saw this stunning American bald eagle perched in a tree along the Delaware

and these beautiful ringneck pheasants in a field nearby

Such gorgeous weather this weekend, perfect for a walk in the woods. The wild turkey and deer abound; half a dozen turtles are sunning themselves on an old log in the lake; and the musical cackle of migrating geese fills the air. Even if you don’t live in the country, I hope these photos inspire you to drive to a nearby forest or visit your local park to take in a few of the sights and sounds of this glorious season.

a snake basks in the late afternoon sun

wasps were crawling in and around this bit of nest

nearby was this mud dauber nest resembling a pipe organ

mud daubers like to feast on orb weavers like the one below

this one is slightly different from the one we saw on our house last fall

witch hazel’s spindly yellow blossoms are often the last spot of color visible in the woods

this puffball is one of many mushrooms that pop up after the rain

i need to get better at identifying these fungi

this is a milkweed pod on its way to drying out

when they burst open, the seeds fly away on a mass of incredibly silky floss

breaking open a cattail reveals another kind of soft fluff

it instantly expands into a mass of ethereal flyaway seeds

so much beauty, such intense and fleeting colors

roger tory peterson and a young osprey    photo by alfred eisenstaedt

I had my first guest-post on a kindred spirit’s blog this week. The visionary Peter Buchanan-Smith honored me with a feature on his fascinating blog, Best Made Projects. We share an interest in the natural world, so when he asked me to review a field guide, I chose one by the naturalist and early environmentalist Roger Tory Peterson (seen above holding a movie camera mounted on a gun stock). Peter has kindly allowed me to re-post my review in its entirety here.

FIELDING QUESTIONS: A Review of Roger Tory Peterson Field Guides – Eastern Forests

Returning home to Sullivan County from the stinky summer streets of New York City brings a surge of relief and gratitude: the cool night air filled with the rustle of leaves and the throbbing drone of cicadas is a tonic. The woods I now call home are not the same as those I grew up with in the Santa Cruz mountains of California. Fog-shrouded sequoias and wild surf are here replaced with blazing summers and snowy winters among the hawthorn, hickory, maple and pine. The Steller’s jay of my youth is now the equally brazen blue jay of my mid-life. The fence around our small property does little to keep out all the critters that also live here, and long rambles on our kind neighbor’s thousand acres have led to countless discoveries, animal, mineral and botanical.

How then to begin to understand all these natural wonders? Each season brings uniquely intriguing sights and sounds, its own miraculous unfoldings. Where to turn to identify this orange amphibian, that proliferating fern, the eerie sound of that night creature?

There is no more reliable and exhaustive source than Roger Tory Peterson (1908–1996). An American naturalist, ornithologist, artist and educator, he was one of the founding inspirations for the 20^th-century environmental movement. No one of the past century has done more to promote an interest in living creatures. In 1934, he published the first modern field guide, his seminal Guide to the Birds. It sold out its first printing of 2‚000 copies in one week, and went through 5 subsequent editions. His detailed paintings and simplified method of identifying birds helped the layman become familiar with species through their easily observed “field marks,” rather than by the old “bird in the hand” method, thus replacing the shotgun with binoculars as the birder’s instrument of choice. Soon, his techniques were applied to all manner of flora and fauna.

My green leather-bound, gilt-edged Roger Tory Peterson Field Guides Eastern Forests – North America (written by John C. Kricher, illustrated by Gordon Morrison and edited by the master himself) is a boon companion through all seasons. As the winter snows melted this year, I opened my book to “Patterns of Spring,” and headed into the forest to the vernal pools where spotted salamanders lay their jelly-like egg masses. I discovered that the small red efts crawling on the woodland floor on early summer mornings were in their interim terrestrial stage—an adaptation that helps them disperse—and would have an unpleasant “peppery” taste designed to repel predators. I returned to the book to positively identify what turned out to be yellow-bellied sapsuckers drilling away at our old lichen-covered maple, and to learn more about the wily woodchuck that has attacked our vegetable garden two years running.

The first chapter acknowledges that “everyone begins to use a field guide by thumbing through the pages and looking at the plates of illustrations,” and, indeed, this 1988 edition has beautiful visuals that do justice to their subjects. But what’s genius about this particular field guide is that it places emphasis on the way plants and animals interact together, so you really gain an understanding of what a habitat entails. You learn the differences between a Boreal Bog (a wet, mossy place) and a Northern Hardwood Forest (full of Sugar Maple, White Pine and Eastern Hemlock) in terms of who lives there and what they eat.

Why is this good? Why do male juncos winter farther north than females? Why do some spider webs have thick zigzag strands? Why don’t herbivores eat all the leaves? Why ask why? For the answers to these and other pressing questions on the natural world, I refer you directly to Roger Tory Peterson Field Guides Eastern Forests – North America, which is laden with “Observations and Explanations,” and from whence came this illuminating statement:

“Why-type questions are ultimate-type questions. They identify the most  interesting aspects of natural history, those of adaptation and survival. The answers to ultimate-type questions reveal the actual fabric that holds nature together. Being able to ask and answer ultimate questions about natural history adds a new and powerful dimension to your understanding of nature.”

I’ve always been into birds. Where I grew up, in Santa Cruz, California, we had lots of bossy Stellar blue jays, noisy woodpeckers, seagulls, and hummingbirds that drank from our bottlebrush bushes. But I developed a great passion for spotting birds when we were in India. Gliding along the backwaters of Kerala in the South, binoculars glued to my face, I saw some truly exotic beauties—tiny, vividly colored kingfishers, long-legged herons, split-tailed drongos—and I was hooked! My girlfriend Lisa and I even kept a list of our sightings. It was truly a thrill to watch it grow. With the advent of spring, and G’s frequent replenishment of our feeders, our yard is full of bluejays, mourning doves (I adore their sorrowful coos), waxwings, red-breasted robins and lots of other little brown birds I have yet to identify. And on our forays beyond, we’ve encountered many others, such as the enormous turkey vulture, above. The fringe-like quality of its wings makes it easily identifiable, and they’re often circling in groups of three or four. This weekend we saw one hunched over a dead deer at the side of the road. They’re rather ugly, these carrion-eaters, and yet they have their place in the cycle.

We saw an osprey just like this one, heading toward its nest with a fish dangling from its claws, all set to feed its little ones.

And on Saturday, G and I went for a hike and had the most fun watching a yellow-bellied sapsucker just like this one. It wriggled its way into a small, perfectly round hole about 7ft up the trunk of a rather small tree and then we heard the frantic chirping of its babies inside! A little while later, both mom and dad flew out, presumably on their way to collect more insects—or whatever their brood eats. I’m not even sure why these encounters fill me with such excitement and delight. There is just something so beautiful about seeing wildlife in its element; you feel so privileged to be a part of it all.

I am grief-stricken. Here are just some of the innocent creatures currently dying because of the gulf oil spill: Birds, Reptiles & Amphibians, Fish, Invertebrates, Habitats & Plants, Wetlands, Marine Mammals and Terrestrial Mammals, including but not limited to pelicans, sea otters, tortoises,  seals, shrimp, oysters, plankton, sea gulls, plovers, algae, turtles,  dolphins, egrets, insects, crabs, herons, fish, manatees, sea lions, whales, jellyfish, porpoises. This is an outrage and a tragedy: one that could have and should have been avoided. And yet further evidence that this country must turn away from fossil fuel consumption and toward a future of alternative energy sources.

This weekend was full of interesting animal friends. Pulling off the road to get a closer look at some baby geese, we wound up near a swampy pond where we saw a big osprey nest poised on top of a tall, limbless dead tree. With the binoculars, we could just make out the top of somebody’s head and then, sure enough, mama (or daddy?) came swooping in with a big fish dangling from its talons! And just then, lumbering across the field and heading straight for the water was this big dame—a snapping turtle with a long tail like an alligator’s, big beady eyes and plenty of attitude. She must have weighed about 20+ pounds, but they can get up to 45!

Nearby were several spots like these; her little ones had hatched and moved on. Snapping turtles can lay up to 83 eggs at a time.

Just as we were about to drive off, we spotted the most brilliant flash of blue—the Eastern bluebird!  This feathered friend has fallen into decline in the last couple of decades, so we were thrilled to catch a glimpse of its vivid plumage.

You won’t believe this, but there was ANOTHER bear in the yard and this one was ENORMOUS. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get a picture because it was night. (This one is an approximation I pulled off the web.) We came home late and I was puttering in the kitchen when I heard some loudish crashing noises outside. Thinking it was G, I called out to him but he was in the bedroom, on the other side of the house! He immediately ran over with the night-vision goggles (the best birthday present I ever got him) and spied a huge bear UP IN THE TREE behind our house. It was trying to pry open our metal bird-feeder to get at the black sunflower seeds we’ve since learned are a bear favorite. (The feeder is now dismantled. Sorry, Tweety.) Then I looked through the goggles and was TERRIFIED! The bear was looking right at me and, because of the night vision, his eyes were like big green saucers. My heart was pounding and it didn’t help that the sister-in-law was giving me a blow-by-blow over the phone of how a bear broke into David Letterman’s house and ripped the door off his fridge. WTF? Our house started to feel like a cardboard shack. G said the bear was over 7 feet tall!!! But eventually it scrambled down and lumbered away, and later I fell so sound asleep I didn’t even hear it come back in the middle of the night. Good thing G stays on the alert…

Is this not the cutest thing you have ever seen? A baby hedgehog! I was beside myself. Could not resist posting a couple of photos from nephew Stan’s 4th birthday party. Aside from baby hedgehog and the enormous (20+ lbs) python below, there was an angora rabbit, a skink (very cool), a tortoise, a chinchilla, some guinea pigs, giant cockroaches (gag) and various other lizards. A good time was had by all, big and small.

I was minding my own business, sitting in my little study, and happened to glance out the window in time to see this dude ambling across the lawn. Naturally my heart began to pound like mad! I was actually on the phone at the time (with a client) but threw it down and went charging to the front door with my iphone. I actually opened the door and stepped out as I wanted to get a good shot for G (diehard bear fan, I knew he would be crushed to miss this) and the bear—a teen, and male, I think, for no good reason—locked eyes with me and froze for a good 30 seconds before turning and loping down the hill. I’m not ashamed to say I was deeply thrilled.

Last weekend we took our houseguests exploring in the woods behind our house. The air was fresh and clean, the sun was shining, the woodpeckers were tapping out a beat and there were plenty of newts and tadpoles to ogle. It’s amazing to think that just a couple hours out of the city you can be an entire world away. (Or at the designer outlets at Woodbury Commons, for that matter.) The last photo, of the snake, was actually taken in our front yard. The first garden snake of the season…