May 23, 2023

Lake Springfield Boathouse Meadow

May 23, 2023/ Gwen Morrison

The two Purple Martin houses near the Lake Springfield Boathouse are very active; there are always birds visible from the balconies. The houses are in the mowed area close to the boathouse and parking area – convenient for the birds to swoop over the meadow or out over the lake. It is very challenging to get the eyes visible with the dark coloring of the feathers!

A little further along the path and across from the meadow...there are periodic bluebird houses. One of the houses was being used by a tree swallow…another by an Eastern Bluebird that was still supplementing the nest inside.

The multiflora roses were blooming under the trees….a non-native plant that was promoted years ago, but is now generally viewed as invasive.

The meadow was mostly green….with a few plants beginning to flower The milkweed was up but not yet blooming.

I was glad I had by bridge camera with its optical zoom to photograph some insects. There were a few butterflies, but I didn’t manage to photograph any of them; they seemed to be moving about in a frenzy.

Many of the places where water makes it way down to the lake have scoured banks…the water trickling through the bottom of a ditch except right after a rain when the banks are eroded making ditch deeper/wider. There was one that was different with lots of vegetation on the banks – not eroded at all. I wondered if it was a new route for the water.

My phone and Bluetooth remote shutter control were used for some macro shots.

I was glad the boathouse had a small store since I had forgotten my water bottle. The day had started humid and a little cool, but the sun was out and the temperature rose pretty fast – an excellent morning to observe the meadow (glad we didn’t wait for the afternoon).

May 31, 2018

Zooming – May 2018

May 31, 2018/ Gwen Morrison

Sometimes I use the zoom on my camera to capture botanicals that I can’t get close to – like this weathered sycamore seed ball.

And sometimes I capture an insect on a plant that I don’t see until I look at my ‘take’ on the big screen after I get home. This is a grass seed head I photographed at Belmont while I was waiting for the bus with the students coming for BioBlitz.

Most of the time I use the zoom to capture things like frogs (yesterday’s post) or birds that would move away if I tried to get closer to them. This month I photographed two birds that were singing: a Grackle in the black walnut and a Caroline Wren on our deck railing.

There was a Mourning Dove with an iridescent patch on its neck near our birdbath

And a Robin alert to what was happening in our backyard.

I managed to get one good image of a Chipping Sparrow on a split rail fence at Belmont; it kept flying ahead of me even with the distance the zoom was providing.

2018 05 IMG_0624.jpg — Finally – I got some pictures of Tree Swallows at Belmont. They were protecting their nest along the path to the pond – would dive bomb hikers (to the delight of all the BioBlitz groups) and return to the top of their box between rounds.

May 23, 2018

Baltimore Birding – part 3

May 23, 2018/ Gwen Morrison

We continued our Baltimore Birding experience with a walk around Fort McHenry the next morning. It was mostly sunny and warmer. Even with the better light and no rain – I saw more birds than I managed to photograph. I’m featuring the ones that say still long enough for me to get the camera in position. There were quite a few Great Crested Flycatchers (I remember seeing one in my back yard last year about time…posted about it here).

There were American robins in the grass.

The small birds moved around rapidly in the trees. I think this one is an orchard oriole.

I photographed mushrooms when I saw them. The mulch was support several groupings….and a sycamore stump had a collection of small shelf fungus.

There was a grackle aggressively defending a trash can at the front of the visitor center.

There were mallards about. There was a female that looked calm for the moment…the males were being very aggressive.

There was a ‘mixed breed’ duck…probably mallard and a domestic duck of some kind.

There were some sycamores along the path that did not look healthy. I wondered if salt water incursion was happening through the seawall around the fort….or maybe they are all the same age and getting old. I took a picture of one that already had its top gone; there was a knot with leaves sprouting at about eye level with ‘wrinkles’ on all sides – almost like skin.

We headed over to a marshy are beside the fort…and I managed to finally get a picture of a one kind of swallow we say: a tree swallow. We saw barn swallows on our walk as well.

Overall our Baltimore Birding experience provided a different perspective on the city. I would guess that birding in just about any city would have the same results. Maybe it is something we should do more often….although the amount of trash (particularly in the water) is always depressing.

April 26, 2018

Ten Little Celebrations – April 2018

April 26, 2018/ Gwen Morrison

April has gone by very quickly…full of company and travel and the beginning of the spring volunteering blitz.

Six of the 10 little celebrations were experiences outdoors – typical celebrations of springtime everywhere:

Blue birds and tree swallows were making their nests I the boxes at Mt. Pleasant in Maryland.
There were ducklings at Josey Ranch Lake in Carrollton, Texas.
An eared grebe at Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge near Sherman, Texas.
Macroinvertebrates in the Middle Patuxent close to home.
Spicebush in the forest behind my house and at Belmont Manor and Historic Park (both in Maryland).
Deciduous Magnolias blooming at Brookside Gardens. Maryland got a freeze at the wrong time in 2017 and most of the blooms turned brown from the cold just as they were opening. It was a treat to see them again this year.

I celebrated the end of two long driving days between Maryland and Texas. Both were blustery and more traffic than expected. It felt good to be done!

My new iPad is something I celebrate every time I create another Zentangle with it! I a pleasantly surprised with how easy I made the transition from pen and paper tiles to digital.

I thoroughly enjoyed a meal at a Brazilian steakhouse – this time managing to savor the flavors and not overeating. I even topped off the meal with dessert!

Finally – the Watershed Summit where the high schools of the county presented their report cards to the county government for their steams and school yards – based on data they collected last fall. Each of the 13 high schools had 2 presenters. They all were so poised and organized. It was a double celebration: the environmental findings trending positive in most cases and the quality of the students in attendance. Both bode well for the future.

April 13, 2018

Hurray for Spring Field Trips!

April 13, 2018/ Gwen Morrison

This week I volunteered for school field trips with the Howard County Conservancy – three mornings in a row. The first two were 5th graders at Belmont. I did two hikes with groups of about 10 students and their chaperone on both days. The school buses arrived on time and both groups wanted to head to the forest.

Along the way to stopped to see a pecan tree and a southern magnolia with lots of seed pods around its base. The students measured and described nuts, husks, pods and leaves…and then it we moved to the forest where we found millipedes and a tiny red mite. The spicebush was in bloom. It’s an understory tree so the students could take a close look at the flowers, see the stoma in the bark (white dots) and smell the ‘spice.’ They were thrilled that the trees are surviving in the forest behind Belmont…and that means there will be food for the swallowtail butterfly caterpillars as the days warm and the leaves emerge.

There was a bird in a high tree as we started the hike back from lunch. We thought it was a crow…and then it flew and ‘cawed’ to confirm.

As we waited to regroup in the field we compared seeds of sycamores and sweet gums…and picked out the sycamores in the distance along the drive into Belmont.

I took pictures of the lilacs planted in symmetrical plantings in front of the manor hour as I walked back to my car after the last hikes. The buds for the flowers were not numerous and I wondered if a recent frost had damaged them.

2018 04 IMG_9815.jpg — The third field trip of the week was for 3rd graders and was at Mt. Pleasant Farm. The students arrived in school buses and the normal chaos ensued to divide into groups.

The topic was ‘habitats and home’ which is always a great topic for a hike but particularly in the spring. The hike included observing blue birds and tree swallows jockeying for the bird houses along the trail. My group stood on a little hillock to observe the action. The tree swallows seemed to have staked a claim but weren’t building their nest there yet.

I completely missed the wood frog orgy in the little pool in the Honor’s Garden this year. It evidently happened on some warm days we had back in February! There are a lot of tadpoles in the pool now and were part of the lesson for the students during the non-hiking part of the morning.