A Huge Flood in August Along the Haw River NC

When you live on the banks of a sizeable river the paramount determining factors in its local flow are generally the upstream river height stage and seasonal factors that influence it. Recently a tropical storm (Debbie) came roaring out of the NE Gulf of Mexico and slammed into eastern NC. The river stage upstream of our location quickly reached a maximum of 22.3 feet on August 9, had another similar peak and then rapidly declined afterwards. You can see from the attached graph how quickly this “flashy” river increased and decreased in height. Such a high water level of course penetrates deeply into the floodplain and causes a lot of disturbance/damage to vegetation. Many trees fall down that are rotten and/or are undermined by the water flow. I show one example of a medium-sized hackberry tree that fell and had a rotten center that obviously weakened it. These fallen trees eventually are carried by floods downstream and cause us a lot of work to clear out our trail network.

One natural consequence of tree falls is the creation of light gaps in an otherwise shady forest understory. This encourages the growth of shade intolerant species such as this passionvine or Maypop. Some more shade tolerant orchids, the rattlesnake plantain and cranefly orchid, were blooming along the edges of our forest roads. There was also rapid growth of a milkweed, the anglepod, that has very unusual flowers which smell like rotten meat and are pollinated by flies.

The large amount of rain from the tropical storm stimulated the growth of fungi such as this Amanita jacksonii, a spectacular relative of the European Caesar’s amanita which is famous for its use as food in Rome ( https://www.first-nature.com/fungi/amanita-caesarea.php#:~:text=Etymology,wonderful%20opportunities%20for%20dastardly%20deeds. ). If you are an emperor I guess you can have a food taster check the edibility of potentially poisonous mushrooms. The “death cap” fungi are of course generally highly poisonous but also serve a very important function as the fruiting bodies of an ectomycorrhizal symbiote to trees. For this reason I do not recommend picking mushrooms and thus disrupting forest ecology for a tasty and potentially dangerous snack.

A very beautiful native wetland hibiscus is Hibiscus coccineus which I have planted in the overflow of my bird water bath. They have flourished in this artificial wetland and are unusual among hibiscus in providing nectar attractive to butterflies and hummingbirds. This shows a male spicebush swallowtail visiting a flower. Another mallow that is non-native but very attractive to nectar loving pollinators is the rose of Sharon or althea. It can be somewhat invasive so I dead-head any seeds produced.

Butterflies, bees and moths continue to visit our flowers in bloom Here I show a red spotted purple (a brush foot that mimics the unrelated poisonous pipe vine swallowtail) on a butterfly bush. An orange sulphur is shown on a native Joe Pye weed. A cloudless sulphur is seen drinking nectar from a native red hibiscus.

Among the many insects which I observe this predaceous robber fly is one of the most impressive. This red legged robber fly has captured and is eating a small bumblebee.

Box turtles are one of my favorites since I see them often during my walks. They vary a lot in coloration but the shells are usually brightly colored. But this individual was much redder than usual. Yet the related FL box turtle is a different species with a distinctly different appearance- here is a turtle from my yard in FL as a comparison. We need to be careful to protect these long lived reptiles from automobiles and dogs which crush the shells of young individuals.

Birds continue to come to our dripping water bath, to sunflower feeders and to fig trees which are now fruiting in our yard. I rarely see the bright red males but the yellowish female summer tanagers often visit the water bath. This one individual tanager was yellowish with reddish blotches and I assume this is a juvenile male beginning to get his adult male red coloration. A similar looking cardinal nearby is likely also a young male getting his adult red male plumage.

We have had hummingbirds all summer collecting nectar from our flowers and this shows an adult female resting between bouts of feeding. She is particularly attracted to flowers of coral honeysuckle, althea, red hibiscus and butterfly bush. I think it is far more natural to feed hummingbirds nectar from non-native flowers than to offer them sugar water.

On one of my regular walks around the property I found three small raccoons up in a tree during a flood. Mother was nowhere to be seen but I assume she was nearby. I very often see raccoon tracks but rarely see the animal since they are shy around people in most circumstances.

As I write this on Aug. 22 the weather has become much cooler with temperatures dipping down into the 50’s overnight, quite a shock from our usual summer temperatures. Surely this is a sign of the coming Fall as is the occurrence of some Fall bird migrants- two Baltimore orioles seen yesterday feeding on hackberry fruits. So prepare yourself for the coming change and get outside and watch for the rapidly changing panorama of migrating birds.