November 27, 2022: A Gaggle of Goldeneye

There were a lot of feathered creatures out celebrating Thanksgiving this week:  woodpeckers, goldeneyes, mallards, geese - but none that I saw were turkeys.  Of these, the most interesting to watch was the pileated woodpecker.  It caught my eye as it flew, the flashes of white in its wings divulging its identity, and it was easy to follow it to its destination on an oak tree with a promising rotten spot on a large branch.  

This branch caught the pileated's trained eye.

It hopped up on the branch and listened for signs of life inside the decaying wood.

The red stripe on the cheek indicates this is a male.  Females have a black stripe.

He apparently found what he was looking for and pinpointed the exact spot to attack.

Right there, in that little gap surrounded by lichen.

He began his assault, chopping at the branch with long strokes of his powerful neck, up and down, up and down.  First he broke through the bark, making a small mark on the branch.

Woodpeckers use their strong tail as a third contact point to brace against as they drive their chisel into the wood.  This video, though blurry and out of focus, at least shows the force a pileated can apply to its work.  Note how he keeps his tail pressed against the tree, and stops to listen now and then:

As he worked, the hole enlarged and deepened.

Soon he broke through the outer wood and opened up a pathway to the insects' home inside, most likely a nest of carpenter ants, at which point he simply stuck his beak in the hole, pushing his sticky, barbed tongue into the nest - a pileated can extend its tongue out two inches - pulling out ant after ant, and maybe some eggs too.  

He sat for long time feasting on the high protein food inside.  

The whole process, from when he landed to when he got his first morsel took just five minutes.  Here's a video of him reaping the fruits of his labor.

The next bird encounter came on Thursday morning when we took a walk along the WOW Trail between Laconia and Lakeport to rev up our appetite for Thanksgiving dinner.  There in Opechee Bay was a huge gaggle of goldeneyes that had gathered for their own Thanksgiving celebration - over 30 of them.

Goldeneyes, thankful for making it unscathed through the first half of hunting season.

For some reason, there was one lone hooded merganser leading the flock.

Or perhaps being chased by the flock?

I've seen large gaggles of goldeneyes on Lake Waukewan as well, but only small groups on Wicwas - it must be too small a water body for large family gatherings.  These are pretty little ducks with their white cheeks and bright golden eyes.

There were also a few mallards in the bay.

Mrs. Mallard stretches her wings.

Lastly, I'll share some pictures of needle ice that I found on a run up to the White Mountain Ledge in the Hamlin Town Forest.  I keep my eye out for this on the first cold days of the year, but these were easy to find as they were right in the middle of the trail.  

Needle ice on the Red Trail leading to the White Mountain Ledge

Needle ice forms when the earth is wet and still warm, but the air gets cold so water on the surface of the ground freezes.  As water in the soil is cooled from above, it freezes onto the bottom of the ice crystal, and the needle grows skyward.

The intersection of water and cold always fascinates me. 

November 20, 2022: First Snow

Jack Frost made his first appearance this week, bringing just a few inches of snow Tuesday night, but it was enough to make it look like winter before the calendar says it's time.

Jack Frost, Mother Nature, Father Winter - they all ignore human calendars.

November snow.

They roll to their own agenda.

The beaver ponds and marshes have started to skim over with ice on cold mornings and even small areas of the lake are seeing ice form.

A beaver lodge in Double-dammed Pond in the Hamlin Town Forest.

Soon the beavers will be locked into their underwater world for the winter.

I always anticipate heading out on the morning of the first snow to see which critters been out on the trails, but this snow was wet and still falling over night so tracks were melted and filled and pretty much unrecognizable.

Ill-defined tracks not easily identified.

I'll enjoy the anticipation a bit longer.

A few more mergansers stopped by Lake Wicwas on their way south this week including three males courting a single female.  

It seemed as though one male had been eliminated from the competition.

He was left all alone behind the others.

The hen was still deciding between the two remaining contenders.  

She's in complete control of the situation.

Hooded mergansers often pair up in the fall with the drake spreading it's showy crest to impress it's intended beau.  Once a pair has formed they will usually stay together for life.  Like wood ducks, hooded mergansers nest in trees, often as high up as 50'.  When the chicks hatch in the spring they climb out of the nesting hole and fall to the ground just 24 hours after hatching.  They then follow their mother through the woods to the nearest body of water which may a journey of several hundred yards.  It's a good thing they lay a lot of eggs, typically a half dozen to a dozen in a single clutch.

And, wasn't I surprised to see our young Maddie on Friday!

Maddie, on November 18th.

There had been no reported sightings for a while, so I don't know where she's been hiding, but I can only assume this juvenile loon is our Maddie.  

November is an interesting transition month that brings a multitude of changes including interesting skies, clouds, and sunrises.  

Pink sunrises

30 minutes later the sun shines bright white on new snow.

And another 30 minutes later, sun on the shoreline, with dark clouds overhead.

November - it's a never ending circle of wonder.

November 13: 2022: Frost on the Fountain

We're finally starting to get some colder weather around here.  I walked past the fountain on Main Street in Meredith one cool, bright morning this week and got a clear message that it's about time to put away the hoses and turn off the outside spigots.

Frost on the Fountain.

Still, many of our hardy plants are hanging in there even though it was cold enough that night to put a sheet of ice on even the moving water in the fountain.

Perhaps it's due to the mild weather, but we haven't seen a lot of migrating ducks this fall - just a few wood ducks, and then this week, a couple of hooded mergansers paddled by.

I say a couple rather than a pair because these are two males.

I love the way their tail feathers fan out on the surface of the water.

One of our loon observers responded to my question last week about the presence of our loons.  They reported that until about November 4th they had seen the chick and an adult most every day, but after that, nothing. So it's possible our young Maddie has now left her childhood home and flown off to the ocean where she'll spend the next four or five years.   I'll wait another week to be sure, but we may have seen the last of her.  Most of our summer visitors have also left by now, but there are plenty of brave birds that will tough out the New Hampshire winter with us.  One of these, the stealthy barred owl, flew out from its perch as I was on a run and landed on a tree almost right above me.  I only had my phone so I didn't get a great picture.

It's a little unusual to see an owl in bright sunlight.

When it looked right at me its eyes looked like huge black saucers.

Were you able to see the eclipse of the full beaver moon this week?  I wasn't, as there was a layer of clouds at the horizon at the time of the eclipse.

The morning of the full lunar eclipse.

From the red color on the clouds I could tell it would have lived up to the name of a "blood moon".  Of course, the next morning was perfectly clear.  

Earlier that night, the beaver moon shone through the trees.

So let's honor the namesake of this month's moon to close out the week:

A beaver cruises Lake Wicwas in search of winter food.

It's a busy month for beavers as they stock up for the coming New Hampshire winter - which might actually make an appearance next week!

November 6, 2022: The Elusive Marten

 Hello November, though it sure doesn't feel like it.  

A warm November day on the lake.

We've had more good paddling weather and I've been out a couple of times this week to take advantage of it.  Though most of the leaves have come down there are still a few bright yellow trees accenting the hills around the lakes.

I wasn't sure what kind of tree was holding on to such bright leaves this long so I took a trip over to Wicwood Shores Road to investigate, and they are in fact bigtooth aspen trees - very large and impressive bigtooth aspen.  

Mature aspen can grow to 60' high

The only down side of the warm weather is the high water content in the atmosphere brought up from the south with the warm air mass which makes for a lot of haze, particularly looking south with the sun low in the sky. 

Looking south from the summit of Mt. Osceola on Thursday,

But even looking north towards Canada it was hazy.

North from the summit.

It was hard to drag myself off that warm and peaceful spot on our planet, knowing it may well be the last summer hike of the year.  There were few people on the trail this late in the hiking season, and even fewer birds to be heard - just a few scolding chickadees and a barely perceptible "pip" of some tiny bird in the trees.  But there was one exciting find, evidence of the elusive marten right in the middle of the trail.  

Marten scat deposited on a boulder for all to see.

Other animals will leave their scat in prominent spots for all to see and smell, including other members of the weasel family, so I had to look this one up.  I knew it was a weasel by the twisted form of it, but not which weasel.  My go-to reference book, "Tracking and the Art of Seeing" by Paul Rezendes [HarperCollins, 1999] indicated it was left by a Marten.

They definitive factor is the size.  Marten scat is 1/4" in diameter and 1-1/2" long, whereas the other likely candidates, the least weasel, long-tailed weasel, or ermine, have scat less than 1/8" in diameter and 1-1/4" in length.  Supporting this conclusion is the location, in a mixed forest at an altitude of about 2500' in the White Mountains.  In winter this animal may move to higher elevation to take advantage of the dense cover of the spruce-fir forest for dens and hunting.  The marten is the rarest of our weasels, having been driven from most of its range by logging and trapping, though recent regulations on trapping have allowed a rebound in its numbers.  It's range in New Hampshire is still constrained to the White Mountains and farther north;  marten are secretive and reclusive so I don't expect to ever see one.

I didn't see any loons on the lake this week, so I'm interested if anyone has seen them.  It doesn't seem like they would have left while the weather is still so nice.  The herons certainly haven't left; I've seen them several times this week, fishing, and flying over the lake.

Note the toes on its upheld leg as it stalks the shoreline.

I can't be sure what the heron think, but I'm perfectly happy with 70 degrees in November - as long as it gets cold in time for winter to start, and I know I'm not the only one that likes a quick transition from summer to winter.  

I'll end with a couple more scenes that reflect the beauty of the late fall season around the lakes.

Looking south down Harris Cove.

The Rawson Wood Islands from the Red Trail viewpoint in the Hamlin Conservation Area.

This weather can't last forever.

One last note as I'm about to publish this on Sunday morning - a bunch of woodpeckers have just arrived and are flitting about the trees all around the house:  two big hairy woodpeckers and two smaller downys.  A sign of the changing season.