Podcast: Wild About Utah

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Acorn Woodpeckers

Acorn Woodpecker Melanerpes formicivorus Courtesy US FWS, Gary Kramer, Photographer
Acorn Woodpecker
Melanerpes formicivorus
Courtesy US FWS,
Gary Kramer, Photographer

My first encounter with an acorn woodpecker occurred many years ago in California, a species unknown to me. I was surprised to find a small flock of these comedic looking birds- most unusual for woodpeckers, which are generally solitary other than with mates or young. And those startling yellow eyes!
On a recent West Rim trek in Zion N.P., to my delight, I got a second encounter near Potato Hollow. Their loud, sharp calls first alerted me. I paused to find the source, and was startled to see who it was, unaware they existed in our state.

Acorn woodpeckers live in large groups, hoard acorns, and breed cooperatively. These woodpeckers live in oak and mixed oak-evergreen forests on slopes and mountains in the Southwest and West Coast. They are found infrequently in the south end of our state. They’re tolerant of humans, and occur in towns where there are acorns and suitable places to store them.
If more than one female in a colony breeds, they lay eggs in the same nest cavity. When egg-laying is not synchronized, females often destroy each other’s eggs. In-synch egg-layers, however, produce a clutch totaling three to seven eggs. Although this behavior seems counterproductive, it may be beneficial, resulting in all chicks being roughly the same age and size. Several different individuals of each sex may breed within one family, with up to seven breeding males and three breeding females in one group.

All members of the colony share in incubation duties, and all pitch in to feed the chicks when they hatch. Young adults remain with their parents for several years to help raise successive broods, but eventually disperse to other territories. Nesting groups can contain up to ten offspring helpers. These breeding coalitions are typically closely related. The males are often brothers, and the females are usually sisters. Inbreeding is rare, however, meaning that co-breeders of the opposite sex are almost never related.

All members of an Acorn Woodpecker group spend large amounts of time storing acorns. typically stored in holes drilled into a single tree, called a granary tree. One granary tree may have up to 50,000 holes, each of which is generally filled with an acorn by autumn.

When any protective group of woodpeckers experiences a death or disruption to the hierarchy, nearby birds rush to the area and fight for access to the trove; these fights also attract woodpecker audiences who leave their own territories to witness the battles.

In 1923, American ornithologist William Leon Dawson called the dapper Acorn Woodpecker “our native aristocrat.” “He is unruffled by the operations of the human plebs in whatever disguise…Wigwams, haciendas, or university halls, what matter such frivolities, if only one may go calmly on with the main business of life, which is indubitably the hoarding of acorns.”

Jack Greene for Bridgerland Audubon Society and I’m totally wild about Utah and its acorns!

Credits:

Nest Picture: Courtesy US FWS, Gary Kramer, Photographer, https://digitalmedia.fws.gov/digital/collection/natdiglib/id/2755/rec/3
Audio: Courtesy and Copyright Kevin Colver, https://wildstore.wildsanctuary.com/collections/special-collections/kevin-colver
Text: Jack Greene, Bridgerland Audubon, https://bridgerlandaudubon.org/
Additional Reading: Lyle W Bingham, Webmaster, and Jack Greene, Author, Bridgerland Audubon, https://bridgerlandaudubon.org/

Additional Reading:

Acorn Woodpecker Overview, All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Cornell University, https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Acorn_Woodpecker/overview

Acorn Woodpeckers, Species, Utah Division Wildlife Resources, Utah Department of Natural Resources, State of Utah, https://fieldguide.wildlife.utah.gov/?species=melanerpes%20formicivorus [Link updated January 2024]

DAWSON, William Leon, Islapedia, Santa Cruz Island Foundation(SCIF), https://www.islapedia.com/index.php?title=DAWSON,_William_Leon

Webinar: Adaptations of Acorn Woodpeckers with Sahas Barve, National Museum of Natural History, Science How, Smithsonian Institution, https://naturalhistory.si.edu/education/teaching-resources/life-science/webinar-adaptations-acorn-woodpeckers-sahas-barve

Murtaugh, Paul, Granary Tree Image, Oregon State University, sites.science.oregonstate.edu/~murtaugp/photos/jan2017/p12.html [Link broken and removed January 2024]

When It Comes to the Family Granary, an Acorn Woodpecker’s Work Is Never Done by BirdNote, Podcast, National Audubon, September 23, 2019, https://www.audubon.org/news/when-it-comes-family-granary-acorn-woodpeckers-work-never-done [Added January 2024]

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Responsible Pet Ownership

Responsible Pet Ownership: Cat Courtesy Pixabay Genocre, photographer
Cat
Courtesy Pixabay
Genocre, photographer
Our Homes, Our Pets, and Our Natural Environment: Supporting Coexistence through Responsible Pet Ownership.

Nature perseveres in even the most built environment. The cycle of life continues, in our parks, our backyards, and the green spaces in between. Hawks hunt for rodents, rodents forage for seeds, and both seek out mates, no matter how temporary.

We rarely pause to consider how the ‘wildlife’ we bring with us impacts the natural world around us. Our dogs, from stoic german shepherds to the fluffiest toy poodle, are descended from wolves. Our cats, distant relatives of the middle eastern wildcat, are arguably semi-domesticated, after only 12,000 years of human intervention. Perhaps in another 12,000 years the common house cat will be as perky and eager to please as the average golden retriever, but I doubt it.

No matter how loving, our pets are descendants of great predators and they have the ability to negatively impact the fragile ecological balance that persists around us. Some simple commitments allow us to continue to coexist. First, spay and neuter your pets. Unplanned litters contribute to animal shelter crowding and stray populations. Intact pets are also more likely to roam, and to disturb and harm wildlife.

Second, maintain control of your pets at all times. It may be adorable to watch your fox terrier romp unhindered through an urban park, but she is potentially searching for rodent burrows and bird nests to demolish with glee. Your cat is a fierce predator, with the unfair advantage of a delicious and reliable supply of cat food. The ready flow of calories you provide gives fluffy the energy to hunt with enthusiasm. Keep your dogs on a leash or under voice control and your cats indoors. If your feline demands fresh air, consider building her an enclosed catio. Generations of demanding cats have ensured that the internet contains instructions for easy and affordable catio construction.

And last, take a moment to observe and appreciate the vibrancy of life around you. All around your home, animals are hunting, eating, breeding, and dying. Nature has found a way, and we all have responsibility to respect and protect our local natural ecosystems and the essential biodiversity that relies on the interconnectedness of all it’s parts.

I’m Stacey Frisk with the Cache Humane Society and I’m Wild About Utah!
 
Credits:

Images: Courtesy Pixabay, genocre collection, https://pixabay.com/photos/cat-feline-animal-animals-pet-825365/
Audio: Courtesy & © Kevin Colver https://wildstore.wildsanctuary.com/
Text:    Stacey Frisk, Director, Cache Humane Society, https://www.cachehumane.org/
Included Links: Hilary Shughart & Lyle Bingham, Webmaster, WildAboutUtah.org

Additional Reading

Catio Spaces, https://catiospaces.com/

2020/2021 Bridgerland Audubon/Cache Humane Society Feline Fix Project https://bridgerlandaudubon.org/cache-humane-society-feline-fix-fundraiser/

Cats Indoors, Bridgerland Audubon Society, https://bridgerlandaudubon.org/cats-inside/

How cat advocates can allocate time and other resources for the biggest impact, Bays, Danielle Jo, Animal Sheltering magazine, Humane Society of the US, Winter 2018-2019, https://humanepro.org/magazine/articles/pointing-way-pyramid

Inspired by diagrams for healthy diets, the community cat pyramid encourages a holistic approach to cat management and a strategic use of resources. Graphic by Patrick Ormsby/The Humane Society of the United States
Inspired by diagrams for healthy diets, the community cat pyramid encourages a holistic approach to cat management and a strategic use of resources.
Graphic by Patrick Ormsby/The Humane Society of the United States

Cache Humane Society, https://www.cachehumane.org/

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Flippant Gripes and Labyrinthian Gratitude

Flippant Gripes and Labyrinthian Gratitude: In summer I begin to gripe and wear increasingly larger hats. Courtesy & © Patrick Kelly, Photographer
In summer I begin to gripe and wear increasingly larger hats.
Courtesy & © Patrick Kelly, Photographer
I love the sun. Now, I don’t always like it, but I always do love it. It’s a relationship that is both iterative and consistent, built by years of experience and yet left open for surprises. It provides, draws me out, pushes me inside, and draws me out once more. Like the four valves of our hearts, the seasons each give new direction.

In winter, I seek it out and try and absorb as much vitamin D as I can. I can appreciate that it gives us nutrition, life, longevity. I inhale as I look up and if I try hard enough I think I can gently photosynthesize. If I get real desperate, I’ll make my optometrist’s scorn roll out of my mind as I play some lighthearted sunstare, burning a gentle nimbus of black into what was once a perfectly fine astigmatism.

In spring I feel as though I can count myself among the ilk of flowering trees, alien hybrids in their own right. The sun bakes my own winterlogged bark, and I too reach forth beyond my skin. I use my palms as leaves stretching upwards and my warmed respite as flowers. I allow myself to feel awakened, thawed beyond simply thawing, and into growth. I exhale as I look up and warm my bones by that big yellow fire in the sky.

In summer I begin to gripe and wear increasingly larger hats. I deeply feel what semi-arid means, and eventually begin to ponder if that’s just marketing against the surely true aridity I feel. My dormant joints rediscover their ranges of motion and youthful play blooms perennial in my lexicon. And, it gets hot. Hot hot. My love, though, does not wane as I seek increasingly dense shade through the season. This love persists in the dog days of summer because while I pant in lily-skinned evapotranspiration, a life of hard winters reminds me to hyperphage my vitamins while I can. I inhale as I look around and see the life which feeds from the sun just as I do. We are all in the same boat.

In fall my solar binge takes full stride, paired neatly with cool winds foreboding the coming darkness. Just how summer mirrors winter, fall mirrors spring as I stock up and prepare for another winter. As want gives way to need, I try and push the sun into my own roots. I store memory, reflection, and nostalgia in one cellar, and hard cider, wild berry jams, and garden salsa in the other. I exhale and stoke the coals which will carry me to yet another spring.

So this spring as you, too, are finding your own leaves and flowers bend to the fresh-stoked fire in the sky, I invite you to reflect upon your own relationship with the sun. See how it molds you. Feel your gripes as flippant and your gratitude as labyrinthian. Hear how it draws the world in and out of breath. Even if you don’t always like it, discover how you love it.

I’m Patrick Kelly, and I’m Wild About Utah.
 
Credits:

Images: Courtesy & © Patrick Kelly
Audio: Courtesy & © Kevin Colver https://wildstore.wildsanctuary.com/
Text:    Patrick Kelly, Director of Education, Stokes Nature Center, https://www.logannature.org
Included Links: Patrick Kelly & Lyle Bingham, Webmaster, WildAboutUtah.org

Additional Reading

Wild About Utah, Posts by Patrick Kelly

Stokes Nature Center in Logan Canyon, https://www.logannature.org/

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Going In With a Child’s Naturalist Eye

Going In Courtesy & © Shannon Rhodes, Photographer
Going In
Courtesy & © Shannon Rhodes, Photographer
In Kathryn Lasky’s picture book “One Beetle Too Many”, we read, “Charles [Darwin] learned the names of everything he collected, for to know the names of these things was important, and it might be the one time when adults would actually listen to a child speak.” As an elementary school teacher, I ponder its message, reflecting on my wilderness experiences enriched by children. In fact, some of my best discovery days have been when I was led by a curious child.

As a Stokes Nature Center camp leader one summer, my focus for the day was on alpine forest plants as we set out on a northern Utah trail. I carried plant presses and field guides, ready to teach how to identify a Douglas fir from a Lodgepole pine and to have them hug quaking aspens blindfolded to discover distinguishing characteristics of each trunk. These youngsters were going to learn every forest fact I could share, I thought, but they quickly taught me the meaning of naturalist John Muir’s quote: “I only went out for a walk, and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.”

Black Fly Larvae Courtesy & © Shannon Rhodes, Photographer
Black Fly Larvae
Courtesy & © Shannon Rhodes, Photographer
Not thirty steps from the trailhead, I witnessed natural inquiry at its best, and it was facilitated by these seven- and eight-year-olds. Few things are as fascinating and magnetizing as running water, and they’d found some. The day before, we’d hiked along Temple Sawmill beaver ponds, scooping up stonefly and midge larvae and designing our own dams, so I was gearing up for another muddy adventure. Instead of sloshing, though, Franny instantly noticed some wiggly black things stuck to the rocks, and the children huddled together around the smooth rocks in the trickle, peering at them with their hand lenses in this impromptu sit spot. “Hey, do you still have that water bug chart?” one asked me. We veered from the day’s alpine plant plan and made friends with what the kids decided, using a macroinvertebrate key, were black fly larvae. They noted the mouth brush filters and abdominal features allowing these critters to anchor to the stones. I would have led them right by, never noticing the rich possibilities of exploring the natural world through a child’s eyes. I am sometimes guilty of tunnel vision without a young companion, only noticing what I know or am expecting to find.

Nathan's Mac & Cheese Courtesy & © Shannon Rhodes, Photographer
Nathan’s Mac & Cheese
Courtesy & © Shannon Rhodes, Photographer
That same June I was hiking in the Manti-LaSals with my nephew when he reminded me of the message in another of Muir’s statements, “One day’s exposure to mountains is better than cartloads of books.” We sat down when he heard the sounds of a woodpecker busy in the treetops, making wisecracks about how it can peck like that and not get a headache. Our sit spot observation led me later to find answers: did you know that woodpeckers have special muscles and extra inner eyelids? I admit that it was Nathan, the hiker without the Utah Master Naturalist certifications, who spotted what looked like macaroni and cheese on the branch as we moved on and proceeded to tell me that he thought it was a fungus, much like a young Darwin who said, “I am a complete millionaire in odd and curious facts.” Next time you go out, take along a child. You’ll be a millionaire, too.

I’m Shannon Rhodes, and I am wild about Utah.

Credits:
Images: Courtesy & Copyright Shannon Rhodes, Photographer
Audio: Courtesy & © Kevin Colver https://wildstore.wildsanctuary.com/
Text:     Shannon Rhodes, Edith Bowen Laboratory School, Utah State University https://edithbowen.usu.edu/
Additional Reading Links: Shannon Rhodes

Additional Reading:

EcoSpark. https://www.ecospark.ca/black-fly

Lasky, Kathryn. One Beetle Too Many: The Extraordinary Adventures of Charles Darwin. Candlewick Press, 2009.https://www.amazon.com/One-Beetle-Too-Many-Extraordinary/dp/0763668435

Mertins, Brian. How to increase curiosity with nature. https://nature-mentor.com/increase-curiosity/

Natural History Museum of Utah. https://nhmu.utah.edu/citizen-science

O’Connor, Mike. Why Don’t Woodpeckers Get Headaches? And other bird questions you know you want to ask. Beacon Press, 2007.https://www.amazon.com/Why-Dont-Woodpeckers-Get-Headaches-ebook/dp/B001GQ1TCK/

Stokes Nature Center. https://logannature.org/

Utah State University Extension. Key to Aquatic Macroinvertebrate Life in Utah Ponds and Streams. https://extension.usu.edu/waterquality/macrokey/

Wolfe, Linnie Marsh. John of the Mountains: The Unpublished Journals of John Muir. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1938.https://www.amazon.com/John-Mountains-Unpublished-Journals-Muir/dp/0299078841