White Throated Sparrow

There really isn’t any sure fire way to keep birds from flying into your windows. We have a few light catchers in our kitchen window and I still have seen birds fly into that.  The main reason birds fly into windows is because of the reflection off the glass. When glass reflects the sky and clouds or the trees in the yard birds can’t tell the difference.  Some birds will repeatedly fly into a window because they see their own reflection and think of that as another bird competing for their territory or mate. These birds generally are unharmed as they don’t fly full force into the glass but merely bump it. There are plenty of suggestions on the internet you can find to cut down on bird/window collisions but most are so impractical in that no one would utilize them. One suggestion was to move all your plants away from your windows.  Who’s going to do that? Why have plants!, or this suggestion, “make sure to cover your windows with decals or light catchers keeping the spacing no more than 4 inches apart”.  If your going to extremes like that does it even make since to have a window at all?  Here are a few of the more practical suggestions.

• Don’t wash your windows as often. Dirty windows don’t reflect as much light.
• Install blinds or shades.
• Don’t place bird feeders close to your windows or up against them.
•  Install window awnings to shade the window.
• Apply an opaque film to the window that still allows you to see out.
• Install a mesh screen barrier over the outside of the problem window.

No matter what precautions we take birds sadly will still crash into our windows lets just hope our efforts can get that number from 1 billion down into the millions. If you have any of your own tips we would love to hear them.

Enjoy the Outdoors !!

The first thing you want to do is remove the label.  Next, measure up about 1 1/2 inches from the bottom. Take a sharp knife or utility knife and cut a straight line around the bottle at the   1 1/2  inch mark.  Don’t throw the bottom away your going to use this to hold your pot in.  Place your pot in the bottom piece and then gently slide the top part of the bottle over the bottom piece.

If your having trouble getting the top of the bottle to slide over the bottom use a pair of scissors to cut three vertical lines in the bottom piece, your top should slide over easier now and still fit snugly.  Unscrew the cap or slide the bottom back off if you need to water the plants. I place a little gravel in the bottom of my bottle for drainage and it also lets the plant sit flatter and not as prone to tip from side to side.  All that’s left now is to place your bottles on the windowsill and watch your plants grow.  When it’s time to transplant to the garden save those bottles for next season, they’ll come in handy to start all over again.

I’m sure you’ll enjoy your miniature greenhouse, there’s a lot of satisfaction in starting your own plants from seedlings.

Happy gardening & good luck with that green thumb!!

Materials you’ll need:

• (1) 5 foot piece of 1 x 6 pine or cedar (natural)
• approximately 16 exterior 1 1/2 inch screws or  nails
• (2) 3 inch mounting screws (exterior)
• (1) 4 inch  butt hinge
• 1 1/2 inch paddle bit (for entrance hole)
• 1/4 inch drill bit (for ventilation holes)
• electric or battery drill
• hand saw or electric chopsaw

Once you’ve secured a piece of lumber  you want to make the following cuts.

• 1 floor piece 4 inches  wide by 5 1/2 inches long
• 2 side pieces 5 1/2 inches wide by 9 inches tall
• 1 front piece 5 1/2 inches wide by 9 inches tall
• 1 back piece 5 1/2 inches wide by 14 inches tall
• 1 roof piece 5 1/2 inches wide by 7 1/2 inches long

Once you cut the floor piece clip the corners back 1/4 inch at a 45 degree angle to allow for ventilation and water to drain out should any get inside. Assemble the 2 sides to the floor piece  on the 5 1/2 inch profile then attach the front panel over the sides. Everything should fit flush. Next attach the partially assembled box to the back panel. Leave about 1 1/2 inches of the back panel sticking down below the floor. This will allow you a surface to attach to the tree later on. Now you can put the roof panel in place, secure this with a 4 inch hinge. You can pick up the hinge at any hardware store  for about $3 bucks. You’ll get two hinges in the pack, save the second one for another nest box. The hinge make cleaning each year a lot easier than using screws or pulling nails to get inside.  Once you have the box all assembled  it’s time to drill your entrance hole. This hole will  be 1 1/2 inches wide. Hook your tape measure on the top of the front panel and measure down 1 3/4  inches and measure from the side over 2 3/4 inches .  These two marks will be the center of your hole.  You’ll need a little ventilation on the sides of the box as well. Just under the roof panel on each side drill (2) 1/4 ” wide holes about 3/4 of an inch down.

Now that your box is built you’ll want to paint or stain it … DON’T … It’s best to just leave the box natural with no sealer or paint. Paints and stains can be toxic to birds. Pine can last several years untreated, cedar will give you a longer lasting product but is 3 times more expensive than pine. If you absolutely feel the need to preserve the wood then apply a coat of Raw Linseed Oil, use Raw Linseed Oil only, not boiled; Boiled Linseed Oil contains toxins. Linseed oil takes along time to dry so you should only apply a coat to the exterior in the fall once the birds have left.  Once the linseed oil has soaked into the surface it makes for a very durable wood. Still after saying that it’s a much better idea to leave the wood natural.

Just as important as the dimensions of the house,  maybe even more important, is the placement of the nest box. You can have the nicest Bluebird box but if it isn’t in the right place then you won’t have any Bluebirds nesting in it. Bluebirds prefer open areas with short, low growing vegetation; pastures, mowed lawns, cut fields are all good examples. You should screw the house to a pole, fence post or tree at eye level. If possible place the nest box on the East side of the post or tree to prevent it from overheating inside. Exposed to too much sun the temperature inside the nest box can rise to deadly levels.  That’s one good reason to use natural pine as the light colored wood reflects the sunlight rather than absorbing it as dark colors do. If your placing more than one nest box in the same area make sure they’re at least 100 – 150 yards apart. Bluebirds like most animals are territorial and need their own space.

Now that it’s built and hung, it’s time to sit back, relax and give yourself a pat on the back for helping out Mother Nature. If you’re lucky, you may just be rewarded with a beautiful pair of nesting Bluebirds next spring.  Well done!!

Happy Hiking !!

I stood in silence in the deep snow
bathing in the beauty of my surroundings would be an understatement, I was drowning.
This spot in the woods was just that…a spot. It wasn’t a destination, it didn’t have open vistas, no waterfalls
or colorful leaves………It was just a spot.
Yet that spot held me in its embrace and wouldn’t let go.
Sky the deepest blue,
the river just a whisper, a faint trickle under the ice.
Snow so white it was crisp, sharp like a knife.
Warm air carried the scent of rain.

I tried in vain to capture that moment,
the beauty, the serenity of it all!
A great photographer I’ll never be, yet my mind holds the most vivid pictures I have ever taken.
The colors, the breeze, the aroma…… they’re all there.
A never ending photo album, page after breathtaking page of the most spectacular spots I’ve ever seen.

Few pictures can ever do those moments justice.
Those moments when we realize the perfection of Nature,
of how small we are in this universe. When the simple beauty of the landscape makes you feel …….. complete!

I can never and will never be able to convey the love I felt today.
I’ll never be able to show you the world that I saw, so beautiful, so peaceful, so perfect.
Forever they remain, pictures in my mind.

7:30 a.m. returned home, no truck means the day off, $240.00 in lost time

10:15 a.m sold a stock in my account for a loss of $330.28

10:16 a.m a thought crossed my mind, could the day possibly get any worse? I had already lost $970.28 and it wasn’t even noon yet.

Yes, it was time to get outdoors, I’d had enough. Something about being outside always cheers me up.  I’m not quite sure what it is, the solitude, the wildlife, the scenery, fresh air ……… maybe it’s a mix of them all. Whatever it is, I love it.  I packed my camera bag threw the tripod over my shoulder and headed for the ridge out back. I figured I’d try to get a shot at the deer that bed down in the Balsams seeking a little break from the winter wind.

11:37 a.m. I hit the mother load!….. I found gold.  No… not that shiny yellow stuff that’s really heavy. I mean, you can’t buy anything with this gold but none the less it’s gold to me.  Twenty five yards off the trail of deer tracks I was following something caught my eye. It just didn’t look right,  a little to much shine maybe, the color, or maybe that the point just looked to rounded.

Antler!!

There’s just nothing quite like the excitement of finding a shed antler. If you’ve never experienced it you just wouldn’t understand. Here in the Adirondacks finding a shed amongst all the blow down and fallen pine branches is akin to finding the proverbial needle in the haystack.  So is this one worth $970.28?  No, in dollars it isn’t worth much, you could sell a single shed for maybe 10 bucks on Ebay. I learned long ago that everything doesn’t have a monetary value.  This piece of bone is worth much more than the cash I lost today.  Twenty years from now when I hold that antler in my hands, I’ll look back in my mind and I’ll be 48 again. I’ll be working my way up a that ridge, pulling my collar a little higher to fight the chill, smelling the Balsam that brush against my sleeve. Clearly in my mind it lays there,  a glint of sunlight on the tine. I’ll relive the excitement of my find. I’ll remember, I’ll remember and I’ll  smile.

Today I lost nearly $1,000.00 but I made a memory, a priceless moment that will last forever.  I found a bone, an antler, a piece of nature, an experience. Something money can’t buy and I’m all the richer for it.

Enjoy the Outdoors

Common Evening Primrose, Oenothera biennis

Every living organism, plant or animal belongs to a family. The family name is probably the hardest part to memorize. The second part of a scientific name is the individual species. This part is descriptive. It usually describes a color, trait, location or something of that nature.

In Picea rubens for example Picea is the family name for Spruce and rubens is the Latin word for the color red, hence the common name, Red Spruce.  A species may also be named in honor or recognition of a person.  Mimulus lewisii is a species of monkeyflower named after the famous explorer Meriwether Lewis of the Lewis and Clark expedition.

Many species names will lead you toward the more common name, niger (black), spinosa (spiny), grandifolia (large foliage), canadensis (of Canada), quadrangulata (four sided) and linearis (linear). Those are just several of the hundreds to thousands of scientific names that are in use.

So does it mean your a geek if you know your scientific names? Not at all, in fact it’s quite rewarding to to be able to hear or read some of the terminology and understand what their talking about. Latin isn’t the only language used either. In fact, one of my favorite scientific names of all times has a Japanese origin, Tsuga canadensis.  Go ahead, say it to yourself…… “Tsuga canadensis” ……sounds awesome doesn’t it?  In short you just said Canadian Hemlock.

New England Aster, Aster novae-angliae. Aster is the Family, novae is Latin for new and angliae means english or England

Bottom line is, there’s no need to roll your eyes. Scientific names don’t have to be complex and boring to learn. It’s my guess you’ll actually enjoy using them. So get outside and find me some Solidago, er, ummm    ………..   Goldenrod.   Is that another cool name or what? Solidago, ya gotta luv it!!

Enjoy the Outdoors

MyNature Tree App, it’s good for what ails ya!!

Can you find the antler?

A few years back  I  spotted a huge 10 pt. buck one evening who had just shed his left side that day. I knew it was that day because I had seen him the night before.  I probably spent a total of 40 hours looking for that shed and never found it, to this day I still find myself looking.  While I searched for that shed I passed by another antler at least a dozen times  lying amongst the dead pine branches until I finally saw it. They blend in that well.

A couple of inches of snow can be a big help when shed hunting. Snow does three things for you. One:  it covers most if not all the dead and downed branches. Two: deer are much easier to trail in the snow you can follow their tracks right to their bedding areas  where the probability of finding a shed is the greatest. Three:  dropped antlers show up in fresh snow like a beacon from a lighthouse. On the other hand too much snow especially several inches of light fluffy snowflakes will make it nearly impossible to find a shed.

Your not the only one who’ll be excited to find a shed antler. Rodents and there are many of them love calcium.  It just so happens that antlers are made up of none other than ….. you guessed it, Calcium!  Squirrels, mice, and porcupines, they all love antlers.  If you find an antler that’s been lying around for a while chances are that it has chew marks on it or it has been partially devoured already.

rodent chewed antler

The most important thing about shed hunting to remember is don’t get discouraged. It takes a certain amount of luck to find an antler laying in the middle of nowhere. There are years I turn up empty handed. The great thing is your outdoors with fresh air and sunshine. A little bit of nature goes along way on a winter day.   Enjoy!!

• Plaster of Paris – you can find this at any hardware or home improvement store. It comes in a 5 pound box shaped like a milk carton.  One box is plenty for most tracks.  I carry my plaster in a ziploc freezer bag.
• Cardboard or heavy paper strips to make a dam or enclosure around the track to pour the plaster in. You can just use mud, sticks or rocks and skip carrying the paper strips.
• Spoon or knife for mixing, again you can use a stick and eliminate carrying extra tools and weight.
• Paper clip or picture hanger to insert in the cast if you wish to hang it on a wall.
• Water, you can carry water with you but I always carry 1 or 2 extra ziploc bags to gather my own water after I find a track to cast. I may have to hike a ways to gather water but it’s much easier than carrying extra weight around all day.

The video below will show you step by step on how to plaster cast an animal track.   Enjoy and enjoy the Outdoors!!

Plaster Casting Animal Tracks

Caribou tracks are very distinctive, being nearly round in shape. Their hoof has two toes like other deer but rather than triangular or tear drop in shape each toe on a Caribou is crescent shaped. The overall shape of their foot  allows them to stay up on top of the snow better.   Caribou tracks measures between 4 to 5 inches long.

This track  below shows a good example of a Caribous dew claws which are often present. Their dew claws help them from sinking in the deep snows.

Caribou scat resembles that of most deer. It can either be in a loose pellet form or clumped pellets resulting from from a succulent diet. The scat measures from 1/2 to 5/8 of an inch in diameter.

A Caribous diet depending on the time of year consists of lichens, moss, leaves, grasses and fungi.

One of the few tracks that would overlap the range of Caribou would be that of the Moose. Moose tracks have the more common heart or tear dropped shape to them. There shouldn’t be any confusion in the two just based on their shape.  Moose scat is roughly 3/4 of an inch in diameter and the pellets are around 1 inch long, much larger than the scat of Caribou.

Do you think it’s a male or female in this image?

Yes, it’s a trick question, both sexes have antlers but we’ll  never know which one this is. I didn’t get close enough to find out.

Enjoy the Outdoors !!