Goldfinch & Thistle

Clouds of downy thistle seeds have been billowing out onto the landscape and flying up into the sky. The seed is attached to an umbrella of feathers that enable it to float away in the slightest breeze. Goldfinches are on the scene to forage before the seeds sail away.

Goldfinches mainly eat seeds, but they will also supplement their diets with small fruits (elderberry and madrone) and tree buds (cottonwoods, alders, sycamores, willows, and oaks).

I think this particular plant is a bull thistle, a non-native plant. Non-native plants can be invasive, but I had to admire the cool seed head left behind after the seeds were released. It reminded me of a straw hat that Van Gogh might have painted.

In the birdseed business, Niger seeds are sold as a popular goldfinch food. Early marketing labeled this plant seed as a thistle. People wanted to capitalize on the fact that goldfinches love thistle seeds, which Niger seeds aren’t. They are a native plant to Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Malawi. They are also grown in India. You may also see the plant labeled Nyger or Nyjer on the bag of bird seed.

I wanted to mention this because I feel that it is better to grow native plants and create more habitat for birds to forage. I feel these types of small changes can have huge impacts on restoring a balance in nature. When we use native seeds, we not only create habitat, we avoid spending energy importing seeds from far away to put in our bird feeders. In addition, Niger seeds are not going to be as nutritious because they are sterilized by heat before being shipped. I am sure this is to help prevent germination and spoilage of the seed.

Common Merganser

Recently, I have been delighted to see a small group of common mergansers on the river. The male’s breeding plumage is striking. He has a white body that sharply contrasts with a black back and dark green-black head. His bill and feet are red and his breast is tinged with a rosy peach. The female and immature mergansers are gray-bodied and have a rufous head with a short crest. Their chest and a patch under the chin are white. From late summer to mid-autumn, males wear a nonbreeding plumage that looks very similar to female plumage. So at the moment, they all look fairly alike.

I usually see them paddling upstream and enthusiastically diving for food. They dip their heads just under the surface of the water as they swim and scan for prey. When they dive, they give a slight leap to help launch themselves underwater. When one bird dives, the others usually follow. They normally dive for less than 30 seconds, but they can stay under for up to 2 minutes! Their diet consists mostly of fish which are, of course, slippery. To help catch and hold them, they have serrated bills. Sometimes I see one surface with a fish in its bill, and if it isn’t quickly gobbled down, a chase often ensues.

They can also be seen relaxing on rocks or on a log out in the river. That said, there always seems to be one vigilantly standing guard for any predators. I also have seen them merrily floating downstream, looking around, and to all appearances, just taking it easy.

Find a spot by the river to quietly sit and listen to the water gurgling, the wind blowing through the cottonwoods, and hopefully, you will be blessed to see a flock of mergansers paddling around on the river.

Nature is an inexhaustible source of wonder. Hope to see you out there.

References
Common Merganser Life History, All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology. https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Common_Merganser/lifehistory. Accessed 14 Sept. 2022.

Peterson, Roger Tory, et al. Peterson Field Guide to Birds of Western North America. 4th ed, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2010.

Messenger of Beauty

I saw a bird
quietly alight on a branch.
Sunlight filtered through
the forest canopy
gently washing over
its body of soft feathers.
It turned and tilted its head,
listening and watching.
It awakened me
out of my thoughts.
I heard the rustling
wind through the trees and
the clapping of grasshopper wings
in the meadow nearby.
I felt the warm, dry summer air
blowing against my skin.
I caught the sweet scents
of the earth wafting by
in the breeze.
Thank you little bird for
helping me tune in
to the moment and
the natural world around me.
May your visits to the arboretum
be filled with messengers
that deliver you beauty, harmony
and inspiration.
Peace.

Morning of Blue

The morning river is cool. It flows in blues and grays. It is soft and quiet. The air is gentle. It soothes my eyes and skin and my breath. I am awake, alive in its stillness. I want to wade through the dawn, mindful and respectful, a heron.

Steller's Jay & Manroot

I have been watching this wonderful vine grow throughout the arboretum this year. I have followed it from the beginning as it sprouted its first vibrant, green leaves in spring to now, as the dried, brown seed pods split open to release their seeds. At the end of this trail, I find the mysterious, radiant blue Steller’s jay collecting the seeds and carrying them off to cache them.

Manroot is a native perennial in the cucumber family (Cucurbitaceae). Unlike its relatives, this plant is not edible. It gets its name from its large, woody, tuberous root.

Manroot will climb trees, cover shrubs, or flow along the ground. It can form a dense blanket of vines and leaves as it grows. Its coiled tendrils reach out and grasp onto small branches, bark, and other vegetation as it weaves its way through the landscape.

The male and female flowers are separate and on the same plant. Loosely clustered male flowers emerge on a narrow stalk, and that is what you see filling the landscape in spring with soft, white stars. The female flower is short-stalked, close to the vine, and is usually solitary.

The fruit is light green with dark green veins spreading on its surface. It is covered with spines that, fortunately, are fairly soft. Inside, it is fibrous and mostly consists of huge seeds. As the manroot vine dies off for the season, the pods turn brown, split open from the bottom, and release their seeds.

I feel that plants take on another fascinating life and energy as their color, shape, and texture transform as they die. The skin of the seed pod can have a variety of decaying textures and colors. The seeds have a look and feel of small, weathered river stones. They are round and flat with a slight curve. They are pleasant to roll around in my hand and listen to them tumble against each other. The dried leaves are captivating as they hang from the vines like wrinkled capes.

Nature is an inexhaustible source of wonder. Hope to see you out there.

Reference
Pojar, Jim, and Andrew MacKinnon. Plants of the Pacific Northwest Coast: Washington, Oregon, British Columbia & Alaska. Revised ed, Lone Pine, 2004.

Black Hawthorn Berries

The black hawthorn berries are ripening, and some of my feathered friends are there to start gobbling them up. I sat in the shade nearby for about an hour and saw cedar waxwings, robins, chickadees, and a scrub jay. The robins and cedar waxwings ate them whole. The chickadees would hang onto the cluster and eat them. The scrub jay plucked the berry and flew off with it to eat it elsewhere.

The black hawthorn is in the rose family and the berries are edible. I tried one, and it reminded me of eating a rose hip or a mealy apple. There were 4 seeds inside that were most of the berry. There was only a little fleshy part surrounding the seeds. Maybe they are not quite ready to eat. Birds tend to eat certain berries before they have fully ripened.

Red-tailed Hawk

Red-tailed hawks can often be seen soaring in the clear blue skies of summer. As they circle overhead, the sun illuminates their tail's warm, red feathers from where they get their name.

Red-tail hawks love the arboretum. It has the perfect habitat of open, grassy meadows that support an abundance of animals, like voles, mice, pocket gophers, ground squirrels, and rabbits. These small mammals make up most of the hawk’s diet. In addition, there are many tall trees and snags adjacent to these open spaces where the hawks can sit, watch, and wait for an opportunity to grab their prey.

Red-tail hawks also nest out at the arboretum. I usually see their nests in the crown of tall cottonwood trees along the river. They will often refurbish an old nest used in previous years or build a new one. The nest is a sizable construction of dry sticks up to 6.5 feet high and 3 feet wide. The inner part of the nest is lined with bark strips, fresh foliage, and dry vegetation.

The call of the red-tailed hawk is usually given while soaring. Peterson describes it as an “asthmatic squeal, keeer-r-r (slurring downward).” The Cornel Lab characterizes it as, “a hoarse, screaming kee-eeeee-arr.” While those interpretations are useful, I think they don’t capture the essence. To me, the line from section 52 of Walt Whitman’s poem Song of Myself truly expresses the call of the red-tailed hawk: “I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable, I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.”

Nature is an inexhaustible source of wonder. Hope to see you out there.

Peterson, Roger Tory, et al. Peterson Field Guide to Birds of Western North America. 4th ed, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2010.

Red-Tailed Hawk Overview, All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology. https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Red-tailed_Hawk/overview. Accessed 7 July 2022.