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Jm5ic3A7I
On 8/12/2013 4:06 PM, James W. Wolford wrote:
> Here is a relevant note I wrote myself on Aug. 7:
>
> BUT what really struck me was *how very few other insects I am
> noticing on the flowers*as I walk. Thinking back a couple of decades
> (or more?), I used to see a wide variety of insects and spiders on the
> flowers, and now I am seeing few to none, plus the few butterflies. Has
> anyone noticed the same thing?
* in eastern Ontario, we've had the same thing happen - Apple trees
whose fruit is usually gnarly with Insects are as perfectly formed as if
they'd been commercially protected by pesticides, Grasshoppers were late
into moulting into the imago stage, Purple Loosestrife free from the
perforations of the biocontrol Galerucella Beetles, I've forgotten what
a Colorado Potato Beetle looks like, vanishingly few Malacosoma
americanum tent caterpillars this spring, few moths or Butterflies...
the list of plant-feeding Insects that are scarce goes on and on.
Something about the schedule of the spring gave the plants the advantage
this year, and if there's few Insects, the forest Birds may have done
poorly or cleared out early (we haven't had any noticable paucity of
Birds here, though).
> And does anyone know of a database
> somewhere out there in our world of information that has decades of data
> like we have for breeding birds?
* we're working on that -
http://fragileinheritance.org/projects/database/dbintro.htm - says
86,000, but we're now up to 105,000.
fred.
===============================================
>
> Begin forwarded message:
>
>> *From: *Blake Maybank <bmaybank@gmail.com <mailto:bmaybank@gmail.com>>
>> *Date: *August 12, 2013 2:52:49 PM ADT
>> *To: *naturens@chebucto.ns.ca <mailto:naturens@chebucto.ns.ca>
>> *Subject: **[NatureNS] Empty Forests*
>> *Reply-To: *naturens@chebucto.ns.ca <mailto:naturens@chebucto.ns.ca>
>>
>> 11 August 2013
>>
>> I was part of a group that hiked a trail near Moses Mountain in the
>> beautiful Avon Valley in Western Hants County yesterday. Despite
>> walking more than 12 km through beautiful deciduous and mixed wood
>> forests, we encountered very few birds. While I suspect that most of
>> the migrant breeding birds had departed, why were we unable to detect
>> a single chickadee, nuthatch, or Blue Jay? We heard a couple of vireos
>> and a pewee, and one flicker. The one highlight was a soaring Turkey
>> Vulture, a new species for my Hants County list.
>>
>> Plenty of Goldenrod, knapweed, and other often flowers lined the trail
>> along most of our hike, but we did not encounter a single butterfly.
>> And there were very few bees in evidence as well, which was also
>> discouraging.
>>
>> On such a beautiful day it is hard to account for the paucity of birds
>> and butterflies and other wildlife.
>>
>> --
>> Blake Maybank <mailto:bmaybank@gmail.com>
>> 144 Bayview Drive,
>> White's Lake, Nova Scotia
>> B3T 1Z1 CANADA
>> (902) 852-2077
>>
>> My Blog: *CSI: Life* <http://blakemaybank.com>
>>
>> Organiser, *Maritimes Nature Travel Club*
>> <http://tinyurl.com/naturetravel>
>> __ <http://tinyurl.com/naturetravel>__
>> Author, "*Birding Sites of Nova Scotia* <http://tinyurl.com/birdingns>
>>
>>
>>
>> <mailto:maybank@ns.sympatico.ca>
>>
>>
>
--
------------------------------------------------------------
Frederick W. Schueler & Aleta Karstad
Bishops Mills Natural History Centre - http://pinicola.ca/bmnhc.htm
Mudpuppy Night in Oxford Mills - http://pinicola.ca/mudpup1.htm
Daily Paintings - http://karstaddailypaintings.blogspot.com/
RR#2 Bishops Mills, Ontario, Canada K0G 1T0
on the Smiths Falls Limestone Plain 44* 52'N 75* 42'W
(613)258-3107 <bckcdb at istar.ca> http://pinicola.ca/
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