Outside My Window

Pileated woodpecker (photo by Chuck Tague)

Last week Pittsburgh Today published a brief article about ecosystem health in the Pittsburgh region.  One of their points caught my eye: Pileated woodpeckers (Dryocopus pileatus) have made a big comeback in our area.

I’ve noticed this too.  During Pittsburgh’s 2016 Christmas Bird Count last December, many of us found pileated woodpeckers — so much so that Audubon’s summary of the count included this remark: “Pileated Woodpecker was reported at a higher than expected number.  48 individuals represents a new high count for Pittsburgh. ”

On the same day as Pittsburgh Today’s article, I also received an email from Tree Pittsburgh with news about a project this fall to replace ash trees lost to emerald ash borer (read more here.)

Without intending it, the topics are related.  My hunch is that we have more pileated woodpeckers in Pittsburgh because we have more under-the-bark insects and more dead and dying ash trees, suitable for nesting, since the emerald ash borer came to town 10 years ago.

Pileated woodpecker hole in dead white ash tree, western Pennsylvania (photo by Kate St. John)

Woodpeckers are doing really well.  It’s the only bright spot in the emerald ash borer plague.

(photo credits: Pileated woodpecker by Chuck Tague.   Dead ash tree with pileated woodpecker hole by Kate St. John)

Tent caterpillars in May (photo by Marcy Cunkelman)

On Throw Back Thursday:

In May we see white tents in the trees made by some incredibly social caterpillars.

“Social” caterpillars?  Find out more in this vintage article from 2009:

Tents

(photo by Marcy Cunkelman)

Tulip tree leaves and flower, 2 May 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

When a wind storm blew down a tuliptree branch in Oakland it gave me an opportunity to look at the flowers.

Tuliptrees (Liriodendron tulipifera) are sometimes called “tulip poplars” but they’re actually in the magnolia family.  They’re one of the tallest trees in North America — up to 160 feet — and by the time they’re old enough to bloom at age fifteen they have no branches in the first 80-100 feet so we rarely see their flowers.

Like magnolias, tuliptree flowers are showy and attractive to bees — so attractive that they’re considered one of our major honey plants.

Here’s a closeup of the flower.

Closeup of tulip tree flower (photo by Kate St.John)

The petals are called “tepals” because they’re combined sepals+petals, the ancestral form of flowers.

Notice that they’re orange on both sides.

Side view of tulip tree flower (photo by Kate St. John)

Why orange?  Bees can’t see red so why do the flowers have orange accents?  Are the flowers hoping for hummingbirds?

(photos by Kate St. John)

Sugar maple flowers (wind pollinated), 15 April 2017, Schenley Park (photo by Kate St. John)

Are you sneezing yet?

It’s a busy week for trees in southwestern Pennsylvania as they open flowers and unfurl new leaves.

Redbud flowers fully open (insect pollinated), 15 April 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

In Schenley Park the trees are flowering everywhere, from insect pollinated redbuds (pink above) to wind pollinated sugar maples (yellow at top) and hophornbeams (below).

Hophornbeam catkins (wind pollinated) 15 April 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

Last weekend it was so dry that pollen coated my car and made my throat and eyes itch … and this was before the oaks had bloomed!  (Pollen note: Both oaks and pines are wind pollinated. Southwestern PA has an oak-hickory forest with few pines.)

Other busy trees include the bursting buds of hawthorns and hickories.  …

Hawthorn buds bursting, 15 April 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

Bitternut hickory bud is opening, 15 April 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

… and new leaves on Ohio buckeyes.

Ohio buckeye shows off its leaves, 15 April 2017, Schenley Park (photo by Kate St. John)

The city is a heat island so Schenley Park’s trees are ahead of the surrounding area.  Our red oak buds burst yesterday so you can expect several busy weeks ahead for trees in southwestern Pennsylvania.

Are you sneezing yet?

(photos by Kate St. John)

Blooming cherry trees, Paris (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

Spend time today to see spring’s beauty. A reminder from A. E. Housman.

Loveliest of trees

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.

A. E. Housman

(poem: The Loveliest of Trees by A. E. Housman (1859-1936), #II  from “A Shropshire Lad“
photo: from Wikimedia Commons. Click on the image to see the original)

Downy serviceberry or shadbush, Barking Slopes, 9 Apr 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

The ground has thawed, the shad are running, and across the hillsides there’s white lace among bare trees.

Downy serviceberry (Amelanchier arborea) is one of the first wild trees to bloom in eastern North America.  At 30 feet tall with smooth gray bark, it opens its curly white flowers in early spring.  The tree stands out against the gray backdrop of the hills in April but we don’t notice it in summer. The birds do, though, because its reddish-purple berries are a favorite food.

Serviceberries have a wealth of common names.  On the eastern seaboard they bloom when a special fish, the American shad (Alosa sapidissima), swims upstream to spawn.  In that region it’s called a shadbush.

Shadbush at the Allegheny River (where there are no shad), 9 Apr 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

In Appalachia the serviceberries bloom when the ground has thawed enough to bury the dead and hold a funeral service.  Where the word service is pronounced “sarvis,” it’s called a sarvisberry.

Though they’re members of the Rose family and have perfect flowers (containing both male and female parts) serviceberries can reproduce asexually and they hybridize freely, crossing and back crossing until it takes an expert to identify them.  Even then there are disagreements.  David Sibley’s Guide to Trees points out that the number of species has ranged from 3 to 25; pegged at 16 when the book was published.  Downy serviceberry is one of them.

In Schenley Park I was able to reach a low branch and photograph the flowers.  This specimen is a cultivated variety, recently planted, so I can’t identify it for sure.

Serviceberry’s “perfect” flowers, Schenley Park, 10 Apr 2017 (photo by Kate St.John)

But it can show you why one species has the downy name.

Downy serviceberry refers to the soft hairs on the back of its young leaves.  The hairs disappear as the leaves get older.

Do you think this cultivated leaf is downy?

Serviceberry flowers and new leaves at Schenley Park, 10 Apr 2017 (photo by Kate St.John)

Maybe so.

(photos by Kate St. John)

Sunshine through a lacy tree, early April 2017 (photo by Kate St.John)

For five months Pittsburgh’s trees are bare.  This month they look lacy.

In April the trees open their tiny flowers and leaves.  Sunlight falls through the branches and heats the ground, prompting woodland wildflowers to bloom.

Many trees are still in bud.  The redbuds look dark pink because their rosy flowers aren’t open yet.

Redbud flower buds along the stem (photo by Kate St.John)

In a few weeks the trees will be full of leaves.  Now’s the time to appreciate their lacy look.

(photo by Kate St. John)

Star magnolia, bursting bud, 29 Mar 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

On Wednesday I found more signs of Spring in Schenley Park.

Above and below, a star magnolia near the Westinghouse Fountain showed off its fist-shaped buds that burst into wild petals.  Did you know these flowering trees are imported from Japan?

Star magnolia blossom in Schenley Park, 29 Mar 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

Below, northern spicebush (Lindera benzoin) opened its tiny yellow flowers.  You can identify this shrub by smell.  Just rub your fingernail against the twig’s bark and smell the spicy citrus scent.

Spicebush blooming, 29 Mar 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

Most native trees haven’t opened their buds but this oak is getting there.

Oak buds opening, 29 Mar 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

These buds will distend their wind-pollinated flowers first, then open the leaves.  This timing gives the flowers full access to the wind without any leaves in the way.

p.s. The oak bud photo looks fake but it’s a trick of the bright sunlight that put shadows on the buds in the background.  No retouching required.

(photos by Kate St. John)

A face in a twig, Schenley Park, 23 March 2017 (photo by Kate St. John)

After more than a week of cold weather, the buds were not bursting in Schenley Park last Thursday as I walked around taking pictures of Spring.

Instead, I found this unopened bud that looks like a devil’s face.

It’s the bud of a black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) a very common tree in southwestern Pennsylvania that tolerates pollution and thrives in the poor soil of old fields, disturbed woodlots and roadsides.

Though black locusts have devilish looking buds and twisted branches, they’re good trees to have around because they enrich the soil through nitrogen fixation.

Their roots have a symbiotic relationship with the Rhizobium bacteria. Rhizobium enters the root hairs, the plant makes tumor-like growths to surround it, then the bacteria takes in nitrogen and converts it into a form that fertilizes the plant.  Strange but true.

Look for these devilish twigs soon.  When the buds open they won’t look like faces anymore.

(photos by Kate St. John)

Maple trees with sugar pails (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

There’s snow in this picture but there hasn’t been snow in Pennsylvania’s Laurel Highlands for half of this month.

March is supposed to be the best month for tapping sugar maples to collect sap for maple syrup.  The sap runs best with daytime temperatures above freezing and nights below freezing.  When the nights don’t freeze the sap stops running and the season is over.

This year Somerset County’s maple season was hampered by bursts of extremely warm weather in January and summer-like temperatures this month.  The thermometer hasn’t dipped below freezing since February 17 and some days have been more than 20^oF above normal.  Maple sugaring stopped before it should have reached its best.

This trend isn’t unique to southwestern Pennsylvania.  The maple syrup industry tracks what’s happening to maple farmers from Virginia to Maine. Since 1970 they’ve noticed that the seasons have become shorter and the sap is less sweet so it takes more sap to make the same amount of syrup.

No matter where you stand on climate change the people whose livelihoods depend on cold winters (maple sugar farmers and ski operators) can tell you this:  Whacky climate ruins their business.

Read more here in a 2014 article from the Allegheny Front.

(*) Today the weather is yo-yoing again.  Meyersdale, PA will dip below freezing tonight (25 Feb) for two nights, then run up again to a 48^oF low on Tuesday 28 Feb.

(photo from Wikimedia Commons. Click on the image to see the original.)

UPDATE on 7 March 2017: Here’s more on this year’s maple sugar season from the Allegheny Front, WESA-FM.