Gray birch seeds fall as warblers arrive

The gray birch stands release their seeds now in late spring, each catkin breaking apart into thousands of papery fragments that spiral down through the warming air. If you're walking beneath these trees, you might notice the faint rustling as the tiny winged seeds settle on your shoulders or catch in the new grass. The timing is precise. Just as the Northern Parulas and other migrant warblers reach their breeding territories, the birches finish their work of the year.

The Northern Parula moves through the mid-canopy with quick, deliberate motions, its blue-gray back and yellow throat bright against the fresh green leaves. This small warbler has traveled from Central America to find the right combination of moisture, insects, and nesting material. It seeks out places where old man's beard lichen drapes from the branches, weaving the gray strands into a pouch-shaped nest. The parula's buzzy trill rises and falls as the male establishes his territory, a sound that carries clearly in the still morning air. While the warbler hunts for caterpillars and emerging flies, the birch seeds continue their descent, creating a carpet that will feed other birds through the summer months.

The gray birch completes its reproductive cycle quickly each spring, producing small cones that mature and release their contents before the heat of summer sets in. Each seed weighs almost nothing, designed to travel on the slightest breeze, but most fall within a few hundred feet of the parent tree. The American Goldfinches will work these seed patches through June and July, their bright yellow forms easy to spot as they cling to the spent catkins or forage on the ground. The seeds provide the high-fat nutrition that goldfinches need during their own delayed breeding season. Unlike most songbirds, goldfinches wait until midsummer to nest, timing their reproduction to coincide with the abundance of seeds from birches, thistles, and other late-flowering plants.

The forest holds both arrivals and departures now. While the parulas and other warblers settle into their breeding routines, the birches shift from reproduction to growth, putting their energy into expanding leaves and strengthening roots. The dropped seeds create small disturbances in the leaf litter where they land, and some will germinate in the filtered sunlight of small clearings. Others will be carried further by wind or water, or stored in the cheek pouches of chipmunks for winter caches they may never retrieve. Listen for the parula's ascending buzz somewhere in the canopy above you. The sound rises like a question, then drops to a definitive note, repeated every few seconds as the bird works its way through the branches where the last birch seeds are still falling.