On The Trails: Spring in late May

A lupine inflorescence with closed buds and a few open flowers. (Photo by Mary F. Willson)

By Mary F. Willson

On a recent semi-sunny day, I ventured down the badly pot-holed access road to the trailhead for the wetlands at the end of Industrial Boulevard. Elderberry shrubs bore a few inflorescences with open flowers and more to come soon.  

Out in the meadows, zipping up my jacket vs. the chilly breeze, listening to the savannah sparrows, I saw that the flower show is beginning. Going off the main trail on the trail that parallels the golf-course fence, the first open meadow area is full of dandelions and a few buttercups. The next meadow area is a field of buttercups (and a few dandies). Shooting stars are common there: some were already blooming, many more were still in bud, and thousands of young plants bear the promise of flowers in coming years. Shooting stars have been classified in their own genus (Dodecatheon) for a long time, but genetic research has indicated that they should be in the genus Primula. Primulas (primroses) come in many forms, as a visit to the Arb makes evident, and the huge diversity of floral shapes, colors, and arrangements is now augmented by the addition of the still more different shooting stars.

A few lupines bore open flowers, while others presented clusters of buds in characteristic closed, fuzzy white inflorescences. Chocolate lilies had fat buds, but no iris buds were evident yet. There’s lots to look forward to!

A red-breasted sapsucker has captured a crane fly. (Photo by Bob Armstrong)

My home pond in late May becomes a rendezvous place for female mallards that have lost their first clutch of eggs and need to start a new clutch. A male mallard is on the pond most of the day, and he is visited regularly by a female in the afternoon — and possibly a second female in the evening. They cruise around the pond together, exploring the pond edge for edibles and nibbling at seeds fallen from the suspended feeder. At times, they nestle down on the bank, close together, just loafing. I suspect that the action she comes for takes place in a sheltered little bay on the far side of the pond — I sometimes see a flurry of disturbed wavelets and she emerges, settling down her ruffled feathers. I always look forward to broods of ducklings visiting a few weeks later.

The hummingbird feeder is often visited by two females, sometimes three, that feed at the same time from the four-ported nectar feeder. Regular visitors to my deck include chickadees, nuthatches, pine siskins, and juncos, but there are fewer of them than there were earlier; presumably some have gone off to start nests somewhere else. An abundance of yellow-rumped warblers has diminished greatly; some still come for peanut butter (many more than in previous years). A male hairy woodpecker arrives for a snack of peanut butter nearly every day. One day, I was surprised by an eagle dropped in, perhaps hunting ducks, but it left, empty-fisted.

Trips to Point Louisa are usually good. On a very fine sunny day, robins and crows were busily carrying food back to nests. Hermit thrushes sang. A male song sparrow was "on station" in the usual area, singing from the top of a tall dead weed stalk or from the isolated bush in the open stretch between conifer stands. The spiny black gooseberry (a.k.a. prickly currant, Ribes lacustre) was in full bloom. A few days later, in cold, light rain, the song sparrow was still active. This time, I saw two red-breasted sapsuckers, both scanning tree trunks in hopes of edibles. Males and females look alike, in this species. It would be fun (for us) if they nested out here: they are cavity-nesters, laying about five eggs per clutch, and both sexes incubate. Chicks stay in the nest three and a half or four weeks and begin to feed on their own soon after leaving the nest.

Shooting stars bloomed in the wetland, with many juvenile plants for future flowers. (Photo by Mary F. Willson)

On the most recent trip there, I saw the prize I’d hope for: a pair of black oystercatchers, hunkered down close together in the lee of a rock, looking bunched up against the chill. They were just black lumps until I saw the occasional flash of a long red bill.

Meanwhile, at Kingfisher Pond, red-wing blackbirds were nesting, Wilson’s warblers flitted in the understory — and tree swallows gracefully swooped to and fro, not then showing interest in the nest boxes that have been used in previous years.

• Mary F. Willson is a retired professor of ecology. "On The Trails" appears periodically in the Juneau Independent. For a complete archive of Mary Willson’s “On the Trails” essays, go to https://onthetrailsjuneau.wordpress.com