Category Archives: Weather & Sky

Tracks!

Weather & Sky


One of the best things about snow is that you can see who’s been there before you and guess what they were doing. 

Last weekend at Moraine State Park I was pleased by the tracks in the snow.  My favorites were made by a red fox who walked at least a mile on the North Shore bike trail.  For the most part he just put one foot front of the other, literally placing each back foot in the print of his front foot like a cat.  On and on he walked until…  

Something caught his eye and he broke into a gallop.  He rushed at a pine tree with squirrel tracks at its base but his prey must have escaped.  No blood, no struggle in the snow, and the fox resumed his walk with only one backward glance as if nothing had happened.

Behind him came a coyote who walked only a short section of the bike trail, then veered off to a thicket for some serious hunting.  His prints showed him sniffing in all the corners, then digging near a culvert.  Something edible must have been hiding there.  I saw rabbit and vole tracks but were they what he was after?  I don’t know.

Birds make tracks, too.  Shown above are the tracks of a wild turkey walking alone in the snow.  It would have been fun to find out where he went and if any other turkeys joined him.

So despite the cold I’m not tired of the snow (yet).  I’m out looking for tracks!

(photo by Tim Engleman of Saxonburg, PA via Wikimedia Commons. Click on the photo to see the original.)

Crabapples and Rain

Bird Behavior, Weather & Sky

Thank you, everyone, for your comments, emails and phone calls about yesterday’s quiz.

My local experts — Marcy Cunkelman, Dianne Machesney and Chuck Tague — agree that the tree is a crabapple.   My photo didn’t provide enough information to identify the cultivar but Marcy suggested a Sargent’s Crabapple, Dianne gave us a list and Chuck Tague emailed this comment:

“Dianne and Marcy are correct.  It is one of the ornamental crabs.  It resembles the trees at Chatham Village in Mt. Washington, Showy Crabapple “Malus floribunda”.  The top of one is close to my second floor office window. It is not a favorite of birds until after the first hard frost.  Then, usually a week or two before Thanksgiving, swarms of fruit-eaters descend on the tree.  American Robins and Cedar Waxwings bounce from crabapple to crabapple in a frenzied feast.  Mixed in are House Finches and House Sparrows.  Eventually a brigade of European Starling swoops in and the fruit is stripped clean in a few hours.”

Chuck sent a photo of a cedar waxwing tossing back a crabapple, but I chose this one of a robin in the rain — on Chuck’s crabapple tree — because it ties two themes together.

Yesterday’s storm and heavy rain reminded me that there’s a link between weather, birds and food.  We might guess that heavy rain puts birds under stress.  Now we have some proof.

Alice Boyle of the University of Western Ontario studies white-ruffed manakins in Costa Rica.  They’re fruit-eating birds the size of chickadees who, like chickadees, must eat all the time and, like chickadees, change elevation in the winter.

Winter in the Costa Rican rain forest isn’t cold but it’s very, very wet.  Alice Boyle and her colleagues discovered that when particularly long, heavy rain storms plagued the area, the white-ruffed manakins migrated to lower elevations.  Blood tests of rain-affected birds showed they had high levels of stress hormones and were burning fat.  In other words, they were hungry and stressed out.

Boyle says that the stress of rain may be what prompts the birds to fly downhill to drier ground, “These rainstorms have really strong effects, both behaviorally and physiologically, in ways that nobody knew before.”

Her study might not translate to all birds, but it supports our guess that rain means stress.

Read the article and see a picture of the white-ruffed manakin here.

(photo by Chuck Tague)

Through the Cracks

Insects, Weather & Sky
Crack in the wall at Willowbank (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

9 October 2010

I don’t know about you, but I’m seeing way too much Nature indoors lately.

Yesterday’s suddenly warm weather heated up the bugs and they came inside.  Fortunately I’ve not seen what I consider “too many” of these critters:

  • Brown marmorated stink bugs:  After a brief hiatus (when it was raining) the parade of stink bugs distracted us at work yesterday.  Despite their large appearance stink bugs can flatten themselves into a narrow profile and drag their large shielded backs through tiny slits.  I’ve actually seen one emerge through the crack under my office window.  Eeeeewwww!
  • House centipedes:  At home we have had all sizes of house centipedes though thankfully not in great numbers.  I really hate them because their fast-moving legs give me the creeps.  My cat points them out by watching and waiting to pounce.  Get them, Emmy!  (p.s. See Steve-o’s comment below about what centipedes eat.  Maybe I should let them live.)
  • Common house spiders:  Their cobwebs are in nooks and crannies around the house where I had hoped they’d capture the stink bugs and centipedes.  Unfortunately these spiders are too small to tackle such large insects.  Some webs have no spiders; Emmy eats them.  Even the empty webs perform a useful function:  When you want to seal your leaking heating ducts, look for cobwebs nearby.  Spiders always build where there’s moving air.

And here’s what I haven’t seen yet — and hope to avoid:

  • Asian lady beetles:  Though beneficial these bugs are annoying in large numbers.  I haven’t seen them inside yet but their favorite invasion month is October.  Alas, they’re bound to come.
  • Mice:  In the fall of 2001, I discovered I had mice when my indoor cats gave me presents:  a white-footed mouse and a house mouse.  Where there’s one mouse there’s always more, and where there are two species the house is a sieve.  I stopped them by cementing all the outdoor cracks around the foundation.  Well worth the effort, though my cats were disappointed.

The parade of indoor Nature is underway.   Now’s the time to seal the cracks.

(photo by Achim Hering from Wikimedia Commons)

p.s. Emmy has many names including Emmalina.

Drought Warning

Weather & Sky


Last Thursday the Department of Environmental Protection issued a drought warning for 24 counties in Pennsylvania and a drought watch in the remaining 43.  The entire state is dry but some places are worse than others. 

Here in western Pennsylvania I could see it coming.

Since July we’ve had no rain for weeks at a time, then a day of mere drizzle or a single downpour that ran off the packed, dry dirt.  The ground is rock hard, the plants have shriveled, and some trees have lost their leaves even though it’s only September.  I was wondering when DEP would declare a drought.

A drought warning is more severe than a watch. Highlighted below are the counties in the warning zone.  As you can see, both the bottom left corner and the east central part of the state are in trouble.

In the warning area DEP asks residents to reduce water use voluntarily by 10-15 percent.  We’re urged not to water our lawns, not to take long showers, to check our faucets for leaks and to upgrade our plumbing.

I’m sure DEP told industry to conserve as well.  

I hope the industries that take water without giving it back(*) will stop drawing water until the drought is over.

(Drought photo from Shutterstock)

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(*)  In western Pennsylvania the Marcellus Shale drilling industry is permitted to draw 48.5 million gallons per day from the Ohio watershed.  The water cannot be given back because most of it is lost underground during hydraulic fracturing and the remainder, which cannot be treated yet to safe drinking water levels, is too dangerous to consume.  For a discussion of Marcellus Shale water issues see this paper by a law firm advising the industry, and this news article about the Monongahela River.

Birds before the storm

Travel, Weather & Sky

Last evening before Tropical Storm Earl reached Maine, I checked on what the birds were doing:

  • Surf was high at the outer islands by late afternoon so rafts of common eiders came into the sheltered coves of Mt Desert.  I’ve never seen so many so close.
  • Another ocean bird came in too. By dusk, northern gannets were hunting fish within sight of shore.
  • An hour after sunset the air was calm and almost foggy when I heard large numbers of Swainson’s thrushes migrating in the dark, heading west along the coast.  It seemed to me they were flying toward the bad weather.  I wished them luck.

The wind and rain did not begin until 4:00am.  At dawn the crows & osprey were up and out as usual.  Maybe the birds are better informed than the Weather Channel.

UPDATE, 11:00am: No wind, and now no rain.  Earl was more hype than storm.

Red Sky at Morn, Sailors Forewarn

Travel, Weather & Sky

The sky was red-pink at sunrise this morning.

After five days of absolutely clear, hot weather the clouds are here in advance of Hurricane Earl.  By the time Earl gets here he’ll be downgraded to a tropical storm.  The wind out there in the Gulf of Maine will be 50-65 knots (57-74 mph) with waves 18-28 feet.

Sailors forewarn.

(p.s.  Here on land it will rain from midnight Fri to noon Sat with wind gusting to 50 mph.  Not bad.)

Hot!!!

Travel, Weather & Sky

We’re on Day Three of four days in a row of incredibly hot weather for Maine.  At this time of year the normal high we’re used to is 75. Today it will be 90 and the air quality will be bad because the air is moving up from PA, NYC, and the east coast.  It’s too hot to hike.

Some of you asked if Hurricane Earl will affect us. Yes, but my husband and I are looking forward to the rain & cooler temperatures.  We might regret that attitude at dawn on Saturday when Earl will have been here for 6 hours, but for now Earl is welcome to arrive ASAP!

Downpour!

Songbirds, Weather & Sky

Rose-breasted Grosbeak in the rain (photo by Marcy Cunkelman)

July 28, 2010:

What do birds do when it rains?

If it’s storming they take shelter but during showers — even heavy ones — they’re willing to get wet.

In the National Aviary’s Wetlands Room there are sprinklers near the roof that turn on to simulate a tropical downpour.  Have you ever been there when it “rains?”  The birds react instantly.  Most of them sing or shout, some fly through the water, others bathe.  The room is filled with sound while the birds obviously enjoy themselves.

This month we’ve had some weather that’s felt mighty tropical, complete with brief downpours.  During one of them Marcy Cunkelman photographed this rose-breasted grosbeak in her yard.

He doesn’t seem to mind the rain, does he?  That’s probably because he lives in the tropics most of the year.

My goodness it was pouring!

 

(photo by Marcy Cunkelman)

Bad News For People Who Breathe

Weather & Sky


And that would be all of us. 

If you’re not feeling well during this weather it’s not just the heat, it’s the air.

Bright sunshine and temperatures over 90 have brewed up some really bad air quality.

Shown above is our National Weather Service “1-hour average” ozone forecast for 5:00pm today.  Red means unhealthy air and as you can see it’s not confined to cities. 

Ozone is cosmopolitan because it’s formed in the sky and blows with the wind.  It’s created when heat and sunlight cause nitrous oxides (NOx) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) to chemically combine into O3.   NOx and VOCs come from motor vehicles, power plants, industry and chemical emissions and from those new gas well compressor stations popping up in Pennsylvania.  That’s why we’re urged not to drive so much and to use less electricity on Ozone Action Days.

We’re also told to stay indoors.  That may work for us but it doesn’t help birds, animals and plants that have nowhere else to go.  Ozone is harmful to their respiratory systems, too, and it burns sensitive plants.

So we’re all limiting our activity today – a sort of Ozone Inaction Day – and waiting for the weather to change.

Bad news for everything that breathes. 

(NOAA’s 1-hour ozone prediction for the Eastern Great Lakes for 5:00pm July 6, 2010 (as of noon on July 5). Click on the image and the Loop Control arrow to watch the latest animation on the NOAA website.)
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p.s. GASP (Group Against Smog and Pollution) is working for clean air in southwestern PA. Please join us.