It was a February morning. The weather had been cold, but the air felt new. An American Robin was singing from a wooden fence post in the mist. That song changed everything.
Before the first tree remembered to leaf out. Before the first flowers of the woods poked up. The robin knew it was time.
The color of the fence post
The post the robin chose to light on was the same color as the bird’s own breast, the color of live coals.
The fence post got its color from the Firedot lichen that grew there in a thin layer. This lichen emerges as a very tight crust, more in the surface than upon it. You cannot peel it off without taking away some of the wood.
The crust of lichen
With my pocketknife I pried off a narrow strip and brought it home to look at under the microscope.
Magnified, the orange lichen appeared chunky and granular, like oatmeal crust on Apple Betty.
Sunscreen orange
This Firedot lichen often lives on fence posts, in full sun. The orange pigment shields the sensitive lichen from ultraviolet light. It’s like sunscreen.
The orange pigments, which are called carotenoids, are chemicals like the ones found in plants such as carrots and many wild fruits.
American Robins use the same carotenoid pigments to produce the color of their breast feathers and to protect themselves against infections. They get the carotenoids by eating colorful wild foods, such as cherries.
Maybe the fire-coal color of the wooden fence post is what attracted the robin to perch there… and sing in the spring
I love the soundbite! It added so much.
It's not on this post, at least what I see. No horizontal line either.