Spruce Bringsgreen Speaks!

Hello again! Margo told me that some of you have been asking after me. It has been a long time [Editor's Note: Nearly five years, to be exact.] since the last time I've written in this blog, so it's high time I tell you what I've been up to lately.

So far, about 50 feet. [Colorado blue spruces can grow 75 feet tall in the wild but 30-60 feet in the yard, so I think Spruce might be exaggerating a little.)

Spruce Bringsgreen after the Feb. 28, 2023, snow.
(Modified photo by Margo D. Beller)

Yes, I've been growing. I put out my first cones so I am now a mature Colorado blue spruce. I'm the pride of Margo's yard and, unlike some of the other trees she had cut back recently, I've been left alone to get bigger and spread out. Maybe a bit of tickling of my bottom branches as that guy she now has mowing the lawn instead of her husband works around me. The deer leave me alone because they know I'm prickly and don't cotton to being nibbled on.

It has been very nice in this yard. We haven't had a lot of snow in a very long time except once, which gave me a thick, warm coat. [See photo.] But that didn't last long. The way I am built, the stuff just slides off once the sun comes out. Soon enough I am my old self again.

Spruce dressed up for Christmas, 2018
(Margo D. Beller)

However, I will say that it has been sad to see some of the old neighbors cut down. Up and down this block the tree cutters roll by in their trucks and the air is soon filled with the sound of sawing, mulching and stump pulling. I know Margo dislikes it very much because she tells me that. Some of the old guys were sick and had to come down, I guess, but some of them I don't know why they had to go. Maybe they were in the way. 

The cedar I can see by Margo's front door was cut in half by the people who came to do her tree work. That cedar got almost as tall as the roof, and it used to provide shelter for some of the small birds. It also has softer leaves than mine and the deer would get at it, as they get to most things. 

[Note: One of the biggest problems in suburbia is people planting trees too close to the house. This cedar, and one on the other side of the front door, I had planted in 1995, when I was a new homeowner and didn't know better, as I was to learn about most of the deer-attracting plants I put in before I put up netting to save them. The other cedar eventually died after an ice storm and I cut it back myself. I needed professional help on this second one because it was too tall. It would almost double over when covered with snow.] 

The cedar before it had to be cut back.
(Margo D. Beller)

Now the birds take shelter in my branches. Being so tall, they can be high off the ground and away from those four-legged predators that seem to come through this yard with increasing frequency, particularly at night. 

I don't mind sheltering these birds. The ones that go "dee, dee, dee" [black-capped chickadees] are fine. They stay quiet, fly out for food, eat it elsewhere and then come back to me to hide or get away from the wind or to rest. But those black and white ones [male juncos] are terrible. They fight each other, they fly in and out, they make a lot of noise as they get in each other's way. But they'll be gone once it gets warm.

Sometimes a redbreasted bird [a robin] will bring bits of material and make a nest high on my shoulder, but it rarely stays. I don't take it personally.

It's hard to believe I've been planted in this spot for as long as I have [since November 2007]. It feels good to be rooted. I know Margo comes out to admire me frequently. I've no fear she will be cutting me down. That's about all a tree can hope for nowadays.

The Woodpecker Story Continues

The story never ends, it just enters another chapter.

It was over a month ago I heard the knocking of a pileated woodpecker excavating one of my neighbor's trees. At that time I wasn't sure if it was digging out a nest or just hunting for carpenter ants. If the latter that meant the tree might decay and die in a matter of years.

Pileated trying to hide from a sharp-shinned hawk. 
(Margo D. Beller)

When a squirrel climbed too close the woodpecker flew off. It was then I saw two holes so it was looking for a meal. I later learned February is not when these birds build nests and breed.

And now we get to today.

After spending some time outdoors in the cold and wind I returned home and made some hot tea. When I finished my drink I went into the kitchen to wash the mug. Through the open curtain, at eye level, I could see a male pileated whacking at a different tree in the same neighbor's yard.

Was it the same bird as a month ago? Could be. This one continued to whack at the tree until it could put its head into the hole and use its long tongue to pull out an ant to eat. Even then it kept using its long beak to chop further into the hole.

(According to the people at Cornell, while the pileated woodpecker’s primary food is carpenter ants, it also eats "other ants, woodboring beetle larvae, termites and other insects such as flies, spruce budworm, caterpillars, cockroaches and grasshoppers." I'm glad the bird was getting rid of one or more of these pests.)

The woodpecker kept at its work. It did not notice me taking pictures from my enclosed porch. Nor did it notice another neighbor's kids playing basketball, the birds flying to the feeders or the squirrel sunning itself on the flood wall.

Pileated rather far along in excavating.
(Margo D. Beller)

But what did stop it, suddenly, was the appearance of a male sharp-shinned hawk. From my porch I saw it fly low to the ground, heading toward the hedge where many small birds roost. The male is smaller than the female, and mature birds have red breasts rather than brown streaks on a white chest. This bird, I could see, was small and had red on the breast. These accipiters are fast, nimble flyers, able to maneuver through a hedge and fly out with a meal. (I can only hope it didn't pick off one of the cardinals or other birds I've seen in the hedge, tho' these birds have to eat, too.)

The pileated, meanwhile, had moved from the hole to another part of the tree and flattened itself against it. It did not move for a long time. Pileateds have black backs so perhaps the idea was to be unobtrusive. Whatever the reason, it stayed still. When it sensed the danger had passed it moved back to the hole and continued its excavation. 

Back at work after the danger is gone.
(Margo D. Beller)

As I write this it is still at the hole, tho' when I looked for it out an upstairs window I saw it was briefly spooked by a squirrel climbing the tree. Unlike the February visit, however, it did not leave. It spread its wings to make itself look bigger - pileateds are the size of a crow - and the squirrel left. 

I expect the bird will be there chopping at the tree when I go out this evening to get the feeders, at which point it will leave as it gets dark. 

It will be interesting to see if the bird returns to another tree in this yard, and which of its meal trees will fall first. (Not into my yard, I hope.)