Next week is Thanksgiving. Today, two wild turkeys were strutting across my front yard. One was shy and did not want to be photographed, but the other was a poser.
Happy Turkey Day!
Go Hawk!
In July, I posted a picture and video of a sick, injured baby hawk that my husband found near our house. We called Iowa Bird Rehab who came to get the hawk. This morning, I was delighted to see on Instagram that the red-tailed hawk is alive and well, and being moved to a different bird sanctuary that specializes in raptors.
Peter, Peter Pumpkin Eater
I had two pumpkins ready to carve for Halloween. I sat them outside and the next day found this:
I saw a suspicious looking deer hanging around my yard, but I didn’t know how the deer was eating the pumpkin without knocking it off the ledge. Day # 2:
Many types of animals will eat raw pumpkin. The animals I have seen near my yard include: deer, raccoon, possum, groundhog and squirrel. Day #3:
Can you find the culprit in his photo?
Guilty as charged.
Day#4:
Season of the Sticks
My daughter sent me a picture of a walking stick bug that was crawling on her window. Walking sticks are common but rarely seen because they live in trees and are camouflaged to look like sticks. There are thousands of species of stick bugs. Most of them live in tropical areas. They “naturally prune” trees. There are two main species in North America that like to eat the leaves of deciduous trees (especially oak, hazelnut, walnut, locusts, and cherry). In North America where the winters are cold, the bugs lay eggs on fallen leaves and then die when winter arrives. The kiddos hatch in the spring and climb the nearest tree. The picture below is Megaphasma (“big ghost”) dentricrus (“tooth leg”). Here is a video that tells more about these bugs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dblhygB8inw
Fungus Schmungus #9
I saw this mushroom growing in the grass on a small lawn of a hotel in Arkansas next to the parking lot. I believe it is a type of Ganoderma or Reishi mushroom. I have two other species of Ganoderma on this blog (Fungus Schmungus #2 and #6). I was not able to identify the species with certainty. There are two photos of this same mushroom on the internet posted on Reddit with one from Nebraska and one from Ohio. These posts also question the species.
https://www.reddit.com/r/mycology/comments/os9ea7/found_in_eastern_nebraska_growing_out_of_a_lawn/
https://www.reddit.com/r/mycology/comments/14t9slv/id_swmo_found_on_the_ground_near_what_i_believe/
Below is a photo of the mushroom which was the size of a small plate and a close-up of its skin.
Goldfinch Nest
I was walking our dog, Webster, along the edge of the ballpark under some pine trees. He sniffed at something on the ground that I thought was a baseball with the covering torn off, but when I picked it up and turned it over it was a small bird nest. I did some research to find out what kind of bird makes this kind of nest. Three clues: 1. it was small, three inches by three inches, but bigger than a hummingbird nest which is the size of a quarter 2. it had a perfectly shaped cup, very tidy 3. the nest was mostly made of dried grass but also had thistledown or milkweed fluff weaved in so the nest felt soft and spongy not brittle. I decided this was a goldfinch nest. Here is a nice video about the goldfinch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m89zcYdv-mA
Mudbugs, Crawdads, Crayfish, Crawfish
Mudbugs are also known as crawdads, crayfish, and crawfish. They are edible crustaceans related to shrimp and lobsters. When I was visiting Arkansas recently, it was hot and dry. I ran across a crawdad city in a ditch next to the road. Crawdads often live in water, but also dig burrows in dirt until they reach mud/moisture. They carry the extra mud to the surface making a tall “mud chimney” around the entrance to their burrow. Here is a video of a crawdad making his burrow: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=tech+360+crawfish+digging+hole
There are many ways to catch crawdads. If they are in water, a trap is the easiest way. Here are two different ways to catch crawdads if they are in the burrow:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMGn6jhZ0ZA
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/pxAhCU9A358
How to cook a crawdad:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuvdyhhfwsM
How to eat a crawdad:
Fungus Schmungus #8
I found a bunch of these mushrooms near our yard under a large pine tree. They are called Chicken Fat Mushroom or Suillus Americanus. They always grow near an Eastern White Pine and nowhere else. They are a type of bolete mushroom which has pores on the underside of the cap rather than gills. Boletes are the only group of mushrooms with pores. I have a post of another bolete mushroom called Dryad’s saddle on 5/28/22. Not all boletes are edible, but this one is. Here is a short YouTube video about these mushrooms: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GegYQ1x4XN0
Notice the pine needles.
Pores on the underside of a Bolete mushroom
Red-tailed Hawk Down
Last week, my husband found a young red-tailed hawk at the edge of our driveway. The raptor had a wound on his neck and was covered in flies. I took a video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZ-SKg4er10 while we waited for Iowa Bird Rehabilitation to arrive. She was there within 15 minutes, threw a small blanket over the bird, picked him up and placed him in a cat carrier. She said they feed the raptors mice. I began to worry because last winter we had mice in our house and the pest control people placed bait stations outside. I read that the poisoned mice can then poison raptors so we need to get rid of the bait stations (unless our house becomes infested again). We have owls, hawks, , bald eagles, and peregrine falcons in this area. Sadly, these bait stations are all over the place, for example, at restaurants. Funny mouse story: Last winter, I saw one run across our kitchen floor. I set a trap but never caught the mouse. Our son picked up our dog and took him to his apartment one weekend. When I went to bed, the dog bowl was full of dry food. When I woke up, it was completely empty! I thought, “How many mice do we have?!” My kids did not believe this story and thought Mom was loopy. But the pest control man said a single mouse can spend a whole night moving food to his lair, one piece at a time. Months later, I found the food neatly lined up along the back wall of the pantry behind the cans.
Injured baby hawk captured by Iowa Bird Rehabilitation
Hot Sam’s Antiques and Foto Park
Near Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN, just off I-35N you will see the shark used as a prototype for the JAWS movie along with some other giant statues. If you exit and travel to Hot Sam’s Antiques and Foto Park in Lakeville, MN you will enjoy a unique sculpture park filled with unusual antiques and metal sculptures. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIRC8YlC1mY
Shelley Jones Clark
