To Mary Oliver

The golden evening sun and calm water were too delicious to miss. Decked out in full bug jacket and long pants, I hauled my old yellow kayak through the patch of soggy earth and a gauntlet of tiny vampires toward the lake. My head buzzed with thoughts of the day, plans for tomorrow, and the wings of those diminutive Dementors. How are there still so many?

Dip. Dip. Dip. Strong (desperate) paddle strokes took me out into the light breeze. One by one the mosquitos fell back, until finally I could unzip the head net and see properly. I paddled across open water toward a ring of green surrounding a rocky island.

Nosing into the wet thicket, I became transfixed by the way my bright yellow kayak parted the green polka dots of water lily leaves, then the narrow weave of the floating bur-reed, then the spikes of the rushes. Ramrod straight and austere, those gave way to a whimsical patch of upside-down heart-leaves and fuzzy clusters of purple monkey-faced flowers belonging to pickerelweed.

Pickerelweed

Watching my plastic prow poke through the striking palate of shapes and colors, a line from the poem “Moles” by my favorite poet, Mary Oliver, popped, unbidden, into my head. “Pushing and shoving / with their stubborn muzzles against / the whole earth, / finding it / delicious.”

I inhaled the perfume of basswood flowers on the breeze, and the sweet smell of algae picked up in the wind, and the fresh fragrance of cool evening air tumbling out of the woods. Delicious, yes!

And then my phone buzzed. Why did I even have it on? But the text was from a friend who’s been making me smile, so I tapped on the screen. It wasn’t a long message, just a note to correct a typo in an earlier text. “That should have said I love how you quote Mary Oliver! Not…I love how you Mary Oliver!”

I chuckled—my brain’s own autocorrect had skipped right over the phone’s autocorrect fail. So often, even when someone’s words come out in a funny order, we still know exactly what they mean. But now I re-read the original typo and felt a little fizz of joy. Leaving out a single word had essentially turned Mary Oliver into a verb. I mulled this over. What would it mean “to mary oliver”?

If you’ve read any of her poetry, you know that she was an ecologist poet who wrote with joy and empathy about the natural world. She’s shaped my views on death and beauty more than I can comprehend, and little phrases from her poems overlay my days like the script on artsy greeting cards.

Thinking of her while picking my way around the slippery rocks of the island, I stuck my nose into a patch of hot pink swamp milkweed flowers to inhale their heady scent. “Every day I walk out into the world / to be dazzled, then to be reflective,” wrote Mary Oliver. That seems like a good start to the definition of our new verb.

Swamp milkweed

Backpaddling out of the thicket, I became enamored with the bur-reed leaves. The cells in the dead leaves had hollowed out to create long strips of stained glass. While photographing those held up to the Sun, I noticed some funny bumps on a live leaf, each with two long tails like the bunny ears on my first TV. When I picked up that leaf, I found that they each extended a long oval capsule into the water on the underside. Often, when you are mary-olivering, “if you notice anything, / it leads you to notice / more / and more.” (If you know who these eggs belong to, please tell me!)

Mystery eggs on a floating bur-reed leaf (held upside down).

As I paddled on through the shallow bays of Lake Namakagon, the ghostly shapes of aquatic plants appeared and disappeared beneath me. To get a better look, I dipped my waterproof camera beneath the surface and blindly took photos in the water. I’d have to enjoy them later, after dark, on my computer screen. “I look; morning to night I am never done with looking.” Wrote Mary Oliver, and although I’m pretty sure she wasn’t talking about uploading photos, I think it counts. (Check out my Reel!)

Finally I made it to a patch of white water lilies just starting to bloom. In a scene straight from her poem “The Ponds,” a muskrat swam past. I dipped my camera below the surface and snapped away, then brought it up and peered at the screen. The lily was luminous. Light from above filtered through the white petals. Specks of algae surrounded it like fairy dust.

white water lily

But the flower wasn’t perfect. Algae and tiny eggs had clung to its surfaces and the odd detritus of a productive lake mucked up the water. Nearby, the water lily’s leaves were full of holes chewed by beetles. They aren’t just art, they are habitat. Still, they were worthy of mary-olivering. “I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing— / that the light is everything—that it is more than the sum / of each flawed blossom rising and falling. And I do.”

I mary-olivered all evening. I plan to mary-oliver every day. “Tell me, what is it you plan to do / with your one wild and precious life?”

Emily’s award-winning second book, Natural Connections: Dreaming of an Elfin Skimmer, is available to purchase at www.cablemuseum.org/books and at your local independent bookstore, too.

For more than 50 years, the Cable Natural History Museum has served to connect you to the Northwoods. Our new exhibit: “The Northwoods ROCKS!” is open now! Our Summer Calendar of Events is ready for registration! Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and cablemuseum.org to see what we are up to.

Learning from Banded Loons

With a dozen sets of eyes scanning the water, it took us almost no time at all to spot the family of loons. A little cheer went up from the pontoon boat when we finally got a clear look at the fuzzy chick paddling around behind their parents. Since this was the first Loon Pontoon Tour on Lake Owen of 2023, the chick was as much a surprise to me as to the participants on this Museum program.

I pegged this little fuzzball with the big brown eyes at about 2 weeks old, even though they were swimming independently behind Mom and Dad and not riding on a safe, warm back. Zooming in on that cute little beak, I happened to get the tail end of an adult loon in the photo, too. Below all those snazzy black and white feathers and quicksilver waves, there were some other, more unusual colors, too: this loon was wearing leg bands!

Bird banding is an old, if not ancient, practice, but loon banding has only been possible since 1988 when researcher Dave Evers developed a way to capture and band loons on Michigan’s Seney National Wildlife Refuge. His technique revolutionized loon research by allowing identification of individual loons from afar, without recapture. Colored leg bands are how we know that loon pairs split their parenting duties roughly 50/50, and that loons can live at least 34 years.

A week later, I revisited that same loon family (the chicks grow so fast!) and got even clearer photos of the loon’s leg bands through the crystal clear water of Lake Owen. This time, I emailed the photos to researcher Walter Piper. His Loon Project blog at loonproject.org is a great resource for updates on loon behavior, ecology, population, and more. He wrote back “This looks like white over green, green over silver. If so, it is this bird, banded in 2003 as a chick on Turtle Flambeau Flowage!”

Wow! A 20-year-old loon, still producing chicks, 50+ miles from where he was hatched! I asked Piper for more information, but this wasn’t one of the hundreds of loons he’s banded. Instead, we reached out to Mike Meyer, a biologist with the Wisconsin DNR’s Science Services department, now retired. Mike confirmed that “yes this loon was banded as a chick on August 5, 2003 in a loon territory on the Turtle Flambeau Flowage we termed Beaver Creek. Beyond that we have no information, that is until your observations…which is excellent dispersal data…Always nice to hear from our past loon acquaintances...”

As it turns out, Mike has many past loon acquaintances from his 25+ years of research.

I gave Mike a call last week, hoping to hear a story of the night this particular loon, “white over green, green over silver” was captured. But as Mike began describing his summer field seasons, I quickly understood why he didn’t remember this individual loon.

Each spring, Mike and his team began monitoring loons on the 50-60 lakes in their study area to see which pairs had chicks. A fluffy little chick is too small to take a leg band, so researchers waited until the chicks were 5-6 weeks old. Then the fun really began.

Their “day” started at 10 p.m. as the 3-5 person research team arrived on the first lake just in time to use the last light to spot the loons. When it was completely dark, they piled into a small boat with a small motor, a spotlight, a musky net, and a boom box. Using the spotlight, the researchers sought out the shining white breast feathers of the loons. Then they used the boom box to play the sounds of peeping chicks and other loon calls. This brought the family close, and kept them at the surface to investigate.

You always try to capture the female first, Mike told me. “She’s the first one to get outta there, because she wants to live to reproduce another day.” That’s what the musky net is for. Then, the chick can be dipped up, and finally the male, although “circumstances make shuffle the deck,” Mike chuckled, stating a fact of fieldwork. The loons were housed in dark plastic tubs with air holes, and everyone headed to shore where the banding, measuring, and sometimes blood drawing, could take place on stable ground.

“It’s a bit of an operation,” explained Mike. He had stories of skin torn and bruised from loons’ strong, serrated beaks, and having to swim for a boat that wasn’t pulled up all the way, and even having the sheriff called on them for acting suspiciously with spotlights at 2 a.m.

With all of this, they averaged 3 lakes per night, caught 95% of the loons they attempted, and banded more than 2,000 loons. Mike’s work on mercury toxicity in loons helped establish Wisconsin’s 2010 mercury emission reduction rule for coal-burning power plants. Banded loons have contributed immensely to our knowledge of their population dynamics, migration, threats they face on their summer breeding grounds, and more. “Loons are biosentinels of lake health,” Mike told me. “If you have loons on your lake, you’re doing it right.”

I wonder if “white over green, green over silver” remembers that dark night 20 years ago when he first met Mike Meyer. Probably not. But as part of the valuable long-term research on banded loons, both Mike’s and the loon’s contributions to science will be remembered for decades to come.

Emily’s award-winning second book, Natural Connections: Dreaming of an Elfin Skimmer, is available to purchase at www.cablemuseum.org/books and at your local independent bookstore, too.

For more than 50 years, the Cable Natural History Museum has served to connect you to the Northwoods. Our new exhibit: “The Northwoods ROCKS!” is open now! Our Summer Calendar of Events is ready for registration! Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and cablemuseum.org to see what we are up to.

Camping with the Cousins

I wasn’t quite sure what I was getting into when my cousin Meggan decided that this was the summer her crew would come to the Northwoods on vacation. Born just six weeks apart, we’d spent our childhood together with a pack of 13 cousins running wild around Grandpa’s house in southern Iowa during most holidays and school breaks. Now Meggan has six kids of her own. How would I entertain them for a few days? This same crew was part of the family reunion I attended last summer, where we caught a shimmering young spider and named her Princess Entelegyne. As it turns out, I didn’t need to worry.

Me and one of my "best-friend-cousins," Meggan. 

I packed my car, too, and we all headed up to the campground at Little Sand Bay on Lake Superior, hoping to avoid the thickest flocks of mosquitoes. It worked. We had time to make s’mores and tell stories around the campfire before a few biters emerged from the woods, just as we were snuggling into our tents.

The next morning, after Rosemary, age 4, had finished her oatmeal, she wandered over under a tree to build fairy houses. I was helping her poke a little cone of sticks in the ground when she discovered a caterpillar. Enchanted, she encouraged the critter to crawl on a stick so she could hold them up for a better view. My heart twisted a little, and my head churned with negative thoughts.

Rosemary, age 4, had no trouble finding spongy moth caterpillar “fairy babies” to inhabit her little twiggy fairy house. Photo by Emily Stone.

With their pretty rows of red and blue dots, and whimsical, wispy hairs, I could see why Rosemary was fascinated with this spongy moth caterpillar. She probably hadn’t noticed the defoliated trees lining Highway 13 near Bayfield, though, and she definitely didn’t know that Bayfield County is in the third (and hopefully last!) year of a spongy moth outbreak. Even though the sugar maple tree we sat under isn’t their favorite food, it is one of the 300 species the pests will consume.

Rosemary dropped this caterpillar off in the fairy house, and then went searching for more. She didn’t have to go far. They were crawling up tree trunks, car tires, and even our pantlegs. At first, because she was putting them into the fairy house, we called the caterpillars “fairies.” That felt odd, though, since fairies usually have wings. So, we switched to calling them fairy babies, a nod to the little pale-winged adult they would become. The cute name softened my grudge against them. I tamped down my worries about the outbreak, and just enjoyed the fact that the caterpillars were such an abundant source of wonder for the kids.

Catherine, age 10, let’s a “fairy baby” crawl on her fingers. Spongy moth caterpillars may be destructive, but they are also fascinating little critters. (Note: the hairs on spongy moths can sometimes irritate your skin. We seemed to have no problem with caterpillars on sticks and on our hands, but letting them crawl up the soft skin of your inner wrist might not be a great idea. I decided not to warn the kids about this to avoid unnecessary anxiety, but did keep an eye on it.)
Photo by Emily Stone.

After breakfast, we loaded up and headed to Houghton Falls. This relatively short, wide, gently sloping trail skirts the edge of an elegantly carved sandstone ravine with waterfalls on its way down Lake Superior. I had seen videos of spring snowmelt tumbling over the ledges in spectacular fashion, but now the stream was a mere trickle. I gave a little sigh of disappointment at the lack of show, and worried that the kids would be bored.

In no time they were braving a balancing log across a little pool to get a closer look. James, Meggan’s husband, went with them, and then stood with his back to the falls. I puzzled at his position, until Charlotte’s little two-year-old hand reached out from her perch in the pack on his back, fingers splayed, trying to catch each cool drip. Rosemary joined them and stood there catching drops with a look of thoughtful wonder on her face. They didn’t need a rushing waterfall to enjoy the touch of water.

On the hike back, after spending a few minutes admiring Lake Superior on a sunny, sandstone point, the kids were getting tired. There was a commotion, some accusatory tones, and a very sad Jerome. One of his siblings had swatted at an insect and injured it. Jerome was indignant. The insect hadn’t been hurting anyone! When he caught up to me, I examined the big horse fly cradled gingerly in his palm. A relative of deer flies, the females inflict a painful bite, then lap up the blood to fuel egg development. Jerome didn’t know that. He felt in his kind little 8-year-old heart that this fragile living being deserved respect and needed care.

Jerome, the Healer of Horseflies

Later, we got out the bug nets and swept the bushes around our campsite. Someone soon found a colony of pink and yellow common-candy-striped spiders with their net. There were enough that we could each have a spider “yo-yo” dangling from our finger on an invisible strand of silk. My rule with spiders (learned from Larry Weber, who wrote the book on Northwoods spiders) is that you can only hold spiders if you’re sure that YOU won’t hurt THEM, not the other way around. I knew I could trust this group.

Meggan might have brought the kids up here thinking that my naturalist knowledge would augment their homeschool curriculum. And indeed, I read them Natural Connections articles at story time, taught them the correct name for crane flies, and helped Catherine, age 10, complete the Geology Activity Booklet designed to complement the Museum’s current exhibit.

Storytime selfie with Cousin Em

One of the activities in the geology booklet is making your own dinosaur tracks.
Here's Catherine with hers! 

But by the end, they’d also taught me to find beauty in the spongy moth, empathy for a horse fly, and wonder in a trickle of water. Now that’s a productive vacation.

Love you all soooo much! Can't wait to see you again!

 

Emily’s award-winning second book, Natural Connections: Dreaming of an Elfin Skimmer, is available to purchase at www.cablemuseum.org/books and at your local independent bookstore, too.

For more than 50 years, the Cable Natural History Museum has served to connect you to the Northwoods. Our new exhibit: “The Northwoods ROCKS!” is open now! Our Summer Calendar of Events is ready for registration! Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and cablemuseum.org to see what we are up to.

Fawn Feeding Frenzy

I was up earlier than normal to pack my backpack for the Lake Superior Fisheries field trip I wrote about last week, but the Sun was up early, too, on the Summer Solstice. While stuffing my camera into the pack, I glanced out my second-floor window and then did a double-take. On the grass below was a doe. The sight of deer in my yard usually just makes me fear for my garden, but as the doe shifted slightly, her tiny, spotted fawn came into view beneath her belly. The cuteness of baby animals is irresistible, even if they do grow into broccoli thieves.

I pulled my camera back out of my pack and took some photos through the window. The fawn was just finishing up nursing, then the pair began to meander down the trail toward the lake. Click. Click. Click. I snapped away, hoping to catch the cutest expression on the fawn’s little face.

Later, when I uploaded the photos to my computer, a pattern made me chuckle. In every frame capturing their walk, the fawn was mimicking Mom’s behavior. Mom stopped and looked over her shoulder. So did Baby. Mom lowered her head to nibble the daisies. Even though the fawn won’t start testing out solid food until at least week two, Baby watched and sniffed with their nose close to Mom’s. It was a little game of Follow the Leader, which, of course, is how many wild babies learn to survive.

A week later, I was about to do my daily fill of the hummingbird feeder, but stopped just in time. Mama and baby were back. The fawn was a little bigger, and nursing hungrily. I opened the window as stealthily as I could, and snapped some photos without glass in the way. Absorbed in their tasks, they did not look up.

Baby was nursing with furious intensity, their little head bobbing and throat quivering. The fawn’s outsized ears and adorably fluffy white tail were all standing at attention. With similar focus, Mom was licking the little one’s rear.

Watch a video!

Now, lots of animal parents take care of their young one’s poop. My beloved chickadees, for example, keep their nest clean by carrying out little membrane-wrapped fecal sacs, conveniently packaged by the chicks’ own digestive tracts for easy removal. The chicks are primed to poop just after they are fed, which is good timing—the parent brings dinner and takes out the trash in the same visit.

Chickadee carrying a fecal sac.

Similarly, by licking the fawn’s perineal region the whole time they are feeding, the doe stimulates the fawn’s bowels, gets rid of all the stinky stuff, and refills Junior’s belly in the shortest time possible! This multi-tasking is necessary when a doe may only spend a few hours each day with the fawn. Even with limited feeding sessions, fawns double their weight—from an average of 6 pounds at birth—in just two weeks. Deer milk is richer in fat and protein than cow’s milk.

Some of the fawn’s best defenses are to be small, well-camouflaged, and almost scent-free. Big, fragrant Mom hanging around would be easier for predators to detect, and this is dangerous for the fawn before they are strong enough to run. After about five days, a fawn could outrun most predators (including you!), but not all of them. So, for the first three weeks, fawns stay hidden, with Mom hanging out within earshot and returning to nurse them four or five times a day. If a fawn’s cover is blown, a distressed bleat will bring Mom running to the rescue.

Even with all of these precautions, being a fawn is risky business. During the Wisconsin DNR’s 2013 fawn mortality study, only 44.8% of fawns survived to their half-birthday in the northern forests, while 57.8% survived in the eastern farmland. Predators were the largest cause of mortality up north, while starvation was the main problem in farmland. In the absence of abundant predators, fawns still die of emaciation, disease, and birth defects.

These fawn mortality studies are not easy to conduct! Most predators are members of the clean plate club. The Voyageur Wolf Project has been studying wolf predation in the summer since 2012. Their trained field technicians are able to identify the remains of a fawn dinner by the subtle clues of disturbed vegetation, a few bone fragments, or the stomach contents…but only after a wolf’s GPS collar has led them to the site.

This is the season of wild babies! Does nibble on tender young plants (and have even been captured on nest cameras eating baby birds). Fawns drink their milk. Then fawns become lunch for fast-growing wolf pups at a critical time. The food web is humming along at top speed, and everyone’s baby—no matter how cute—is potential food for something else.

And here’s the required PSA: while humans are wired to help cute little babies survive, if you find a fawn, leave it! It’s likely that Mom is nearby. Even if she isn’t, human intervention has been shown not to increase fawn survival over the long run. Somehow, there still seem to be plenty of deer!

Emily’s award-winning second book, Natural Connections: Dreaming of an Elfin Skimmer, is available to purchase at www.cablemuseum.org/books and at your local independent bookstore, too.

For more than 50 years, the Cable Natural History Museum has served to connect you to the Northwoods. Our new exhibit: “The Northwoods ROCKS!” is open now! Our Summer Calendar of Events is ready for registration! Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and cablemuseum.org to see what we are up to.