Site Discussions

I really would love to know how all of these squirrels were able to get into your car…. Just how many did get in?!

I just watched a robin attack and continue to shake a wooly bear caterpillar against a sidewalk even after it was obviously dead.  It seemed to be working the wooly hairs off, then he ate it.

Wildfires may not be as much of a concern in the northeast, but they do occur. Firewood placed on or under decks against a house or outbuilding are a leading cause of houses lost to wildfires. Embers may fly miles ahead of a fire and land in all of nooks and crevices of a woodpile which will burn up not only your woodpile, but your house. during the active wildfire season no firewood should be placed on or adjacent to a structure.

Interesting, Elise! You lead an adventurous life!

We built a pole shed using fir logs in a hurry when we didn’t have time to peel them first.  Once done it was too easy to get busy with other tasks and not get on with the peeling.  Four years later bug activity has taken hold and we are now peeling.  Are we too late?  Will treating and sealing the logs once peeled preserve them?

Robyn Nichols

Bees would normally after they have been removed from a particular area return, sometimes within a month or two, sometimes once a year or even after 6 years. Difficult to say. It would depend if the particular area is in the “flight-path” of a particular hive in the vicinity. It would also depend on the scout bees how much they like the area and if they find it secure enough.

If you have left the hive on the tree outside, you would have had a better chance of getting a new hive to settle there…..BUT they would sometimes move to a total new area as e.g. of your houses roof, even though you had a hive in one area before. Bees are “Nature” at its best, but sometimes also at its worst because they may overlook “good” places as we would like to believe, but they think/reason differently.

The bees in your tree that left might have been disturbed by something and or queen might have died, disease might have rendered the hive useless and or the temperature “got” to them. It is not a good place for the bees to have a hive outside, they use all their energy to keep the hive at a constant 34-35 degrees C for the brood (babies) to hatch etc. and constantly having to cover the hive with propolis to try and waterproof it…...and many factors could have been the cause of their demise.

Hope you find new hive settling in your area soon
Rietha the Honey Bee Lady in South Africa

I have white circles the size of a 50 cent piece all over the bark of my camels tree. Any ideas…anyone?

I saw what was either a very large brownish bobcat, or else it was a catamount.  It was around dusk and I was driving on the west side of Hogback Mountain, just past Monkton Boro.  The cat came part way out of the woods, saw me, and darted back into the woods.  It looked like it was about 100 pounds.

I caught what I believed to be a short-tailed shrew in the wall of my basement. It was incredibly easy to catch and actually let me touch it when getting it into a container to move. It had the five toes, dark grey velvety fur, pinpoint eyes and long nose, but the behaviors was really off from what I have been told.It seemed more frantic being in the wall then it did being trapped and relocated. Am I wrong in thinking shrew?

Good article and thanks for writing. I’d like to add the FlyfishinginMaine.org(FFIM) an organization formed to protect, preserve and promote fly fishing in Maine contributes thousands of dollars in the research efforts put forth by the Maine DIFW.  FFIM also organized the only official catch a bass “tournament” on PIR in coordination with DIFW as part of their research.

My friend found a neatly made nest of fine roots in a blue bird box. It is not a bluebird nest, nor a chickadee or titmouse. Any ideas who would make a nest of roots in a bird box?

I’m a bark-up stacker. Common wisdom in this part of the country used to be to fell trees in the winter when the sap was down, pull out lengths while ground frozen and covered with snow, cut and stack four footers in the sun. By autumn most would be dry enough to split, cut to length and sell as “seasoned”, except for oak which needed another year. Now however, the old time wood cutters are dying or retiring and unless you cut your own wood it’s hard to know how really “seasoned” a cord bought is. And oh the destruction logging in spring mud.  I also oriented my piles north-south because in sunny winter day or so, a mis-oriented stack could thaw and expand on one side and totally spill the stack the other way. Otherwise you got a lot of it right according to our local custom.

While hiking in western Maine, we came across a tree near a stone gated entry site, dating back 200 yrs. The tree had a dia’ of over 15’ apperared to be a hardwood, any estimate of age?

Some beauties on my property in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. . . ,

Right on, Dave!

Nice tribute. You are a likely inheritor of the Keillor tradition, as are other writers for the magazine.

I loved this…in fact I love your site.  As a “yooper” (person born and raised “above the bridge” in the UP…Michigan’s Upper Peninsula…) l can relate to both a Prarie Home Companion and to your articles.  BTW, we Yoopers refer to folks in lower Michigan as “Trolls” since they live “under the bridge.”

Thanks for this column, Dave. I started listening to PHC in the early 1980s, and loved it, but I have to admit I grew tired of it over the decades and stopped making a point to listen. If it happened to be on the truck radio when I was heading someplace, I would usually give it a listen—and the News from Lake Wobegon was always what I was most interested in. You’ve done a great job of pointing out the importance of grounding our often complicated human dramas in the natural patterns of the places we call home. Thanks for that!

Silver maples are very fast growing, and it sounds like this is a yard tree, which would mean it would be really, really fast growing. I would guess under 100 years old, for sure. You might use your house as a gauge. If it’s right outside your door someone probably planted it, maybe around the time the house was built.

“Jack-in-the-pulpit surfaces in wet, shaded woodland areas”—that’s what I thought, too, until a dry boulder pile in the yard in full sun all day started sprouting Jacks and Jills!