Naturally

I was on a trail of discovery as I walked toward the delicious colors of a sunset. I appreciate things in the hopes of being a responsible ancestor. The leaves and the trees have had a falling out. Once, when I was a boy, I thought I saw a mosquito wearing a parka, refusing to give up. I have no photo to document that sighting because I had no camera.

Odds, ends and wonderments

Puffins sound like mini-chainsaws.
The California quail’s main call consists of three syllables and sounds like the bird is saying “Chi-ca-go.”
The collective noun for dippers is a ladle—I guess.
A boreal chickadee sounds like a black-capped chickadee with a head cold.
A bird’s mothering instinct will overcome the scent of a human, no matter when that human last bathed.
The blue-gray gnatcatcher eats spiders, steals insects from spider webs and uses the webs as nesting material.
A fossorial animal is one adapted to living underground, often by digging a burrow and/or tunnel. Examples of fossorial animals are earthworms, ants, moles and pocket gophers. Insects are the most diverse group of animals and many are fossorial.
The Canary Islands weren’t named after the birds; the birds were named after them. Their label comes from the Latin name Canariae Insulae, meaning "Islands of the Dogs." The story is that a Mauretanian king sent an expedition there that found multitudes of large dogs. The Canary Islands had a teeming colony of monk seals known as “sea wolves” by sailors and might have morphed into “sea dogs.”
Iowa State became the Cyclones after the Chicago Tribune noted on September 29, 1895: Struck by a Cyclone It Comes from Iowa and Devastates Evanston Town. “Northwestern might as well have tried to play football with an Iowa cyclone as with the Iowa team it met yesterday. At the end of 50 minutes’ play, the big husky farmers from Iowa’s Agricultural College had rolled up 36 points while the 15-yard line was the nearest Northwestern got to Iowa’s goal.”

Q&A

“What are some predators of the honey bee?” I watched a skunk feed at a hive. Skunks are insect eaters by nature and a bee is a sweet delicacy. When a skunk finds a hive, it scratches at the entrance, causing the bees to come out to investigate. When they do, the skunk snatches them up as a tasty treat. You’ll know skunks have been visiting your hives when you see scratches on the lower parts of the hive and find remnants of bees lying on the ground outside the hive. This is because skunks often suck on a bee, drawing out the bee’s juicy inner parts, and then spitting out the exoskeleton. Skunks also dig up yellowjacket nests to eat larvae and adults. Skunks are able to bear the pain of the stings. Putting a fence around a hive discourages skunks as they aren’t skilled climbers.
Yellowjackets and bald-faced hornets eat dead bees, live bees and honey. Varroa mites, bears, praying mantises, dragonflies, ambush bugs, spiders and many others are predators of honey bees.
  “Are coyotes pack animals?” Coyotes may live as solitary individuals, in pairs or in small family groups, both in rural and urban areas. Their packs are typically much smaller than wolf packs and most often include only family members.
  “Where do spiders go in winter other than into my basement?” In Minnesota, the adults of most spider species die at the end of the summer, while the eggs or immature spiders overwinter. Of the species that overwinter as adults, the largest is the wolf spider.
  “I see swellings on goldenrod stems. What’s going on there?” The round gall is readily seen during the fall and winter, and occurs on several species of goldenrods in Minnesota. The goldenrod gall-fly female punctures the bud of a goldenrod plant and deposits one egg, which hatches and the larva begins to feed. The plant forms a gall in response. In September and October, the larva bores a tunnel from its central cavity to the outer epidermis, leaving a thin skin of tissue in place (this eases the exit of the adult) and then returns to the central cavity where it spends the winter. Pupation occurs during April and the adult fly emerges during the latter half of May to the first part of June and lives 8 to 10 days. The white grubs make excellent bait for ice fishing, and chickadees and downy woodpeckers feed on the larvae.

Thanks for stopping by

“It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood.”—Karl Popper.
“Someone needs to explain to me why wanting clean drinking water makes you an activist and why proposing to destroy water with chemical warfare doesn't make a corporation a terrorist.”—Winona LaDuke.
Do good.

©️Al Batt 2022

Bobcats are long-legged animals with bobbed tails. They have a white patch on the back of their ears. Photo by Al Batt.