Paw Paw

Paw paw fruit

After a series of late freezes have destroyed the Paw Paw crop we were excited to see lots of fruit in our Paw Paw grove.  My excitement diminished today as I saw a number of broken branches, evidence that the competition is getting to them before they are ripe.  Squirrel, bear and raccoons are all in line as the summer draws to an end.

Paw Paw (Asimina triloba) is a native tree which produces fruit two to six inches long.   It has the flavor of an over ripe banana and when mature you may smell them before you see them.  It has 1/4" seeds and a custard-like pulp which is good on ice cream, paw paw bread or even eaten raw. 

The small tree is easily identifiable by its distinctive leaves.  They are alternate, single veined and widest close to the tip.  The leaves are among the largest in our forest, ten to twelve inches long, four to five inches wide.  In the early spring, before or just as new leaves are coming out, it produces a distinctive maroon flower.  This early spring blossoming leaves it vulnerable to late frosts.

Paw paw leaves

Paw paw tends to grow in well-drained, fertile bottom-land soil.  How our grove developed up on top of a ridge a mile from the creek remains a mystery.  The density of the 40 trees is more understandable as they grow by suckering of the roots, meaning that they are likely all genetically identical.  The grove is close to a hollow tree that has been a refuge for bears over the years.  They or some other animal may have transferred the seeds in the way a large mammal "moves" big seeds.

Paw paw girls- 2003

It doesn't look like we will have a big harvest like the one in 2003.  I can only show the ones that survived the morning as over half were shoved into mouths as we harvested them.  I suspect this year we will have some really big raccoons and a few bears with green gooey smiles.

Mud Daubers

A Springfield News-Leader article by Francis Skalicky of the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) on wasps led me to some interesting information.  It turns out that not all mud daubers are created equal.

Organ pipe dauber nest

The male organ pipe mud dauber (Trypoxylon politum) is not only a master mason but a dedicated family man.  After constructing the detailed nest, a family affair, the male stays to guard the nest against parasites while the little lady is off shopping for spiders to feed the future kids that are currently resting in the egg.  This trait, more recent evolved in human husbands, is not all that common among male wasps.

Black and yellow dauber nest

The black and yellow mud dauber,  Sceliphron caementarium, is more like my generation, leaving the feeding of the kids to the female.  Their nest is built built of parallel tubes, later plastered over to form a large and unsightly lump.  Once sealed, the adults leave the kids on their own.  Consequently there are several  insects that will parasitize their nests.


The blue mud dauber Chalybion californicum is a metallic blue species that preys primarily on black widow spiders. It does not build a nest, but uses nests abandoned by other mud dauber wasps. It doesn't carry mud but only water which it uses to renovate their previously used nest.  Like other mud daubers, it is rarely aggressive. Think about it- doesn't build new nests, doesn't attack and harvests black widow spiders. Sounds like a good household pet to me.

There is a summary of these wasps in the Discover Nature Field Guide.

Black Vultures Fledge- They're Baaaack!

August 23- You again?

I stuck my head in the Black Vulture nesting stall to see if I needed to clean out anything and there the chicks were, looking none the worse for their outing.  If I hadn't gone all over the stall the day they fledged I would have thought I had overlooked them.

I had assumed that like robins and bluebirds, once they leave the nest they are gone.  The hawkmountain.org site says that they fledge at around 10 to 14 weeks but remain dependent on their parents for much longer.  Sometimes they are still being fed by their parents eight months later.  They also may hang with their parent's social group for several years. With this late teenager behavior I almost expected to see an X-box in the stall.

The hawkmountain.org  site has extensive information on black vultures.  Stay tuned for more adventures!

Black Vultures Fledge!

Last day at home- Click to enlarge

For those of you who have been following the series on the Black Vulture chicks growing up in our barn, they are now coming to a sky near you.  I took these pictures on August 15th, 56 days after they hatched.

The egg discovery was covered in a May blog and their hatching in the June 20th entry.  They had grown up considerably since they were fuzzy little - well medium sized - balls of fluff.

Video Outake

As you can see now their fluff was falling off by the handfuls.  They walked around the stall paying attention to me only if I stepped in to get better pictures.  By now they would only raise their wings but no longer bothered to hiss at me.

Two days later I was headed past the old barn when I noticed black birds in the open center portion  As I neared I saw two turkey vultures fly out the other end, then two black vultures.  They were followed by the smaller chicks, awkward in flight and flapping rapidly like ducks.  They were able to gain altitude across the field and clear the distant tree line.

The barn was built before 1900 and has seen its better days.  One day it will collapse, hopefully long after we are gone.  We have a picture of Christopher Columbus Meadows holding a beautiful horse beside it.  It has stored our equipment, housed our harvested gourds and dried the garlic from its rafters.

Barn Swallow

It also serves as a nursery.  Resident wood rats chew on gourds and the occasional garlic.  A ground hog has taken up residence beside it and undoubtedly has maternal instincts.  A colony of barn swallows annually raise chicks that peer over the nests at us as the parents swoop through, chattering their protests that it is their barn.

With all this history, I think our favorite memory will be raising black vultures.  We will always wonder which vultures circling the skies are "ours".

Note:  Some day this fall we will post a video combining their nursery days.

Mushrooms of August

In Europe they hunt truffles with trained hogs or dogs but you have to feed and care for them.  At Bull Creek, I have Barb who can spot mushrooms while riding along on her ATV and she feeds and cares for me.  What a deal!  Editor's Note:  He is such a lucky guy!

Two-color Bolete- Click to enlarge

Monday's tour produced six species including two nice batches of Oyster mushrooms, a culinary treat.  We also found these beauties, Two-colored Boletes (Boletus bicolor).

Even with a distinctive looking mushroom like this one, identification is time consuming for a beginner.  Beginning with a careful inspection of the gills, pores or other methods of spore production, you then focus on consistency, texture, odor, bruising and other features.  Sometimes the final identification requires microscopic examination of the spores.


Two-colored Boletes are a little easier to start with.  The cap is 2-6 inches across and varies from dark red to almost pink.  The under surface is bright yellow with tiny pores packed tightly together, hard to see with the naked seventy year old eye.  The stalk is thick and very firm, a dark red which fades to yellow near the cap.  As is true throughout nature, colors can vary at times.

These are common mushrooms which show up from July to October and are usually found under oak trees, just as we found them.

All mushrooms are edible - once - some only once.  Many mushrooms will make you wish you hadn't eaten them but aren't fatal.  Occasional individuals may be sensitive to edible mushrooms including even morels.

"Edible" in mushroom reference books means it is safe to eat but says nothing about taste.  In theory, cardboard is edible.  This Two-colored Bolete is rated as choice.  Most of the mushrooms which could be confused with it are edible but I passed on it.

We never eat a mushroom unless we have learned to identify it from an expert who has eaten it in the past, and is standing in front of us looking healthy.  At least it made a great picture.

Tobacco Hornworms

Tobacco Hornworm on Datura

Barb identified these dreaded tobacco hornworms on a Datura "Moonflower" plant we acquired from Larry Wegman.  These and their near kin, tomato hornworms, are frequently described with scorn by visitors to the Butterfly House.  Both varieties are major pests on tomato plants but I think they deserve a little better press.

In spite of the tobacco in its name, Datura species plants are also a hornworm favorite.  The genus Datura includes Jimson weed and various thorn-apples (see the thorn-apple in the picture).  Datura are members of the Solanaceae family, which includes tomatoes, potatoes, eggplant, tobacco, petunia and even the deadly nightshade. 

Carolina Sphinx Moth- Wikimedia

The tobacco hornworm, Manduca sexta is the caterpillar of an attractive moth of the Sphingidae family that includes hawk moths, sphinx moths and hornworms. Its adult form is called the Carolina Sphinx Moth. They are rapid fliers and hover while feeding like a hummingbird.

Because of their large size, short life cycle and ease of feeding they are used in research settings as well as classrooms. Research includes neurobiology, flight mechanisms and larval nicotine resistance. Given their contributions to research and their habit of eating tobacco, I can almost forgive them for chewing the occasional tomato.

Read more: Datura and Hornworms | eHow.com http://entomology.unl.edu/k12/caterpillars/hornworm/hornwormpage.html

Incredible Osprey

Osprey- MDC

Dan Crane sent me this arkive.org link with footage of Osprey catching fish.  What I am sure is just business as usual for the bird is incredible to me.  The last catch shows it hauling out a fish twice its size, taking off from being completely submerged and carrying its prey in one claw!

Osprey are the only raptor that plunges into the water to catch its prey.  The fact that they can then take off, let alone with a large struggling fish is impressive.  Some of us can't always hold a fish long enough to take out the hook!  Osprey have special adaptations which allow this unique fishing style.

"The Osprey is particularly well adapted to this diet, with reversible outer toes, sharp spicules on the underside of the toes, closable nostrils to keep out water during dives, and backwards-facing scales on the talons which act as barbs to help hold its catch." (Wikipedia)

Last fall, Mike Kromrey pointed out an Osprey flying over Valley Water Mill.  Never common breeders in Missouri, their numbers were apparently reduced even before DDT took a toll on their population.  Like other species at the top of their respective food chain, they are vulnerable to toxins accumulated in fish.  We are seeing more Osprey in recent decades due to the reduction of pesticides and the development of reservoirs. (MDC)

More general information on Osprey can be found at this natural history site.