Latest Northern Michigan News

Water levels in the Great Lakes are really high right now. Lakes Michigan, Huron and Erie are all breaking records and creating all sorts of problems for communities on their shores.

Kris Kruid was halfway across the world and had to race the coronavirus to get back to her home in Honor.  Borders were slamming shut behind her. She was in 13 airports in 8 days.  She told her story to Red Pine Radio producer Cheryl Bartz.

“I was in Botswana on a trip we’d been planning for a year to go on safari and then go see the great apes," she recalls. "Then my traveling companion turned on her phone and saw the news about borders closing. So then we had to get out.  South Africa was closing, and Kenya had already closed."

In the early days of the pandemic Munson Healthcare administrators were in a flurry of panic.

Terry McMillan is a bestselling author known for her novels that feature female African American characters. Two of them, “Waiting to Exhale” and “How Stella Got Her Groove Back,” were made into major motion pictures. Her latest book is “It’s Not All Downhill from Here.” Terry appeared at a virtual National Writers Series event. She spoke with Detroit’s director of arts and culture, Rochelle Riley. In the second half of our program today, we’ll hear a discussion with Scott Turow.

Green frogs

The rest of June is the peak time of year to hear green frogs calling.  “Green frog” is actually a species name.  These frogs might be green, yellow, olive or brown.

Kathy Gray, who volunteers with the Michigan DNR Frog and Toad Survey says, “it’s only the males who sing and they are trying to attract a female. That is how they sound. Like a banjo string. Just one kind-of-not-in-tune banjo string being plucked.”

Monarch Butterflies are arriving in Michigan.  They overwinter in Mexico.  But it’s not actually the same monarch that arrives in Michigan that left Mexico. For some reason the monarch can make the trip from Michigan down to Mexico, but to return takes a few generations of butterflies.  So the one that arrives in Michigan might be the great great grandchild of the one that left Mexico.

It’s the peak of fawning season in Northern Michigan.

Steve Griffith, wildlife biologist with DNR, says right about now does are leaving their groups to find secluded places to give birth.  “As soon as the fawn can manage to walk, she’ll move them to a new spot and hide them.  And she’ll leave them for 8, 10, 12 hours at a time, feeding, but feeding close by, then she’ll come back and nurse. People think they’re abandoned. Very likely not the case. The mother is nearby.”

U.S. tart cherry growers and processors narrowly voted to renew the Federal Marketing Order last week. The FMO passed with 53 percent of growers and 57 percent of processors in favor.

On the Guide this week:

Kirtland’s Warblers will be showing up in the jack pine forests around Gaylord and Grayling this week.  There’s been good news about this bird in recent years. If you went back to 1971, there were just 167 pairs of Kirtland’s Warblers in the world.  In 2017, there were 2,000 pairs. That allowed it to be reclassified as a threatened species rather than an endangered species. 

Governor Gretchen Whitmer says some rural regions of the state can partially re-open Friday, May 22 due to low COVID-19 infection rates. Restaurants and bars will be able operate at 50 percent seating capacity in the Upper Peninsula and 17 counties in the northern Lower Peninsula.

This week on the guide: 

This week is prime time for bird watching up north. You can see all kinds of colorful birds like Indigo Buntings, Baltimore Orioles, Scarlet Tanagers and a whole range of warblers and they’re easier to see because the trees haven’t leafed out yet. 

This week on the guide:

Early season trout fly fishing centers around the Hendrickson fly hatch that some call “The Gentlemen’s Hatch.”

On the guide this week: the sky dance of woodcocks, the appetite and torpor of bats and the first spring flowering ephemerals.

Peter Heller is a writer of literary nonfiction and novels, including his bestseller “The Dog Stars.”  His latest novel, “The River,” is a thriller that draws from some of Peter’s own experiences canoeing wild rivers. Peter Heller talks this hour with fellow author Peter Robertson. 

On the guide today: how eastern chipmunks use social distancing, the danger of overharvesting ramps and the sonic power of ruffed grouse.

The video we mention, produced by the Ruffed Grouse Society, is here.

Thanks to Cheryl Bartz, Larry Mawby and Leslie Hamp for production help.

County health departments are asking businesses that remain open to step up their efforts to prevent transmission of the coronavirus.

On the audio guide today: the first butterflies of spring, nesting bald eagles and oak wilt.

Also, a good reason to put off raking up all that leafy debris in your yards. 

You can report sightings of turtles and other reptiles and amphibians to the Michigan Herp Atlas.

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, millions of people across the state are working remotely from home — or not at all. But on April 7 the State House of Representatives will go back to work in Lansing.