Every spring, it rains torrentially for a few days and the frogs have orgies in my rain barrels. Weeks later, my rain barrels are filled with tadpoles. They love to munch mosquito larvae. I love to watch them grow.
Two weeks ago, we received an inch of ice at the MHM garden. Because it’s the South, and we have no snow-and-ice infrastructure, life shut down until we thawed. I think the only thing that kept me sane (a housebound beagle and two kids out of school were decidedly unhelpful in that mission) was the birdfeeder in the back yard.
White-breasted Nuthatch (Sitta carolinensis ) and House Finch (Haemorhous mexicanus)
House finch (Haemorhous mexicanus)
I’m dependent on Merlin Bird ID to tell me who my visitors are. This app, created by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, offers a brilliant beginners’ guide to identifying local birds.
American Goldfinch (Spinus tristis), showing his winter coat. His spring-and-summer one is much livelier.
I keep my feeder filled with black oil sunflower seeds, which is what they want to seem to eat. These seeds pack protein and fat into a very small, easy-to-shell package. When the temperature plummets, birds need these extra calories to maintain energy and stay warm. And when berries and fallen seed may be encapsulated in ice, a full feeder can make a big difference in birds’ ability to survive.
As the weather warms and more plants come into bloom, I will taper back on the feed to encourage them to scavenge insects from the garden. I hope that they’ll be enough in the habit of visiting my garden that they’ll stick around and enjoy the buffet.
American Goldfinch, showing his distinctive wing markings.
Winter, I’m crying uncle. You win. I know I’m a winter wimp, that I can’t take the prolonged cold and gray. That’s why I moved from Chicago.
It’s time for you to get packing, and please kindly take the rain with you. I haven’t been able to do a thing in the garden for weeks because it’s simply too wet to walk. Even taking the compost to the bin requires lacing up the winter boots. I sink to my ankles in the mud, which stinks, by the way.
Carolina wren (Thryothorus ludovicianus) in my neighbor’s dead tree
You sent two nice days yesterday and Saturday. Can we please, please have a bit more of the sunshine and warmth?
Yellow crocus enjoying a rare bit of sunshine.
I suppose if that’s too much to ask, I had better start boning up on my bog plant knowledge. Perhaps I can turn my home into a preserve for the endangered Venus flytraps and pitcher plants that are native to my home state. I suppose there are worse fates; these plants are fascinating.
The other morning, I noticed a large spider in a yucca plant near the road in my blue slope garden. Yesterday afternoon, I nipped out to see if it was still there.
The black and yellow argiope (Argiope aurantia)
The black-and-yellow argiope (Argiope aurantia) is fairly common throughout the US and Canada. It lives in shrubs and tall plants in meadows and gardens, and eats the small flying insects it catches in its web, which may be up to 2 feet in diameter.
This is a female spider. Like most of her species, she spends her time hanging head-down in the middle of her web. I haven’t yet found an egg sac, but I shall keep looking. It will be a half-inch to an inch in size, coated in a brown papery covering, looking a bit like a fat acorn. The eggs hatch in autumn, but the young overwinter in the sac and disperse in the spring.
The zigzag pattern in the web is known as a stabilimentum, but its purpose is of some debate. These spiders eat and rebuild their webs every day, except during periods of molting and egg-laying.
I watched her for perhaps five minutes, during which time she seemed to feel peckish. She turned around and began climbing towards the bundle she’d wound up earlier.
The short, light-brown leggy structures with which she seems to be holding the prey are called pedipalps. Although they look like legs, they function more as antennae. She uses her pedipalps just as it appears, to hold the prey steady and guide it to her mouth.
She wrapped herself around it, perhaps taking a sip in the process, and then moved her dish to another spot on her web.
I spotted these fellows this morning when I walked out to get the paper.
I have a lot to learn about identifying frogs and toads, but I think they might be Rana clamitans, the unimaginatively named Green or Bronze Frog.
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