Vernal: A Spring Photo Project (Day 41 - Day 50)

It has been nearly a month since I shared anything on this blog.  I've have been photographing every single day for my Vernal photo project, but I have suffered from both a lack of time (and often a lack of motivation) to write.  It's been so long since I have written that my mom has started to yell at me...

Here you go, Mom.

Day 41 (29 April 2019) - Rise up

The fiddlehead of ferns emerging from the ground are one of my favorite spring photography subjects.  I have been taking pictures of them since I before I purchase my first "real" camera.  Between film and digital I probably have hundreds of images like this in my archives, but I continue to take more.  Why?  Because it screams "SPRING" and after a winter devoid of color - anything green is more than welcome.  This photograph was taken at Mill Pond Park in Mt. Pleasant.

Day 42 (30 April 2019) - Raindrops on Tulips

Most of the plants in our garden are native to Michigan with one major exception - tulips and other spring bulbs.  I can't get enough tulips.  Every few years I plant a couple hundred in the garden on the south side of the house.  In addition to the tulips, we have several other spring flowering bulbs: alliums, grape hyacinth (which spread like crazy on its own), crocuses, and striped squill. But the tulips are the star of the show - my favorites are these variegated ones that have petals that fade from red in the center through orange to yellow on the edges.  This photograph of tulips covered with raindrops was underexposed a little bit to deepen the colors of the petals and the image has been cropped around the edges.

Day 43 (01 May 2019) - May Day Raindrops

Rain was a common theme for the beginning of May.  I took this image of raindrops hitting a pool of water on land owned by Shepherd Public Schools near the south end of Shepherd.

Day 44 (02 May 2019) - Dutchman's Breeches

Dutchman's Breeches (Dicentra cucullaria) is perhaps my favorite spring wildflower (after skunk cabbage).  I photographed this stem of dutchman's breeches flowers at Chipp-A-Waters Park.  For many years I knew of only one patch of this flower in Mt. Pleasant, but in recent years it has both expanded at Chipp-A-Waters Park and begun to grow at another location along the river.  I chose this photograph because of the way the raindrops have beaded up on the flowers and stem.

Day 45 (03 May 2019) - Mayapples

What would the month of may be without mayapples (Podophyllum peltatum)?  I love how these plants pop up out of the ground  and unfurl like small umbrellas over the course of several days.  This photograph was taken at the Chippewa Watershed Conservancy's Audubon Woods Preserve.  This species spreads both by seed and clonally by spreading roots.  Audubon Woods is home to several large colonies Mayapple.  I imaging that if you were to look at the genetic makeup of any single colony you would find that the majority of the plants share the exact same DNA.


Day 46 (04 May 2019) - Grape hyacinth

This is the fifth day in a row that my photograph featured raindrops.  When we moved into our house eight years ago there was already a flower bed planted on the south side of the house.  One of the plants present was grape hyacinth.  Over time the as we have added other species of plants the hyacinth has "migrated".  Now many of the plants appear in the lawn.  I don't really mind.  They add a lot of color and when mowed the leaves look similar to the grass.  In this image I like the contrast between the vibrant green, deep dark purple, and the glowing raindrops.  Although there is no focal point thimage just works for me.

Day 47 (05 May 2019) - White Trout Lily

If I want to see white trout lily (Erythronium albidum) in Mt. Pleasant I have to search a certain patch of woods.  Many years I search without finding a single bloom.  I once went five years between sightings.  It isn't that the plants are not there, but rather that they take so long to bloom.  Their corms (bulbs) need to store up enough sugars to produce a bloom.  In non-flowering years, the plant produces a single speckled leaf.  It can take up to seven (or maybe more) years for a plant to store enough sugar.  This year I was able find a few flowers in bloom.  I like all the detail on the pistil and stamen in this image.  You can also see specks of pollen on the petals.  This image is worth clicking on to enlarge the details.

Day 48 (06 May 2019) - Love is in the air...

I thought I missed American toad (Anaxyrus americanus) breeding season this year.  I heard them calling at Chipp-A-Waters Park during the last week of April.  Then nothing more as the period of cold rainy weather hit mid-Michigan.  Thus I was actually kind of surprised when I heard them calling again.  There is a small wetland near the the canoe landing at the park.  Around the edge of this wetland could be seen several dozen toads calling periodically from the shallows.  This individual let me sit about five feet away as I waited for it to call again.  I like this image because not only can you see the fully inflated throat sac, but you can also see the ripples in the water cause by its calling.

Day 49 (07 May 2019) - Hide-and-seek

For me 2019 has bee the year of the wood duck.  It seems like every time I walked into the woods in April or early May I would see at least one pair.  On May 7th, while walking a trail at Mill Pond Park in Mt. Pleasant, I passed a small seasonal wetland.  Something caught my eye.  This wood duck drake was doing his best to "hide" perched atop this downed log, but his camouflage scheme left something to be desired.

Day 50 (08 May 2019) - A view of the sky

My final image of this set was taken at Chipp-A-Waters Park.  We spend so much time looking down, sometimes it's just nice to look up and take in the sky over our heads.  I like how the trees frame this opening, the bright green of their newly emerging leaves, an the varying shades of blue sky.

Field Trip - Boardman River Fish Weir, Traverse City, MI

Coho and Chinook Salmon are not native to the Great Lakes.  They were introduced into the Great Lakes in the 1960s by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR) in an attempt to solve two problems.

The native population of Lake Trout was nearly extinct due to a combination of overfishing and predation by non-native Sea Lampreys.  Also, populations of a non-native fish the alewife exploded in the Great Lakes.  Alewives frequently experienced seasonal die-offs as they exhausted food supplies.  Their bodies would then wash up on Great Lakes beaches making them inhospitable.  Both Sea Lampreys and Alewives were introduced to the Great Lakes when the Welland Ship Canal.

By introducing Salmon, the DNR hoped to revive the Great Lakes sport fishery and reduce Alewife populations to an acceptable level.   The introduction was a wild success.  Today, Salmon remain a popular sport fish in the Great Lakes.

Great Lakes Coho and Chinook Salmon sped most of their lives swimming in the open waters of the lakes.  At the age of three, they return to rivers to spawn. After these salmon spawn they die just like all Pacific Salmon species; Atlantic Salmon live after after spawning and return to the ocean.

When salmon were first introduced in the Great Lakes this caused a huge problem in Traverse City.  Four dams spanned the river preventing salmon from migrating far upstream (one of these dams has been removed and two others are slated for removal).  This meant that when the salmon spawned and consequently died they did so within the city limits of Traverse City.  Saying that the resulting smell was unwelcome is an understatement!

The solution was to build a harvest facility to collect salmon from the river before they could spawn and die.  This facility, known as the Boardman River Weir, consists of a weir that blocks passage upriver, a fish ladder that leads to a series of survival tanks, and a building that contains sorting tables and other equipment for processing the fish.

The weir allows water downstream, but blocks fish from traveling upstream

The fish ladder is staggered to allow salmon to rest before swimming up each spillway.

The holding tanks and fish ladder a fenced off to prevent people from taking salmon.

Inside the building, processing tables are used to sort salmon for shipping to distributors.  Tubes lead to a recovery tank so trout, steelhead, and Atlantic Salmon collected in the weir can be returned to the river.

Carbon Dioxide and Oxygen are used as an anesthetic to calm the fish so they can be handled for processing.  The basket on the right is used to lift the anesthetized fish up onto the sorting tables.

The number of salmon (and other species) collected are recorded and posted so the public can see what is happening.  Windows look in on the processing facility

During the fall salmon run, staff from the Michigan DNR is on site to answer questions and give tours of the facility.  We are lucky enough to know several of the DNR employees at the weir and we were allowed to stay inside the fence taking photos as long as we wanted.

Once in the holding pens salmon just cruise around as there is nowhere further upstream for them to go.  Occasionally one will jump up out of the water, sometimes even landing on the concrete walkway.

The weir spans the entire river, blocking passage upstream upstream, but allowing water through

Despite the barrier, a small number of salmon jump over the weir and continue upstream.

Debris has to be removed from the weir periodically so water can flow through.  If the water flows over the weir salmon will be tempted to jump over instead of entering the fish ladder.

The view of the facility from the weir.

While we were watching several fish attempted to make their way up the fish ladder.  Some of the fish had an easy time; others struggled to make it upstream.  The staggered spillways ensure that there is an area of slack water at each level, allowing tired fish to rest before ascending to the next level.

This salmon just swam up the ladder

This salmon jumped up the spillway to the next level.

The bright sunlight made it easy to see the salmon as they swam around the holding pens.

Unfortunately not every salmon that makes it up the fish ladder survives until harvest.  Some salmon are simply too exhausted and beat up by their journey.  When that happens the dead fish are removed from the pen and disposed of.

DNR employee Francis Majszak gaffs a dead salmon and removes it  from the holding pen at the Boardman River Weir.

This dead salmon had a surprise.  That's a juvenile Sea Lamprey attached to its tail fin.

A closer view of the juvenile lamprey.  Because the Sea Lamprey is an invasive species it was destroyed rather than being returned to the river.

If you would like to learn more about the Boardman River Weir, the brochure shown below can be downloaded from the Michigan DNR.  The fish weir typically remains in operation through October.  It's only a 2 hour drive from Mid-Michigan and is a great place to visit while in the Traverse City area, especially when combined with a fall color tour of the Old Mission Peninsula, Leelanau Peninsula, or Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.