Evergreens in Winter

This class took place the day before a blizzard was expected, so we had deep snow on our minds as we searched for evergreen trees and thought about their importance to wildlife in winter.  First, they provide food.  For instance, deer eat the twigs and needles as high as they can reach.  We found raggedly nipped off small branches on the evergreens along our walk.  Rabbits also eat the greenery that is low to the ground.  We were surprised to learn that porcupines can spend a couple of weeks in a single hemlock tree feeding on the bark and twigs.  Also, the seeds found in cones (or dropped by them), including the blue berry-like cones of red cedars, are a good source of food for red squirrels (and flying squirrels?), chipmunks and numerous birds such as chickadees and nuthatches.

Evergreens are also important in winter for the shelter that they provide.  Birds may roost among the branches, red squirrels may nest in them, deer-mice may re-use a bird's nest, and an evergreen grove is a favorite place for deer to have a winter "yard" where they rest away from high winds and deep snow.  The snow is not as deep under evergreens as it is out in the open or under deciduous trees such as oaks and maples.  Dense evergreens cut down on cold winds reaching animals sheltering inside. 

On our walk we found white pine, balsam fir, another kind of fir that we did not identify yet, and 3 kinds of cedar.  We smelled the balsam needles and crushed the scaly cedar needles for a very different smell.  We also found several deposits of deer scat, some rabbit scat and a fox or coyote scat.  One of the things that we encountered was a small wetland that was frozen over.  It was very solid and shallow (a few inches), so we have a lot of crazy fun sliding around, exploring, and playing on the ice.  On the way back to the school, we found ice in the crevices of some large rocks in front of the school.

Back inside, we examined samples of evergreens: white pine, 2 firs, 3 cedars and 1 hemlock.  We noticed that pine needles are longer and are grouped together, joined at one end where the needle packet is attached to the twig.  Hemlock and fir needles, on the other hand, are shorter and attached separately to the twigs.  Cedars have scale-like needles that fan out in pretty patterns.  We learned that fir needles are kind of soft compared to spruce needles.  We had to take our instructor's word on that because we did not find any spruce.  We saw that hemlock and balsam needles have white lines on the underside.  All evergreen needles have a kind of waxy coating that helps the trees conserve water in winter.  Winter is pretty much a drought time for trees because water is "locked up," frozen in the ground and in snow. 

We used small snipped up twigs, and packets of needles to decorate pencil containers.  Here is what you need:

• evergreen twigs and needles
• strip of paper (cut to size that can wrap around a can)
• cleaned soup (or other) cans
• laminator or clear contact paper
• scissors
• scotch tape 
• pencil or marker
• glue stick

We glued the twigs and needles on the paper and labeled them (balsam, hemlock, etc.).  Then we laminated the decorated paper, cut off the excess laminator plastic, wrapped the can and taped the paper's ends. Easy!