Witch Hazel: The Procrastinating Shrub

Witch Hazel flowers

With the arrival of October, plants are preparing for the long winter ahead. Shades of reds, oranges, yellows, and browns color the landscape with plants going through senescence, and vivid and unique fruits are dispersed through every way in the book. Yet, the crisp air and shortening days triggers one shrub to flower? Yes I said that, even later then the goldenrods and asters.
The Common Witch Hazel, or Hamamelis virginiana, is a understory shrub or small tree found in rich forests east of the Mississippi. It is also a procrastinator, unfurling it's ribbon-like yellow petals after the first frost, and can continue blooming even into December! But why would a shrub want to bloom at a time when pollinators are dying out or going dormant for the season?
Ironically, there are still small flies, midges, and gnats out flying around in search of food. So by making itself the only food source out there for that time of the year, the flowers are bound to get pollinated. Witch Hazel has a few tricks up it's sleeve for dealing with the cold. The flowers are only active during a warm spell when insects wake up and attracts them using a strong fragrance for the few buzzing around. Once pollination is complete, the fruit doesn't develop until the following spring. Pretty nifty huh?
The hard capsules ripen throughout the spring and summer. Once they are ripen in the fall, the pressure from the capsules opening shoots the seeds out as much as 30 feet! This is a good trick in the plant world because the "mother plant" doesn't want competition from it's children. Extract from the bark and leaves are used as lotions, hemorrhoid treatment, and treatment for acne. The name was from the fact that the branches were  supposedly the best for "witching" or dowsing, a trick used to find ground water.
I'm a student in horticulture, so trust me on this one. This is a great landscaping shrub for your yard. It adds interesting yellow flowers late in the season, and has great fall color. It likes shade to part sun, but if you want a lot of flowers, full sun is recommended. The only downside is that, because it's a woodland plant, it will get sunburned. This is shown through browning leaf edges and discoloration of the leaves. Otherwise, this procrastinator is one of my favorite shrubs for the home garden.

Verse of the day: "but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" Romans 5:8. It's never too late to know Christ as your personal savior, just like it's never too late for the Witch Hazel to bloom in the coming winter.

Complete Metamorphosis

Monarch Butterfly

Here's probably one of the best magic tricks in nature. Okay, we're going to take a plump caterpillar, let it melt in it's own skin, and have it come out as a beautiful butterfly!... I guess I need to explain it.
Butterflies, as well as moths, flies, bees, wasps, ants, and beetles go through this process called complete metamorphosis. This is where the larvae look completely different then their parents and go through a pupa stage to transform into their adult form. Let's take the example of the butterfly. After the caterpillar hatches from it's egg, it becomes an eating machine consuming it's own body weight in plant material each day... That's like me eating 580 quarter pounders each day! Anyway, as it matures into it's final stage during it's life as a caterpillar, it begins to find a good place to hold itself to a leaf or stem and throws it's skin over it's body. This form's a chrysalis (in the other insects, it'll be a pupae). Now, here's where it gets crazy. The caterpillar melts, yes melts, inside of the chrysalis into a soup. Then, all of the parts of the adult butterfly begin to form and assemble together, and after all the tissues, organs, wings, legs are in place, the end result is a butterfly. That's quite the magic trick right?
As a christian, we've all gone through a complete metamorphosis, but we don't turn into a soup during the process. You could have a past that is just downright ugly or a heart just heavy from events in your life. However, once you allow Jesus to enter your heart, He will transform you. You old heart just melts down and turns into something beautiful, and you change completely. Like a caterpillar, you transform from the inside out. Who would've thought you could learn something from an insect.

Verse of the day: "But those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint." Isaiah 40:31

A Bird's Funeral

A little ceremony for a Common Yellowthroat

I talked about being a volunteer for a bird collision organization in my previous post, but I did forget to answer one question: How can I relate that to my christian walk?

There was one verse that stuck to me on one of my readings. "Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father" Matthew 10:29 (ESV). During the age of the Roman Empire when this was written, a sparrow was pretty much worthless in the eyes of a human being. However, the second part of this verse says that our huge and powerful God cares about His creation so much that He even has time to attend the funeral of a songbird. I think this is pretty cool! So if He cares for such a small event such as the death of a sparrow, think about how much He cares about you! Yes you, the reader of this blog! Think about that for a while.
Anyway, during those mornings when I collect the bird casualties that died from a window collision or rescuing the ones recovering at the base of a building, I know that I am right there with my Father paying my respects for a victim or feeling the heartbeat of a bird alive in my hand.
It's a short post, but I think it gets the point across.

The Bittersweet Mornings of a Bird Collision Monitor

Blackpoll Warbler

Imagine yourself as that Blackpoll Warbler pictured to the left. You were born and raised in the treeline (where forest meets tundra) of northern Canada. No civilization around you for miles, and you enjoyed your days of basically learning about being a Blackpoll Warbler (I'm guessing that's a first year bird in that picture, as the adults do acquire this nonbreeding plumage too). The days grow shorter and you begin to feel this instinct to fly south. Luckily, you have this built-in GPS system in your mind, which is great because this is your first time on this journey and you have no idea where you're going. Knowing about your long journey, you fatten yourself up, doubling your body weight with insects. Now that you're fuel gauge is on full, you wait until the sun dips below the horizon to begin your migration. On your way south, you read the stars, the timing of sunrise and sunset, and even follow the magnetic field of the earth with your innate compass to know that you are going the right direction. In fact, your fuel supply of fat allows you to fly as much as 300 miles in a single night! You feel good about yourself, until one night you come across a foreign landscape. It's looks like the starry sky above you laden with lights, but there are towers everywhere. Lights are reflecting in every direction, and you soon become disoriented. You try to escape and see a tree to land in... but it was only a reflection off a window, and before you know it, you're on the ground with the worst headache ever. But, you were lucky enough to be alive.

Window collisions are the #1 killer of migrating birds in the United States. Millions of birds lose their lives trying to navigate through cities. However, there are many who manage to survive a collision, but they are then vulnerable to many dangers. Hungry gulls and crows, even rats, take the opportunity of an injured bird for an easy meal. Cars, bikes, and people might crush them, vacuums and street sweepers will suck them up, and they can get trapped in doors and alleys. There is hope for these travelers, and this is where I come in the picture.

Wood Thrush

I get up early, usually two hours before sunrise so that I have enough time to get to Chicago before hungry gulls and crows wake up. I'm equipped with a net and a backpack containing paper bags, paper clips, Ziploc bags, a sharpie, tissues, a flashlight, and gloves to wear for a bat or bird of prey. If I come across a live bird, I try to sneak up on it so it doesn't fly away. Many birds just recover from a bang in the head and are not injured, so I have to chase them down until I pin them against a building with the net. Others are still dizzy and I can easily grab them. I then take out a bag and record the date, time, the address of the building, what side of the building I found the bird, my initials, and the bird species. I then place the bird in the paper bag with either a tissue or napkin on the bottom so it can grip to something, and close the top with a paper clip. If I come across a dead bird, I record the same info and put the body in a Ziploc bag. All this information is recorded to help buildings to become more bird friendly, while the dead birds are used at the Field Museum for research. Because of all this, Chicago was the first city to start out a "Light's Out" program in which some buildings turn off their lights during the spring and fall to help birds safely navigate the city. Collisions have decreased since this program was started. This past weekend of September 25-26th, 2010, I rescued 25 birds, 21 of which were on Sunday. These included a Wood Thrush, Virginia Rail, Eastern Wood-pewee, Lincoln's Sparrow, Blackpoll Warbler, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Red-breasted Nuthatch, 3 Golden-crowned Kinglets, and many White-throated Sparrows and Brown Creepers. I also had roughly the same number of dead birds too. It has been my busiest weekend of bird collision monitoring so far.

Golden-crowned Kinglet

So why do I do this? Well, back to you being that Blackpoll Warbler. You would now be able to head to the Atlantic coast to refuel for another crazy journey ahead of you that only Blackpoll Warblers do. Get this, you'll have to go on a 48 hour nonstop flight from New Jersey to South America... that's a bird that weighs 25 grams flying 3,000 miles over the ocean for 2 days! Holy crap that's amazing! A total of 5,000 miles for a bird that fits in the palm of your hand, and that's only a one way flight... Once spring comes, that bird has to come back ( I don't think I even put 10,000 miles on my jeep in a year). The Wood Thrush and the Wood-pewee have to fly 18 hours over the Gulf of Mexico to the tropics. And the other birds are heading to the southern United States for their vacation. I rescued them so that they may be able to complete these amazing journeys. I wish them the best of luck on their long journey, and I hope to see them again. Only this time, I want to see them singing their hearts out in the trees and not at a base of a building.

Verse of the day: "Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?" Matthew 6:26 (ESV)

Brown Creeper

White-throated Sparrow

Lincoln's Sparrow

Dead Northern Flicker

The Prodigal Son

Sunrise in the mountains of North Carolina

On Saturday night, I went to Greg Laurie's Chicago Harvest crusade in, well, Chicago. It was a great night of worship and just hearing about the Gospel all over to reassure my faith in Christ! He also shared my favorite parable (story) that Jesus told: The Prodigal Son.
For those of you what are not familiar with Luke 15: 11-32, it's about a father with two sons. He divides his estate to both of his sons. The younger one runs off with his share and goes onto the party life. Gambles, spends his money on fancy items, gets drunk, sleeps with prostitutes, does drugs, and the rest of the whole shebang. Meanwhile, the other son helps his father at home. A drought strikes the land and the younger son has absolutely nothing to get him through it. He decides to go home, but he feels so ashamed about the life that he chose to live because he knew that would offend greatly. How will he react to me? What do I tell him? Will he still love me?... When he gets home, his father runs out to him, and before the son can say he's sorry, His father gives him a hug and kisses him and was so happy that he came home and threw him a big dinner party.
So, what was the meaning of this? We are the prodigal sons (or daughters for women). Our sinful nature has made us run way from God for a "better" life in the eyes of the world. Yet, we are scared to come back to God and admit to our wrong doings because many of us feel that He will punish us. Folks, God loves us! In fact, He loves us so much that He sent His Son to pay the ultimate price and die for the sins of all mankind! So why would He punish you? He wants you to come back to Him, and He will embrace you with open arms when you come back home!
Listen, there was a time in my life where I was a prodigal son. I was growing in my faith during my latter years of high school, but when I went to college, that all changed. I was in the party situation my freshman year and I screwed up bad. February came when I was at a huge low point in life because I did stupid things, and I thought that I ruined my whole christian hike forever... Guess what, God knows we will screw up in life. So I repented my sins that I did and I asked Him to fill my life again! Well, to put in my terms, a tree will break and fall over during a bad storm. However, it reacts to the disaster by shooting up sprouts that grow even faster then it's previous growth. I had a bad storm hit my tree, but it resprouted quickly once it saw the light again.
Let's be honest, we've all screw up at a point in out lives right? We all are tempted to the "party" life and think it's way better for us. In the end of all that, we still feel empty and realize who've we hurt: Our Father. But remember, he's waiting for us with open arms and a great feast! I came home, and I'll never regret that. Have you come home yet?

If you ever want to come home, I'll be more then happy to give you directions.

The Autumn Equinox

Sugar Maple in fall color

Thursday was the official beginning of autumn! It is a time when nature prepares for the long and depending where you live, cold winter ahead. About 3/4 of the birds in North America migrate south to climates that have their needed food sources, and many of them travel hundreds of miles to get to their destination. If you're a birder like me, fall is one of the best times to see lots of bird species as they take a breather in a local park or backyard, fattening up on insects, fruit, and seeds to build up their fat reserves for their long journey ahead.
For insects, they try to live out their final days. Many adults die at the first frost, but some will produce an antifreeze in their body and will hibernate for the winter. Bees, wasps, ants, some butterflies, and other insect species apply this trick in their lives. Most insects are in the form of eggs. Adults lay their final brood so that the nymphs and larvae will hatch in the spring when food is abundant. Some, like many butterflies and moths, go into a pupa stage during the winter. When spring arrives, they will arrive as adults into the world.
Many plants put on a spectacular show in autumn. Cooling air chemically reacts with chlorophyll in the leaves of deciduous trees, and this accounts for their array of colors in the fall. Dropping your leaves is a way to reduce water loss in the winter time, which is hard for broad thin leaves. Plants also produce an abundance of fruit in the fall. Once the seeds are spread, they will remain dormant in the soil until the warmth of spring triggers them to grow.
For us, well, this is when we go outside to enjoy all of the fall events happening! Whether it's fall colors, apple cider, corn mazes (or a corn "maize"), pumpkin patches, fall migration of birds, hunting, football... whatever makes you happy, go out and enjoy it! But please, don't stay curled up on the couch all day because it's only here for a limited time only. Otherwise, you''ll have to wait until next year!
Verse of the day:
"So that people may see and know, may consider and understand, that the hand of the Lord has done this, that the Holy One of Israel has created it." Isaiah 41:20

Imagine

Snowy Egret

I've been on this earth for 20 years now, and there's one thing I never get tired of: Nature's beauty. Whether it's the eternal flute-like song of a Hermit Thrush echoing through the mountains, carpets of wildflowers on the forest floor in May, a massive thunderstorm that cries with crackling thunder, or something as humble as delicate moss on a rock, they are all truly pieces of beautiful artwork made by an amazing designer. However, what I have realized is that creation isn't at it's full potential. It is under a curse.
At a church service a couple weeks ago, the pastor really explained a verse that I read about last year. "For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now" Romans 8:22 (ESV). When sin entered the world, all of creation was cursed and not just human beings. The world is in the pains of childbirth, and all plants, animals, rocks, clouds, whatever God made is groaning and awaiting the return of the King.
So, what does this have to do with what I said in the beginning? Well, many of us can agree that the nature around us is beautiful, but can you imagine how vibrant the colors of birds would be in heaven? Or massive trees in autumn leaves? A meadow blushing with wildflowers? Even all of the insects? Or the songs of birds? I'm not saying that they are going to heaven because they don't have souls to save them, but God is preparing a place for His children heaven as we speak, and I'm sure He will have His artwork. It would be His creation before the fall. I can't even describe or imagine how beautiful the woods will be when I birdwatch with Jesus in the best place ever! So next time you see that bird singing on a branch, think about that same bird after Christ has returned to earth, and how awesome it's song will be praising it's Creator forever.