The Rhinelander Daily News - Online news and information for the Rhinelander, Wisconsin region

The flame of the maple tree.

Color me...

How fortunate we are to live in an area where the autumn leaves burst into such exciting and vivid colors. This doesn’t happen in most parts of the world.

There is some color in Britain and Western Europe — parts of China and Japan — on the western tip of South America — and at one end of New Zealand — but nowhere are the colors as bright as they are here.

Scientists still have much to learn about the reasons for the color changes. However, it is usually accepted that the leaves are more vivid red in the acid soil and on the top of hills. The yellows are brighter in the valleys. Moisture is needed for brilliant leaf colors.

When most of the autumn days are overcast, the yellow leaves will be dominant. Bright sunny days bring you the vivid reds. Although 42-degree nights are ideal for making leaf paint, Jack Frost’s below-freezing temperatures blacken the leaves and bring them down sooner. He’s not the artist that folklore has credited him as being.

Of all the forest trees, the sugar maple is one of the prettiest. It’s the only tree that can boast red, orange, yellow and green leaves at the same time. No one knows what causes one branch of leaves to turn while the other portion of the tree remains green.

Hats off to the sumac!

One of the Northwoods’ showiest shrubs is the stag horn sumac, which displays its vivid red and orange leaves. It is known as stag horn sumac since its branches are covered with a velvety material, much like that found on the male deer’s antlers this September. The sumacs belong to the same family as poison sumac and poison ivy. However, the common sumacs are not poisonous. Their hairy, red seed clusters can be steeped in water and sweetened with sugar to make a tasty sumacade as well as wine and jelly. It can also be brewed to make a lemony tea.

Q and A

Q: I have been told red squirrels castrate gray squirrels. If true, why?

A: This is not true. The legend that red squirrels castrate gray ones has been around a long time. It probably arose because gray squirrels retract their testicles into their abdominal cavity when it’s not breeding season, so they might look like they’re castrated.

More September notes

Traditionally, the height of the fall colors in northern Wisconsin is during the week of Sept. 20. Jack Frost has nothing to do with the color change, but autumn rains frequently bring down the leaves.

The acorns are ripening. Acorns are an excellent source of winter food for deer, fox, gray squirrels, raccoons, bear, bluejays, wood ducks and wild turkeys. Adequate acorn crops are produced only once every five years.

The birds are on the move! We notice the passage of the large birds — ducks, geese and hawks — but we fail to see the smaller species. They fly at night. It is estimated that 90 percent of bird migration takes place under the cover of darkness.

The mushrooms are poppin’ out of the forest floor. Of the several hundred species of mushrooms in the Northwoods, 200 may be edible. Pickers are gathering “buttons,” “grassies” and “frosties” — all generic names.

September is spider month in Wisconsin. There are 2,000 species. Only a few of them spin webs. During its life span from spring to autumn, a spider may consume 2,000 insects.

Headed for Mexico

The orange and black monarch butterflies are migrating, flying nearly 2,000 miles to the mountains in Mexico. They then cluster in evergreen trees in such numbers that the branches sometimes break under their weight.

The monarchs we watched during the spring and summer lived for two or three months, but the migrating generation has a life expectancy of nine months — enough time to fly to Mexico, winter there, mate and return to the United States in the spring.

Quill pigs mating

Porcupines mate during the late autumn. It’s a time when their low-pitched monotones (“uhn-uhn”) become transformed into high falsetto notes. As one outdoor writer describes it, “... a caterwauling or an extreme loud meowing that compels instant and startled attention across 200 yards of space.”

Winter coats

Take a good look at the whitetail deer. They’re getting their grayish winter coats. Winter hair differs from the reddish summer hair. It’s longer, thicker and more brittle. It has excellent insulation qualities and continues to grow in length and diameter until mid-winter. Beneath the long guard hairs is a very soft, fine, kinky undercoat — much like cashmere wool. The coat has such excellent qualities that a deer can be bedded down in a snowstorm with several inches of snow on its back. None of the snow will melt since the coat does not permit the body heat to escape and melt it.

Moving for winter

The first ducks to leave the Northwoods are blue-winged teal. The smallest of the 15 species that nest in Wisconsin, the teal migrate further south than any North American waterfowl, traveling as far as 3,000 miles in 30 days.

Snakes are moving back to their winter dens, congregating in large numbers to conserve heat and moisture which are essential to their survival. Deep crevices, rock outcroppings and basements are common hibernating sites. The same dens are used year after year.

Tell us what you think...

Comments »

TRAVELING wrote on Sep 10, 2008 2:47 PM:

" YOU OBVIOUSLY HAVENT VISITED US HERE IN ASHEVILLE NORTH CAROLINA - IVE LIVED BOTH PLACES AND THERE IS MUCH MORE COLOR FOR A MUCH LONGER TIME HERE IN WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA "

Barb in Madison wrote on Sep 8, 2008 12:03 PM:

" Hi Ced,
I recently heard from a birdwatcher that hummingbirds will catch a ride on the back of the Canada Geese as they migrate. Any truth to that?
Love your columns. I learn so much and my enjoyment of the northwoods is richer for that. Keep your columns coming! "

The comments above are from readers. In no way do they represent the views of the Rhinelander Daily News.