Early April brought some nice sunshine and the first purple mountain saxifrage blooms. Swans graced some of the ponds in the Mendenhall Valley and on Douglas. Bufflehead males showed off their white cockades to females. Skunk cabbage (aka swamp lanterns) began to glow in the warmer spots. The first songbirds tuned up. At Fish Creek, I watched a crow chase a greater yellowlegs, apparently just for the fun of it.<\/p>\n
Toward the end of April, around the lower loop at Eaglecrest Ski Area, the ice was gone from many of the ponds. Waterstriders scooted over the pond surfaces, making big-footed shadows. I saw one damselfly larva, one diving beetle and hundreds of tiny mysterious beasties crawling through the mucky bottoms of some ponds.<\/p>\n
A few ponds were covered with the floating exoskeletons of unknown insects, presumably left behind when the adults emerged and went off somewhere. Some pond lilies had large buds not quite ready to open.<\/p>\n
[New fishing area provides wetlands access, honors conservationists]<\/a><\/ins><\/p>\n Robins moved about in small flocks over the muskegs, although at sea level they were already singing on territories. A persistent red-breasted sapsucker hammered away, announcing his presence in no uncertain terms. A few male hooters called from far away.<\/p>\n There was plenty of evidence of deer chomping on the yellow floral display of skunk cabbages. Usually, they bite off the whole top of the display, leaving just a stub, but I saw two plants on which the deer had neatly extracted just the cylindrical inflorescence from the still mostly-furled yellow spathe. The sweet fragrance of these flowers sometimes builds up near a patch in full bloom, and it is worth savoring.<\/p>\n Early May brought (excessively) prolonged gray skies and drizzle, punctuated by occasional downpours and fresh snow on the peaks. On a little trip up East Glacier Trail, I heard hooters advertising their availability to females and my first Townsend’s warbler of the year. Sadly, I saw no signs of dippers at their traditional nest site on Steep Creek, although elsewhere they were already incubating eggs.<\/p>\n