Its February. Time to THINK SPRING

The weather has been very capricious this past few weeks. We’ve had days when the temps hovered around 20, and then snow, and then buckets of warm rain, followed by ice and more freezing temps. Earlier in the week we had warmth and sunshine, with highs in the 60s. Today, though, it feels like your face will get blown off every time you step outside, and its only barely twenty degrees. This weekend we might see some more snow.

Ah, wintertime in DC. Ain’t it grand?

No matter what the thermometer reads, however, it is time for those of us in the Mid-Atlantic to begin thinking of spring if we want to welcome birds and beneficial bees to our gardens. So today I’m going to write a little about what you should do for the birds. Next week, I’ll post something about helping out the bees.

Right now the birds are very active in our neighborhood. On the way to school one morning my daughter declared that spring must be close because the birds are singing so loudly all around. (Thanks again for that noisy blessing, Rachel Carson.) Anyhow, this caused a debate about when spring actually begins between the members of my family.

My son is all about what month it is: March is when I call it spring, he says, because that is when it feels right. My husband is all about the date. Until the actual, official calendar says its spring, he won’t allow anyone’s statement to the contrary to stand uncorrected.

To me, spring begins in February, because that is the right time to think about bird boxes. Phooey on the calendar. Some guy made that up a while ago and so what. The birds know better.

Chickadees and wrens have already been seen out in our yard, checking out nesting spots. Both are cavity nesters, and both species like to find and claim potential mates and nesting spots at this time of year. So if you want to attract these to your small urban yard in the DC area, now is the time to put out boxes. They are both voracious insect eaters and so even if you aren’t a bird watcher you will rejoice when you see them carrying bugs into the box to feed their young this spring. So will your tomato plants.

If you are lucky enough to live in a large rural area where meadows are available, then now is the time to put out bluebird boxes, too. I used to volunteer as a bluebird monitor along a rural trail near Baltimore when I lived up there, and I can recall that often, right after we put up a box in January or February, we’d find evidence that the birds had been checking it out. Sometimes there would be bird droppings on the top of the box, and other times there’d be actual nest bits inside. Seeing a bright blue bird sitting on top of one of our boxes on a gray February day was always a treat.

As always, no matter where you live and what your yard’s habitat potential may be, you’ll want to make sure to buy a box that has been specially designed with a certain bird species in mind. Boxes that are simply wooden cubes with random holes may attract desirable species sometimes, but often they end up housing the aggressive and exotic species, like English sparrows and starlings. Helping to deter these species will help all the native birds in our area, so it is worth it to get the right box even if the price tag seems a bit daunting. Also, take comfort in the fact that a well-built, high quality box can last many, many years, whereas the cheap decorative ones fall apart before the season even ends.

If you’d like to read more about my past experiences with building boxes with my kids, the Voice newspaper archives.

Two good places to buy boxes locally are:

Audubon Naturalist Society in Chevy Chase

and

Wild Bird Center in Wheaton


Both places have helpful staff members who are very knowledgeable.

Advocate for the Anacostia

On Saturday, March 7, the Anacostia Watershed Citizens Advisory Committee will be hosting a workshop on Advocacy in Greenbelt. The objective of the half day workshop is to strengthen the advocacy skills of subwatershed groups and individuals. The day will include fun and informative discussions of how to best advocate for the watershed, in the context of a hypothetical case study and will also provide great networking opportunities.

For more info visit: www.anacostia.net/advocacy.html

If you plan to attend you will need to RSVP.

Early signs of spring: skunk cabbage and honeysuckle

Today the weather is colder than it has been for about a week. We had started filling the bird bath again, because it was so warm all week and the birds were out in abundance. But we woke up this morning and found it covered with ice.

But because the skies were so clear, we decided to bundle up and head out to the woods in Wheaton Regional Park for a short hike despite the cold air. While out there, I found the first sprouts of skunk cabbage were pushing up through the rich, dark mud along the creek. (I cursed the fact that I'd left my camera behind, so no pictures to share... if only I'd learn how to actually use that camera that came in my phone. )

I also noticed that the native trumpet honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens) that grows along our fence is leafing out as of this weekend. The leaves are tiny, as you can see in the photo above. But I happened to notice them because they wrap around the posts just outside the kitchen window. It seems early for them to be out, but I also know that corner of our yard is an intensely warm micro-climate. Besides facing southwest, the honeysuckle grows next to a brick wall which absorbs a ton of heat. In fact, the leaves closest to the house are much bigger than those that are on top of the fence.

I wonder if anyone else's are out... I will probably ask around on local listservs this afternoon to find out.

I also plan to make an entry about it in Project Budburst. This fantastic project, run by the National Phenology Network, was the subject of a story I wrote for the Voice newspapers last year April. They are using citizen scientists to track the leafing out and blooming of plants in North America, in order to see if the timing of the seasons is changing.

Water Quality and Dogs

I recently adopted a dog from an animal rescue group. Pet adoption has to be one of the nicest forms of “recycling” on earth. I love to walk along Sligo Creek in Silver Spring with her, even on bitter cold days. The woods are so lovely, the water so peaceful and we both enjoy taking in our favorite views (and smells) while we exercise.

But like a lot of dog lovers, I’ve often wondered how to handle the most indelicate issue of dog waste. Poop is not good for a creek, but wasn’t until I was “at the helm” of a leash once again that I really began to think and research the issue closely to figure out my approach to being a responsible dog owner and good watershed resident.

Cleaning up after a dog is not fun, and a lot of people only do it if they think someone is watching them. Maybe they figure that if the dog goes under some bushes, off the main path, that it is better to leave the droppings there because poop is natural and it will break down pretty quickly if we leave it out in the open air. They might think dog poop is no different from deer poop, or bird poop, or fox poop. (By the way, I think that might break some kind of record for use of the word poop in one sentence by someone who is over the age of five.)

It is kind of weird to bag up dog poop in some ways. You have to carry the stuff until you find a trash can. Some joggers and trail users will tie their dog poop bags to trees or bushes. My friend thinks that these people really mean to return later and do the right thing and take that poop to a can. They don’t like to run with the bag and they plan to get it on the way out, she claims. But I sometimes find those bags hanging from those same trees weeks later, like odd Christmas ornaments left by an extra mean Grinch.

And then you wonder if you do bag the stuff and throw it away… is it really better to have these plastic bags full of poop sitting around forever in our landfills?

Hunting around on the internet brings up some interesting research on the topic. Seems that landfills are not ideal, but almost everyone who has given water quality and soil sanitation any thought seems to agree that scooping poop is far superior to leaving it alone to decay.

For one thing, the intensity of dog ownership is astounding. In any watershed you can find millions of dogs. In fact, there are 74.8 million of them living in the US right now, according to the US Humane Society’s accounting.

But it only takes a small number of them to make an impact, because the bacteria levels in dog droppings can be very high. One gram of dog waste can contain as much as 23 million fecal coliform bacteria. Dog waste can also harbor Giardia, Cryptosporidium, Leptospira and Salmonella.

When you leave the feces along the creek -- or even on the sidewalk or lawn – storms can quickly carry those nasties to Sligo Creek, then the Anacostia River, and then onto the Chesapeake where they can pose serious health risks to both humans and wildlife. The EPA noted in some research conducted in the mid 1990s, for example, that if a twenty-square mile coastal bay watershed was home to only 100 dogs, two to three days worth of dog droppings would contribute enough bacteria and nutrients to temporary close that small bay to swimming and shellfishing.

Mike Smith has been testing the water quality of Sligo Creek as a volunteer with the Friends of Sligo Creek every other week since 2004. Most of his tests focus on things other than bacterial counts, such as temperature, ph, conductivity, nitrates, turbidity and dissolved oxygen. The Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission (WSSC) and the Anacostia Watershed Society (AWS) both do test regularly for bacteria, however, and Mike says their numbers show that dog waste is a big problem, and that generally around 15% of all the bacteria that is in the Sligo has been found to come from dogs.

“Bacteria is a major reason why a creek like Sligo doesn’t meet the Clean Water Act standards. Its supposed to be swimmable and fishable and bacterial contamination -- including dog waste -- is a big contributor,” Mike notes.

Besides bacteria, the release of excess nutrients from dog waste promotes algae and weed growth in watersheds, which can limit light and stop aquatic plants from growing. This can reduce the amount of oxygen, which fish and other aquatic animals need to survive.

Bagging poop for disposal in municipal landfills is not ideal. Plastic doesn’t break down over time and can accumulate quickly in dumps. You can help by using biodegradable bags, instead of those heinous newspaper bags we all wish didn’t pile up in the kitchen cabinet. If it really grosses you out you can even buy all kinds of contraptions which will make clean up easier and a bit more tidy.

Some owners also choose to use bagless scoops which completely contain the waste until it can be flushed in a toilet. I think this is really impractical and really gross. But hey, if you feel like doing it, go for it. Flushing will move the waste into municipal sewer systems where it can be handled just like human waste. (Homeowners with septic systems should avoid this method, since the systems can quickly become overwhelmed by the hair and ash often found in dog feces.)

Some municipalities also allow residents to bury pet waste, but this could also cause water pollution, and the amount of waste created by the average dog would make this quickly impractical in most Silver Spring and Takoma yards. Commercial digesters which are sold to break the waste down have not proven to be environmentally beneficial, and in many cases may not work any quicker than regular ground burial. (Queries about whether someone could bury waste in Montgomery County, MD did not turn up any specific laws or regulations. If anyone out there is aware of one that pertains, please let me know.)

Although it might be tempting to put dog waste into your compost bin, don’t ever do it. The fecal bacteria will not break down in the average backyard pile. Using compost that contains pet waste of any kind can pose serious health risks to people that visit your garden or eat your home grown veggies.

Its important to note, of course, that not all water quality problems come from dogs, and although dog owners can make a big difference by cleaning up after their pets, there are a lot of other ways we could improve the quality of our local creeks and streams.

(This story originally appeared in the February edition of the Takoma Park and Silver Spring Voice newspapers. As usual, all rights are reserved and you cannot use it without permission.)

Bees' Buzz May Be Protecting Your Plants

Researchers in Germany say that honeybees seem to provide a protective buzz to plants in gardens. Writing in the journal Current Biology, a team of biologists led by Jurgen Tautz at the University of Wurzburg found that foraging honeybees flying around in test garden plots deterred caterpillars from eating away at the leaves of pepper plants.

In the plots with bees, caterpillars ate only about one third of what they consumed in the areas where bees were eliminated.

Susan Milius in Science News reported it this way:

“So far Tautz has tested the idea only in a strictly controlled setup. He and his colleagues put up a pair of tents housing an array of plants. In the various runs of the test, researchers used bell pepper plants, once with and once without fruits, as well as soybean plants. A bee hive opened into the one tent, and some 50 bees at a time buzzed over the plants on the way to collecting sugar water from feeders in the corners.”

Army worms (Spodoptera exigua) were then added to the scene. They can be a real nuisance in gardens, eating some 50 kinds of plants, but they have been known to stop moving and even fall from leaves if wasps fly by. This may be because wasps are known to eat caterpillars. Tautz, the researcher leading the tests, says that the caterpillars have small hairs that can sense wasp wing movements.

Bees and wasps differ in a few major ways, not the least of which is diet. Bees do not eat caterpillars. But to the pest worms, the sounds may be the same and cause the same reaction.

The team would like to do more research on this interesting cause and effect relationship, but say that it may simply bee a nice side benefit to pollination.

Reading over the press releases and stories written about this research, I couldn't help but wonder if native bees (like the one in my photo, above) provide the same protection. Also, I think this proves that there are huge advantages to planting nectar rich flowers near your fruits and vegetables that go beyond pollination.

And hey, now I have one more reason to tell people that they shouldn't hate the bees.

Shine a spotlight on your favorite CSA

Today's Washington Post carried the following announcement: On Feb 4 the Food section will publish a list of Washington area farms that still have 2009 Community Supported Agriculture for sale. If you know of a farm that might want to participate, tell them to email: food@washpost.com by this coming Friday. They will need to include: farm name, location and county, contact person, phone number, website if possible and prices for full and half shares, number of weeks in the season and pick up locations.

It is NOT too cold to play outside

A lot of times people are surprised to find out how much I like winter. Maybe because I am such an avid gardener, people expect me to hibernate somewhere until the warmth returns.

But winter is one of my favorite times to hike. You see things in winter you don’t see any other time of the year. There’s a feeling of standing backstage at a big opera; everything is quiet and still and hushed, and the bare branches are like open stages where nature’s more reluctant divas cannot hide.

One of the best hikes I ever took was a lone winter walk I made one January afternoon outside Irvine Natural Science Center in Baltimore County almost a decade ago. I left my office and the stuffy, hot air of the indoors behind and felt the cold burn at my cheeks as I walked past farm fields full of stubble and frozen mud to find the woodland trail along a favorite creek. Foxes ran alongside the trail a few feet ahead of me at one point, and as the sun waned along the horizon, I watched an enormous silent owl as it glided through the branches over my head. I had never seen one before, and I was the only person there to witness its silent beauty that day. When I returned to my car, snow began to fall and I felt as if I was the only person alive on earth watching it fall from the sky.

We don’t get snow here very often, and the past few winters we’ve had almost none at all. I think this lack of flakey white stuff leads people to think that there is nothing to see in the woods during winter, and no reason to go outside, maybe because snow lends itself to all kinds of fun times like sledding and cross country skiing.

Finding things to do in brown, cold woods is a bit more challenging. But even if we don’t get snow this winter, there are good reasons to get out and get some cold, fresh air along a trail in the woods.

“I like to take people out and explore what’s happening now and in the moment,” says Tina Stachura, who leads nature walks at Brookside Nature Center in Wheaton. “There’s not enough of that these days.”

A lot people, Tina says, have the mistaken idea that everything goes to sleep here in the winter, and her winter hikes are sometimes scavenger hunts designed to prove this notion false to kids. Early this month, she’ll encourage hikers on one of her walks to find evidence of animal activity in the woods, such as feathers, fur, scat (a fancy naturalist word for poop), and tracks in the mud. She’ll also ask kids to look for berries that are unusual colors, old birds’ nests left behind from the warmer months, and places where bucks have rubbed their antlers against tree trunks. She’ll get kids on her hikes to think about what is and is not happening in the woods during the colder months, in order to explain what the seasons mean to other animals.

“The key is, just because everything looks dead to us, things are still happening in nature,” she says.

Even if you can’t attend a walk at the nature center this month, you can still find ways explore on your own with your kids when its cold, and you don’t have to be an expert naturalist to find fun things that will nudge your kids’ curiosity.

Sometimes I play games with my kids to get them thinking and exploring. We hunt for things that are different colors, for example. My kids will start out thinking that they can’t find anything bright red or purple, for example, and then are surprised to see bright berries and purple leaves hanging all around.

You can also read some great books to your kids before you start. A family favorite at our house is Jan Brett’s The Mitten, which the Nature Center even adapted into a puppet show. We also like the picture book Keep Looking, by Millicent Selsam, which as beautiful illustrations about what happens on a farm in winter. We also like Snowflake Bentley, by Jacqueline Briggs Martin. This beautiful book is full of fantastic wood cuts that tell the story of a man who was so passionate about snow he made documenting its beauty into his life’s mission. There’s a wonderful theme here for kids that illustrates the glory of stopping to slow down and notice even the small details of life.

When you can’t get out to the woods, you can try doing science experiments with your kids at home in your own backyard.

My kids never get tired of making ice, for example. If the weather is warm one day but the forecast calls for a sudden freeze the next morning, I invite my kids to make outdoor ice cubes. We search the house and yard for funny containers that we can fill with water, such sand box toys shaped like different animals. We fill put them out by our swing set, and then check them the next morning when the frost is still on the ground. As the day goes on we see if we can dislodge the ice, making funny sculptures that can be decorated with grass, or sticks or whatever strikes their fancy. We check our thermometer to see how warm it before the ice animals to melt away to nothing.

We also check to see which is colder: the freezer in our kitchen, or the air outside. Sometimes my son gets very interested in this game, and walks all around the house and yard with the thermometer, checking to see if every place he goes has a different reading.

If you want to check out a winter program or take a hike at any of the county’s nature centers, you can visit their registration booklet in PDF format online at http://www.parkpass.org/. Look under the nature center section. This same booklet is also available at most of the county’s recreation centers and libraries.