This week I went down to Redstone quarry in search of one of our focal species of trees. Walking down to the pond area, I saw a Paper Birch. While it could have been one of the winter lookalikes, gray, yellow, or river birch, I was confident in this identification because the bark was clearly peeling, which gray birches don’t do. The bark was also the characteristic white color of paper birches and not the gray/gold of yellow birches. River birch also tends to peel much more than paper birch.
There was a lot of bird activity at the quarry this day as well. I saw a Red-Tailed Hawk and recorded a bunch of Cardinal and Blue Jay calls!
