On Our Mountains

An Emo Deer

by MomJovi

As I’ve told you, we have a mini-Maria on our hands around here. E. is completely obsessed with The Sound of Music. The day I got her the DVD may have been the happiest day of her life so far.

Ever since we got it, she’s been singing the songs over and over. She watches all of the scenes with the von Trapp children closely to try and learn all the moves. Since the movie is 3 hours long, she only gets to watch it on weekends (usually over several viewings). Luckily for me, a certain captain is easy on the eyes...

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The Bright Side of Rainy Days

by Jan D. Axtell, Staff Naturalist

To say that we have endured a wet spring here in the Green Mountains would be a gross understatement. The fact of the matter is, everything feels a little damp around here and I can’t remember a day when I haven’t wanted to change my socks after guiding a tour. Spring weather, in our mountains, can be a bit fickle at times. Most Vermonters I know share an innate tolerance and good natured humor for, shall we say, our peculiar weather. Those that can’t laugh at mountain weather and roll with the punches often suffer needlessly and, are often viewed as a bit soft - adding insult to their perceived injury.

Fear not the rainy day! Every storm cloud has a silver lining. My silver lining has come in the form of mud puddles. The soft rain saturated soils have been a boom for tracking our resident wildlife. Their prints tell stories of the comings, goings, and nightly ramblings of those creatures that call our northern forests home.

Each day on the birding and forest ecology walks I take note of each mud puddle we pass. Sometimes it is a single track you find. Other times an entire path winding through the forest is laid out in plain sight. You can tell a lot about an animal by the marks they leave on the forest floor and vegetation. Their size and stride tell us how big an individual might be. The number of tracks often give insight as to whether animals are either moving in groups or as a solitary individual. The condition of the track can often tell how long ago the animal moved through, and whether they were running or walking. Often times the tracks and path as a whole tell where an animal is headed, and if you pay close enough attention, what that animal might be eating along the way. These stories are played out on a grand scale across the landscape. The amount of information in the prints and paths collectively are a graphic illustration of the circle life as it plays out in our forest.

Over the last few weeks we have seen a great number of these events play out in the mud puddles. This year’s white-tailed deer fawns are now moving about very confidently with their mothers. Look closely and you will find their dainty prints purposefully following their mother’s. When our fawn’s confidence gives way to hunger or fear you can discern where they stood together. The tracks often tell how the little one either took shelter and nourishment under the doe’s belly or bolted for the safety of the thick forest cover.

In addition, there are numerous places where the small song birds are coming down to bath in the puddles. The numerous prints combine to create a pattern that looks like the crackled glaze on an old ceramic vase.

But the crème de la crème has been those tracks left behind by a black bear passing through Maria’s Plaza headed down through the Sugar House woods. It’s steady un-interrupted gate and deep prints are straight as an arrow. The tracks are so clear, un-hurried, and self-assured that one is left with the impression that the bear had a purpose in mind as it walked through the tall sugar maples. I have a long history with black bears. They are magnificent animals. Any sign of their presence is - in my mind - good luck, and just as much proof of a benevolent God as any religious relic or doctrine. So, you can imagine my excitement.

Every storm cloud has a silver lining and every rainy day has a bright side to it. Animal tracks show up in the soft mud a lot better than they do on hard, dusty ground. The tales told by the prints in the rain saturated earth are of endless fascination to me. They document the: who, what, where, when, why and how of the animal community as they move about the landscape; while we aren’t looking. So a little rain is nothing to mope around about.

New Beginnings

by Jan D. Axtell, Staff Naturalist

It is a time of new beginnings. Everywhere one looks new life flourishes. It is all eye candy if you spend any time, at all, tracking the cyclic ebb and flow of the season here in our northern forest. What changes and surprises the next day brings one can only guess.

It is best to stay vigilantly observant and take a few moments each day to look beyond oneself and take note of what is going on around them in a world not associated with the day to day grind of man. A momentary break to take refuge in a world forgotten by most people as they whiz through the responsibilities of daily life in a society that demands more and more attention. We are very lucky to be surrounded by the natural world and the ceaseless change that defines the spring. It makes the succession of spring driving toward summer, through time and space, all the more heady.

My field note book is filling up quick this year. I have been more consistent in documenting my observations this year. For weeks I have been making lists of birds at locations around the area noting new arrivals. I think it is safe to say that most all have returned to raise broods and pass on their legacy/genetic material to the next generation. The cacophony of bird song punctuates each morning. A far greater intensity exists in the morning symphony than a month ago. If you sleep with the windows open you know what I mean.

This morning I spent some time nosing around my friend Roland Beliveau’s property. In just 5 minutes I tallied up over a dozen different bird species including a black and white warbler that spent the entire time foraging along the trunks and branches of the sugar maples that define the edge of Roly’s lawn and a striking indigo bunting that has been visiting his property over the last couple of weeks. This is the time of year made for ornithologists and bird watchers. Each morning I wake wondering who will greet me with song at my doorstep.

Another major change is the complete leaf out of the forest that has taken place over the last 2 weeks. It seemed like yesterday that my walks through the woods were defined by full on sun that reached the forest floor. Trout lilly, trillium, Spring beauty all sprung forth in those early days, but now in the dappled shade of the forest they have already begun to die back giving way to the host of ferns that are unfurling from fiddle heads , wood anemone, star flower, Canadian mayflower, and jack in the pulpit. The forest is a different place than it was 2 weeks ago and it will continue to change again and again leaving me to scratch my head and scribble in my note book.

Late last week I traveled to Norton Pond and was surprised to find that only an hour’s drive north from our Sterling Valley home the forest is at least a week behind our own corner of the state. It left me wondering what the forest looked like 2, 4, and 8 hours north of Stowe. It occurred to me that the cycle of change, rebirth, and new beginnings is an awful lot like a tide that sweeps across the land coming on strong in some parts and slowly working its way into others. Someday I will take the time to ride the tidal bore of spring north surfing the front end of it and maybe getting a little understanding about how it moves over the land.

Everything is getting wound up in a big way. Spring peepers fill the dusk and night with frog music. Eastern garter snakes and American toads are finally showing up in my perennial gardens to sun themselves on the rocks and take part in the age old struggle between predator and prey. The fish are rising in the rivers and streams once again warm enough to fire the metabolism into a feeding frenzy. Plants are sprouting, birds are singing, and new beginnings happen with each tick of the clock. These are great days. Don’t miss them.

A Push of Warblers

by Jan D. Axtell

The last week, from a bird watcher’s perspective, has been very exciting. Despite some rain, cold morning temperatures, and even a little fresh snow at elevation the spring bird migration has been throttling up to peak power here at Trapp Family Lodge. New sightings of returning migrant bird species have become a daily event.

There are a few things I use as harbingers of the seasons. During spring it is the bird community that is my barometer. Early on in late February when the days begin to lengthen, after the winter solstice, bird song begins to pick up. Later, as the snow melts, the first migrants of the year begin to show up. Waterfowl of all manner, American robins, and Red-winged blackbirds appear in the flooded fields and on the bare patches of ground to forage. Slowly but surely other species begin to show up until the woods are once again fecund with bird life and their songs.

It is during this tsunami rush of arriving migrants that my attention gravitates to the presence – or absence as the case may be - of one specific group of birds; the woodland warblers. Their arrival, in my mind, is the bell that tolls spring’s advance toward summer Their yearly return each spring allows me, psychologically, to close the door on winter. Over the last few days we have seen a significant migratory push of these colorful little birds into our forests here at the Trapp Family Lodge.

The woodland warblers are members of the Parulidae. They are characterized by being small, quick, colorful birds. They are, in large part, leaf gleaning insectivores. The process is facilitated by their pointed needle like beaks which is also one of the defining characteristics of the warbler family. Members of this most fascinating family that select nesting habitats in the canopy tend to be quite brightly colored while those species that choosing shrubby or ground cover for nest sites tend to have drabber plumage; relatively speaking.

The woodland warblers often migrate in loose groups of mixed species. So, much to my delight, if you see one warbler this time of year you will often see many with the chance of several species mixed together. This morning I was in the wedding meadow’s birch glades and found myself in the midst of one of these migratory flocks composed mostly of Yellow-rumped warblers with a couple black-throated blues thrown in and one lonely black-throated green. All told I estimated approximately 20 individuals total in the flock as they foraged in the birch canopy.

I believe that this is the best time of year to enjoy bird watching in the heart of the Green Mountains. New arrivals are part of every morning, the birds are easily viewed because the trees have not leafed out yet, and the mature adults are in their vibrant breeding plumage. In addition, it is the perfect opportunity to observe the courtship displays of a variety of bird species.

This morning’s birding tour counted 26 individual species of birds over the course of an hour. You never know what you will see each morning. Aside from the arrival of the woodland warblers we watched a male Common snipe performing its winnowing flights over the fields behind the gardens, a strident male rose breasted grosbeak singing in the tree line at the Outdoor Center, Eastern bluebirds nest building in the garden, and a giant Pileated wood pecker swoop across Trapp Hill Road headed for the safety of the forest proper with its dipping flight. There are even a few winter visitors around still, like the white crowned sparrow as a bonus.

The warblers have returned to their summering grounds at the Lodge. In my mind the woods are a completely different place then they were a week ago. Over the next few weeks and months they will be setting up their breeding territories and bringing off the next generation of birds, who will play their own parts in the grand spectacle that is the ebb and flow of life in the heart of the Green Mountains.

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