The Sparrows Are Back!

There's a flock of sparrows that roosts in a towering mulberry tree in the side yard. In the winter they move to a fairly tall juniper bush next to it -- tallenough to make them feel secure, and with very dense foliage, wihch must make it easier to stay warm.

Over the summer they disappeared. I suspect it was because of the cicadas -- we had cicadas in all the trees on my street, at least one to every tree, and the racket, starting in the afternoon and lasting throught he night, was increcible. I'm convinced that the sparrows left because they couldn't get any sleep.

At any rate, they've started coming back over the past few weeks -- I can hear them twittering their "Good night, sleep tight" chirps in the vening, and their wake-up chatter in the morning, and they've started appearing in the parkway, hopping around looking for something to eat.

It's sort of reassuring to have them back.

Sparrows

One of the ubiquitous parts of city life is sparrows. By "sparrows", od course, I mean the English sparrows that somehow made their way from Europe in the distant past and made themselves at home.(There are native sparrows, but unless you've got a keen eye and a good bird book, they tend to vanish in the crowd.)

What brings this to mind is the juniper bush outside my front door -- at least, it started life as a bush. It's grown intoa bushy tree, about 20 feet high, with very dense foliage -- a perfect place for sparrows to roost at nigh -- sheldter from the elements, high enough to discourage wandering cats and rats.

However, the racket from a flock of sparrows waking up in the morning has to be heard to be believed -- everyone wishing everyone a good morning, taking roll call, who knows?

Critter Chronicles: My Neighbor's Pear Tree

The neighbor across the alley has a pear tree in the back yard which I find myself studying when I'm out. First off, it's got to be at least thirty fee tall. I didn't think pear trees got that tall, but thinking about it, there's no reason they shouldn't. In the spring, it's covere with blossoms, which are soon hidden by leaves. And as the season progresses, it becomes laden with pears.

As the pears mature and start to fall, the tree becomes a favored stopping off place for the rabbits and squirrels in the neighborhood. (Probably the rats, too, but I don't seem them very often.) I once saw a squirrel -- and not a very big one -- making off across the parking lot with a pear in it's mouth that was almost at big as it was -- whether the plan was to bury it for later or find someplace more secluded for lunch, I never discovered.

And this fall, within the space of a day, it turned from green to bright, flame red. It was glorious for a few days, but then we had a very windy day and the leaves were pretty much stripped off -- along with the remaining pears. (We've had a very windy summer and fall -- I credit the hurricanes and tropical storms in the Gulf of Mexico, which tend to drive warm winds up the Mississippi valley.)

And still atrractive -- the branches tend to droop a bit, which gives it a graceful appearance.

I still can't get over how tall it is, though.

Saturday Science: Earth: A Biography: A Sidebar: Autumn Color

Those of us who live in the north temperate zone are treated every fall to autumn color, when the leaves on the trees turn from green to red, orange, yellow, and everything in between. This is because the chlorophyll in the leaves, which gives them their green color, breaks down, exposing other pigments that have been hiding under the surface.

Chlorophyll is one of a class of photoshymthetic pigments that first made their appearance roughly three billion years ago. There are others -- look at any number of decorative plants and shrubs, which show red, yellow, orange and various combinations of color. And they all enable photosynthesis, which not only allows plants (and some bacteria) to make their own food, but produces as a byproduct the oxygen in the air we breathe.

No one is quite sure how some bacteria -- known officially as "cyanobacteria" -- first made use of photosynthetic pigments, but they did. One of the immediate results was oceans full of rust, which sank to the bottom and created what are nown as "banded iron formations" -- the source of mose of our iron ore. Once that was accomplaished, the oxygen that these bacteria were producing escaped into the atmosphere -- which at that point was composed of nitrogen, carbon dioxide, and water vapoor - and created the ozone layer, which proved to be of great significance: the ozone layer filters out most of the harmful radition from the sun and enabled life to move from the oceans to the land.

Scientists believe that land plants are descended from green algae, mostly because they contain the same kind of chlorophyll. It actually makes a lot of sense -- who has not seen a clump of algae on a shore, periodically left high and dry as the tide goes out. And the first land plants were mosses and selaginellas, which require a moist environment.

But back to fall color: What we're seeing after the chlorophyll breaks down is the other pigments, which will last until the leaves fall. There's even an order in which this all happens, at least as far as the trees themselves are concenred: here in Chicago, the firt to turn are the locusts and ashes, followed by maples and basswoods. Mixed in there are birches, ginkos, and the various others that get planted in the city. Oaks are notable for having prsisent leaves -- they turn color and die, but they don't fall. That's probably why squirrels pefer them for nest-building: the leaves hold to the twigs so you bedroom isn't constantly falling apart.

So that's all I have to say for now about fall color and how it fits in which the scheme of things.

The Season Turns

We went from a week or two of summer in late September/early October, to autumn over the past few days, and it seems as though overnight, the leaves started turning. It's mostly locusts and ashes*, which are the first to turn. There are whole stretches of streets lines with bright yellow locust trees, although, typically, there are places where they are still green.

The maple across the alley is bright flaming red-orange, although the maple next to it is still green. Ditto a pair of basswoods at one of my regular bus stops -- one is mostly that dark bronze-red that basswoods turn in the fall; the one next to it is still green. I haven't figured out the mechanism here -- it's got to be a combination of day length and exposure: it seems that trees in more sheltered locations turn later -- not always, but then nothing in nature is 100%.

At any rate, fall is here. Nice to look at, but I'm not as cold-proof as I used to be, so it's a mixed bag.

* Those ashes that are left. The emerald ash borer, which somehow got here from Asia, has wreaked havoc on the native ash trees. I can't find a count on the number of trees destroyed, but it's in the tens of millions.

Critter Chronicles: We Still Have Cicadas

Although the noise at twilight is not quite as deafening as it was. We have here, in addition to the world-famous seventeen-year locust, annual cicadas as well, so every summer we get serenaded. And it turns out that there's also a thirteen-year cycle for some species.

I suspect, because of the noise level, that we'be hit a congruence of broods, although I don't think the seventeen-year bugs are quite due.

Critter Chronicles: The Nightly Chorus

If I were living in, say, the mountains of North Carolina, I would probably be talking about frogs. Whoever first started the rumor of the peace and quiet of the country was never in the Appalachians at night.

However, I live in Chicago, where, among other things, we have cicadas, the seventeen-year variety and the annual variety. I was stuck last evening, just before sunset, by how incredibly loud they can be. We have a lot of big old trees in my neighborhood, and once they've hatched in the spring and early summer and molted into their adult forms, the singing starts. They can be deafening.

Here's a short course on cicadas -- it's geared toward school kids, but Jeff the Nature Guy relates a couple of things I didn't know.

His cicadas are very quiet. If you're outside in my neighborhood in the evening in summer -- well, they're loud.

Critter Chronicles: Encounters with Rabbits

So, I saw one of our neighborhood rabbits this morning. He/she crossed the street to the bushes in our parkway, then hopped into the yard. As I came in the gate, he was sitting there on the sidewalk; we looked at each other for a while, then he sat up and washed his face. After another couple of minutes, he hopped toward me -- in stages -- and eventually, after many pauses, hopped past me and out the gate, then hopped down the middle of the sidewalk to the neighbor's yard.

I don't know if our rabbits are somewhat tame, or just used to people -- I suspect they don't get a lot of harassment, in spite of the number of dogs in the neighborhood. Maybe he just sensed, somehow, that I wasn't going to eat him.



Side note: I've been noticing a lot of very small dogs in the park. I mean really tiny. I've never noticed that before.

Critter Chronicles: Goslings!

Hordes of them, both at North and South Ponds. They're all busily eating and growing -- some, presumably the first hatched -- are getting quite large. Apparently, one mother serves as baby-sitter for a group of little ones while the other mothers get out from under for a while. I've been seeing groups of eighteen or more, of various sizes, under the supervision of one adult, although there may be a second adult standing guard -- presumably a male, since that's what they do. I saw a group of about thirty at North Pond -- I say "about" because they move around and they tend to blend together if they're close to each other.

Strangely enough, I haven't seen any ducklings yet, although there are pairs of mallards all over the place, and even a couple pairs of wood ducks.

And the notorious Lincoln Park squirrels are out in full force.

And down by the wolf habitat at Lincoln Park zoo, the black-crowned night herons are clacking and squawking and generally makes nuisances of themselves.

Critter Chronicles: A Cacophony of Birds

Have you ever noticed how noisy birds are? Usually around sunrise is peak noise time, when all the songbirds are greeting the day and reminding everyone that they're here. It's died down a little bit over the past couple of weeks -- I guess everyone's got their territories staked out and mates safely in the fold, but there's still the dawn chorus.

Of course, sparrows are always chattering and squabbling, but we've got robins, cardinals, the occasional gull screaming (I'm less than a mile from the lake shore), and even every once in a while a skein of geese on their way to somewhere.

Speaking of, yesterday I saw the season's first clutch of goslings out in the park busily grazing with their parents. They can't be more than a few days old -- they're still pretty small. And I"m trying to figure out where the parents found to build a nest -- the reeds are just sprouting, and there's not much in the way of cover anywhere near where they were feeding. I keep thinking it's early yet for goslings and ducklings, but looking at the calendar, I realize it's that time of year -- they do tend to nest early.

(Side note: Also yesterday was my first sighting of a frog for a long time. It was just sitting on a branch poking out of the water, maybe waiting for a bug to fly by. Or not.)

Critter Chronicles --Addendum

I forgot to mention seeing a large group of robins in one small area of the park, all busily scurrying a few steps then stopping to listen, the way robins do. I'm not used to seeing such large groups -- over a dozen -- in a relatively small area. Come to think of it, I'm seeing a lot of robins, period, in the park and around home.

At any rate, one did find a worm -- pulled it out of the dirt, banged it on the ground a couple of times, then swallowed it in one long gulp.

We also had a mutant robin in the neighborhood, but I haven't seen it in a while. Large patches of white on its back and breast -- in fact, the breast was almost all white. It was much more timid than the other robins -- maybe it knows it sticks out.

Critter Chronicles

This may become a department here, with no specific time or day for posting. Inspired by my friend Terry, who replied to an e-mail largely concerned with what I had seen in the park that day with "You're so newsy!"

So here's some news that's not about the Plague, or the incompetent in the White House, or any of the other disasters, major and minor, that are considered "news".

To bring this up to date, here's just a few comments from recent wanderings. (Yes, I try to stay in as much as I can, but I really can't deal with spending days at a time at home. So I put on my armor -- mask and gloves -- and venture out to the park, which is theoretically closed, but try to keep Chicagoans out of their parks. Closing the parks doesn't really make much sense to me -- people are being careful about maintaining distance from each other, and especially along the lakefront, which has some of the highest population density in the country, the park is the main place that people go to walk, or run, or ride their bikes, or give their dogs a walk.)

Down at the Zoo, which, like every other public attraction, is closed, the black-crowned night herons are back and are starting to refurbish their nests. I remember a few years ago, when they first started nesting in the Children's Zoo, there were maybe eight or ten pairs. Now, I've lost count, and the nests have spread from the north edge of the red wolf habitat to almost the entire Children's Zoo. (There's a story here: the herons apparently first started nesting on the island at the south end of South Pond, which is administered by Lincoln Park Zoo. The Zoo staff, being very conservation minded -- the herons are listed as "endangered" in Illinois -- set the island up as a nature reserve, with signage on the boardwalk opposite the island. The birds decided they liked the Children's Zoo better.) The herons seem to prefer rather spindly trees, like birches, which is odd -- they're quite awkward when clambering around the branches. They're rather bulky birds for their size, with huge feet much better suited to wading in muddy ponds than perching on a skinny branch.

Speaking of herons, I saw a great blue flying around North Pond. Don't know if it was planning on taking up residence are just passing through. It's a bit early in the season, I think, for there to be many fish coming out of winter quarters -- although on sunny days there are turtles basking on some of the larger branches that have fallen into the pond. It's just a few, so far, but I remember one time I counted sixty-four out basking, and another two or three swimming, while walking along one side of the pond.

There are no large flocks of geese grazing on the lawns like there will be later this summer -- they've all paired off and are concentrating on getting ready for goslings. You see them in pairs now, and ditto ducks -- I saw a couple of pairs of wood ducks at North Pond, in addition to the omnipresent mallards.

And of course, there are squirrels. At certain times of day, they seem to be everywhere, busily foraging and trying to remember where they had buried goodies, just in case. For some reason I find squirrels particularly entertaining. I remember one summer, in a former residence, I was sitting the back yard when I heard a scrabbling behind me. I turned just in time to see a squirrel diving behind a slab of limestone that was leaning against the neighbor's garage; I looked up and there was a very disgruntled hawk -- not sure if it was a peregrine or Cooper's hawk -- just alighting on a branch. A near miss. At any rate, I had a confrontation with a Lincoln Park squirrel the other day. The squirrels of Lincoln Park are legendary -- shameless beggars, they used to come up and practically demand to be fed. Not so much any more, but this one was a classic. Sadly, I had neglected to put my usual store of cashews in my bag. The squirrel was not pleased.

And I should mention the flowers. At this point, there are still scillas -- great swathes of blue under the trees in parts of the park -- and daffodils are coming into full bloom. And there are still hellebores in flower. There are still magnolias blooming, and grape hyacinths are starting to blossom. And the trees, finally, are starting to leaf out -- there are faint washes of green, like watercolors, on some of the branches.

So that's the news of the critters in the park so far this spring. We'll see what they're up to as the season progresses.

Herons

I saw what I think was the first black-crowned night heron to arrive at Lincoln Park this afternoon. Black-crowned night herons are endangered in Illinois, but there are a couple of nesting colonies in Lincoln Park, one in the Children's Zoo at Lincoln Park Zoo and one farther south.

Originally, there was a small colony on the island in South Pond. The Zoo staff, being very conservation minded, immediately set it up as a sanctuary, with signage on the boardwalk and everything. The herons, as perverse as any other creature, decided they liked the red wolf habitat in the Children's Zoo better -- they seem to prefer nesting in somewhat spindly trees, such as birches, which I find odd -- they're fairly clumsy clambering around the branches. In the beginning, there were maybe eight or ten nesting pairs, making a racket and dropping guano all over the place. Over the past few years the population has grown until they've pretty much taken over the Children's Zoo during nesting season -- if you want to visit the Children's Zoo in the summer, you'll find it wise to take an umbrella.

At any rate, it looks like they're back (although it's a bit early, I think).

The Great Outdoors -- Sort Of

For those of us who are pretty much housebound, here's a nice post from Water Girl at Balloon Juice with links to remote cameras at various zoos, aquariums, and outdoor parks.

Here's a sample from Chicago's own Shedd Aquarium:

Sea otters make everything better.
💙 🦦 Let’s all pause, take a big breath and watch Yaku play! pic.twitter.com/TiNslLvQhW

— Shedd Aquarium (@shedd_aquarium) March 21, 2020

It Can Be Done

But not by this administration. The contrast between Australia and the US is even more stark than you might imagine:

 CreditAsanka Brendon Ratnayake for The New York Times

It’s a magical sight: Just as the light begins to vanish, thousands of tiny penguins waddle out of the surf on an island in southeastern Australia, then head up the beach and along well-worn paths toward their burrows.

The “penguin parade” has been a major attraction since the 1920s, when tourists were led by torchlight to view the nightly arrival of the birds — the world’s smallest penguin breed, with adults averaging 13 inches tall — from a day of fishing and swimming.

For much of that time, the penguins lived among the residents of a housing development, mostly modest vacation homes, in tight proximity to cars and pets, as well as ravenous foxes. The penguins’ numbers fell precipitously. But in 1985, the state government took an extraordinary step: It decided to buy every piece of property on the Summerland Peninsula and return the land to the penguins. The process was completed in 2010.

The Trump regime, of course, goes the opposite route, setting the stage for wiping out our remaining wildlife.

Coneflowers

I remember reading not all that long ago that purple coneflowers were an endangered species. Now, they've become a common garden plant, at least in Chicago.

I have to confess that I always wondered why they were called "coneflowers". I guess I must have been observing them too early in the blooming cycle, when the central portion -- the part that has the actual flowers -- was flat. I've been noticing lately that as the season progresses, that center does become more and more cone-shaped.

And it happens that the scientific name is Echinacea purpurea. For those with any acquaintance at all with herbal medicine, you know that Echinacea is recommended as an aid to the immune system. The American Indians used it for all sorts of ailments, including wounds, burns, snake bites, throat infections, what have you.

And best of all, the flowers are really attractive.

Climate Change: A Possible (Partial) Solution

Someone has finally done a study on the carbon-storing capacity of forests:

Good news: we can help halt climate change through a massive campaign of reforestation, according to a new study published Thursday.

Bad news: it would require covering an area the size of the United States in new trees, and even then some scientists are skeptical about the paper’s conclusions.

Of course, scientists being only human, there's some controversy:

Some experts who were not involved with the study, however, expressed skepticism about some of its findings.

“Restoration of trees may be ‘among the most effective strategies,’ but it is very far indeed from ‘the best climate change solution available,’ and a long way behind reducing fossil fuel emissions to net zero,” said Myles Allen, a geosystem science professor at Oxford.

“Yes, heroic reforestation can help, but it is time to stop suggesting there is a ‘nature-based solution’ to ongoing fossil fuel use. There isn’t. Sorry,” he added.

Here's the comment I left at the site:

This is one area where I have to take both sides. Yes, reforestation is necessary and would be more than a little helpful, but it's not the solution. We really do need to cut fossil fuel use drastically. (It wouldn't hurt to start pushing birth control; there are way too many people on this planet.)

Side note: This article reveals the "either/or" thinking that seems to plague us and is most glaring when considering "opposing" scientific theories. I've run across several instances of scientific controversy over opposing theories, and in most cases, they aren't mutually exclusive. (Most notably, how did organic molecules appear on earth, created in deep-sea vents or on meteorites? And how did people come to the Americas, via land bridge or by boat following the coasts? My answer to both questions is "Yes.")

Side note 2: In the first decade of this century, the City of Chicago planted over half a million trees, ostensibly as part of a "beautification" program. I've noticed that we are now able to plant types of trees along the streets (oak, basswood, even bald cypress) that we couldn't plant before. Our air is that much cleaner. (Not to discount tighter standards on automobile emissions, but don't tell me the tree-planting didn't play a part.)

Antidote

There's a new litter of red wolf pups at Lincoln Park Zoo:

The arrival of spring also brings a litter of four critically endangered red wolf pups at Pritzker Family Children’s Zoo.

The pups, two male and two female, were born on April 13. The dam, Becca, and sire, Rhett, were recommended to breed as part of the Red Wolf Species Survival Plan® (SSP), a cooperative effort among Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) institutions to save species. This is the first litter for the zoo since 2010. . . .

Since 2005, Lincoln Park Zoo has been involved in the Red Wolf Recovery Program to try and assist the wild population with cross-fostering of zoo-born pups into wild family groups and other reintroduction efforts. Since that time, Lincoln Park Zoo scientists also conducted a Population Viability Analysis (PVA), a computer model which helped to evaluate different management scenarios for the zoo and wild populations and scientific advice to the Recovery Program. The future status of the North Carolina wild population is uncertain, but the Red Wolf SSP and Lincoln Park Zoo will continue to work toward long-term recovery efforts.

The picture's a little out of date -- they're out and about, exploring their home. I saw them yesterday. One of them got a little adventurous and went off on his own, but the rest were sticking close to mom.

Saturday Science and Today's Must-Read: Poop-Sniffing for Conservation

Interesting post at Hullabaloo on how scat can help conservationists in preserving species:

Let's face it: All dogs like to smell poop. But this dog smells something else, too -- opportunity.

Train, a Chesapeake Bay retriever, sniffs out the scat, or poop, of elusive wild animals like jaguars and oncillas in the name of conservation.

It might sound like an unsavory task, but these scat samples are goldmines for researchers like Train's owner, conservation biologist Karen DeMatteo.

DeMatteo and a research team in Argentina are trying to pinpoint the habitats of endangered animals, but it's hard to figure out where they live if you can't find the animals themselves.

It's pretty interesting. Read the whole thing.

Antidote: Kitties!

In this case, a litter of orphaned mountain lion cubs. Via Digby:

The Oklahoma City Zoo and Botanical Garden recently welcomed a litter of orphaned Mountain Lion cubs. The cubs, two males and a female, are approximately ten-weeks-old and arrived at the OKC Zoo in late January after being rescued from the wild.

There's more information -- and more pictures -- at the link.