Beaver

I recently purchased this sign and thought it would be a cute addition to Habitat Home. While walking the trails this morning I spotted evidence of a beaver. I thought this little chopped down tree was interesting and a good example of what a beaver does.

But then as I walked further along the path, I came to this ....

The beaver or beavers are doing some damage here. Beavers are herbivores and will use just about any tree along our river corridor; willow, river birch, maple, cottonwood, sweet gum, black cherry, dogwood, and oak. The beaver is probably living in a burrow dug into the riverbank which is about 20 feet away. Beavers, the largest rodent in Illinois, were once almost extinct in Illinois. They were reintroduced in the 1930s and are now thriving. We could apply for a trapping permit as trapping is allowed from November through March. But we won't as it looks like we have lost the trees already. Maybe tonight we can watch him finishing the job!

Prairie Wedding Day Photos

October 29th was a BIG day for us at Habitat Home. It was wedding day! The ceremony was actually at our small rural church about 3 miles away, but it was a desire of the bride, our daughter, to have wedding photos taken in the prairie. Thankfully, it was a beautiful day and even more thanks to our wonderful farmer friend for providing tours about the property on his tractor-driven hayrack.

Sun Art

Something new for the little garden shed.

Woodchuck

We noticed this large Illinois herbivorous rodent, the woodchuck (Marmota monax) or groundhog, out sunning on our patio under the deck this afternoon. By the time I fetched the camera, he was hiding out under the stack of firewood behind the house, and attempts to get a closeup view resulted in a rather (for a woodchuck) quick escape (photo above). But we had a calming conversation with him for a while in the garden before he ambled off into the woods.

Habitat Home is a great place for woodchucks, although we rarely see them. They like forest edges but can be found in more open fields, stream banks, railroad embankments, and even residential areas. This little guy will probably start putting on some weight now in preparation for his true hibernation over winter. He will curl up in a burrow, body temperature dropping to 39°F and heart rate to 10 per minute; woodchucks rouse once in a while, and might even emerge briefly on warm winter days, but only rarely on February 2.

Giant Swallowtail

We have noted the bottlebrush buckeyes (Aesculus parviflora) previously, but have never posted about this frequent visitor to them, the giant swallowtail (Papilio cresphontes). This largest of Illinois butterflies (4 to 6 inch wingspan) goes through two generations in Illinois and then overwinters as a chrysalis. They feed on a variety of vegetation found at Habitat Home, including these bottlebrush buckeyes, milkweed, clover, and phlox. They are a beautiful sight as they make their "hopping" flight way across the yard. Note: the photo above is one of those that is worth clicking on to open up a higher resolution version to ponder in more detail; for example, it looks like the butterfly's proboscis has passed behind or right through the flower.

Apple Trees

We have three standard apple trees on our property. Like the cicadas (see previous post) the apples are unusual this year. This is the first year that we have apples on all three trees. The trees were planted in 1993. Previously, all have born fruit but not all in the same year.

Since all the trees are producing fruit this year I may just have an opportunity to harvest some apples this year. There may be enough for the deer, raccoons, squirrels, birds, possums, skunks and us!

13-year Cicadas

Upon returning from our vacation to Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park, we were welcomed home by the droning trill of thousands of cicadas. 2011 is the emergence year for so-called Brood XIX, the Great Southern Brood of periodical cicadas. One species of Magicicada, these cicadas (not locusts, that's a whole different order) live underground for 13 years, feeding on the sap of friendly tree roots. By some unknown signal, they then all emerge in May and June to quickly fly around, eat, mate, and lay eggs in a matter of 5-6 weeks. A strange life cycle, to be sure, but apparently a successful one. 13- and 17-year periodical cicadas are found only in the eastern U.S. and nowhere else in the world.

I am incapable of picking out to which of the 3 (or four?) species that these Habitat Home cicadas belong. Apparently, one species differentiator is the song, sung only by the males. So I have included here an audio recording for those who might care (see link below). This recording includes an obvious bird in the background, but both the chirps and the drone are from these cicadas, mostly in the crab apple tree where these photos were taken.

For more information, see:

• Susan Post and Michael Jeffords article on Illinois cicadas (from Illinois Steward, Summer 2004)
• Wikipedia article on Magicicada
• Wikipedia article on Brood XIX (The Great Southern Brood)
• 17 second audio recording from the crab apple tree