Allegheny Woodrat, a charming packrat

A sheer cliff face of dolomitic limestone thrusts upward from the forest floor in a remote area of Adams County. The rock is pockmarked with crevasses and alcoves; perfect habitat for one of the rarest mammals in Ohio.

Some time back, Laura Hughes invited me along on one of her field research visits to this Allegheny Woodrat site. Of course I said yes, especially as I'd never seen one of these interesting little rodents. So, finally, September 24 was the day, and John Howard and I met Laura and her assistant Shane Herbert early that morning along a road near the Ohio River in southern Adams County.

The night prior, Laura and crew had placed 31 traps in ideal woodrat habitat. This work is spearheaded by longtime woodrat researchers Cheryl Mollohan and Al LeCount, former instructors at Hocking College. Captured woodrats are weighed, sexed, and a small blood sample is taken so that DNA can be extracted.

After arriving at the site, we loaded our gear up and headed back into the woods to see what the traps might yield. The first set was a bust, although Laura thought that they might be most likely to produce a woodrat. Just as I began to wonder if all would be for naught, a cry went up from Laura - a woodrat was in a trap!

We rushed to the scene, and there he was, peeking curiously at his captors. A male Allegheny Woodrat, weight 340 grams. After Laura and Shane efficiently dealt with gathering necessary information, we prepared to release the mammal. There aren't many good photos of woodrats in their native haunts, at least in Ohio, and both John and I wanted to portray the mammal in the best possible light. My big fear was that it would quickly dart back into one of the cliff's narrow crevices, never to be seen again and before we could get any shots off.

Allegheny Woodrat, staring curiously at our group of large bipeds. No need to worry about getting photos, as it turns out. These charming mammals seem to have no fear whatsoever of people, probably because they rarely if ever encounter Homo sapiens, at least at this site. So, upon release into a rocky alcove, the woodrat turned, sat, and stared at us for a good minute or so. During that period, both John and I got some excellent images, with John also obtaining remarkable video footage (a clip is at the end of this post).

I really wish the word "rat" was not in this wonderful little mammal's moniker. That word instantly conjures very bad connotations for most people, as they associate it with the Norway (now, Brown) Rat, Rattus norvegicus. This is the introduced (in this part of the world) rodent that can infest buildings, sewers, dumps, etc., and is a carrier of bubonic plague. The Allegheny Woodrat could not be further in character, habits, and habitat than that invasive mammalian scourge. In fact, we wonder if its common name should be changed to something more user-friendly, such as "Velveteen Cliff-Mouse". Who would not want an animal with a name like that around?

The word "packrat" probably stems from woodrats in the genus Neotoma. These species (only the Allegheny Woodrat, N. magister, occurs in Ohio, but there are about 21 other species, mostly in western North America), are fabled for their propensity to stockpile all manner of items. The above photo shows a woodrat midden ("trash heap") in a long abandoned outbuilding in Adams County. I made the image ten years ago, on one of my previously futile ventures to see one of these beasts.

Woodrat middens are often comprised mostly of leaves, but the curious mammals are attracted to all manner of objects, especially shiny ones. It's not uncommon to find pop can tabs, pieces of glass or metal, rocks, and freshly cut plant material in the middens. Woodrats also have the interesting habit of often strewing dried leaves about the floor of the rocky recesses in which they reside, as perhaps the crackling of the leaves warns them of approaching predators.

Ten or more years ago, Mark Zloba of the Cincinnati Museum's Eulett Center within the Edge of Appalachia Preserve took me into a sinkhole cavern in Adams County on a woodrat hunting quest. While we didn't see any, we knew they were there as fresh fern cuttings were neatly laid upon many of the cave's rocky ledges, as if the woodrat was keeping current with its interior decorating.

The Allegheny Woodrat is in precipitous decline over much of its range, and its fate is unknown. It formerly occurred from Connecticut and New York south through the Appalachians to northern North Carolina and Alabama, but is now gone or reduced to perilously low numbers in many if not most areas. They once occurred more widely in Ohio, such as in the Hocking Hills, but are now absent from all former areas other than the tiny area of Adams County where we saw the animal featured here. Perhaps fewer than 100 woodrats remain in the state.

Threats are many, including logging and other habitat destruction, human disturbance of their cliff-face habitat, and isolation of populations due to habitat fragmentation. Greatly reduced populations may become more vulnerable to extreme winter weather events. But perhaps the greatest threat to the Allegheny Woodrat comes in the form of raccoons, and an associated disease, Raccoon Roundworm. Woodrats contract the disease when they scavenge raccoon scat and mine it for undigested nuts and other plant fruit. The disease is fatal to the woodrats, and as raccoon populations have boomed in most areas, the likelihood of woodrats encountering the roundworm has skyrocketed.

Fortunately, recent work with woodrats may be producing solutions to these issues, especially the raccoon roundworm, so there are glimmers of hope on the horizon. Here in Ohio, the Ohio Chapter of The Nature Conservancy deserves kudos for their acquisition and protection of our only remaining woodrat stronghold.

Video by John Howard

I'll conclude with this wonderful video by John Howard. It brings out the charm of these most interesting of Appalachian mammals, and I hope that a brighter future is in store for the Allegheny Woodrat.

Hike to Buzzardroost Rock

Last Sunday, October 25, dawned crisp and clear. I know, because I watched the sun came up as I drove to one of my favorite places in Ohio. This day was to be the last of the great fall days, weatherwise, and I wanted to be atop a certain conspicuous promontory soon after sunrise.

The sign above points the way to one of the best - and most significant - hikes in the state. The Buzzardroost Rock trail is about a 4.5 mile round trip, and worth every footfall. It is part of the vast Edge of Appalachia Preserve in Adams County. I toted my backpack full of camera gear along, and managed to make a few passable photos during the trek.

The scenery, from a fall leaf color perspective, was still stunning if slightly past peak. One of many great things about living in the vast eastern deciduous forest region is the conspicuous change of seasons. Nothing signals the changing of the guard like late autumn's brilliant burst of foliage. Of course, the color is but a short-lived harbinger of the coming of Old Man Winter, but the next few months of snow and cold will bring their own charms, and make the arrival of spring that much sweeter.

Not a bad canopy to have over one's head! I found myself constantly ogling the trees, searching for the perfect shot. Myriad options presented themselves, and scads of photos were taken, but I like this image as well as anything I clicked off on this pristine day. For those of a photographic bent, it was shot with the Canon 5D Mark III rigged with Canon's 17-40L wide-angle lens, using a focal length of 17 mm. ISO was set to 100, shutter speed was 1/200, and the lens was stopped down to f/8. I was lying on my back in the leaf litter to better get this perspective.

After a fairly speedy hike, I reached the trail's terminus and the namesake Buzzardroost Rock while the sun still hung low in the east. Limestone cliffs tower 70 feet above the forest floor, and the view from the rock is extraordinary. You MUST make this trip at some point.

Buzzardroost Rock is part of the sprawling Edge of Appalachia Preserve, which is co-managed by the Cincinnati Museum Center and the Ohio Chapter of The Nature Conservancy. The preserve now encompasses about 16,000 acres, and TNC regularly adds new parcels. Their Sunshine Ridge corridor project is an effort to link "The Edge" to the 65,000 acre Shawnee State Forest, which lies not far to the east.

The Shawnee/Edge region is the wildest landscape remaining in Ohio, and one of the most significant biological hotspots east of the Mississippi River in North America. Rare habitats and unusual flora and fauna abound, and I have featured scores of them on this blog over the years. The primary reason that so many natural history events - at least ones that I have had a hand in - take place down here is because of the natural diversity. Mothapalooza, Flora-Quest, numerous Ohio Ornithological Society conferences, and the Appalachian Butterfly Conference, are but a few. People attending Mothapalooza III next year will once again be wowed by this area, and one of the trips will journey to the very rock that you are now virtually visiting.

Ohio Brush Creek carves a whopping dimple through heavily forested terrain. This stream is one of Ohio's healthiest, in large part because so much of the buffering landscape has not been badly abused and is largely protected.

The straw-brown tufts of grass at cliff's edge may not look like much, but looks can be deceiving. This plant is Plains Muhlenbergia, Muhlenbergia cuspidata, an Ohio endangered species. It is one of numerous threatened and endangered species found on Edge of Appalachia properties.

On the return trip, I adopted a much more leisurely pace and explored habitats such as this prairie opening. Signs of former pasturing were present, but managers are working to return this spot, and many others, to barrens prairies. The botanical diversity in places such as this is fabulous, and botanists can lose themselves for hours searching about barrens prairies. It was a habitat similar to this that I made the photos of Stiff Gentians featured in the previous post.

While their collective voices have largely been muted, a number of singing insects still held on. This is a Treetop Bush Katydid, Scudderia fasciata. Many of the katydids seem to color up somewhat as fall fades, their increased reddish pigments serving to better allow the insects to blend with senescent fall foliage. This animal is a male, and note his ear, just below the knee on its foreleg. While that may seem to be an odd place to have one's ear, it serves these insects well. By having its ears as far apart as possible, the insect can better triangulate on sounds and pinpoint their source.

Asters are without doubt the botanical markers of fall's conclusion, and many species hold on past first frosts. This one is a rarity, the Shale-barren Aster, Symphyotrichum oblongifolium (Sim-fee-oh-tri-kum oh-blon-gih-fol-ee-um). Horticulturists have worked wonders with this species, and a cultivar is now widespread and available at many nurseries. Get one if you can. Shale-barren Aster is a pollinator magnet extraordinaire.

If you get the chance to visit the Edge of Appalachia Preserve, by all means do so. More information is available RIGHT HERE, and HERE.