In the Right Place: Strangers in Paradise

This is one of three scruffy ducks that were loafing in our pond yesterday, probably conspiring to do no good. They were faux male Mallards and their history is more interesting than their appearance.

A pure drake Mallard and his mate are beautiful birds But, many would argue that there are too many Mallards and there is trouble and unnatural brazenness in wildlife numbers. This is especially so when the wildlife becomes dependent on humans. It’s thought that wild Mallards were the first ducks to be captured and bred by prehistoric man, thus becoming the forebears of domestic ducks.

Leighton Archive Image

Now, Mallards have become, by far, the most abundant duck in many jurisdictions, including Maine. Yet, they often are not native to their present locations, including Maine. They have the unfortunate luck to being a favorite bird to breed and introduce for hunting. There are records of hundreds of the birds being raised on State preserves for hunting in Maine in the 1940s. (See Vickery, Birds of Maine [2020] at 110.)

Mallards reportedly have been introduced successfully by humans throughout South and Central America, the Falkland Islands, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand.  Their success is, in part, due to their being good and abundant breeders – and not just with other Mallards.

Which brings us back to the three drakes loafing in our pond. Note that their heads appear mostly black and somewhat dingy. They apparently lack the full range of glossy green-reflecting head feathers that pure Mallard drakes have. There is some fear that the duck gene pool is being polluted by Mallards breeding with other species, especially Black Ducks.

One nasty thing that unpaired Mallard drakes and their unpaired faux counterparts have in common, however, is that they gang rape (sorry, there’s no better word) lone females, practically drowning their victims. (You don’t want to see the photos.) Perhaps this is another function of overpopulation doing what it does best -- creating even more population.

Leighton Archive Image

(Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Hot Stuff

Many Skunk Cabbage plants are at their lush peaks now. This image, taken yesterday morning, is of a Skunk Cabbage cluster in our bog that we’ve been studying for five years.

The plant’s purple pixie-cap spathes, which house its flowers, break through our frozen ground in March by generating their own internal heat over the winter. The heat inside the spathes during winter has been recorded as high as 67 degrees (F), according to one Canadian study. Here’s an image of our study plant breaking through the frozen ground this March:

Here’s an image of the same plant during this year’s April showers:

At this time of May, the leaves of Skunk Cabbage plants are full of water to get them through the summer. By July, the leaves are starting to whither and usually they dry up and disappear completely before the end of August, perhaps getting ready to turn on the heat during our first frost in September. (Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Soon!

Great Cove was calm early this morning, but the excitement was palpable – there she was, the first student sailboat that the WoodenBoat School has launched since the pre-Covid 19 season of 2019:

She’s also the only WBS sailboat launched so far. However, more of the School’s impressive small fleet are being spiffied up to enter the water soon. The first WoodenBoat day of the 2021 season starts on May 30. In the interim, proud WBS alumni have been helping to get the school ready for this year’s lucky students.

The double-ender shown above is Swifty, a 19’6” (waterline) Caledonia Yawl with a 6’2” beam (widest part). She was built by WBS students in 2014 and named after their instructor, Gordon Swift. She’s extraordinarily good at light air sailing and sailing to windward. She also has an unusual (and big) push-pull tiller – pulling the tiller forward turns the boat to port; pushing it back will straighten the boat out or turn it to starboard.

Leighton Archive Image

Yesterday, in light rain, Cracker Jack (green) and Fox (red) were out of storage and waiting to have their varnish work completed. These Haven Class sailboats, which run 15’11” at the waterline, were designed by famed Brooklin naval architect Joel White.

The Havens are variations of Nathanael Herreshoff’s beloved 12’6” sloops, which also run 16 feet overall. However, the Havens have centerboards for practicality (shallow-water sailing and easier trailering) and a slightly wider beam for more stability while students learn to sail. Here are Cracker Jack and Fox archive images:

(Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Wild, But Cultivated

It’s apple blossom time here, as you can see from these images taken yesterday.

More interesting, it’s wild apple tree blossom time, when the locations of long-abandoned apple trees and orchids make themselves known by their blossoms, which sometimes appear by surprise in the middle of overgrown brushlands:

Even more interesting are the “apple detectives” who will appear when the wild apples finally hang on the branches. Inspired by John Bunker’s fascinating book, APPLES and the Art of Detection, these detectives try to learn local history through finding, identifying, and sampling the types of apples once grown on trees in Maine – the Marlboro in Hancock County, the Black Oxford in Oxford County, Cole’s Quince in York County, Cora’s Grand Greening in Knox County, etc.

Of course, all of these “wild” apple trees were at one time cultivated into a new species by humans. The original apple tree from which all this started is thought to be a wild species in Central Asia, Malus sieversii.

European colonists brought apple trees with them to North America, but they weren’t the first to do so. European fishermen, who previously worked New England’s summer waters, first planted cultivated apple trees on the coastal islands, where the fishermen camped and ate. (Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Osprey Nest Report 4

Ozzie and Harriet are well as of yesterday morning, which is when this image of Harriet was taken. She’s been incubating very low in the nest, where only the tip of her head is visible until she gets uncomfortable. Then, she often stands, stretches her wings (shown here), shifts her position, and returns to incubating.

Some of the days are turning hot and sunny now, which can be difficult for a brooding Osprey in a high nest without shade. Last year, when Harriet got very hot, she glided down to a nearby freshwater pond, took a head dip and a gulp. and flew back up to her eggs, all in about a minute.

Ozzie, as always, is a good mate. He comes immediately when Harriet complains about invasions of their nest’s airspace. He also has been feeding Harriet fish regularly. Last year, Harriet sometimes got up and took her lunch to a nearby spruce when she was in the mood to eat out. Ozzie sometimes incubated while she was doing this.

As he did last year, Ozzie usually first eats the head completely off the fish before he offers it (often dripping blood) to Harriet. “Offer,” according to Osprey etiquette, usually means swooping in, flopping the fish into the nest while Harriet gets out of the way, and flying off.

Leighton Archive Images

Leighton Archive Image

A live, headless lunch seems like a fair deal – Harriet gets more flesh and calories, but Ozzie probably gets the most nutritious part of the fish. The heads of fish reportedly contain the most concentrated fatty acids, plenty of vitamins and minerals, and all those power-packed brains. Ummm-umm. (Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Short Shrifted

This cute little fellow appeared today in our monthly column in the Ellsworth American.

To read the column, click here:  http://www.5backroad.com/montly-column

In the Right Place: A Play in Two Acts

Yesterday in the parking lot:

Act I: “Where is he? Is He coming back?”

Act II): “I KNEW he’d come back to me!”

(Blue Hill, Maine)

In the Right Place: Historic Irony

Flowering Crabapple Trees are coming into full bloom here. Yesterday, the two Crabapple Trees at the portal of Naskeag Cemetery provided welcoming soft red and pink petals to this special place near the tip of our Naskeag Peninsula.

Although welcoming, the flower-bordered Cemetery entrance arch contains an irony that might make historians smile: it states “NASKEAG.” That word means “the end” to the Abenaki natives who lived here before strangers arrived.

Nonetheless, historic Naskeag Cemetery, the smaller of Brooklin’s two cemeteries, is a pleasant, quiet place to visit. There are veterans from many different wars buried here, including William Reed, a Captain who served in the Revolutionary War. He died and was buried here in 1790, three years after the Constitution of the United States was signed. 

(Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Black Peacocks

Common Grackles are now nesting in cattails around marsh ponds here and guarding those nests from surrounding high spruce trees, as you can see from these images taken yesterday.

Approaching these areas will result in a cacophony of threatening “chucks” and “chacks,” as well as a multitude of unique Grackle curses. Their strange name reportedly comes from its Latin root, “Gracula,” which either referred to one of the calls made by Grackles or the European Crow named a Jackdaw.

Some people call these birds “blackbirds,” which they often are in certain light. However, Grackles share a trait with male Peacocks: they have reflectors within their feathers that are spaced and shaped to create an array of iridescent hues, especially in bright light. Basically, the effect enhances some color wavelengths that produce purple-, blue-, and bronzy brown-colored refractions of light and blocks others. (Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Stoned

Here, we see cumulus clouds conferring over Stonington on May 12, deciding whether to turn themselves into cumulonimbus or cumulus congestus storm clouds and give the old seaport a dowsing.

Our eye can’t help catching the sweeping sheer and remarkably clean buoys and lobster traps of the Fishing Vessel Tsunami, calmly waiting at its mooring that day:

Stonington was settled by Europeans about 1769, relatively late in the colonization of New England. Perhaps this is because it’s on the southern tip of rocky Deer Isle, Maine, where soil is not abundant and the sea winds can blow hard. But, as is obvious from its name, Stonington does have stone -- fine granite that was quarried in the 19th Century and shipped south to become part of many famous buildings and roads.

The granite boom is gone, but lobster fishing is doing well here. The Stonington fleet may be the most successful lobster harvesters in the world. Perhaps the Town name should be changed to Lobsterton. (Stonington, Maine)

In the Right Place: Famous Bands

This is one of those small, drab birds that few people know or notice. Yet, it’s a famous species with a fascinating song.

It’s an Eastern Phoebe, a sparrow-sized flycatcher that migrates here in the summer  and often reuses its old nest. I was lucky to see it yesterday as it flitted onto a branch for a second or two while I was shooting Ospreys.

Phoebes are famous for the report that they were the first birds banded in the United States – and by none other than John James Audubon in Pennsylvania in 1804. He reportedly tied a silver thread to the bird’s leg so that there would be a way to tell whether it migrated back … and it did, according to Audubon!

These birds were not named Phoebes because they look like someone known by that name. They were named Phoebes because they sound like someone saying that name. They often repeat raspy “Feee-Beee … Feee Beee” calls from hidden locations. (Brooklin, Maine) See also the Image in the first Comment Space.

In the Right Place: Tribute to the Frozen Dead

Here, you see the spring flower fireworks of one of our native Shadblow Trees yesterday. These joyful trees, part of the Serviceberry family of bushy trees, come in many native and domestic varieties in the United States, but our state biologists say that the native species that we’re seeing is Canadian serviceberry, Amelannchier canadensis.

A closer view shows that the trees produce small pyramids of white-petaled flowers and bronzy green leaves now. In the summer, they’ll produce purple, blue, and pink berries.

The tree has many common names, but the two most frequently heard here have unusual origins. It was named a Shadblow because it flowered when Atlantic Shad (River Herring) would be running in large numbers up the Hudson and other Rivers. (One of the old English origins of the word “blow” translates into “to swell”; thus, there was a swelling of Shad.)

The name Serviceberry also reflects conditions in the Northeast and Canada. Settlors here couldn’t efficiently bury their dead at least six feet in the winter until the ground thawed at about the time that this tree flowered. Relatives held last services for their winter dead about this time of the year, used these flowers, and lowered the previously-frozen bodies into freshly-dug soil. (Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Predictions

In the Right Place: Predictions

Here, we see yesterday morning’s sun, scudding cumulus clouds, and 20-mile-per hour wind gusts at the head of Eggemoggin Reach. This is where the Pumpkin Island Light used to warn sailors of the Reach’s treacherous nighttime waters.

I tried to imagine what a 19th or early 20th Century coastal schooner captain would have said when he awoke to the glorious new day. As usual, I turned to John Leavitt’s invaluable sourcebook, Wake of the Coasters, and found one answer: The captain, likely a man of a few words, might well have said, “Looks like a chance along.” This meant that there was a fair wind on a fair day and the odds of having a good trip without trouble or disaster looked favorable. At least at that moment.

Cumulus clouds also are known as “fair weather clouds” here in Down East Maine. The base of each cloud is usually flat and the top is rounded or in mounds of fluffiness. However, cumulus clouds can congregate into a mass, darken the day, and decide to grow upward into towering cumulus congestus or cumulonimbus storm clouds. Hence, fair weather clouds give you a good chance, but they’re not totally reliable as weather predictors.

(Little Deer Isle, Maine)

In the Right Place: Preparing to Shoot From the Hip

I had a hip replacement Monday, and everything has gone well since. There will be no posts for several days more, while I go through physical therapy and relearn how to slink through life by studying the masters. I’ll be back soon, though, maybe toward the end of next week.

Leighton Archive Image

In the meantime, I hope you all enjoy yourselves .

Leighton Archive Image

Cheers, from Brooklin, Maine

April Postcards From Maine

April gave us some beautiful days — perhaps too many. Down East Maine needs rain and plenty of it, if it is to avoid a summer drought. Yet, there were only a handful of good rainstorms. Nonetheless, our fields, streams, woods, and sea coast did make a good showing in the April sun.

The April showers and a few snow flurries that we did get grounded our seagulls for a while. However, the droplets encouraged daffodils and forsythia to start our cold spring with bright yellow hues and our star magnolia trees to bloom into white pom-poms. The rains were enough at times to flood our bogs and help the important flora there to emerge, including skink cabbage and ferns.

We also had some very windy April days, with gusts in the 40-mile-an-hour range. If you were light enough, you could defy gravity by leaning into them.

The winds had our fishing vessels tugging at their moorings. They hunt scallops in April; some with booms and dredges, some smaller vessels only needed an outboard motor for aqua lung divers to hand-harvest “divers’ scallops.”

There were, of course, very still days when everything seemed perfect and ready for spring.

As for April wildlife, we can’t ignore old robin redbreast, one of the signs of spring. However, the return of our nesting pair of ospreys, Ozzie and Harriet, was the highlight of the month for us. Other birds of interest were loons in the sea and wood duck in the pond. One notable event was the early emergence of two painted turtles.

Finally, April had a super moon — literally and figuratively. The April Pink Full Moon was at its closest to earth when it appeared late in the month, hence it was a “super moon.” It’s called the Pink Full Moon because it appears when pink phlox does.

(All images in this post were taken in April 2021 in Down East Maine.)

In the Right Place: Osprey Nest Report 3 (Good News)

I wasn’t sure I’d be able to see the nest from my usual vantage point yesterday morning: it was foggy and misting and the nest is about 100 feet above Great Cove, atop a broken off spruce. I also didn’t have high hopes for Harriet’s annual return from the south in such thick weather. But, I went to see out of concern for Harriet’s being late.

And there she was!

She was lying flat in the nest while Ozzie stood. Yesterday apparently was Harriet’s first day at her summer residence.  As you can see, she and Ozzie were gazing through the murky morning like an old, settled couple enjoying the airs on their porch. (A curious thing: although ospreys usually are monogamous, it is thought that they return to the same nest out of territorial fidelity, not attraction to their mate.)

If all goes well, “our” pair will do some courting and mating for a short period, with Ozzie feeding Harriet as part of the ritual. She’ll lay one to four eggs and incubate them for up to 40 days, with Ozzie feeding her and sometimes doing a little incubating, himself.

The young hatch sequentially, usually one a day, and grow fast. This gives the first born (hence biggest) an advantage. It is not unusual for one or two of the hatchlings to be bullied to death by their siblings. (Last year, Harriet brooded three youngsters and two survived the competition.) (Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Osprey Nest Report 2

As followers know, we’ve been concerned about one of “our” pair of ospreys that hasn’t returned to it’s nearby nest, a nest that we’ve been studying for five springs and summers. Another pair from another nearby nest has already hooked up and has been flying and loudly “cheep-cheep-cheeping” at each other over Great Cove recently.

For descriptive reasons (and for fun), we’ve named our pair Ozzie and Harriet. It’s Harriet who hasn’t arrived yet, based on last year’s photographs. (We could be wrong; the only way we have been able to tell the difference reliably is when the birds are together. Harriet is a little larger than Ozzie, whom we assume we’re seeing now.)

Yesterday, as you can see above, Ozzie was standing alone in his nest looking in every direction when we got within “shooting” range. He did not call; he just stared with his golden eyes. In about an hour, he flew off to the north, where one of his favorite fishing areas lies. See below.

Ospreys usually are monogamous and nest faithful, but mates do die and there is a breeding imperative. When a mate disappears, the remaining bird chooses another mate or is chosen as one. It’s then often a question of whose nest to use for breeding and raising the young.

But, we’re not giving up on Harriet just yet. Stay tuned. (Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Greetings

Daffodils are bobbing in the cold winds and ducking in the rain all over Brooklin; yet, they appear to be tooting “Spring is coming! Spring is coming!” Here, you see them protecting an old New England double rock wall yesterday:

Here’s one after a rainstorm:

Leighton Archive Image

The botanical name for these flowers is Narcissus pseudonarcissus, part of the Narcissus genus of spring perennials. They were named after the handsome Greek youth who, according to legend, fell in love with his own reflection and was punished for his vanity by being turned into a flower.

Pretty they may be, but they contain protective alkaloids that are toxic and have been known to cause major problems for dogs who tried a mouthful. When cut and put into a vase, they also can adversely affect some other cut flowers there, unless the Daffodil stems are thoroughly washed beforehand.

Nonetheless, these beautiful greeters have almost convinced me that we’ll see spring soon. (Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: In the Pink

The “April Pink Full Supermoon” last night and early this morning was spectacular here. It’s the first of only two supermoons that we’ll see in 2121 and It lit up the night; no flashlights needed. For those who missed it, there will be a second, virtually identical, performance tonight. The only other supermoon that will happen this year is on May 26.

In the images above, you see (from our perspective) the full moon rising seemingly even with the tall spruce trees on Naskeag Point ridge. In the below, it’s risen well above the ridge and heading for Great Cove at 11:19 p.m. :

Below, it’s on its way northwest at 5:13 a.m. this morning, but still able to light up our North Field and a few deer grazing there.

As you can see, the “April Pink Full Moon” is not pink. It’s named after the herb known as pink moss (also known as creeping phlox or mountain phlox), one of the earlier spring flowers.  It’s a supermoon because it’s full (the sun lights the side facing us all up) when its orbit is closest to the earth; that is, it is at its “perigee.” (Brooklin, Maine)

In the Right Place: Where is She?

It’s Osprey breeding season. This appears to be Ozzie yesterday on a local nest to which he has been returning from southern climes for at least five years, since I’ve been monitoring the nest and named him and his mate for convenience. Ospreys are what has been called “nest faithful” as well as being monogamous.

Ozzie has been here this year for at least a week and Harriet, his mate of many years, has not shown up yet, at least at the times that I’ve been monitoring the site and watching the skies along the coast. Harriet is larger than Ozzie, which is typical for female birds of prey. (One theory is that female birds of prey need to be larger to protect themselves and their young from aggressive male mates and strangers with killer instincts.)

To be sure, Harriet is one tough bird when it comes to protecting the nest. Here are a few Leighton Archive images of her:

However, Ozzie has shown no killer instincts toward his families and often is left alone to sit on eggs or youngsters when Harriet needs a break to eat the fish that Ozzie delivers or to get away from it all for 30 minutes or so.

We’ll let you know if and when Harriet returns. (Brooklin, Maine)