Smooth Asters

In addition to Seaside Goldenrod, one of the flowers blooming most profuse at Sandy Hook this weekend was Smooth Aster. There were several dense patches of it along the first segment of the Fishermen's Trail, and even more along the peninsula's roadsides.

Smooth Aster has flower heads intermediate in size between the large New England Asters and the many species of small asters. The heads have yellow centers, which turn reddish with age, and lavender blue rays. The stems and leaves are smooth, and the stem may have a purplish tint.

Asters are composite flowers, meaning that the flower heads are actually clusters of tiny flowers rather than a single flower. The center is made up of tiny yellow flowers called disk florets. Arranged around the center are ray florets, which have several petals (in the case of asters, three) fused into a single long ray.

Seaside Goldenrod

If you imagine a stereotypical goldenrod, it is probably a tall plant with several  horizontal branches of small yellow flowers near the top. Further, it is probably in a meadow. This is reasonable since some goldenrods – particularly showy ones – do fit that image. However, goldenrods come in a variety of forms. Some are short, some produce vertical spikes, others are flat-topped. Still others grow in different habitats, like in woodlands or on sandy soil and beaches. For this post, I will be looking at one that does not easily fit the goldenrod stereotype, Seaside Goldenrod (Solidago sempervirens).

As the name suggests, Seaside Goldenrod is most at home on sandy beaches and salt marshes. Sometimes it may be found further inland on the coastal plain or along major waterways such as the St. Lawrence Seaway. On Saturday, Seaside Goldenrod was blooming profusely all over the dunes at Sandy Hook.

Seaside Goldenrod has some features that make it easier to identify than most goldenrods, even aside from where it grows. Its flowers are noticeably larger than most goldenrod flowers, with a wide central disk and short rays around the edges. It has large, fleshy, waxy leaves – a feature that helps it survive the harsh conditions of its maritime habitat, which features salt spray in addition to wind, glaring sun, and occasional flooding.

Like other goldenrods, Seaside Goldenrod is pollinated by insects. (This, by the way, is why goldenrod is not at fault for seasonal respiratory allergies, which are caused by plants that use wind for pollination.) Several insect species were visiting the Seaside Goldenrod at Sandy Hook. It proved particularly attractive to the many Monarchs that were fluttering around the dunes.

Birds at Sandy Hook

As of Friday evening, the forecast called for rain all day on Saturday. However, the forecast changed for the better by Saturday morning, so it was possible to make a trip out to Sandy Hook. There were a lot of birders present, many of them in two large tour groups (one led by NJ Audubon and the other run by a local birdwatching store). The other birders had some good finds, including a Clay-colored Sparrow on the Fisherman's Trail and a Mississippi Kite flying along the bay side of the peninsula – both of which I missed.

Instead, I was treated to a nice variety of birds and a beautiful day. There was a lot of bird activity along the Fisherman's Trail, though on closer inspection, most of the movement turned out to be American Robins and Gray Catbirds. Around the spot where the Clay-colored Sparrow was seen, I watched a few Field Sparrows moving around. Had I known the rarity was there when I walked out, I would through those apparent Field Sparrows more closely. There was very little present around the tidal cut at the end of the trail aside from three or four Ospreys that were fishing just off the beach.

Back in the parking lot, a friend involved with one of the tour groups pointed out a group of shorebirds in a puddle at the south end of the lot. These included a Pectoral Sandpiper (a year bird for me), a Dunlin, three Least Sandpipers, a Semipalmated Sandpiper, and a Semipalmated Plover. The Pectoral Sandpiper alone was worth a stop, as its plumage looked especially crisp and bright.

A stop at the garden behind the Officers Club turned up more birders and some warblers. There was only a handful of warblers, but they were good ones, as the foraging flock included a Tennessee Warbler and a Cape May Warbler. The warblers stayed low in a catalpa tree, so it was possible to get great looks at them (without neck soreness!) when the warblers were not obscured by the tree's giant leaves. A subsequent stop at Plum Island did not turn up any new birds for the day.

Berry Go Round #44

Welcome to the September edition of Berry Go Round, the blog carnival devoted to posts about plants. My blog might seem like an unusual choice for hosting a carnival based on plants. After all, this is nominally a birding blog, and I rarely write about plants. However, plants ought to be of interest to birders since they are necessary for the life of birds. Fruit trees feed many bird species in the autumn and winter, and herbaceous plants set seeds that birds eat through much of the year. Most birds eat insects at some point in their lives, and many of those insects also depend on plants for food in their larval or adult stages. That leaves aside such benefits nesting locations and materials and shelter from the heat of summer or cold of winter.

Jessica Budke at Moss Plants and More reviews a study on moss reproduction in Hot off the Geothermal Presses and finds moss imagery on Postcards.

At Reading History in the Green spaces of Berlin, common sea-buckthorn is suggested as a resource for foragers in Sea-buckthorn: suncreen for astronauts and superfruit for all!

Marc Cadotte at The EEB and flow summarizes talks presented at the recent Journal of Ecology Centenary symposium in BES day 2: Plants, plants and way more plants.

The Phytofactor offers Don't drink water - green Lake Erie edition, which advises against drinking from a water body that is full of algae due to its toxicity. (Algae was historically associated with plants, but it is no longer considered a plant.)

Finally, for my contribution, I wrote a post on White Snakeroot, a plant with a poor reputation that provides food for numerous insects in S is for Snakeroot. A few days after I wrote that post, Common Yellowthroats started showing up to pick insects off the snakeroot stems.

Thanks to everyone who contributed to the September edition of Berry Go Round! Next month's edition will be hosted at Slugyard. Submit links for next month's edition through the Berry Go Round website.

Loose Feathers #310

Common Yellowthroat / Credit: Bill Thompson/USFWS

Birds and birding news

• A study found that weaver birds, which construct some of the most complex nests, learn how to build nests through trial and error.
• Workers are restoring a former wetland on Santa Cruz Island in California. The habitat restoration project is expected to benefit species such as the Island Fox and Island Scrub Jay.
• France is planning a cull of Canada Geese, which are not native to Europe.
• A study of forest types in Papua New Guinea found that birds are most abundant in primary forests, as opposed to primary forest edges, secondary forest edges and agricultural land.
• Mongabay has a photo of a Chestnut-breasted Coronet, a bird native to Andean forests.
• Tom Reed has already broken the big year record for New Jersey but faces strong competition to finish the year with the most species.

Nature blogging

• Laura's Birding Blog: A closer look at North American field guides
• 10,000 Birds: New Zealand Storm-petrels; Back from the Dead
• Coffee and Conservation: Research: Types of fruit trees on shade coffee farms important
• ABA Blog: The Chittering Curlew
• Mike's Birding and Digiscoping Blog: Curlew Caper Resurrected!
• The Drinking Bird: Birder Jargon Project: Abbreviatory

Environment and biodiversity

• The colors of ancients beetles are preserved in fossilized beetle remains. However, the colors are red-shifted because of chemical changes, so that a blue beetle now appears green, and so on. LiveScience has a gallery of extinct and living metallic-colored insects.
• Madgascar is seeking CITES protection for its rosewood and ebony because of a period when a coup opened its forest to unrestricted logging.
• Research on katydids found that female katydids will search for males if the males offer a gift in addition to the sperm packet. 
• Over 100 people were arrested for civil disobedience in Ottawa during a protest against the Keystone XL pipeline.
• One of the two major ice shelves in the Canadian Arctic melted almost entirely this summer.
• Scientists have installed a data-collection device on one of the Cape May-Lewes ferry vessels to gather information on the health of Delaware Bay. The device measures the temperature and salinity, as well as levels of dissolved oxygen and chlorophyll.
• Oil left from BP's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is still harming Gulf Killifish (Fundulus grandis), even without killing them.
• Now is the season to gather black walnuts.
• LiveScience has a gallery on the devastating drought in Texas.