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Category: Door to Nature

  • Door to Nature: Tent Caterpillar versus Fall Webworm

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    Some springs, like this year’s, had many small trees and shrubs partly covered with the dense webs of tent caterpillars, but recently I noticed different types of webs on some much larger trees along country roads. My good friend Dick Smythe, an insect expert, informed me that there are two different creatures constructing and living […]

  • Door to Nature: Spiders of September

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    September is a great month to search for, photograph, learn more about and increase your admiration for spiders in the great outdoors. On a recent early-morning walk, I saw a lot of dew-covered spider webs suspended between tall grasses along the side of the road. They looked like a fairyland. Arise at dawn and venture […]

  • Door to Nature: Mushroom Hunting Season Begins

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    Many people ask me whether I’m finding a lot of mushrooms, and usually I say that late summer and autumn are the best times to look for them, especially after a rainy spell. In July, 8.25 inches of rain fell in north-central parts of the county, and some nice chanterelles were harvested. Now parts of […]

  • Door to Nature: Gentle, Voiceless Creatures

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    Few animals are as gentle, harmless, common and beautiful as butterflies. I am finally seeing some of the wood satyrs and northern pearly eyes that live in my woods because they were about two weeks late in emerging. It is so important to cultivate in youngsters an admiration and respect for butterflies and other small […]

  • Door to Nature: Is it Really Queen Anne’s Lace?

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    The county roadsides are now abloom with the tall, white, umbrella-like flowers of Queen Anne’s lace. This plant – in the parsley family – has been around for many years and is considered a weed. It was about 32 years ago when my late husband, Roy, and I discovered huge fields of a very similar flower blooming […]

  • Door to Nature: Rose-Breasted Grosbeaks

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    I truly enjoy bird songs during the breeding season, and among the bird varieties that have sung in my woods for the past 42 years, one of my favorites is the rose-breasted grosbeak. They nest in this primarily upland hardwood area every year and are regulars at the feeders. Now the first youngsters are out […]

  • Door to Nature: Fireweed Heals Burned Land

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    One of my favorite wildflowers, the fireweed, will soon be blooming along roadsides and in open, fallow fields.  My late husband, Roy, and I used to enjoy vacations in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and one trip to Grand Marais was memorable. This small town on the south shore of Lake Superior has a park […]

  • Door to Nature: Flying Tigers

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    Yes, there are tigers in northeast Wisconsin. Some that hunt their prey by day, others by night. Their eyesight is excellent when they are not running too fast, and they use their amazing speed and fierce jaws to bring down their victims. Fortunately, these are not four-legged mammals, but rather, six-legged insects: tiger beetles. Delve […]

  • Trilliums of the Eastern United States

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    I grew up in Milwaukee and never knew what a trillium was until I moved to Baileys Harbor after my late husband, Roy, and I were married in 1972. The spring hardwoods in some areas are generously adorned with trilliums in the month of May. That summer was the beginning of a longtime nature-education experience […]

  • Door to Nature: Carnivorous Plants

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    Many of you have heard of the Venus flytrap, but there are some other insect-eating plants growing right here in Door County. We are fortunate to have The Ridges Sanctuary: a place where you can see some of these unusual carnivorous plants.   The most abundant is the northern pitcher plant. The hollow, water-holding, reddish-green leaves […]

  • Door to Nature: Is That an Oriole or a Redstart?

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    One of the most trusting and inquisitive songbirds that more people should come to know might rival even the American robin in numbers in our state. The male of this small, chickadee-sized bird has fooled many a novice birdwatcher into thinking they were seeing a miniature Baltimore oriole. Instead, they were seeing the American redstart. […]

  • Door to Nature: Thimbleberry Flowers and Fruit

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    Many wild, white-flowered plants reach center stage during the last week of June in northeastern Wisconsin. The Canada anemone, Canada dogwood, highbush cranberry, oxeye daisy, red dogwood and thimbleberry are all decked out in their immaculate white. The species that we will keep clearly in mind throughout July, patiently waiting for its delectable fruit to […]

  • Door to Nature: Egrets and Herons

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    I have recorded most of the migrating species of birds that travel through Door County during the official spring season, March 1 to May 31, since 2002. Many birders in our county post the dates of their sightings to our Doorcobirders email group, and some mail a report form to me. A number of birdwatchers […]

  • Door to Nature: The Mayapple Is a June Fruit

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    It was 18 years ago when my late husband, Roy, and I were guests of friends who lived in southwest Wisconsin near the Kickapoo Valley. We explored this fascinating land and found many wildflowers blooming there that were not common in Door County. We saw large patches of mayapple plants that were totally new to […]

  • Door to Nature: Iris Flowers in Door County

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    I remember the fabulous flower garden that the father of Roy, my late husband, had at his home in Kewaunee. Some of the plants that he shared with us were the light-blue-flowered cultivated bearded iris. He called them the Great Lakes variety. The Iris genus was named for the Greek goddess of the rainbow, so […]

  • Door to Nature: Wild Strawberries

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    There perennial fruit in the large rose family, both wild and cultivated, could very well be called the “robins’ delight.” You guessed it: the strawberry. The open hillside near my home used to have many plants that would bloom during the last half of May. We never found any berries developing, though, due to the […]

  • Door to Nature: Violets of Door County

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    May is the month for the spring ephemerals to bloom. What are spring ephemerals? They’re the woodland wildflowers that blossom prior to the deciduous trees leafing out. They require full sunlight before the woods are in deep shade from the fully developed leaf canopy. Large-flowered trilliums are some of the most well-known spring ephemerals. When […]

  • Door to Nature: Ruby Throats

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    By Charlotte Lukes How can anyone not be excited about a native songbird that weighs only one-tenth of an ounce, is about three and three-quarters inches long, and can eat up to half its own body weight in sugar each day? Obviously the bird I refer to is that tiny, needle-billed dynamo, the ruby-throated hummingbird. […]

  • Door to Nature: May is Morel Month

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    Door County has had good years and bad years for finding the true morel mushrooms. If we have a snowy winter with lots of spring rain – which replenishes soil moisture – it will usually be a good season for finding morels. However, spring must also have warm weather to help the process. Last year […]

  • Door to Nature: Plants in the Arum Family

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    We’re looking forward to the spring flowers that will soon carpet the woods – first in the upland hardwoods – with delicate petals of many colors. One plant that my late husband, Roy, and I always thought of as the native harbinger of spring is the skunk cabbage, which grows in cold, low, wet areas. I found […]