Observation Quiz! How good are you?

Mystery Object

A student brought this in and asked me what I thought this was and I am stumped! I think she said it was found on a beach. I will ask her where. Does anyone know what this is? (I think it's a calcified fairy wing, but until a fairy is caught and its wing is studied for comparison, we will never know)

Heads Up!

I'll never forget the day I hit my grandmother in the head with a baseball. I was only thirteen and learned the hard way that my accuracy still needed honing. I was playing catch with my brother in our backyard when she dawdled towards our garden. We cautiously continued to play catch until a high, rainbow like flutter ball konked her on the head and softly landed five feet away. She was a bit stunned but forgave me even though I did not shout "heads up!" It all happened so slowly, that yelling "heads up" did not even enter my mind. I felt like I was watching a horror movie in slow motion! And anyways, if she did look up, she would have been hit in the nose. So I like to think that I was "protecting" her. My brother disagrees, but he had a bad angle on the throw anyway.

So I am here to say "heads up" to you. Because there are at least five things you need to keep an eye out for in the coming days.

ANOTHER FALLING SATELLITE

Did you know that you had a 1 in 3200 chance of having a decrepit satellite fall on you last month? If you didn't, now the odds of having a satellite fall on you has increased to 1 in 2000 because a defunct German satellite is going to enter our atmosphere and crash somewhere on Earth. Where? No one knows until one or two hours before it hits. Now don't fret. Our atmosphere will protect us by burning up most of this satellite. But unfortunately, the mirrors on the satellite will probably survive re-entry temperatures and land on Earth. They gave an estimate that it will land somewhere between Canada and South America. At least I know Santa is safe. UPDATE: The estimated time of crash is this Sunday morning (the 23rd). So make sure you park your car in the garage and spend the weekend in a bunker or basement!

METEOR SHOWER

If you do not want to wait to see Halley's Comet, just look outside near the constellation Orion during the wee hours of Saturday morning. If you see a meteor streaking across the sky, you are likely seeing a piece of dust that left Halley's comet the last time it whipped around our Sun. The peak of this meteor shower is only 15 meteors an hour, but it is still better than no meteor shower at all. So heads up for space junk and meteors!









BIRD POOP

When one of my kids was a toddler, a bird in a parking lot pooped on her head. It was gross and quickly cleaned up. When I told my Mom about this, she said one of the best things in the world. "When a bird poops on your head, that means your lucky." I never heard that before. So I believed it, until last week.

I visited Blue Beach in North Kingstown and had the whole beach to myself except for the presence of some cormorants and one large great blue heron. I stalked the heron to get a picture and I watched in awe as it slowly flew away with its usual grace. But the elegant grace disappeared as a single, thick, long wet stream of heron poop landed on the pristine sand of the beach. It's incredibly hard to gross me out, but that was totally disgusting. So heads up for bird poop.

LICHEN

I have a love / hate relationship with squirrels. Mostly hate though. But when I was in my backyard over the summer a piece of bark landed on my head. Then another piece just missed me. When I ran away and looked up, I saw a squirrel frantically breaking apart the lichen and bark looking for food to eat. I was very impressed with the variety of the squirrel's diet. It made me want to at least try some "yucky" foods like cabbage, pickles and cauliflower. But not really. I would rather throw that food at the squirrels who constantly outsmart me at my attempts to feed birds. So heads up for lichen and bark falling on your head from evil squirrels.

THE ACORN GAME

I thought of a great game to play. Put on goggles and lay face up under a towering huge oak tree as it is losing acorns. Try to catch the acorns for points. If you miss and it hits you, then you get a bruise from the speedy and pointy acorn. I have not played this yet, but I will have the common courtesy to let someone else be the first to play and to let me know how much an acorn can hurt you before I decide to play. At least with this game, due to your position facing the sky and trees, no one needs to holler "heads up!"

Foliage Color Map

Irene's Shredding

One thing I love about hurricanes is the long drawn out warning of their arrival. How often do we get a week long heads up about a possibly devastating event? A massive counter clockwise storm slowly moving its way north is a breath of fresh air compared to a possible tornado in your neighborhood. Tornadoes are highly unpredictable and much more life threatening if you are not expecting one. And forget about predicting earthquakes. The only time you can accurately predict an earthquake is after the initial earthquake, because aftershocks are just smaller earthquakes. Volcanic eruptions are now easier to predict but not as precise as a hurricane. We all knew Hurricane Irene was going to hit on Sunday. With volcanoes, predictions are usually off by a few days resulting in angry villagers clamoring to go back to their homes near the base of an active volcano. You have to be tough to live along the "Ring of Fire." Good thing we live here along the East Coast. I would take sharks, ticks and hurricanes over earthquakes and volcanoes any day of the week.

One amazing thing about Hurricane Irene was how the wind literally shredded healthy green leaves and littered them absolutely everywhere. During the "peak" of the storm I rode my bike on the street to take some pictures and was glad that no one came with me. Because it's pretty stupid to ride your bike during a hurricane. At least I had my helmet on.

I rode to Frenchtown Park and expected to see numerous trees down across the trail. I counted just one. 
The wind made the water in the pond come alive as a quick downward thrust made the water quiver in all directions. That was something you don't see everyday.

 The above picture is from Beavertail Park, at the southern end of Jamestown. This is one of the best places to view waves during a hurricane.

The above picture is of Frenchtown Park pond during the peak of Hurricane Irene. 

Several times as I was riding home I heard a car's engine roar behind me. As I turned around to see the car, I saw nothing. The roaring noise of the wind as it shredded the leaves in the trees made me feel that I was being chased by a mad teen driver with a muffler problem. Sorry teen drivers. You deserve the bad rap anyway.

The best decision I made was to not ride my bike under a hanging wire on Frenchtown road. It was absolutely tempting but I decided not to "Lance Armstrong" my way under the live wire and took a longer route back home.

After heeding the warning to completely remove all belongings from our yard, I quickly rebuffed the bird feeder removal advice and put out a fresh batch of nectar for area hummingbirds. Multitudes of flowers must have been destroyed by the tropical force winds because an epic battle between five hummingbirds lasted for twenty minutes around the nectar. Zipping and zooming, whirring and chasing, it was actually cute. Like babies fighting. Not that I have seen babies fight, but if I did, I would break it up immediately. In the case of the hummingbirds, they hate sharing their nectar with other birds and are very territorial. During the past summer months though, a small bee would chase the hummingbird away and steal some nectar. I never understood why the hummingbird didn't just bite that bee in half and go back to feeding.

Overall, Hurricane Irene caught a lot of us off guard. I think one way to prepare for a hurricane is to go camping for a week. Then those camping skills will come in handy when the lights go out. Cooking on a camp stove, setting up tents and purifying your water are skills that are transferable to surviving without electricity. Unless the hurricane shreds your tent. That may call for an involuntary camping vacation at a hotel with complimentary breakfast. 

This is a Katydid on an oak tree in my backyard. It was probably wondering what was going on with the hurricane blowing through the area.

See the red fox? My kids saw it and took a picture. Probably a bit hungry after waiting out the hurricane.

12 Essentials for Wilderness Hiking

(I rode my bike during Hurricane Irene and took some photos and will share them in my next post. This was what I was working on before Irene hit us.)

Before my first daughter was born I took an intensive course in wilderness medicine and became a Wilderness Emergency Medical Technician through the outdoor organization S.O.L.O. in New Hampshire. This trained me to take care of various outdoor emergencies such as treating injured hikers to dealing with various animal attacks.

During one of our training days the instructors discussed the 12 essential items that you should bring along if you are headed out into the wilderness. I lost and found this list many times during the past 13 years as I have moved in and out of apartments. This list of  "Essential Items" started to take on a mythical quality; I thought that if I lost the list, I would be losing some vital information that could save my life someday. So I clung on to this idea as I kept on losing and finding my list over the years. But when I cleaned out my basement this summer,  I found it again and decided to put an end to this list by sharing it with you on the Internet and saving it as a Google Document.

So without further adieu, here is my mythical list of the 12 Essential Items that you need to take with you if you are venturing into the wilderness for a hike!

This list was compiled by expert search and rescue instructors during July of 1998.

1. Map
2. Compass 
3. First Aid Kit
4. Matches
5. Fire Starter
6. Food
7. Clothes
8. Water
9. Knife
10. Flashlight
11. Blanket
12. Whistle
13. Sunglasses

Now as I look at the list, being thirteen years wiser, here is what I would leave behind.

Sunglasses. What am I going to do with sunglasses? Put them on my face right before I die so my rescuers can think that I am cool when they are putting my dead body in a body bag? Sunglasses are not essential.

Blanket. No way. I am not carrying a blanket every time I hike in the woods. What am I, Linus?

Flashlight. Am I that scared of the dark? If I am lost I will find a nice, warm, dry place for shelter BEFORE sundown. I don't like the idea of carrying around a chunky, odd object that I may not use. The D batteries will probably be dead from Irene anyway.

Fire starter.  Can you say pine needles? If you can, there is your fire starter.

Compass. I know how to find Polaris, the North Star, and I can figure out the compass rose by looking at the path of the Sun. I can also make a compass using a leaf, water and paperclip.  Can you say MacGruber?

First Aid Kit. Do you know what is in my first aid kit? Band-Aids. If I am hiking with kids, I take this to cover their boo-boos. For me? Unless it's a "Hello Kitty" bandage, I will leave it in the car.

Map. This is a murky one. If you are hiking in the 100 mile forest in Maine and want to bushwhack, take a map. If you are going to Frenchtown park for the 1000th time, leave it home.

Let me tell you why the following items are essential.

Matches. Small yet powerful. When I see free matches at the gas station I take them and throw them in the glove compartment of my car. I saved two people from horrible birthdays by running out to my car for matches so they could light their candles. All I asked for in return was for their birthday wish but they refused.

Food. You can survive for around a month without food but a nice hike in the woods is a good excuse to munch on a dark chocolate candy bar. It's for the energy of course.

Clothes. I'm not a lawyer, but I think if you hike naked you will go to jail. I would rather wear my clothes than jail clothes. And anyways, it's an extra layer of protection against ticks and poison ivy.

Water. When I was in Idaho catching mountain lions I foolishly thought that I could rehydrate myself by eating snow. Little did I know that I had to eat a "Blizzard of '78" amount of snow to keep me hydrated.

Knife. Right now get a small pocket knife and put it on your key chain. I guarantee that you will use it within 24 hours. You will use this for a variety of things from cutting annoying tags off clothing to cutting bananas apart at Dave's. And don't forget about striking an attacking grizzly bear directly in the eyeball for defense.

Whistle. Another small but powerful one. If you are yelling for help you will lose your voice. So a little whistle and a short breath will combine for a noise loud enough to be heard by a rescuer.

So there you have the Wilderness Essentials list! But remember to always use your brain and use caution. In addition use technology. GPS receivers and charged cell phones and smart phones can go a long way to help you survive. In a smart phone alone, you can have a flashlight, map and GPS. Remember to always tell someone where you are going. And if you can, bring five or six friends and maybe a six pack. (a six pack of soda of course!) 

Red Fox Suprise Visit

One humid morning, as I was hiking and exploring some off beaten trail in Arcadia, I stepped from the dense forest trees and into a jungle like parking lot that was overgrown with weeds and small trees. The anxious signal call of a blue jay drew my attention and as I entered the small clearing I noticed a small flock of birds chatting away in a small bush to my left. But immediately in front of me, stalking close to the ground was a red fox that now stared at and stalked me. 

It was ridiculously close at around ten feet. In most cases this red fox should have quickly turned and bounded away into the dark forest but it suddenly took three or four steps directly towards me as if to attack. I backed up, raised my hands and yelled as loudly as I could. I was not in the mood to be attacked by a sick red fox and wait in line to get some life-saving rabies shots. My yelling and odd behavior worked and it turned and disappeared quickly into the summer woods. The last thing I remember seeing as it scampered off was a fuzzy white tip on the end of its reddish furry tail.

Since that time I usually have seen foxes at dawn or dusk while I am in my car. So it was a complete treat to have a red fox trot through my yard and spend five minutes rolling around and scratching itself in the afternoon sun. I grabbed my camera, hushed the kids and had them watch through the kitchen window as I took as many pictures as I could. The general rule is that it is bad sign to see a fox during the daylight hours because it may indicate that they are rabid. But this fox was keen on scratching itself, rolling around in some dust pit and marking its territory with urine near the hulking oak in the far back of the yard.

After this red fox scurried away, I placed a trail camera in my backyard to see if I could get a night time picture. Instead of the red fox coming back for an encore, two gray foxes stole the show. Gray foxes are a bit more secretive and are excellent tree climbers. They also have a black tip on their tail and do not have the “black boots” on their feet that red foxes have. I learned that red and gray foxes do not have territories that overlap but a few years ago, my trail camera caught both foxes exploring a trail on the same night.

The trail camera pictures show both flash and infrared images of the gray foxes. The infrared images do not show color but the advantage is the lack of a flash which can spook nocturnal animals. If it was not for this recent camera technology, I would have to rely on chance and luck to observe the behavior of wildlife in the back yard.

 I enjoyed seeing both the red and gray foxes, but overall, the serendipitous observations of the red fox with family members will always be more memorable than observations made with technology.

Flash camera was in use for this gray fox picture.