Minnesota Outdoors: This Week in Nature hungry hummingbirds are migrating
Your weekly glimpse at what’s happening outside.
By Lisa Meyers McClintick
September 5, 2024 at 12:00PM
Ruby-throated hummingbirds are on the move from northern nesting areas to coastal states, Central America and Mexico. Watch for their fast wings and listen for chirps as they feistily drain nectar feeders and swarm favorite plants such as butterfly bushes throughout the state as they fuel up for the big journey. You can log or follow sightings at Hummingbird Central.
Ghost pipes are popping
These white and sometimes pink-toned plants have been popping up in shaded, humus-rich wooded areas statewide, particularly after rainfall. Because ghost pipe lacks chlorophyll for photosynthesis, it saps nutrients from tree roots with mycorrhizal fungi as the intermediate source.
Wild hazelnuts are ready, if you can beat the squirrels
Two types of wild hazelnuts, American and beaked, are ripening on shrubs in shaded woods across most of the state except the southwest and Arrowhead corners. Ripe nuts can be tasty, but tough to find and harvest as they’re quickly eaten or squirreled away by wildlife.
Lisa Meyers McClintick of St. Cloud has freelanced for the Minnesota Star Tribune since 2001 and volunteers as a Minnesota Master Naturalist.
about the writer
Lisa Meyers McClintick
The southern species is pushing north in Minnesota, where its habitat overlaps with its northern cousin; researchers want to know what that means for both.
