May 14, 2023: Why do Bears Bite Trees?

I did some boundary monitoring on the Eames and Hamlin properties this week, and the best part of monitoring is exploring remote areas of conserved land, away from the well-travelled parts of the properties.  This often provides unique sights and sounds where the animals are less disturbed by humans, and way back in Eames I found this gash on a tree.  

This is a Bear Bite, where a black bear sunk its teeth into the trunk of the tree.  It's generally accepted that bears do this to mark their territory, perhaps by sight, but more so by smell, as bears have poor eyesight but excellent sense of smell.  Black bears have scent glands in their mouth, so biting the tree will deposit their scent and allow it to be blown with the wind for other bears to detect.  

Less than half a mile from the bear bite, near a beaver pond, I found some of the most impressive beaver cuttings I've ever seen.  There were many trees cut down, and quite a few girdled (the bark chewed all the way around) to make them die.  The girdled trees were all hemlocks, a tree that beavers don't prefer to eat, but which grow tall and wide, shading out all the other trees around their pond.  Beavers know that killing hemlocks by girdling them will allow space and sun for their preferred species to grow.  But I have never seen beaver take on a hemlock of this stature:

I can't estimate the height of these trees; I'll just leave it at "they're big", and they'll let a lot of sun in when they die.  The poor trees - between beavers, bears, and woodpeckers, let alone the insects, they can take a beating.

Another exciting find way out there was a nice pile of moose scat.

I used to see moose even from the trails on Eames, but haven't seen them the past few years, or even any recent signs.  But the Meredith Conservation Commission created some patch cuts in the area to provide some different habitat for wildlife, and an abutter to the Eames property recently created one as well.  Right by that cut is where I found the moose droppings, so maybe they're coming back.  That cut has a gorgeous stand of young pin cherries trees that is regenerating right along the Eames boundary line.

A young successional stand of pin cherry.

You can easily distinguish pin cherry from black cherry when they are blooming.  Pin cherry have relatively flat clusters of blossoms, while black cherries have tubular shaped clusters.

Pin cherries, which are blooming now.

These are black cherry blossoms; they will bloom in another week or two.

If you hike the Arbutus Hill Pond Trail (blazed white) you can see this stand of pin cherries from the high point on the trail where it passes close to the boundary.  

On that trip I also saw the first trilliums of the season, just one small painted trillium and one small purple trillium.  There will be many more soon, so keep you eye out for them on your journeys.

Certainly not unusual, but still fun to see, was the first snake of the season:

This garter snake, a cold-blooded reptile, was warming itself in a nice sunny spot.

Back on the lake, more loons have joined the pair that arrived a few weeks ago.  I don't know if any of them are our second pair, but they were battling each other right along the dividing line that has separated the two pairs for the past few years.  We'll have to wait to see if any of these newcomers stick around.  You can watch one of their skirmishes here.

There were lots of new arrivals from lands south this week.  For the journal record, these are the new birds I saw this week:

Black-throated Blue Warbler, Black-throated Green Warbler, Blue-headed vireo, Blackburnian Warbler, Broad-winged Hawk, Common Yellowthroat, Eastern Kingbird, Gray Catbird, Great-crested Flycatcher, Northern Parula, Ovenbird, and Tree Swallow.

And, just in time for Mother's Day, the hobblebush viburnum are blooming.  

                  Happy Mother's Day!