A Northwoods Almanac for March 14-27, 2025

 A Northwoods Almanac for March 14-27, 2025  

 

Sightings – Canada Geese, Redpolls and Pine Siskins Arrive

         Judith Bloom on Lake Tomahawk sent me a photo of Canada geese, trumpeter swans, and mallards all sharing a bit of open water on Lake Tomahawk. 

photo by Judith Bloom

         Individuals of all three species often return quite early, even when there’s little open water to be found.

         So, migration has begun, albeit for only a few species. The first songbirds are soon to follow. We expect to see our first red-winged blackbirds in the wetlands below our home right around spring equinox, with American robins not too far behind. 

         There may even be a few species already sitting on eggs – Canada jays and great horned owls are particularly early breeders and are often on nests by mid-to-late March.

         Other birds who have been wintering south of here are now stopping over for a while to feed or are passing through. Redpolls and pine siskins began showing up at feeders near the end of February and are growing in numbers. 

         However, American goldfinch continue to rule the roost at most residential feeders with many folks reporting a small army of up to 100.

 

The Character of Snow

         A heavy snowstorm like we had on 3/5 reminded me of the varying character of snow. On any given day, snow can create opportunities or problems, and every species has its own story on how it responds to the changing conditions.. 

         Snow can feed or starve; free or trap; freeze or warm. During the snowstorm, our bird feeders were crammed with birds, the most at any time this winter. The reason was simple – the heavy snow completely covered every branch and bud and blade of grass, making it extremely difficult to find other sources of food. So, for the songbirds, the snowstorm was a starving event. 

         But the heavy snow on top of the icy conditions from the previous day bent many trees over, bringing buds and conifer foliage closer to the ground for browsers like deer and hares. So, for them, it was a feeding event.

white pine sapling bent over with snow load

         For all the mice and shrews that have had so little snow to hide under this winter, this was a warming event – they now had 8 inches of snow to insulate them and protect them from being easy prey for predators. However, as the temperatures warmed and the snow began to melt, it became more of a freezing event for many animals, because nothing conducts heat away from the body faster than water.

         Still, as the snow warmed and began to “set up,” it became much easier for travel for a species like a snowshoe hare with huge feet that gives them an advantage on softer, powder snow. It became a freeing event.

         However, as the week has worn on and the temperatures warmed, the snow has developed a crust, which for deer, is particularly difficult for travel. They break through and really struggle. So, for them, a deep snow with a crust, is a trapping event.

         We humans tend to see snow in terms of three things: driving, shoveling, and recreating. Our needs have mostly to do with convenience and efficiency of travel, and very little to do with survival. Thus, we see snow in a comparatively superficial way that masks its complexity. If we were more closely tied to the natural world, we’d certainly see it in a different light.

 

Birding in Colombia

         I returned on March 1 from a 9-day birding tour of a small portion of the Colombian Andes. We birded from as low as 3,000 feet at the Laguna de Sonso to 13,000 feet in Los Nevados National Park, the highest part of Colombia’s Central Cordillera (a cordillera is a system of parallel mountain ranges with intervening plateaus). 

The "crew." with Vanessa, one of our guides, in the center.

         Colombia holds the title for having the greatest bird diversity in the world – nearly 20% of the world’s birds. Just to give you an idea of the astonishing diversity, I mentioned in my last column that Colombia supports 167 species of hummingbirds, but it also has 103 species of tanagers – we have just one, the scarlet tanager. The tanagers come in every hue and combination of colors imaginable. I think God and evolution conspired with a bunch of kindergarteners to create the most extraordinary looking birds possible using the 64 megapack of crayons that is usually reserved only for the most creative 5-year-olds. 

         We were in wetlands, tropical forests, dry forests, and cloud forests, as well as in the unique high-elevation paramo (at the limit of tree growth) ecosystem. 

         We tallied 256 species and then added two more while waiting for our plane in the Cali airport. We “only” saw 28 species of hummingbirds, in part because of dense fog on the day we were in the paramo where we had hoped to see more high elevation hummers.

         Absolutely perplexing to me was the fact I only had one mosquito buzz my ear the entire nine days. I loved their absence, of course, but I came prepared with my 100% DEET super juice only to see it languish in my pack. 

         Would that this would happen here in June.

         I had great trouble remembering the bird names as we went along, in large part because so many of their family names were brand new to me – motmots, gnatwrens, antwrens, conebills, puffbirds, honeycreepers, manakins, antpittas, brushfinches, cinclodes, tapaculos, peepershrikes, plushcaps, tyrannulets, and on and on.

         I have to admit I also had trouble remembering them because I’m old – new words seem to bounce off me now rather than be absorbed. 

         But I wasn’t there to become expert at bird ID or to add to my bird life list (I don’t keep one anyway). I was there to add to my life list of “WOWs”, and I’m fairly certain I used that word over a thousand times, likely to the chagrin of my three other birding buddies.

         I’d return in a heartbeat, though I think I’ll take a blindfold so I don’t have to watch the utterly suicidal motorcyclists take chances on the mountain roads and in the cities that no sane person would ever contemplate.

         I think I even learned ten words of Spanish. 

         So, gracias for reading this.

 

Celestial Events

         Hopefully the skies were clear and you watched the total lunar eclipse that occurred this morning, 3/14. Look ahead now to 3/29 when as the sun rises we will be graced with a partial solar eclipse. 

         The vernal (spring) equinox officially occurs on 3/20, but the moment when we begin to exceed 12 hours of sunlight actually occurs for the Northwoods on 3/17. On 3/20, the sun will be directly above the equator. And by 3/26, we’ll be up to 12 ½ hours of sunlight. 

         By the last week in March our average high temperature will be in the 40’s, so there’s hope that spring is somewhere hiding on the horizon.

         

Thoughts for the Week

         I gave a talk in Madison last weekend on various writers who have authored pieces about water, so here are a couple short passages to cheer us on toward the time when the ice goes off the lakes and rivers, and liquid water reigns again.

         “What we see in lakes depends much on what we bring to the shore - King Arthur's sword or the Loch Ness monster. . . Human beings are, in a sense, bags of water which evolved spine and intelligence enough to walk around and manipulate other forms of life and matter. It is not hard to imagine that when we stop to look into the sea or listen to a mountain creek, the attraction we feel is the water inside calling to the water outside, two ponds, perhaps, stopping by the road of time to trade the news.” – Peter Steinhart

         And from Sigurd Olson’s book The Singing Wilderness: “The movement of a canoe is like a reed in the wind. Silence is part of it, and the sounds of lapping water, bird songs, and wind in the trees. It is part of the medium through which it floats, the sky, the water, the shores. 

         “A man is part of his canoe and therefore part of all it knows. The instant he dips a paddle, he flows as it flows, the canoe yielding to his slightest touch, responsive to his every whim and thought. The paddle is an extension of his arm, as his arm is part of his body . . . 

         “He feels at last that he is down to the real business of living . . . Life for some strange reason has suddenly become simple and complete; his wants are few, confusion and uncertainty gone, his happiness and contentment deep.

         “There is magic in the feel of a paddle and the movement of a canoe, a magic compounded of distance, adventure, solitude, and peace. The way of a canoe is the way of the wilderness and of a freedom almost forgotten. It is an antidote to insecurity, the open door to waterways of ages past and a way of life with profound and abiding satisfactions. When a man is part of his canoe, he is part of all that canoes have ever known.”

         

Please share your outdoor sightings and thoughts: e-mail me at johnbates2828@gmail.com, call 715-476-2828, snail-mail at 4245N State Highway 47, Mercer, WI, or see my blog at www.manitowishriver.blogspot.com.