October 26, 2025: Pied-billed Grebe

I saw a new bird on Lake Wicwas this week:  A Pied-billed Grebe.

Pied-billed Grebe  (Podilymbus podiceps)

It was solitary, and having good success fishing all by itself in the lake, staying and diving for quite a while.  I had to look it up as it wasn't a bird I recognized, but after identifying it I realized I had seen this bird once before - on the coast of Virginia.  Pied-billed grebes breed throughout New Hampshire, but I'd never seen one here.  They are built like a loon with legs far back on their body which make them excellent swimmers, and like loons, very awkward when walking on land.  For that reason they spend almost their entire life in water - even when nesting.  

Unlike our Common Loon, this grebe builds a floating nest, a bowl-shaped nest on a floating mat of vegetation either by constructing a raft from stems of aquatic plants, or maybe even on top of lily pads.  Also like loons, once the chicks hatch they ride on their parent's back for safety.  The pied-billed has a wide range of food sources with crayfish being their primary food, but they also eat fish, snails, mussels, crabs, frogs, leeches, and insects.  [Ref: Cornell Lab of Ornithology]  Unlike loons, these grebes may lay a brood of up to ten eggs.  Here's a photo of a nest from the Southern Wisconsin Bird Alliance.

Pied-billed Grebe nest with ten eggs.  Photo by James Otto.

I saw another uncommon bird on Lake Wicwas a couple of weeks ago:

A Solitary Sandpiper perches on top of a docked boat on Wicwas.

The solitary sandpiper breeds in boreal forests in Canada, so this one picked Wicwas as a nice rest stop on its way to Central or South America for the winter.  We'll soon be seeing more migrating birds making stopovers at Wicwas.

Leaves are falling fast now in the Lakes Region and the open branches continue to reveal new sights I hadn't noticed before.  This week I saw this huge American Beech tree a dozen yards off the trail to Crockett's Ledge in the Hamlin Forest.  

It seems healthy, even with that six foot crack running up the trunk and an enormous cavity inside.  The opening was large enough to put my hand in and take pictures looking both up and down inside the trunk.

The bottom of the cavity inside the beech.

Looking skywards

Fortunately, there were no signs of animal life in there.  I don't think I've seen the inside of a standing tree before!

Farther up towards the White Mountain Ledge I noticed a hemlock tree with a long strip of bark blown off from being struck by lightening.

A long strip of blown off bark where electrical heating
explosively boiled the moisture under the bark.

When lightning strikes a tree the electrical current passes through the cambium under the bark to reach the ground because the live, wet wood is a good electrical conductor.  The heat generated by the current vaporizes the water under the bark which expands violently and blows the bark right off the tree.

Rotting wood indicates this is old lightning scar.

On the trail it was evident that many of the leaves were no longer on the trees, especially the maples.

The beech, oak, and aspen hold on to their leaves a bit longer so there was still some color looking north towards the white mountains.

I could only see as far as Mt. Osceola on Friday.

Closing on a non-nature note, the boat ramp for Lake Wicwas got its rebuild this week.  

There are nine concrete slabs anchored together going out over 20 feet into the water; one is visible as the lake level is still down a few inches.

Hopefully the new design will reduce erosion and sedimentation going into the lake.  

Silt fencing protected the water during construction.

It's worth noting that going into the last week of October, we've still only had one day where the temperature has dropped below freezing and flowers are still blooming.

Daisies at my parents house.

And people are still out enjoying the fall weather on the water.

I hope you're able to take advantage of the quiet season around the lakes!

March 26, 2023: Old Growth Forests

I've known for years about a stand of old growth sugar maples in the Hamlin Town forest in Meredith.  The maple grove is noted on the trail map of the property and I'm always amazed at their size and age.  During a snowshoe trip on that trail this week my eye was caught by another very large tree, which on inspection, is a huge old American beech.  

American Beech

I didn't have anything to measure its circumference, but I estimated it to be about 65 inches.  

Beech has smooth gray bark in its early years but as it ages is becomes rough and cracked, so I know this is an old tree, but I'm not able to guess at its age, though the sugar maples here have been estimated at over 250 years old.  

Now my eye seemed to be tuned to looking up, and soon I noticed another large tree.

Yellow Birch

This I identified as a yellow birch based on its distinctive soft and peeling bark.  Unlike white (or paper) birch, yellow birch is a very long living tree.  Could this also be a couple of hundred years old?  Yellow birch is supposed to have a sweet, minty aroma in its leaves and twigs; it would be long climb to scrape a twig to smell it on this specimen.

Next to be found was a red pine:

Red Pine

Red pine, though not rare, have a specific habitat they prefer, dry and sandy, so I was a little surprised to see it here.  But based on the bark I'm pretty sure it's a red pine.

Red pine has a smooth, scaly, reddish bark.

The crown and needles are also rather distinctive, though the needles were too far away to examine.

All four of these trees were in close proximity to each other.  A short distance away I came upon yet another majestic tree, a towering white ash.

White Ash

Ash is another tree with a distinctive bark pattern which makes it identifiable in winter.

Diamond shaped furrows on white ash.

This is one of the largest ash trees I've seen and it may be largest I'll ever see as the emerald ash borer works its way through New Hampshire, destroying all the large ash trees.  Perhaps this one, hidden among all these other tall timbers won't be found by the invasive insect - wishful thinking, I know.

I didn't pass by the grandfather of all the trees in this forest on this excursion:  the ancient black tupelo (or black gum) tree that has been documented at 450 years old.  I understand why this tree and the sugar maples were not cut down years ago:  the wood of the black tupelo is so hard that no one wants to work with it, and the sugar maples were more valuable as a maple syrup cash-crop than as saw logs.  Why the other large trees are still standing is more of a mystery.  Clearly the area has been logged in the past based on the lack of mature white pine and hemlock.  Perhaps the wood of these trees just wasn't in demand when it was logged in the past.

Another question:  why hadn't I noticed these trees in my many prior hikes on this trail?  I'm sure the good visibility due to the lack of leaves on the trees was a factor, but I think the bright sun, blue sky, and white snow also made these handsome trees stand out on that pretty March day.

We may be well into March but there is still 17 inches of ice on the lake, and even taking out the four inches of porous frozen slush on top, that's over a foot of ice the March sun still has to bore through.  With a bit more snow yesterday, we've got a long ways to go before ice out.

Open water slowly works its way back from the outlet of Lake Wicwas.

August 29, 2021: Beech Nuts

This may be a good year for animals that consume beech nuts, such as black bears, red squirrels, deer, chipmunks and many others.  I started seeing beech nuts and their husks on the forest floor over a week ago and now they are appearing in large numbers.  One quiet morning as I approached a huge old beech tree it sounded like it was raining; I stopped to take in the scene and parts of beech nuts were falling all around me, even bounding off my head:  The squirrels were up in the tree feasting on these nutritious nuts.  I picked up a handful and brought them home, having heard recently they actually taste pretty good.

Beech nuts are smaller than an acorn and their outer husks are strong and covered with sharp spikes that make opening them a challenge for human hands.

The outer husk of a beech nut.

Left on a tree the fruit will split in half, revealing two or three triangular-shaped inner nuts.

The nuts inside the husks, many of which had been eaten. 

The nut meat, which is quite small, is further hidden inside that inner seed and that's what the animals are ultimately after.

A seed from which the meat has been consumed.

I felt only a touch guilty taking some of the squirrel's harvest but when I inspected my collection I realized the animals are smarter than I am.  Most of the husks were empty, and most of them that did have nuts still in them also had worms in them - not presently, but earlier in the season - and thus the nuts were not desirable.  Here's an example of one with a worm hole in it that the squirrels passed up.

And another where it appears a squirrel had chewed into it.

And ate the nut meat by extracting it from the open point.

The same nut pried open.

The squirrels must be eating the best nuts up in the tree and leaving the others to fall to the ground along with the shreds of what they had opened or partially eaten.  So I ended up with just a few nuts that appear to be edible.  

They need to dry for a week or two, and then I'll let you know if I find them palatable.  

Beech are patient trees, growing slowly over a long period of time in the lower story of the forest, waiting for their day in the sun.  When they finally get their chance - due to a neighboring tree falling down, a forest fire, or logging for example - the exposure to sun results in a burst of growth.  But even without any direct sunlight beech trees can inch their way up slowly to become giants of the forest.  When the colonists first arrived in North America beech were some of largest trees in the old growth forests along with hemlock and white pine.

Today they are disliked by foresters because beech has little market value.  But if logging is done poorly without careful attention to the species in the logged area, after other trees are are removed and the sun let in, beech can easily take over large areas of forest.  But being such an important food source for so many of New Hampshire's forest animals, especially after the demise of the American Chestnut due to the asian chestnut blight, it's important to keep them in the forest inventory.  And it's always good to see squirrels and deer enjoying their produce; I just hope I don't come across a bear some morning when I'm walking among the beech trees.

I was away most of this past week so I don't have much status on the loons, but I did get one good look at them early in the week, and they continue their rapid progress toward becoming adults.

Coco and Jimmy, age 60 days.

A white chest and flight feathers are signs of a maturing loon.

But neither they or their parents better let their guard down because there are still hungry eagles visiting Lake Wicwas on a regular basis.

Photo by Debby Crowley.

Debby Crowley saw this bald eagle on Wednesday;  the bit of something hanging from its beak is curious.  

Let's hope Coco and Jimmy's parents continue their careful safeguarding of their chicks.

Photo by Debby Crowley.

September 10, 2017 - Weed Watch Tour

I took my final weed-watch tour of the summer around my section of Lake Wicwas this week, searching for signs of invasive weeds that may have found their way into the lake. I was pleased to see that our Lake Host Program continues to be successful, as I found no Eurasian Milfoil or other exotic species in the lake.  Eurasian milfoil is just one of several invasive species to watch for in New Hampshire Lakes;  the Lake Wicwas Association Website has an excellent overview of invasive species - take a look so you'll recognize them if you come across them.  If you see something suspicious you can take a picture or collect a sample and contact our Weed Watch coordinator at 279-5242 who will arrange to pick up your sample and deliver it to the NH Department of Environmental Services if needed. You can also become an official weed watcher yourself for any New Hampshire lake - learn more here or contact me or the Weed Watch Coordinator.

Not finding any invasive weeds doesn't mean the trip around the lake was uneventful - there are always interesting sights when one takes a slow paddle around a New Hampshire lake on a quiet day. How about a young turtle, still light enough to float on top of a lily pad while sunning itself?

This painted turtle was about 3 inches long

The next one was enough large that it had to find a old log to support its greater mass.

There were also numerous birds to be seen, both on the water and in the air.

A pair of ducks on the mud flats

A cormorant fishing by the (non-invasive!) weeds

An osprey flies over Wicwas

I have heard osprey calling frequently around the lake the past few weeks, so they are spending a good amount of time fishing on Wicwas.

There are still plenty of colorful plants to be seen around the shores of the lakes, both in the water and on the shore line.

Buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis) with some bright red berries photo bombing

Fragrant Water-lily (Nymphaea odorata)

Signs of the fall harvest continue to appear around the lakes.  Perhaps you have noticed the abundant crop of pine cones growing like bunches of bananas in the tops of the white pines.

A bumper crop of white pine cones

Down at their roots the furry animals - squirrels, chipmunks, mice - have been feasting on their seeds, leaving table scraps all over the trails.

Pine cones stripped for their seeds (probably by a red squirrel)

It is also looking like an excellent year for beechnuts.

Beechnuts are plentiful

These also have the appearance of being consumed by rodents, but the bears will be after them as well.  Keep an eye out for bear claws on the trunks of beech trees as evidence they have climbed the tree to access the nuts.

A single set of claws is hard to discern

But multiple sets provide more definitive evidence

Other signs of bears going after beechnuts will be branches broken or ripped right off the tree in order get the nuts.  Sometimes a bear will just pull the whole tree over so it can sit on the ground while it eats its lunch.

Breaking a tree over makes for lazy snacking

Beech trees are an important food source in the forest;  the forestry plan for healthy and diverse forests includes leaving some of the largest beech trees for both their aesthetic value and their food value for the animals. Good foresters do this even though it would be more financially valuable to remove them.

When you're traveling around the Lakes Region during the upcoming fall season you are bound to see land-based invasive species such as Japanese knotweed, purple loosestrife, and oriental bittersweet. These can be quite beautiful, but sadly will crowd out native species that are more important to our wildlife, and are just as beautiful in their own right.

Orange Jewelweed (Impatiens capensis), a native North American plant, enjoyed by humming birds, bees, and butterflies - as well as humans