Wednesday, September 06, 2006

Broad Meadow Brook: Worcester, MA (8/27)


Sunday morning was cool, dark, and gloomy... not the best day for a butterfly walk. But my Mom was signed up to lead a trip at Broad Meadow Brook and we did have one club member who was interested in giving it a try.

We got to BMB around 10:00 and started by looking around the butterfly garden. Nothing was moving but I did find a bumblebee resting on the Joe-Pye-Weed. I don't know if bees sleep, but if they do, that's what this guys was doing. I know that if I was his size, this flower would be a very comfortable place to spend the night.

Other than the Joe-Pye-Weed, the garden was filled with late blooming flowers including New England Aster, Butterfly Bush, and even a Sunflower or two.

After waiting for a few minutes for any last second stragglers, we left the visitor's center and drove down to Dunkirk Ave. We hiked down the stretch and over the brook to the wet meadow. Absolutely nothing was flying, butterfly or bird. So, we continued up to the Powerlines. As we hiked thru the woods, we noticed a plant covering the ground and climbing all over any structure it could. I had identified this plant last year, but I had to look it up again. Turns out it was Hog-Peanut.

When we got to the powerlines, we found that they were just as quiet as the rest of the sanctuary. But, when you get outside you never know what you'll find. Along the the road I spotted the remains of turtle nest. The eggs had apparently been found and eaten by a scavenger. I was surprised to see how far the nest was from the water. I've hiked from the brook to the powerlines thru the woods and it is not easy. I can only imagine the challenge it is for a small turtle.

Not seeing anything flying, we decided to try to scare something up by walking thru the field. Not far from the road we found a group of 5 or 6 Black and Yellow Argiopes. They were all pretty large and I was even able to find an egg sac. As I tried to get out of the field I stumbled on a cool caterpillar. I'm not entirely sure what species it was, but I'm guessing that it was a moth caterpillar.

We didn't get totally "skunked" on out butterfly trip but it was pretty close. We were able to scare up a Common Ringlet and an Eastern Tailed-blue, but that was it. So, we gave up and headed back down to Trioano Brookside Trail. There we found that at least some birds had braved the inclement weather. I spotted a Green Heron along the stream and a couple Tree Swallows circled the water. But the highlight was the American Goldfinches. They were everywhere picking seeds off the flowers that rimmed the brook. I'd never seen this species in such great numbers. There must be a pretty good foodsource at BMB to attract them.

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