The Urban Pantheist

A light snow made for a pretty landscape in Olmsted Park today. This is my favorite view of Ward's Pond.

( nine more pictures and a video )

Ward's Pond.

( Read more... )

Photos by cottonmanifesto

Urban species #302: Ruddy duck Oxyura jamaicensis

Yesterday, we spotted our first winter duck on Leverett Pond. Leverett Pond is a widening of the muddy river between Boston and Brookline, in Olmsted Park. Because of its width, and the fact that it is fed by relatively warm, salty, and polluted water from storm drains and street runoff, Leverett Pond never fully freezes. Many different duck species converge there in wintertime, having left summer breeding places in Canada. Some ducks are only there for a few days or weeks, leaving to find better food resources, less crowded water, or fewer human disturbances, but many come in fall and stay until early spring. The ruddy ducks are usually there for a few months.

Ruddy ducks are small diving ducks with distinctive upturned tails. Their name comes from the male's reddish breeding plumage. As the male's feathers get ruddy, his bill gets blue, a feature that our duck is hiding from us here. You'll have to go peek at someone else's site to see that. Ruddy ducks dive under the water to catch insect larvae and mollusks, and to graze on aquatic plants. This duck species has been introduced to Britain, where it hybridizes with the closely related, and endangered, white-headed duck (O. leucocephala).

Photos by cottonmanifesto. Location: Olmsted Park.
Urban species #298: Pear-shaped puffball Lycoperdon pyriforme

Puffballs are familiar to most people, but it may be surprising to see them erupting from wood, rather than from grassy soil. But while most fungi that produce puffballs feed on organic matter within fertile soil, the pear-shaped puffball's fungus digests wood. When the fungus is ready to reproduce, clusters of puffballs appear on the top of the dead wood. They have short stems, presumably helping to lift them out of the reach of smaller, lazier insects and slugs, and to give their spores a centimeter boost. The stem gives these mushrooms their inverted pear shape for which they are named. When the puffballs are fresh, their inner flesh is white and edible, if rather a small morsel for most bipedal foragers. Their surface is pebbly or "gem-studded"; a very similar puffball that grows on soil is called the gem-studded puffball Lycoperdon gemmatum. As the puffball's flesh matures, it yellows, then browns, becoming inedible. When the spores are ready for dispersal, an aperture forms at the top of the mushroom. Puffs of "smoke" composed of hundreds of thousands of spores blow out of the aperture when a raindrop falls on the puffball's now leathery hide. Similar results can be obtained by lightly poking or tapping the puffball. The genus name of many species of puffballs comes from an imaginative description of the reproductive discharge: Lycoperdon means "wolf fart."



( Read more... )

Photographs by cottonmanifesto.

Urban species #291: Terrestrial flatworm Bipalium adventitium

I'm making a more conjectural species identification this time than I usually do, if you can believe that. Bipalium adventitium is a species known to be in the United States from Illinois to New York, and spreading. I'm still waiting to hear from someone at the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology to see if an identification to species is even possible. This type of animal I have seen exactly three times, each time under debris in the wooded part of Olmsted Park in Boston. What's reasonably certain is that this is an exotic animal, most likely introduced inadvertently with tropical plants or soil from Southeast Asia or Indonesia. When the flatworm specialist comes back from vacation, hopefully these photographs along with the dead specimen pickled in 70% alcohol in a vial on my mantel, will provide enough information to positively verify it's taxonomy and origin.


Terrestrial flatworms are predatory animals, in the group Platyhelminthes, a phylum more well-known for its many parasitic members. Of course, painting the terrestrial flatworm with the same broad brush applied to the liver fluke or tapeworm is about as fair as condemning all vertebrates for their relation to the kandiru, the tiny catfish whose existence makes urinating while swimming in the Amazon ill advised. That said, it can't be described as a beautiful creature, unless one has an uncommonly agreeable attitude toward natural beauty. Flattened and flaccid, yet muscular and sluglike, secreting a thick sticky mucus, and, when disturbed, forever waving its mushy little hammerhead around, it's certainly distinctive. Unlike its more famous relatives that spend most of their lives inside the bodies of other animals, this creature and its ilk feed on earthworms, tackling prey many times their own size. A terrestrial flatworm introduced to Ireland from New Zealand (an island group usually on the short end of the "alien invasive" stick) is eating through the annelid fauna of the Emerald Isle at an alarming rate. The ecological damage to Ireland, its soil, its crops, and its natural landscape has yet to be fully calculated, but the situation is worrying. Whether this flatworm in Boston is a cause for distress or not, is something I hope to determine.


( More pictures--EDIT! plus some scientific validation )

Photos by urbpan. Location: Olmsted Park, Boston.

Urban species 289: Oyster Mushroom Pleurotus ostreatus

The oyster mushroom is named for its resemblance to a seashell, growing from dead wood (for discussion of this topic, see the entry on turkey tail). Like most mycological topics, the identity of the oyster mushroom(s) is a topic for argument. Some authorities designate all bracket mushrooms (those that attach to wood horizontally with no stalk) that are whitish to grayish to brown as Pleurotus ostreatus. Others save P. ostreatus for the gray capped ones, assigning white capped Pleurotus the species names dryinus or cornucopiae. All agree that a bracket mushroom of these colors, with gils on its spore bearing surface instead of pores, is delicious. Oyster mushrooms are much sought after, even included in the "safe six" in Start Mushrooming and other beginners' foraging guides. Oysters can be cultivated, and many supermarkets include them alongside portobellos (Agaricus bisporus) and shiitakes (Lentinula edodes). Oyster mushrooms are produced by wood decay fungi, which perform the vital service of turning dead wood back in to soil. Along with humans, certain beetle species enjoy eating oyster mushrooms, and these insects are often hiding in the gills of collected specimens.



( Read more... )

I'm starting to collect more photographs of Olmsted park than I can keep track of. I'm doing a wildlife survey there; I bring my camera in case it will help document something. Sometimes I just take pictures because something is cool or pretty.


( Read more... )

Photo by cottonmanifesto. Location: Olmsted Park, Boston

Baltimore oriole Icterus galbula

The Baltimore orioles return to Boston in April, when cherry and apple trees are in flower, and the caterpillars that feed on them begin to become abundant. Orioles feed mainly on insects, but are well-known for taking nectar and fruit from trees and specially-designed bird feeders as well. They prefer to stay high in treetops in partially-forested open areas, particularly along rivers or streets. There may be more orioles today than ever, due to the increase in habitat caused by suburban development of forested areas. The Audubon Society, studying oriole population trends with data collected from the public; habitat loss in their wintering grounds in Central and South America may threaten the future numbers of orioles.

Though it is tempting to note that this bird shares a name with an American city, both the city and the bird are actually named for the British lordship that governed colonial Maryland, and happened to have orange and black for emblematic colors. Though the oriole is Maryland's state bird, it is probably more common in New England.


Photo by urbpan. Location: Riverway, between Brookline and Boston (The Muddy River, over which the oriole dangles, is the border).

Ward's pond, often featured here and at cottonmanifesto's journal, is tucked away in Olmsted Park, a linear stretch of green between major roads in Boston and Brookline. It's hard to believe this tranquil pond is just a few steps from the roar of traffic on the Jamaicaway.



( a few more )

While walking the dogs yesterday, we came across this huge oak, toppled over at the bank of Ward's Pond in Olmsted Park in Boston.

(5 pictures behind cut)( Read more... )