Brenda is a certified Virginia Master Naturalist, a Habitat Defender for Shenandoah National Park, and a devoted fan of Mother Nature. She lives in a cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains near Shenandoah National Park, and hikes up to the higher elevations of her mountain often to see what nature is up to. Her constant hiking companion is a camera that captures nature as it unfolds through the seasons. It’s her goal to share the natural world around her through her photographs.
In the past few weeks I’ve been seeing a few Goldfinches (Spinus tristis) coming to my feeders. They return for the seeds that I put out, hulled sunflower seed and nyjer seed.
They’re dressed in their winter garb. Males hardly recognizable without their brilliant yellow body feathers, and trademark, rich black foreheads. In the next month or so both both males and females will begin their molts to trade-in winter feathers for summer plumage. After the molt starts, in the in-between stage, they have a strange mottled look. This happens twice a year. Once in late winter and again in late summer.
This is what they’ll look like come May, but now just a single minuscule speck of yellow nestled in the green. The first hint I’ve seen of a Green and Gold (Chrysogonum virginianum) bloom this spring. These plants don’t grow tall but do spread out nicely. Don’t be concerned though, their growth is not aggressive.
Green and Gold is native to eastern North America. A plant that I’ve had on my back hill for many years. A low growing ground cover with opposite, hairy leaves. Those leaves are considered semi-evergreen. Here on my mountain the plants stay green through winter. Peak bloom time is in May and will produce flowers intermittently through autumn. Quite the pleasure to have just steps from the back door.
While most butterflies overwinter as eggs or pupae, there are a few including this one, the Eastern Comma (Polygonia comma) that overwinter as adults. They wedge themselves in crevices in trees, behind loose bark, or under loose shingles away from the worst of winter.
You’ll see them out on trails on warm sunny days during the winter and early spring. Certainly the first of the butterflies in the spring.
See that bright white mark on the ventral side of the wing, the mark that if you use your imagination might look like a comma? That is why this butterfly is called “comma.”
My heart goes out to Ukraine. The news all day long is so devastating. So insane.
The national flower of Ukraine is the Sunflower. A flower that symbolizes happiness, optimism, honesty, longevity, peace, admiration, and devotion.
It’s believed that Sunflowers were planted and grown as a crop by American Indians in what is now New Mexico and Arizona around 5000 BCE.
Back in 1996, Ukraine, which had the third largest arsenal of nuclear weapons, committed to total nuclear disarmament. In a ceremony to honor the occasion representatives from the US, Ukraine and Russia planted Sunflowers in locations where missile silos had been. Sunflowers were chosen because they absorb radioactive isotopes from the environment. These special flowers have also been planted at Chernobyl and Fukushima in order to help remove radioactive toxins.
My heart goes out to Ukraine, its land, its towns and cities, its ancient castles, its parks, its natural world and most of all its people.
Early March, meteorological spring and things are just beginning to stir. Flowers? Not many, certainly not many of the native sort but a few.
The Maples (Acer) in the lower elevations are acknowledging that spring is here.
Maple blooms are something that you’ve got to be aware of, or something that you’ve got to look for. They don’t demand attention.
They’re subtle. But wait, there’s more to come.
Once the little noticed flowers are finished, along comes the magical things we used to play with when we were children, the helicopters.
Throw them in the air and see what happens. That action, such fun, spinning as they drop, in order to fall far from the parent tree. These helicopters are technically termed samaras.
And which of these photos is different from all the rest? All the images with the exception of this last one are of Red Maples (Acer rubrum), native to eastern and central North America. The picture immediately above is of samaras of a Silver Maple (Acer saccharinum). Silver Maples are native to the eastern and central US and southeastern Canada.
And the show is just beginning. Soon comes many beautiful shades of green, then OH MY, so many warm gorgeous colors of autumn.
Zion National Park, easily one of my favorite national parks. And in that park, rooted in a crevice in an incredible soaring rock wall, an Indian Paintbrush (Castilleja coccinea) showing what determination can accomplish.
Ah, the change of seasons. How I love the change. How boring it would be if we only had one season. And now the beginning of meteorological spring. Soon flowers will be bursting forth with a cacophony of color. What a change from the impressive, black and white/pen and ink drawing, landscape of winter.
One of the first, a very early wildflower, Twinleaf (Jeffersonia diphylla), is native to eastern North America. It is a plant that I must remind myself to hunt for. It emerges, buds ready to open, well before I’m used to finding wildflowers blooming.
Here in the mountains of central Virginia, that crucial time is late March into early April. Each flower only lasts for a very few days, so searching at the right time is important.
As the flowers enjoy their few days, the leaves hold back, not to come into their own until the show is done for the blooms.
Then it becomes evident why this plant has the name, Twinleaf, with its appearance of butterfly wings or angel wings, a pair of leaves joined at the stem.
Then comes the seedpod which starts out with the look of a goblet and as it matures it takes on the appearance of a comicstrip character with a mouthful of seeds.
The Twinleaf has seeds that ants are attracted to. These seeds are carried by the ants to their nests, because they have a fatty appendages, called elaiosomes, which the ants feed to their larvae. In the process, the seeds remain intact and are discarded, where they often take root. This process, which is surprisingly common is called myrmecochory. And who would have thought – ant farmers!
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Setophaga coronata), a winter visitor. I don’t see them at the feeders. Sunflower seeds, jelly, raisins, suet, and peanut butter are said to attract them but here on the mountain I am having no luck except with the bird bath. I sure am glad they enjoy that.
The Yellow-rumped Warblers do eat berries that grow here, either in my yard or close by. Among those berries native to this area are Poison Ivy berries, Juniper berries, and Dogwood berries.
Now, to be honest, I’m not going to encourage Poison Ivy but I might just look the other way if I see some growing at the edge of the woods. I know that there are many birds that enjoy it, including these cute little birds that show up every now and then at the birdbath.
Well THAT certainly was strange. The poor Pileated Woodpecker (Dryocopus pileatus) trapped between the glass of the window and the screen which he has just crashed through.
This afternoon we were in the living room when we heard a very loud thump. We immediately went to the porch, knowing that sound. The thump of a bird that crashed into a window. But this was a much larger bird than we have had crash in previous incidents. A Pileated Woodpecker has a length of 16 to 19 inches and a wingspan of 26 to 30 inches. I have always felt confident that the screens we have in nearly all of our windows are a life saver for birds. That certainly was the case with this critter.
He appeared to be uninjured but still very frantic. Upon crashing into the screen it had ripped an L-shaped tear. He was flitting up and down the narrow space between the glass and the screen, going to the opening but managing each time to miss slipping through.
Using his bill in a very efficient way, he was creating more holes. And creating an escape route if he were able to work on it long enough. But Bill opened the window next to this one and with a yardstick, opened the L-shaped flap. With pure luck and no sense of what he was actually doing the woodpecker flew to freedom. Hallelujah.
A little bird, a Phoebe (Sayornis phoebe), sits atop a Colorado Blue Spruce (Picea pungens) as if it were the tree topper on a Christmas tree, trying to ask you, “What is YOUR favorite Christmas tree?”
I’m a very visual person so my choice of Christmas tree depends entirely on how it looks. Soft needles are not a characteristic of the Colorado Blue Spruce. Its needles are sharp and can be painful to deal with but that’s okay with me. It’s my perfect tree for decorating at Christmas. Its color fascinates me. The blue happens because of a wax that is produced on the needles in spring and early summer. That wax may erode thanks to wind, hard rains or hot sun leaving the needles with a more green color. When the tree has its traditional blue-green-gray color it reminds me of looking in a mirror at my own eyes.
It’s native to the central and southern Rocky Mountains in the states of Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.
In the wild a Blue Spruce can grow to 135 feet tall and 30 feet wide. One stunning tree that can live more than 200 years. And in the image above, a beautiful part of the tree, a new growth bud.
