Some Natural Areas of Chatham-Kent, Part 6 (McKerrall Woods)

This natural area takes us inland, well away from the Lake St. Clair shoreline and associated wetlands of the last few posts. It is a little known natural area, and I feel confident that at least 99% of the residents of C-K have never even heard of it let alone visited it. In fact during all the years that I have been going to it, I have yet to see anyone else there except for the one time I led a hike to feature the display of spring wildflowers. The name of this place? McKerrall Woods.

This first image shows it relative to the north end of Chatham. The large Superstore/Walmart shopping area in north Chatham is visible in the lower left hand corner. Towards the upper right hand corner is an area marked with 'M'. This is the location of McKerrall Woods. So distance isn't a factor to explain why it is not known and seldom visited.

 This closer map shows the configuration, outlined by the blue line. The gravel road along the bottom of the photo is Darrell Line. At the bottom of the image is an 'X'. That is where the small parking lot is, just a kilometre or so east of DeGeest Line. What makes this site difficult to find is that in spite of there being a small parking lot, the woodlot is at least a couple of hundred metres away from the parking lot, and even though there is a sign in the parking lot, the white cedars that were planted along it quite a few years ago have grown up and completely hidden the sign. To access the woodlot, after parking in the small lot, one can walk through a red steel gate and along a grassy path and cedar hedge to the edge of the woods. There are no trails here, you just wander wherever you like.

This woodlot was given to the municipality many years ago. I don't know any of those details. However it is publicly owned and accessible. It is about 20 hectares (50 acres) in size and the mixed upland/lowland forest is in nice condition.

 Some parts of the woodlot have a fairly dense understorey, as shown in the next photo.

 Other parts are quite open.

 During late April and early May, there is a good diversity of spring wildflowers, some of which are shown below.

White Baneberry

Jack-in-the-pulpit

Squirrel Corn

Red Trillium

Long-spurred Violet

After the forest canopy is in full leaf, the wildflowers are usually on to the next stage of their lives, which is developing seed, and the forest floor is covered with greenery.

During the bird migration, a number of birds can be found, including migrating warblers. The site has not been heavily birded, as the modest number of species recorded for the site to date (45) would indicate. If it was birded more intensively, this number could likely be doubled. For example the next site I will be describing is a smaller woodlot, but has 109 species known, primarily because it is visited more often.

Cape May Warbler, a migrant

 Rose-breasted Grosbeak will be found as well, although probably do not nest here.

Birds typical of this size of woodlot include species such as Great Horned Owl, Red-tailed Hawk, various woodpecker species, one or two warblers, flycatchers, Baltimore Oriole, Cedar Waxwing, etc.

Baltimore Oriole

Cedar Waxwing

There is a good diversity of trees as well, all of which are fairly typical of the area. With the topography varying very little in this part of Ontario due to the outwash of the receding glaciers, the entire site is gently undulating, with lowland forest in the wettest areas, and upland forest in the higher drier areas. Therefore there is a mix of typical maple and oak species, along with American Beech, Sycamore, Black Cherry, Basswood, etc.

The lowland forest part does support a fairly healthy population of Poison Ivy. I usually wear rubber boots to minimize contact with it.

Typical lowland forest with shallow pools of water

Sycamore is not a common species, but is widespread. Looking at the lower part of the trunk, doesn't show anything that really stands out about it. The large tree on the right hand side of this next photo is a good sized Sycamore.

 If you look a little higher up the trunk, you may notice the bark looking quite mottled like either of the next two photos.

One of the reasons I go there several times a year is to enjoy the peace and quiet. Being so far off the road, and at times when farm machinery isn't very active, it can really be pleasantly quiet, especially when you have the place to yourself. On occasion you may hear cattle from a property nearby.

Another reason I enjoy this place is because there are a few impressively large trees, the older growth characteristics giving one a few hints of what the area might have looked like before settlement. Here are a few I've captured on digital film. This first one is an American Beech, and is slightly less than one metre in diameter. That makes it one of the largest diameter American Beech in the province!

American Beech

 This Bur Oak is a little more than a metre in diameter.

 This next one is a Swamp White Oak, and is a good size for the species.

 A really large individual is this Silver Maple, measuring 143 cm in diameter. Silver Maples grow quickly since they grow in wet sites, but don't live nearly as long as many other trees. However their rapid growth even in such a relatively short time can give them some impressive diameter.

McKerrall Woods is always a treat to explore. While the walking conditions can be a little wet in the spring, depending on the year, the late summer and fall period is very enjoyable, shuffling through the leaves or looking through the amazing golden colours.

Check it out.....I'm sure you will be glad you did!

Woodlands and wetlands

I recently took another trip to McKerral Woods, a 50 acre woodland in Chatham-Kent that is in quite nice shape and very few people know about it. It is just barely large enough to have a bit of Interior Forest, which is the area of forest more than 100 metres from the edge. In Chatham-Kent, where there is such a limited amount of woodland, any woodland greater than 5 acres is considered significant!

McKerrall Woods was donated to the municipality several decades ago, and is a great spot to get away for even a short excursion. It is a combination of upland and lowland. Although topographic relief is relatively minor, it is enough to make the difference between what is sometimes under water and what is relatively drier upland.

There are some nice sized trees scattered throughout. Some of the largest ones are maple, especially Silver Maple, but the one in the image below is a Sycamore, and is slightly over a metre in diameter. The upper trunk has lost much of its bark, which is typical, and shows a lot of pale greenish mottling.

A nice surprise was this quite large Swamp White Oak. It is approaching a metre in diameter, and that species doesn't often get much larger than that in its restricted range in Ontario.

The wildflowers are mostly finished now, but not that long ago there was a good variety. Some of the lingering ones are:

Blue Phlox

Jack-in-the-pulpit

White Baneberry

 White Baneberry is sometimes called Doll's-eyes since the fruit, as shown in the next image, was sometimes used by pioneers as eyes for home-made dolls for their children.

Note the green insect climbing in this fruiting head. It is an immature Assassin Bug. In spite of their small size, they can give a nasty bite!

I took a swing over to the Bear Creek Unit of St. Clair National Wildlife Area about the same time. The wetland was in good shape, and parts of the interior of it were quite visible from the road side. An Eastern Kingbird was fluttering about.

Several Great Egrets were feeding in the shallow water, but what caught my attention was this family of Pied-billed Grebe chicks, about half grown.

 There were two families of them altogether, totalling 8 young and two adults. Most of the time they did what grebes often do, and that is slowly sink out of sight below the water surface.

In the large creek system near by, several large female Northern Map Turtles were busy basking. This species is a Species At Risk in Ontario.

Elsewhere a Great Blue Heron was playing farmer, being outstanding in his field of soybeans.

When the birds aren't plentiful, enjoy the wildflowers

I had a bit of a diversion today, and spent some time in the McKerrall Woods, which was donated to the municipality of Chatham-Kent by a local landowner a couple of decades or so ago. It is about 50 acres (20 ha) in size. As it is away from the rural gravel road, but accessible via a grassy farm laneway, there is a lack of garbage and off-road vehicle damage.

It has largely been ignored, and for the most part that is good! There are some 'older growth' characteristics to this woodland, with large old trees, very little evidence of any recent timber harvest, and the forest floor looks to be in good condition. Older growth forest is incredibly valuable, with its array of age classes of woody species, and with less disturbance on the forest floor, there are fewer invasive non-native species. It can take many decades even after a 'good' harvest, for a woodland to regain the older growth characteristics that make it so valuable.

Here are a few pics I took a couple of weeks ago, showing some of the large old trees. The first two are of primarily American Beech and Sugar Maple, and are approaching 2.5 feet in diameter.

The following photo features a quite large Sycamore, which is almost 3 feet in diameter.

It is a mixture of upland, meaning fairly dry, and lowland, meaning fairly wet forest types. There is standing water in various places, and more so this year due to the extensive snowfall and normal amount of recent rainfall. The mosquitoes can be quite feisty later in June and July! But now is a good time to see wildflowers, and even a few birds.

Probably most of these wildflowers are familiar to you, but maybe not all. I took most of these today, but since it wasn't sunny, the Trout Lily wasn't open, so I dove into some photos I took a year ago to show its flowering style.

Squirrel Corn

Red Trillium

Trout Lily, a.k.a. Dog-tooth Violet

Blue Cohosh

Jack-in-the-Pulpit

There is quite a parade of wildflowers in many woodlots right now, all striving to grow and flower before the leaves of the trees by virtue of their shade, reduce the sunlight energy the wildflowers need.

While I was exploring this woodland, I noted a Red-tailed Hawk has its nest high up in a maple tree. The adults were soaring overhead, expressing their displeasure at my presence. I also saw a Great Horned Owl nest high up in another maple. A single owlet was peering at me over the edge. I didn't take a photo of this nest since I only had macro equipment with me today, but the following image is of two owlets raised in a Black Cherry tree. The tree had had a large branch break off, leaving this nesting space. The nesting space was a mere 4 metres above the forest floor, making it quite accessible for photographers.This occurred in a small woodlot immediately adjacent to the city of Chatham.