Natural history bits

Over the weekend, Ben and I went to the annual Houston Gem & Mineral Show (it was both our 2nd time going).  Mostly, it's to go and gape at the really amazing specimens offered, some that are spectacular enough to be in museums.  Obviously, such specimens cost 1000's, if not tens of thousands, of dollars, so if we do buy anything, it's small and cheap.  But it's still worth it to just go and look - how often will you get to see and touch 1-meter long prisms of selenite, huge blobs of malachite that look like broccoli and grapes, perfect smoky quartz crystals intergrown in amazonite?  It's a fun experience.  And because we went on the last day, some vendors were offering their specimens for 50% off.  We managed to snag a beautiful trilobite, a Mrakbina specimen from Morocco:

We put the new trilobite with Ben's rock collection, which, not surprisingly, is heavily dominated by biological and sedimentary things (except that beautiful piece of obsidian on the right).

Speaking of fossils, we managed to make one of our own (and continue to make it every time the cabinet door containing the coffee is opened and closed).  Here's a cockroach that got smashed and somehow ended up pretty well-preserved:

Here are some random biological bits I've picked up on various trips, now sitting on a shelf above my desk:

From the top left - a cowrie shell I found in Papua New Guinea, a box on top of a jar of random shells, a septarian nodule from the Atacama Desert, two limpet shells from the Chile coast, a nautilus (lamely, from a gift shop in Galveston, TX), a mermaid's purse from Long Island, and a snail shell filled with sand and bored through by another organism (also from Long Island).

And to finish off the weekend, we celebrated a bunch of recent nice things:  Ben's NSF DDIG getting funded, Ben getting the Vaughn Fellowship from Rice, me accepting the post-doc at Brown starting in January.  For that, we splurged on a ~$15 bottle of wine which we only splurged on because it had an ammonite on the label!  (And it wasn't too bad of a wine either).

Migration

One of the best things about living down here in Houston is the proximity one has to amazing and diverse ecosystems (coastal wetlands, prairie, semi-tropical scrub forest, among others), and thus really cool animal and bird life.  Also, Houston is along a major bird migration route.  So things get pretty awesome here during the late spring.  With the perfect combination of winds, there can be some spectacular fallouts of warblers and other passerines.

Last weekend we headed out to High Island, which is on the Bolivar Peninsula down on the Texas Gulf Coast:

American avocets in full breeding plumage

I think these are stilt sandpipers (?) but not sure...

Eastern kingbird

Summer tanager

 

A glimpse of an indigo bunting, in the sun for a moment

It's really special when warblers like this one (prothonotary warbler, one of my favorites!) fly right in front of your face for just long enough to get over the shock and take a picture that actually turns out decent!

A slow, cool Spring

It's been a couple months since my last post.  Many big, good things have happened:  I experienced my first real job interviews (both for academic positions), I accepted an post-doc offer (now I just need to defend my PhD by December), BEN AND I GOT ENGAGED (in my opinion, the best thing that's happened!).

Lots of small, good things have happened too.  More tangible everyday things, like finally sitting down after all the excitement and starting to write my third paper (almost 50% done with a rough and highly imperfect first draft), getting exciting new data from collaborators, and even the seemingly mundane process of re-reading a paper for the --> n^th time and learning something new from it.  And in between, Ben and I have been enjoying the long, cool spring Houston has been blessed with this year.  After several weeks of anomalously hot weather (daytime temperatures in the mid 80s) in January, the temperature didn't continue to steadily ramp up to the usual high 80s - low 90s I've grown accustomed to in late April.  Instead we've had a serious of pretty cold cold fronts that blew in temperatures (even in the 40s), alternating with warmer days.  It's been kind of nice actually.  At heart I'm a northern soul and the cold invigorates me.

Some cool things seen and photographed since March:

Savannah sparrows in a yucca plant at Brazoria NWR.

Got really close to a pileated woodpecker at Bear Creek Park:

The equestrian trail was beautifully overgrown and devoid of horses or people.

A hooded warbler came really close to us, but as usual, only fleetingly.

Wild garlic bursting forth.

Winter Birding Down South

Before the semester fully revs up and things got too busy, Ben and I decided to take a short half-day trip down to Quintana and Surfside, hoping to see a Nelson's sharp-tailed sparrow, which neither of had seen yet.  Since they winter in saltmarsh down on the Texas coast, we had a good chance.  And indeed we did see not one, but several!  We stopped along Crab Road in Surfside, where they had been reported.  While looking at reddish egrets, tricolored herons, a bubblegum-colored spoonbill, and great egrets, we kept hearing this one-note metallic clink-chip.  We didn't even think it was a bird at first, because it sounded kind of weird.  The sounds were everywhere around us.  Then all of a sudden we looked into the marsh and there was a Nelson's sparrow sitting in the reeds staring straight at us!  Encounters with Ammodrammus sparrows tend to be of this startling, "whoa moment" nature.  I think it's because the birds have such striking faces, yet they remain so still and quiet and hidden.

Can you find the sparrows here?

Surfside town viewed from Crab Road

Winter colors at the Quintana bird sanctuary

Great egret in winter saltmarsh.  A year ago, I took a very similar picture

 

Forster's tern.  Around this time last year I also photographed one at Lynchburg Ferry.

Mist shrouds the empty, palm-lined street.

Some leaves holding onto their summer colors

Milkweed in various states (buds, flowers).

An Eastern phoebe.

Orchard oriole nest.

Reddish egret.

Turnstones on the Quintana jetty.

Willet

When you look up close, even the great-tailed grackle, one of the most common birds around here, looks striking.

Winter Birding up North: Long Island

Winter is definitely something I miss living down here in Texas.  Perhaps it's because I was born in the winter that I have always felt like it was "my season."  But as a kid, I didn't always appreciate winter.  I had what one would describe as a "love-hate" relationship with it.  While the quiet of snow-laden meadows, icicles dripping from boughs, the dark skeletons of black trees against gray skies were all beautiful things to behold, there was also the reality of shoveling snow, driving on icy roads, sunset at 4 pm, and the cold.  Down here in Texas, though, winter is more like an extended autumn.  Temperatures rarely drop below 50 F.  Strange as it may sound, I sometimes miss the bite of the northern wind, and whenever a wind like that blows down here from up north, I relish it and try to imagine the scent of pine terpenes blowing in too.  The Texan winter leaves something missing - perhaps the anticipation of spring is diminished, because the days, being so mild, lack a stark enough contrast to make one long for warmth and green things.

But in terms of birding, the mild Texas winter means much more bird life compared to the Northeast.  Even in January, flowers are blooming and there are even butterflies and dragonflies.  The wetlands don't freeze, so herons, egrets, spoonbills and lots of other wading birds are still around.  But up North you get a different sort of winter birding.  Over New Years, Ben and I drove out to Jones Beach on Long Island.  The West End was a particularly good spot for birds.  We got red crossbills there - but the best part was walking right into a winter flock of nuthatches, chickadees, a downy woodpecker, and a hermit thrush stalking around on the ground.  There are small groves of pine trees at the West End which provide shelter out of the wind and cold, and here the birds were feeding like crazy.  The nuthatches were so loud, it sounded like several tiny car horns honking up in the trees.  The chickadees almost got stepped on by us, they were probably so hungry and cold and dazed by the sea wind all they cared about was food.  When you walk into a flock of birds like that, it's just such a cool experience - it's like being one of them almost (or at least seeing what they're doing from up close).

 View of Jones Beach - West End.

 

Red-breasted nuthatch

 From left to bottom:
A tiny windblown red-breasted nuthatch.
A chickadee foraging on the ground.
A grove of pines - perfect nuthatch habitat.
A downy woodpecker.

Wintery Ohio

Some photos I took on various walks in central Ohio over the winter break.

A hike in a beautiful mossy place called Conkle's Hollow in Hocking Hills, Ohio

Left: Fungi on tree
Right: Cup lichen and reindeer moss

Freshly sprouted fungi glowing orange.

Walking through Prairie Oaks Metro Park

Left: Pistia (?) water lettuce amidst dry snags
Right: Can you find the Carolina wren in this scene?

Prairie Oaks

Darby Creek

Ben birding in a field in Hocking Hills