They’re everywhere here, and demand to be in the slideshow. Here’s one with a white bottom. He first came to my attention New Year’s Eve, while in the hands of my 3 year old, who was running up the stairs screaming “Papa - I have a mouse.” My lazy man’s guide to mouse identification says it’s a deer mouse (Peromyscus maniculatus).
Oriole
Saturday was our first morning at Rocky Gap and we were half awake in the tent for most of the dawn chorus, but we finally dragged ourselves out of bed at about 6:45 a.m. A loud sing-songy song drew our attention to the corner of the large camping field. We were rewarded by a Baltimore Oriole (Icterus galbula). It wasn’t making the song after all, but there it was, apparently gleaning insects from low black locust trees, Robinia pseudoacacia. I hope Jenn doesn’t mind that I’ve blogged her photo.
Ants
Wait, what was that strange tail flicking the oriole was doing? I suspected anting, and upon closer inspection, the trees were indeed covered in ants. Orioles are among a number of birds known to practice active anting — the bird grabs an ant and rubs its feathers (usually underneath) with it. Passive anters (like American Crows) simply crouch over anthills and let the ants run through their feathers. Either way, the currently fashionable hypothesis is that the formic acid in the ant provides some protection against feather mites and other undesirables. This quaint study associates it with molting, which is not at odds with the prophylactic hypothesis. Sometimes the ant survives the involuntary use as a pest repellent, sometimes it doesn’t. I believe these are Formica ants, and am working on narrowing down the species.
Aphids?
While photographing the ants I discovered yet another layer in the story. The ants appeared to be tending aphids, most of which were clustered at the junction of new branches on the black locust trees. I’m not sure yet what the aphid species is. The typical interaction in systems like this is that the ants protect the aphids from predators and receive a sugary reward, honeydew, from the aphids’ back ends. Some trees benefit from this arrangement because the ants also keep caterpillars and other foliage destroyers in check. Some, such as black locusts, apparently suffer damage from the aphids themselves. In my photograph, you can see that something has been eating the locust leaves. There’s a chance these aphids are leaf hoppers; I haven’t managed an identification yet. Perhaps a kind reader will help.
In any case, there’s clearly something complex and cool going on.
Cyanobacteria were detected last Fall in Lac Mercier. The village of Mont Tremblant closed the beach (shortly before winter), and advised residents to not drink or bathe in lake water.
Here’s some cyanobacteria trivia:
1. They are water dwelling, photosynthesizing prokaryotes (that is, they have no cell nucleus). They can exist as either single cell organisms or as colonies of sheets , filaments, or hollow balls.
2. Because of their lifestyle, they are commonly called blue-green algae, although this government of Canada website gives their common name as “pond scum”.
3. They are rising through the taxonomic ranks, and have recently been promoted from phylum to subkingdom in some classifications. (If they ever make kingdom, I hope someone opens a Pond Scum Kingdom theme park.)
4. They played a revolutionary evolutionary role during the early Cambrian (or late Vendian), when some of them took up residence in eukaryotic cells, becoming what we now call chloroplasts. Those eukaryotes went on to become plants.
5. Some species produce compounds toxic to humans, others do not. Toxic compunds produced by cyanobacteria include those that attack the liver (hepatoxins), and the nervous system (neurotoxins).
In reference to (5), Mont Tremblant assayed the lake in early Spring, and found no cyanobacteria-linked toxins. A second assay confirmed this result last week. So everything’s fine, and there’s no reason to worry about the fact that pond scum blooms don’t really get going until the dog days of summer, or about the fact that blooms have been observed to become toxic overnight. Anyway, the cyanobacteria are pretty much an act of God, and not really related to the nutrients pouring into the lake from properties recently stripped of forest in favour of lawns, nor to the explosion of golf courses the area has seen in the last decade. I myself took a swim last week, and the water felt great.
The dead guy in the picture is probably Mus musculus (house mouse). I admit that the picture is alarmist, since I have no idea what killed him.
(If I see a bloom, I’ll post a picture.)
I am not an expert in any group other than birds and there are plenty of birders better than I am. For example, read John’s account of his experiences birding for the BioBlitz. So, I spent my Saturday morning shift shadowing the scene at the scientists’ area near the Nature Center.
My colleagues at the Lepidoptera tables, Don Davis, John Brown, and Mark Metz, were busy sorting and pinning the winnings of the blacklights and traps set out overnight. I had helped Eric Lind set up one of these the previous night. They did reasonably well, though Don Davis remarked that warmer weather would have meant more than a hundred species rather than the 40 or so they found. The final tally across all groups, now reported on the official BioBlitz blog as 666, will continue to climb as entomologists in particular tackle the laborious task of identifying specimens. More than once I saw one expert say to another, “I dunno what it is” and shrug their shoulders. For me this illustrates that 1) taxonomic experts, with total focus on and vast knowledge of their groups, are human too, 2) nature’s diversity even in an urban park is awesome, and 3) specimens are invaluable for such inventories. I assume that the 666 includes their estimates of how many different kinds, even if the bug folks really don’t know exactly what they found yet. No comment on the significance of the number of the beast vis a vis the evolutionary bent of this whole enterprise.
While trying to track down scientific names for the egg cases I found during my blogger BioBlitz, I ran across this What’s That Bug’s entertaining page full of stories about mantids. Can you imagine having hundreds of mantis nymphs decorating your Christmas tree? There are so many awesome observations reported here I’ll try to go through and pull some out for SPOTs (that’s what we are calling the structured reports we are making using the SPOTter tool).
For example, a Carolina mantid ate a golden orb weaver (spider) in West Virginia. Mantises stalk paper wasps and eat stinkbugs. There are photos of young mantids (nymphs) and some cool species from around the world, too.
However, I must take exception to the claim that when females eat the heads off their males while mating that it is “for the good of the species.” Of course it is to the benefit of those individual males if his sacrifice means a greater chance that his offspring will survive. The female uses the nutritional gift to produce the eggs and substantial egg case. The foamy structure of the case insulates the eggs over winter so they can hatch in the spring.
The bottom line is that this site is, by the authors own disclaimer, an art project written by two MFAs, not by credentialed scientists. BugGuide.net is somewhat more authoritative but again the determinations are often done by non-professionals. Still, there’s lots of good stuff here as long as you take it with a grain of salt. I suspect both of these sites are more popular with the public than more official university or government sites. Why? I suspect that’s due to responsiveness and friendliness. Hmm . . . food for thought.
Lead off story: These stylish brown tufts are the fruiting bodies of Stemonitis (probably S. axifera), a beautiful slime mold lurking under a rotting log. Never would have known what they were, except I ran into Dr. Harold Keller and a team of canopy climbers as we returned to base camp from our field outing. They came all the way from the University of Central Missouri to look for slime molds, lichens, and other canopy dwellers. He looked at the photo, said it was a beautiful specimen and wished I’d collected it. Next time I’ll know how to collect slime molds (you cut off the bark they are on and glue the whole thing to the bottom of a box).
As the Urban Pantheist notes, it is really hard to focus on too many things at once. At least 50% of my three hours with the herp survey team were spent trying to keep my kids entertained so they wouldn’t annoy everyone around them. Still, I feel I’ve made up for not herping on my Blogger BioBlitz. Plan to spend tomorrow morning with the Lepidopterists, who don’t expect much in this chilly weather.
What we saw:
A few more “firsts of the year”: we’ve spotted fireflies displaying on the ground (as early as last week), and have heard red foxes crying in the neighborhood (today). I still have not heard any nighthawks, but there were so many insects out last Tuesday night that I needed a windshield as I was biking to an evening meeting.
On my commute to College Park I sometimes take I-95. Bordering the highway are some of the tallest light poles I’ve ever seen. In previous years, I’ve noticed they seem to be popular nesting places for crows — in fact, they look just like the “crows nests” that you might find on ye old ship masts. I’ve always wanted to do a survey to see how many of those towers are housing crows. This morning I saw a crow enter a nest in one tower, and can put it on a map. I’ll keep my eyes open for more.
Looking for photographs on the web (because I’m not sure how easy it will be for me to stop on the interstate to photograph!), I found a very nice blog called Ravens in Hollywood. Ravens are known to nest in all sorts of interesting places, and this blog’s author documents some of them. Crows also get some mention.
Postscript: I tried checking for more nests on the way home, and decided it is rather dangerous to examine tall light poles while driving during rush hour.
Blogger BioBlitz results are due soon, and the Spire team is still planning to get that data out on the Semantic Web where we can play with it. In the meantime, I’ve got a chance to redeem myself at another bioblitz — this time a traditional one with massive scientist and volunteer participation. The site is Rock Creek Park in the heart of Washington, DC. It is probably not to late to join in the festivities, which begin at 11:30 a.m. this Friday and go until noon on Saturday. Get more information and sign up at the National Geographic site.
I say I can redeem myself because I never did do the blacklighting for moths that I promised for the Blogger BioBlitz. So I’m planning to learn from two of my Leptree.net colleagues, Don Davis and John Brown, as they inventory the Lepidoptera in the park.
A second choice might have been to join the amphibian survey team. One morning I tagged along with Evan Grant, a USGS biologist and University of Maryland graduate student, searching for stream salamanders in Rock Creek Park. The deepest reaches of the park can be surprisingly quiet. I highly recommend creek-walking, whether for science or for pleasure (not that the two are mutually exclusive).
Perfect weather yesterday meant that our outing to Mt. Pleasant was, well, quite pleasant. Most memorable observations: ticks. I think we found six of them (so far) on our car and on our persons. Which did not spoil the morning at all, by the way.
Later in the day we visited my mother-in-law who lives on the Bird River north of Baltimore. The treat of the day was a mature bald eagle. With the major comeback in recent years, especially in the Chesapeake area, this isn’t surprising, but still it is always nice to see them.
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