JOURNAL
This image of a male Bobolink appears in my monthly column in the current Ellsworth American. Click on the image to enlarge it.
These males are our only songbirds that are black on the bottom and mostly white above – like wearing a tuxedo backwards. To read the column about the troubled life of the Bobolink, click here: http://www.5backroad.com/montly-column
Here you see Angelique lowering sails as she enters Great Cove at dusk Wednesday (June 7). She was on a passenger cruise that included a tour of nearby Acadia National Park and the WoodenBoat School campus here.
She overnighted in the Cove and was caught sleeping there at dawn yesterday. The tide and wind swung her 180 degrees several times in the morning.
Angelique took down her protective tarp and discharged her passengers in several row-yourself trips to iThe WoodenBoat School, which is teaching classes in boatbuilding and other subjects now.
Out of Camden, Maine, Angelique is our most distinctive coastal cruiser. She was built to carry passengers in 1980 in Florida. She’s 130 feet long overall and the only Maine windjammer that is configured as a gaff-rigged topsail ketch. (Note that, unlike schooners, Angelique’s foremast is her main [tallest] mast, not her aft mast.)
After her passengers returned from their tour, she raised sails and turned to get a good South-Southwest breeze behind her.
Her “tanbark” reddish sails also are unique in the Maine windjammer fleet. In days of yore when sails were cotton, they were dipped in vats of tannic acid, tallow, and red ocher, which turned them reddish and protected against mildew.
Curiously, she was not named after some femme fatale, according to an online interview with her original captain, Mike Anderson. She was named after one of the hardwoods imported from French Guiana and Suriname that are used in boat and ship construction: “Angelique wood” (Dicornya quianensis). A significant irony here is that the vessel has a steel compartmentalized hull. Her design was inspired by early pilot sailboats and early large sailing yachts, according to Captain Anderson.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on June 7 and 8, 2023.)
Bunchberry here is blooming profusely. It’s been thriving in the cold and wet weather that we’ve been having lately, although it reportedly is listed as endangered in Illinois, Indiana, and Maryland and as threatened in Iowa.
At this time of year, Bunchberry (Cornus canadensis) is characterized by what appears to be a single, white, four-petaled flower within the center of a whirl of green, ovate leaves. However, those white petals are special protective leaves (“bracts”) surrounding a flower head made of the plant’s real, but tiny, greenish-brown flowers.
In late July and/or August, those bracts and flowers will be replaced by the plant’s fruits, which are tight clusters (“bunches”) of green berries that soon turn shiny red. Apparently, the fruit is a good source of pectin. Native Americans in Maine reportedly ate the fruits raw, used them in puddings and sauces, dried them for winter use, and used an infusion of the plant’s leaves as a purging tea.
This wildflower grows in mixed woods and bogs and is one of the few members of the dogwood family that is a creeping groundcover and not a tree or shrub. In some good-growing areas, Bunchberry will colonize a large area:
The plant also is listed as being commonly called Pudding Berry, Crackerberry, Dwarf Cornel, Dwarf Dogwood, Creeping Dogwood, Canadian Bunchberry, Dogwood Bunchberry, and Bunchberry Dogwood.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on June 2 and 7, 2023.)
Red-winged blackbirds enjoy breakfasts that snap, crackle, and pop – and that provide a sporting chase. Dragon flies, which are starting to emerge here, are a favorite morning meal for these kings of the cattails.
Redwings mostly eat insects and similar creepers, crawlers, and sliders during the summer. I’ve seen them feeding on, among other things, dragon and damsel flies, wasps, beetles caterpillars, and grasshoppers, as well as spiders and millipedes (arthropods) and snails (gastropods).
During the seasons when insects are dormant, redwings mostly eat seeds and grain. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on June 2, 2023.)
There’s new information (new to me, at least) about Starflowers, which are popular and profuse here now. Apparently, the botanical Powers That Be decided to merge Starflowers into other genera in the genus Lysimachia and have given them a new species name: Lysimachia borealis.
This new name was the result of recent analyses of the plant’s molecular and morphological data. This change apparently has not yet been reflected in the official Integrated Taxonomic Information System, so the old scientific name (Trientalis borealis) continues to be used in many reference sources, sometimes as a synonym with the new name, sometimes not.
Nonetheless (and thank goodness), the plant apparently will keep its enchanting common name – Starflower – and, of course, a Starflower by any other name remains a delicately beautiful thing. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on June 1, 2023.)
I’m going to rephrase an old English proverb about children and suggest that male green frogs should be seen and not heard. Unfortunately, the reverse seems to be true for those in our ponds that are now loudly calling for females.
I spent 20 minutes Friday looking for four male frogs hidden in our upper pond. Their efforts sounded like bad banjo players doing call and response challenges. When his turn came, each frog would seemingly pluck an untuned string to play a single, short, and low “GAH-um.” (It also can sound like a human clearing a phlegmy throat.) The calls came from different parts of the pond, and I couldn’t find any of the players, even with a large lens.
However, a slight movement allowed me to detect the camouflaged cutey shown below, which I think is a female enjoying the commotion. She’s certainly a northern green frog (Lithobates clamitans melanota), our native subspecies of green frog (Lithobates clamitans).
I think that she’s a female because of her silence while invitations were being issued and her small tympanums (exposed eardrums), which were about the same size as her eyes. (In males, the tympanums [or tympana] are about twice the size of the eyes.) (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on June 2, 2023.)
Thursday was one of those golden days on the coast when – if you can get the right perspective – almost everything looks perfect, even boats out of water, broken rail fences, and aromatic low tide.
Since Thursday, our days have been gray, wet, and cold, and it’s difficult to find the right perspective, although it must be there. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on June 1, 2023.)
Harriet continues to stay in a brooding position virtually all of the time. She seems content – a lot more than I am. (This waiting for hatchlings is driving me crazy!) Ozzie, of course, is as steady as ever; he’s a veteran at this waiting game. He recently lost two primary feathers, one in each wing, but he shouldn’t be molting now and it apparently hasn’t affected his flying.
Ozzie delivers fresh fish meals regularly without expecting a tip or a thank you. He also sometimes takes over the brooding when Harriet needs a break and comes ferociously when Harriet gives the alarm about rogue ospreys or a bald eagle come too close to the nest.
Ozzie has always ferociously run intruders off. He can be quite intimidating with his piercing eyes and over five-foot, flexible wingspan that allows him to hover threateningly over the nest.:
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on June 2, 2023.)
Our summer fishing vessels are starting to come back into Naskeag Harbor in preparation for the lobster fishing season, which usually begins in June or early July. Here you see Judith Ann and Blue Sky in yesterday’s hazy heat:
Note that neither has a mast and boom for winter scallop dredging (“dragging”). There are several vessels in the Harbor that still are configured for scalloping, and I expect that they’ll be “de-masted” soon. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on June 1, 2023.)
This May in Downeast Maine we got what we pined for all winter — sunny days; clouds racing in blue skies above clear waters; trees and grasses turning green, and buds and blossoms emerging in a profusion of colors.
Our woods were inviting and our streams were ample.
The white-tailed deer were molting into their lighter coats, the muskrats were shedding fat and hair, and the snowshoe hares were losing their white fur.
The returning birds were spectacular, as usual — great blue herons were in abundance; ospreys immediately nested and the brooding females were fed by their mates; red crossbills swarmed the treetops, prying out seeds from cones; nest-building, sparrow-like female and audacious male red-winged blackbirds took over the marsh ponds; tree swallows flittered over fields, and our resident wild turkeys strolled the woods. Our shy painted turtles emerged from their winter sleep and basked almost hidden around the rims of ponds.
On the waterfront, the first schooner of the year, the J&E Riggin, arrived in Great Cove toward the end of May, full of tourists who didn’t seem to mind a chilly breeze. Alumni returned to the WoodenBoat School to ready the fleet of small boats and classroom shops for June classes, and lobster boats also were being prepared to haul their traps in June.
May tree foliage was especially good this year. The old, gnarly apple trees again bloomed white and pink; horse chestnut trees produced their pyramidal blossoms; yellow lantern and white star magnolias were true to their names; kousa dogwood trees offered their delicate, vase-like bracts, and ornamental crabapple trees were breathtaking.
Not to be outdone, the traditional May-blooming perennials were outstanding, including lush lilacs; trumpeting daffodils; mysterious orange quince, and even the pesky dandelions.
Finally, in the darker woods and still waters, we had a gorgeous May crop of starflowers; robust arrow arum shoots, soon to be very large; fragrant water lily pads, many red; vibrant green skunk cabbage, and purple rhodora, our wild azalea.
(All images here were taken in Down East Maine in May of 2023.)
Here you see one of our fastest little birds obeying the law. Yes, it’s a tree swallow taking a deserved rest yesterday.
A pair of these fast-flying acrobats reportedly needs a daily diet of about 6,000 small insects – all caught in the air – to feed themselves and their fledglings.
These five-inch swallows not only eat on the fly, they drink and bathe while skimming over still water. They often go unnoticed due to their blurring speed.
Although these birds remain common breeders In Maine, they have experienced tremendous declines in recent decades, according to New England ornithologist Peter D. Vickery. This is part of an overall decline of swallows and most other air-hunting insectivores in North America, he reports in Birds of Maine (2020). (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 30, 2023.)
We had our first schooner visit of the year over the weekend. Here you see her, the J&E Riggin, leaving Great Cove yesterday (Memorial Day) after spending a pleasant-sounding night – she’s on a four-day live music cruise, according to her schedule.
The Riggin was built in 1927 as an oyster dredger for Charles Riggin of New Jersey. He named her for his two sons, Jacob and Edward (“J&E”) Riggin. She’s 120 feet long overall with a beam (widest part) of 23 feet. She dredged for oysters in the Delaware Bay area until the 1940s, when she was sold, converted to power, and sent out in search of mackerel and other fish.
In the 1970s, she was sold again and reconverted to a passenger vessel. In the process, her inboard engine was removed to make more room for cabins. Now out of Rockland, Maine, the Riggin still cruises the area waters without an inboard engine; she relies on her diesel-powered yawl boat to push her when she’s not under sail. When pushing, her yawl boat is lashed to the schooner’s stern with its motor running and is not manned.
That’s what happened yesterday, when the Riggin left Great Cove. Much to my disappointment, the Riggin was pushed out by her yawl boat despite a fair wind and clear skies; not a bit of canvas went up. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 29, 2023.)
It’s Memorial Day, a time to remember and honor the military men and women who lost their lives in service to the United States of America.
Above, you see “Taps” being played at Arlington National Cemetery during a military burial ceremony for a friend and colleague of mine a few years ago. Traditionally, when “Taps” is being played at a military burial, it is performed by a single bugle or trumpet. Here, it’s being played by a member of the Marine Corps Band, since my friend served in the Corps and its Reserves.
The National Cemetery, the final resting place for almost 400,00 people, is located in Arlington, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. It was established during the Civil War on property confiscated from Confederate General Robert E. Lee, whose former mansion is visible on the distant hill in the image above. Below is the Marine Corps color guard that led the procession at the burial of my friend, whom I still honor.
(Images taken in Arlington, Virginia, on November 13, 2015.)
A yearly treat here is watching WoodenBoat School’s small fleet emerge and begin to bloom again when the lilacs are doing the same thing.
As usual, WBS's alumni have been here for their annual two weeks of spring cleaning, helping to get the School ready for its opening on June 4 – getting boatbuilding classrooms, dormitories, and boats in shape for another glorious summer of teaching in the shops and on the water.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 27, 2023.)
Here you see an older male red-winged blackbird sitting on one of the tallest cattails in his territories, puffing himself up as large as he can, and warning other males to stay away in a harsh, hypertensive voice.
As near as I can tell, this red-wing has four distinct territories, each with a nesting female in it. He may own the territories, but not the females. The female red-wings look like gussied-up sparrows:
They’re infamous for their infidelities with unpaired males who sneak in the “back doors” of their neighbors’ properties. Maybe that’s why the dominant males are often hysterical. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 21 and 27 [female], 2023.)
It’s apple blossom time here. Most of the delicate white flowers and their pink-accented buds are appearing on ancient apple trees that no longer are used for fruit harvesting.
Nonetheless, on a fine spring day, the sight of a familiar, old apple tree still producing beautiful flowers can be very reassuring.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 24 and 25, 2023.)
One of the daintiest of our spring plants is blooming now in shaded and dappled parts of the woods. It’s the starflower plant, which looks a bit like a tiny tropical tree before its flowers bloom.
The plant has a Latin scientific name that is descriptive: Trientalis borealis (Raf.). Trientalis means “one-third of a foot,” which is about the plant’s mature height; borealis means “northern” or “from the north.” (Nonetheless, starflowers do grow in parts of the Midwest and the higher altitudes of the southern Appalachian Mountains.)
The starflower plant is a perennial herb that grows from thin, creeping rhizomes that allow it to live in the oddest places (see below). Its simple leaves occur in whorls of 5 to 9 at the tip of the stem. The flowers occur as a single bloom or sometimes 2 to 3 blooms on thin (almost invisible) stalks. The flowers are approximately 1/4 to 1/2 inch in diameter and have 5 to 9 white petals.
Finally, if you’re a hopeful person, you might want to search for your lucky starflower and make a wish on it. “Lucky Stars” or “7-7s” are starflower plants that have a combination of seven leaves and a seven-petalled flower. They’re easier to find than four-leaf clovers. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 23 and 24, 2023.)
Basking painted turtles seem to complete the picture of a serene spring or summer pond. The problem with our painted turtles, however, is that they’re paranoid. As soon as they see or hear you, that perfect picture becomes an uninteresting bare rock (maybe decorated with turtle scat) and a ring spreading on dark water where the PT took a fast bellyflop.
Nonetheless, if you sacrifice the serenity and creep and crawl up to the pond, you sometimes get a quick glimpse of the turtles.
Maine’s subspecies is the Eastern painted turtle, Chrysemys picta picta, shown here. It’s the only subspecies with shell top (“carapace”) segments (“scutes”) that occur in virtually straight rows and columns. The other subspecies are the Western, Midland, and Southern PTs. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 22, 2022.)
Here you see one of our most beautiful and interesting plants, especially at this lush time of the year. Yet, the most common name for this visual delight derogatorily focuses on its emission of a protective, sharp odor when it is damaged.
Yes, the primary common name for this plant is eastern skunk cabbage, although it never smells like skunk spray and is not a cabbage. Even its scientific name is derogatory: Symplocarpus foetidus, roughly meaning stinking compound fruit.
The plant has many pleasing attributes that could have been chosen when deciding on its name. Calling it a skunk cabbage seems to be like classifying Luciano Pavarotti merely as a fat singer. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 21, 2023.) I feel better now.
Here you see an unusual bird that looks like he has serious over-bite issues. He’s a male red crossbill, a type of finch with a special beak adaptation in which the mandibles are crossed at their tips.
Their namesake crossed beaks allow the species to extract seeds from unopened conifer cones and fruit. I was lucky enough to come across him in the deep woods yesterday while he was feeding two of his fledglings; the female was not in sight.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 21, 2023.)
