Below the Surface

Iowa is synonymous with agriculture. Our state is renowned for its rich soil, and its farmers often claim that they "feed the world." The landscape is largely vistas of corn and soybeans in the warmer seasons, swathes of bare stubble over the winter, pocked with towns and cities scattered along rivers and other areas favorable to human populations.

This soil, the source of generations of wealth and well-being, is a legacy of the prairies that once covered this land. Deep-rooted prairie plants grew, died, and decomposed for millennia, building up many inches of nutrient-rich earth held in place by those long, spreading roots. Rainfall could infiltrate the land, penetrating the surface and sinking below to water the grasses and forbs that grew.

 Over time, those prairies were plowed under and replaced with crops. In recent decades, the crops became largely huge monocultures of corn and soybeans. Gone was the diversity of plant, animal, and insect species that once reigned. The rich soil, no longer held in place by those deep-rooted prairie plants, washed away in heavy rains, clogging rivers and carrying fertilizer and pesticides with it. Rivers, lakes, and other waterways become impaired by the runoff, requiring treatment before it can be used for all the necessities that water is used for.

Corn monoculture

Even as the prairies gave way to farmland, farmland gives way to concrete. Expanding towns replace corn fields with houses and roads, scraping away or covering over what is left of that rich soil millennia in the making. How we take for granted that rich heritage of the prairies, and how easily we watch it go to waste.

Think about the earth under a prairie, or beneath a wooded ravine. Stretching roots; burrowing mammals; digging worms and insects. The sun warms the surface while rain and snow deliver moisture at intervals. Seeds dropped by passing birds or blown by a strong breeze find purchase and grow into new generations, providing food and habitat for many other species beyond their own.

Soybean monoculture

Now think about the earth under a field of corn. Shallow roots, unwilling to share the earth with other species--plant, insect, or otherwise. It does not thrive on the meager bounty of sun and rain that sustained life for thousands of years before the arrival of monoculture but instead relies on inputs of fertilizer to fuel growth and pesticides to keep out any  unwanted life.

And then--imagine the earth under a parking lot, or a paved road. No water can reach it; the sun bakes the artificial surface but gives no life. The only roots are those that stretch sideways from the nearest open patch of land hospitable to plant life. Does anything live below that surface?

The soil made Iowa what it is today. The prairies made that soil. As we consider how our state has changed over the past couple of centuries, and how it will continue to change, we should always be mindful of whence our state's greatest wealth came. How long it took to develop, and how quickly we have lost so much of it.

A slightly more diverse landscape

Let's imagine what we could do to begin to build and restore even small parts of the land and preserve its life-giving functions. Make sure that every acre paved and every foundation laid is absolutely necessary, because it is far too easy to destroy the work of generations for a short-term profit.

Organizations working to preserve our state's natural heritage:

• Sustainable Iowa Land Trust: dedicated to preserving land for sustainable agriculture
• Bur Oak Land Trust protects and conserves natural areas in and around Johnson County
• Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation, helping to protect and restore Iowa's land, water, and wildlife
• Nature Conservancy in Iowa, working to preserve our state's natural landscapes

A Lonely Straggler

A mixed flock of sparrows--House and Eurasian Tree--swoop back and forth across the Greenway trail, from the brush to the east into the corn stubble in the west. Soft chirps punctuate the still air, as their pale bellies glow yellow overhead in the fading afternoon sun. Glittering black eyes watch, wary, as the approach of an ungainly, unfeathered biped sets off a hopscotch wave of individual birds flit past their neighbors to keep a safe distance from the intruder.

A few sparrows settle in a tree ahead, where a larger bird sits silent. It's a male Red-Winged Blackbird, his crimson epaulets hidden. He is not defending territory or wooing the ladies--that will come later, in the spring. For now, he is riding out the winter. Why is he here after so many of his brethren have migrated away to the south? Who can say?

Data for Johnson County show that the abundance of Red-winged Blackbirds peaks during spring migration, in early March, with more than 80 birds reported on count sheets on average. There is a slightly lower peak for fall migration, in mid-October, averaging just under 50 birds reported. Throughout the summer breeding season numbers are fairly steady between 5-10 birds reported, as birds leave migratory flocks and settle in territories established by individual males upon their return from wintering grounds.

But in December? Nearly nothing! eBird data shows that for the months of December and January, in the past hundred and some years only a single record shows up at the Sycamore Wetlands, for 7 birds on 12/12/17, with just a scattering of other records around Johnson County. Is this fellow alone, left to struggle for survival until the other blackbirds return in a few months? Does he have unseen friends lurking in the area to keep him company?

Though their summer diet is largely made up of insects, blackbirds will also eat waste seeds and waste grain, including corn (which should be in good supply in the fields around the Greenway).

So good luck, my unseasonable friend! Stay warm, stay safe, and I hope to see you again. 

A Premature Requiem

I was feeling melancholy walking the Greenway this recently.

The area covered by the proposed zones and standards,
outlined in red. The Greenway and wetlands are at the
right edge of the area.

On Wednesday, the city held a report-out on the new "Form-Based Zones and Standard for the South District," which are to guide development in the currently open fields that surround the southern portion of the Greenway. These stated goals of project and the proposed regulations include creating walkable communities with connected streets and paths, while also preserving "important environmental resources" and designating a variety of acceptable, low- to mid-density housing types.

I can't fault the city for its attention to detail and how carefully they have solicited feedback from area residents and stakeholders, and it appears the consulting firm they have been working with has done a fine job of creating a vision for a nice place where people will want to live. They answered questions from area residents concerned about parking and speed limits, and reassured folks that there would be no tall or disproportionate buildings permitted.

But the slide they showed with a possible development plan--carving up every single open field and packing it with residential blocks and streets--was something of a gut punch. The tiny green squares left as "natural spaces" seemed...tiny.

I know, I have always known, that development would catch up to the edge of town. I've been told to assume that any open space in Iowa will eventually be developed unless it is bought and protected. The inexorable development of our state, with less than 1% of our iconic tallgrass prairie remaining, makes me appreciate even more those organizations whose purpose is to preserve and protect our natural spaces: Bur Oak Land Trust, with properties in and around Johnson County, and the Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation, throughout the state. 

You wonder if the narrow strips of habitat that will be left along the Greenway will be enough to lure our summer friends the Dickcissel and Eastern Meadowlark to stay and raise their families. Will all the building and bustle drive away the family of Sandhill Cranes that has made its home near the wetlands for a decade or more? Will the wetlands themselves, currently a birding hotspot, remain a draw for migrating waterfowl and shorebirds? What of all the new hazards faced by tiny baby snapping turtles as they try to cross more and wider roads?

It may be many years before all those fields are filled in. Maybe there will be quaint neighborhood shops and friendly people enjoying those walkable communities and appreciating the Greenway that remains. Maybe there will be enough open space still to tempt those Dickcissels back for the summer, despite the close proximity of attractively-proportioned human housing. Maybe the final design will offer more of an opportunity to share our habitat with those who were there first than the example slide showed. 

Maybe. Hopefully.

In the meantime, there is solace in the aforementioned land trusts, and our existing city and county parks and natural areas. We are fortunate to live in a place that, while not anywhere near balancing the needs of wildlife with those of humans, at least understands the importance of these natural places for humans, for recreation and comfort for our souls, and wildlife is able to reap some of those benefits in the incidental preservation of their habitat.

The city and its residents stand to gain a lot with the development of this area. But what we lose, we lose forever. Let's hope that the loss will be minimal, and all possible steps are taken to ensure it is so.

Sandhill Cranes foraging one of the fields slated for development.

Project Feederwatch!

This Saturday begins this year's annual Project Feederwatch, a great opportunity to put the time you spend looking out at your yard to use for citizen science. Join more than 20,000 bird-lovers, bird-watchers, and seed-enthusiasts in observing and counting the birds that show up to feeders in your yard throughout the cold winter months.

A program of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (an amazing resource for all things bird), Project Feederwatch has been around for more than thirty years, gathering data on trends in winter bird populations with the help of interested citizens. Participants can spend as much or as little time as they like: sit at your window for hours and count, or just glance out the window every time you pass by each weekend. Or one weekend a month. Or once a year! Even better to take part year after year, to see how the species and numbers change over time.

In previous years I may have...complained? opined? at the dearth of species in and around my yard, located in a newer subdivision with few large trees. My previous neighborhood, with a canopy of huge oaks, sycamores and other venerables, brought a delightful array of woodpeckers, chickadees, titmice, and other winter regulars whereas the new place...house sparrows. And a few mourning doves.

A map of my data from last season

Last winter, however, I embraced my sparrow-friendly habitat and, instead of using just a tube feeder and a small platform, I began scattering sunflower hearts widely around the space in front of the garden. It was close enough to the cover of the standing stems for birds to feel safe, but open enough for me to see and count from an upstairs window. With the food availability spread beyond the two small feeders, I was treated to...sparrows. But wait! Not just the usual clan of House Sparrows but also Dark-eyed Juncos, Song Sparrows, American Tree Sparrows, and my favorite prize of all, a single Eurasian Tree Sparrow.

Each week would bring the same House Sparrows and Mourning Doves. But some days the wider group would show, including my Eurasian Tree Sparrow as well as what appeared to be an Oregon form of Dark-eyed Junco, with a black hood and chestnut sides. It was a little motivation to keep the seed stocked and check out the window regularly, in hopes of catching sight of one of these less-regular visitors.

So each week I collect my data, and enter it into the Project Feederwatch site. My data, along with data from all the other feederwatchers across the continent, is available to explore. For example, there were around 60 count sites in Iowa reporting data last year; you can see a breakdown of all the species counted over the course of the winter. You can also view your own data year over year; I am looking forward to seeing more cardinals and chickadees in coming years as our neighborhood trees grow, but in the meantime I can enjoy my hardy sparrow friends.

If you don't yet participate in Project Feederwatch, consider it! A participation fee of $18 offsets the costs of the participant's kit, and offers access to tons of information and helpful hints for identifying birds...not to mention helping to collect valuable data about bird populations right in your own neighborhood. You don't need to be an expert at bird identification (they provide a poster with commonly-seen birds when you sign up), just interested in watching the birds outside your window.

Eurasian Tree Sparrow at right

Take some time today

What a different world it is when you slow down!

When I traverse the Greenway by bicycle, or on a run, it is simple a means of conveyance. I zip (or quickly lumber, if enjoying a run) past the familiar catalpas and sumacs, noting at a glance which flowers have stopped blooming and which leaves are beginning to turn. Without slowing down, I greet the cardinals chipping in the brush and the quiet tap-tap-tap of the little downy woodpecker foraging on stems down in the now-dry cells.

I will often bring the camera in my little bicycle basket and stop to take pictures if something catches my eye. But the threshold for eye-catching is so much higher on a bicycle, having to stop, dismount, prop up the vehicle, pick up the camera, remove the lens cap, and get the subject in focus! If it was a bird or butterfly, chances are it has already moved out of view by the time I get the camera to my eye.

So I find myself just passing the world by, and making excuses as I do. Oh, there's a monarch. Stop? Nah, I've got plenty of photos of them this month. The sun looks pretty glinting off those leaves...stop? No, a photo wouldn't do it justice.

And those are just the things I notice. How many more tiny lives escape our sight when we move quickly through our neighborhood? What appears to be an empty aster from a distance turns out to be hosting a little female Melissodes bee, with luxuriously lengthy leg hairs. On foot, she is the focus of intense scrutiny for a minute or more. By bicycle? Completely unseen.

Or the distant buckeye, backlit against the afternoon sun. At a walking pace, there is time to admire the way the light shines through the light spots on its wings as it balances briefly on a spent flower. On wheels--invisible.

Traveling by foot can be an exercise in mindfulness, an immersion into things normally unseen and an experience of all the life that surrounds us day by day.

Slow down. Look around. Experience the world, don't just pass it by.

The Unassuming Hazelnut

Ah, the hazelnut. My favorite of all nuts.


Its small, mostly-spherical shape is easy to overlook in a handful of mixed nuts, lacking the wrinkly texture of the pecan and walnut, the distinctive pointy shape of the almond, the meaty heft of the Brazil nut or the chunky curvature of the cashew. But its flavor and texture enhance fancy chocolates around the world.

The familiar edible hazelnut is native to Eurasia, usually some variety of Corylus avellana. My fellow hazelnut lovers/native plant aficionados will delighted to know we have our own native hazelnut here, Corylus americana...though its nuts are quite a bit smaller and less meaty than the commercial variety.

The American Hazelnut is a large shrub that is not terribly spectacular in appearance, though its nuts are enclosed in a pair of attractive, feathery-looking bracts. Many nut-loving birds and mammals enjoy hazelnuts: blue jays and woodpeckers, squirrels and mice...and the occasional human.

Seeing the smooth brown nuts peeking out from their protective bracts, I could not resist taking one to sample. It looked much like a standard hazelnut in the shell that can be found in bulk bins around the holidays, but much smaller in stature. Alas, the lack of a nutcracker in the house led to an ill-advised attempt using a tool not suited to the job, and as a result the little nut exploded spectacularly, shattering into fragments of shell and a tiny morsel of nut that was nearly too small to taste.

The victim, pre-smashing.

Although I can't be certain the bulk of the nut didn't fly off in the shattering and land unseen in a corner of the room, the meager reward has convinced me that these little nuts are best left to those creatures adapted to eat them. I shall continue to take my fancy hazelnuts comfortably ensconced in chocolate, and enjoy the American Hazelnut from afar for its value to our wild neighbors.



 

Look! Up in the Sky!

Most of the summer, my eyes are cast toward the earth, looking at all the new flowers that are blooming, noting which flowers seem to have finished blooming, inspecting the various bees, beetles, and other invertebrates hopping, buzzing, and crawling about. Watching my step to avoid basking snakes and briskly-trundling caterpillars crossing the trail.

But some days, when shapely clouds loom far overhead, my mind takes a maudlin turn and my gaze dims. I imagine people long ago looking up at the sky the same way, watching the clouds form and move and form again in different shapes, wondering where they came from and where they are going. Or the pale moon hanging in the sky, rising and setting day after day, month after month, as it is now and ever has been. Did those long-ago people think of me, hundreds of years later, looking at the same shapes in the sky?

I'd have to surmise probably not. I rarely spare a thought for the potential human hundreds of years from now, looking up at the moon, or whatever else may be up there by that time. They are too distant, too unimaginable. There are too many different paths the world can take to easily imagine if the clouds and constellations will be looked upon by the same sort of eyes, through the same atmosphere, with the same history and memory. The immeasurable set of options available to our species is no option at all to one small individual trying to guess what the future holds.

A hundred years ago, airplanes were just coming into their own as vehicles by which humans could conquer the air as we conquered land and sea. As were the mighty zeppelins, those temperamental and massive airships. Who would have predicted in those early years that the zeppelin would spectacularly fall out of favor after a few (dozen?) high-profile flaming tragedies, while the descendants of those early aeroplanes would grow faster, sleeker, and extraordinarily diverse in their design and use?

On days when the little airport a couple miles west of the Greenway hosts an event, sky-watchers are treated to a sample of the many ways humans have been able to co-opt the air. Is offers a glimpse of military history and aviation history, a world utterly alien to a person with feet firmly planted on the ground and eyes that prefer the perfectly adapted wings of birds and butterflies to the cold, brutish planes that force their way into the air. But these aircraft are not without charm and interest, and well worth a moment to ponder one of the myriad ways human ingenuity has expanded our place in the world beyond what our ancestors may have dreamed.

(I am not even going to attempt to identify these. Apologies to any enthusiasts for my utter ignorance! Except the one...I think that one's a cliff swallow that looked a lot like an airplane from the thumbnail!) 

 

A-Courting We Shall Go

Out of all insects, butterflies are favorites of humans for their sheer visibility and beauty. Although bees and other pollinators are getting more attention lately as parts of a healthy, functioning ecosystem, it is the colorful, scale-winged lepidopterans that have lit our imaginations for centuries.

What is not to love? They are utterly harmless to us; they are colorful and decorative, and they hang out on beautiful flowers sipping nectar and gently flapping their wings in the sun (we ignore or forgive the less-savory aspects of their behavior, including eating poop and "forced copulation" of females just emerging from their pupae).

The social lives of some butterflies can remind us of birds, with territorial males staking out prime real estate to defend from other males, while females may select mates based not on appearance or song but on their smell, territory, and courtship behavior.

Like a couple of scraps of lace dancing in a breeze, a pair of Black Swallowtails (Papilio polyxenes) engage in a brief courtship flight, swirling around one another and turning up and down before disappearing from sight. A successful dance will result in the butterflies joining to mate for up to 45 minutes before the individuals go their separate ways. 

An Enchanting World

Sometimes the world can be a bit...overwhelming. So many huge problems, so much hustle and bustle, with a pinch of chaos on top of all the regular joy and suffering of daily life as a piece of humanity.

That's why it is good to take a calming moment and appreciate some of the other lives with which we share our world.

I have an uncomfortable fondness for many of our non-native plants--though I am aware on an intellectual level the ecological disaster they can be, I also admire their tenacity and their persistence, blooming where other plants dare not set root and producing prolific blooms throughout the hot, dry summers.

Birdsfoot Trefoil (Lotus corniculatus) is one of these rugged invaders, roundly reviled as invasive, a "pest" plant, and generally a noxious weed (though not technically classified as such in our state). Its low mounds of compound leaves with small clusters of buttery-yellow flowers are commonly seen along sidewalks and roadsides, sometimes cascading over curbs in decorative masses. Some plants have bright yellow flowers tinged with orange; they have the characteristic 5-petaled flower shape of their bean-family relatives, with their pollen- and nectar-producing organs enclosed in a pair of petals forming a sort of pocket (called the keel).

Because they are non-native, these plants don't participate in the healthy ecosystem as fully as native counterparts, which are usually swarming with bees, beetles, butterflies and other insects with which they have evolved for millennia. Birdsfoot Trefoil, in contrast, is a relatively recent arrival and seldom have I seen any insect visiting its abundant floral arrays.

So when I noticed a single bee diligently visiting one flower after another, I paused to watch. The little bee would alight on a flower, force its way into the enclosed flower with comical enthusiasm, sometimes appearing to rest its abdomen on the keel with hind legs dangling on either side, and then fly to the net flower seemingly at random--but always sticking with the Birdsfoot Trefoil instead of the tempting stands of Cup Plant or Gray-headed Coneflower--each teeming with pollinators--just a few meters away.

Why this bee with this plant? Why didn't other bees find their way to the spoils hidden within the pineapple-hued blossoms? And why did this one bee insist upon foraging on the Birdsfoot Trefoil rather than joining the pollinator party at the abundant native flowers nearby?

It turns out that the bee was an Alfalfa Leafcutter (Megachile rotundata), another non-native (though not as reviled as the aggressive Trefoil and in fact introduced to assist with pollination of crops). These bees specialize in Alfalfa, another non-native that has been grown as a forage crop and of which remnants can be found near the Sycamore Apartments. Alfalfa, as a member of the bean family, has similar flower shapes to the Birdsfoot Trefoil and it is easy to see why the Alfalfa Leafcutter bee might find success on related flowers.

How interesting to see the interaction of two European species, finding each other thousands of miles from their original range and going about their business. They are our kindred, brought to this land for our own selfish purposes. They thrive because they are adaptable and hardy--and we humans possess the same virtues.

There's Got to Be a Better Way

You have probably heard by now about campaigns to stop using plastic straws, and efforts to ditch plastic bottles of water in favor of reusable bottles. Have you ever considered how pervasive single-use plastics are in our daily life? On a simple walk down the street or along the Greenway trail one will almost always encounter a piece of plastic trash that has not been disposed of properly.

We have packs of gum wrapped in plastic. Plastic peanut butter jars. Electronic gadgets in oversized plastic clamshells. Plastic bags at the grocery store. The ubiquitous plastic beverage bottles. Have you tried grocery shopping without purchasing something made of or packaged in plastic?

There are things we can do as consumers: limit our use of disposable, single-use cups and utensils when we eat out, bring reusable bags when we shop (for general groceries as well as produce). Skip the straw, or bring your own reusable straw.

But those are of limited scope and effectiveness. What about the companies that continue to manufacture and use plastic for every item they sell? It is a great material: sturdy, inexpensive. But as we are coming to learn, recycling facilities are inadequate and sometimes no longer cost-effective. These companies are reaping the benefits of cheap plastic while offloading the costs to cities and taxpayers to dispose of or recycle the materials.

What if the costs to recycle plastic had to be included in the sale price of an item—if an industry had to include the costs to recycle or otherwise safely dispose of all the materials in the item? That $4.99 jar of peanut butter ends up on your curb, collected and sorted and (hopefully) shipped off to a facility when it is cleaned and recycled into something else. All those costs are currently not included in the price of the peanut butter but rather paid using municipal funds collected from citizens as taxes and fees.

In a well-ordered system, collecting, sorting, and recycling would not be entirely on municipalities to handle, but on the industries that profit from manufacturing and selling these items. How quickly do you think companies would switch to biodegradable materials in lieu of non-degradable plastics?

That doesn’t leave us off the hook as consumers. Imagine if you had to dispose of all your trash and recycling on your own property. Could you? How would your buying habits change if all those plastic bags and peanut butter jars ended up in your backyard?

Well—they do. Maybe not your immediate backyard, but they have to go somewhere. Some pieces escape and end up on roadsides or places like the Greenway, or floating downriver; the rest ends up at a landfill or recycling facility. In our finite world, we all have to take responsibility for stewardship of our home.

The choices we make have an effect. Encourage elected officials to make changes that internalize the costs of doing business back to the industries that profit instead of externalizing them to taxpayers. And of course, skip the straw and bring your own bags to the grocery store.


Disclaimer: This is not a sanctimonious post, as I am 100% guilty of wasteful buying, with a particular attachment to fast food and its related wrappings. I'm trying to do better.

The Birds and the Bees and the...Aphids?

Abundant generations!

We all know (generally) how baby animals are made: the male and female encounter one another, some mode of intercourse is engaged (enthusiastic, coerced, or otherwise), and after some period of time the female gives birth or lays eggs to begin the next generation.

Aphids--those abundant garden pests--have a rather more complex series of strategies. Who knew? And their abundance is in part due to their unique method of reproduction.

Aphids will generally overwinter as eggs. In the spring, the eggs hatch into a generation that is entirely female. These females (fundatrices) will, without having mated, give birth to other females that are essentially genetic clones of herself. And she gives birth to live babies, not eggs! No need to faff about with finding a mate, cooking some babies and laying eggs--female aphids can be already developing their own babies before being born themselves.

The first generation of females born are wingless. Individuals in later generations may or may not have wings; since the wingless individuals are not able to move from plant to plant easily the winged versions help to disperse and carry on the population as the original host plants become crowded.

Winged females in the upper left

As the summer passes into fall, the females begin to produce both male and female offspring. The males again are nearly genetic clones of their mother but missing a single chromosome, which flips the switch and produces a male clone instead of a female. This generation will (finally) mate and these females will lay the eggs that will survive the winter and begin the cycle again the following year.

Patterns and Serendipity

Common Milkweed with variegated leaves

Summer on the Greenway is such a fast-moving, blink-and-you-may-miss-it extravaganza of life. Every week there are new flowers blooming and new sounds to be heard, from dickcissels returning from their winter homes to the south, to katydids chirring in the grass and cicadas buzzing up in the trees.

There are predictable patterns to the progression, with Wild Quinine flowering before the Purple Coneflower, which flowers before Gray-headed Coneflower, Tall Coreopsis, and so forth. When I noticed the finely-frilled Illinois Bundleflower leaves near the Birds in Flight,  I backtracked to where a patch of Partridge Pea normally grows to see if it had also made an appearance (it had, though small enough that I had overlooked its low sprouts when I first passed).

Illinois Bundleflower

Although the general sweep of the season is predictable, it is spiced with the seemingly arbitrary daily occurrences one encounters. Why is this Wild Quinine plant swarming with flies, beetles, bees and ants when the next dozen along the trail are completely devoid of insect life? What in the world caused the variegation on that Milkweed's leaves? Why is one morning filled with birdsong when the next is silent? Are those Asters--in June?! Sometimes answers can be found with additional research or observation. Sometimes they remain mysteries.

Partridge Pea

What fun would it be walking a trail day after day, week after week, if everything was always as  expected? For every time I encounter a tiny baby snapping turtle crossing the trail, there are twenty trips where I see no herps at all. I may know that I am more likely to see them in overcast, drizzly conditions, but there are no guarantees. Same goes for butterflies, birds, bees--I can try to time my jaunts for when I may see whatever my target is at the moment, but I regularly come away empty-handed (if one can consider a couple hours walking out in the world empty-handed).

The world is full of patterns and surprises. Just another reason to get outside and enjoy it as the seasons go by.

June Asters

A Brief Encounter with a Gem of a Fly

Tiny, jewel-toned fly. I pause to inspect you as you pause on a leaf, to my eye not doing much of anything at all. To be honest, I appreciate your utter lack of interest in me, after an hour spent swatting, brushing and tossing my head madly in futile attempts to ward off the abundant gnats, mosquitoes, and other assorted winged beings attempting to dine on my body.

What is your life like, shiny little fly? What do you spend your days doing...eating and flying? Wooing mates? Do you travel far to find other shiny flies like yourself, or if I took the time to examine other leaves nearby would I find them? Where do you sleep?

Why is your shiny metallic body colored so divinely? What semaphore signals do you send with those delicate, patterned wings?

I try to learn more about you. With assistance from Insects of Iowa's ID Tool, I tentatively identify you as a long-legged fly, Condylostylus sp. Tantalizing pieces of information about your mating habits ("Adults mate after elaborate and unique behavior, involving the males displaying their legs to the female."*--who wouldn't be intrigued by that?) lead me, with a mild, familiar pang at yet another unsavory entry in my search history, to search for "Condylostylus mating".

There are small tidbits of information to be found.  According to insectidentification.org, "Males have tufts of hair on their feet that are usually seen best during courtship dancing. This genteel behavior is needed in order to attract females." Well, that sounds like a charming event!

Alas, the one video I was able to find shows a wooing that is too fast or too subtle for my clumsy human eyes. I slow the speed in a vain attempt to see the tufted feet or other moves of the persistent male.  I can only conclude that, not being a long-legged fly, the entire scene is lost on me. 

Such is the mysterious life of a fly. The quiet communion of a moment shared at a leaf along the Greenway, two lives that intersect at this one tangent. It is safe to assume that the effect was more profound on me than it was on the fly. 

*https://bugguide.net/node/view/42317

Trails Everywhere!

Visit RTC's website to explore the planned trail.

Did you catch the recent announcement by the Rails to Trails Conservancy about plans for a cross-country trail system called the Great American Rail Trail? This trail, stretching from sea to shining sea, could one day allow you to walk or bike your way across the country in a grand expedition, much like hiking the Appalachian or Pacific Crest Trail.

Best of all--it passes through Iowa, right in our backyard! The trail will take advantage of portions of existing and yet-to-be-completed sections of the Hoover Nature Trail and the Cedar Valley Nature Trail as well as the famed High Trestle Trail near Des Moines. You could one day ride a personal RAGBRAI across Iowa whenever you'd like, from Muscatine to Council Bluffs.

Although there are gaps in the planned route, the entire trail is more than half complete. Be sure to tell your elected representatives how important trails are to our cities and states, and what an economic boon they can be to small towns and businesses along the route. Lobby for funding to be allocated for infrastructure projects that will improve transportation and leisure activities for everyone!

The Rails to Trails Conservancy also has an excellent site called TrailLink that allows you to explore trails near and far. Be sure to visit the entries for your favorite trails and upload photos or leave a review!

"Walk Slowly, Look Closely"

A teeny grasshopper nymph spotted
last July.

Walk slowly. Look closely.

Much of our life is spent moving briskly from one activity to the next, swaddled in inattention as a series of screens insert themselves between us and the world around us. When MJ Hatfield uttered the
words "walk slow, look close" during her talk at the Day of Insects last month, it resonated as, if not the answer to all the world's ills, at least a small way of coping with the fast-moving, anxiety-plagued civilization we have built for ourselves.

Walking slowly in itself can be a form of meditation. Just walking, not to get anywhere or for exercise. Breathing, looking, feeling, moving. It is a simple communion of our bodies with our environment.

Eurasian Tree Sparrow
("not a House Sparrow")

When you add in looking closely, you engage with the other beings that share our world. You see things you don't see if you are riding a bicycle, running, or even walking quickly and inattentively. So many little brown and black slugs crossing the trail! Moths and grasshopper nymphs popping up in the grass alongside the trail, some so tiny you have to get down on your hands and knees to make out their features. The sparrow that you assumed to be a House Sparrow but wasn't, or that one funny-looking coneflower with the odd florets. The assorted well-camouflaged bugs, from ambush bugs to camouflaged loopers.

Each of these encounters is a new delight, simple and there for the taking. It doesn't cost anything except time, and the benefits to well-being are, for me at least, immeasurable.

Strategic Flowering

If you look up at the bare branches of some trees along the Greenway, you may see the beginnings of tiny green buds of leaves beginning to burst. Other trees, however, may bear full-fledged flowers on their otherwise naked limbs. Why do some trees flower before sending out leaves, while others don't flower until much later in the season?

Redbud is a common tree that produces
flowers before leaves in the spring.

Trees, after they lose their leaves for the winter, maintain a supply of carbohydrates and sugars throughout their dormant period, which can be drawn on for producing new growth when the weather warms up. Some trees, known as hysteranthous, use those initial reserves to produce flowers, while neighboring species may not flower until after their leaves have grown (proteranthous).

This maple already flowered and has set seeds by the time
the leaves began to appear.

There are many advantages to flowering early: for wind-pollinated flowers, the absence of leaves allows pollen to move freely and find flowers without interference, while flowers that rely on bees and other insect pollinators benefit from greater visibility and access, as well as being in high demand for these hungry helpers while other flowers are scarce. These trees get the hard work of reproduction over with quickly, and can focus on growing and replenishing their stores throughout the rest of the growing season.

This strategy is not without its risks, as many gardeners are keenly aware. A late cold snap can damage or kill the flowers that the tree just expended precious energy to produce, forfeiting the opportunity to reproduce this season.

Not all trees flower early: Catalpa waits until its
large leaves are developed before flowering.

Trees, like all other living organisms, have developed an amazing variety of strategies for life and reproduction, all of which have been successful (up to this moment, at least!). Changing climate will bring new challenges and pressures, and those species best able to adapt will come out ahead.  Meanwhile, such diversity presents a spectacular show for us humans to enjoy throughout the seasons.

What is that Bug?

Gather 'round, friends. I'm about to rock your world.

A couple weeks ago the annual Day of Insects was held at Reiman Gardens in Ames. Among the presentations (ranging from an update on the endangered Rusty-patched Bumblebee to a business based on crickets as people-food) was a demonstration of the Insects of Iowa website by its creator Jim Durbin.

This site has photos and records of the insects that can be found in Iowa, with detailed records of surveys and sightings. But a new (and utterly amazing) feature is the photo ID:



You just upload a photo, crop it to the bug you are trying to identify, and click "Submit for Identification." After a few moments, the program recommends species with a match probability:

The website uses AI that has been "trained" on local species; it is particularly good at moths and butterflies. Rather than leafing through hundreds of pages of photos or drawings in a printed guide, or trying to search online using descriptive keywords, the website does all the work!

It's not flawless; I had poor luck with bees (the two examples below don't seem very promising); perhaps the features that are necessary to identify bees are not always easy to capture in photos? Or maybe the AI has not been trained on enough photos of bees to reliably identify all the species.

I'm not sure what this one is, but I'm
fairly positive it's NOT Apis mellifera,
the common honeybee.

Again, this one is definitely NOT Agapostemon
virescens, a metallic green bee. But a long-horned
Melissodes seems plausible.

Even if the program doesn't identify your photo with 100% accuracy, it often provides enough information to get you started on the right track. You can click the linked results to see photos of the species on the site, or search for the scientific name to see other photos and determine how closely that match.

This guy, for example, was clearly not a Hummingbird Clearwing Moth, and Yellow-Collared Scape Moth didn't seem right either. But #3, the Large Clover Casebearer, looks pretty close (even if the ID was only 2.55% confident). 

Give it a try! Do you have a photo of an insect that you've never been able to identify? Or maybe head out to the yard and find an unidentified friend hanging out in your garden. You might get a species, or maybe you will just be able to narrow it down to a genus and refine your search through other means. But it's a great tool to help learn more about the insects that share our neighborhood.