March 2020: Life Marches On

Management and wildlife highlights this month included the following:

Due to the solitary nature of the research, Bowling Green State University was able to continue its multi-year investigation into northern pike reproduction and the top predator's dependency on coastal wetlands as critical spawning habitat.

The 40-acre Rest Pond was intentionally drawn down over several pumping events to move relatively warm marsh water from within the wetland into the (comparably cold) adjacent bay to coincide with ice-out. Bay water was then allowed to flow freely back into the marsh, inundating desirable spawning habitat (note deep water canal above and emergent vegetation below). This carefully timed water movement through Standing Rush's "fish-friendly" Structure 1 was intended to encourage pike passage into the marsh just as they and their future offspring would benefit from its refuge.

A Fyke net (aka fish trap) set by BGSU researcher Nate Stott just inside Standing Rush's West Marsh (see black framed structure highlighted by the red arrow in the left channel of the Rest Pond).

Two male northern pike trapped in the estuary off of Sandusky Bay immediately adjacent to Standing Rush's Structure 1.

A major goal of this year's research is to fit individual adult northern pike with small radio transmitters that can be harmlessly inserted into the abdomen to track future movements in and around the wetland, the bay, and broader Lake Erie over the next 2-3 years.

A true sign of spring -- one of three nesting pairs of "our eagles" -- birds that have set up residence on or immediately adjacent to Standing Rush.

How many bald eagles can you count in one willow tree? Many of these birds are juveniles, likely offspring of "our eagles."

Trail camera images retrieved late this month demonstrate why I may not have seen many deer the couple times I got in the stand this past season.

Our inability to secure a trapper this spring (due to the pandemic) has direct consequences in the marsh. The badly injured muskrat immediately above -- aside a healthy specimen for comparison -- shows the outcome of finite food and space availability, especially during the spring breeding season. It is not unusual for muskrats to battle to the death as populations grow and competition for mates escalates.

Beaver activity just north of our Tower Woods -- while SO COOL to see on one hand, a bit ominous on the other; these water-loving structural engineers are persistent and can be very destructive!

A Memorable Day on the Trapline in Pursuit of a Truly Renewable Natural Resource

One of the 32 muskrats we recovered from 48 sets in the Tower Marsh;
check out an article we posted a couple springs back about this important player in the coastal marsh ecosystem

Thus far, the month of January has been dominated by grant-related writing, administrative logistics relating to our conservation easements (first secured and second pending), and accounting work to ready us for 2019 tax preparation -- all important stuff, but none exactly thrilling subjects for a blog post. That said I've been wanting to write about the one shining exception that pulled me into the field for a day in the marsh the week before last.

Muskrats prefer cattails to construct their
mounded dens (as evidence by the
isolated Phragmites left standing)

We were fortunate enough to be able to host a long-time friend of Roy's (who also happens to be an exceptionally nice guy and expert trapper) at our bunkhouse for the entire week of January 13. Darl and Roy go back all the way to their college years, but he has been trapping the creek bottoms, river banks, shorelines, sloughs, and beaver dams of northeast Ohio even longer (like since he was eight). This is a guy who proudly confesses he's been trapping Ohio for more than half a century -- without missing a season.

Until very recently, Darl did all of this while holding down a full-time natural resource position for a local park district and (in more recent years) overseeing a family maple syrup farm that operated near the Pennsylvania line for a full hundred years. Now retired, he can devote even more time to what is clearly a passion.

I couldn't get to the marsh till almost 8:30 that Wednesday morning. Darl had already been up for a few hours (at least!) and had already checked more than 30 of the traps that he set the day before by the time I got in his punt boat. While I have some exposure to trapping -- mostly as a young kid watching an older cousin and in reading books on the subject -- I learned more in six hours than I could have learned any other way. It was a memorable day (to put it modestly). Below is a photo depiction of some of what I saw and learned.

Where's Waldo? (or more accurately, Where's Darl?) This overview shows one large den constructed primarily of surrounding
cattails; this is a particularly large den, so Darl is placing two sets, marked by hardwood stakes tipped with bright orange paint

One of our punt boats loaded with gear

In the natural history-focused article that I wrote on muskrats back in 2017, I mentioned that local lore suggests 10,000 (ten thousand!) rats were routinely trapped off of the Bay View marshes a hundred years ago. I've now heard that statistic repeated from multiple sources. My single day with Darl involved 48 "sets" (discrete traps), 32 successes (not a bad batting average at 0.667), a couple dozen over-ripened apples, 2 sweaty guys, 1 muddy boat, and a lot of gear.

My biggest takeaways from the day:
(1) trapping -- even when it is 45 degrees and sunny in January -- is a heck of a lot of work (the best kind of work);
(2) trapping requires a sound understanding of animal behavior, but when it comes down to it, it can be fairly simple (like so many things in the outdoors, it is immensely gratifying because it often boils down to 'cause and effect');
(3) trapping could easily slip into the realm of a passion for me (and I think for my kids); and,
(4) 10,000 is one hell of a lot of muskrats!

Darl setting a trap is kind of like watching the mechanics of a baseball pitcher on the mound -- it's pretty much automatic;
he could identify the proper location, prepare a cavity to receive the set, engage and place the trap, bait and stake without
 even looking at what he was doing (his skinny skills proved to be equally hardwired as I watched him later in the day)

Most of the sets utilized were "leg holds" but Darl
couldn't resist setting a conibear when
presented with the perfect opportunity

I shadowed Darl for a meager 18 sets (out of ~250 he set for the entire week). That meant we checked 18 traps that he set the day before, recovered 18 muskrats (yep, we batted 1.000!), and placed 18 new sets to be checked the following day.

Darl's experience and technique insure that the animals are killed quickly and humanely. And while the fur trade continues to struggle to rebound from an artificial over-supply (thanks to hundreds of millions of farm-raised mink introduced into the trade from China about a decade ago), every animal is carefully handled and fully utilized.

As the balance of the photos below demonstrate, a 3-4 pound healthy muskrat has a beautifully rich and amazingly soft pelt. It is truly a renewable natural resource. Darl works through the largest and oldest fur buyer in North America (up on the Hudson Bay) and if everything works out just right, he stands to make about $3-$3.25 per animal this season. Considering that he trapped and skinned 152 rats over the course of the week -- and that he still has to "flesh" (remove fat) and stretch each pelt before selling to his buyer (sometime in March), he is not doing this for the money. He does it because he loves it -- the entire process . . . from the early mornings to the full days, to the anticipation of what the new dawn will bring. As a 60-something, he enthusiastically admitted that he still lies awake at night retracing his day's efforts, restless in anticipation of which traps will bear out. Pretty cool.

Hair color ranges from reddish blond to brown and even to black; condition, color, and proper presentation are all
keys to maximizing price on the market

One day's haul (left), lying outside to allow for further drying after being individually towel dried with a bath towel;
a freshly skinned muskrat (right) received a few more hours of fan-assisted air drying before being rolled and frozen for
further processing after the trapping season closes (for most species, by the end of February in Ohio)

Aside: To read more about why all this effort helps us from a management perspective, check out an article we published last spring. Darl worked 12+ hour days for five straight days (not including the time to mobilize and demobilize from his home a couple hours east). He concentrated on just 60 acres of wetland at Standing Rush. He was obviously very successful, but there are plenty more muskrats even in those waters. The only thing that stopped him was a quick freeze. Open water or safe "walking ice" present ideal conditions, but trapping is tough when we're stuck in between as we are now. We hope he'll be able to come back sometime in February to continue his efforts. He'd start by concentrating on dike banks, another area (besides dens) that unfortunately tend to draw muskrats in concentrated numbers. If he comes back, I hope to be able to get back out there with him. Still so much to learn.

Busy as a . . .

Certain creatures leave evidence that makes their presence pretty unmistakable; Roy just captured this fresh sign
just inside our main opening to the bay

Life has been particularly busy as of late. I simply haven't found the time to write much this last week. I guess that makes the subject of today's post particularly apropos . . .

Back in the spring, I posted about our most prevalent rodent at the marsh -- the muskrat. Just recently, Roy found fresh evidence of their much larger cousins -- the beaver -- for the first time within our boarders. We've had some old sign on the east marsh and neighbors have had to trap a couple over recent years, but this was our first confirmed visit since we've begun our work on the property.

Photo courtesy of the Ohio Division of Wildlife

Considering these waterside lumberjacks can reach weights surpassing 60-pounds (compared to 1 to 5-lbs for a 'rat), it's not surprising that beavers are the largest rodent in Ohio. And like all rodents, they have to exercise their teeth.

Roy got a kick out of the fact that our recent guest chose to fall two willows that were 6-8" in diameter and that he (or she?) was falling them into an opening 100+ feet wide -- at the mouth of our estuary where the marsh water connects with Sandusky Bay. If creating a dam was the goal, this ambitious critter bit off more than he could could chew. But that's apparently not unusual, especially with adolescents (<3 years old).

Had to slip in photo of our oldest son (10)
just before his first time in the tree stand;
I'll hopefully have time to re-tell some fun
stories from last Friday night's sit soon!

Based on annual estimates from statewide surveys (largely tallied with trapper input), Ohio can boast of 25,000-45,000 beavers in any given year. Or at least that's the range published by the Ohio Division of Wildlife since the late 1990s. The northeast counties are our hot spot.

Prized for the properties of their pelt (warm, soft, and water repelling), beaver were actually critical to early European settlement in our area. Fur traders made their way through the unforgiving Great Black Swamp largely motivated by this specific animal. Beaver pelts were literally a form of currency.

At their peak, there were 400 million American beaver in the United States. By 1830, they were completely eliminated (extirpated) from Ohio and numbers dwindled to isolated pockets throughout the Midwest. It wasn't until one hundred years later (1936 to be exact) that the first (four-legged) pioneers made their way back into NE Ohio.

It is obviously neat to see them back in marsh country. But as I've heard it said, they are best enjoyed "on the neighbor's marsh." These industrious creatures are powerful diggers and competent brush-clearers. We are hopeful that this visitor was a guest, and that he doesn't feel obliged to make our marsh home . . . to block any of our pipes or water conveyance structures or to dig through any of our precious dikes.

Back to one of my common refrains: time will tell.

The Algonquin Indians Called it "Musquash"

Muskrat, showing off the teeth and the fur that make them famous

It's about time to get enter a mammal into the discussion. The Common Muskrat (with special emphasis on Common) is aptly named in marsh country. While often mistaken for a miniature beaver, they are actually an adeptly aquatic freshwater rodent more closely related to mice and rats. At 15-28" long (including their markedly narrower tail), "rats" rarely exceed 4-5 pounds (compared to 20-70 lbs for their paddle-tailed cousins). Anyone who has encountered them at particularly close range can attest to a strong and distinct odor that literally fills your nostrils . . . and won't let go!

While seemingly small and innocuous (at least at a distance), muskrats are more than just pungent passers-by in a coastal marsh ecosystem.  They are intimately tied to the ebb and flow of cattail populations, driven historically by water level changes and more recently by an influx of invasive species like purple loosestrife and Phragmites. When cattail populations are strong, dense stands can support tremendous numbers of muskrats.

According to the ODNR, females normally produce up to five litters per year in Ohio, with each litter containing up to seven young. That’s up to 35 young a year from a single reproducing female! Juveniles are able to take care of themselves within a month and are on their own and often reproducing themselves by the following spring. With this dizzying math in mind, it's not outside the realm of possibility that local lore could be true: a neighbor of the marsh contends that in the 1920s and '30s as many as 10,000 muskrats were trapped off the Bay View marshes in a single season!

A free-standing muskrat lodge made out of cattails becomes a haven
for everything from nesting waterfowl to reptiles and amphibians

Muskrats are deeply intertwined with the natural and human history of marsh country. Like commercial fishing, trapping has been a mainstay for generations along Lake Erie -- and muskrats have been a foundational and consistent resource. While fur prices continue to yo-yo, trappers persist not only to supply domestic and international demand (now largely from Russia and China), but also to help prevent these tireless tunnelers from making Swiss cheese out of the earthen dikes and levees that help sustain their aquatic habitats.

In the last two weeks alone, we have repaired more than a half dozen subsurface "runs" that have caused breaches within internal dikes. This management challenge tends to come in waves, particularly when water levels are altered in areas that have not dramatically changed in recent history. By drawing water off a unit that has been held high for multiple years, we are exposing internal cavities that can quickly become breaches under changing water pressure. As with everything on the marsh, change begets change.