Another turtle-ific day in the Great Swamp

I went back to the Great Swamp last saturday. I figured it may be my last good day out in the swamp before it gets too hot. I ventured in the wilderness portion of the swamp. I pulled up to its entrance, where I've never been before, and was excited to see that I was the only one there. Of course just as I was getting ready another person pulled in. Rats. The trails in this part are not really maintained so I can see why only the more hardy folk venture out there. No flip-flops and sweat pant shorts wearing kind come here. Then the second reason hit me quickly...the deer flies. They bite and they circle around your head like you are the sun and they are planets. Even if you kill one, another takes their place. No sprays will help and the constant fanning really does nothing. Nevertheless I continued on. After about 20 minutes of speedy walking, I decided that my trail was not very exciting..just more of the same so I turned back. I was on the prowl for some turtles and I wasn't getting that vibe. So I headed back to where we were last weekend.



Sure enough the turtles were fully representing. This time I saw 3 adult spotted turtles and a baby spotted turtle. Can you find the babe in this pic? How precious!
The painted turtles like to congregate. Can you see the baby painted turtle trying to climb up right behind the big one below? Every little bump in the duckweek is a painted turtle.
Let's not forget the baby snakes. I think this baby is a water snake. Look how tiny it is compared to the green duckweed.
This baby looks like a ribbon snake...but it might just be a plain old garter snake. Hard to tell unless you hold them. These two babies were hanging out together.
Another fun part of the Great Swamp is seeing all the random people there. You have the fanny pack crowd with their flipflops, t-shirts and sweat pant shorts. Today I saw one guy in a dress shirt and tie!!! Last weekend we passed some woman wearing heels and another chick wearing way too much perfume. I guess Americans think everywhere should be as clean and easily accessible as their local supermarket or the mall.

The only squirrel I tolerate

I have a long negative history with squirrels. In grad school, ground squirrels ate and destroyed one of my outdoor experiments for my thesis. It was a constant battle with them. I'll photodocument that debacle in another posting. Then back in NJ, they've more than once caused me to take down my birdfeeder. One birdfeeder they completely destroyed in one day. I now have a squirrel proof birdfeeder, but they still repeatedly jump on it and try to bite anything on it in hopes of releasing the seeds. They also jump on the peanut butter suet feeder and gorge on that. Yup. So that's been taken down because they ruined it for everyone. They help themselves to my green tomatoes that I'm growing on the deck. They take one bite and decide they don't like it and then try another. Their latest antic is to dig in the pots. Are they burying their treats already? Nevermind they've become so accustomed to me that I have to open the sliding door and step onto the deck before they budge. I swear I'm going to launch one with my broom one day. But there is one squirrel that I enjoy (for now). It's this teenager squirrel. It's more wary of my presence and easily frightened by the other obese adult squirrels. It's probably the size of a normal squirrel...not the beasts that terrorize my birdfeeders.

Naitch's real fruit snacks

One of the bonuses of working outside this time of year is that there are bountiful supplies of naitch's fruit snacks. The black raspberries (above) are right at peak. Last friday I did more munching that working at a site near Princeton. I really should bring tupperware out with my to collect this little gems. But then I really won't be doing any work. It does gross me out ever once in awhile to spot an ant secretly munching on one. They are so camoflauged that I am convinced that I have eaten ants (again...naitch's snacks..just not the fruit kind). I can only imagine what the ant is thinking finding this yummy food that's like 20 times its size.

The blackberries need some more time to ripen. Fine by me with the ample black raspberries and the blueberries coming into season. Yum.

Only bummer, if you could even call it that, is the ample seeds in my teeth. I will say these berries sure beat eating cattails any day.

Coyote pupdate

My coworkers were back out doing the big grassland bird survey. I passed on this final outing since it was getting very difficult to plow through grass that's as tall as me. Nevermind my grass allergies, almost falling into a groundhog hole (since I couldn't see it), too much walking (enough muscle pain to warrant some advil mid-day), waking up at 5 am, and wet pants from walking through dew covered grass. But they got to get some pics of the coyote pups. There are actually five of them, not just three, and they are brazen enough to lie in the company's driveway. They don't mind you in the car, but on foot they scare easily. Kind of like a safari. This is the only picture that is not a butt shot. This little one was on its own and lying in that stone covered ditch. He/She could be the runt or outcast? So snorgle-able!

Some don't brake for wildlife

I never thought I'd be the one to jump out of my car to check out some roadkill. One of my co-workers has a collection of roadkill photographs. I wonder if his girlfriend has ever stumbled upon that photo album. Eek! One of my bosses has a dead hawk in his freezer that he found. The hawk was swooping down to catch a bird (which it got and was still in its talons) and was hit by a car. A husband of another coworker has found 2 bobcat roadkills. One bobcat he picked up was on a pretty major highway. Since bobcats are endangered, he gave it to the fish and wildlife folks who did a "necroscopy" on it and took some dna. I don't think there will ever come a day when I will be up at these levels of ick. But I will stop if I think something might be alive and just trying to cross the road. This local water snake was not so fortunate. After helping a spotted turtle cross the road and finding this guy, I have been known to stop for rocks and other animal shaped debris.

Then at my local supermarket, I stumbled upon this large sphinx moth. It was already smushed and I was getting my cell phone camera settings all set. I was standing like a foot away and this moth is big...like the size of my palm. Wouldn't you know it, but some oblivious middle aged woman comes down the aisle with her cart, nearly runs it over and missed stepping on it by an inch. She never saw nor it seemed interested that I was fumbling with my cell phone in the middle of the aisle.

Every rose has its thorn

Now it probably seems like my work is just finding cute animals and fun stuff. But nearly every outing brings me face to face with thickets of thorns. You have green brier, cat brier, multiflora rose, Japanese barberry, blackberry, wineberry, and raspberry. Plus your thorny trees such as black locust, honeylocust, hawthorn, osage orange, etc. When I say thickets, I mean THICKETS. I have my trusty garden clippers, but that will only take you so far. Every once in awhile, you'll find a deer path that dead ends. I've had my fair share of sliding on my belly to get through a thicket. During the height of the field season, my legs are dotted with red marks from these thorns. I've had a thorn under my thumb nail. I gave out a real nice scream for that. If you are the second person to walk through a thicket, you might get whacked by a thorny branch. Last week I got to remove a dead thorny branch from my eyebrow.

These poor chumps are in Vermont removing some thickets of multiflora rose. Boy do I have some spots for them to help out.

Japanese barberry, which the deer don't eat, multiplies like crazy and has thorns like needles. These thorns seems to survive in my pants even after a wash.

Bear town

Over my 5+ years working outside in NJ, I've only had a handful of bear sightings. The above pic is the only pic I have of a bear I personally have seen. Yes that black blob is a bear...mostly bear booty. This past year I worked at this very large property up near Wild West City that I affectionately called bear town. Bear town is an old farm/ranch and I've been there lots of times. In the fall, I was delineating the wetlands. The corn (diners for bears in my mind) was still up and the place was actively hunted for deer. So the guys who live there, one of which I affectionately called Grizzly Adams, would bait the deer with corn meal (more bear food). Actually I just googled Grizz Adams and he's pretty harmless looking so this guy would be his evil and older twin. Grizz Adams and his buddy would drive around in camo, drinking beers, with guns of course, and bait the deer. Now I don't have too much in common with these folks, but I know the few topics we share...bears. Grizz told me the largest bear he ever saw was on the this property and then the next week he told me they saw 6 bears in one day on this property. I was sure that I would see a bear especially since there was so much bear poop everywhere. One swamp in the back had poop every five feet on the trail and it reeked like a zoo. We did hear rustling in the bushes like 20 feet away that wasn't scared when I yelled out to it. Obviously the deer on the property were exceptionally skitish so it wasn't a deer...so it probably was papa bear. I never did see a bear there, but I sure was on super high alert when out by myself. The property had all these high ridges of rocky outcrops (bear condos in my mind) so I didn't like having my back to them. It was really disconcerting to go through thick brush. I did a lot of talking to myself and humming in hopes that I would not surprise anyone. I know how quiet they can be and the last thing you want to do is startle one. Now don't get my wrong, I really do want to see bears...just at a distance that's acceptable for both of us. Not face to face in a thicket. Today I was back out and we found a super fresh bear track but alas no bear. I think I have one more outing there...my last chance.

What we did see today was a pair of blue jay babies. I hope they are ok since they aren't in a nest and don't seem to be ready to fly. They were silent and relatively motionless. I think I have like 10 pics of them and each pic is progressively getting closer. I could make like a flip book of them.