In northern New England, acorns ripen in late summer and normally drop from oak trees from September through October. They may fall earlier, however, for a host of reasons, from eager squirrels getting a head start on gathering nuts for the winter to environmental stress, including excessively hot or rainy weather. Prematurely dropped acorns…

  On a recent hike up Eagle Mountain in Milton, Vermont, we climbed to a ledge overlooking Lake Champlain. Turkey vultures soared overhead, tilting back and forth on the breeze. A sheer cliff dropped to the forest below us, a lush variety of plants clinging to its face. Cliffs are defined as areas of exposed…

  Until 65 million years ago, huge reptiles dominated our planet – and every summer I think they might be making a comeback. The sight of a snapping turtle hauling herself onto a sunny log or lifting her incredible bulk on mud-colored legs always fills me with prehistoric daydreams. Turtles have roamed the Earth for…

   A caterpillar eats and eats, becomes a chrysalis, and after a period of metamorphosis emerges as a beautiful butterfly! Except, sometimes… it doesn’t quite work that way. Occasionally, while sitting on my deck, I spot smallish, orange butterflies landing on our hop plants. Their upper wings, about 2 inches across, are bright orange with…

  The doodlebug waits. It is patient. It is silent. And it is hidden under a fine layer of dry, loose, sandy soil at the bottom of a small conical pit. Soon, a wandering ant will slip down the side of the pit, where the sickle-shaped mandibles of the doodlebug will rise from the bottom…

For most of the year, it’s hard to find a pond without at least a few mallards swimming around. These ducks, with their green-headed drakes and streaky brown hens, are among the most common water birds throughout the Northeast. In spring and fall, mallard flocks are ubiquitous, gobbling up grasses and aquatic plants. In winter,…

  At first, I suspected it was the deer that had almost completely defoliated the northern spicebush sapling I had planted just weeks earlier. Only days prior, it had been brimming with new growth, and now all that remained were two leaves wrapped into cigarlike cylinders. Curious, I inspected this pair of surviving leaves. At…

  Named for their polka-dot-like markings, spotted turtles have declined throughout most of their range, which stretches from Maine south along the Atlantic coastal plain to northern Florida, and from western New York into the eastern Great Lakes states. This species is listed as threatened or endangered in northern New England states.  While I have…

   Spittlebugs are the color of a new spring leaf, their bodies both tiny and so fat that you hardly notice their six miniature legs underneath. This plumpness makes them an appetizing snack for various insect predators—or would, anyway, if spittlebugs didn’t have an elaborate adaptation to keep them safe.  Spittlebugs live in a variety…

  When I worked on a college campus, a northern mockingbird often accompanied me on the walk between my car and my office. This slender gray bird darted from the hedges, flashing white wing patches and outer tail feathers before landing on a crabapple branch, where it poured forth a string of trills and phrases,…

 When our lilacs bloom in late May, pale yellow butterflies with black stripes arrive to feed on their nectar. These are tiger swallowtails. These exquisite butterflies have a broad black band along the edge of their forewings bordered with yellow dots. They also have small red spots and “tails” at the base of their hindwings.…

  In the shallow margins of many lakes and ponds in June and July, you may spot male sunfish guarding their nests. The sunfishes (family Centrarchidae) comprise many well-known species — including largemouth bass, smallmouth bass, rock bass, and black crappie — but the most visible nest guarders in early summer are the pumpkinseed, bluegill,…

  If you take a walk through a thick, broadleaf forest on a cool summer morning, you might recognize the cascading, metallic song of a thrush called a veery. It is an ethereal sound that echoes through the understory, like the ring of a haunted cell phone. You might even see a veery, with its…

  Here come real stars to fill the upper skies,  And here on earth come emulating flies,  That though they never equal stars in size, (And they were never really stars at heart Achieve at times a very star-like start...  —Robert Frost, “Fireflies in the Garden” It happens on a warm June evening: in the…

  On a foggy morning walk, it may seem as if the spider webs on your path have turned into jeweled wonders, every thread a string of gems as smooth as pearls and as sparkling as diamonds. Each of these “jewels” is a drop of water the web has collected from the misty air. As…