First Week 

Female snapping turtles leave the safety of ponds to dig a nest for their eggs in loose sand or gravel in a warm, sunny setting. 

Unlike most birds, catbirds sing at night. Their songs are quite beautiful, unlike the meowing call for which they are named. 

Earthworms now make up 15-20 percent of a robin's diet. Many worms are plucked from mowed lawns where the robins can more easily see them. 

Second Week 

If the weather is good when black locust trees flower, honeybees will pack away some fragrant, light-colored honey. 

Newly emerged female mosquitoes and all adult males feed on plant nectar and are important pollinators, something to keep in mind as you're swatting. 

Female hummingbirds are building their nests of bud scales, lashed together and to a sloping branch with spider silk and camouflaged with lichens. The inside is lined with soft plant down.  

These listing are based on observations and reports in our home territory at about 1,000 feet in elevation in central Vermont and are approximate. Events may occur earlier or later, depending on your latitude, elevation - and the weather.

Find yourself a sphagnum-covered bog in Vermont or New Hampshire, and you're likely to find a pitcher plant. Peer a little closer, and you'll find a miniature food web living within each leafy pitcher...

Download the Article  

Student Scientists Say White Pine Getting Healthier, Kristen Fountain 

Get your students involved in a real-life scientific research project. The Forest Watch program (coordinated by UNH's Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans, and Space) offers K-12 teachers and students the opportunity to participate in long-term monitoring of the effects of air pollution on tree health. Specifically, students learn how to monitor ground-level ozone damage on the needles of eastern white pine. More than 360 elementary, middle, and high schools in the Northeast currently participate.

Check out Kristen Fountain's article and visit the Forest Watch website to see how you and your students can get involved.

Download the Teacher's Guide 

(This activity is on page 4)  

Download the Article:

Student Scientists Say White Pine Getting Healthier      

Click here for the complete Teacher's Guide Archive! 

We'll only say that yes, you do know what it is. Maybe this will be the week we'll finally get to keep our book.

Every other week we run a photo of something unusual found in the woods. Guess what it is and you'll be eligible to win a copy of The Outside Story, a paperback collection of our Outside Story newspaper columns. A prize winner will be drawn at random from all the correct entries. The correct answer, and the winner's name, will appear in next week's column. 

Our friend Alfred Balch submitted this picture of a nest he found recently. What kind of bird made it?

ground, and their nests are festooned with light-colored down and body feathers. Wild turkeys have similarly-sized eggs, but their nests aren't lined with down. Look closely and you'll see that some nearby branches had been nibbled on by a beaver, a hint that water is nearby. Females incubate 3-8 large, creamy white eggs (another helpful ID) for about four weeks while the male stands guard.