Finding your own 'backyard park'
While a walk in the woods in early September can still be buggy and muggy and not very birdy, there is a lot to see in the backyards of southern Illinois as summer begins to fade.
And while many folks automatically look to a nearby state park or chunk of national forest to go to in search of wildlife, this week I'm encouraging you to stay home and explore your very own "backyard park."
This is prime butterfly and hummingbird time in southern Illinois and a silent wave of migrant songbirds, heading south for the winter, has begun to show up, adding even more biodiversity to your little park.
I'm a fan of sitting on my deck in the morning with a cup of coffee and a pair of binoculars and watching the wildlife dramas unfold.
Watching the action at my two hummingbird feeders is actually a bit stressful, and I wonder how, with all the chasing that goes on, those hard-earned little sips of sugar water are worth the effort.
Northern cardinals make regular checks of the tomato plants in my garden and no doubt have plucked off several juicy tomato horn worms. While Carolina chickadees hang upside down under the drooping heads of the giant sunflowers and pluck seeds from the original sunflower seed feeder.
These dewy fall mornings are a great time to see and admire spider webs in my backyard including those of the big black-and-yellow argiope orb-weaving spider.
Once the sun is up a bit and the dew begins to dry, the butterflies flutter in and make the rounds of the zinnias in my garden. The big swallowtails are the most dramatic but there are several other smaller species. Monarch butterflies also find my flower patch and I marvel to think that they will migrate to Mexico for the winter!
Reptile-wise, the last few summers I have been able to consistently find a couple box turtles in my garden munching on my cucumbers. After a couple of failed attempts at relocating the turtles, we have arrived at a truce. Anyway, they don't eat much.
Speaking of garden robbers, this year appears to have produced a bumper crop of eastern cottontail rabbits. They relentlessly mowed down my sweet potato slips and green bean plants this spring, but now they seem to be mostly innocent, and undeniably cute, garden occupants.
Like I mentioned earlier, lots of migrant songbirds are back in southern Illinois, heading south now, and a day of birdwatching off my deck can net 40 species including warblers, flycatchers, orioles, and tanagers that haven't been here since the spring.
I get all this entertainment and more for zero dollars and free cents, and I get refills on coffee!
Like Dorothy in "The Wizard of Oz," we all often dream about trails and parks full of wildlife "somewhere over the rainbow" when, in reality, there can be no place like home.
So take time this fall to enjoy your backyard park, and I'll see you back on the trail next week!
• Mike Baltz has a PhD in biology from the University of Missouri and writes about changing the world from his home in Carbondale.