Naturally
It’s a lovely day, one offering perfect winter weather in early October. I know it’s fall, but still. The everlasting summer didn’t last. Fall begins. Summer ends. Winter looms. The pigments of trees are thrilling, and farm fields have turned the color of overdone meatloaf. I stopped at a pumpkin patch to have a pumpkin repaired.
I walked, moseyed, strolled, ambled, meandered, sauntered, wandered, ambulated, hoofed, traipsed, stepped, peregrinated, tramped, tiptoed, strutted, lumbered, waddled and toddled along, seeing many people on the trail who were taking their phones for a walk. The best things in leaf are trees. I played the "catch the falling leaf" game, a folk tradition that claims catching a tumbling leaf brings good luck, helps avoid colds, or grants 12 months of happiness. It’s a form of mindfulness that fosters focusing on the present moment and the beauty of autumn. I snatched a red maple leaf out of the air. It was a vision of loveliness. Yay, me!
Meadowhawks are small dragonflies, an inch to an inch and a half long. The males are red, and the females are a yellow-orange color. They are tough, sometimes surviving into November.
Fluttery will get you everywhere or at least will get a monarch butterfly to Mexico. Their future is up in the air.
Migrating birds carry built-in clocks and calendars. Unlike other warblers, yellow-rumped warblers (butterbutts) don’t go far to overwinter, traveling to the southern United States, Mexico and the Caribbean. Some butterbutts winter farther north on the east and west coasts. They’re able to survive harsh winters due to their ability to eat berries when insects aren’t readily available. They’re able to digest bayberry, juniper, wax myrtle and poison ivy berries.
A Jack-in-the-pulpit has red berries that glow on the forest floor, and the red sashes of ambitious Virginia creeper (woodbine) climb trees. Milkweed pods burst, having turned from green to a gray or brown color, and the seeds inside are mature when brown.
Bur oak acorns have fuzzy caps that remind me of a Russian fur hat. Wood ducks, wild turkeys, squirrels, deer and other animals prize this acorn. A white oak has rounded leaf lobes, and in contrast, red oaks have pointed leaves with bristle tips. The burr oak is a white oak. A study in Science Daily found that squirrels eat 85% of white oak acorns shortly after discovery and store 60% of red oak acorns. That’s because red oak acorns contain larger amounts of tannins than white oak acorns. Tannin is a bitter-tasting chemical that protects acorns from insects and animals.
Q&A
“Do ducks migrate in flocks?” During migration, ducks may form loose flocks to take advantage of group navigation and predator avoidance, though the flocks are typically less structured compared to the V-formations of geese, and ducks may migrate in smaller, more dispersed groups than geese. Some ducks, especially larger species, will use a V-formation. Migratory habits vary by species.
“I see woodpeckers all year round. Don’t any of them migrate?” Red-bellied, hairy, downy and pileated woodpeckers spend the year in our company, a fact for which I’m most grateful. Some woodpeckers migrate—red-headed woodpeckers, northern flickers and yellow-bellied sapsuckers. These migrants are casual here in winter. The most northerly of our woodpeckers, the uncommon black-backed and the American three-toed woodpeckers are bog birds, attracted to recently burned forests. They’re most often observed in winter.
“Why are they called songbirds?” Because they leave musical notes on your car’s windshield. Almost half the world’s bird species are songbirds, a group known as passerines. They’re perching birds with feet that have three toes facing forward and one toe facing backward. This allows them to grip onto branches and other similar surfaces. Songbirds have a highly developed voice box, which means they can sing beautiful and complex songs, which we hear in lovely dawn choruses.
“I watched a Cooper’s hawk chase a songbird. How fast can that hawk fly?” That accipiter was clocked flying at 23-55 mph during migration at Hawk Mountain. A Coop is a strong and agile flyer that during a powered flight on stiff wing beats could hit 40-55 mph in pursuit of prey.
“Do bumblebee colonies survive winter?” Bumblebees don’t maintain colonies throughout the winter. The last brood of the summer colony contains many queens, each of which mates and finds a safe place to spend the winter—a small hole in the ground or a protected spot just big enough for her to hibernate. Only the queen hibernates until spring. The rest of the colony, including the old queen, dies.
Thanks for stopping by
“If I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns.”—George Eliot.
“I love to think of nature as an unlimited broadcasting station, through which God speaks to us every hour, if we will only tune in.”―George Washington Carver.
Do good.
©️Al Batt 2025
Eastern towhee males sing a "drink-your-tea" song. Both sexes produce a "che-wink" or "tow-hee" call. Males have a striking color pattern, black above and on the breast, rufous sides and a white belly. Females and immatures look similar, but are brown where the males are black. Previously known as rufous-sided towhees, they are birds of the undergrowth. Photo by Al Batt.