Signs of Fall 2: Observations

Photo by srinivasaroab, Pixabay

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It was raining quite hard tho other morning. In fact it had been raining hard for the three days before. One day we got almost four inches of rain! The remnants of Tropical Storm Gordon fed into a midwestern cold front and set up a conveyer belt of water delivery to the East Coast. Temperatures have fallen to “autumn” levels, too. I have gotten out my sweatpants and long sleeved shirts and am making an extra cup of coffee in the breakfast pot to help counterbalance the cold of the morning.

This summer I moved most of my birdfeeders to the side yard so that we could see them from our new sunroom. I still have, though, the thistle feeder out front hanging from a branch of the lilac bush. The goldfinches and house finches have been emptying out the thistle almost every day, and mourning doves feed on the spillage that gathers under the branches of the lilac.

I also still toss a couple of handfuls of peanuts out front every morning for the crows. They won’t come into the confined space of the back yard and used to not even come into the front before I took down the yard fence: they need open flyways for their quick escapes! The crows watch me from the surrounding tree tops and excitedly caw when they see the peanut bag. When I go back onto the porch they immediately swoop down into the yard, gobble down their breakfast, and fly off to get on with the rest of their day.

Photo by D. Sillman

The crows wait until about nine o’clockfor their breakfast. After that, if I put out any peanuts, the shells will just lay there on the grass for hours barely touched. A few cardinals and even one or two chickadees drop in to pick up single peanuts at a time. The cardinals eat them on the spot, although they seem quite nervous eating out in the open, potential-crow space. The chickadees, though, fly their peanuts over to the sheltered branches of the arbor vitae and laboriously peck at the shells until they can get to the nut inside.

Late this morning in a brief lull in the rain, I went out and filled the thistle feeder. Under the feeder, next to what was left of the peanut shells, were the remains (feathers and some bones) of a mourning dove. The dove must have been eating the fallen thistle when it was attacked by the sharp-shinned hawk that regularly patrols our yard. In the hour or so between my putting out the crow-peanuts and returning with the thistle, the hawk had killed the dove and consumed most of it.

There is another burst of fledglings coming into our feeders! The house finches and goldfinches have large cohorts of late summer offspring. The cardinals have also successfully launched another brood. This might be the fourth cardinal clutch of the season! The finches alternate between the thistle feeders and the sunflower feeders, but the cardinals are at the sunflower feeders almost all day long. The fledges take a few days to get the self-feeding routine down, but then they start to act like mature birds (except when they see their parents, and then they flutter their wings and beg shamelessly for food).

Photo by D. Sillman

The male hummingbirds have left our yard. They have begun their fall migration southward. The females and the fledges, though, are still here. I watched one fledge methodically hunting for insects up and down the branches of the scarlet oak and the arbor vitae out in my back yard. There have been lots of small gnats and mosquitoes around (all the rain has made great conditions for tiny dipterans), and the hummingbirds must be feasting on them!

I haven’t seen any monarchs for several days. I hope that the migration cohort has gotten a good start on their long trek to Mexico. Observations here in Western Pennsylvania this summer have been very positive. We have seen more monarch butterflies than in any recent year, and more caterpillars and chrysalises, too. It will be interesting to see what the winter monarch hibernation count is this year in the forests of Michoacan and Mexico.

The other morning a small flock of Canada geese flew low over our house. They were partly hidden in the morning fog, but honked loudly as they went past in their distinctive “vee” formation. Deborah was out walking Izzy at the time and said that she could feel the turbulence of the geese’s wings as they flew over her. Izzy, of course, had no idea of what was going on!

Photo by Neonorange Wikimedia Commons

Earlier this spring Patrick Kopnicky and Paul Hess talked about the Canada geese (Branta canadensis) of Pennsylvania. In the early part of the Twentieth Century global Canada geese populations reached dangerously low levels due to uncontrolled hunting and habitat loss, and very few Canada geese were found in or passed through Pennsylvania. The regulation of their hunting and the establishment of wildlife refuges around the Chesapeake Bay and on the barrier islands off of the Delmarva Peninsula helped the migrating subspecies of the Canada geese begin their recovery. The Pennsylvania Game Commission in the 1930’s also brought in a small population of Canada geese and released them at Lake Pymatuning. These introduced geese, though, were the “maxima” subspecies  of Branta canadensis.  These are the larger version of the Canada goose that are, very significantly, non-migratory! Prior to 1935 there were no non-migratory, resident Canada geese in Pennsylvania, now  there are over 240,000 of them, and they are found  in every county in Pennsylvania. Many of these geese create great problems for the ponds and parks in which they reside.

The geese flying through the morning fog, then, created an almost archetypal symbol of the coming Fall. They suggested the first phases of the great Fall migration to the south.  These geese were, though, probably just some resident Northmoreland Park geese out for a little exercise before breakfast! I bet they were back home before I had my second cup of coffee!