Not
long ago I rediscovered in my basement a century-old collection of bird eggs
that were passed along to me by a friend who discovered them when cleaning out
his own basement about a decade ago. They were apparently collected by a friend
of his grandmother.
Contained in a beautiful wooden case and protected
by a thick layer of sawdust, the 32 tiny songbird eggs appear to represent many
of the species that will be arriving here in Rhode Island on migration in the
next few weeks – thrushes, warblers, sparrows, wrens and more – though I’ve
been unable to identify most of them. They range from the classic robin’s-egg
blue
to pure white, and many have speckles and smears of brown on a white, tan
or gray background. They’re almost too delicate to handle.
Because it’s the season of the
Easter bunny and his delivery of eggs to good boys and girls – or maybe that’s
Santa Claus – it got me thinking about the wide variety of wildlife eggs that
are certain to be laid and hatched during this season of renewal.
Birds lay round, oblong or oval eggs
of varying sizes and colors, depending on the species. Many bluebirds and
phoebes are already sitting on their eggs by now. Tiny chicks of great horned owls and barred
owls have already hatched and are growing in their nests under parental care.
But most of the birds that breed in our area have yet to get started.
That’s not true of most of the
egg-laying amphibians in southern New England. Several weeks ago, most wood
frogs, spring peepers and spotted salamanders laid their eggs wrapped in a
bad-tasting jelly-like coating that protects them from be being eaten by
predators before they hatch in local ponds. Green frogs and American toads are
due to do the same thing any time now. When the eggs hatch a couple weeks
later, the emerging tadpoles spend several months growing into adults before climbing
out of the water and spending most of the rest of their lives on land.
Snakes are an unusual case. About
two-thirds of the world’s snakes lay eggs, but the rest give birth to live
young. Among the egg-layers in our area are ring-necked snakes, milk snakes and
black racers, while two of our most common snakes, the garter snake and
northern water snake, bear live young. For most species, egg-laying takes place
in June or July, and they hatch a month or two later. But don’t expect to
stumble across snake eggs like you might find bird eggs or frog eggs. They’re
typically laid in a burrow or under soft soil in inconspicuous places.
That’s not necessarily true of
turtle eggs, however. Most dig nests in the sandy soil adjacent to the ponds
where they spend most of their lives, and the disturbed soil is often a
give-away to the location of the nest. Raccoons know that, so they dig amid the
disturbed soil to find and eat whatever eggs they can unearth. The large size
of snapping turtle nests make them especially vulnerable to raccoons, and I
know several places where snappers nest every year and where I usually find the
remains of their shells after having been predated.
But somehow, despite all the threats
that nature – and humans – put in their way, enough of those eggs tend to
survive to hatching, and enough of the hatchlings make it to adulthood to keep
the species going. Even those that aren’t known to breed like Easter rabbits.
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