Writing in the Snow

Growing up, I would hear people quote this statistic: “Eskimos have more than a hundred words for snow.” Actually, I still hear people rattle off this little ‘fact’, especially in winter.  However, there are a lot of problems with this statement, not even including the fact that the indigenous people of North America’s tundra and Arctic regions are known as Inuit, not Eskimo. No, what really grates on me about this blanket statement is the implication that it’s somehow weird to have so many words to describe one thing.

When it’s something that makes up a very large part of your daily life during a significant portion of the year, why wouldn’t you take the time to describe it as accurately as possible? The English language has several words for rain: showers, downpour, drizzle, sheets, so why not snow, especially in light of the fact that it sticks around a lot longer than its warm weather counterpart.  Actually, as a Canadian, I’m surprised that we, as a population, haven’t developed more words beyond flurries, blizzard and slush to describe this white stuff that blankets much of the country for four to six months out of the year.

To do that, we have to turn to other cultures and languages. While the true count is well under one hundred, many Inuit dialects have several useful words to describe the incredible variety of snow that we can encounter throughout the course of the winter.  For those of us who live in forested areas, one handy word to know is qali. It refers to the snow that builds up on the branches of trees, glazing limbs in white and making it look like someone attacked the woods with a decorator’s bag full of royal icing.

I was lucky to have learned several Inuit terms for snow as part of some of my undergraduate university courses and like many people who study winter ecology, they’ve been part of my lexicon ever since. So, it took a bit of digging to figure out where the word qali comes from. According to William Wonders, who wrote the book Canada’s Changing North (2003), the word originates from the Kobuk Valley Inuit of northwestern Alaska, along the edge of the treeline.

Qali can range in thickness from a light dusting that could almost be mistaken for hoar frost to heavy globs of wet snow that drag beleaguered limbs to the ground under its unrelenting weight. All along that spectrum, it has a significant impact on the ecological community.

Many winter residents are affected by qali. Spruce grouse and squirrels that regularly feed on cones often find themselves driven down to the ground by a particularly heavy layer of qali. The snow-covered branches can be hard to navigate, forcing these species to search elsewhere for food. On the other hand, qali can make some food more accessible. With particularly heavy wet snows, the qali that builds up on young birches, willow and aspen pulls the flexible branches down, bringing the young, tender tips within reach of hungry cottontails and snowshoe hare. These contorted trees may also provide shelter for a whole host of wildlife.

You might not have ever realized it, but if you live in an area that experiences snow, qali has likely affected you at some point and I don’t mean that moment when you accidentally brush up against a laden branch and send an unwanted shock of snow pouring down the collar of your coat. I’m talking about more significant impacts. Qali can be very heavy and often trees buckle under the weight taking down whatever else is nearby, which is some cases are power lines. I know I’ve spent the odd cold, snowy night in the dark, waiting for hydro to be restored.  These qali-broken trees also open up the forest floor to new growth, creating pockets of mini forest succession and driving the forest cycle on a smaller scale.

Snow is an amazing thing and qali is only one small facet in a dizzying array of diversity, which thanks to northern cultures, we’re able to describe in accurate and imaginative ways. So, next time you take a winter walk surrounded by white, take a moment and discover that variety for yourself and maybe even create your own words to describe it.

 

Living on the Edge

Our world is in a constant state of transition, both in time and space. Most of us are more aware of the former, noting the passing of minutes, days and years. However, for many species, it’s changes in habitat across space that have a significant impact on their survival.

Life needs edges, places where the shadows of the forest recede in the face of the sun, where waves of grasses dip their roots in murky waters, where ripples lap incessantly at a rock face, etching away the sand of the future. Edges create variety and when it comes to ecology, variety is truly the spice of life, at least in terms of its diversity.

The technical term for a transition zone between two types of habitat is ecotone. It’s a place where two communities meet, knitting together elements of each other, often bringing the best of both worlds.

Some ecotones are abrupt, like the striking boundary between forest edge and farmer’s field, a change so sudden, it can easily be seen from the air. Others are more gradual, such as the subtle gradation of shades from soft, sunny aspen leaves to the dark mossy needles of the boreal forest as one moves pole-ward throughout much of the northern hemisphere.  Some edges we we can’t even see, like the lines between distinct communities layered on top of each other in the depths of a lake. It’s all a matter of perspective. What might seem like a continuum to us, may be a stark contract to another species.  It all depends on the resources you value.

Regardless of how they’re defined, edges are important places. They’re interfaces, areas where two distinct worlds can influence each other for better or worse. Edge-effects can be positive or negative, depending on the organism whose point of view you are looking from and what type of edge it is.

Naturally occurring ecotones, like a reed bed bordering a lake shore, are hugely important areas, a bridge between the land and watery worlds, creating an interface where a greater number of species can thrive than would otherwise exist without these marshes. Whether they’re lines of trees along a winding stream, offering a windbreak in an otherwise open field, or a wet meadow cutting its way through a thick forest, edges can also provide natural thoroughfares, ancient pathways followed by generations of animals.

However, that same linear accessibility can also become a problem when the edge is not natural. Clear-cuts slicing into an normally intact forest, seismic lines cross-crossing though arctic tundra or farmland pushing into what’s left of tall-grass prairie can create novel and unnatural ecotones, opening corridors for predators and invasive species, irrevocably changing the landscape. In contrast, what may be right-of-ways for some organisms may also be barriers for others, with human-caused edges limiting normally wider-ranging movements of many habitat-sensitive species, such as songbirds and woodland caribou.

Anyway you cut it, the world is full of edges, both dividing and uniting this remarkable patchwork of landscapes in all three dimensions. Understanding the depth of that complexity and our impacts on it has kept biologists busy for decades and will continue to do so for many more to come. I, for one, welcome the chance to continue the exploration.

Restless Heart

To regular readers of this blog, my love of obscure words is not a new thing. Over the last few years, I’ve been creating these ‘definition images’ as my way of bringing life to some of the wonders of nature and the words used to describe them.

Looking back over them all, I realized, much to my surprise, that I’ve crafted more than 70 of them, covering just about every letter of the alphabet. That discovery has led me to challenge myself to visualize words starting with more uncommon letters, like  X, Qand Z. Kind of like an artistic variation on Scrabble.

Autumn has given me the perfect opportunity to address one of my favourite Z words.  It’s another one of those terms that comes up only in the discussion of natural history and animal behaviour and it never fails to raise a few eyebrows if you manage to slip it into regular conversation.

The word is Zugunruhe.

Zugunruhe is a combination of two German words = Zug, meaning to move or migrate and Unruhe, meaning restlessness and it together, the sum is really the combination of the parts: migratory restlessness. For a behavioural ecologist, it’s a word that tends to conjure up thoughts of autumn, or more specifically, late summer.

As the earth lumbers along its orbital path and those of us in the Northern Hemisphere find ourselves canting away from the sun’s warmth, many creatures get antsy. Birds especially are seized by a sudden disquiet and activity levels skyrocket. Sleep patterns change and if the individuals are kept in a cage, they start orienting their activity in the direction they should be migrating in. Most species go through a period of excessive feeding, needing to pack away as much energy as aerodynamics will allow for the journey that inevitably lay ahead. We see it all around us in the clouds of blackbirds roiling through the air or flocks of geese descending on a recently-harvested field. This period of restlessness is referred to as Zugunruhe by biologists who study animal behaviour and it’s a phenomenon observed both in the spring and in the fall, just prior to the mass migrations that move millions of birds along north-south flyways over the continent.

Here, in the boreal forest, it’s a phenomenon that usually starts in August. Our summers are relatively short and as soon as breeding is over, the preparation of the twice-yearly journey gets underway, especially in songbirds, who have to travel thousands of kilometres to Central and South America. With their time here so fleeting and the journey so long and fraught with danger, you can’t help but wonder, why go through all the trouble?

Why not stay in the tropics, where the weather is favourable and save all of the energy and risk associated with long-distance travel? The answer to that question likely varies to a certain degree between species; but evidence suggests that food, or rather the lack of it, was likely the driver behind the evolution of long-distance migration in many birds.

Most of today’s migratory species likely evolved near the equator, enjoying consistently tolerable weather and relatively abundant food. However, as populations started to grow and segment into different species, the pressure on food sources grew to a point where the survival of some depended on searching out new resources. The only place to go was away, into the temperate zones north and south of the tropics. Those that did, discovered abundant resources, millions of insects, and a glut of fruit and vegetation. The problem was it only lasts for a short period of time, forcing those explorers to retreat back to the warm haven to the south during the winter months.

Over millenia, these paths have been extended and entrenched by generations of birds winging their way along now well-established routes.  As those paths have become increasingly ensconced in the collective memories of each species, so has the irrepressible need to travel those routes that spurs everything from hummingbirds to harriers on their way twice a year.

With migration in full swing here in Manitoba, the period of zugunruhe is actually over; but once balance of night and day swings back into the favour of the light, the millions of birds enjoying the warmth of their winter homes will feel the inexorable pull once again, the restlessness building until one day, they’ll have no choice but to take to the air and find their way back to us.

The Edge of Darkness

As I’ve mentioned before, I have always had a love for obscure words, especially those that find everyday use in the lexicon of certain specialties.

Crespuscular is one of those words.

I use it all the time, but it’s definitely not common knowledge, something that’s become increasingly obvious over the many years that I’ve been a nature interpreter. I’ll throw it out there, along with other natural history terms, like ‘nocturnal’ or ‘carnivore’. While my charges usually nod sagely in understanding at these other adjectives, ‘crespuscular’ usually elicits furrowed brows and working tongues as they try to wrap their mouths around the syllables, eyes rolled up towards their brains, as though watching it try to divine the word’s meaning.

It’s too bad, because it’s a good word. It’s also a great way to be. A crepuscular animal is one that is most active at twilight, straddling the line between night and day in the muted light of either dawn or dusk. It certainly my favourite time to be out and about, probably because I’m in such good company.

Many animals are crepuscular in their habits; the most notable of which,  for me, are the owls. Species, like the Great Gray Owl, are at their best at this hazy time of day, making use of their enormous eyes and highly-tuned hearing to pick up the slightest rustle of prey along the forest floor. Owls, however, are not the only birds that enjoy this shoulder time. Common Nighthawks and Wilson Snipe also come alive in the dusk, the former swooping and diving through the gloom, scooping up millions of flying insects that have taken to the air after the heat of the day before the cool night temperatures slows their metabolisms and forces them back to earth. Most songbirds reserve their choruses for the crepuscular hours; Olive-sided Flycatchers announcing the dawn and Hermit Thrushes heralding the dusk, their refrains rounded out by the harmonies of breeding frogs.

Most boreal mammals are also crepuscular in their habits. The dull grey winter coat of the white-tailed deer is at its most invisible in the murky hours of twilight, especially to the mostly colour-blind vision of their carnivorous predators. Bats join the nighthawks in their aerial quest for a meal and rabbits emerge from the shadows, taking advantage of the low light to grab a quick nibble before complete darkness makes it difficult to spot approaching danger.

In reality, the busiest time of day, in whatever habitat you might live, is twilight. So, whether you are an early bird, who rises before the dawn, or a night owl, like me, who takes comfort in the release of the day as the sun slips below the horizon, get outside at these tenuous moments and discover the beauty and wonder of becoming crepuscular in your habits.

You know, that sounds kind of dirty …

I spent quite a bit of time, several years ago, teaching first-year biology labs and when this word came up in the botany section, it would always draw a few muffled snickers from the crowd.

It’s not really all that surprising. Gymnosperm is kind of a funny word; makes me think of some smarmy guy who hangs out at fitness centres, trying to pick up women. Of course, it’s nothing of the sort. Like many scientific terms, it is of Greek origin and basically means ‘naked seed.’

In technical terms, Gymnosperms are a group of seed-bearing plants whose seeds are not contained within an ovary.  The most commonly-known members of this group are the conifers. Here in the north woods, we have a lot of different gymnosperms: spruce (pictured here), pine, tamarack and firs.

So, what exactly do they mean by naked seeds?

In other vascular plants, like flowers, broad-leaved trees and pretty much everything else out there but mosses and ferns, developing seeds are protected inside a closed chamber called an ovary. Instead, gymnosperm seeds are formed on specialized leaves known as sporophylls, which ultimately become the scales of the cones we know so well. Although they are somewhat protected by cones, the scales usually hang open, leaving the seeds exposed, naked.

The rest of the seed-bearing plants out there do things a little differently.  They fall into a group known as angiosperms. In these plants, the seed is kept safe and sound inside the aforementioned ovary, which, once fertilized, becomes the fruit of the plant. As we all know from experience, that fruit comes in all manner of shapes and sizes from the winged seeds of a maple tree to a giant watermelon.

So, what’s the difference? Why should having a naked seed matter?

Having your seeds exposed makes you more vulnerable to the effects of the elements. Seeds that are out in the open are much more likely to dry out or be damaged in some other way. By keeping their seeds inside a protective core, angiosperms can withstand a wider scope of environments, allowing them to exploit more niches. This is why angiosperms have diversified into the most successful group of plants in the world, with possibly over 260,000 species.

Still, gymnosperms have been very successful in many places. Look at the boreal forest. In its northern reaches especially, they are the dominant tree species. The tallest living plant and the oldest single living organism are both gymnosperms. It’s all about making the most of what you have and when you do that in the right environment, you can’t help but flourish.

The Joy of Obscure Words

After over 10 years as an academic, I forget sometimes that I’ve accumulated a vocabulary that most other people have never heard of. Every now and then, I’ll throw a word into a conversation or program that will leave people gazing back at me blankly, brows furrowed in confusion.

The thing is, I don’t do it to impress anyone. I use them because there just isn’t another word out there that better describes what I’m trying to say.

Subnivean is one of those words. I figured that since we’re on the subject of snow, (and we’re getting more of it as I write this), it would be a good time to bring it up.

Subnivean is a great word. Once you break it down, it’s quite simple. Sub = under, nivea = snow. Basically, it refers to anything that is found under the snow. Most of the time, it’s used to describe the habits of animals that are found living under the snow.

There are actually quite a few of them. Small mammals, like mice, voles, lemmings and shrews are too small to grow a winter coat of fur when things get cold. That much hair would make walking a challenge.  Instead, they take advantage of a rather ubiquitous source of insulation: snow. The white stuff is an excellent insulator. On days out here when the mercury drops down well below -30 degrees C, the temperature at the bottom layer of snow, right where it’s in contact with the ground, is still hovering around the freezing mark, a much more comfortable temperature for our furry little friends.

That bottom layer of snow is quite a bit different from the rest of the layers above it. It’s referred to as the pukak layer (an Inuit term) and is usually very crystaline, almost like sugar. This type of structure makes it easy for mice and voles to create an entire network of tunnels completely hidden from the hungry eyes of predators.

That doesn’t mean they are completely safe. Predators like weasels and mink can follow them down into the tunnels, while foxes and owls listen for them from above (a story for another day). Still, with lots of readily-available food, shelter and relative safety, being subnivean isn’t a bad way to be for a small mammal.

However, there are reasons to come ‘top-side’ now and then. The pukak layer can be compacted by snow collapsing or from people walking or driving snowmobiles over it, making the substrate impenetrable.  It can also get hard to breathe down there. With all sorts of critters running around in what is essentially a closed environment, CO2 can build up, making it necessary to punch a few air holes to clear things out (above).

So next time you’re out for a walk in the snow, keep your eyes peeled for the subtle signs of our subnivean neighbours.