Cleaning Up After The Trees

 In October, a maple tree before your window lights up your room like a great lamp.

-- John Burroughs

October, the year's tenth month (with a name reflecting when it was the eighth month under the Roman calendar), is a time of transition. October is when you really notice it is darker later in the morning and earlier in the evening. October is when the weather switches from over 80 degrees one day to cold enough to break out the winter quilt the next. 

The acorn doesn't fall far from the tree - a small sample of
what I have been sweeping up from the patio.
(Margo D. Beller)

October is when the pumpkins, squashes and dried corn threshes start showing up on suburban doorsteps with the September mums. You realize you are closer to the end of the year than the beginning, and you wonder if there will be more snow this year than last.

For me, October is when I start thinking about bringing plants back into the house and putting up storm windows. I notice fewer catbirds in the yard but hear white-throated sparrows. Raptors are on the move and I see skeins of Canada geese overhead, heading south. Soon I will be putting out more seed feeders and suet.

The "flowers" on the ornamental grasses are the
best they've been in years. (Margo D. Beller)

Yes, there are also the colorful autumn leaves that send people into their cars to drive north to Vermont or the Adirondacks or other such hotspots. In my yard the red leaves of the maple and the dogwood, the brown of the white oak, the yellow of the elms and the scarlet of the red oak will be very pretty, at least for a short while. And then the usual October winds will blow them off the trees to become that much more mess to be cleaned up. 

Yes, October is when things start falling out of trees.

This week, the summery days gave way to foggy, cool nights and my sleep has been continually interrupted by the sharp rap of oak acorns falling on the enclosed porch's roof. The squirrels are foraging in the trees by day, and by night the trees must figure it's time to spread some seeds all over the ground beneath them to perpetuate the species. 

The dropping does not cease. Sometimes, if the acorn hits a metal gutter, it can sound like a gunshot. Most of the time, however, it sounds like someone is banging into something in the night.

Two types of nuts falling from my trees. (Margo D. Beller)

Despite the noise I am glad I have this roof over my porch. I have friends with open decks who are forced to huddle under the picnic table umbrella as acorn bombs drop from the sky. When my in-laws lived in New Jersey the big oak next to the driveway regularly pitted the old family sedan, making it look like it had been in a hail storm.

My problem is when the acorns make it hard to walk to the feeder pole or the water dish. That is why I have gone out on the patio three times - so far - to herd marble-like oak acorns with my broom into my large garden pail, lug it to a corner of my yard and dump it for any squirrel, chipmunk, deer, woodpecker, jay or crow that might want a snack.

But there are many, many more acorns all over the lawn, and even when I am drinking coffee on the porch, congratulating myself on a job well done, I hear the acorns continuing to drop. It will be like this for weeks.

What hangs up will eventually come down. (Margo D. Beller)

It is not the tree's fault, of course. It is just trying to survive. If the trees were in the woods this would be a barely noticed process. But these trees are not in the woods, they border the property of my suburban yard. And so I notice big time.

There are some years when there are many more acorns than there are squirrels, like this year. There are some years there are many more squirrels than there are acorns, like last year. This boom and bust is not as random as it may seem.

Acorns are seeds and they are dropped by the oaks to make more trees. But the seeds are also food. The more food there is, the more an animal eats and then the more it breeds. More animals mean more food is needed. When seeds are plentiful, everyone is happy - the animals and the trees. But if there are too many animals and not enough seeds, there will be a decrease in new trees. That seems to prompt trees to shut down making seeds, which then cuts back on the animal population because there is less food.

The technical name for this boom and bust cycling is masting. According to the New Jersey Conservation Foundation, mast is the fruit of forest trees, in this case acorns. During "mast" years, the trees "go into overdrive, producing enormous amounts of nuts." Then comes the bust, a year or more when there are very few nuts produced.

How the pretty autumn leaves will eventually end up...
(Margo D. Beller)

Why does this happen? Again, from the Foundation:

Scientists don’t know the exact trigger for mast years, but it most likely has to do with climate events in past stressful years. Trees may produce an abundance of offspring as a hedge in case the stressful times continue. Stressors may include droughts, heat waves, or cold spells.

I'm no scientist but I know there is a lot of wacky stuff going on in the atmosphere around the world - a rare tropical storm in California, abundant wildfires in Canada, deadly floods in Libya. We are on pace to have the hottest year on record after having the hottest past few months on record.

... and the pods. (Margo D. Beller)

Closer to home, this has been a very wet year. The same abundance of rain that has helped keep my dogwood tree alive, produced the "flowers" on my ornamental grasses for the first time in years and kept the spider mites and white flies off my flowers likely produced favorable conditions for the oak trees to produce acorns after a year when not many were produced. The old trees have grown and now more of their branches are above the porch roof, something I didn't notice until the acorns started raining down heavier than usual this year. 

The oaks are not alone, of course. Many other trees are now dropping their seeds, including the bane of my existence, the black locust. October is when I notice how many of the long, black pods are hanging, waiting for some signal or gust of wind to drop like a blanket over my lawn. Like the acorns, eventually they will all come down and be swept away, to be forgotten until the next October. 

Food for Flight

As usual, the year is flying by. It is now August. For many birds, nesting is complete and the young have dispersed. The days are starting to get shorter and the winds are coming out of the north. Instinct tells them it is time to head south for the winter.

Jewelweed (Margo D. Beller)

Birds travel light, literally and figuratively. A hummingbird weighs less than an ounce. An osprey can weigh up to four pounds. Even the biggest birds can be thrown off course by high winds and heavy rains, making their travel perilous, especially when they have to fly over open water such as the Gulf of Mexico or the Atlantic Ocean.

They also don't travel with a cooler filled with snacks. They have to depend on whatever foods they can find when they land after a day (diurnal flyers such as hawks) or night (most small birds including warblers) of flying. For the osprey, that means fish. For other raptors, that means small mammals or birds (which is why most small birds travel at night). For the smaller birds, that includes insects, the seeds and fruits ripening now, and whatever they might find at people's feeders.

The privet shrubs in my backyard are filled with small, round, black berries favored by such fruit eaters as robins, mockingbirds, catbirds and cedar waxwings. The wild cherry tree has also attracted birds because it is fruiting, which is good because the viburnum and dogwood are not going to provide much to eat this fall. There are also red berries all over the yew hedge.

In my travels I have seen plenty of food Mother Nature has put out for migrating birds.

Hop hornbeam with hanging seeds (Margo D. Beller)

There's the hop hornbeam, for instance. I would never have even noticed this tree had I not almost walked into a low-hanging branch and noticed the seeds dangling from it. Once I identified this tree I found it everywhere - on hillsides, along river banks. It is an understory tree, meaning it grows below the canopy of larger trees. Apparently it thrives on being left alone, which may be why they were planted years ago by municipal parks departments. I've seen cardinals and cedar waxwings eating the seeds from this tree. 

There are also nectar-filled or seeding flowers. Thistle and goldenrod bloom now, and when they go to seed they will feed goldfinches, sparrows and other seed eaters. Weeds are also a wonderful source of seeds, including the ragweed that torments my sinuses and always seems to come back no matter how much it is mowed or pulled out.

The cardinal flower has a gentle spike of red flower and prefers moist areas, which is why I see it near streams and why I've had no luck growing it in my garden. Hummingbirds are attracted by the color and feed on the pollen. Another hummingbird favorite is jewelweed. This one also favors wet areas along stream banks or bogs but unlike the cardinal flower it is orange-yellow. However, its flower is a trumpet that attracts the hummingbird. Apparently it is also used to make medicine, but thankfully no one has touched the stands of jewelweed I've seen attracting hummingbirds, bees and insects.

Cardinal flower (Margo D. Beller)

These food sources are not everywhere, of course. The insect population is in decline, which will have a devastating effect not only on birds but on humans because most of our food needs to be pollinated by bees and insects when it is first flowering. Ocean waters are much warmer than they should be this summer. According to NOAA, we are in an El Nino year. That means:

Our global climate models are predicting that the warmer-than-average Pacific ocean conditions will not only last through the winter, but continue to increase. There is a good chance—approximately 2 in 3—that the peak Oceanic Niño Index this winter will match or exceed 1.5 °C, our informal threshold for a “strong” El Niño event.

El Nino, according to NOAA, is a "naturally occurring climate pattern associated with warming of the ocean surface temperatures in the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean, which can significantly influence weather patterns, ocean conditions, and marine fisheries worldwide."

When the Pacific Northwest is as hot as Houston, when wildfires destroy millions of acres of forests and homes, when parts of the U.S. have not gone below 100 degrees F in months, when New England is hit with tornadoes, when the mid-Atlantic states are hit by several 100-year floods in one season, what is a "naturally occurring climate pattern" anymore?

I just hope the birds make it.

 

Too Much of a Good Thing

Where do the natives of Tahiti go on vacation?

Our dry, cool, sunny un-August weather in New Jersey is like paradise after our recent, normal heat and humidity, but it may be too much of a good thing and it has me concerned.

Gift tomatoes (Margo D. Beller)

At some point during the expected 10 days without rain, I will have to go out with the hose and the sprinkler so the plants and the lawn don't die. There are two water dishes out for the birds (and the squirrels), and they've been visited frequently.

The peppers prefer heat, not evenings that fall into the 50s, as we've been having out here, so I am not sure if the fruits will ever get big or change from green to their expected ripe colors. 

The people who like the beach had a fine weekend (until the traffic home) and those who stayed home and have a grill and/or an outdoor fireplace enjoyed stinking up the neighborthood using them, too.

We aren't beach people but we did visit friends near the Brooklyn waterfront the other day and the wife's small garden put me to shame. Various tomatoes, cucumbers, ginger root, melons, coneflowers, sunflowers, herbs, all in a space about the size of a postage stamp. 

Like other gardening friends when the harvest is coming in, I got gifts to take home because they had too much of a good thing. That happens this time of year. I've had garden plants foisted on me because they'd otherwise be thrown out. One friend claims he will put a zucchini in every unlocked car he finds in his neighborhood, and I've been given zucchinis that look like green logs. A relative complains she doesn't know what she is going to do with all the fruit and vegetables she's picking. (She is a good cook and canner so I am not worried.)

My produce, in pots rather than in the ground, have it a little tougher because the roots are limited in how far they can grow. Some friends are using the new type of mesh pot that supposedly allows for greater air circulation for the roots and creates happier, fruit-bearing plants.

Gift cucumber, nearly 14 inches long
(Margo D. Beller)

Will my peppers ever grow to the right size? One friend in Delaware complains that all the rain she got this summer created a terrible harvest for her cucumbers and tomatoes. The farmers I've talked to in New Jersey have said the same. Too much rain is as bad as to little.

And yet the farm markets are full of peaches, corn, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and other produce. Some people are obviously doing a lot of things better than I am.

Meanwhile, our good thing in the northeast is balanced by too much of a bad thing in the rest of the country.

In California. there are major forest fires. In Texas, Hurricane Harvey strengthened into a Category 4 hurricane thanks to the abnormal warmth of the Gulf of Mexico before slamming into the barrier islands, which should've limited the damage but there are people living on them, and so there is damage. The continued rain has devastated Houston. The rain in Texas is being measured in feet, not inches.

Too much dry, sunny weather in NJ, a mega-hurricane flooding Texas. Global warming? You tell me.