Ep 101. Woodcock Dance-Making a Meadow

Last week's Antics of Meadow Wildlife (Ep 100) leads to preparing and planting a meadow, often called a wildflower garden or prairie. Dennis Briede shares how the Land Conservancy is converting a field inundated with Mugwort into a Meadow.

My interview with Dennis leads to a fantastic surprise – the mating dance of the American Woodcock. You'll enjoy the interview and the sounds of this charming robin-sized bird.

Related Stories and Helpful Links 

Woodcock Dance – Making a Meadow

Antics of Meadow Wildlife 

The Cornell Lab All About Birds – American Woodcock Overview 

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I'd love to hear about your garden and nature stories. And your thoughts about topics for future podcast episodes. You can email me at AskMaryStone@gmail.com. Thanks so much for tuning in :^)

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Mary Stone, Columnist & Garden Designer
AskMaryStone.com

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Welcome to Garden Dilemmas, Delights, and Discoveries.

It's not only about gardens; it's about nature's inspirations, about grasping the glories of the world around us, gathering what we learned from mother nature, and carrying these lessons into our garden of life. So, let's jump in in the spirit of learning from each other. We have lots to talk about.

Thanks for tuning in, Mary Stone
Garden Dilemmas? AskMaryStone.com
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Transcript

 Ep 101 Woodcock Dance -Making a Meadow

Sat, Mar 25, 2023 3:47PM • 12:31

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

meadow, dennis briede, American, woodcock, mugwort, garden, bird, nature, nest, insect, spring, dilemmas, mary stone, garden, nature, inspiration

SPEAKERS

Mary Stone, Dennis Briede

Mary Stone  00:00

Hello, fellow lovers of all things green. I'm Mary Stone, and welcome to Garden Dilemmas, Delights, and Discoveries. It's not only about gardens, it's about nature's inspirations, about grasping the glories of the world around us, gathering what we learned from mother nature, and carrying these lessons into our garden of life. So let's jump in in the spirit of learning from each other. We have lots to talk about. Hello there, it's Mary Stone, and welcome to the screen porch on the very first day of spring. I guess it officially arrived in the evening yesterday, and what a warm sunny day we are greeted with such a blessing to have a new season of growth ahead. While walking Jolee there was a crocus that sprouted amongst the snowdrops, which brings a smile. I want to welcome new subscribers to our weekly newsletter. Thank you. I feel like I have new friends, which is so nice. In fact, in this week's story, one of the new friends will be mentioned. During the week I heard from a few of you asking how to start a meadow. And so I thought I would chat again with Dennis Briede, who we featured in last week's story, and visiting him led into a very fun surprise - a bird that was doing a mating dance. And it starts like this. 

Mary Stone  01:19

Hello fellow listeners and readers. What fun to have witnessed the mating calls of a Woodcock invited by my birder buddy Dennis Briede. Microphone in hand, I captured the unusually loud nasally insect-like sound of the male on the ground, followed by a melodic call while sweeping through the air. And we could see the little fellow, but I couldn't grab a photo of him. So thankfully, Dennis's friend Blaine, who's the scientist who staged the moth counts we spoke about last time, is a photographer. And he shared these fantastic photos that you'll want to see. There'll be a link in the show notes. And what's really fun as he is one of the friends I'm telling you about that I've only met virtually but I'm going to be part of the next moth count so I look forward to meeting him in person. How the Woodcock swooped quickly from side to side and saw his light underbelly glowing in the dusk sky intrigued me the most and reminds me of a bat flitting through the night sky feeding that and his charming appearance. Big beak, Big Eyes high on his head, and a body about Robins sized but shaped like a football.

Dennis Briede  02:25

Yeah, just a little piece like this has....

Mary Stone  02:28

And tonight, we're going to be witnessing the mating calls of Woodcocks. 

Dennis Briede  02:31

Yes, American wood. 

Mary Stone  02:32

American Woodcock. So tell me what I should know before I witness it. 

Dennis Briede  02:36

Well, they're little birds. They're about the size of a little football, and they have a really long beak. And they're actually considered a shorebird even though they're they breed inland. And their eyes are kind of toward the top of their head rather than the side of their head. And they really cryptic they blend right in with the field, the browns, and the light tans, and they'll blend right in. And they have what they call a lek.  A lek is kind of like a display area where they attract females. And for some reason, my meadow since the day I moved in every spring, they come here. I used to get six. Now, um, maybe there's two or three, but they do their thing. They squat down, and they make this noise. I can't even explain it. But it's a weird noise. They do that like 25 times, and then they burst up and fly. You know, maybe 500 to 600 feet up and Twitter, Twitter, Twitter around in circles. Wow. And they'll come down. If you put your chair close to where they went up. You'd run over there and put your chair and sit down. Don't move. They'll come down sometimes 20 feet away from me. You can watch him do their thing is really cool. They open her mouth, and it makes a noise. It's really, really cool. 

Mary Stone  03:44

The Males? 

Dennis Briede  03:45

 Yes, the male, and I guess they attract the females, which, you know, they're so cryptic. You can't even tell they're in there. You know, they're probably getting close. I never saw them mate there. But I just see the display going on, which is cool. Who knows how many years, but I've been here 17. There's no way that the ones doing it now were alive 17 years ago, right? They don't nest here. They nest nearby, but they don't nest in my meadow. How do the young know to do it in this meadow? I must admit we know nothing about nature. It's just amazing how every year there, they are not the same ones. Maybe two years in a row might be the same ones, but they don't live that long.  And so its generations are coming here and doing that just like out west of the grouse Lex. They have, you know, sage grouse, and those they have the same type of thing where they display. It's just so cool. But most people don't even know they exist. 

Mary Stone  04:35

So this is gonna be really cool bird. 

Dennis Briede  04:37

Yeah, yeah. They do it early in the morning, right before, like as the sun starts to come up, and they do it in the evening when the sun's going down. So it's not totally bright out when they're doing it.

Mary Stone  04:48

What, how many weeks does this go on?

Dennis Briede  04:51

Well, they arrived here on February 23. And they'll do it. I've had them do it all summer, but most of the time, it's from February to about April 10. I guess they're nesting after that, and then once in a while, they'll just do their thing wherever they are. 

Mary Stone  05:12

The Woodcocks plumage blends into the foliage and has a shy demeanor making them hard to see other than dusk and dawn during mating season. When the male shows off for the ladies with their loud calls and aerial acrobats -- boys will be boys. I told the tale of last summer when Jolee got a scent near the parking spot at Blue Mountain Lake. I followed her and saw what I now know was a docile and adorable Woodcock blending into the foliage. The long-beaked bird reminds me of a waterfowl rather than the bird you see around here; they nest near wet spots or marshes likely why the little fellow chose Blue Mountain Lake. 

Mary Stone  05:51

Earlier, I was drafting a story of how to start a meadow as a follow-up to last week's story, and I thought Dennis could share a few tips. As it turns out, his Meadow was there when he bought the property almost 18 years ago. He enhanced it by removing invasive plants and keeping volunteer woody plants in check. Recall that Meadows wished to the forest as we discussed last time. But Dennis shares the protocol of a plot that the Land Conservancy is developing. They're converting a field that's now inundated with mugwort into a meadow. It's on the South Branch preserve and Mount Olive, New Jersey. The chrysanthemum-looking plumy colonies of invasive mugwort, which is Intermedia vulgaris, are also known as common wormwood. Even the name sounds nasty. Their aggressive underground stems, called rhizomes, send out roots and shoots to travel two feet below the surface, making it a miserable invader to squelch. I hadn't known the benefits of using it as an insect repellent by crushing the stems and applying the juice. But the over the head high two-acre patch is more repellent than anyone can use. And Dennis describes a several-year remedy underway. And the nifty thing about this strategy is it's one that we can use to develop a meadow as well. There are other ways to do it. But even if you don't have nasty mugwort, this is a really unique way to develop metal, and it's fun to hear it in Dennis's voice.

Dennis Briede  07:16

wildflowers Yeah, I'm not even wildflowers, just mugwort oh, really bad. Invasive. The mugwort was like seven feet high. The whole meadow. Well, we have a farmer that we went to, and he's really good. He's organic. So he gave me the steps that I needed to do to bring that to a wildflower meadow. Oh, and it's a lot of steps. If you want to do it really right. I mean, it costs a lot normally. So what I do is first mow it low.  I just kept mowing and mowing as low as I could, maybe two inches, three inches. For the whole year. Just mow and mow so nothing will go to seed. Then the next year, I was tilling and tilling it. I know they don't like you to till,  but I don't think there's any other way we're not using chemicals. So you just till and till. Not a deep till, but maybe....

 Mary Stone  08:04

like six inches deep. 

 Dennis Briede  08:05

Yeah, about six, and you turn it over, and the mugwort has deep roots. So you keep turning it over, you leave it laying on the surface, the sun bakes it a little bit, and you just keep doing it all summer long. 

 Mary Stone  08:16

Like how often do you till?

 Dennis Briede  08:17

 Well, you'll know when you start seeing more stuff growing up, you know, that high (8 inches) then till it again. Okay, and then last. We got a little bit late, but last mid-September, we planted farm peas, and that add nitrogen to the soil. And also blocks whatever else has been trying to grow in there the last two months. 

 Mary Stone  08:35

So like a cover crop. 

 Dennis Briede  08:36

Yeah, like a cover crop. And now I'll till it again in the spring. And then we're going to plant buckwheat. Buckwheat has very large leaves and shades everything over. You can get it to flower, but you don't want it to seed because then it just spreads a seed. Yeah, that's a very good ground cover. It grows maybe three feet high.

Mary Stone  08:57

Is that a perennial? 

Dennis Briede  08:59

I believe it's an annual, but it re-seeds all over the place. So you want to make sure you take care of it before, like,  early July. And then you till it under again, maybe till one or two more times. And then, in the fall, I ordered seeds. I'm gonna plant like 70 pounds worth of wildflower seeds and also grass. Grasses that are short grasses no more than three feet high. I don't want the really tall ones because they'll compete with everything. And then it takes over. The whole thing takes five years to really have it come out. You know, the really nice. And there's a lot of maintaining after that too. You have to mow it. What we want to do is mow half every other year, maybe, so the shrubs don't come back in.

Mary Stone  09:42

So back to the beautifully beaked Woodcock. It's a popular gaming bird which makes me so sad. I can appreciate hunting for food but for gaming? Well, that's what clay pigeons are for, though some consider them a flavorful feast. Not the clay pigeons. Maybe they should eat those, though.  Oh, that's funny. Per Cornell lab's All about Birds, populations declined between 1966 and 2019. Though hunting tallies were down considerably from 1.5 million per year in the 1970s to 170,000 in 2020. They write that population decline may relate to habitat loss due to development and pesticides used to treat forest insects. Plus, 60% of their food is earthworms, making them vulnerable to contaminants in the soil. They feed on flies, beetles, snails, millipedes, and spiders as well and small amounts of plant material. 

Mary Stone  10:39

They have a nifty way of rocking back and forth, moving their weight from foot to foot to inspire critters underground to move to hear or feel the vibrations. What a nifty strategy, don't you think? Mother Nature puts on quite a dance. May more of us learn to dance along with her -  to nurture rather than disrupt and contaminate our dear Earth. Garden Dilemmas, Ask Mary Stone.com. 

Mary Stone  11:06

Yes, indeed, nature reveals itself in perfect timing. We cannot control it just as we can't control our lives. And fiddling with nature -  interfering with it never works. It throws off the balance of things. Haven't we proven that enough? So let nature dance and dance along with it. Thank you, Dennis, for sharing your meadow with us and for the privilege of having you as a friend. And for all the new friends that are joining us and learning and growing in the garden of life. It means so much. And for those of you that want to subscribe to the newsletter, which is free, of course, you can go onto the website. The link is in the show notes Ask Mary Stone.com. And there's a little signup form there. Thanks so much for coming by. I always look forward to our chats together. And if you have as well, please share the podcast with a friend or two so more can join us. Thanks so much. Have a great day. 

Mary Stone  12:01

You can follow Garden Dilemmas on Facebook or online at Garden Dilemmas.com and on Instagram at hashtag Mary Elaine Stone. Garden Dilemmas, Delights, and Discoveries is produced by Alex Bartling. Thanks for coming by. I look forward to chatting again from my screen porch. And always remember to embrace the unexpected in this garden of life. Have a great day.