Nature Moncton Nature News: April 13 2024

NATURE MONCTON NATURE NEWS

April 13, 2024

Nature Moncton members as well as any naturalist in New Brunswick or beyond are invited to share their photos and descriptions of recent nature sightings to build a fresh (almost) daily edition of Nature News

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The live feed to the Peregrine Falcon nest box camera can be accessed at https://www.zoodemagnetichillzoo.ca/nest-cam

**Georges Brun shares a few screenshots of activity at the Peregrine Falcon nest with the pair interacting. From the looks on their faces, it may be just as well that inter-pair chatter cannot be interpreted or heard!

**Jane LeBlanc checked her St. Martins yard pond after dark on Thursday and found both frogs and Yellow-spotted Salamanders. They are several days earlier than last year.

** Lynda Leclerc was cleaning out a Tree Swallow nest box beside the man-made lake at the Harrisville Dr. entrance of the Humphrey Brook Trail on Friday, April 12. As she was leaving the area she first heard a Tree Swallow and looked above her and saw it flying high above her.
While Lynda was in Tennessee recently, she saw many Tree Swallows flying high in the skies there as well as several other bird species assumed to be on their migratory route north.

**A few weeks ago, we had interesting comments and photographs from folks who grow Air Plants in their homes. These unusual tropical plants do not require earth to grow. Pat Gibbs reports on the progress of her Air Plant with the surprises of its development in the past weeks.

Pat comments originally when she sent the first photo of her flowering Air Plant, she thought the red chevron-like blade was the flower but Thursday evening she noticed another shoot out of a purple stalk coming out of the red chevron’s side, and as close as she can get, it rather looks like a stamen or pistil maybe? So maybe that purple structure is the flower? Pat doesn’t know any Air Plant specialists so she really can only guess. The only thing Mr. Google told her was that if your Air Plant was flowering it might benefit from a bit of orchid or cactus fertilizer, so she gave it a bit. Now Pat will periodically photograph the plant to see how this flower changes if at all and how long the flowers last.

**On Thursday Brian Stone stopped in briefly at the Arthur St./Grand Pre St. lagoon in Memramcook and noted large numbers of Ring-necked Ducks present with the lagoon pretty much to themselves. On the next day, Friday, Brian photographed a male Ring-necked Pheasant browsing in his backyard for the first time this season.

**On Friday, Nelson Poirier completed the spring cleaning of 21 bird nest boxes in the Miramichi area with surprises.

Eighteen were Tree Swallow boxes and all were occupied in the 2023 season with 15 occupied by Tree Swallows, 2 by Eastern Bluebirds (assuming that by the pine needle construction of the nest), and one occupied by a squirrel (assumedly a Red Squirrel as the opening had been enlarged for a second time). There were 4 nests with an unhatched egg. In one nest, there was a complete unhatched clutch of eggs and a second nest was built on top of it. Last season was a very cold wet spring and Nelson wonders if this contributed to some of the eggs not developing.

One kestrel box was checked and cleaned with a pair of Kestrels already in the area about the box. Nelson had forgotten wood shavings on the first visit and on return a few hours later, got a surprise when a female flew from the box as the wood shavings were being put in!

Two Northern Saw-whet Owl boxes were checked. One had no activity while the other gave a major surprise when opened.

The skull and vertebrate of a large passerine bird was present which left a lot of questions as to how it got there and what its presence indicated. The remains appeared to be that of a Raven. No other body parts were present other than the skull and vertebrate. It would be unexpected that a bird that large could actually get in the 3-inch opening to the nest.

Were gremlins at work? The nest boxes were high in a tree and unlikely to be noted by humans.

Any comments to explain this mystery finding would be very appreciated.

**Nelson Poirier photographed the brilliant evergreen leaves of Trailing Arbutus (Mayflower) on the forest floor beside receding snow.

Nelsonpoirier435@gmail.com

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