Nature Where I Live: San Francisco: Midwest Interlude, Pt. 4

Virginia Creeper, National Grove Forest Preserve, Cook County, Illinois

I first stumbled onto the National Grove while making random explorations during a bike ride over the summer. Now that I'm back in Chicago for a spell, I thought I knew where I'd been and that it would be an easy walk to get there. I went the wrong way at one of the forks in the road though, and ended up having a different adventure than the one I'd expected. The next day I corrected my mistake and enjoyed an excellent stroll through the woods along the Des Plaines River, only to run my camera battery down to zero much sooner than I expected or desired. The forest preserve has since become my go-to, daily nature walk.

Around the house, all is quiet. The cicadas have stopped buzzing. Butterflies and katydids have moved on or died and left their eggs to carry on the next generation in the spring. A single squirrel occasionally nibbles maple seeds in the branches high above the back deck, unseen among the dense, still-green leaves; the oaks have been picked clean of acorns. A pair of rabbits hunker down in the yard once in a while, tucked into balls like furry puffballs on the lawn. Even the robins and house sparrows seem to have gone elsewhere, and it's not even cold yet. I still go for my walks in shorts and t-shirt, with temperatures much like the west side of San Francisco.

I came back out to Chicago on what turned out to be the last day my mother-in-law was still able to communicate with her LCD e-writing board after taking a sudden and precipitous turn in her battle with bulbar ALS. She is still on a respirator 24 hours a day, and during the month I was back in San Francisco an oxygen concentrator was hooked into the respirator. With very few, very brief exceptions, she can no longer open her eyes, and can make only the most basic responses to what she hears and experiences.

For the last seven days she has been off food, water, and most medications on the advice of the hospice medical team. Toward the end of life, tube feeding only increases one's discomfort and potential for complications. It took a day or two for my wife and brother-in-law to get used to the abrupt end to her busy feeding and medicine schedule, but they're still administering anxiety medication and morphine via oral syringe, as well as continuing to keep her as comfortable as possible.

During the last few days it was startling and awe-inspiring to watch her breaths, so light and apparently fragile, yet still bringing life. Only after eight days did that fine, frayed thread finally break, right along with our hearts.

I was surprised to find a new-to-me bird, a palm warbler, foraging on someone's lawn in Riverside.

Cottontail, National Grove Forest Preserve

Most days I see these cute fellows busily collecting food for the winter, including a couple of chubby-cheeked chipmunks that scurryied across the sidewalk and ducked into cover, too fast for my camera.

It's hard to tell from this shot, but this is a yellow-rumped warbler. Around here they seem to travel in larger groups than they do back in San Francisco.

Des Plaines River reflections on a sunny day.

In addition to the yellow-rumped warblers, I was glad to make another familiar find, a hermit thrush.

On another day I took a bike ride out to the Salt Creek Trail and spotted this coyote about to cross a somewhat open stretch of meadow. I tried to be sly, but the coyote turned around as soon as he saw me point a camera his way and disappeared into the taller weeds.

Still no chubby cheeks, but I liked the addition of mushrooms growing on the log.

North America's smallest woodpecker, the downy woodpecker, is among the more common species I've been spotting. Although they are usually too far away to photograph, I'll occasionally get lucky and have one land near me while I'm just standing still.

The cardinal was picking berries in a photogenic spot, only to hop over onto these cables to eat one. When it returned to the bushes it moved too deep into the foliage to give me a more "natural" shot. Deeper into the woods I discovered a new plant that turned out to be a kind of greenbrier with edible berries. I was surprised that none of the birds were going after them.

Red-bellied Woodpecker

Downy Woodpecker

I was surprised to see this doe browsing in the woods from which a guy with two large off-leash dogs had just emerged. Somehow they must have passed right by without spooking the deer.

Not all the deer were easy to spot.

I felt right at home listening to a red-shouldered hawk calling out across the Des Plaines River, and then it swooped over the water and landed in a tree right above me. The red foliage on the tree snag to the left is Virginia creeper.

This was my first-ever Nashville warbler. I've seen a few other beautiful and new-to-me birds but have unable to lock focus on them in the subdued light of recent cloudy days.

You can see the chubby cheeks in this one, even though they appear to be empty at the moment.

I was looking at the mushroomy stump where I'd photographed a chipmunk on another day when I realized a doe was bedded down and ruminating not far behind it. Had I not looked at the stump, I'm sure I'd have walked right past the deer without seeing her.

This might be as close as I get to photographing a chubby-cheeked chipmunk.

When I first heard these alarm chirps, I assumed a bird was making the sound. I was surprised to finally track down the chirp to a chipmunk.

When I saw how difficult it was for this yellow-rumped warbler to pick off one of these berries high in a tree I realized why the birds haven't been going after the greenbrier just yet. The greenbrier berries look black and ripe at first glance but show their green side on closer examination, and are still quite firmly attached to the stems.

I don't try to photograph the squirrels for the most part -- and they don't usually stick around to tempt me. Woodland squirrels are much more skittish than yard squirrels. I'd been standing still when this guy climbed into view, and he fled as soon as he noticed me.

One of the reasons I was standing still was in the hope of this winter wren, which I'd seen busily hopping around near the ground, making an appearance out in the open.

Several northern flickers were flying to this tall tree to peck at something in that bowl.

A brown creeper gave me a nice view, then moved on with all the other birds of a feather. Moments later, the area that had been quite birdy just moments before had become a ghost town.