April 2006 part 2
April 10 we went south for a long weekend and got a preview of spring, though we won't get forsythia uphere. Sunny day, and into the 50s, with a good breeze from the west. At the land I got down to White Swamp, to the inlet, and I could see right away that the swamp's water level was higher,
might even say it was getting full. When I got down to the inlet, I saw that the otter scent mound had been leveled, but there were otter scats on some mud which it seemed like the beavers had recently pushed up, forming a bank where the water from the inlet runs into the swamp.
Don't know why they'd want to make the channel there deeper. It is already about two feet deep. Out on the mound of grass where the otter scent mound had been, there were relatively fresh scats,
and another smaller, scent mound, a little off to the side. The curious things is that while it appears that beavers and otters have been here, the water in the swamp is very clear. You'd think the water flowing in would be muddy anyway and the animal activity making it muddier. I checked the dam which still leaks, but the water is backed up and the beavers have been gnawing on a trunk cut down into the water. The peepers were still singing on the land, but it was cold last night and windy all day, so they did not seem as loud.
I was anxious to tour the park ponds to see if otters had visited, so I did that before dinner. No signs of otters along the South Bay trail. I did flush a heron at the end of the north cove, and then flushed a muskrat who swam up the bay along the shore. It paused briefly in a bit of cattails and I got the camcorder on it but didn't press record because it looked like a stray chunk of wood -- then it dove and continued swimming. It went under the dock, but continued swimming up the bay. There was a beaver scent mound there, just up from the water -- not too fresh. No signs of otters. I went to the East Trail Pond first and flushed two pairs of wood ducks and a pair of mallards. Pond getting low. As I sat above the Second Swamp Pond two large raft of ducks flew off, but two male and one female bufflehead remained. I tried to figure out the males' flying about. One seemed to be after the other, but neither seemed that protective of the female. Nothing new on the beaver lodge, and as I crossed the dam, even though the water level is high, I saw only tentative beaver mud work.
Then when I crossed the center spill over, which was leaking, I saw that the beavers did a more credible job on the other major leak.
No otter signs on the dam, and actually not that much fresh beaver nibblings. While this dam seems a bit ragged, the dam on the other side of the pond looks perfect, and the Upper Second Swamp Pond brims the dam and swells into the brush. Still not that much fresh beaver nibblings along the dam.
There were bugs in the air and several swallows over the Second Swamp Pond. Smiling at that returning pleasure, I cocked my camcorder going up to the Lost Swamp Pond, as a blue jay welcomed me, hoping to get a fleeing bufflehead or hooded mergansers, shows soon coming to an end as they go north, but there were not any ducks on the pond. One goose kept a respectful distance from the lodge in the pond, and the goose on that was so well camoflaged that I couldn't see it. The dam is leaking, and not much fresh beaver packed mud either. It crossed my mind that beavers might have moved out. Last year the beavers seemed to always be swimming behind the dam, even this early in the evening. I saw one freshly stripped log there. Then at the moss cove, I could see more beaver work, lying on the pond bottom along the shore.
Then as I continued walking around I saw delicate little nibblings,
and what looked like a path up the slope. I followed that to where the beavers had been trimming and stripping a large maple branch that fell off a tree.
I was quite impressed at how smoothly some of the branches were trimmed, almost like a saw did it.
Are some beavers living in the bank lodge and coming up to this convenient meal? I looked at the lodge they lived in during the winter through my spyglass, and saw no fresh work up there. I did see a muskrat swimming along the shore, and then climbing up on a log and doing some rather busy grooming. Muskrat jaws are rather rapid and when muskrat paws clean muskrat jaws they appear to stroke just as rapidly. This muskrat had a nice fluidity to its grooming, not so stop and go and stolid as a beaver's grooming. When it got back in the water it made a point of keeping its groomed back dry, at least for a little while, as its jaws went a mile a minute into a clump of submerged grass. On the Big Pond, I saw a hooded merganser and a bufflehead, not quite together, and the bufflehead flew off. The beavers have not done much to the dam, just a little mud there, but there is plenty of water in the pond. The redwinged blackbirds have claimed their nooks in the marsh, and perhaps the same bird I bother every year at this end of the dam, complained.
Even after not seeing otter signs I held out hope of finding some here -- one year I thought the otter marked off this valley specially as it neglected its other latrines around the other ponds. But, no sign of otters. Then when I got home to check my e-mail, I learned that Jeff had seen one otter fishing at 11 am between Murray, Picton and Maple islands! The otter came up with a fish and, from the shore, Jeff got this photo of it eating,
When a boat came, the otter swam into a boathouse and Jeff heard chirping. So an otter is around, and where I expected them to be.
April 11 full day at the land, supposedly working. Of course I took several breaks, or more accurately, as the day got too warm, I took breaks from watching the spring to do some work. First I went up to the Turtle Bog where I didn't see a turtle. A few wood frogs cackled then clammed up when I got there. I looked for caddisfly larva but saw none. There were small flies low over the pond, and a busy back and forth of crows, ravens, and red squirrels. I heard one weird call but with ravens around.... I walked around the Bunny Bog which is quite full, and thanks to its having a cocked in its boldly craning yellow neck, I spied a Blanding's turtle up in some roots above the water and below the still bare branches of the bushes, though in the busy photo it hardly shows up. As I tangled twigs to get a better angle, it slipped into the water, probably a female since males are often impervious to surrounding antics. To get back to the cabin, I tired to back track to see if a Blandings might have come out at the Turtle Bog. A pair of mallards flew over my head and crashed into the Turtle Bog, neither noticing me. They were close for a violent moment, that I didn't quite see. Then with the drake grumbling under the female's forthright quakes, I watched. He wiggled his tail a bit, and drank some water in a pleasing way. This continued and they swam a bit more, still apart, but with less tension I thought. I turned back. They seemed to have a nice story going. During my next break I sat by the Teepee Pond where I had seen so many scorpion water bugs. None of them today. But a beetle climbed out on a rock,
and a spider swim into the shore where I was sitting.
And I noticed holes into the grassy ground that soon found water, and there were holes in the moist bank.
I think something was digging up and out -- a water shrew? Too small for muskrat holes. For my last break I went down to White Swamp, first sitting high on the ridge, taking my shoes off, and measuring the expanse by the ducks I saw swimming around and the turtles on logs. I saw one quite reddish. Another turtle swam up to it, poked its head out, and fled. I wish I could tell where the rails and snipes, I think, were calling from but their loud calls are hard to pinpoint. They are so well concealed in the clumps of brush. An osprey flew low over the pond, and something leapt into the water just when it hovered over a cul de sac of a channel. The osprey perched; something small swam by unmolested, perhaps a muskrat, then the osprey flew off. A heron flew over the same area later, but perched near another cul de sac. Then I checked the otter latrine, and for the first time, I don't think I saw anything new, and that prompted me to check the inlet again. No otter signs there either, but there was a new stick leaning near the beaver scent mound.
And I keep seeing the stumps of cut saplings. Evidently the beaver makes a great show of taking the sapling to its prominent scent mound and eating there. On the way over the ridge I saw my first hepaticas, what a sight as they poke out of the dry brown leaves.
I should add that up on our land, off the Bunny Bog, I was quite taken by the pink hue of the fresh bark of a birch,
and the bark itself would be like a flower if it didn't seem to be stapled on the tree.
The flying insects are beginning to hover.
April 12 calm river so I was off to check the Picton and Murray island latrines. I slowed down where Jeff saw the otter, but there were only buffleheads around. As I approached the Picton latrine I could see that the otter scratching in the pine and dirt was lower on the rock slope.
I docked the boat in the usual spot and fancied I was following the otters' path as I walked up the rocks and then skirted pine tree branches low over the rock, and the pine needles and dirt seemed shaped like otters may have slid down the rock.
I found old scats and then a fresh one, perhaps from that morning, a few feet above the lowest commotion.
Then I climbed the rock and took the high road over to the point of the rocks, but I noticed that the dirt behind the pine with the old swinging rope had been dug up.
I found scats there too, some fresh enough for beetles.
At first look the old latrine just above the point of rocks seemed unused, but there were scats and digging. The otters found a different path up. There were little flecks of scat on some of the rocks. At first blush, it seemed that more than one otter had to have done all this, but there were not any piles of poop. It was as if three or four otters had divvied up the whole point with each romping up and down separate paths. I kept flushing a heron that couldn't get enough of the rocky shore. I motored over to the Murray Island rock and saw no digging from the boat, and I saw no fresh, nor very recent scats on the rock. There were about six geese swimming near the rock, parting as I came and left. I also saw a school of perch swimming by. As I cruised down the north shore of Murray going towards the Narrows, I saw something dive beside one of the docks, and saw that it was an otter. I didn't get a very good video. The otter fished next to the dock and probably got something because it surfaced. Then I got too close and it dove.
I drifted past the dock and could hear the otter under it. There was a splash, and then some purring chuckles, and one very brief screech. On Saturday Jeff had followed the otter until it went into a boathouse, and he heard chirping. Since otters usually chirp to each other, I thought that might mean there were two otters, though Jeff only heard one. Otters usually chuckle to each other too, but I only saw one otter and when I went up to the dock and heard the otter up in the rock crib under the dock, it sounded like there was only one otter. I bid it goodbye. My guess is that it is a one year old, and somewhat confused. I noticed a large flock of bufflehead flying high, maybe they are getting ready to leave.
I didn't venture too far afield at the land. I checked the bog high on the ridge, and it was quiet. There were wood frogs in the bogs at the end of the valley. There was enough water for a pair of wood ducks, who flew off, but I saw surprised to see how much of the boggy area was drying out.
We need rain, but despite afternoon winds and clouds, we only got a sprinkling. While I was sawing logs by the Teepee Pond, a kingfisher flew over and cackled at me. Good to see it back -- and as far as I can tell the pond is teeming with shiners. I see them swimming near the surface.
April 13 rain last night, but not much, cloudy and cool in the morning. Then the sun came out and striking white clouds hurried across the blue sky. I crossed the golf course and took the second vally down to the Big Pond, probably for the last time this year as the golf course will soon open. Of course the attractions this time of year are the frogs. I heard chorus comb frogs scratching away just off the golf course, at the top of the valley and at the bottom. I tried to get to the Big Pond without scaring the ducks, especially after I saw that the widgeons were there, but all but one pair of buffleheads fled before I could get close. I sat at my perch for twenty minutes, following my policy of giving muskrats time to materialize. After 15 minutes I saw one floating in the middle of the pond. I lost sight of it, then when I crossed the dam I saw it balled up in some shallow water.
The beavers have not repaired the dam, but have been by to dollop some mud on the dam and push a rock up on it. I thought the widgeons flew over to the Lost Swamp Pond, but I didn't see them when I got there, and some mergansers flew off before I could get settle. Then I saw a muskrat and it swam to the same log in the water and groomed just like the muskrat I saw there a few days ago, at about the same time, too. But today it only groomed for a minute or two then swam into shallower water to nibble. Then I saw another muskrat swimming over from the north side of the dam. When it got in front of me, it splashed and turned around and swam back, then thought better of it and swam in front of me again, stopped and sniffed the air. I first thought it was reacting to the other muskrat nearby, then thought it might have reacted to me (wind at my back), but then the other muskrat swam toward it and the newcomer swam quickly back to the north side of the pond. These muskrats are peaceful compared to the contretemps I've seen here in other years. I checked for fresh beaver work up from the bank lodge, and saw nothing certainly new. However, in the water, near the lodge was a chunky, stripped log that wasn't there the last time I was here.
Still there are no scent mounds around, and no fresh mud on the dam. Walking around to the dam, I saw a dead duck, common merganser, I thought, but I didn't see an orange beak. And I wasn't about to touch it to make a positive identification.
Not far from the duck, I saw some striking poop, like a fox had eaten Frosty the Snowman and left this token.
Having seen the otter off Murray Island yesterday, acting so much at home and reminding me of the young otter I saw in the ponds three years ago who seemed so content to stay put in the ponds. All to say, a young otter is most comfortable where it was raised, and the otter pups this year were mostly raised in the bays and marshes. So I didn't expect to see otter signs around the pond and I didn't. To get a better chance to see the ducks on the Second Swamp Pond, I crossed the pond by tiptoeing below and upon the seemingly razor thin Upper Second Swamp Pond dam.
I was struck by two things -- how far the pond now stretches behind the dam and how strong the logs and sticks firming up the dam behind the spillway are.
Which didn't prevent me from getting my feet wet. Good as the dam is, it can't keep back enough water because it is completely waterlogged and sweats, making all the ground below it soggy. When I got to the other side of the pond, I checked the ash the beavers had cut a few weeks ago, and was surprised to see only one branch taken. Is this food on a shelf, or simply forgotten? When I got in the shade above the Second Swamp Pond bank lodge, three ducks remained, a male bufflehead and what looked like two females. The make stayed right next to one female as if he feared the other female would lure her away. I seldom see a female duck not being courted at this time of year. There are midges all over now, and I was surprised not to see swallows. I did get a photo of a midge. I noticed its furry antennae, indicating, I think, that it is a male, but that didn't come out well in the photo.
Last year this was a good pond for peepers and chorus frogs, but only sporadic sounds today. Then I headed for Meander Pond and at Thicket Pond on the way, not only did I hear a thick chorus from both peepers and western chorus frogs (I left the leopard frog snoring at the East Trail Pond) but the water was muddy. Some beavers have moved back to Thicket Pond. I saw a maple down and four oaks girdled,
one was an old job from two years ago resumed.
The dam had been repaired, which is an easy job because the dam is nothing but a heave of mud about eight feet long. No sign that they are in the lodge, but some probably are because there was no wet path coming up from Meander Pond. I sat by that pond, not really expecting to see beavers or muskrats, but in awe of the frogs. Here peepers predominated and I could still hear chorus frogs behind me. Then I checked to see if beavers were still active around Meander Pond. I saw an oak log, cut last year but stripped recently.
Then there was an ash, cut last year and just stripped.
And I saw fresh mud on the dam.
Last spring these beavers were often out in the day, but there was no sign of them as I walked around the pond. Now that I am not so obsessed with finding otters in the ponds, I can relax and try to figure out what this creative colony is up to. They live in a small world, but of all the colonies I watch they are most adept at bringing down big trees. I headed home at 6pm -- no otter signs around South Bay.
April 14 we arranged batter boards and strings for our new little house on the land, but first I sawed logs. Going up the road to the Teepee Pond, I heard two or three pine warblers contending up in the pines. One was north of the road and two were south of it. These birds have an insistent chipping call, but today they seemed vehement. At the same time I heard a flicker yukking it up off in our woods. Quiet at the Teepee Pond, but I noticed a wood duck flying down from the trees for a second time -- perhaps there's a nest up there. I heard the kingfisher but didn't see it, and I saw a crow chasing a raven with the latter making an indescribable whine of disdain. Around the cabin, chickadees were contesting for holes; a brown creeper was about, and phoebes preparing a nest as in other years. Leslie thinks she heard a towhee. After work, I went down to commune with White Swamp. I stopped to check the Deep Pond dam on the way. The pond is higher than I expected because grasses are clogging the inlet cutting the flow to a quarter of what it was.
I suspect that muskrats are pulling up some of the grasses from the bottom because I now see a clear brown trail coming out from the muskrat burrows at the end of the dam.
Going down the drier valley to White Swamp -- a high valley as it were, I saw the leaves of a trillium stretching up
and then the green leaves of leeks.
I also saw some spring beauties but the photo I took didn't capture their magic -- the wind was blowing them. When I got down to the cove that the valley opens into, two wood ducks flew off. I noticed a beaver stripped stick in the water. On the other side of the cove is a large beaver scent mound, just perceptible in the photo below.
Otters also scat over there. Then I sat high on the ridge above the cove, nestled in some ferns and moss, and below there was a growing beaver scent mound along the shore.
This cove must be a significant place for beavers, but none were about. So I leaned back on a rock and enjoyed the duck periginations and flappings, punctuated by the hidden calls of snipes and rails, and the more obvious rencountres of geese. Along with the usual wood ducks, mallards and common mergansers, I noticed a mating pair of ring necked ducks. I had been assuming the most of the swamp had some depth, say, at least a foot deep, then I saw a mallard standing in water up to its ankles. The mallards seemed the most active, with the male of one pair continually harrassed by a half dozen other males, at times swimming up close behind and at times letting him move off and then flying in noisily and landing right beside him. The pair remained together. I saw one heron, and perhaps the osprey again in the distance. The gulls seem to have gone. Then I went down to where the inlet creek from the Deep Pond flows into the swamp.
The beavers had left more sticks on their mound commanding this cove. There didn't seem to be any new otter scats. The beavers had done a little work on the channel coming down from the dam, but the dam continues to leak liberally, and I couldn't be certain that they took any sapling from the valley behind the dam. There are still plenty closer to their scent mound. I use the plural pronoun out of hope that there are several beavers, but, of course, one could have managed all the activity I've seen. It started to rain which inspired some peepers to sing. I think the frogs here are primarily night callers now. Hopefully we'll check that out soon.
April 15 cool and cloudy with a pretty good breeze. We went off at about three to hear the frogs at the Thicket Pond. Some were singing, comb frogs predominating and a few peepers and leopard frogs, but not as good as two days ago. But today a robin was singing sweetly. Then I headed off to check on the beaver work along the north shore of Meander Pond. The beavers have worked on the Thicket Pond dam and one big heave of mud suggested that a beaver bellied over the dam to get back to Meander Pond.
Then I noticed that the beavers had made a muddy channel heading back to their old canal where they were girdling two white oaks.
This was picking up on unfinished business from two years ago. Then I inspected the winter's work along the north shore of Meander Pond.
The more recent stripping of the downed red oaks was a bit rosier but it was hard to tell how recently the beavers have been working there.
But using the rosier is newer rule, it seemed like they had resumed stripping a maple trunk that had been one of the first they cut for winter food. The lodge in the background seemed decorated with freshly stripped sticks, and grass is greening in the pond.
There was new work up the slope. These beavers begin their cuts on the up side of the slope which probably assures that the trunk will fall toward the water. Plus the beaver had gone up the rocks to girdle two oaks at the foot of the granite cliff.
As usual along with this bold work there was gnawing on roots under last years girdling
Yet the pond did not seem muddy at all, unlike the Thicket Pond. Have to get a look at the beavers here. There was a bit of a roar from leopard frogs in the Short cut trail meadow. No signs of beavers coming down there. This had been a much bigger pond, ten times the size of Thicket Pond. Yet the beavers return to the strange little pond -- they don't eat the button bushes that form the thickets that will give dense shade in the summer, but they find enough to eat since this is the third time in seven years that they've returned to that small pond. At first glance Audubon Pond seemed quiet save for the female goose grazing in the grass while the male stood guard. Then I saw a beaver on the western shore, low in the grass, perhaps grazing. Soon the beaver looked lower, like it was sleeping. It was a little after 4 pm so it crossed my mind that this beaver was an interloper just come up from South Bay and getting rest and sustenance before the resident beavers woke up and drove it away. I sat on the bench long enough to watch the geese swim over and the female shake her tail, climb up on the lodge, preen a bit, and then sit.
Then I decided to try to sneak up on the sleeping beaver. I paused to photograph an old ash, ice damaged eight years ago, that had survived years of beaver foraging, until now.
The beavers here have always been fond of ash but always took trees farther away from the lodge. Before I got half way to the beaver, it woke up
and swam into the pond. I continued walking around, and then as the beaver swam off a muskrat swam toward me. Of course it wasn't interested in the sticks the beaver had been nibbling on. The beaver went close enough to the lodge to convince me that it was quite at home and then it weaved back toward me punctuating its approach with tail slaps. I got a blurry photo of its tail cocking up.
The beaver came within 20 yards and swam hard across my bow with chin high and hard in the water. I retreated and left it in peace. Otters had scarcely crossed my mind, but, of course, I checked the latrine high over the entrance to South Bay and there was a new scat.
not fresh until I flipped it over. This was a hard scaly scat so the otters haven't started eating the bullheads yet. Another scat nearby was so dry that I could pick out the bones and scales and I thought a bit of shell, but on closer examination it appeared to be a delicately shaped bone. On the same ridge as the latrine I saw a girdled elm with big gnaws so I thought a beaver did it, but it was hard to picture one climbing up just for that.
I had seen similiar girdling by the docking rock, and when I got down there to check for otter scats, I saw that a beaver had done that, girdling had given way to a cut. There were no new scats at the docking rock nor the other latrines. At the end of the cove, a goose had its head down in the grass,
a graceful, touching attempt to hide. Those other spring beauties, the little flowers, are out too.
by Bob ArnebeckCheck out my other web pages: otters; beavers; minks; muskrats;porcupines;Leslie's art