Tag: Ozark wildlife

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Gravel County Road

My Missouri county seems to draw a lot of people from other places. Most of them are city people who don’t really want to live in the country so the county is busy paving their gravel county road system.

Me? I like living on a gravel county road. Like anything else, it has advantages and disadvantages.

gravel county road in winter
County gravel roads are the highways for people and animals in rural areas. They are easy to walk on. Reptiles love how they heat up. Deer love to browse they reach along the roadsides.

Disadvantages of a Gravel County Road

Dust, lots of dust is kicked up by passing vehicles and the wind. All that dust drifts away to settle elsewhere – like in the house. It coats everything in a brown layer.

Every rain storm seems to leave pot holes behind. Occasionally the road grader comes by to fill them in, but never address the reason the pot hole appeared in the first place. This is usually a ditch choked with branches, dirt and rocks or sloped so the water doesn’t run off.

armadillo along gravel county road
Ozark county roads have sides with ditches to hold water and sides covered with leaves and other plant pieces. This armadillo was spotted checking for grubs and earthworms buried under the leaves.

Loose gravel can be a problem too. It rolls under the tires letting them slide. Or the road develops washboards – a series of small mounds across the road – that challenge the shock absorbers which are another casualty of a gravel county road.

Gravel wears out tires. The best tires are all terrain or have mud and snow tread. The good ones are costly. Cheap tires with city tread can be deadly.

Mourning Cloak butterfly sunning on gravel county road
Mourning Cloak butterflies hide over the winter and often come out in the first warm days in February. This one is sunning on the road. There are no flowers for nectar, but it sips water and minerals from the roadsides and near streams.

Advantages of a Gravel County Road

My road has springs all along it and is no candidate for paving. That’s just fine with me. It discourages lots of idle traffic.

And that is the biggest reason for choosing to live on such a road. When the weather is bad, there is no traffic, only country quiet. Even many nice days have little or no traffic.

I can walk a mile or more up or down the road enjoying the wildflowers, spotting the wildlife that also use the road. And have no one drive by.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Rough Green Snake

Exercise is the main reason for walking up and down my road now. It is so dry few flowers are blooming and everything is covered with dust. Then I came across a rough green snake.

Both of us were surprised. The snake froze hoping I would keep on walking. I stopped to admire this lovely snake.

Rough Green Snake
At about two feet long, this is as big as this rough green snake will get. The color is spectacular.

What is a Rough Green Snake?

The easiest way of knowing this snake is its spring green color. These aren’t big snakes, only growing to around two feet which this one was. They are very slender. This one was only as fat as a fat pencil.

These snakes eat things like grasshoppers. They are not poisonous. It’s rare to see one any place other than when one basks out on the road and that is rare.

High Reaches Snakes

Although rough green snakes are one of my favorite colors, they are not necessarily my favorite snake. They live out along the creek or up in the hills.

Midland Brown and Ring Neck snakes live in my garden. They are much smaller and eat the slugs, snails and other unwanted garden pests. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to eat stink bugs.

Speckled King snakes do visit now and then. It is always a treat to see these enemies of rats and mice. They tend to stay near the barn or in the pastures.

Yes, copperheads live here too. A pair was living under my barn floor this summer. I would see them from time to time as they went hunting for mice.

Although copperheads are poisonous, they are also very shy. Lots of other creatures eat them. Their bite is fatal for a chicken, but they are too big to attract much attention from these voracious birds. Goats swell up, hurt for a day or two and then are fine.

Black rat snakes are a mixed blessing. These rid the barn of a burrowing rat invasion and keep it free of these varmints. But these snakes love hen eggs and summer is an egg race for whether I or the snakes get to the eggs first.

Round Pupil is nonpoisonous
Nonpoisonous snakes like this rough green snake indicate it is nonpoisonous. Poisonous snakes have rectangular pupils. Zooming in with a camera from several feet away is the best way to spot this.

Interesting Creatures

My fear of snakes has gradually waned as I have observed these allies in the fight against mice and garden pests. We now have a truce. They are welcome to live here. We will say hello from time to time and go our separate ways.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Exploring the Creek

Lately I seem trapped working in the garden everyday I am home and in spare minutes the other days. I needed a break and went off exploring the creek.

My Ozark Creek

One of the things we love and hate about this place is the creek. We hate it because it makes fencing impossible across it. It floods and destroys things, especially the last few years.

We love it for its beauty and its water. The goats use it for drinking water. We used it for washing off when we first moved here, before we moved into the house. Now it waters my garden during dry weather.

Exploring the Creek

Almost no rain has fallen here in a couple of months. The creek no longer really runs like a creek, but as a series of connected pools. Water still flows, but down below the gravel surface.

I walked down the dry creek bed dodging wet areas to find a nice pool to look in. Tiny minnows fled from my shadow as tall shadows usually mean someone wanting them for dinner.

Interesting rocks made walking challenging with their uneven sizes and tendency to roll when stepped on. Water striders plied the water surface of the pool I stopped at. Plants lined the steep banks. Nothing else seemed to be in the pool.

Hellgrammite seen exploring the creek
Hellgrammites are baby dragonflies. Like dragonflies, they are ferocious predators. This one was hidden below a rock. It stayed motionless out of the water hoping I wouldn’t eat it. These will bite, if you grab them.

Who Lives There?

Even though the pool looked empty except for the minnows, lots of creatures lived there. To find them I picked up the rocks and looked at the undersides and in the gravel under the rock. I found snails, water pennies, even a hellgrammite – larval dragonfly. There were larval horseflies too. I didn’t kill them, although that was tempting considering their attacks on the goats and me once they grow up.

Each rock was put back as I had found it. That way all the creatures were back where they belonged.

Exploring the creek may include crayfish
One important skill needed when exploring a creek is patience. Residents flee as people are big and may want them for dinner. To see ones like this crayfish aka crawdad you have to sit or stand motionless for what seems like ages.

Bigger Denizens

I know crayfish live in the creek. A darter was under one rock I picked up. But crayfish were no where, or were they? I waited. And waited. Finally, one crawled out from beneath some rocks.

It was time to leave. My garden needed watering.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Honeybee Swarm Capture

“I heard this loud buzzing when I came out of the house. When I went to look, there were thousands of bees coming into the yard.” It was a honeybee swarm.

My companion was watching a special sight, one the local beekeeper who put up the bee trap has never seen. The mass of bees landed on the box and gradually disappeared into it.

Persimmon Trees

The bee trap was strapped onto a native female persimmon tree. We enjoy her fruit every fall. The goats go crazy for them.

Insects like honeybees go crazy for the flowers and this tree was in full bloom. This was probably why the swarm’s scouts knew about the tree and came to check for a good place to live around it.

honeybee swarm capture bee trap
A bee trap isn’t very large, only a couple of feet long, a foot high and half a foot wide. The bees must be very crowded inside, but they don’t seem to mind.

Bee Traps

The local beekeeper told us this is more of a bee lure than a trap. The scouts a honeybee swarm sends out are looking for a place with room inside and a roof to keep the rain out. A bee trap provides this plus foundation for a honeycomb.

These scouts found the bee trap, went back to the swarm and it came our way. In a couple of days the swarm has settled into their new home.

Bee Trap Door
A bee trap is a temporary home for a swarm. When the beekeeper moves the trap, the door is changed from the open to the small holes. The bees still get ventilation, but can’t get out until they get to their new hive home.

What Is a Honeybee Swarm?

When a hive gets too crowded, the bees raise a new queen. The new queen takes over. The old queen leaves with a crowd of bees to find a new place to live.

Bees can swarm for other reasons. When we first moved here, two hives were in the backyard. After the old beekeeper died, the hives were abandoned.

Parasites moved in. The bees moved out. We knew honeybees still lived out in the woods as they were regular visitors to the white clover in the lawn and the flowering vegetables in my garden.

The local beekeeper will move this honeybee swarm into a regular bee hive. The descendants of the old hives will again live as domestic bees.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Watching Wildlife

We own no dogs. This isn’t because we don’t like dogs, as long as they belong to someone else. It’s because we enjoy watching wildlife.

The other morning, I needed to fill the water fount for my baby chicks. There is a hand pump on a cement pad over an old dug well. Something was curled up on the pad. What?

I cautiously approached to find a young fawn curled up on the platform. We often have fawns in the small pasture, but not in the barn compound. Does like leaving them near us for safety.

baby fawn makes watching wildlife special
A young fawn has few protections from predators. They have no scent. Lying still is another. If disturbed, a fawn is a fast runner. Finding one like this is a real treat.

Watching Wildlife at the Bird Feeder

Lots of things happen around and on the bird feeder. Usually, it’s the various kinds of birds. Lately other visitors are showing up.

Gray squirrels move in and sit at one end of the sunflower tray eating. The birds come and go from the other end of the tray. When the red squirrel shows up, the birds and gray squirrels flee.

Now the chipmunks are back. They bound through the grass with their tails held high. The posts are no problem. Even the lip around the edge of the feeder is not a deterrent. Each chipmunk moves in, stuffs its cheek pouches and leaves.

At the Hummingbird Feeders

Four quart feeders hang from the eaves of a shed. They are busy with hummingbirds. These swoop in, chase each other, sit and drink and whirr off.

Earlier orchard orioles visited the feeders. One year a pair stayed to nest. Usually they visit for a few days and move on.

A new visitor is a downy woodpecker. Evidently this one has a taste for sweets. It scoots up the corner of the shed, flits over to the end feeder and drinks from several holes before flying over to the suet cake.

nuthatch and downy woodpecker on bird feeder
The downy woodpecker is on the right. They are a small bird with a long tongue making using the hummingbird feeder possible. A nuthatch is on the left.

Dogs and Watching Wildlife

Dogs bark, chase and need attention. I might appreciate having the backyard groundhogs chased off to the hills, but I would also miss the squirrels, chipmunks and deer. Opossums can be a nuisance as can raccoons.

Several years we had gray foxes raise their young around the house. Having a dog would rob me of these opportunities. I prefer watching wildlife.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Six More Weeks

January thaw finally showed up with beautiful, warm sunny days trailing into February. So, the back yard ground hog got up to see what was going on, saw his shadow and announced six more weeks of winter.

Big Surprise – Not

This is the beginning of February, still considered the middle of winter. Spring doesn’t officially arrive until the end of March. And, the last few years, spring has been lucky to oust winter by April.

That doesn’t mean the drop from a pleasant seventy degrees to a cold forty was appreciated. It definitely wasn’t.

Disappointment

That ground hog was in for a hard time scrounging for food. The goats have noticed too. A few blads of grass are trying to grow, but the five inches of snow stopped any thought of spring. The snow decided we had six more weeks of winter and green grass.

My cabbage and leek seedlings are hoping the weather will moderate into a semblance of early spring by March. That’s when they are supposed to move into the garden. In the meantime, they would like fifty during the day as they can move out on the front porch instead of sitting under grow lights. Sun is so much better for seedlings.

Early Bloomers

The wayside speedwell started blooming during January thaw. Its cheery blue flowers are the color of a summer sky.

Down by the river, the silver maples are blooming. I’d love to get some pictures. To get these pictures I need to climb up thirty feet. There are lower branches, but the flowers are on the top ones.

During those six more weeks of winter, the garden gets renovated. Barns get cleaned out. Hiking plans will be made. Seedlings will be started and grown.

The endless tasks of spring and summer are on the horizon. Perhaps a bit of extra sleep should make the list too.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Winter Hikes

The hills are covered with bare branches. They don’t look very inviting for winter hikes, but there are interesting things out there.

Birds

Most of the year birds say hidden behind leaves. I hear them singing or scolding, but rarely catch more than a glimpse.

Winter is different. There are few leaves to hide behind. Fewer kinds of birds are out there, but they can be seen.

Cardinals are the most visible. The males have put on their mating finery so their red glows.

Woodpeckers are beginning to nest so the sound of wood being chiseled is everywhere. The males are drumming to advertise their latest nesting holes.

Carolina Wren on Bird Feeder
I put out fresh sunflower seeds to lure in a couple of cardinals. They went elsewhere. Chickadees came to enjoy the bounty. Carolina wrens don’t normally stop at the feeder, but this one decided to inspect it.

Plants

The trees and shrubs may be bare, the ground isn’t. Mosses and lichens coat the ground with greens and grays. Christmas and ebony spleenwort ferns add green spikes.

A number of plants do sprout in the late summer into fall and overwinter as small sets of leaves. Trying to identify them is a fun challenge on winter hikes.

Trees and I have an uneasy relationship. I like trees. However, photographing them is difficult as they are so tall.

Still, on winter hikes, I take photographs of winter buds on branches I pull down. Then I go in to stumble my way through the “Missoui Trees in Winter” keys trying to identify them.

Once the trees leaf out, I will go back and use leaves to identify these trees. And I can look up to the branches far overhead on some trees I can’t include in my Flora project unless I learn to climb trees.

green mosses light up winter hikes
Mosses are among the very earlies plants. They need moist places and thrive even in frigid temperatures. Over the winter, with the trees bare, mosses green up absorbing the winter sun adding color to the Ozark hills during winter hikes.

Weather

The biggest drawback to winter hikes is the weather. Many days I stand at the windows looking out at the hills. Cold, rain, snow, ice are good reasons to stay inside.

One nice thing about the Ozarks weather are the warmer spells mixed into the cold ones. Going out walking is possible then.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Visiting Yellow Shafted Flicker

The workshop roof does keep the rain out, but has open eaves letting others in. This time it was a visiting yellow shafted flicker.

Finding the Visiting Yellow Shafted Flicker

With the arrival of almost nightly frosts, old blankets and towels are in daily evidence in my garden. Each morning these need to be removed for the day.

Orange Cat likes exploring my garden as so many interesting animals live there, interesting to him anyway. He caught a pack or wood rat as I was weeding. It was too big and escaped to continue raiding my garden.

This time Orange leaped up at the workshop window along one edge of the garden. The flicker was hanging on the inside of the window.

yellow shafted flicker
Although a kind of woodpecker, the yellow shafted woodpecker mostly eats ants. The stiff tail, strong feet and chisel beak show it is a woodpecker.

What Are Flickers?

Only the yellow shafted flicker occurs in my part of the Ozarks. It’s a brown backed woodpecker with a white rump patch and yellow under its wings.

These birds are welcome around my garden although they don’t often come. Their favorite food is ants. I don’t mind ants, but they tend to overpopulate the garden.

Ants like a wide variety of produce and dig holes in things like tomatoes. Their colonies appear under every rock, piece of cardboard, bucket and in the raised beds.

Usually visiting yellow shafted flickers are off along the creek banks raiding the ant colonies there. They take off as soon as I come into sight. This means safety for them and disappointment for me as they are beautiful birds I would like to see close up.

flicker looking to escape
The black face stripe and large red stripe on the head mark this as a male yellow shafted flicker. He is upside down at the peak of the rook on the rafters.

My Chance

Although the flicker in the workshop was not trapped, it had forgotten how it got in. It was a bold bird, staying hanging on the window as I went inside with my camera.

The doors at each end of the workshop make inviting exits for most birds visiting in the workshop, usually sparrow and wrens, occasionally hummingbirds.

The flicker ignored the open doors choosing to fly up to the rafters. There it flew to the end of the room and went out the way it came in: under the roof peak.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

My Ozark Creek

After two days dealing with baling and putting hay in the barn, I was tired. The day was warm and overcast so a walk down to visit the goats and explore my Ozark creek seemed a good idea.

This idea had another appeal to it. As I write about the Ship Nineteen Carduans, their creek, which they consider a river, is a place they go to often.

a section of my Ozark creek
This section of my Ozark creek is wider than I can jump, but it’s definitely a creek. But then, I’m five feet tall. If I were four inches tall like the Carduans I’m writing about, this same creek would seem very wide and deep and look much more like a river.

My Ozark Creek

Most of the creek banks are steep drops where high water and flood waters have scoured out the dirt. Roots hang out of these cuts. When enough of a tree’s roots are undercut, the tree begins to lean, then falls.

Once you are down the bank, the creek bottom stretches out. Much of this area is paved with gravel left behind as the water carries the soil away.

Water levels vary according to the rain. As I look over this part of the creek, it is more a series of pools with small streams of running water flowing between them than what might normally be considered a creek.

Some pools are broad and less than a foot deep. Other pools are deep cuts often where trees have been uprooted. Fish and crawdads inhabit the pools.

A wide variety of plants live along the creek. The trees are mostly sycamores with their white trunks studded with brown puzzle pieces and willows, black and Carolina. Underneath the trees is a mix. I notice jewelweed with its orange earring flowers dangling, a pink swamp milkweed, purple self heal and hog peanut vines draped over much of it.

my Ozark creek forms pools
Gravel moved into this area of my Ozark creek during the last flood. The young tree in the bank is undercut and a pool has formed under it. Broad Head Minnows swim back and forth through the pool. It’s deep enough for some of them to reach six inches long.

The Carduans

Food is a constant need for the Carduans of Ship Nineteen. The creek they find is a place to catch fish and crawdads.

There are stones to use for building. Honey locust trees supply thorns. Willows supply slender canes for making chairs.

When I wear boots, the creek is easy to cross. The Carduans, at four inches tall, find the creek is often deeper than they are tall. All of us think it is a great place to spend an afternoon.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Cottontail Rabbit Invasion

As I finished milking the other evening, I noticed a cottontail rabbit eating grass. That was a bit unusual, but I have no barn cat right now.

This rabbit didn’t concern me until it calmly hopped over to my garden fence. My garden is fenced with two by four welded wire. The rabbit slipped through and into the garden.

My garden does not need a hungry rabbit. I charged in. The rabbit left.

Cottontail rabbit invasion
People tell me the cottontail rabbit invasion is widespread in this part of the Ozarks. There are numerous rabbits near my garden and in the back yard. This may bring the gray foxes back.

Raising Rabbits

Never confuse a cottontail rabbit with a domestic rabbit. All the domestic rabbit breeds trace back to European rabbits. None trace back to the native rabbits.

Years ago I had a commercial rabbitry. Even more years before that my family raised rabbits. They make good pets and good dinner.

My commercial rabbitry had around a hundred does divided into eight sections. Each week one section got bred, another section got nesting boxes and another had their little ones weaned.

Does did move between sections from time to time for various reasons so they were mixed up. My father came up with a great system to keep track of them.

I bought clothes pins. They were painted red, yellow, orange, green, blue, purple, black and white. One side was all colored, the other half. They were clipped to the feeders.

When I walked down the aisles, the clothes pins told me which section the doe was in. If she was bred, the half side was out. If she had babies, the full side showed.

Rabbit Food?
My Savoy cabbages look great. If the cottontail rabbits make it into the garden, they may disappear.

Cottontail Rabbit

Chicken wire got stretched across over the garden fence. That seemed to work as nothing seemed to get eaten.

The number of rabbits eating the grass kept increasing. Four were there one morning. I got nervous.

Then the few beets still in the garden got eaten. Was it the rabbits? If it was, the rabbits had gone around the garden to the far side. Then again, I’d seen a chipmunk zip out the fence there and they eat gardens too.

Chicken wire is going up around the garden fence and on the gates. The rabbits and chipmunks can eat outside the garden.