A Calico-Colored Bird

As autumn in the Upper Peninsula becomes colder, darker, and less vibrant, other changes are happening, too. The coats of deer turn heavy and gray for the winter; the fur of raccoons becomes full and bushy. Birds, so colorful in the summer months, trade their eye-catching plumage for more muted, earthy hues. Some animals brace themselves for the impending winter: the gray and red squirrels eat constantly, fattening themselves for the cold months ahead, caching acorns and nuts for use in the future. While some birds stay for the winter -- the hardier chickadees and nuthatches are a good example -- many are already well on their migratory routes south. Large flocks of Canada geese form Vs in the autumn sky; our musical thrushes have long since disappeared.

Still other birds are arriving for the winter, from even further north. One of these birds is the snow bunting. Its summers are spent in the Canadian tundra, nesting on the rocky terrain far north of Hudson Bay. While in the Arctic tundra, its breeding plumage is a striking contrast of black and white; by the time it arrives in the U.P. for the winter, the snow bunting has turned an equally-striking mottled calico.

It's a long way to fly, only to be hit by a car.

Snow buntings aren't a common sight. Steph found this one along County Road 550, while out on a field trip with her Boreal Flora class. She remarked how strange it was to hold a bird that she did not recognize. Her professor identified it, and he mentioned that he'd recently seen another dead snow bunting, also along a road.

 

 

 

Mister Mallard

While gulls, crows, and songbirds are regular victims of passing traffic, ducks aren't a very common roadside sight. They don't fly low, as robins and blue jays tend to do, and unlike gulls and crows, ducks don't stray too close to traffic to feast on roadkill. Imagine my surprise when I saw a dead mallard along US 41 -- again, in that dangerous strip of highway separating the mainland from the shore of Lake Superior.

 

The mallard had just been hit; the neck was broken, and the eyes were moist. Thrown several feet from the road, the body rested on the short bridge that crosses the mouth of the Carp River -- an area, I've found, that is a popular spot for ducks. 

Mallards are common birds: they're found almost everywhere, from neighborhood parks to the shores of Lake Superior. Often, small groups swim by on the Chocolay River, quacking loudly as they pass. And yet, in all their familiarity, I had never seen a mallard so closely until I saw this particular duck. Until very recently I thought it was a female, but the yellow bill says otherwise -- I believe it was a juvenile drake.

 

His plumage was beautiful, and I couldn't help but marvel at how soft and dense the feathers were on his head and neck -- they looked and felt like fur. 

 

It was also neat to see the signature band of blue on the mallard's wings. Often, I'll see solitary blue feathers washed up on the beach, but to see them all together was quite the opportunity. Depending on the angle that the light was striking them, the feathers would appear blue, teal, green, or colorless.

 

Since I travel on US 41 into town for work, I see lots of different animals dead on the road. Most common are raccoons and squirrels, but this duck was certainly an unusual victim. Other recent casualties along this stretch of highway have been a mink, a whitetail deer fawn, and a coyote. It's a beautiful drive, between mountains and Lake Superior, but it comes at a price to local wildlife.

Too Late

Usually, when I find a dead animal, chances are it has been lifeless for quite some time. Skeletons, partially-decomposed carcasses, and even most roadkill are almost always long-deceased by the time I find and photograph them. Last night, however, a needless death could have been prevented, had I been paying attention to the road.

No, I didn't hit and kill an animal -- but within two minutes of Steph and I arriving home, someone ran over a small snapping turtle, right in front of our house. Had I been watching the road as I got out of my car, perhaps I would have seen the turtle crossing the street; after all, I could see its smashed body plainly from our living room window.

Judging from the damage to the head, neck, and shell, the turtle died instantly. It was gruesome, gory, and sad, and I moved it off the road immediately. The legs were all limp, but the muscles of the tail were still firing and flexing, which made the scene all the more disturbing. Because the shell was so damaged, and the head and neck were flattened, there wasn't much for me to photograph. I focused on the snapping turtle's scaly, armored feet and its tiny, hooked claws.

 

Turtles are common victims to both rural roads and highways. Because they move so slowly and are generally dark in coloration, they can sometimes be hard to spot, especially at night (this snapping turtle was hit about an hour before sunset). I have also had the displeasure of seeing motorists hit turtles on purpose, which is a sickening, despicable behavior.

If you see a turtle trying to cross (or in the process of crossing) the road, and it's safe for you to assist it, by all means, do. I once saw a woman holding up traffic on a very busy street in Ann Arbor to let a painted turtle cross, and though it was dangerous, it was also very admirable. Last summer, Steph and I helped a medium-sized snapping turtle cross Highway 550 just outside of Marquette -- a much safer road, for sure. If you do transport a turtle across the road, always carry it in the direction that it was headed (if you just put it back where it came from, it will attempt to cross the road again). And of course, always use extreme caution when picking up snapping turtles!

After I finished photographing this little turtle, I buried it in our backyard with an offering of semaa. Semaa is a mixture of tobacco, sage, and red willow. Oftentimes, it is used by the Ojibwe to give thanks, and to honor deceased family members and ancestors. Turtles hold a very important place in Ojibwe culture; when I took Anishnaabe language classes at NMU, our instructor, Kenn, told us how he would give semaa offerings to the animals he found dead on the road -- especially turtles. They are, after all, our family -- beings we share this earth with.

Young Skunk

One of the major routes in the Upper Peninsula is M-28. The highway runs from one end of the peninsula to the other and passes through national forests, the Seney National Wildlife Refuge, and land leading up to the shore of Lake Superior. It's a very scenic drive, especially between Munising and Marquette, but it's also a death trap for animals. In places where M-28 follows the shoreline, the road becomes a barrier between the forest and Lake Superior, a major source of food and water for wildlife.

I've seen many different animals dead along this stretch of highway: deer, raccoons, foxes, skunks, squirrels, porcupines, and even an opossum. With the volume of traffic along M-28 so low (as compared to that of downstate, for example), I sometimes wonder how cars manage to hit skunks and porcupines, as they are such slow and bumbling animals. One has to remember, however, that many of these animals are out at night, and this highway becomes very, very dark once the sun sets.

On a recent trip down M-28 toward Munising, we found a freshly-dead skunk. Her nose was still wet, her teeth were so white and sharp, and she was tiny: a kit from this year, she was about the size of a healthy Ann Arbor fox squirrel.

We brought the body home, double-bagging it for two reasons. For one, her scent glands hadn't been ruptured, but she still did smell like a skunk, and even more importantly, her face was covered in deer ticks. I'd never seen deer ticks before -- and I could have lived without ever seeing them -- but when we got home, we picked off nearly forty of them from the poor skunk's face alone. They're tinier than dog ticks, and are vectors for all sorts of nasty diseases, so extra care had to be taken.

I cleaned up the skunk, washing her with a mixture of water, peroxide, dishsoap, and baking soda, to both help eliminate the skunky scent, as well as to kill the lice, fleas, and remaining ticks. I promptly froze the body in our new chest freezer, and took pictures the next day after everything had thawed.

I've found that skunk feet are amazing. Their front claws are long and sharp -- for digging out tasty grubs -- and their back paws are fleshy and, oddly enough, very much like baby feet.

After I finished photographing the little skunk, I case skinned the body. It was my first time trying this method of skinning, and I found it to be far easier than ventral skinning, which I've done on a squirrel and a chipmunk. Special care had to be taken around the skunk's scent glands. They were located at the base of the tail, and I was shocked by how large they were, for a skunk of such small size.

The face was the last part of the body to be skinned, and when the fur was pulled away, sharp teeth and powerful jaw muscles were revealed. I buried the corpse in our backyard, near the raccoon; it's certainly a better place to decompose, rather than languishing in the center of the road.

Why skin an animal? For me, the reasons are twofold. Obviously, it's a learning experience. When the skin is stripped away, left behind is the body, sleek and muscular and bony, no longer obscured by fur. It's fascinating to see, and I'm constantly surprised at how delicate these animals are, their ribcages so frail beneath my fingers. Secondly, it's my goal to learn how to skin, tan, and eventually mount animals. Taxidermy has long been an interest of mine, and seeing all the creatures in the Mammal Division really made me revisit this interest.

This little skunk won't become a taxidermy mount; what she will become is a tanned pelt, as well as beetle food and, ultimately, food for the soil.

Return to Marquette

It's been just over two weeks since our return to Marquette, and Steph and I are so happy to be back! We've made the house our own, and now that we're done unpacking, painting, and hanging art on the walls, we've had the opportunity to catch up with friends (of which there are many), scour the area for jobs (of which there are few), and return to our favorite haunts -- Presque Isle Park, the farmers market, and so on. Here at Riverhouse, the name we've given to our new abode, we've been keeping track of all the animals we've seen -- and the list is quite extensive! Not only have we seen and/or heard nearly thirty species of birds, we've seen plenty of mammals, including a gray fox and a raccoon, who helped himself to our birdfeeder.

This afternoon, as we were heading into town along US 41, I spotted a raccoon on the side of the road. There was no time to pull over and investigate more closely, but after some chores and an inspiring seminar about art and success, we returned to the scene. By then, the corpse had started to bloat and was covered in flies, but we took it home anyway. Closer inspection of the teeth revealed that the raccoon, though decently-sized, was relatively young. The fur was thin and scraggly, typical of a summer coat, though the tail was full and bushy.

The feet, of course, were fascinating.

The raccoon was struck on the head -- a quick death. Many teeth were broken as a result of the impact, and the snout was crushed.

I'm rather pleased with how well these photographs turned out -- I used my macro lens, and no tripod. The sun was low in the sky, making the light nice and cool without any harsh shadows. The raccoon, meanwhile, was emitting quite an odor, and flies were flocking to it in droves while I took pictures. After I finished, I dug a hole in our backyard and buried the corpse; the raccoon will feed the white pines and red pines and jack pines that tower over our house.