A few days ago I visited Rondeau on a couple of occasions. It is much quieter now, with hardly anyone else to meet along the trails or anywhere else. Some days I feel like I have the whole park to myself!
One of the reasons for my trip in early November was to see if I can spot any new locations for the endangered Red Mulberry. This southern tree is extremely limited in Ontario and Canada, with populations at Fish Point Provincial Nature Reserve on Pelee Island, Point Pelee National Park, Rondeau Provincial Park, and the vicinity of the Royal Botanical Garden in Hamilton as the primary locations. Even those populations are at risk due to the hybridization of the much more abundant, and non-native, White Mulberry.
The leaves of Red Mulberry are late in emerging in the spring, and also are late in falling off in the autumn. In my experience, the last week of October and the first week of November is the best time to find this species in a forest. The leaves are large and often do not change from a mostly green colour in the fall, and since they are late in dropping, are often more visible against the mostly gray/brown forest setting. They can even be spotted from the main roads and trails for several ridges over, so I don't have to go wandering through the forest as much and expose myself to ticks.
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| Typical late October/early November leaves |
I had found a couple along Harrison Trail on one of these excursions several years ago. But there is always the possibility of finding others, and I did just that on one of the trips this November. It isn't a large tree, perhaps only 6-7 metres tall and ~6 cm in diameter. But there it was.
Some of the leaves were on the ground. The lens cap is about 7 cm in diameter, so you can see that the leaf is at least 15 cm across and, not including the stem, closer to 20 cm in length. The leaves are mostly roundish, but some have one or more lobes as this one shows.
While I was checking out this Red Mulberry, I scanned around in case another one was close enough to be seen. I did see another tree with green leaves in the distance that looked a bit suspicious, but I wasn't convinced it was a Red Mulberry. When I got to it, I realized it was an even rarer tree, well rare at Rondeau, but not a species at risk. It was a Common Hackberry. The bark is quite distinctive.
Although it is a southern, Carolinian species like the Red Mulberry, it is scattered across the southern Carolinian Zone at places like Pelee Island, Point Pelee NP and along the Thames River, amongst others, and sometimes quite abundantly. But for some reason at Rondeau it is very rare. I know of only one other individual within the park.
Of course while I am out covering the trails looking for rare trees, I do happen to look at a few other things along the way. On one of the sunnier days, I even noticed a butterfly. This Eastern Comma is periodically seen late in the season, but with the below average temperatures in the last few weeks, sightings are few indeed.
Some herps were out. I had heard Spring Peeper, and this Leopard Frog was out on the road soaking up some sun.
This Northern Brown Snake had been doing the same, although it did not escape the impact of a vehicle.
While going down the west side of the South Point Trail on my search for Red Mulberry, the birds were really few and far between for the majority of the hike. But when I got to within the last 3-400 metres of the trail, things changed considerably. In that last area and in less than an hour, I saw at least 35 species of birds, including these next three species.
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| Hermit Thrush |
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| Eastern Bluebird |
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| Eastern Bluebird |
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| Eastern Phoebe |
Presumably some of these birds were waiting for the right conditions to cross the lake, and the slightly warmer conditions at the south end of the park due to the lake effect made the wait a bit more bearable.
On another occasion, near the north end of Harrison Trail, I was looking again for Red Mulberry trees, while keeping an eye and ear out for the Great Kiskadee in case it was in the area. I came across a large flock of birds made up of mostly American Robins. They were busily feeding on berries of Carrion Flower and Virginia Creeper.
Another Hermit Thrush was in the group, as was Yellow-rumped Warblers and a couple of Pileated Woodpeckers, the latter of which were ripping apart some fallen logs looking for grubs.
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| Hermit Thrush |
No Great Kiskadee, however, and it is has not been seen or heard for almost a week. Undoubtedly it is still somewhere in the park, but there is lots of potential area for it, and most of the area is not visible from the trails. Given the many windy days as November lives up to its reputation of being one of the windiest months of the year, hearing the Kiskadee is even more challenging. It is entirely possible that we have had our last record of this super rarity, although when it disappeared in early September only to be seen again in mid-October, who knows whether we have seen the last of it or not. One apparently survived winter in the mid-western USA by feeding on suet, so if this bird manages to discover one of the few bird feeding stations in the area where suet is supplied, maybe we will see some more of it.
In the mean time as the park quietens, White-tailed Deer are becoming more obvious, especially the bucks which are busily seeking out does.
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