I returned to the Stronghold for another stakeout and survey of the territory, accompanied this time by my brother Brian. Unlike my prior visit, temperatures were in the upper 50's (Fahrenheit), with low humidity and a mostly sunny sky. There had been no rain to the area for the previous four to five days.
We were on the trail as the sun rose. The fair weather really brought out the birds, and the bottomland rang with their calls. Red-bellied woodpeckers (RBWO) were very conspicuous, Pileateds (PIWO) somewhat less so; of red-headed woodpeckers (RHWO) there was no sign. Once, I spied a pair of pileateds flying over the trail behind us.
(Two years of searching have left their mark. I have noticed that, where before my gaze as I walked was usually on the ground around me, now I walk with my eyes on the middle to upper boles of trees, and on the openings between them, constantly turning to glance behind. This is not a good thing, considering.)
Not long into our hike, we were pleasantly surprised to find a pair of swallow-tailed kites atop a sweet gum, watching us with seeming indifference.
Arriving at the scaled sweet gum (I refer to it as the "scaled sweet gum" only to be specific about the tree, not to imply that Ivorybill scaling is involved -- more on that later). We decided that he would stake out that tree for an hour, and I would backtrack up the trail some, and stake out a lightning-struck oak for an hour.
Brian took the following eight photos of the tree with his Nikon:
I snapped a couple more near the base:
I made my way back up the trail, and found the lightning oak without too much trouble. It is a large red oak, probably around 30 years old, that had suffered a lightning strike sometime during the latter half of 2015. Much of the bark upon the lower bole was blown off, with the sapwood splintering into long strips in rather spectacular fashion.
We were on the trail as the sun rose. The fair weather really brought out the birds, and the bottomland rang with their calls. Red-bellied woodpeckers (RBWO) were very conspicuous, Pileateds (PIWO) somewhat less so; of red-headed woodpeckers (RHWO) there was no sign. Once, I spied a pair of pileateds flying over the trail behind us.
(Two years of searching have left their mark. I have noticed that, where before my gaze as I walked was usually on the ground around me, now I walk with my eyes on the middle to upper boles of trees, and on the openings between them, constantly turning to glance behind. This is not a good thing, considering.)
Not long into our hike, we were pleasantly surprised to find a pair of swallow-tailed kites atop a sweet gum, watching us with seeming indifference.
(Photo: Brian Carlisle.)
Another shot of woodpecker work upon a sweet gum near trailside. (Photo: Brian Carlisle.)
(Photo: Brian Carlisle.)
Arriving at the scaled sweet gum (I refer to it as the "scaled sweet gum" only to be specific about the tree, not to imply that Ivorybill scaling is involved -- more on that later). We decided that he would stake out that tree for an hour, and I would backtrack up the trail some, and stake out a lightning-struck oak for an hour.
Brian took the following eight photos of the tree with his Nikon:
I snapped a couple more near the base:
I made my way back up the trail, and found the lightning oak without too much trouble. It is a large red oak, probably around 30 years old, that had suffered a lightning strike sometime during the latter half of 2015. Much of the bark upon the lower bole was blown off, with the sapwood splintering into long strips in rather spectacular fashion.
Photo taken 10-4-2015.
The tree is still alive, though doubtless its days are numbered. I positioned myself some 20 yards from its base, and settled in for an hour, during which I neither saw nor heard anything odd or unusual. No woodpeckers came to feed upon the oak, although RBWO's were active nearby.
At length I rose and approached the tree. Using my "bully horn" (a water buffalo horn, sold as a dog chew toy), I performed a series of double-knocks upon the hard live sapwood, at roughly 40-second intervals, for about ten minutes. I felt the sound carried well upon the exposed wood. It was not long before a RBWO swooped in to a nearby tree, and about five minutes in, a pair of hairy woodpeckers (HAWO) began calling nearby as if in answer. But I heard no DK's in answer to my own.
Brian and I met back on the trail. He had nothing to report, and I was disappointed to learn that he had not heard my anthropogenic double knocks (ADK's), which I felt should have carried well.
We made our way back northward up the trail, determined to explore an area north of one of the three or four elongated fields found within the Stronghold. A downed water oak lies across the way, forcing foot traffic through brush and woods on either side. We walked around the ruined remains of the tree's lower bole, where much exposed wood still stabs upward from the stump, free from rot. On a whim, I took out the bully horn, and performed a few ADK's in the manner I had earlier. To our delight, a pileated woodpecker wheeled through the forest to land in a nearby tree, and hopped from tree to tree within eyeshot as I did both ADK's and imitated "nonspecific" woodpecker tapping.
We made our way to the field, and followed a wide path through slough-crossed bottomland forest, dominated by sweet gum, water oak, spruce pine, baldcypress, and tupelo, typical of the area.
Medium- to large-sized cavity in a tupelo. (Photo: Brian Carlisle.)
(Photo: Brian Carlisle.)
We neither saw nor heard anything else of interest during our visit, and left the area before noon.
Regarding the "scaled" sweet gum: I feel very comfortable in attributing the work on the lowest 2-3 feet of the tree to beavers. There is, as I stated in a prior post, a beaver dam within 50 yards of the tree. Also, I do not at this time rule out lightning as a contributing factor, possibly even the major factor, in the bark removal higher up the bole and along one of the larger lower limbs. Due to the nature of the bark removal, though, I could with great certainty ascribe it to Ivorybill work, if there were other trees with similar scaling in the area. As of now, I have not seen any; so the tree must for now remain an enigma.
