Nannyberry Terminal Buds
Nannyberry (Viburnum lentago) is a native woodland shrub in the genus Viburnum. Nanny goats apparently feed on the ripe fruit (reportedly more so than billy goats), hence the common name. It is also known as Wild Raisin due to the appearance of its dark fruit when dried.
Like all viburnums, Nannyberry has opposite-branching leaves and flowers in umbrella-shaped clusters, called umbels. One trait that keeps it from looking like every other woodland shrub in the winter is the distinctive shape of its terminal buds. There are two scales protecting the bud, whose edges meet. Some compare the shape of this bud to the bill of a goose, but I find it far more graceful.
Grouse, robins, catbirds, cardinals, bluebirds, waxwings, grosbeaks and finches feed on Nannyberry’s clusters of blue-black berrylike drupes. Humans also consume the fruit, usually in the form of jams and jellies.
Naturally Curious is supported by donations. If you choose to contribute, you may go to http://www.naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com and click on the yellow “donate” button.
Bobcat Caches & Revisits White-tailed Deer Carcass
Rabbits and hares comprise much of a Bobcat’s diet, but when prey is scarce or hard to capture, adult male and large adult female Bobcats will attack bedded, weak or injured White-tailed Deer. Bobcats often cache prey such as a deer that is too large to eat in one feeding. They scrape up leaves, bark, twigs, soil, snow — whatever is available — and cover their prey, returning soon to eat it. When feeding on a deer, Bobcats bite away the hair to avoid eating it, and this discarded hair is frequently mixed with the debris that the cat drags over the kill to cover it.
This photograph was taken 24 hours after the deer was cached, and the site has been visited by several predators. A characteristic sign of Bobcat feeding is the amount of hair strewn around the carcass and the lack of broken long bones (see inset). (Bobcats don’t have the strength to break large bones with their teeth.)(Cache discovered by Lynn & Otto Wurzburg, who observed the Bobcat leaving after caching the deer)
Naturally Curious is supported by donations. If you choose to contribute, you may go to http://www.naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com and click on the yellow “donate” button.
White-tailed Deer Bucks Shedding Antlers
White-tailed Deer antlers are typically shed in December or January. Once breeding has taken place, cells start to de-mineralize the bone between the pedicle (where the antler attaches to the deer’s skull) and antler, causing the antler’s connection with the skull to weaken — a flick of the deer’s head and one or both antlers go flying, ridding the deer of these heavy, cumbersome, bony appendages.
It’s a win-win situation for both deer and resident rodents, who scarf up these rich sources of calcium phosphate and protein almost as soon as they hit the ground. Take a close look at the tip of each tine in this photograph and you will see that something — most likely a vole, mouse, squirrel or porcupine — has been whittling away on it, and the antler’s probably only been on the ground for a matter of days or weeks at most. (Once a deer sheds its antlers, new growth starts immediately, though visible antler growth is often not apparent for several weeks.)
Naturally Curious is supported by donations. If you choose to contribute, you may go to http://www.naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com and click on the yellow “donate” button.
Zygodactyl Toe Arrangement
Most birds have four toes, three pointing forward and one back. A quick look in the snow beneath your bird feeder will confirm this. Exceptions to this rule include woodpeckers, owls and ospreys, among others, whose toe arrangement is 2 and 2: two of their toes (the middle two) point forward, and the outer toes point backwards. The term for this arrangement is zygodactyl.
Different species have evolved this toe arrangement to meet different needs. It enhances the ability of woodpeckers to hold onto limbs and climb up vertical tree trunks, while owls and ospreys can get a better grasp of slippery or wiggly prey. (Woodpeckers can pivot one of their back toes to the side, and owls can pivot one of their back toes forward, as well.)
Naturally Curious is supported by donations. If you choose to contribute, you may go to http://www.naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com and click on the yellow “donate” button.
Bohemian Waxwings Dining On Bald-faced Hornet Larvae
We think of Bohemian Waxwings, colorful winter visitors, as primarily consumers of sugary fruits, but their diet is not exclusively frugivorous. They (and Cedar Waxwings) eat sap drips in the spring and aerial insects, especially emergent aquatic species, in the summer.
During the winter, in addition to fruits, Bohemian Waxwings also feed on protein-rich foods when they are available. Pictured is one of many Bohemian Waxwings that found a goldmine of protein — dead Bald-faced Hornet larvae. While the hornet queen overwinters under loose bark or a similarly protected area, the larvae that are developing within the nest when a hard frost hits are killed. Bohemian Waxwings apparently recognize this rich source of protein. Scale insects and tree buds (American Elm and ash species) are also consumed in the winter and spring. (Photograph by Terry Marron)
Naturally Curious is supported by donations. If you choose to contribute, you may go to http://www.naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com and click on the yellow “donate” button.
Drumstick Truffleclub Fruiting
Finding a mushroom in January is a delightful discovery, especially finding one that is only 3” high with a yellow stipe, or stem, (when in its prime) and a tiny, bumpy brown cap. Drumstick Truffleclub (Tolypocladium capitatum) is unusual not only for its size, but for the late timing of its fruiting period (typically November/December) and the fact that it is a parasite of another fungus. If you were to dig down beneath a Drumstick Truffleclub, you would likely find that it was attached to a species of truffle (another fungus). (Photograph by Sally Fellows)
Naturally Curious is supported by donations. If you choose to contribute, you may go to http://www.naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com and click on the yellow “donate” button.
Red Foxes Mating
Red Foxes spend much of the year living a solitary life, but come January and February, during their courtship period, males join females. Nocturnal barking ensues and their pungent urine begins smelling strongly like skunk spray. Vixens come into heat for 1-6 days during this time and up to a week or two prior to this there is much interaction between a pair, when they often hunt and cover ground together. Once breeding takes place, they part ways. In about two months, when their young are born, the parents rejoin each other and raise their young together.
Naturally Curious is supported by donations. If you choose to contribute, you may go to http://www.naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com and click on the yellow “donate” button.
Promethea Moths Pupating
Now is a perfect time to look for cocoons, with leaves off deciduous shrubs and trees. Giant silk moth cocoons are especially evident, due to their large size (often 2″-4″). The Promethea Moth caterpillar (Callosamia promethea), one of several giant silk moths in the Northeast, hatches in the summer and reaches its full size by fall. It then chooses a leaf and reinforces the leaf’s stem, or petiole, with silk so as to make it less likely that the leaf will detach from the branch it is growing on. The caterpillar then spins its silken cocoon inside the curled leaf, and spends the winter pupating inside the cocoon. Look for their well-camouflaged cocoons on low-hanging branches.
Come May or June, the moth will emerge, and if it’s a female, will produce pheromones that may attract males from as far as several miles away.
Naturally Curious is supported by donations. If you choose to contribute, you may go to http://www.naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com and click on the yellow “donate” button.
Pine Grosbeak: Crab Apple Mashers
Congratulations to Gail Coffey, the first NC reader who recognized the signs of Pine Grosbeaks feeding on crab apples! Snow discolored by bits of uneaten fruit usually indicates feathered consumers have been in the tree whose branches are above the snow. The litter can consist of sumac seed coats, bittersweet bits, crab apple flesh and parts of other fruits that are available in winter, as many readers suggested. There are many birds that remain in or visit the Northeast in winter and consume fruit (Northern Cardinals, Crows, European Starlings, Blue Jays, Cedar and Bohemian Waxwings, Eastern Mockingbirds, American Robins, etc.).
When it comes to crab apples, most birds tend to swallow the entire fruit, leaving some bits on the snow, but nowhere near the amount pictured in the Mystery Photo. Pine Grosbeaks, occasional winter visitors from further north, are crab apple eaters but unlike most other species they tend to mash the crab apples in their stout beaks and swallow only the seeds. The fleshy uneaten parts of the apples accumulate on their beaks until the load becomes heavy enough to fall to the ground, coloring the snow below red.
Naturally Curious is supported by donations. If you choose to contribute, you may go to http://www.naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com and click on the yellow “donate” button.
Naturally Curious with Mary Holland 
What Other Naturally Curious People Are Saying