Troglodytes hiemalis

It was a beautiful fall morning in the Big Woods, clear and cool with only a gentle breeze. There I sat on a small folding stool against a large white pine close to a tiny woodland stream. I was in full camouflage (in what's called a "leafy suit" plus a facemask and gloves) waiting for a subject to photograph.

Thanks to the dry weather of late summer and early fall, the stream was dry with barely a trickle of water. But the mostly dry channel still attracted birds and other wildlife.

After I'd been there about a half hour a few juncos and chickadees passed on by and then a winter wren appeared –

Troglodytes hiemalis , is the scientific name of the bird we call the winter wren, the smallest of the ten species of wren in North America. It’s song isn’t as loud as that of the Carolina wren nor is it as comfortable around people as the house wren. 

Winter wrens frequent stream banks and other cool shady places where they hunt for insects and spiders among fallen branches, and upturned roots. They’ve often been compared to a mouse as they scurry about seeking food.

Until fairly recently the winter wren was considered the most widespread species of wren, ranging from Newfoundland to the tip of the Aleutian Islands and across Europe and Asia. However, it has recently been decided that the winter wren is confined to eastern North America with the western population now named the Pacific wren and the wren of Europe and Asia (where it is the only wren) named the Eurasian wren.

In spring and early summer male winter wrens produce a long bubbly song that, because they’re rather secretive, is often the only indication that the wrens are nearby.

In our area we may see winter wrens throughout the year. Northern birds migrate south as winter sets in so its hard to say whether the birds we see in the winter are migrants or permanent residents.

The next time you’re in an area dominated by evergreens with a small stream running through it, sit still or stand quietly for a while and you may glimpse a mousy brown creature scampering along the ground –

Take a good look, it may well be a winter wren.

Into the Hole

It was a beautiful mid-October day; we were walking along the edge of an open woodland when H spotted something on the ground. That something was a bright green caterpillar on the brown and tan of the bare ground and the fallen leaves. The caterpillar was moving, but not on its own, it was paralyzed and being dragged by an inch-long wasp.

We watched as the wasp dragged the caterpillar quite rapidly across the ground, over fallen leaves and through scattered tufts of grass –

I recognized it as one of a group of ground-nesting parasitic wasps and we followed along as it traveled 40-50 feet. 

After a few minutes the wasp arrived at her destination and put down the caterpillar –

Then began opening a previously constructed burrow by removing pebbles and soil that were blocking the entrance –

When the burrow was open, she turned and pulled the paralyzed caterpillar into the burrow –

The wasp emerged and proceeded to pick up small pebbles and insert them into the burrow to block the entrance –

Finally, the wasp turned to scrape loose soil over the entrance and fly off –

Back at home, and after looking at the photographs, I identified the wasp as a common thread-wasted wasp, which is found from Canada to Central America. The species stings the caterpillars of moths and butterflies to feed their own larvae. The sting paralyses the caterpillar, thus ensuring a fresh meal for its own larva.

The common thread-wasted wasp lives in areas with bare soil where the female excavates a burrow a few inches deep with a brood chamber at the bottom. After completing the burrow the female closes and conceals the entrance, then flies around the area to memorize landmarks so she can find the burrow again.

At that point the hunt begins; when the female wasp finds a suitable caterpillar she stings it and takes it back to the burrow where she lays a single egg on the immobilized caterpillar. After laying the egg, the female wasp again closes the burrow with pebbles and soil. Occasionally the wasp will use a pebble as a hammer to pack soil tightly into the burrow entrance – one of the few instances of a tool-using insect.

The egg hatches after two days and the wasp larva feeds on the live but not moving caterpillar for about a week. It pupates and then emerges the next year to begin the cycle anew.

Three Bulls

We’d met friends for coffee and snacks and spent much of the morning talking, then H and I decided to head home. Before we’d gone far I thought that it might be a good day to see some elk. We’d been disappointed the last couple of times we’d headed west in search of Pennsylvania’s elk herd, but hope springs eternal.

When we got home, we quickly gathered things together: cameras and lenses, sandwiches for supper, bottles of water, sweaters and vests, and to change into more suitable clothing. Then west we went, stopping for lunch along the way.

When we got to the elk range we visited spots that had been prime elk viewing in the past and where, when only 40-70 elk lived in the state and I’d taken my first photos of Pennsylvania's elk in the mid-1970s –

Back then, and for many years after, we went to an area of abandoned hill farms and reclaimed strip mines above wooded stream valleys. In recent years, with the elk herd swollen to over 1,200 animals, the area has become home to large parking lots, a multi-million dollar visitor center, multiple second homes with more under construction, tour busses and hordes of tourists – but fewer elk to be seen. It’s difficult to avoid seeing a connection between the increased human activity and the decreased sightings of elk.

After unsuccessfully searching for elk in a few of the old places, we checked one of those spots for a second time and there they were, several cows and three bulls, far across a field in a location somewhat similar to that in the first photo from the 1970s –

The distance combined with the large number of tourists were enough to deflate whatever pleasure I derived from seeing the elk – it was time to leave. We got on the road, traveling about 20 miles to a location where I’ve seen elk many times in the past. And there was a bull, one with non-typical antlers but a bull nonetheless –

He headed into the forest, so we went on – and through the trees and branches on the edge of the field we got a glimpse of another bull –

Easing forward a bit, we got a better view of one of the most impressive bull elk I’ve ever seen –

He turned and walked along the field/forest edge, bugling as he went.

He too disappeared into the forest and we moved on.

We hadn’t gone a half mile further along the narrow field when we saw yet another bull elk, this one smaller and younger than the others, wearing a tracking collar and full of testosterone –

Three bulls, but not a cow elk to be seen. Each of the three bulls would usually try to collect a harem of cows, but the smallest bull probably wouldn't be successful with two larger competitors. Because none of them had harems, I had to believe that an even more dominant bull was somewhere out of sight with a band of cows.

When the young bull was busy thrashing the grass, it was already too dark for still photos and rapidly becoming too dark for videos – time to head for home.

One day you're here ...

             

                "One minute you're here. Next minute you're gone."

                                                                       Bruce Springsteen  

  

With due respect to Bruce Springsteen’s song, I’m going to change “minutes” to days as it relates to ruby-throated hummingbirds. So, “One day you’re here. Next day you’re gone.”

These beautiful tiny birds were around the house all summer feeding on nectar from the flowers both in the woods and in the garden.

An adult male usually arrives as the first flowers began blooming in our garden – when a red and yellow primula blooms we know a hummingbird will soon arrive. He sets up a territory and is followed a few days later by one or more adult females. Male ruby-throated hummingbirds mate with as many females as they can find in their territory.

The female builds a nest on a tree limb; I’ve never found a nest here, they’re very small and well camouflaged. There she raises her young without any help from the male. It doesn’t take long for the young ones to become independent –

As summer ended the male disappeared from the yard, but the female and young continued to visit the flowers and feeders. At least three females and/or young birds visited and fought over the flowers and feeders.

They fought over the feeder in our birch tree on September 16, but on the morning of September 17 there were no hummingbirds to be seen – and there have been none since.

One day they’re here. Next day they’re gone. Gone to fly across the Gulf of Mexico on their way to Central and South America where they winter. They'll be back next spring when the primula blooms, until then our place will be poorer for their absence.