natureswondersbyclyde

      American woodcocks and Wilson's snipe are inland sandpipers that have several characteristics in common.  Both kinds are camouflaged in their respective habitats, making them hard to spot.  Both species have chunky bodies and long, straight beaks they use to probe in soil and mud after invertebrates to eat.  Each kind has sensory receptors on the tips of their bills to detect prey underground.  I see both these species at some time of the year in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.  Females of both species lay four eggs in a clutch laid on the ground.  Chicks of these species hatch fluffy, camouflaged and ready to move about and feed themselves.  And both kinds have intriguing, aerial courtship displays that attract females of each kind to mate and raise young, and discourage rival males of each species.  Those courtship displays also make these species appealing to us.      Male woodcocks start courting in Pennsylv...

      Years ago, I wanted a house along Chesapeake Bay, or an inlet off the Atlantic Ocean, so I could see rafts of wintering ducks, geese and gulls bobbing on their waters.  But now I see several kinds of these adaptable birds wintering on Barnegat Bay, New Jersey, through a live camera mounted on an osprey nest and our home computer screen in southeastern Pennsylvania.      That camera scans a half-mile long, narrow salt marsh along a road on the Barnegat Bay side of a developed New Jersey barrier island between the Atlantic and the bay.  And Barnegat Bay itself is between that barrier island and the Jersey mainland.  That strip of remnant marsh, covered with ten-foot-tall phragmites with lovely, feathery plumes in winter, clumps of grass and shrubs, is interesting to watch by live camera in winter.      A shallow, freshwater stream flows through that thin marsh and pours into the brackish Barnegat Bay.  Several kinds of...

      Around 7:45 AM one day in mid-March some years ago, while driving my son a few miles on the Lititz Pike to work, I noticed flocks of Canada geese passing overhead and going north, flock after flock.  The day was cloudy, damp and cool, typical of March, and making me think of spring and ducks and geese.  After dropping off my son, I raced home, got my binoculars and stood in our backyard in Neffsville, Pennsylvania to watch for more  northbound V's and lines of Canada geese.  I was not disappointed because fast-moving flocks of magnificent geese were passing low over my neighborhood as soon as I was on our lawn.  It seemed that all the geese were honking at once.  I was thrilled to see them in big numbers, in flock after noisy flock after flock.      Numbering in the thousands, gangs of Canadas poured over my neighborhood, one after another.  All those noisy gatherings were coming from the south and heading directly n...

     During January of 2025, I occasionally watched for flocks of large water birds on Nebraska's shallow, braided Platte River via a live camera at Audubon's Rowe Sanctuary on the Platte, and our computer screen.  But through that month, I only saw ice, snow, a few bald eagles and an occasional coyote or two.       Then, suddenly, on February 1, 2025, flocks of Canada geese, cackling geese and mallard ducks were on the open water of the Platte, I guess, literally, overnight.  To me, they were the second hint of spring's coming on the Platte and Nebraska's prairie, after the increase of daylight each succeeding day.      That increasing of daylight stirred the birds' hormones and caused them to push north a little toward their breeding territories.  Meanwhile, some of the snow and ice melted along the Platte, causing those hundreds of waterfowl to land on it and wait for spring to catch up to their restless hormones. ...

      Several kinds of early-blooming, alien plants from Eurasia have the potential to spread across sunny, human-made habitats, including lawns, meadows and fields.  I have seen many patches of snow drops, winter aconites, scilla, glories-in-the-snow and grape hyacinths blooming in such built, open habitats in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania through the years.  And their lovely flowers add much cheer to us humans, from the middle of February into April, often right at home and just when we need that inspiration the most.        These plants are introduced to soil in flower beds as perennial bulbs that sprout leaves and bloom beautifully every early-spring.  But when these plants become acclimated to soil and weather conditions, they begin to march across lawns, pastures and fields, annually beautifying those habitats with their lovely blossoms.  Those wayward plants and their blooms also help make spring more wonderful and inte...

      The elegant bar-headed geese and graceful demoiselle cranes are the highest flying birds on Earth.  On migration, both species pass through Himalayan passes, over those mountains themselves and over the Tibetan Plateau, vocalizing all the while.  The geese pass over the Himalayas in spring and fall between their summer nesting territories and their wintering grounds.  But the cranes fly over the Himalayas only during their autumn migrations from their summer to winter homes.  Both these large, majestic species are impressive and inspiring because of their ability to ascend to 26,000 feet and above when on migration.  They have adapted to cold, and reduced oxygen in the thin air at that altitude.        The stately bar-headed geese winter in India and Pakistan, but raise young in colonies in short-grass habitats near wetlands and other waters in the Tibetan Highlands of Mongolia and China.  The dainty-appearing, ...

      From March to August, with a peak in April to June, hundreds of thousands of seven-inch, silvery fish called grunion wash out of wavelets along sandy beaches in southern California to Baja California in Mexico to spawn.  These slender, streamlined fish spawn at night in wet sand at high tide levels, for a few nights in a row, every two weeks, under a full or new moon.  Whole beaches at the high water line shimmy and wiggle with the many thousands of grunion piled on each other and ready to spawn.       Each little fish flops around on the wet sand just up from the foamy surf.  Each female looks for a place to dig into the sand with her tail, and, eventually, does, straight down about five inches, until only her gills and head is above the sand.  Then she releases her many tiny eggs into that hole she dug, while one or more males wrap themselves around her and eject sperm into the hole, which seeps down and fertilizes the eggs....