When my husband’s family lived in Harrisburg I liked to combine a Thanksgiving visit there with a stop at Conowingo Dam in Darlington, Maryland, five miles down the Susquehanna from the Mason-Dixon line and an hour and a half from Harrisburg.
Conowingo Fisherman’s Park is the place to be in late November. Migrating bald eagles congregate below the dam to scoop up fish that were stunned by passing through the gates. Competition is fierce between immatures and adults though there are enough fish for everyone.
Photographer Johnny Chen was there in November 2021 to film the action. You will love his 8-minute video. He slows the action during dives, shows real-time interactions between eagles, and includes an adult mantling over a fish while the black vultures pace around him!
Habitat is everything. We tend to forget this because humans are versatile and avoid places where we cannot survive (Antarctica). Many species, though, require a specific habitat for their livelihood. When it becomes scarce, they have nowhere to live and may go extinct.
Less than 200 years ago grasslands dominated much of the continental U.S. where fires and less rainfall kept them open. Since then most grasslands have been converted to farmland, cattle ranges, or suburbs and now more than half of what remains is at risk of range-wide collapse. Relict grasslands support the last remaining species. The relicts themselves would disappear were it not for prescribed fire.
On Wednesday November 19, 7:00pm – 8:30pm, Phipps Conservatory is hosting a screening of the new nature documentary The Little Brown Bird, which tells the story of the Florida grasshopper sparrow, one of the most endangered birds in North America. A few years ago, there were as few as 50 Florida grasshopper sparrows remaining – today, there are as many as 200.
The 30-minute film focuses on the work of wildlife biologist Fabiola ‘Fabby’ Baeza-Tarin and a coalition of conservation partners who are working to rescue this sparrow back from the brink. The film’s director and cinematographer, KT Bryden, will join attendees virtually for a discussion after the film, and a panel of local speakers—including Ryan Miller, a wildlife biologist with the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy; Julie Travaglini, the director of education for the Allegheny Land Trust; and myself, Andrew Moore, a nature writer and author.
In addition to the Florida grasshopper sparrow the panel discussion will touch on the plight of grasslands and the endangered species they host, such as the massasauga rattlesnake in Pennsylvania.
Join Phipps for a screening and discussion of The Little Brown Bird. Price is $15 for members, $20 for non-members. Click here for tickets.
p.s. There are 12 subspecies of grasshopper sparrows. We see Ammodramus savannarum pratensis in Pennsylvania as it breeds in the eastern U.S. and southeastern Canada. The Florida grasshopper sparrow is non-migratory and only occurs in a small part of Central Florida.
American crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos) are very intelligent and thrive on solving problems, especially when it comes to food. Those who enjoy feeding crows sometimes provide them with brain teasers in the form of puzzle feeders.
Outside of the breeding season, @Crows_are_SkyCats in Seattle, Washington offers puzzle feeders for crows, young and old. When this video was recorded in February 2022 a group of young crows, members of Seattle’s winter crow flock, stopped by frequently to figure out how to get food from the spinning red containers.
Watch how long it took them to solve the puzzle. These crows are working for kibble.
Laurel and Hardy here have had several tries with this puzzle and finally found a repeatable solution. They worked on this puzzle for 20 minutes in this session. The solution they landed on is physically awkward, but once they landed on it, they stuck with it. I’m experimenting with a way to make it more comfortable to reach & spin.
Frost in Pittsburgh on 4 Nov 2021 (photo by Kate St. John)
4 November 2025
Four years ago today I took a photo of frost because it was so late that year.
Though Pittsburgh’s killing frost date officially ranges from October 20 to 22, it was so warm in 2021 that we had no killing frost until early November when low temperatures were in the upper 20s for five days. The growing season ended abruptly.
This year, vegetation in my “urban heat island” neighborhood is still in good shape so we’ve had no killing frost here even though there was a freeze warning on 9 October (not!) and the temperature dipped to 31°F at the airport on 27 October.
I’ve marked this NWS graph of Pittsburgh temperatures last month with yellow on 9 October (we did not freeze at all) and a red box on 26 October (the one day that fell below freezing at the airport).
Because of the urban heat island effect, Pittsburgh’s growing season between frost dates could be mapped in micro climates with a warmer zone in the city and colder pockets in the creek valleys.
This graph was drawn with summer temperatures; I added October/November low temperatures to give you an idea of the variation in first frost.
By November adult orb weaver spiders have died and left behind overwintering egg sacs to hatch in early spring. The zigzag webs are gone but there is new scientific research about their purpose. Why do these round, almost invisible webs of Argiope spiders have thick prominent zigzags on them?
The zigzag web decorations are called stabilimenta, a word whose Latin origin means “stabilizer.” Unproven past theories on their purpose include:
For stability? No. The decorations are only loosely attached to the web.
To camouflage the spider?
To draw notice to the web so large animals don’t break it?
To attract prey by reflecting UV light?
To attract a male?
An October 29 study in the journal PLOS Oneoffers yet another explanation. Instead of stabilizing the spider web’s structure, the filaments help out spiders by allowing the vibrations of a stuck animal to disperse throughout the entire web, the research found. This in turn helps the spider know exactly where its prey is on the web structure, they write.
To reach this conclusion, scientists created computer simulations of prey hitting Argiope bruennichi spider webs based on photographs of the stabilimenta. They concluded that when prey hit the web at a tangent the stabilimenta amplified prey vibrations throughout the web. This might help the spider find the prey.
Yellow garden spider wraps her prey, Sept 2017 (photo by Kate St.John)
But …”The actual impact of the stabilimenta may be limited, the researchers admit. For now, they write, the true reasons behind the spidery structures remain largely unknown, with many hypotheses still untested or lacking experimental validation.” — from Smithsonian Magazine.
Yellow garden spider female with prey, Sept 2017 (photo by Kate St.John)
In the world of birding a Life Bird, or “Lifer,” is a species seen for the first time in one’s life. For many years I kept a handwritten list but I didn’t know the count. Once I started using eBird the software automatically kept my Life List so every time I open the website eBird presents me with my current Life Bird count.
On 30 October I noticed that my Life List had jumped from 1,569 to 1,574 birds. I’d heard the whimbrel would split into two species during eBird’s taxonomy update last week, so I expected to gain one Life Bird without any effort. But FIVE Armchair Lifers?
With the help of eBird News I found 4 out of the 5 additions but I’ll have to spend lots of time with the 2025 eBird Taxonomy Update to find the fifth.
In the meantime, here’s what I gained in taxonomic order. All of them are “travel” birds (no splits in Pittsburgh) but you, too, may have gained a Life Bird within the U.S.
Formerly “Striated Heron” everywhere
This bird split three ways. I saw two of the three species in Panama and Southern Africa. The Central and South American bird retains the original common name.
I’ve seen Hudsonian whimbrels in the Western Hemisphere and the Eurasian whimbrel in Spain. This Hudsonian whimbrel has a brown rump which is not visible.
One in the east, one in the west. According to eBird: The breeding range splits roughly at the Rocky Mountains, breeding habitats differ somewhat, songs differ substantially. I saw the western one in Montana.
Eastern Warbling Vireo (Vireo gilvus) a bird of lowland watercourses from the Great Plains eastward, usually in areas with cottonwoods, willows, and other riverside vegetation.
Western Warbling Vireo (Vireo swainsoni) Rocky Mountains and westward. Occurs in mountain forests—especially riparian forest adjacent to pines.
Yellow warblers are extremely common in spring in eastern North America. I saw the mangrove yellow warbler in Panama. It’s the one with the little rusty cap (photo at top).
Northern Yellow Warbler (Setophaga aestiva)—the migratory northern population that breeds in shrubland and riparian habitats across Canada, the United States, and northern Mexico.
Mangrove Yellow Warbler (Setophaga petechia)—the resident southern population that lives year-round in mangroves along the coasts of Mexico, Central America, and northern South America, and on the fringes of Caribbean islands.
Green hawthorn fruits (probably Winter King cultivar), Frick Park, 28 Oct 2025 (photo by Kate St. John)
1 November 2025
This week the brightest fall color disappeared from the landscape as rain and wind took down the reddest leaves. This showed off many colorful fruits to attract attention.
Above, a hawthorn tree at Frick Environmental Center is loaded with bright red fruit. I believe this is a cultivar of the green hawthorn (Crataegus viridis) chosen for its winter hardiness.
Below, on Flagstaff Hill I found one tree that still had red leaves on Wednesday. Thursday’s rain and wind probably stripped it bare.
One red tree left on Flagstaff Hill, Schenley Park, 29 Oct 2025 (photo by Kate St. John)
Fragrant sumac (Rhus aromatica) was so colorful that even the bud scales looked red.
Fragrant sumac leaves and buds near Phipps, 29 Oct 2025 (photo by Kate St. John)
Tonight’s the night for jack o’ lanterns and Trick Or Treat. Carved pumpkins glow on front porches and in the woods, far from city lights, a mushroom with the same name glows in the dark.
On my bird walk last Sunday we passed the site at Schenley Park golf course where there used to be jack o’ lantern mushrooms (Omphalotus illudens). They grew on an oak tree stump which I noted in 2021 below, but this year the stump and the mushrooms are gone, ground up and removed.
Jack o’lantern mushroom in Schenley Park, Oct 2021 (photo by Kate St. John)
Here in town we wouldn’t have seen the mushrooms glow because of city lights, but in parts of western Michigan there is very little light pollution. West Michigan’s WOODTV featured them in the video below.
See the beautiful rosy male and olive-yellow female in the highlights video below. Listen carefully and you’ll hear their contact calls, a single clear whistle. You’ll also hear crows and ravens in the background.
“This streaming cam is located in a residential neighborhood in Manitouwadge, Ontario, Canada, a small town 430 miles northeast of Duluth, Minnesota, and is hosted by Tammie and Ben Haché who have been members of Project FeederWatch since 2002. Their backyard has a large birch tree, a mixed stand of conifers and several fruit and berry producing shrubs. Just beyond the backyard there’s a small swamp as well as larger stands of woods and a small lake. It’s an excellent location to see winter finches, like redpolls and grosbeaks, as well as two species of Jays and even Ruffed Grouse.” — Paraphrased from Cornell Lab Bird Cams
Do pine grosbeaks come to southwestern Pennsylvania? No. These bulky finches eat mountain ash berries (Sorbus americana) in winter and won’t leave home unless the fruit is scarce. Even then, they only wander to areas with lots of mountain-ash berries.
Southwestern Pennsylvania has a few of mountain-ash trees planted as landscaping but these trees do not occur here naturally. The last time pine grosbeaks came to southwestern Pennsylvania was in 1973.
If you want to see pine grosbeaks, watch the Ontario Feedercam at http://allaboutbirds.org/feederwatchcam This link also has highlight reels and information about the birds.
Eastern massasauga rattlesnake in Pennsylvania, 29 August 2025 (photo by Jim Chapman)
29 October 2025
In late August Jim Chapman and Pattie Relosky were exploring public land in northwestern Pennsylvania when they were surprised to see a snake basking by the trail. It was an endangered species they had heard of decades ago but never seen: an eastern massasauga rattlesnake (Sistrurus catenatus).
Eastern massasaugas are one of only three venomous snakes native to Pennsylvania. 125 years ago they lived in parts of Butler, Clarion, Venango, Mercer and Armstrong Counties (historic map below). Nowadays, there are only four small populations left out of 19 historic populations in Pennsylvania.
Jim and Pattie stood far away and used their binoculars to look at the snake. Jim zoomed his cellphone camera to take distant photos. The photo at top looks as if he was close but the image was cropped like this.
Eastern massasauga rattlesnake in Pennsylvania, 29 August 2025 (photo by Jim Chapman)
Fortunately the snake stayed frozen in place until Jim and Pattie left the area. Jim showed his photos to an expert who confirmed the snake’s identity and explained that this one was a pregnant female. Here’s why she was visible.
Pregnant females will choose sparsely vegetated dry areas to bask until they give birth to their young in August or early September. Females reach breeding age at four years and give birth to an average of six or seven young every other year.
Amazing to me, massasaugas are ovoviviparous, meaning they carry their eggs inside them while the embryos develop and ‘hatch.’ The female gives birth to live young.
If you are lucky enough to see an eastern massasauga in Pennsylvania, keep in mind that it is endangered.
A Caution to Commenters: Snakes can be an emotional topic. Please be respectful, stay on topic, avoid offensive and inflammatory language and personal attacks. If you post a comment that could inflame others, I may edit or delete it.
