Rites of Spring

by Dr. Sarah D. Oktay
Managing Director UMass Boston Nantucket Field Station

Each year, people on Nantucket seem even more desperate to celebrate the first indicator of spring, whether it is a peeper or a daffodil or an increase in traffic around the rotary.  Our winter hibernation season, which seems both too long and too short to me, is brought to a halt by a peep or flash of color announcing that spring is finally here.  Our connections to the trees and other plants and animals on the island make it relatively easy to see the first buds, grass greening, and suddenly abundant rabbits foraging. You might remember from an article published here a couple of years ago on peepers (archived at archives/science/1-a.php) the peep you hear is the way males find their mates.  The deafening noise around our wetlands is basically their version of the 80s disco scene.  In 2009, (archives/science/4.php) we learned that in spring, bunnies are busy lining their nests to keep their kits (baby bunnies) warm.  Vernal ponds are becoming very active now with many species of insects entering early larval (instar) stages.  And these are only a few of the many minor miracles occurring around the island as the ground warms up and plants and animals crank up their metabolic activity.

As you walk around on some of the Nantucket Conservation Foundation, Mass Audubon, Trustees of the Reservations, and Land Bank trails, you’ll see that the emerging leaves on the trees have a hint of pink or red which a botanical friend of mine (sounds like a plant is talking to me, I mean a human who knows a lot about plants) told me is “nature’s sunscreen.”  The roseate coloring is how a plant protects its more delicate parts from the sun’s UVA and UVB rays.  Our tender and common scrub oak (Quercus ilicifolia) leaves are a great example of this.  Researchers have found that these same red pigments - called anthocyanins – are also produced in greater quantities in the fall in plants such as maples, oaks, dogwoods and viburnums to act like sunscreen as the plants are storing up nutrients for the winter.

Typical spring happenings on island include hearing and seeing “our” ospreys returning from South America to the nests they fledged from or the surrounding area.  Their piercing cries are unmistakable in the cool air.  Senõr Bones, named by Nantucket Elementary students (Mrs. Davis’ 1st grade class), banded by Dr. Bob Kennedy at the UMass Boston Nantucket Field Station and later outfitted with a tracking device by Kennedy and Dr. Rob Bierregaard of UNC Charlotte (2010/science/3-hannah.php) was in central Florida on April 1st and should be back on island by the time you read this.  Across the country, school groups and biologists and science educators record the first blooms, peeps, and unfurling as we plug into a human network of observational science to predict and record how spring is sprung across the country. Last year we talked about Project Budburst (www.budburst.ucar.edu) which has been going on for several years now and is co-managed by the National Ecological Observatory Network, Inc. (NEON) and the Chicago Botanical Garden.  They are looking for reports of blooming forsythia and red maple (both of which can be found here on island) among other species in their list of the top ten most wanted plant species in America.  All this recording and observing and monitoring of how spring is sprung is part of phenology, which is the study of periodic plant and animal life cycle events and how these are influenced by seasonal and interannual variations in climate (2010/science/1-spring.php).  It is something that is virtually impossible NOT to do here on Nantucket.  The word is derived from the Greek “phainomai,” which means “to appear” or “come into view.”  So we can see that phenology is specifically concerned with the dates of first occurrence of biological events in their annual cycle.

Nantucket is an excellent place to study microclimates on your next walk. One side or the other of the many roads crisscrossing the moors now have bearberry blooms peering out on the warmer side of the road; the indentation of the road due to erosion and many years of use provides natural ledges for the heavily vegetated plants of both sides which helps them drain and keeps them from being covered in sand.  Trailing Arbutus (Epigaea repens) also known as the Mayflower is showing off its pretty white and fragrant flowers in select spots as recently as April 15th.  Bearberry  (Arctostaphylos uvaursi),  a sandplain heathland plant, is in bloom now on path sides in the moors and along areas accessed via the Land Bank’s Shawkemo trails off Polpis. As one side or the other is more exposed to the sun’s drying and warming rays, those plants will bloom and bear fruit first. Bearberry forms low mats of dense vegetation and have flowers that are bell-shaped. This Trustees of the Reservations document “ A Picture Guide to Interesting Flowering Plants” by Lloyd Raleigh (www.thetrustees.org/assets/documents/places-to-visit/Flora.pdf) has wonderful pictures of many of our common native plants in bloom so you’ll know what you are looking at while out on a the trails on a warm spring day.  I could not find a picture guide to not-so-interesting plants, but I bet it is out there.

I am writing this week’s column from one of my favorite places on the planet — the La Selva Biological Field Station in Costa Rica (-www.ots.ac.cr/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=162&Itemid=348).  I am being spoiled while I work with scientists, teachers, field station directors, and education experts from around the country.  This is a perfect activity for spring, when the promise to teach science better and in a more interesting way is still fresh.

Nothing says spring to me more than the sight of a two-toned, yellow and blue Central American whiptail lizard or Ameiva festiva Lichtenstein 1856 (great name!).  According to our rainforest naturalist and guide, this little guy is sporting a blue tail to signal to any territorially-inclined full grown male Ameiva festiva in the area that he is a juvenile and no threat.  Other sources of information on Ameiva festiva  say that the blue tail is to attract females (in a Rod-Stewart-like show of restraint) and/or to warn of birds of a poisonous taste.  Obviously we will have to enlist some hapless juvenile lizard, a female lizard or two (one might just be in a picky mood), an older male and a bird or other predator to figure this out. This is why science is fun!

So what does this lizard have to do with Nantucket? The many rainforest frogs I see here such as the beautiful but deadly strawberry poison dart frog, Oophaga pumilio formerly the artist known as Dendrobates pumilio, remind me of the island peepers (Pseudacris crucifer) with their tiny sucker disc tipped (say that three times fast)  toes and fingers.  Helioconia’s red and yellow and orange flowers remind me of our most famous spring feature on island, the daffodil, which is actually a narcissus. 

Narcissus is the botanic name for a genus of mainly hardy, mostly spring-flowering, bulbs in the Amaryllis family native to Europe, North Africa, and Asia. The ancient Greeks believed the narcissus plant originated from the vain youth, Narcissus. He died after becoming so obsessed with his reflection in a pool he could not leave (one of my brothers had the exact same problem).  Another theory for the origin of the word can be found on Wikipedia: “The name Daffodil is derived from an earlier "Affodell," a variant of Asphodel. The reason for the introduction of the initial "d" is not known, although a probable source is an etymological merging from the Dutch article "de," as in "De affodil." From at least the 16th century, "daffadown dilly" and "daffydowndilly" have appeared as playful synonyms of the name.  In some countries the yellow variation is associated with Easter. The German word for daffodil is Osterglocke, or "Easter bell.” With such an interesting etymology, you can imagine how complex all the cultivars and varieties can be. Here on Nantucket, they make people smile and deer leave them alone, and although they are not native or indigenous plants, you can’t help but think spring when you see them. There are many extremely knowledgeable people on island who are information goldmines on daffodils, so track them down as you enjoy the Festival and you can learn more narcissus at the American Daffodil Society’s webpage www.daffodilusa.org/