Outside My Window

In his Sand County Almanac, Aldo Leopold called November “the month for the axe.  …In winter, when we are harvesting diseased or dead trees for our fuel wood, the ring of the axe is dinner gong for the chickadee tribe… Every slab of dead bark is, to them, a treasury of eggs, larvae, and cocoons.”

Dead trees are treasure troves for woodpeckers too, and in the bird world they wield the ax.  Though the leaves have fallen the weather is still warm, the larvae are still active inside the bark, and the woodpeckers can hear them.

This weekend I found a pileated woodpecker excavating a dead tree in Schenley Park.  Among birds, the pileated’s beak is about as close as you can come to an ax.  The bird itself is the size of a crow with a beak 1.5 to 2 inches long.  That may sound small but his beak hits the wood at 13-15 miles per hour so the woodpecker experiences 10G’s of force at each blow.  

It would kill you or me to slam our heads against trees but the woodpecker’s head is designed for the work.  His neck absorbs the impact and his brain is cushioned by a network of flexible cartilage and spongy air-filled bone.  His tongue is very long for probing the openings he creates – so long that it retracts inside to the back of his skull.  It’s the right equipment for chopping trees.

Keep a lookout this month for pileated woodpeckers.  November is the month for the ax.

(photo by Dick Martin)

Remember how on November 7th I wrote that non-native trees are often the only ones with leaves at this time of year?

Here’s a Norway maple, seen yesterday in Schenley Park.  It was the only tree with leaves on this Blue Sky day.

(photo by Kate St. John)

Very soon all the trees will be bare in my neighborhood.  This is already the case north of Pittsburgh.

A week ago I visited the Clarion River in Jefferson County where I noticed that even the oaks were bare.  At the Allegheny Front last Sunday the leaves on the mountain had fallen but in the valley the oaks were russet, the tulip trees golden.  In the valley the leaves were putting on a final show.  By now it’s probably over.

However, the show isn’t over yet if you have non-native trees in your area.  Trees from northern locations are out of sync with our photo period so most of them still have leaves, some are green. 

Our native maples lost their leaves two weeks ago.  The maples you see now with yellow and green leaves are Norway maples which respond to the amount of light they receive in Norway in October – about 10 hours per day.  Pittsburgh’s days aren’t that short until early November so these foreign maples are delayed.  They’re on Norway time.

Eventually even the non-natives will catch up.  How will I know when all the leaves are gone?  When I don’t have to rake anymore.

(photo by Marcy Cunkelman)

This morning the fog rose from the river and blanketed my neighborhood in frost. 

Above the fog the sky is clear, the sun shining.  Both fog and frost will be gone soon.

(photo by Dianne Machesney)

Golden sunlight on yellow leaves at North Park.  Enjoy them now.  They’re falling fast.

(photo by Dianne Machesney)

Winter is coming.  Orion the Hunter is back. 

Hidden all summer, the Orion constellation is visible again in our southern sky.  I first noticed him last week, just before dawn. 

You can pick out his features in the photo at left.  The line of three stars in the middle is his belt, the vertical line below that is his dagger and the four stars at the four corners mark his shoulders and knees. The unusual red star at his top left shoulder is Betelgeuse.  Click here to see how the Ancient Greeks made this pattern into a hunter.

Orion lies on the celestial equator so he’s visible in each hemisphere in winter. He’s one of my favorite constellations but truth be told he’s one of the few I can see.  My neighborhood is bad for star gazing due to city lights and Pittsburgh’s frequent cloud cover.  If the Ancient Greeks had seen as few stars as I do, they wouldn’t have named so many constellations.

Right now Orion is in the south but by January he’ll be at his best.  Meanwhile he has a special claim to fame this month.  On October 21 the Orionid meteor shower will flash in the space between Orion and Gemini, above and left of Betelgeuse.

So keep looking up.  Even at night there’s always something to see.

(photo linked from University of Arizona Astronomy Department.  Click on the photo to see it in its original context)

Today Chuck Tague reminded me it’s time for an October phenology.  Yikes!  I wrote September’s “What to Look For” only three days ago and included some early October predictions.  Is there any more to say?

I read Chuck’s list and right off the bat his is better than mine.  Did you know that October is a good month to find Wooly Bear caterpillars?  Did you know the Wooly Bear is the larva of the Isabella Tiger Moth?  I didn’t.

So rather than bore you with my own paltry list I urge you to read Chuck’s at Asters, Wooly Bears and Sweaters: A phenological perspective for October.

p.s.  News!  Three (or more) of Chuck Tague’s bird photos will be part of the OnQ show I blogged about yesterday.  Watch for his scarlet tanager, indigo bunting and mourning dove in the Birding for Everyone segment on Monday, October 5 at 7:30pm on WQED.

(Wooly Bear composite photo by Chuck Tague)

My gosh, I’m late!  I forgot all about writing a phenology for September and now the month is nearly gone! 

To make up for this omission, here’s a backward glance at what we missed in September and a look ahead into October.  At this time of year we can expect to see:

• The nighthawks left by early September.  Chimney swifts are gone by early October.
• Warblers and thrushes pass through in September.  Look for duck migration in October.
• Watch for an increase in the number of crows and starlings.
• The most numerous species at hawk watches changes from broad-winged hawks in September to sharp-shins and red-tails in October.
• Asters and goldenrod are still in bloom.  I have asters in my back yard that don’t fully bloom until October 1.  Here they are – and it’s almost October.
• “Hitch hiker” seeds are everywhere.  Burdock, beggar tickseed and tick trefoil grab onto pants and socks.
• In September, even before the trees and shrubs begin to change color, they lose some leaves and the canopy thins out. 
• Watch for maximum fall color around Columbus Day. 

Unlike me, Chuck Tague has kept up with the season.  Read his early and late September phenologies and the almanacs on his blog. 

(photo of Asters in my backyard.  Blurry, but you get the idea.)

Here’s a flower that I look for in September at Moraine State Park.  Closed or Bottle Gentian (Gentiana andrewsii) likes to grow in damp soil so I risk getting my feet wet when I look for it.  It’s always a pleasant surprise to find it.

The petals of Bottle Gentians never open but a bumblebee can force its way into the flower at the top.  In fact, bumblebees are just about the only insect who wants to – and can – collect the nectar. 

It seems to me this is a lot of trouble to go to for each flower.  It must be worth it.

(photo by Dianne Machesney)

Here’s a flower that blooms in Pennsylvania – and in Acadia National Park in September.  

Pearly Everlasting (Anaphalis margaritaceae) probably got its “everlasting” name because it dries well for use in winter flower arrangements.  It’s a member of the Aster family.

(photo by Dianne Machesney)