Sense of Place

Tag: Piedmont

  • New Hope Bottomlands Trail (Durham, NC)

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    Nicolette Cagle
    in

    The New Hope Creek Bottomlands Trail is a 2.2-mile loop located off SW Durham Drive in south Durham. At the moment, the access point at Sherwood Githens Middle School is closed. The best way to reach the trail is to park near the dumpster in the North Carolina Orthopaedic Center parking lot (3609 SW Durham…

  • Temple Flat Rock (Wendell, Wake County, North Carolina)

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    Nicolette Cagle
    in

    Just outside Wendell, North Carolina (an eastern satellite town of Raleigh), Temple Flat Rock protects a striking expanse of exposed granite—about 5,270 square meters—that supports a specialized community of lichens, bryophytes, and flowering plants. In 1984, the Temple family donated this unusual Registered Natural Heritage Site to The Nature Conservancy. In the mid-1990s, stewardship transferred…

  • Return to Mason Farm (Chapel Hill, North Carolina)

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    Nicolette Cagle
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    One evening this April, I visited Mason Farm with my dear friend gumby. As we started hiking down the grassy path, I commented on how Mason Farm was always a lucky place to find snakes, especially brown snakes, rough green snakes, and rat snakes. We were lucky to add another species to that list: redbelly…

  • Brown Snakes at Mason Farm Biological Reserve (Chapel Hill, NC)

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    Nicolette Cagle
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    One of the most delightful surprises of warm autumn days is finding snakes warming themselves on the walking paths that cut through forest and field. Today, temperatures reached at least 72°F in the Triangle, and snakes were out basking in the sun. At Mason Farm Biological Reserve, we found three DeKay’s brown snakes (Storeria dekayi)…

  • GREAT EXPECTATIONS: April in the Piedmont

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    Nicolette Cagle
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    BirdsApril launches spring migration in earnest, and the next couple of months can bring a steady stream of northbound travelers. Watch for wood-warblers (including Golden-winged, Nashville, Chestnut-sided, Magnolia, Black-throated Blue, Black-throated Green, Bay-breasted, and Blackpoll), along with herons (such as Little Blue Herons, Black-crowned Night-Herons, and Cattle Egrets), thrushes (Veery, Gray-cheeked, and Swainson’s), and sandpipers…

  • GREAT EXPECTATIONS: February in the Piedmont

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    Nicolette Cagle
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    BirdsIn 1936, writer and naturalist Donald Culross Peattie opined that “February is a good month in which to make friends with the birds of a great city.” In North Carolina, he may be right: winter still holds steady in February, and the bird community changes more slowly than it will later in spring. Some of…

  • GREAT EXPECTATIONS: January in the Piedmont

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    Nicolette Cagle
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    BirdsIn the depth of winter, as you walk through quiet woods, you may come across a lone thrush standing at attention, its delicately speckled throat exposed. The Hermit Thrush is a gifted songster, but its voice is mostly muted here; it saves its ethereal song for spring, when it returns to its breeding grounds in…

  • GREAT EXPECTATIONS: October in the Piedmont

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    Nicolette Cagle
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    Birds.− October marks the beginning of food-caching — a food storage strategy developed to sustain year-round avian residents throughout the lean winter. Caching strategies vary by species: red-bellied woodpeckers might store acorns in holes high up in the cracks and cavities of trees, while American crows might simply thrust a left-over meal into the loose soil…

  • GREAT EXPECTATIONS: August in the Piedmont

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    Nicolette Cagle
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    BirdsIn August, early migrants—including Chestnut-sided, Magnolia, and Blackburnian Warblers—begin passing through North Carolina as they head toward the Neotropics for the winter. Most will look duller than they did in spring, having molted out of their vibrant breeding plumage and into drabber winter attire. Many insect-eating (“vermivorous”) warblers stop briefly in the Piedmont to refuel,…

  • GREAT EXPECTATIONS: July in the Piedmont

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    Nicolette Cagle
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    BirdsThis month, lucky birdwatchers may catch a glimpse of uncommon visitors such as Common Mergansers, Tricolored Herons, Little Blue Herons, and Snowy Egrets. Sandpipers also begin returning to the Piedmont. As summer deepens, the melodious songs of many birds fade, though Indigo Buntings can still be heard singing from high perches. Indigo Bunting (Passerina cyanea)…