A Northwoods Almanac for 12/5-18/2025

 A Northwoods Almanac for 12/5-18/2025  

 

Snowy Owls!

            According to the DNR, “The first snowy owls of 2025 reached Wisconsin on Nov. 6. While early November is a typical arrival date, the total of 17 owls reported as of Nov. 17 is above average for this early in the season. The last year with a higher total at this time was 2017, when 58 were already tallied and a large irruption unfolded. Could this be another irruption year? It’s possible, and we should know better by early-mid December.”

            As is typical, the bulk of this year’s owls have been spotted near the shores of Lakes Michigan and Superior. Snowies nest in open tundra, so wide open spaces are where they know to hunt, and that’s where we most often see them in Wisconsin. Harbors from Ashland and Oconto to Kewaunee, Sheboygan, and Milwaukee provide ample prey like ducks and gulls, while grasslands, farm fields, airports, and other open habitats offer rodents, squirrels, and rabbits.

            In the Lakeland area, you can try the shorelines of open large bodies of water or airports to see a snowy, but the truth of the matter is our forested landscape is poor habitat for these owls. The best place in the North County to see a snowy is usually Chequamegon Bay in Ashland.

            Get the full update at https://dnr.wisconsin.gov/topic/WildlifeHabitat/SnowyOwls

 

Natural History Books for Christmas

            Recommended recent books to give nature lovers for Christmas? Try the following:

Is a River Alive? –  Robert Macfarlane

The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2025 – Susan Orlean

The Serviceberry – Robing Wall Kimmerer

How Can I Help? Saving Nature with Your Yard – Douglas Tallamy

The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of    Life on Earth – Zoe Schlanger

How to Love a Forest: The Bittersweet Work of Tending a Changing World – Ethan Tapper

And favorites from local environmental authors:

            Ripple Effect: How We’re Loving Our Lakes to Death; Lakeside Companion; On the Pond – Ted Rulseh

            Beneath the Eagle Tree – Bob Kovar 

            Seasons of the North; White Deer: Ghosts of the Forest; Pure Superior – Jeff Richter

            Wrong Tree: Adventures in Wildlife Biology – Jeff Wilson 

            From Barbells to Spruce Grouse – Joe Hovel 

I’ve written a few, too: See www.manitowishriverpress.com   

 

Hawk Ridge Totals

            Hawk Ridge Bird Observatory in Duluth is regarded as one of the finest sites for counting migrating raptors in the U.S., but the counters also tally songbirds as they fly over the ridge. The count runs from 8/1 through 11/30, but here are a few of the totals through 11/27:

Total number of birds counted – 309,347

Highest monthly total was September – 194,480

Number one most abundant bird – Blue jay – 72,277

Number two – American robin – 32,387

Number three – Common nighthawk – 18,352

Number four – Sharp-shinned hawk – 15,683

Number five – Yellow-rumped warbler – 11,510

            Broad-winged hawks were surprisingly few this autumn – just 8,799. The record high was in 2003 when 160,703 were counted. Does this mean broad-wingeds are way down in number, or was this just a poor year to view them over the ridge? Well, that’s why we do long-term data collecting. We’ll see if future years also show a downturn.

            Of note was the record count for eagles. Golden eagles tallied 252, eclipsing the previous record of 223. And bald eagles totaled 6,108, barely surpassing the previous record of 6,099.

            Finally, the biggest surprise for most people – 59,331 common green darner dragonflies migrated over the ridge! And an estimated 57,000 of those occurred on one day alone – September 1.

            Most folks don’t even know some species of dragonflies migrate, but common green darners do, and they migrate in a manner that echoes monarch butterflies. Researchers in 2019 discovered that at least three generations make up the annual migration of common green darner dragonflies. The first generation emerges in the southern United States, Mexico and the Caribbean starting around February and then flies north. Once in the North, those darners lay eggs and die, giving rise to a second generation that migrates south until late October. A third generation, hatched in the south in the fall, overwinters there before laying eggs that will hatch in February and start the entire process over again in the spring.

common green darner

            Your trivia fact for the week: Researchers in Vermont have found that the common green darner spring migration closely follows the average daily temperature of 48°F northward.

 

Looking for Good News? Bats Are Rebounding!

            The fungal disease white-nose syndrome hit Wisconsin cave-dwelling bats hard beginning in 2014, causing nearly 100% losses in many populations across the U.S. and Canada as well as in Wisconsin. Our four species of cave-dwelling bats (Wisconsin boasts eight species of bats) - big brown bat, little brown bat, northern long-eared bat and tricolored bat – were profoundly impacted, raising alarm that they could be extirpated entirely from the state. However, recent Wisconsin Bat Program survey counts show rebounding numbers of little brown bats in particular at some significant roost and hibernation sites across the state.

            This summer, DNR scientists and volunteers with the Great Wisconsin Bat Count tallied nearly 25,000 bats as they emerged from their daytime roosts, up from 22,600 in 2024, the third consecutive annual increase for the species in Wisconsin.        

            This doesn’t mean all our bats are out of the woods. Hibernating bats are still stressed by white-nose syndrome each winter, and tricolored bats and northern long-eared bats in Wisconsin have not shown signs of recovery similar to the little brown bats.

            Since bats are major consumers of agricultural and forest pests, and predators of biting insects, we want as many as possible around. Three years of increasing numbers offers a strong reason for hope. See https://dnr.wisconsin.gov/topic/WildlifeHabitat/Bats for more info.

 

Snow and More Snow!

            The last two winters offered marginal snowfall in the Lakeland area, but the blizzard that hit us on 11/26 appears to have rectified that omission. We measured 20 inches on our property on Thanksgiving day, 11/27, and it was still snowing!

            For wildlife, of course, there are winners and losers after a big snow event. Deer are both winners and losers. Winners because trees are bent down low enough for them to browse buds they would never otherwise reach. Losers because deep snow limits their ease of movement, while snow over 18” may force deer into “yards” to conserve energy that would otherwise be lost plowing through such heavy snow.

            Rodents are very happy this week. They now have deep insulating snow that also acts as a cover from predators. Called the “subnivean” zone, this area at the junction of the ground and the snow is relatively warm and safe, at least compared to living on the surface.

            For birds, deep snow makes for more losing than winning. Birds need to find seeds, fruits, and/or insect eggs/larvae/pupae during the winter – lots of them – and snow covers them all up. The only advantage I’m aware of is for grouse and redpolls who are both known to plunge into deep snow to conserve heat during periods of prolonged severe cold. 

            Think about every species that overwinters here. Each will have a different story of how they interact with blizzard conditions and the resulting deep snow, and all will be challenging stories.

 

The Limberness of Conifers

            After 21+ inches of snow had fallen over Thanksgiving, the branches of the conifers on our property – the balsam firs, white spruces, white pines, and white cedars –  all hung like collapsed umbrellas, all sheathed in white and bearing immense weight. This capacity of conifer branches to bend and bend without snapping, and then to spring back up as the snow slides off like nothing happened, illustrates why the far northern forests, the boreal forests of North America, are dominated by conifers. 

            The suppleness of the branches are one reason conifers can live in heavy snowscapes. The other is the shape of most conifers, in particular the pyramidal or conical shape of balsam fir and white spruce, the dominant trees in the boreal forest. The branches below support the branches above, all cooperating, or bowing if you will, to bear the enormous snow loads until the snow sheds off. 

            In one study in Finland after a particularly snowy winter, researchers calculated the total weight of snow accumulation on Norway spruces. A 60’ tall tree at an elevation 1,150’ was burdened by an astonishing 7,253 pounds of snow, but like Atlas, bore it gracefully.

            Underneath those branches that droop all the way to the ground may hide snowshoe hares or any other animal or bird looking for a spot out of the wind and out of a predator’s eye.

 

Celestial Events

            The full moon was officially last night, 12/4, but it’s still 98% illuminated tonight, 12/5. It’s the highest full moon of the year – 56° higher than June’s full moon.

            This year’s earliest sunsets begin tonight and last through 12/14. The sun will set at 4:14, 3 hours and 39 minutes earlier than the week around summer solstice. 

            Look during the evening of 12/13 into the predawn of 12/14 for the peak Geminid Meteor Shower. The Geminids are usually the strongest meteor shower of the year and are often bright and intensely colored. This is the one major shower that provides good activity prior to midnight. 

 

Thought for the Week

            “’Shifting baseline syndrome’ is the name given to the process whereby ongoing damage to the natural world becomes normalized over time, as each new generation measures loss against an already degraded benchmark . . . The same effect is also sometimes known as ‘generational amnesia’, and it is a powerful force in terms of disguising and enabling further ecological harm.” – Robert Macfarlane

 

A Northwoods Almanac for 11/21 – 12/4/2025

 A Northwoods Almanac for 11/21 – 12/4/2025  

 

Winter Finch Forecast

            According to the “Finch Forecast” from Ontario’s Finch Research Network, it looks to be a good flight year this winter for many northern bird species coming down from Canada. In fact, this has the potential of being the biggest flight year since 2020-2021 because of the very poor seed crops in the boreal forest from central Quebec westward to Manitoba.  

            Hunger has a way of making things happen. Seeds from significant food source species such as white spruce, tamarack and white birch are reportedly totally absent over large areas, while regularly dependent food sources like black spruce and alders are below average within these same areas. 

            So, what does this mean for individual species? Here you go:

            Pine grosbeaks: There should be a small to moderate flight this winter south into the border states. The crop of mountain ash appears below average to poor from Lake Superior across the boreal forest into eastern Quebec, and pine grosbeaks rely heavily on mountain ash. 

            Purple finches: Most will migrate south out of Eastern Canada this winter with some making it to the deep southern States.

            Redpoll: Expect a strong flight south out of the boreal forest east of Lake Superior southward into the lower great lakes. BTW, in 2024, common redpoll, hoary redpoll and the lesser redpoll in Europe were all lumped into the same species, now simply called “redpoll.” I never was sure when I thought I was seeing a hoary redpoll, so this is good news for those of us who were ID challenged.

        

    

photo by Jill Wilm

    Red and white-winged crossbills: There should be modest numbers dropping into the upper Great Lakes states 

            Pine siskins: Areas affected by spruce budworm infestations provided widespread and bountiful food for siskins during the breeding season, but these same areas also have a very poor white spruce and white birch cone crop for the winter. So, there should be a moderate to possibly strong flight of siskins southward, possibly as far south as the mid-Atlantic states. (We saw our first pine siskins in Manitowish on 11/9).

            Evening grosbeaks: Like the other spruce budworm-loving finches, evening grosbeaks were widespread in these northern areas, rearing families on this abundant food source. But winter food sources like cherry species, ash, and mountain ash, had poor crops over widespread areas. So, there should be a moderate flight of evening grosbeaks southward this fall. (We saw our first evening grosbeaks in Manitowish on 11/6).

            Bohemian waxwings: Given the poor native mountain ash crop east of Lake Superior, bohemians should be moving into areas of the lower Great Lakes. But local areas that have experienced drought conditions during the late summer, and thus have had scattered berry crop failures, may force bohemian waxwings to roam even further south.

 

Great Acorn Year – The Good and the Bad

            In an earlier column this fall, I noted the exceptional acorn numbers underfoot, a density so great that Mary said it was like walking on ball bearings. Of course, all those acorns feed a huge number of animals, including an array of bird species like blue jays, common grackles, all our woodpeckers, wild turkeys, wood ducks and mallards who swallow them whole, and even chickadees and nuthatches who can consume acorns after they have been cracked open by larger birds. 

            Most mammals consume them too, from chipmunks, mice and squirrels to deer, raccoons and black bears. White-tailed deer are one of the top acorn consumers, with acorns, white oak acorns in particular, comprising up to 75 percent of their late fall and early winter diet – up to 300 acorns per day. In a big mast year (every two to five years), deer weigh more going into the winter and are more likely to produce twin fawns.

            That’s the good news – it’s a Thanksgiving feast for many wildlife species.

            The bad news is how many mice, white-footed mice in particular, gorge on the acorns, because the higher the population of mice, the higher future incidence of Lyme disease. 

            It works this way. The life-cycle of a tick is generally 2 to 3 years, beginning after a larva hatches from an egg. The larva soon develops into a nymph and later an egg-laying adult. Along the way, the larva feeds on the blood of small rodents and birds, which is where it can pick up the bacterium that causes Lyme disease. After feeding, it develops into a nymph and goes in search of another blood meal, perhaps another rodent or maybe something larger like a deer or a human. In its nymphal or adult stage, the tick can then transmit Lyme disease to humans.

            It’s pretty straightforward then – more acorns leads to more rodents which leads to more nymphs carrying Lyme disease. 

            The process, however, takes a couple of years. First, the oak trees flood the market with acorns and rodent populations are well fed. The following year, the numbers of reproducing mice and chipmunks goes sky high, and the year after that, nymphal tick populations boom with many infected with Lyme-disease.

            One researcher (Richard Ostfeld from the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies) feels the relationship is so direct that he can predict the incidence of Lyme disease based on when a mast year occurs. In summers when there is an abundance of 2-year-old oak seedlings in the surrounding forests, he says we should expect the infection rate of Lyme disease to be high.

            So, we’ll see two years from now if this plays out. And let’s hope he’s wrong.

 

Renewable Energy – A Better Business Model Than Fossil Fuels

            I just saw this report that came out in July summarizing “Renewable Power Generation Costs in 2024.” The report confirms that renewables maintained their price advantage over fossil fuels, with cost declines driven by technological innovation, competitive supply chains, and economies of scale.

            “In 2024, solar photovoltaics (PV) were, on average, 41% cheaper than the lowest-cost fossil fuel alternatives, while onshore wind projects were 53% cheaper. Onshore wind remained the most affordable source of new renewable electricity at USD 0.034/kWh, followed by solar PV at USD 0.043/kWh.

            “The addition of 582 gigawatts of renewable capacity in 2024 led to significant cost savings, avoiding fossil fuel use valued at about USD 57 billion. Notably, 91% of new renewable power projects commissioned last year were more cost-effective than any new fossil fuel alternatives.

            “Renewables are not only cost-competitive vis-a-vis fossil fuels but are advantageous by limiting dependence on international fuel markets and improving energy security. The business case for renewables is now stronger than ever.”

            Before anyone screams that this is nonsense – that we still need fossil fuels – well, you’re right. We still need fossil fuels for many applications! So, no one is advocating the complete end of fossil fuels. Instead, achieving net zero CO2 emissions is the goal. Please remember that net zero does NOT mean we don’t emit any more carbon – that’s impossible. It means instead that we figure out how to remove carbon from the atmosphere at the same rate we are emitting it, and that IS possible. A large part of achieving that goal is switching to renewables wherever and whenever possible.

            A transition away from fossil fuels to renewable energy is both inevitable and utterly essential. The solutions exist. And, importantly economically, it’s a good business decision. The experts tell us we don’t need any more technological innovations, though more efficiencies are obviously welcome. What we do need is to implement what we already know how to do.

            Not sure if you believe this? See the full report: https://www.irena.org/Publications/2025/Jun/Renewable-Power-Generation-Costs-in-2024

 

Deer Herd Population Trends – The Numbers

            The gun deer season will soon be upon us with the usual controversies and the endlessly repeated cries for more deer. For the record, here is a data analysis (the best estimates) of deer herd population trends in Wisconsin: 

Herd Size 1960           400,000           

Herd Size 1970           500,000            

Herd Size 1980           550,000            

Herd Size 1990           900,000            

Herd Size 2000           1,400,000         

Herd Size 2024           1,650,000 

Herd Size 2025           1,825,000                                

            Wisconsin achieved its highest recorded population and a national record harvest in 2000, with over 618,000 deer harvested that year.

            After the 2000 peak, the population experienced some short-term declines due to severe winters and/or intensive antlerless harvests (e.g., in 2004, 2006, 2007), which were management strategies to control herd size. 

            In the 2020s, the population rebounded and remains at very high levels. In 2023, the post-hunt population was estimated at 1,628,500. The 2025 estimate is even higher, with the total statewide population estimated at 1.825 million, the highest in recent history.

            For a deeper dive into Wisconsin’s deer metrics, see the WDNR’s excellent website: https://dnr.wisconsin.gov/topic/WildlifeHabitat/deermetrics.html

Total Buck Harvest from 1960 to 2022

 

Celestial Events

            Ice-up has been occurring on shallow marshes and ponds, with lakes yet to come. Average ice-up date for 39-acre Foster Lake in Hazelhurst (49 years of records from Woody Hagge) is 11/27. 

            We’re down to 9 hours of sunlight by 11/28. 

            The average high temperature drops to 32° on 11/28, the first time since March 3. Minocqua averages 97 days with high temperatures at or below freezing.

            December’s full moon occurs on 12/4, the “Little Spirit” moon/”Popping Trees” moon/“Long Night” moon.

 

Thanksgiving

            I recently spent an hour on the phone with two of my nephews trying to describe the complexities of our family lineage – so many names from so many places over so much time! Even with the various family trees charted out, it’s still a spider web of tangled connections that leaves me with two overwhelming emotions – amazement and gratitude. 

            Amazement that, first off, so many people made it to adulthood in centuries when that was absolutely not a given. And then that they somehow found one another, raised the next set of children, who survived and found one another, over and over and over, until there’s me sitting here typing these words. 

            And gratitude, recognizing  the miracle that I’m here, in this place, with this family, within this community, and not in so many other places of immense strife. So much thankfulness for the luck of the draw.

            Then the additional gratitude for all the beings in the natural world, from the plants that feed us and shelter us and create the air that we breathe, to the rain, the soil, the stars. Good Lord, it’s so much. If we stop to think of each of those lives that make it possible for us to be here, the miracle of each one, perhaps that’s what the thanks in Thanksgiving should largely be about. 

            The giving? That’s up to each of us – how to enact our gratitude in ways that honor the gift of life that we have been given. 

            “Not what we say about our blessings, but how we use them, is the true measure of our Thanksgiving.” – W.T. Purkiser

            

Thought for the Week

            “The wind that makes music in November corn is in a hurry. The stalks hum, loose husks whisk skyward in half-playful swirls, and the wind hurries on.” – Aldo Leopold

 

Please share your outdoor sightings and thoughts: e-mail me at johnbates2828@gmail.com, call 715-476-2828, snail-mail at 4245N State Highway 47, Mercer, WI, or see my blog at www.manitowishriver.blogspot.com

 

A Northwoods Almanac for 11/7-20/2025

 A Northwoods Almanac for 11/7-20/2025  

 

Last Hikes Before the Snow

            Mary, Callie and I took advantage of the 55° weather we had the last week of October and did a series of hikes, one of which was the 9-mile loop around Clark Lake in the Sylvania Wilderness Area, just north of Land O’ Lakes.

            Sylvania still comprises around 15,000 acres of genuine remnant old-growth hemlock-hardwood forest with some ancient white pines scattered here and there. We ran into a friend, a retired forester, who was camping along Clark Lake, and he asked, “Want to see the biggest tree in Sylvania?” Then he pointed, “It’s right over here.” 

            Well, that’s what’s called a ridiculous rhetorical question – of course, we wanted to see the biggest tree in Sylvania! I always bring a diameter tape whenever we hike in Sylvania, because you just never know what you might stumble across, so after a couple minute hike, I pulled it out and we measured a white pine. It was 55” in diameter, which was the biggest he’d ever seen, while I’ve only ever seen one larger, but by only an inch, and in the Huron Mountains near Lake Superior.

55" dbh white pine in Sylvania

            I love seeing these giant pines, likely 350 to 400-years-old – they are truly magnificent. But in the back of my mind I always recall reading of much larger trees that were cut in the cutover logging years of the late 1800s. John Curtis in his seminal 1959 book, Vegetation of Wisconsin, wrote , “Hardwood stands with only 2 or 3 pine trees per acre were highly profitable, since these few trees were likely to be forest giants from 3 to 6 feet or more in diameter . . . Most of the big pines cut in the heyday of the lumbering business were about four hundred years old and stemmed from widespread catastrophes [fires and blowdowns] in the 1400s. The occasional giants of 7 to 10 feet dbh [diameter breast height] reported by the surveyors must have been still older.”

            Theodore Karamanski in his book, Deep Woods Frontier: A History of Logging in Northern Michigan, wrote about giant white pines in 1881 in what is now Schoolcraft County, “The pine trees there consistently measured eighteen feet in circumference.” Divide that by pi (3.14) and you get 69” diameters, or 5’9”. 

            The biggest one in Sylvania, the one we measured, is 4’7”. 

            Given the difference in the sizes of individual trees, and the near total loss of remnant white pines in Wisconsin (best estimate is just a little over 1,000 acres – less than 2 square miles) – what we see today is far from a facsimile of what was here just 140 years ago. Curtis summarizes this: “Results from modern studies, therefore, cannot give a true picture of the actual magnitude and majesty of a mature pine forest at its optimum, and this should be kept in mind in the interpretation of contemporary findings.”  

            Nevertheless, to stand next to a true remnant white pine is to take the yellowed pages of history and bring them into the light.

            Now, if we only had the moral fiber to try to restore some of that ancient pinery, and there’s no better place in Wisconsin to do that than the sandy soils of the Northern Highland State Forest.

            

Goldthreads

            Under the massive old hemlocks, sugar maples, and yellow birch were clonal colonies of three-leaved goldthread, Coptis trifolia for you Latin lovers. In late May, the delicate flowers grow singly on long stems with 5 to 7, white petal-like sepals arranged in a star. Emerging from the base of the plant, the upright lustrous leaves rise on short stems, each evergreen leaf divided into three, fan-shaped, scalloped leaflets.  The leaves look a bit like barren strawberry, but if you are in doubt about its identification, carefully expose the slender brilliant yellow horizontal roots from which the name was derived.

Goldthread rhizomes

            Goldthread thrives in cool, moist woods, particularly cedar swamps and bogs, as well as under Eastern hemlocks. 

            The brilliant yellow, underground wiry rhizomes vegetatively reproduce by sending up shoots, often creating carpets of goldthread in deep woods.

            Goldthread was once called “canker-root” because of its use as a remedy for sore and ulcerated mouths. Most herbs were historically used in a host of different ways, but goldthread had an unusually consistent use among various tribes – Mohegans and Montagnais boiled the root and used the solution for a gargle; Penobscots chewed the stems to prevent mouth sores; similar use was made of the root by Menominees, Potawatomis, and Ojibwas.  

            Historical references also say the root was commonly used for lessening the pain of teething. The root contains the alkaloid berberine which exerts a mild sedative action, explaining its popularity as a pain killer. 

            Widely used as folk remedy, goldthread roots dried for market in 1908 fetched sixty to seventy cents a pound, which is crazy to think of given the near weightlessness of the wiry roots. I can’t imagine how many thousands of goldthread plants had to be pulled to make a pound.

            Lastly, a tea from the golden root was also used as bitter tonic in the spring, undoubtedly due to the belief that anything that tasted this bad must be good for you.

 

Liverworts! 

            I have a whole book called Mosses, Liverworts, and Hornworts by Ralph Pope, a book which I’ve opened on occasion and closed quickly because all those plants are complicated and relatively obscure, particularly liverworts and hornworts. I’m a rank amateur on identifying them, which is actually far too generous a title.

            Anyhow, I recently hiked a trail near Cornucopia in Bayfield County, the Lost Creek Falls Trail, and at a seep along the waterfall was an odd plant that one of my companions looked at and said was a liverwort, a Conocephalum salebrosum. Say what? That was Greek to me, or rather Latin as was the case, but mumbo jumbo as far as my knowledge went. 

Liverwort - Conocephalum salebrosum.- photo by John Bates

            I had along a hand lens with a light, so we put our noses practically right on top of the plant with the hand lens held to our eye, and what a beautiful surprise! The plant was made up of tiny polygons, each with a dot in the center, and all connected together like pomegranate seeds (see my photograph). 

            I’d never identified a liverwort, and being a plant nerd, I was absolutely delighted. Here was a whole family of plants I’ve been walking by and never knew were there.

            I love that moment of discovery. It’s humbling, for one, but also thrilling because here was yet another example of the Earth’s diversity, and creativity if you will, and I was finally privy to it.

            All of this, of course, led to my wondering just what in the heck are liverworts? Well, first off, they belong to a group of plants called bryophytes, which are small non-vascular, spore-producing plants. 

            They lack true roots and a vascular system – in animals like us, a vascular system is a network of arteries, veins, and capillaries that transport blood and lymph throughout the body delivering oxygen and nutrients to tissues while removing waste and carbon dioxide. 

            In plants, a vascular system refers to the xylem and phloem that conduct water, minerals, and sugars. The xylem transports water and dissolved minerals from the roots to the rest of the plant – think about how a sugar maple moves sap through the tree in spring.

            The phloem transports sugars produced during photosynthesis from the leaves to where they are needed for growth or storage. 

            But plants that don’t have a vascular system, like bryophytes, don’t have all that complicated plumbing. They can’t transport water and nutrients, so they have to absorb water and nutrients directly through their surfaces. And they don’t have roots, nor flowers, fruits, or seeds either.

            Robin Wall Kimmerer in her marvelous book Gathering Moss writes, “They are the most simple of plants, and in their simplicity, elegant.” 

            They’re also often called the “amphibians of the plant kingdom” because they require water for sexual reproduction. 

            Got all that?

            It gets really complicated – way too much for this column – but knock yourself out and Google how it all works if you want to be amazed at their life forms.

            Last thing. Bryophytes may seem too small to bother with – I mean, who cares? But they’ve survived for more than 400 million years on Earth and comprise around 22,000 species worldwide, particularly in the Arctic where they are the dominant life form. As Kimmerer writes, “They are the evolutionary first step toward a terrestrial existence, a halfway point between algae and higher land plants.” Without them, no trees, no shrubs, no grasses, no us. 

            Kimmerer exhorts us to pay attention: “At the scale of a moss, walking through a woods as a six-foot human is lot like flying over the country at 32,000 feet. So far above the ground, and on our way to somewhere else, we run the risk of missing an entire realm which lies at our feet. Every day we pass over them without seeing. Mosses and other small beings issue an invitation to dwell for a time right at the limits of ordinary perception. All it requires of us is attentiveness. Look in a certain way and a whole new world can be revealed.”

 

Record CO2 Levels   

            Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels jumped by a record amount in 2024 to push concentrations to their highest point since measurements began, the UN’s World Meteorological Organization (WMO) reported.

            Between 2023 and 2024, the global average concentration of CO2 surged by 3.5 parts per million (ppm) to reach 423.9 ppm, the WMO said. This is the largest increase since modern measurements started in 1957 and is well in excess of the 2022 to 2023 increase of 2.3 ppm. The last time Earth experienced a comparable concentration of CO2 was 3 to 5 million years ago.

 

Celestial Events

            Yesterday, 11/6, marked the midway point between autumn equinox and winter solstice.

            Look after dusk on 11/10 for brilliant Jupiter (magnitude -2.4) about four degrees below the waning gibbous moon. 

            The peak North Taurid Meteor Shower occurs in the predawn of 11/12.

            The peak Leonid Meteor Shower occurs during the predawn of 11/17.

 

Thought for the Week

            “You cannot get through a single day without having an impact on the world around you. What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.” –  Jane Goodall, who recently died at age 91 while on lecture tour.

 

A Northwoods Almanac for 10/24 – 11/6/25

 A Northwoods Almanac for 10/24 – 11/6/25  

Autumn Hikes – Trap Hills, Keweenaw Peninsula, Doering Woods SNA

            Is there any better time for hiking than autumn? Mary and I have tried to squeeze in as many hikes as we can before the snow flies, and in the last several weeks, we’ve enjoyed some exceptional forests and topographies.

            We managed to twice traverse a section of the North Country Trail within the Trap Hills in the U.P.’s Ottawa National Forest. The Trap Hills lie in the middle of the Gogebic Ridge of Michigan’s Western Upper Peninsula on either side of M-64, just north of Bergland and southeast of the Porcupine Mountains. Rugged trails clamber over steep rock outcroppings with “balds” that provide outstanding views for miles. 

            Trap is a term for basalt rock, which is a dark, dense, fine-grained igneous rock formed from solidified lava. 

            The forest varies in the Trap Hills, but may generally be described as mature northern hardwoods dominated by sugar and red maples, eastern hemlocks, red oaks, yellow birches, white pines, and basswoods. 

            In spring, the lush wildflower display of spring beauties, hepaticas, leeks, trout lilies, and Dutchman’s breeches wows those of us enamored of such beauty.

            The North Country Trail winds for 34 miles through the Trap Hills from M-64 to Old Victoria, making this one of the best choices for backpacking in the Upper Midwest. If one combines the Trap Hills section with more North Country Trail on both ends, one can do a hike of 140 miles with only a mile of that hike on public roads. 

            The North Country Trail has a story of its own worth knowing. It was created in 1980 under the management of the National Park System and currently travels off and on for nearly 2,000 miles from Vermont to North Dakota. In Wisconsin, the NCT traverses only 215 miles across our far northern counties, but in Michigan, it wanders all over the place for over 1,100 miles.

            The Trap Hills lie within the UP’s Copper Range, the world’s largest native copper district. By 1850, over a dozen mines were operating in the Trap Hills, the most notable of which were the Norwich Mine and the Forest Mine at Victoria. Over 140 mines were eventually constructed between 1845 and 1968 in the western U.P., hauling out 11 billion (yes, that’s a “B”) pounds of copper. 

            Native Americans mined copper from pits as early as 5000 BCE, and copper-working continued up until the years of Native American contact with seventeenth-century Europeans. 

            See the Peter Wolfe Chapter of the North Country Trail for more information on possible hikes in the Trap hills: https://northcountrytrail.org/trail/michigan/pwc/

 

Keweenaw Peninsula

            A week later, we spent three days in the Keweenaw Peninsula north of Houghton-Hancock, an area we truly love for its Lake Superior shorelines and rocky hillscape. We did five hikes, three of which were in utterly different habitats – one along the deep gorge of the Keweenaw Land Trust’s Hungarian Falls Nature Area running down through hemlocks, white pines and hardwoods. A series of impressive waterfalls cascade down the gorge before draining into Torch Lake near the small town of Tamarack City.

            The second trail was within an Audubon 405-acre Sanctuary near Lake Bailey. The trail initially travels for a half mile through a dense and quite old white cedar “swamp” that was pretty dry, thank God, and absolutely gorgeous. And then a steep uphill climb ensued over 500 feet up through hardwood forest to views out over the lake.

            The third trail ran along old inland sand dunes at the Michigan Nature Association’s Redwyn Dunes Sanctuary located along the Keweenaw’s Great Sand Bay. The 36-acre sanctuary receives the full force of the strong prevailing westerly winds off Lake Superior, and the shoreline has sand dunes up to 100 feet in height above the shoreline. The formation of these stabilized dunes is the result of large deposits of sand which were laid down by strong winds, currents and wave action of Lake Superior. Particularly interesting were the wind-contorted older red pines along the trail.

            We love finding new places to explore, and this trip didn’t disappoint.  

 

Doering Woods State Natural Area

            A few days later, I hiked with a good friend the 284-acre Doering Woods SNA which occurs within the 3,600-acre Round Lake Semi-Primitive Non-Motorized Area near Pike Lake, and contains the origin and upper reaches of the South Fork of the Flambeau River. This is a beautiful hemlock-hardwoods forest with an excellent component of large super-canopy white pines, many of which measure between 36 and 38 inches diameter breast height – the largest being 43 inches dbh.

            The Doering Woods, the legacy of the Otto C. Doering family (Doering was once president of the Izaak Walton League), also features undeveloped shoreline along the South Fork of the Flambeau River. The site has a history of selective cutting, but still contains a surprising number of large super-canopy white pines. The hemlocks range from 16 to 30 inches dbh, not exceptionally large by any means, but very lovely, with a smattering of yellow birch interspersed. While the overall site is not a relict forest, it falls somewhere on the continuum between “mature” and “old”. 

            Very little hemlock or white pine reproduction is occurring within the stand, with heavily browsed sugar maple and red maple dominating the seedlings and saplings.

            The site is managed by the Chequamegon Nicolet National Forest, and was established as a State Natural Area in 2007. 

 

Round Lake Logging Dam

            After hiking the Doering Woods SNA, we visited the nearby Round Lake Logging Dam, the only known surviving logging dam in the Upper Midwest. It was renovated from 1992 to 1995 by the Forest Service, Price County Historical Society, and the Friends of the Round Lake Logging Dam.

            The dam had been added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1981, but the wooden parts of the dam were rotting. Over 4,000 volunteer hours went into the dismantling and rebuilding of the dam with 140,000 board feet of treated white pine nailed together according to the authorized specifications of 1878 with the original 1876 iron equipment in place. 

            In 1876, Black River Falls lumberman William T. Price, operating on the South Fork of the Flambeau, directed his crews to construct a flooding and driving dam at the outlet of the South Fork at Round Lake. They eventually constructed a 170-foot structure that ultimately raised the water 10 feet to ensure enough flow to keep the millions of feet of logs moving to mills along the Chippewa and Mississippi Rivers. The flows were extreme – two to four times greater than a 100-year flood! 

            For the next 30 years, the dam served several owners, including Frederick Weyerhaeuser who purchased the land from Cornell University, one of the original land grant universities, in 1885.

            In 1906, the dam and property was sold to Menasha Woodenware Company, which ran the last log drive through the dam in 1909.

            In 1911, former Sears, Roebuck & Co. vice-president Otto C. Doering, a dedicated conservationist,  purchased the cutover lands, and over the ensuing decades, he brought the property back from the carnage of the cutover era along with attempting to save the dam.

             The Doering’s private estate comprising 2,800 acres was sold to the U.S. Government in 1968, so the dam now sits on land owned by Forest Service and is designated as the Round Lake Recreation Area.

             To get to the dam from Minocqua at the intersection of Highways 70 and 51, drive about 21 miles and turn right on Shady Knoll Road (FR 144). Go north 2.2 miles, then turn right onto FR 535, go 0.1 miles and turn left into a relatively large, signed parking area for the Round Lake Historic Logging Dam. A fee is required to park here.

 

Sightings – Grackles!

            Really noisy large flocks of common grackles passed through our area in the second and third weeks of October. Their harsh and unmusical calls resounded through the woods on several hikes we did locally, and what they were all squawking about is anybody’s guess.

            I’ve never been a fan of grackles, which is, of course, unfair – everything has its place. But common grackles are now among the most significant agricultural pest species in North America, causing millions of dollars in damage to sprouting corn. More important locally, and in our yard, they’ve earned a unhappy reputation for eating other birds' eggs and nestlings, and they  occasionally kill and consume adult birds. They’re also bullies at our feeders, with only blue jays able to hold their own. So, they’re not a “good” guy at first glance.

            They migrate during the day, usually in mixed-species flocks with red-winged blackbirds, European starlings, brown-headed cowbirds, rusty blackbirds, and less frequently, American robins, congregating at night in communal roosts with these same species. 

            They’re known to roost in congregations of over one million birds in the lower Mississippi Valley, and I suspect make a racket that can wake the dead.

 

Celestial Events

            We’re getting colder by the day. The average high temperatures are now in the 40’s. 

            We’re also getting darker by the day. By 11/3, we’re down to 10 hours of sunlight. 

            For planet watching in November, look after dusk for Jupiter rising in the northeast, and for Saturn high in the southeast. Before dawn, look for Venus extremely low in the southeast and hard to see. Jupiter, however, will be high in the south and easily found.

            November’s full moon occurs on 11/5. Called variously the “Ice is Forming Moon” or “Freezing Moon,” this is the closest full moon of the year at 221,817 miles from Earth, and thus the largest and brightest full moon of the year.

 

Thought for the Week

            “Wildness reminds us what it means to be human, what we are connected to rather than what we are separate from.” – Terry Tempest Williams