What in the Woods Is That?

Play our biweekly guessing game!

Whatever draws us into the forest—be it birdwatching or logging, hiking or hunting—all of us are unified by the sense of wonder we feel in the outdoors. The forests, fields, and streams of our region are full of mystery, and if you stop and look closely, you’ll see all sorts of oddities.

Below find a picture of one such woodlands curio. Guess what it is and you’ll be eligible to win a Northern Woodlands woodpecker magnet designed by artist Liz Wahid. A prize winner will be drawn at random from all the correct entries. The correct answer, and the winner’s name, will appear when the next column is posted and in our newsletter (sign up here!).

Ahhh-choo…?

While walking through the woods in northern New Hampshire this past week, we spotted several areas where it looked like someone had spilled ground pepper on the snow. What’s happening here?

Answer

These are snowfleas, a.k.a. springtails, which Northern Woodlands’ Invertebrate Bestiary columnist Declan McCabe calls “the Tiggers of the invertebrate world” in this Outside Story essay, where he notes these tiny invertebrates often show up en masse in footprints and other depressions in snow.

This week’s contest winner was Gene Roy