Nature Moncton Nature News: Oct 1 2019

NATURE MONCTON INFORMATION LINE, October 01, 2019 (Tuesday)

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Edited by: Nelson Poirier nelsonpoirier435@gmail.com

Transcript by: bjpstone@gmail.com

Info Line # 506-384-6397 (384-NEWS)

** Mac Wilmot’s Lower Coverdale grapevine is laden with ripe fruit and a few PILEATED WOODPECKERS [Grand pic] are being very noisy bragging about their unchallenged thievery, seeming to delight in adding a bit of variety to their insect diet. Mac also came across 2 GIANT PUFFBALL MUSHROOMS near his home. Mac’s daughter Kim displays the 4 pound 13 ounce monster. These puffballs are very edible when fresh, tending to take on the flavour of whatever they are prepared with. Slicing them into ¼ to ½ inch slabs or cubing works nicely. One can only imagine the immense number of spores that one of these giants releases when matured!

** Jane Leblanc shares a photo of a GARTER SNAKE [Couleuvre rayée] with its forked tongue out to check out Jane’s dog which the dog politely heeded. The forked tongue in the snake is distinctly split into 2 tines at the tip that allows it to detect smells and where the smell is coming from. The forked tongue is slipped into 2 small entries just above the mouth called the Jacobson’s Organ that send all the information to the nervous system. And we thought that we had developed incredible computer systems! A graphic of the mechanism is attached.

** 2 LAUGHING GULLS [Mouette atricille] visited Jones Lake in Moncton on Saturday. Pierre Janin spotted them and Mitch Doucet and Marc Leblanc got there quickly with Marc Leblanc spotting a second Laughing Gull. Mitch comments that they only stayed for an hour or so and his attached photos may be the only documentation.

** It is interesting to take note of the number of photos we put out of Osprey with Flounders as prey. It must be one of their favourite fish prey species and one would think it would be harder to see as this fish is often right at the water bottom and sometimes partially covered. Aldo Dorio got a few nice photos of an OSPREY [Balbuzard pêcheur] enjoying its lunch at Hay Island on Monday. It is a good time to remind that the Osprey tends to be an earlier southern migrant than some raptors and some may have already left us or are filing plans to do so.

** The BLACK SWALLOWTAIL BUTTERFLY [Papillon du celery] has now assumedly completed its second brood and the caterpillars have gone into the chrysalis stage to overwinter. Marguerite Winsor found 12 caterpillars that had gone into their chrysalis stage on her dill plants between September 17- September 25. A photo of one chrysalis is attached and is protected in a screened in cage to overwinter with its 11 kin in an unheated area for the winter. The chrysalis is approximately 1 ½ inches in length and held attached to the twig by those 2 very strong strands.

nelsonpoirier435@gmail.com

Nelson Poirier,

Nature Moncton