It turns out that it was a hygroscopic earthstar.  Aside from being a great band name, hygroscopic earthstars are a type of mushroom that open up with increased moisture in the air (and close when it’s dry).  When opened, raindrops land on the round center ball of the mushroom, causing puffs of spores to come out.  The ‘legs’ even curl under the mushroom to elevate it off of the ground so that spores can be swept away with the wind.  HERE is a time-lapse video of one opening and closing.

On a different hike later that day we came across a strange marking on a pine tree about five and a half feet off the ground.  The friends we were with knew exactly what the mark was because they live in the area and have seen the creature that left this mark nearby.  If you look closely you can see the individual scratches in the tree made by a black bear. Bear’s aren’t quite hibernating yet, so they can still be spotted (occasionally) out and about.  They often mark trees by clawing, biting, or rubbing their bodies against them.  They do this for many reasons like scent marking to communicate with potential mates, marking a territory, or to simply scratch an itch.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening.  However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it! See you next month!

When I ask others how their summer is going, I get a lot of responses about the number of insects, or lack thereof (does this only happen to me?). Many people have noticed that they haven’t been spending their summer swatting at mosquitoes. The populations are down this year and it’s likely due to the long, cool spring we had. Others have commented that firefly numbers seem to be down while ticks are on the rise. Since insects seem to be all the buzz lately, let’s talk about bugs you might see if you went outside right now!

If you have ever watched the Addam’s family, you might be reminded of Cousin Itt when looking at this interesting little caterpillar. They’re called milkweed tussock moth caterpillars and as their name implies, they feed on milkweed. Milkweed is filled with toxic chemicals that most critters cannot consume. These caterpillars however, have adapted to the toxins which actually help them against predators.

Scientists have discovered that many insects that feed on milkweed are often a reddish orange and black color (like the monarch butterfly, red milkweed beetle, and milkweed tussock moth). Several bird species that primarily eat insects tend to stay away from insects with these colors because of how unpalatable they are.

As I type this nature update, I can hear a cicada screaming outside of my window. Depending on the time of day/night you read this, you may also hear one. The cicada you hear may be really far away if it sounds faint, but because they can produce sounds over 100 decibels, there’s a good chance you won’t have to go far to hear one. Other sounds over 100 decibels include motorcycles, chainsaws, and car horns. I had a couple fly right by my head at full volume while out with volunteers last week, and let’s just say it caught me a little off-guard.

Despite being noisy, cicadas are actually a very interesting insect with a unique life cycle. I encourage you to look up “Brood XIII” as that is the next 17-year life cycle brood to emerge in southern Wisconsin. The last emergence was 14 years ago in 2007, meaning 2024 will host the next emergence. I’m sure there’s a political joke somewhere in there but I’ll leave that up to your imagination.

Monarch caterpillars are munching away! While out collecting prairie seed with volunteers at Westport Prairie last week, we found a few nibbling on some whorled milkweed. We also found some monarch eggs not far from where this picture was taken. It’s always a treat seeing monarch caterpillars out in the field and I often find myself wondering how many wonderful views these little critters will see during their migration.

Lastly, I’d like to leave you with this photo of two mating walkingsticks. I discovered the pair at Devil’s Lake State Park while out on a hike with my family. It was the first time I had ever seen a walkingstick, let alone two of them! The larger of the two is the female and she had to be close to 4″ long not including the outstretched legs and antennae. They were enormous!
Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening. However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it!

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Summer is in full swing and so far I’m enjoying every second of it!  Just in my small front yard, bees are buzzing around the bergamot we planted years ago, our tomatoes are finally taking shape (not ripe yet), crickets are in full chirp-mode, and baby bunnies can be seen darting frantically this way and that.  This is the time of year when I regularly think about the months of January through March and how during those months I dream of being here and now in the midst of summer.  It’s a gentle reminder to soak up the now and try to enjoy every bit of it while it lasts.

For those new to this email series, this is my attempt at documenting nature month by month throughout the year.  There’s so much to cover and so little time, so with that I invite you to join me on a quick virtual tour of how I’ve been soaking up the now and experiencing nature this month.

If you’ve ever been around milkweed, you’ve probably noticed several of the leaves dotted with these little red and black beetles.  These are called red milkweed beetles (surprise surprise) and they rely on milkweed to survive.  Like other insects that feed on milkweed, the milky sap that they eat from their host plant is toxic (not to them) and serves as a defense mechanism against predators that try to eat them.  The toxins build up in their body making them very unpalatable.  If you see one, try to avoid eating it (should be easy enough).

One of my favorite photo subjects lately are the bees that congregate on the bergamot in my yard.  Despite it being a very small 3’x3′ plot of flowers, it brings in countless numbers of pollinators.  My favorite are the various bees since most of them amble from one flower to the next, making them relatively easy to photograph.  If you are able and have the space, I encourage planting your own bergamot (also known as bee balm) since it’s such a great flower for the pollinators that we depend on.

Recently, we had a mother cottontail rabbit sever one of our tomato plants at the base.  I replanted it in another location and it’s doing great (FYI)!  The reason it was severed, was because the cottontail was building a nest in a burrow just beneath.  It’s possible that my constant watering of said tomato plant was making her nest soggy, so she took matters into her own… hands?  Paws? Feet?  Regardless, once I found out she had a nest there (we saw her nursing above the burrow) we gave them space and they’re also doing great!

One morning we heard some scratching from one of our window wells and it ended up being a baby bunny that fell into it.  We scooped up the baby bunny and handed it to my son for a quick photo before releasing it back into my tomatoes (I have more than enough tomatoes to share with our wildlife).  It’s a memory he won’t soon forget.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening.  However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it!

See you next month!

I’m hesitant to say it, but it looks like we might finally be on the other side of the intense dry spell that we’ve been having!  Every evening I take a stroll through my neighborhood with my black lab named Tucker, and seeing all of the brown lawns is yet another reminder of how hot it’s been.  Even those who regularly get the sprinkler going in their yard are still having trouble maintaining green grass.

However, if you were to head out to a natural space you would probably notice that nature continues to thrive despite these conditions.  I know that I wouldn’t last a day in that heat without water, but somehow nature makes it looks easy.  Let’s take a quick virtual tour of the outdoors and see what else nature has been up to, while we’ve been hiding from the heat.

The plant shown in the photo above is called cup plant, and it’s easy to see why.  Where the leaves meet the central stem, a water-holding cup is formed.  Each cup plant has several cups along the length of the stem, and these cups can serve as a nice place for critters to take a much needed drink.  It’s not uncommon to see birds like the American goldfinch stopping by to take a sip.

If you take a good look at the nest photo above, you might notice that one of the eggs is a little smaller than the other three.  It also has more brown speckles.  The reason it’s different is because it belongs to different bird species.

While out with the Prairie Partners intern crew at Patrick Marsh this week, we found this red-winged blackbird nest constructed within a cluster of wild parsnip (which was the plant species we were removing at the time).  We noticed that one of the eggs was different, which usually means that a brown-headed cowbird was involved.  Brown-headed cowbirds are known for not building their own nests.  In fact, they can’t build nests at all.  Instead, they put a lot more energy into laying their eggs in other birds’ nests.  According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, they can sometimes lay more than three dozen eggs in a summer!

Brown-headed cowbird chicks are then raised by a foster parent (unless the parent identifies the egg as not their own and removes it from the nest).  I encourage you to watch this video on ‘brood parasitism‘ to learn more.  *Warning* nature can be… well… nature!  As a reminder, cowbirds are protected in the United States and it’s illegal to remove their eggs from other birds nests (as tempting as it may be for some).

Last but not least, we also found this little guy out in the field while removing wild parsnip.  It’s an eastern black swallowtail that will transform into a beautiful butterfly very soon.  I love it’s expression in this photo.  It’s almost like the caterpillar is saying “can I help you?”  It was eating the parsnip that it was clinging to when I snapped the photo. On it’s head you’ll notice an orange horn-like appendage.  This is called an osmeterium and it’s used as a defense mechanism against predators.  When threatened, the caterpillar will extrude its osmeterium and attempt to smear it on the predator.  Apparently it has a chemical repellent that warns others to stay away.  It must have thought I was a predator, so I snapped a photo and got out of there!

Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening.  However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it! See you next month!

Early each year during spring I am constantly on the lookout for beautiful flowers popping up here and there across the landscape.  The flush of color in a woodland or prairie is a great break from the gray skies and white snow of winter.  While that’s still true for me this time of year, I can’t help but notice everything else that’s happening around me.  Frogs are singing, nighhawks are buzzing, pelicans are basking, and snakes are slithering!  So without further ado, let’s explore!

The other day I was out on a hike through a marshy area with my family.  We were mostly searching for pelicans, all sorts of waterfowl, and even the elusive yellow-headed blackbird.  We struck out on the blackbirds (plenty of red-winged blackbirds) but saw everything else.

We walked through an area that would regularly be inundated with water, but since this year has been pretty dry so far, it wasn’t too wet. We noticed some odd holes that had quite a bit of mud stacked up around them.  The actual hole was about an inch in diameter.  While I was scratching my head and getting ready to pull out our track and sign field guide, my wife Carolyn looks over and said “Oh nice!  Check out that crawfish chimney.”

Apparently, this was the entrance to a crustacean home.  Depending on the species, many crawfish will burrow down into the mud up to 3 feet deep or more!  They do this by forming little balls of mud with their legs which they then drag to the surface and deposit just outside of the burrow.  After doing more research than I’d like to admit, I figured out that crawfish species cannot be identified by their chimney.  Looks like I’ll need to wait outside of the entrance with my headlamp…

Speaking of pelicans, have you noticed that they have finally returned? Normally, I have a few places that I go to for viewing pelicans and I tend to not see them often outside of those places.  This year has been a little different for some reason and they’re popping up everywhere!  We were hanging out in a friend’s backyard in Madison this past weekend and happened to see a handful of them circling above a dozen common nighthawks that flew past just minutes before.  It was a fantastically unexpected evening of birding.

I’ve been getting quite a few emails about pelicans lately and one of the main questions has to do with the lack of baby pelicans around.  One of the main reasons you tend to only see adults is because American white pelicans need much larger expanses of water for breeding grounds than can be found in and around south-central Wisconsin.  They do tend to breed at locations like Horicon Marsh or Cat Island near Green Bay, but any pelicans you see around these parts are likely loafing around and enjoying the scenery until they move on.

I also just learned from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that pelicans must provide at least 150lbs of food to nourish one single chick from the time it’s born until it can forage on its own… That puts my ability to catch fish to shame.

I mostly wanted to include this photo because I was extremely proud of myself for accidentally finding a few small patches of wild growing asparagus.  I’ve stumbled upon quite a few of these over the years actually and it’s hard to go back to store bought asparagus after trying the fresh picked stuff.  They’re so good and they pair really well with morels which are out right now as well (but I’m terrible at finding those).

One of my favorite parts of my job is how much time I get to spend outside.  Particularly, when I monitor our conservation easements in the spring.  While out monitoring with Tony this month, we spotted a snake that was basking on the trail.  It was laying extremely still and was so well camouflaged that it was almost stepped on, but luckily it slithered just off the trail.  We got our binoculars out so we could identify it and maybe even catch it for a quick picture. After seeing that upturned nose closely through the binoculars, it was obvious that we had found an Eastern hognose snake.  This is undoubtedly my favorite species of snake, not only because they’re adorable (sorry if you’re not a snake lover), but because they are amazing actors.  When hognose snakes feel threatened, they flip upside down and writhe around with their mouths gaped open and their tongue hanging out.  Apparently faking their death ruins the appetite of many types of predators.  Check out this link to watch a video of an Eastern hognose snake faking its own death.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my virtual tour of nature as it’s happening.  However you experience the outdoors or nature, be it physical, virtual, spiritual, or anything in between, I encourage you to do it! See you next month!