SMRA

“Nature abhors a vacuum,” is how the famous phrase goes. Whenever I see it, though, I always think it’s missing a follow-up sentence: “And evolution is the process that allows nature fill that vacuum.”

As I research topics for this blog, I always marvel at how every imaginable ecological niche is filled with living things beautifully suited to its demands and rewards. Animals and plants that have evolved in size, shape, and behavior specifically to be able to survive, to thrive, there.

With all their diversity, birds provide endlessly vivid examples of this phenomenon. Just in our area, a few moments’ looking around might reveal a Ruby-throated Hummingbird hovering as it drinks nectar (wing beats per second: 50); a Turkey Vulture soaring effortlessly on thermals as it searches for carrion (wing beats per second: 0); an American Robin yanking up worms (that it’s heard wriggling beneath the earth) from a manicured lawn; and a Barn Swallow darting and twisting with stunning agility as it gobbles up tiny flying insects.

Four members of the same group of living things, each species so different and so perfectly adapted to the niche it fills. And since they are all so commonly seen, so familiar, it’s easy to forget how distinctive their adaptations are.

To me, though, among the most extraordinary niche-filling feat in birds is less visible: The life cycle of shorebirds, the sandpipers and plovers that move through our region each spring and fall.

Or maybe that should read spring and “fall.” Because not only is southward shorebird migration happening right now, it’s already been going on for several weeks. Along with reminding us of how imprecise our definitions of nature’s timelines can be, these little birds also tell a vivid story of adaptation and survival.

Not all shorebird species we see are passage migrants. The Killdeer (a plover), for example, nests in this area at such locations as Croton Landing and Croton Point Park. Some individuals actually spend the entire year here without migrating at all.

But the vast majority of sandpipers and plovers we’re spotting these days on local riverbanks, beaches, and mudflats are merely stopping to rest and refuel before heading on. They’re following an unusual—and unusually challenging—schedule, one demanded by the characteristics of the ecological niche they have evolved to fill.

The story of one shorebird species, the Semipalmated Sandpiper, is both dramatic and characteristic. These tiny birds—6 or so inches long and weighing less than two ounces—nest on the Arctic tundra of North America. They spend the winters, however, in South America, sometimes as far south as Tierra del Fuego. (Roughly a 9,000-mile trip each way!)

As if that isn’t demanding enough, some Semipalmateds take off from the New England coast and don’t land again till they reach South America. This nonstop hop, completed without food or rest, can cover 2,500 miles.

The challenges don’t end there. Naturally, summers on the tundra are extremely brief, as is the Semipalmated Sandpipers’ access to the food sources (insects, crustaceans, marine worms) they depend on to survive and raise their young.

Therefore, while the birds don’t arrive till May, nesting season has to be finished by early July. (If their first nest fails, they do not try again.) Unlike more temperate species, neither adults nor the newly fledged young can take weeks to build their energy before heading south. They have to start their journey almost at once.

That’s why, by early August—when some less itinerant local nesters are still raising their second broods of the season—Semipalmateds start to show up here and in migration stopovers across the U.S. (Those whose nests failed up north may start appearing even earlier.)

And they’re far from the only species on a tight schedule. The Least Sandpiper—the smallest shorebird in the world, less than 6 inches in length and weighing in at a single ounce—is another marathon flyer, nesting on the tundra and wintering as far south as Chile. And, while both Greater and Lesser Yellowlegs don’t have as far to travel—they nest in boreal forests and wetlands and some winter over within the U.S.—they have also started to pass through our region.

It’s always a little bit of a shock to see the first shorebirds showing up in midsummer, when the last thing I want to think about is the changing seasons. But it also reminds me that migration (and the avian evolution that underlies it) is a fascinating—and remarkably complex—spectacle, filled with surprises and moments of enlightenment. And that we get to witness it, in all its complexity, every spring and fall.

By which, of course, I really mean “fall.”

Copyright © 2020 by Joseph Wallace

Ever since the first flowering plants emerged about 130–140 million years ago, they and those that eat them have been engaged in a kind of evolutionary arms race. As plant-eaters chase them down, plants, which obviously can’t run away, have developed other ways to defend themselves and the flowers and seeds that sustain their species.  

Plants play defense via such obvious physical attributes as tough leaves, thorns and spines, and the sheer abundance of the seeds they produce. (One vivid local example of this last survival strategy is the cottonwood, which blankets some neighborhoods in “snow” every spring.)

Another widespread adaptation is also effective: Many plants have a bitter taste, and some are poisonous. They’ve developed an astonishing array of chemical compounds that serve to teach anyone who dares to eat them not to do so again. Scientists have identified more than 3000 separate alkaloids (one group of such compounds), and a single plant can produce 30 or more.

Humans being human, we’ve learned to use some plant toxins for our own purposes: For remedies (e.g., digitalis derived from foxglove plants and used to treat heart problems), in “recreational” drugs (the psychoactive ingredients in cocaine), and as seasonings for our foods. (Capsaicin in chili peppers is meant to deter you from eating them.)

Other animals have also learned to put these toxic chemicals to use. In one remarkable example, small tropical insects (most likely ants), far from being harmed, store plant alkaloids in their own bodies to use as a defense system. But it doesn’t always work: Certain frogs still gobble the ants down, having evolved special glands to sequester the same toxins in their skin. These are the Dendobatid frogs, commonly known as poison or poison-dart frogs, and some of them are so toxic that merely holding one can cause serious neurological, respiratory, and other effects in humans.  

The never-ending battle between plant and plant-eater has also led to the development of microhabitats. These are tiny ecosystems populated by insect species that share one central trait: the ability to eat a plant that most species find toxic. We can find one vivid example of this phenomenon in our own gardens and fields right now.

Not many years ago, milkweeds were considered merely denizens of vacant lots and untended roadsides, no more or less remarkable than a hundred other weeds. What changed their status, of course, was the besieged Monarch butterfly, whose caterpillars eat milkweed…and only milkweed.

Milkweed sap contains chemicals known as cardiac glycosides, which are toxic to most insects and animals and can cause serious symptoms in humans if consumed in large quantities. The sap is also thick, sticky, milky, and hard to clean off your hands, and it can burn if it gets in your eyes. Very few species will dine on a milkweed plant more than once. 

The Monarch caterpillar and some other species, however, find it delicious. These species benefit from their specialized tastes for a simple reason: When most plant-eaters find your chosen food toxic, you don’t encounter much competition for resources.

Yet the benefits of an all-milkweed diet run far deeper. Like the rainforest ants and poison frogs, Monarch caterpillars and butterflies store the plant toxins in their own cells, which makes them as poisonous as the plants they depend on. In a further evolutionary development (also shared with many poison frogs), they’re boldly colored. Predators of all kinds seem to recognize their yellow- or orange-and-black markings as caution flags: Avoid!

Another common milkweed resident, The Milkweed Tussock (or Tiger) Moth, whose caterpillar has bright orange-and-black tufts and adult a tiger-striped abdomen, shares both the Monarch’s toxicity and warning colors. Fascinatingly, though this color palette warns predators away from the caterpillars, it’s useless against the bats that prey on the night-flying adult Tussock moths. So the moths have evolved a secondary defense: They have special organs that emit clicking sounds, alerting the bats to the moths’ bitter taste.

Similarly, both Large and Small Milkweed Bugs boast bold orange- or red-and-black patterns. So does the Red Milkweed Beetle, a member of the longhorn beetle family. (Remarkably, in this species the base of the long antennae actually bisects the insect’s eye, which gives it its genus name: Tetraopes, meaning “four-eyes.”)

Not every insect that takes advantage of the milkweed microhabitat needs such evolutionary adaptations, however. Some just like to spend time there.

Unlike the sap, milkweed nectar contains no cardiac glycosides, and the abundant, long-lasting flowers are popular with a wide variety of butterflies, moths, bees, and other pollinators. Inevitably, the presence of such insects also brings creatures that prey on them.

The Golden (or Goldenrod) Crab Spider, for example, can frequently be found amid milkweed flowers. There it sits quite still, waiting to ambush an unwary bee, butterfly, or other visitor.

As with so many inhabitants of this microhabitat, the spider’s life story contains some unexpected details: It is one of only two spider species in North America that can change color to match its background. It can be white with green or purple patches (good milkweed camouflage), or bright yellow (preferred in another favorite habitat, goldenrods.)

Researching this essay, I was amazed by how much I hadn’t known about the milkweed’s world. But the truth is that microhabitats exist everywhere—in leaf litter, the soil beneath your feet, the trees on your street—and they’re all just as intriguing. I’m looking forward to exploring more of them soon…and telling their stories here.

Joseph Wallace

Decades later, I still vividly recall my first experience birdwatching with a group. It was a boat trip to Monomoy Island, a shorebird haven off Cape Cod, and it took place in the late 1960s, when I was ten or eleven years old.

I also remember that all the other birders—all men, all white—were my father’s age or older, into their fifties and sixties. I could tell they knew each other well, and they were clearly surprised to see a young boy along. But they were delighted: As the trip’s “unicorn,” I was treated with kindness and inclusion. The others always made sure I saw the Willet or Semipalmated Plover, and congratulated me when I spotted something for myself.

Even though I’m now those “old” men’s age, I still remember how they saw me, celebrated our differences, and welcomed me into their group.

In the years since, much has changed. You can drive to parts of Monomoy now. Birdwatching is called birding. And a once largely male and middle-aged (or older) pursuit is now enjoyed by people of all ages and genders.

One thing that hasn’t changed? Birding remains a largely white pursuit, too often off-limits to people of color.

That reality came into sharp, unavoidable focus last month, when a Black man named Christian Cooper, birding in Central Park’s Ramble, asked a woman to follow park regulations and leash her dog. Instead of simply complying, she called the police on him, screaming that she was being threatened “by an African American man.”

This story did not end tragically, but obviously it could have. And it made clear a truth long known by Black birders, scientists, and those who merely love and want to explore the natural world: They often do not feel safe in places so many of us white birders explore without a second thought.

That’s the reality today, but it doesn’t have to be the future. The treatment of Christian Cooper—and the larger issues it brought to light—helped inspire the recent Black Birders Week. Using the power and outreach of social media, this ambitious, wide-ranging effort sought to bring birders and nature enthusiasts of color together…while also making them more visible to the rest of us.

Biologist Corina Newsome announced the creation of Black Birders Week in a video widely disseminated in both traditional media and on Twitter, Instagram, and other social media. (Look for the hashtag #BlackBirdersWeek.) “For far too long, Black people in the United States have been shown that outdoor exploration activities are not for us,” she said. “Well, we’ve decided to change that narrative.”

Running from May 31 to June 5, the inaugural Black Birders Week featured a thoughtful, honest, sometimes painful series of online presentations, panel discussions, and other events. Participants were invited to answer birding challenges and “Ask a Black Birder,” and to follow “Black Women in Birding.” Meanwhile, online panels brought together scientists, birders, and nature enthusiasts from all over the country (including Christian Cooper) to discuss “Birding While Black.”

I talked with Alexi Grousis-Henderson and Nicole R. Jackson, two of the co-organizers of Black Birders Week, seeking their perspectives on the week and its aftermath.

Grousis-Henderson is a naturalist and zookeeper in New Orleans. Growing up in Central California, he was always more interested in nature than in what was going on right in front of him. “I was that five-year-old who’d stop in the middle of a soccer game to watch a butterfly.”

Later, as a student in Kansas City, he discovered a world of mature forests that he hadn’t known during his childhood in the California desert. Today, he says, “I’m a reptile kind of guy…though recently I’ve become obsessed with nocturnal South American mammals.”

Nicole Jackson is Program Coordinator for the Environmental Professionals Network and the Ohio Certified Volunteer Naturalist program at the School of Environment and Natural Resources, Ohio State University.

For Jackson, nature played a crucial role during an extremely difficult time in her childhood in Cleveland. “I was in foster care in an abusive household,” she says, “and nature was my go-to, my escape.”

Ever since, she says, “nature has been that constant. We can be still, see ourselves learning life lessons. It gave me a shield until I was ready to reveal myself for who I was.”

To both of them, the sense of community Black Birders Week helped create may be its most valuable component.  “It makes a real difference,” Grousis-Henderson says. For a long time, “I felt alone, and I know a lot of us felt this way. We were all these islands.” The group chats that have formed in recent weeks, some encompassing thousands of participants, “have allowed us to share our joy.” 

Jackson feels the same way. “We have to reach out,” she says, “both to share our own knowledge and to learn from people who know things we don’t.”

The organizers of Black Birders Week hoped that the events would bring the same sense of community to newcomers that they themselves have experienced and shared on a personal level. When I asked Jackson and Grousis-Henderson if they felt that the effort had been successful, they were both optimistic. The panel discussions, for example, which streamed live on the National Audubon Society’s Facebook page (and are still available—see below), have garnered audiences in the tens of thousands.

The outreach was fulfilling in a more direct way as well, the two co-organizers revealed. “I received messages as the days went on from people I knew, but also from strangers,” Jackson says. “It was great to see people I didn’t know respond to my story and say ‘Thank you…I thought I was the only one.’”

Says Grousis-Henderson, “I was blown away by the number of melanated faces in natural spaces across the U.S.—and in some cases, across the globe! I honestly wasn’t prepared to see this many folks of generations and above and below my own. It was incredible.”

It’s clear that Black Birders Week’s message of community and connection was—and is—a vivid, fulfilling one of hope and essential (and long overdue) change. But that’s not enough: Its full impact will only be possible if white birders step up, too.  

What those “old” men did for me all those years ago helped me embrace a lifetime of birding. It’s my responsibility, and ours, to do the same, inclusively, today.

Copyright © by Joseph Wallace

You can watch the two “Birding While Black” panel discussions here: https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=599256750697358&ref=watch_permalink

and here:
https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=250698879684486&ref=watch_permalink

For many of us, the past weeks of spring migration have been glorious, a bounty of warblers, tanagers, and dozens of other species passing through on their way north. By now, though, migration has ebbed…as have the daily jaunts of many local birders.

Yet even compared to the excitement of peak migration, I think what happens next is more fascinating. For those species that do stay in our area to nest, this is the time to divide up and share territories. In doing so, they create one of nature’s most exquisite patterns, a mosaic that deserves the effort needed to witness it in all its beauty.

This spring, my wife and I have spent much of our time at Croton Landing Park. Comprised of a succession of small habitats—riverside, beach, field, cattail marsh, fields with scattered tall trees, forest patches—this little park provides a welcoming home for an intriguing diversity of species.

Some need no effort at all to see. Robins hop, Grackles stalk, and Mourning Doves stroll on the lawns, and there seem to be a singing (or mocking) Song Sparrow and Northern Mockingbird perched atop a bush or fence every ten feet along the path.

But other species aren’t so easy to spot, especially as the bushes and trees fill in with dense foliage. Therefore, if you want to see and try to understand the mosaic laid out before you, it’s important to have some knowledge of the resident birds’ songs.

One bird most easily found by ear at Croton Landing is the Yellow Warbler whose staccato notes are easily heard near the little marsh and elsewhere along the path. Using them to guide you, a closer look may well reveal the tiny bird flitting around the brush, a spot of bright yellow (or at least yellow-olive) against the green.

Another diminutive resident, the Warbling Vireo, is far harder to spot. Even up close, these mostly gray birds are nondescript at best. Add in the fact that they tend to stay high up in tall trees, and their presence is easy to miss

That is, unless you know their long and bubbly song, which usually ends with a declarative “chip!” Even if you don’t see the birds themselves, listen and you will learn that vireos have made their homes in nearly every one of the tall cottonwoods scattered along the Croton Landing path. (Aren’t familiar with cottonwoods? During the next few weeks, just look for the trees that are “snowing.”)

When seen, most easily earlier in the spring when the foliage is sparser, Baltimore Orioles are unmistakable. Yet by looking for the source of their loud, liquid calls, you can glimpse that splash of orange even now in the mature trees where they build their sock-shaped nests.

Meanwhile, their more subtly colored cousin, the chestnut-and-black Orchard Oriole (whose song is also quieter and more subtle than Baltimore’s) also appears to have found a home here. They can be heard and, with luck, glimpsed, in the trees surrounding the cattail marsh.

The marsh’s surroundings are also home to a bird Sharon and I were excited to identify this spring: the Willow Flycatcher. Part of a notoriously hard-to-distinguish genus, Empidonax, some of whose species can be told apart pretty much only by song, the Willows at Croton Landing have been helpfully vocal. Listen for something that sounds a bit like a sneeze (“Fitz-BEW!”) and then see if you can spot the small, dapper gray bird making it. (Willows, like most flycatchers, are not shy, often perching in plain view to emote.)

One species at Croton Landing reveals itself—and its breeding habits—through its unexpected behavior. At the north end of the park, Cliff Swallows congregate on the mudflats that border the river. In an unusual sight among a group of birds that are typically so aerial, they perch on the ground, fluttering their wings and jabbing at the mud with their sharp beaks.

These swallows are not eating: Like the Barn, Tree, and other swallows also found here, they feed on the wing. They’ve landed to gather mud for their elegantly constructed, globular nests, which they are likely building in nearby culverts or on tunnel underpass walls.

In doing so, alongside the other species that nest in our ever-more-crowded region, Cliff Swallows form a crucial piece of the colorful mosaic that characterizes this place in this rich season.  

Copyright © 2020 by Joseph Wallace

Links for more information on the birds mentioned above:

Yellow Warbler: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Yellow_Warbler

Warbling Vireo: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Warbling_Vireo

Baltimore Oriole: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Baltimore_Oriole

Orchard Oriole: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Orchard_Oriole

Willow Flycatcher: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Willow_Flycatcher

One summer night in 1975, I ventured into a movie theater to see Jaws. And Steven Spielberg’s witty, entertaining thriller terrified me—along with millions of others that summer. At least for a while, its story of a rogue great white shark terrorizing a beach community truly did have the effect its tagline promised: “You’ll never go in the water again.” (Despite the fact that there are only about four or five fatalities from shark attacks each year worldwide.)

But besides making a fortune while scaring us senseless, Jaws had other, far darker consequences: an immediate and long-lasting boom in shark-hunting. This indiscriminate slaughter led to the deaths of a vast number of great whites and other shark species.

This has come to mind often over the past few weeks as I’ve been thinking about the Asian giant hornet, colorfully nicknamed the “Murder Hornet.”The breathless headlines trumpeting its arrival in the Pacific Northwest and western Canada could be straight out of a insect version of the film. And their effect may be just as dire.

Like great white sharks, giant hornets are impressive (the queen can be more than two inches long and individuals can fly at 25 miles per hour) and pose a legitimate threat. They aggressively defend their nests, their stinger is long and powerful, their sting is extraordinarily painful, and their venom is toxic. (The stings can be fatal in humans, though this is rare.)

But the giant hornet’s biggest threat is actually to already beleaguered honey bees, to the flowers that depend on the bees as pollinators, and to the beekeepers who tend them. As the headlines have screamed, , a single giant hornet can kill 40 honeybees a minute, and swarms can easily lay waste to entire hives.

But at the moment Asian giant hornets, exist in North America in only exceedingly small numbers and limited areas. If efforts to find and destroy them succeed, the species may never establish itself on the West Coast, and certainly not in the East .

Yet, especially as the spring proceeds, it seems likely that many of our neighbors, freaked out by the media drumbeat about “Murder Hornets,” will do what people often do when freaked out: attack, even before they really know their enemy. In this case, “attacking” will likely mean using pesticides on native wasps, whether they are a threat or not.

This makes it an ideal time to get to know three common species in our region that are not Murder Hornets.

Bald-Faced Hornet (Dolichovespula maculata)

Rising from a flower to check you out, these large (though barely half the size of Asian giant hornets), black-and-white wasps make for an impressive sight. And if disturbed they can deliver a powerfully venomous sting. (So don’t disturb them!)

By the end of a summer, a bald-faced hornet’s above-ground nest, often located in the crook of a tree branch, can be two feet high and 18 inches wide. An active nest crawling with workers ready to defend it is a sobering sight.

Yet the positive impact that hornet populations have on the ecosystem’s health is significant. The workers help pollinate flowering plants and are themselves an important food source for a variety of mammals, birds, frogs, and praying mantids. They’re even directly beneficial to humans, because along with nectar and sap they prey extensively on flies, especially the horseflies and deerflies that can plague us in summer.

Eastern Yellowjacket (Vespula maculifrons)

The bald-faced hornet’s little black-and-yellow cousin is probably our most familiar—and widely loathed—wasp. All summer long and especially in the fall, yellowjackets seem to be everywhere, especially where someone’s trying to enjoy a meal outdoors. More than one picnicker has drunk from a cup or can of soda and received a painful surprise from the small wasp that got there first.

Further, yellowjacket nests—typically built underground—can be huge, containing up to 5000 workers. Yellowjackets defending their nests are notably aggressive, and, like most wasps, tend to sting repeatedly. So it’s understandable that anyone with a nest in the front yard or under a shingle will want it removed ASAP.

Yet, as with bald-faced hornets, at a time of collapse of honey bee and other insect populations, the abundant yellowjacket serves as a vehicle for plant pollination. Since yellowjackets are also active carnivores (one of their common nicknames is “meat bees”), they naturally control the flies, grubs, and other insects that attack our farms and gardens.

Despite their predatory habits and obvious interest in the burgers we’ve brought out to grill, worker yellowjackets don’t actually eat much meat. (They prefer foods rich in carbohydrates.) Yet the hive couldn’t survive without the protein they bring back.

Here’s how: The process begins when a yellowjacket worker kills an insect. It will then cut its prey up with its sharp mandibles and carry each piece to the nest.

Unlike the adults, yellowjacket larvae need plenty of protein. Back at the nest, the worker will masticate the bug parts and feed them to the larvae.  In turn, the larva’s salivary glands will secrete a sweet liquid for the worker to eat. This elegant process, called trophallaxis, helps insure that both adult and larval wasp will receive the nourishment they need.

I realize that sometimes it’s hard to see the forest for the bees. But fascinating phenomena like trophallaxis—and the whole complex, surprising lifecycle of the yellowjacket—only make me admire them more, and want to learn more about them.

Cicada Killer (Sphecius speciosus)

Of all the wasps that could be incorrectly identified as “Murder Hornets,” the most likely candidate is our most noticeable—yet least aggressive—local wasp: the cicada killer. At up to two inches long, cicada killers are big and stocky. They’re gaudy, too, with reddish wings and black and brown bodies patterned with white patches.

Their behavior is just as ostentatious. Even though they’re solitary wasps, not living in colonies, you’ll frequently find a group of them excavating large burrows in patches of their prime breeding habitat: light-textured, well-drained soil. Among their favorite sites in our area are front walks, at the base of stone walls, in window boxes, and other places close to where we live and work.

Cicada killers are also curious and territorial. At least the males are, often grappling with each other over turf and buzzing around everyone and everything that moves through their territory. As one hovers near you, it might even give the sense that it’s sizing you up.

Admittedly, to be stared at by a large wasp can be a sobering prospect. Here’s the thing, though: The males have no stingers. Buzzing around is all they can do to warn you off.

On the other hand, the females do have a powerful stinger…but they have no interest in you whatsoever. They’re not territorial at all. In fact, you can walk right past—or over—a female cicada as she excavates her burrow, and she won’t pay you any mind.

She’s saving her venom for one specific task: to paralyze the cicadas that will serve as a food source for her larvae. In doing so, she’s helping keep populations of cicadas—which eat sap and in abundant years can damage trees and bushes—in natural balance.

Whether we ever have the right to extirpate a species that might be a threat to us is a debate that plays out whenever humans encounter something potentially dangerous (such as coyotes, venomous snakes, or the great white sharks made notorious by Jaws). Given the outcome of this debate throughout our history, I worry that, in the era of the Murder Hornet, our fascinating and beneficial native wasps may suffer as well. As will we, too, from their loss.

Copyright © 2020 by Joseph Wallace

Many years ago, when my son was about six, he and I went for a quick spring walk around Swan Lake in Rockefeller State Park. In those 45 minutes, we witnessed a whole range of fascinating animal behavior I’d never seen before and have not glimpsed since.

We saw two gigantic male bullfrogs fighting, standing up on their hind legs and engaging in hand-to-hand combat as they emitted horrendous angry groans. We spotted a newly hatched Snapping Turtle, little bigger than my thumbnail, gazing back at us fearlessly. We watched two male Baltimore Orioles fly across the lake towards us, darting at each other the whole way. They were so intent on their rivalry that they crashed headlong into a bush at our feet, only to emerge a moment later, uninjured and glaring at each other.

And we saw snakes. So many snakes. In the shallow southern end of the lake, at least a dozen Northern Water Snakes had gathered, some intertwined, others nosing around the reeds and water plants. Down the shoreline were others, including one that had decided to make another bullfrog into a meal.

For ten minutes we watched as the snake, opening its jaws as wide as it could, tried to swallow the frog. As the frog struggled to escape, the two creatures toppled first one way and then the other. Finally, either exhausted or realizing that its mission was hopeless, the snake released its hold and the frog swam away, seemingly little worse for wear.

For those of us who love reptiles and amphibians (including snakes!), April marks the month not only when most migrating birds return, but when our cold-blooded residents emerge from their winter slumbers and repopulate our ponds, woods, and shorelines. Painted Turtles and Yellow-Eared Sliders (along with some large, invasive Red-Eared Sliders) stack up on logs and exposed rocks. Terrestrial Red-Backed Salamanders stake out their territories under rotting logs, while Red Efts wander the moist forest floor.

And snakes? Even if most of them stay hidden from view, snakes are everywhere once spring arrives and throughout the warmer months of the year. This includes SMRA’s preserves, where at least eight of New York’s 17 species have been found. You just have to know where—and how—to look.

Common Garter Snakes, those small- to medium-sized snakes whose dark bodies are contrasted by multiple lighter racing stripes, are probably the best-known species in our area. They’re certainly the one most likely to appear in suburban gardens, hiding in woodpiles and little-used sheds or sunning themselves atop rock walls.

But the Northern Water Snakes that my son and I saw in such abundance may be the most conspicuous of all local species. Both their size (they can reach more than four feet in length) and their comparative lack of caution in their watery habitat help make them hard to miss.

Dark (they can be almost black, brown, or gray) with lighter blotches or bands, water snakes are most often encountered while they’re foraging in the shallows of ponds or streams. But they’ll also congregate in numbers on exposed rocks to bask in the sun.

The largest regularly seen snake in our area is the Eastern or Black Rat Snake, which can reach a solidly built seven feet in length. (The usual suspects around here are four or five feet long…big enough!) This species can be quickly recognized by the way that its white lower jaw and chin contrast with its black body.

In more agrarian times and places, rat snakes were always welcome residents of any farm. Ferocious hunters of rats and other rodents, they are no threat to humans unless mishandled. (A trait they share with other snakes, most of which want nothing more than to be left alone.)

Currently Rat Snakes are still doing well, even in our populated suburbs. Yet they are sometimes killed just because of their size and prominence, and due to the general fear—even hatred—of snakes that afflicts far too many people.

For those of us who consider snakes an essential and fascinating part of the natural world, a glimpse of the other, less commonly noted species always counts as the highlight of a hike or nature walk. In SMRA’s sanctuaries and other undisturbed areas, you can find the colorful Eastern Milk Snake, the slender and retiring Ring-Necked Snake, and my favorite, the Eastern Hognose Snake.

I confess that I’ve yet to see a Hognose Snake in the wild. So how can it be my favorite? For its brilliant—or at least enthusiastic—thespian abilities.

If bothered, the Hognose will first try hissing and mock strikes. But if these don’t work, it will play dead, rolling over onto its back and lying there slack-jawed. In fact, it is so dedicated to its art that if you flip a playacting one onto its stomach, it will roll onto its back once again. (“Can’t you see I’m dead?”)

What about venomous snakes? None have yet been reported in any of SMRA’s sanctuaries, but two species—the Copperhead and the Timber Rattlesnake—do live in our region.  

The Timber Rattler—usually tan with darker blotches and bands, with a triangular head, stout body, and, of course, rattle—is occasionally spotted in the area’s wilder parks, such as Harriman and Bear Mountain. There, individuals or small groups can sometimes be seen sunning themselves on the rocky outcroppings or ravines where they make their dens.

The usually rusty-red Copperhead (a rattle-less rattlesnake) is a rare resident of Ward Pound Ridge Reservation, Rockefeller State Park, and other larger protected areas. With this species—as with all snakes—the most important rule of thumb is: Do not approach. They are nearly always far less eager to be seen than many of us are to glimpse one.

During these months, the mere possibility of seeing a snake also reminds us that even amid never-ending suburban development, powerful predators—black bears, hybrid coyote-wolves, bobcats, and venomous snakes—continue to hang on, prowling, stalking, and sometimes sliding silently through the underbrush.

Just as they always have, and just as they always should.

Copyright © 2020 by Joseph Wallace

In 1609, Henry Hudson sailed his ship Half Moon from what would soon become New Amsterdam upriver in search of the Northwest Passage, supposed gateway to the riches of Asia. About 30 miles north, after the dramatic palisades along the shore softened into rolling hills, he came upon a stretch where the river broadened to more than three miles from shore to shore. He was certain he’d found his holy grail, which he immediately claimed for Holland.

Sorry, Henry. In his defense, Hudson was far from the first to let hopes outpace reality during explorations of the New World. But if he’d had thought to ask the local Native Americans who’d been plying this stretch of water since time immemorial, they would have told him that he’d “discovered” the passage to nowhere but hundreds of miles of more river. 

Hudson was right about one thing, though: This, the widest point of the river’s estuary and now known as Haverstraw Bay, was—and is—something special, worthy of celebration if not of “claiming.” (Note: An estuary is a river’s tidal zone, where freshwater from upstream meets the ocean saltwater. Though estuaries are most often found near a river’s mouth, the tides flow—to a greater or lesser degree—into and out of the Hudson for more than 150 miles, all the way to the Federal Dam in Troy.)

As the Wappinger people, who occupied the east bank in this region, also could have told him, Haverstraw Bay—which stretches from Croton Point north for about six miles—is one of the most important habitats along the whole river. (It’s been designated as a “Significant Coastal Fish and Wildlife Habitat” by New York State.)

The bay plays a crucial role in the river ecosystem, and it all starts with its depth, tidal nature, and proximity to the Atlantic Ocean. It’s rarely more than ten feet deep on its eastern side, and the tides carrying a regular influx of salt water into this shallow, often sunlit expanse help create a fertile brackish environment.

Such conditions, explains Tom Lake, Estuary Naturalist in the DEC [Department of Environmental Conservation] Hudson River Estuary Program, create an ideal nursery for young fish. “Unlike the clear water of the Atlantic,” he says, “Haverstraw Bay is generally turbid, off-color with suspended sediments, making it more difficult for predators to find smaller fish. Inch-long river herring in the open ocean would have a very short expected survival time.”

These conditions also help create a riotous growth of aquatic plants, which provide additional hiding places for young fish. It may be hard to imagine as you walk along the path at Croton Landing or look north from Croton Point Park, but it’s a jungle down there.

And, like all jungles, it plays host to a breathtaking variety and abundance of creatures—in this case, ranging from minuscule plankton to massive Atlantic sturgeon, which can weigh 800 pounds as adults. “Perhaps the key role of Haverstraw Bay,” says Lake, “is that it is a nursery area both for young-of-year fish [fish in the first year of their lives] from further upriver—such as striped bass and river herring—and young-of-year fish from the ocean, including bluefish and Atlantic menhaden.”

The symbol of the Hudson River estuary—the Atlantic sturgeon—provides a vivid example of the interlocking roles of Haverstraw Bay, the river, and the ocean beyond.

Sturgeon spawn in the river north of the bay, mainly from Hyde Park to Catskill. The young fish stay in the river for up to eight years, relying—like so many other species—on the bay for seasonal food and shelter. Then they head out to sea, where they spend most of their long lives (up to 60 years) in the ocean, only occasionally wandering in and out of other rivers from Canada to Georgia.

When males born in the Hudson River are about twelve years of age—and females close to twenty—they return to the Hudson to spawn. This drive to spawn where they themselves were born, shared with salmon and other diadromous fish, shows the ultimate importance of continuing to protect Haverstraw Bay, not only now but for future generations of fish and humans alike.

But the sturgeon and other famous Hudson River denizens—like striped bass, Atlantic shad, and alewives, currently migrating in vast numbers upriver to breed—are far from the only oceangoing fish that depend on Haverstraw Bay. In fact, some visitors over the past quarter century must have deeply startled their first human observers.

“In dry summers, the bay can reach near fifty percent salinity,” Tom Lake points out. “This intrusion of salty water can lure tropical species such as crevalle jack, lookdown, and even bonefish into the bay.” They’re joined by more northerly saltwater fish, including summer flounder, northern sennet (a kind of barracuda), and northern kingfish.

And it’s not just fish that rely on Haverstraw Bay and the entire Hudson River estuary. Far from it. A wide variety of marine mammals have also been recorded there in summer, when, as Lake puts it, “Haverstraw is like an all-night deli.”

In the past quarter century, four seal species (harbor, gray, hooded, and harp), three dolphins (bottlenose and Risso’s dolphin and harbor [common] porpoise), and most famously, even a minke (in 2007) and a humpback whale (in 2016) have paid visits. Perhaps most famously, a wandering Florida manatee made the river its home for a time in 2006.

During my regular walks at Croton Landing, I’ve most often thought of the waters of Haverstraw Bay—slate gray or silvery, calm or roiling—as merely part of the scene’s palette of color and movement. But now I find myself always on the lookout for a passing manatee, leaping sturgeon, or a glimpse of any of the other surprising riches the bay has to offer.

Copyright © 2020 by Joseph Wallace

Saw Mill River Audubon connects you with free, intriguing and engaging evening programs every month between September and June.  We offer our programs at different locations across our membership area. Here is our line up of programs for Fall 2018.

More