The Metamorphosis of a green-fingered Birder

When I first planned to refresh the front garden of our house in north-eastern USA, I knew I wanted to plant indigenous plants. I must say that I am not a gardener. I loved my garden back in Johannesburg as I planted indigenous and water-wise plants when I first moved in and left them to run wild and grow crazily over the 12 years I lived there. I loved the low maintenance of that kind of garden. Here in the USA, I always seem to see people working in their gardens – not what I wanted to do.

As I’m an avid birder, I knew I needed a few shrubs with berries to carry the birds through the beginning of winter and then anything that attracted insects that their offspring could eat in the summer, would be a bonus. I knew that the Milkweed family of plants would be not only a rather fetching addition to the garden but read that they would also attract Monarch butterflies, which was a bonus. Growing up, I used to watch nature programmes and they would show millions of Monarchs gathering in Mexico to overwinter, before heading north to fly back to Canada in the spring. The idea of having a few plants in my yard that could help these amazing butterflies along their incredible journey appealed to me, so I added Milkweed (Asclepiadaceae family) to my shopping list.

I ended up with only three Milkweed plants by the time the planting came around. A Common Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca), a Swamp Milkweed (Asclepias incamata) and a Butterfly Weed (Asclepias tuberosa). The garden was initially sparse with the idea that I could add more plants over the years.  

The one bush I did leave in the front garden during the great cleanup, is called a Butterfly Bush here. When this started growing last year, I fondly remembered my various Buddlejas from home and was thrilled when it started flowering with fragrant heads of hundreds of light

purple flowers. That was as much as I was going to do about butterfly-friendly plants. I had the stress of watering every day until the plants were established as we had a two-week heatwave right after everything was planted.

Six weeks later I was looking around the garden when I noticed a caterpillar on the Butterfly Weed. Lo and behold, it was a Monarch caterpillar! I was so thrilled and couldn’t wait to get a photo or two up to show everyone. I called myself a proud mamma at the time. Little did I know…

Within a week I had 17 Monarch Caterpillars between my three Milkweed species. That same day I counted all those caterpillars, I found my first green chrysalis hanging under the roof overhang. I immediately needed to know what to do, when to do it and how I could help them. My days of raising silkworms were about 45 years ago and as I can sometimes barely remember what I had for breakfast, I had to use my good friend Google for help. I started reading and found a huge community of Monarch and other butterfly crazies out there with more information than I could ever hope to absorb.

I was relieved to read that I had done the right thing. I had food for the caterpillars and an immediate source of nectar, thanks to my Butterfly Bush. I read up more about chrysalises and learnt that they are initially green, and that it takes 2-3 weeks for what I call butterfly juice to work its magic before the colour turns dark. The chrysalis becomes almost see-through and the dark you see is the butterfly inside, just waiting to emerge. This process of them emerging is called enclosion. Such a magnificent word. I couldn’t wait!

Once the caterpillar has eaten and grown enough, it finds a safe spot (as it turns out, not a safe spot, mostly just a spot), where it weaves a small web base from which to hang and hangs itself upside down in the shape of a “J” with its head lightly curved upwards. In butterfly crazy circles, this is called a “J”. This happens late afternoon (well in my garden anyway) and by morning, the chrysalis is formed. I was never lucky enough to see this process, no matter how many times I went out before bedtime with a torch, searching under leaves. Maybe some of the magic needed to stay magic!

Each morning I would go outside and search under the leaves of the Butterfly Bush, the eaves, the roof overhang, under the windowsill and then surprisingly in-between the sword-like leaves of my Red Hot Poker (yes I found a couple of them at the nursery, so have two in my garden making lovely orange spears to remind me of home). My caterpillar count was also climbing and was 27 at one stage. My Milkweeds were being decimated but magically, the more I watered, the more new leaves kept sprouting and the cycle continued.

My first child enclosed almost 10 days after I found the chrysalis. I didn’t see it emerge but was lucky with future children. Once they emerge, the butterfly wings are small and folded like curtains hanging in your dining room. The butterflies need to safely hang upside down to let the blood pump into their wings before it hardens. Once hard, the wings can sustain flight. Within half an hour my child was flying around and drinking some much-needed nectar before heading off over the house to places unknown.

Soon my free time became dominated with frequent visits to the front garden, checking, counting, watering, recounting, and rechecking. Early one evening I was out watering when I realized that about six chrysalises hanging from the roof overhang were missing. I ran inside for my torch and couldn’t see anything. No creature could have reached them so I assume a very hungry bird came around and grabbed the perfectly hanging tasty treats for dinner. Such is the circle of life but some days it really sucks.

Less than a month after finding my first chrysalis, I have just two left. They are in a safe place so feel confident that they will soon be gracing the skies and heading south to Mexico. At least 10 butterflies successfully emerged, and the success rate of 1:3 isn’t too bad. I don’t think I will get to the point of bringing them indoors like many people do as nature needs to take its course. What I do know is that next Spring I will be planting a LOT more Milkweed to keep the Monarch butterfly factory going.

Vegetable Avenues, Tinted Raptors, Black Waves and a Puff of Smoke - Part 1

Those of us that consider ourselves birders, bird for many reasons. Probably for a variety of reasons actually. Last weekend for example, I ruined a perfectly good long weekend by spending 2 days chasing a hawk that belonged on the other side of the country. Many hours of driving dusty roads and pulling off to stand for more hours in the cold while staring into the sky and bare trees. Fake views that turned out to be very common hawks, getting caught up in the chase and driving down country roads in a caravan of panicked birders, after more fake news. 

I realize that is not one of the many reasons I bird but in fairness I was chasing a lifer - a bird I had never seen before - so was willing to make some sacrifices. Adding birds to the numerous lists I keep is part of why I bird. I compete (mostly) with myself to get the highest number of birds for a given period of time and set myself targets every January that I know are seemingly impossible but because I bird also to escape from the world, I end up overachieving those targets. A sad state of affairs really.

Did I forget to mention the thrill of chase though? Chasing after a much sought-after bird is exciting, adrenaline-pumping and if you catch up with the bird, downright magical. For me, the crazy chasing experience is greatly enhanced with a special friend by my side. Somedays you win and a lot of those days, you don't. Somedays however, everything comes together in a dark sandpit and ends in a puff of smoke. 

After an exhausting week both from a work and political point of view, I was ready to embrace this weekend and the bitterly cold forecast to get a few local year birds on my list. Breathlessly I watched for news of the lost hawk and it was sighted every day during the week so made plans to drive down to once again look for it, plans for local birding once again put on the backburner. A friend was also keen (the same poor friend that spent an entire day last week with me unsuccessfully searching for the bird) so we agreed to meet up at 8:30am under some trees. I got there early, had a good phone call with one of my sisters and checked the message boards for news on the hawk, while I watched the wind whip dust all over the black fields. Today was the chilliest day of the winter and although there was no precipitation, the wind was icy and brought the temperature down to well below zero. 

My friend arrived and we had a good catch up about the drive, the weather and my new number plates. While we were still pulling on extra jackets and agreeing on which roads to tackle first, a friendly gentleman from Long Island (I never got his name so will call him Frank for the rest of my story) stopped to chat and ask if we had heard any news. I could share with him that in this case no news was bad news and which roads to check out. A white sedan came hurtling around the corner and came to a rather sudden pause next to us and the driver shouted that the hawk had been seen in the next road up from us. In a scene from The Big Year, the tiny hatchback from LI and two Subarus (who were sans drivers at the time they heard the news) scrambled to tuck in behind the white sedan and race off to the main road. Within seconds my friend and I were in our cars, had executed the perfect u-turn and were right on the hatchback's tail. One block down and we had "changed vegetables" (from Celery Avenue to Onion Avenue) and were trying to keep to the speed limit between the houses that lined the roads. Soon we arrived where two cars were pulled off. The four of us tucked in nicely off the road and leapt out of our vehicles. I made a mad grab for my camera on the seat next to me and thankfully connected with it, fingers automatically gripping and lifting. A rather elegant exit from the car considering the layers of clothes I was wearing and the size of my snow boots.

I looked around and saw Frank looking upwards and taking photographs with his big camera and long lens. I instinctively grabbed my binoculars and followed his line. There in the sky was a huge hawk. It had pale underparts. Long straight wings - the size of eagle wings - but they didn't seem to be too out of sorts with the size of the body. Small head. Tail seemed shortish but at the time I can't recall making a mental note of that. A Ferruginous Hawk in all its glory! I let my binoculars drop and raised my camera as the bird circled overhead.  It started to head towards the sun... a death shot for any kind of photograph. I held my breath to prevent my viewfinder from fogging up (wearing a mask has a few downsides), clicked on the auto-focus and started shooting. I managed 34 photos in 20 seconds. The hawk flew off into the sun. 

To share my joy in that moment, I needed to make eye contact with someone. Anyone. Now! I looked back and my friend was in her car scrambling for her camera so I looked around and shared my special moment with my new friend Frank. He had the same expression on his face for a brief second. Whipping around to my friend, I told her the bird had flown off so she got out and we did an awkward kind of happy dance, the kind you do in the times of COVID.  

Just before he drove off, we shouted our thanks to the driver that had alerted us to the sighting. A groan from the front of my car drew our attention to Frank, who realized that in his haste to tackle the 3+ hour journey this morning, he had left his camera's SD card behind in his computer at home. Frank did not get a single photo of the hawk but honestly to me he did not look terribly disappointed as I could see the smile on his face behind his 3-ply surgical mask. The white sedan paused briefly and we once again thanked "Frank #2" who was thrilled to hear it was a lifer for my friend and I. He drove off chase the bird again. The three of us that remained chatted in a shared moment of excitement about the bird, how lucky we got, where my accent was from, where my friend grew up, where Frank lived and how far he had travelled.

The shared moments after a great sighting have always added to my pleasure of the birding experience. Last year when I saw a lifer on my own and without my camera, it felt as if I had been cheated. Today was not like that day. I had two friends to share it with. 

New York Breeding Bird Atlas Checklist - 23 Jan 2021 - Black Dirt Region--Onion Ave. - 12 species (ebird.org)

For more information on the Ferruginous Hawk, check out this Wikipedia page:

Ferruginous hawk - Wikipedia

PS. For an added bonus, a few minutes later we got swept up in another convoy, headed to another dusty road also named after a veggie but the views were distant and not nearly as great at the ones we had earlier. My friend and I headed north to search for an eagle. I cover that adventure in part 2.