What to See This Week

As we continue in late spring, more flowers are blooming right on cue. Pictured here is a kousa dogwood, a small tree with a bloom time later than our native flowering dogwood. They are easily recognized by their star-shaped blooms with pointed bracts whereas the showy bracts on the flowering dogwoods are notched at the tips. Kousa dogwoods produce visually interesting and edible fruits in the late summer and early fall.

Now blooming in the Pollinator Garden is a beautiful but deadly plant! This is foxglove, a very popular ornamental plant with flowers coming in purples, pinks, whites, and yellows. The entire plant contains the incredibly toxic cardiac glycosides digitoxin and digoxin. While this plant is deadly, it is a perfect example of the idea that the dose makes the poison as it has also been used as a medication for heart failure!

Foxglove beardtongue is a wonderful native plant blooming this time of year both in gardens and throughout the Red Barn Reserve and Dutch Fork Wetlands. It has an odd name but it all makes sense when you break it down. Foxglove refers to the resemblance this flower has to the foxglove plant listed above. Beardtongue may sound bizarre but look inside the tubular flowers and you will notice one sterile (not producing pollen) stamen looking very much like a hairy tongue in the center!

While prairie areas are far from their peak bloom, which is often deep in the summer, a few popular native flowers are in bloom as early as late May. Along with the foxglove beardtongue, spiderwort makes an appearance at both the Red Barn Reserve and Dutch Fork Wetlands early. Spiderwort has a vibrant, three-parted flower that is best seen in the morning as the flowers fade in the heat of the afternoon. 

We’ve had plenty of rain over the last few days but that hasn’t stopped the birds from visiting feeders in the Bird Watching Garden. Pictured here is a blue jay that along with the rest of the visitors on this day, got soaked in the downpour while searching for food. While birds are able to stay relatively waterproof due to oil on their feathers for short periods, extended time in the rain can lead to some very soaked birds.

This time of year, it is not uncommon to find fledgling birds. Pictured here is not a fledgling but an adult female house finch mimicking a fledgling towards her mate. Part of the courtship of house finches, as well as several other birds, involves the male house finch feeding the female to ensure he is capable of caring for her and their young. This is also a common behavior seen in cardinals in the Bird Watching Garden so keep an eye out for these sweet courtship behaviors!

Plenty of young squirrels are visiting the Bird Watching Garden this time of year. Already beginning at around 12 weeks of age, gray squirrels are fully independent. However, sometimes the younger ones are easy to pick out from the ones who have been around for a few seasons. Aside from being noticeably smaller in general with comparatively larger tails and feet, the young squirrels are also much clumsier and are still learning all the ways to get to the birdseed!

A couple of weeks ago our suspicions were confirmed, and we got the first look at the litter of baby groundhogs we were expecting in the Bird Watching Garden! At least three babies recently emerged for the first time from under the fountain in the garden and have already grown so much. They were regularly seen playing with each other and discovering the best snacks in the garden.