JOURNAL
Yesterday was overcast and gray – until the sun decided that its last act of the day was worthy of an audience. We witnessed a classic battle between the sun’s last light and the clouds’ drifting vapers in our ever-changing vista.
And, we came a smidgeon closer to understanding what poor Vincent Van Gogh could have felt about the sun “en plein air.” (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on November 7, 2023.) Click on image to enlarge it.
Here you see a muskrat taking food to cache it in the rodent’s burrowed den this weekend. That den is hidden in the bank of our pond with an entrance that apparently is under water. I can’t tell what the reddish-orange food is; it’s not an apple, but may be a root.
Muskrats (Ondatra zibethicus) don’t hibernate. They have dense fur and, during extreme winter conditions, they’ll remain underground in their dens or floating lodges where they’ve stored food. The lodges look like small-scale beaver lodges surrounded by water.
When the pond surface freezes, the muskrats often chew access holes into the ice a good distance from their den or lodge entrance so as not to disclose their home’s location. They cover the holes with vegetation and other organic matter to prevent refreezing. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on November 4, 2023.)
The timid larch trees seemingly hide from tourists among our big spruces and balsam firs all summer. When you look their way from a distance, it looks like you’re seeing all evergreens. Then, at this time of year, the larches seemingly get up the nerve to spring their joke with a dramatic visual “Surprise!”
Their needles quickly become an incandescent greenish yellow, and the trees suddenly stand out brightly among their stolid dark green neighbors. Soon, they’ll drop all of their needles and become bare wood, disappearing from easy view again after they’ve admitted that they’re not evergreens. (They are, however, conifers [cone-seeders] like spruce and fir.)
These magical trees also are known by their Native American names as tamaracks (Algonquin Tribe) or hackmatacks (Abanaki Tribe), both names reportedly meaning in English “wood used for snowshoes.” The wood is hard, durable, and rot-resistant. It also was used by Native Americans for canoe parts and sleds.
Today, larch wood has many uses, especially in boat building and structure-cladding projects. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on November 5, 2023.)
The local white-tailed deer seem prepared for winter. They appear to have put on a few pounds and their new, double-haired coats seem to be in good shape.
They should do well during the next quarter, if the predictions for a mild winter hold up.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on November 4, 2023.)
Many people have a preconception from the media about what a “Typical Maine Lobster Boat” looks like. In these people’s minds, the coastal lobster fishing vessel seems to run about 22-45 feet long; has a big, sweeping white or black hull, and is powered by a big, inboard diesel engine.
Well, it’s true that many, perhaps most, inland Maine lobster boats fit that description. However, in Maine, you usually don’t have to go far to see something that’s not “typical” for its kind, including a good number of lobster boats. One is shown here.
How many people from the Midwest think of Maine lobster boats that have purple hulls, and that look to be only about 14 feet long, and are powered by long-mounted gas outboard engines? Yet, there are a good number of smaller lobster boats here, and we have no shortage of people who experiment with colors on boats and other things.
Small lobster boats can be perfect for fishermen who need to limit the number of traps they haul, including beginners and recreational license holders. (Images taken in Blue Hill, Maine, on November 1 and 3, 2023.)
As it gets cold and the leaves shrivel and fall, winter survival food for our wildlife becomes startlingly obvious to us and the birds and mammals that are about to go through their most difficult months. Here you see the shiny rose hips of a multiflora rose bush:
Below, you’ll see a resplendent winterberry bush, a species that is having an especially good year here:
These fruits are eaten by many birds, chipmunks, mice, rabbits and hares, white-tailed deer, and the occasional insomnia-suffering black bear. Rose hips, which contain significant amounts of vitamin C, are especially nutritious. Winterberry is one of the least nutritious winter berries and, therefore, usually is among the last to be eaten. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on November 2, 2023.)
Here you see a lowering, but still very high, tide in Blue Hill Bay yesterday afternoon. That’s Blue Hill in the distance, a near-mountain that usually isn’t blue.
Yesterday, the reported high tide level there was 11.3 feet (above the average height of the daily lowest tide observed over a 19-year period -- the Mean Lower Low Water mark used by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for tidal charts).
The tides here lately have been exceptionally high due to the lingering effects of the Hunters’ Full Moon, which rose at its fullest on October 28. As you probably know, the moon’s gravitational pull exertsa tidal force that causes the Earth’s waters to bulge out on the sides nearest and farthest from the moon.(Image taken in the Town of Blue Hill, Maine, on November 1, 2023.)
This October will be remembered for its skies, I think, especially its cloud races and its fabulous moon. So, let’s begin with some clouds and build up to the moon.
Of course, to many people who live south of us, October in Maine means “Spectacular Fall Foliage!” Well, this year, it was more like a “Pretty Good Fall Foliage.” To be sure, there were spectacular, vibrant colors, but they were scattered for the most part — that tree up there, those leaves here, those berries down there.
Most disappointing were our blueberry fields. They usually cool to the deep red of a hearty Burgundy wine; this year, they mostly reached only the pink of a pleasing rosé:
There also were those trees that we rely on to make a spectacular showing every October, but this year many prematurely released their leaves before I could photograph them:
Nonetheless, October in Maine is much more than colorful leaves. It’s one of the the best times to walk on mosses and fallen leaves in the woods and release their scents, and to take booted steps in fast- moving streams and change the tempo of their music, and to hunt the many mushrooms that suddenly appear in the cool and sometimes wet month. (But don’t eat any of those fungi unless you’re certain they’re edible — especially those that look like the white one below, which is a deadly destroying angel mushroom.)
For some of us, there also is the pleasing option here of strolling or driving along lonely country roads on a cool October morning and remembering when we used to commute in big cities:
October also is the month that we say goodbye to some of our wildlife, including musical hermit thrushes that migrate here for the spring and summer, white-faced meadowhawk dragonflies that are born here and will die here, and resident garter snakes that usually go into an underground torpor during the month. This October also was when a resident red squirrel made sure that we read an important reminder that a neighbor has posted.
On the waterfront, the American Eagle cruised into Great Cove in early October, the last of the tourist schooners until next year. The last of the WoodenBoat School fleet went the other way — it was taken out of the Cove and tucked into winter storage during the month.
Meanwhile, our fishing vessels continued to haul lobster traps in the coastal waters and pose for portraits when they were idle. (The lobster industry is facing some difficult challenges these days. We tried to help in October by letting our daughter buy live lobsters and roast them, then serve them to us over linguine in a beurre blanc sauce. It’s tough, but we like to pitch in when needed.)
We noted above that the October foliage this year was not spectacular. However, October made up for that by providing several moon experiences that were as celestially spectacular as celestial spectacularism gets. At mid-month, October delivered a slim, waxing crescent moon that provided the perfect, delicate touch to complete a fine sundown scene:
The moon showed us more and more of herself as the month progressed. Near the end of the month, on the day before October was scheduled to deliver the full hunters’ moon, there was a virtually full moon behind scary, fast-moving clouds that would qualify for a Stephen King movie:
The next day, October 28, there was a layer of thick cloud several thousand feet above Acadia National Park, when the full hunters’ moon was supposed to rise there in the murky dusk. The moon rose on schedule: big and rough and orange-red in that murky atmosphere and then disappeared into the cloud layer:
Hours later, as it arced above the ocean, the full moon escaped our dingy atmosphere and became a brilliant white orb that proudly displayed its asteroid-created craters like battle scars:
That should be our dramatic end to this post. But, of course, October ends with our weirdest holiday of the year, Halloween. This year there were plenty of creative attempts to join in the weirdness:
It was a good month.
(All images in this post were taken in Down East Maine during October 2023.)
Here are a few of the enjoyable holiday displays from our area.:
Historians trace Halloween customs back to a Celtic belief that on November 1 the souls of the dead returned. This became associated with the holy eve (“hallow” “een”) of the Christian All Saints Day, when saints and other dead are supposed to be remembered.
Costumes were worn, bonfires and Jack o’ lanterns (made of turnips) were lit and skeletons exhibited on October 31 to scare off any evil spirits that might take the opportunity to return with the holy dead. (Images taken in Blue Hill and Brooklin, Maine, on October 28 and 27, 2023.)
Here you see gobs of beautiful, ripe, red Asian bittersweet fruit. I think that I’ve seen more of these berries (Celastrus orbiculatus) this October than I have in any prior year.
Stated another way, these are the gorgeous beginnings of a disaster-in-the-making.
The birds love this fruit and disseminate it widely in their droppings, starting new bittersweet vines all over the place. Those vines, in turn, survive by strangling to death their host trees and bushes to assure that they can steal light and nutrients. Asian bittersweet even attacks and severely damages mighty spruce trees:
State efforts to control this invasive killer have been relatively ineffective; private efforts to get rid of the plants have helped somewhat, but the plants apparently are propagating faster in Maine than they can be removed. It’s plague-like. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on October 27, 2023.)
Here you see the rise of the October full moon yesterday over Acadia National Park during a dingy dusk:
Below, you’ll see that moon as it climbed above our dirty atmosphere, where you could clearly see some of its basaltic craters and plains that were formed by ancient asteroid impacts. It was more than 231,000 miles away yesterday.
This moon was called the hunters’ moon by Native Americans who stocked up on food at this time of year, especially deer that had fattened for the winter, according to the Farmers’ Almanac records. We usually continue to call the October full moon the hunters’ moon, but once every four years it rises in November. (The word “moon,” itself, is derived from ancient words for “month.”)
As for the moon’s surface, that little “belly button” in the moon’s southwest (lower left) is the little crater Tycho, if I’m reading my lunar map correctly; immediately above it to the left are the dark seas of moisture and of clouds, among others; to its right in the moon’s southeast and east, are the seas of vapors, of nectar, and of fertility, among others. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on October 28 and 29 (12:34 a.m.), 2023.)
The unexceptional maple trees seen here usually are a blazing yellow tunnel by mid-October. Not this warm and wet year. The Beth Eden Chapel was finished in 1900 and the driveway beside it went to a residence built in 1902 by Morrill Goddard, a Hearst Publications editor.
The maples that line that driveway and shadow the Chapel are old, but they don’t look old enough to be the original Goddard driveway trees. Does anyone know when these trees were planted?
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on October 25, 2023.)
Old pull-graders such as this one still are in use here to scrape and smooth dirt and crushed rock lanes and driveways that are damaged by rains and frost heaves. They’re now pulled by tractors or trucks instead of horses or oxen. But, they’re still manipulated by a skilled operator who sits or stands on the grader and uses three wheels to steer and adjust the height and angle of the scraper.
The first road grader of this type reportedly was invented in 1885 by Joseph D. Adams of Indianapolis, Indiana. It had two “leaning wheels” that could be angled to the side. In 1896, his company produced a huge four-wheel pull-grader with an eight-foot adjustable blade. The contraption was designed to be drawn by horses or a steam tractor. It was called “The Road King.”
That invention was still popular in 1911 and was advertised then with a claim that might resonate today with frugal Mainers: “Don’t throw away money by putting more new material on your old macadam or gravel roads, but let the Road King Scarifier simply reshape them. *** The Road King is suitable for either eight horses or engine power.” (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on October 25, 2023.)
We’ve been having some beautiful mornings recently, including the one in the image below, taken Tuesday – cool (but not cold), clear (but not glaring), calm (but not dead). Unfortunately, many afternoons have been overcast due to cloud buildup.
As to the above image, of course, you’re looking at the iconic red boathouse at Conary Cove. No matter what the weather, it practically begs to be photographed as you round the curves that snake along the Cove.
Note that there’s not much dramatic color in the deciduous trees on that peninsular and that some of the trees have dropped their leaves without any fanfare. It’s been that kind of fall. (Images taken in Blue Hill, Maine, on October 24, 2023.)
The WoodenBoat School’s 2023 campus programs are done, but the school’s distinctive post-and-panel boat shed has yet to be fully closed and sealed, as you see here. The shed contains a number of WBS’s small boat fleet that will be stored there over the winter.
Inside the shed, the lines and textures of highly-crafted vessels present an almost a jarring contrast to the stolid terrestrial architecture and gravel floor that now holds the boats immobile:
These vessels that are designed for a seemingly limitless and fluid environment will soon be closed entirely into this confined space that is illuminated through skylights. It seems a bit like keeping butterflies in a terrarium, but Maine winters are not good for beautiful butterflies or beautiful boats. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine on October 23, 2023.)
Here’s one of our birds that is rarely seen, yet considered by many to be the best that can be heard. It soon will migrate south. It’s an aptly-named Hermit Thrush whose flute-like summer arpeggios at twilight are among the most beautiful gifts ever given humans. These extraordinary vocalists (Catharus guttatus) have been called the American Nightingales.
I was lucky enough to catch sight of this one fly up to a branch for a few seconds yesterday before it fluttered back down to its patch of shaded leaf litter below and blended back into obscurity.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on October 23, 2023.)
The cool (but not freezing) weather with plenty of rain that we’ve been having is when many mushrooms come out to work and play, including the fungi shown here having a wood-rotting party.
Mushroom Maven David Porter tells me that they’re likely part of the Pholiota genus of wood disposers. Species in that genus usually need microscopic inspection for identification, I’ve read.
Among the more interesting terrestrial fungi that also are showing up here lately are what appear to be Chocolate Milky mushrooms (Lactarius lignyotus), which frequently grow under conifers and in mosses:
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine. on October 8 and 21, 2023.)
We’re having a wet, warm, and muted fall in which the funereal flaring of the leaves seems to lack the color-saturated vibrancy of prior years.
Moreover, the durations of those displays often are cut short by rains that strip the trees bare before they can be appreciated in totality as masterpieces – sturdy trunks, complex branches, colorful leaves.
On the other hand, the sodden fallen leaves provide a colorful mosaic stage for the still-green mosses and ferns that remain vibrant from the rains and cool (but above-freezing) temperatures.
In the darker parts of the woods, mushrooms run rampant or collect in seemingly gleeful clusters; it’s their favorite kind of weather.
(Images taken in North Sedgwick and Brooklin, Maine, on October 8, 14 and 21, 2023.)
Unfortunately, when inflation is added to the other difficulties facing our beleaguered lobster industry, the cost of lobster meat to its loving consumers has reached the wincing point. It’s become a luxury food for many who used to eat it regularly.
However, this luxury can still make a special occasion more special. I feel compelled to share an extraordinary lobster culinary experience that our daughter treated us to for a special family occasion this week.
She bought live lobsters locally, including the one shown above. After dispatching them in a kindly way, she opened the tails and cracked the claws and pan-roasted the tasty meat in its shells. Then, she presented them on al dente linguine under a delicious beurre blanc sauce. A good wine accompanied the dinner. A memorable time was had by all!
Of course, boiled lobster with melted butter also is fabulous, so is lobster salad, so is a traditional lobster roll, so is lobster fra diavolo, so is lobster mac and cheese, so is lobster thermidor, so is lobster stew …. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on October 16, 2023.)
Here you see Dennis Black beginning the annual mowing of our restored fields yesterday. The job often takes more than a day due to some significant slopes and other terrain irregularities. It also can be challenging when the soil is wet, which it has been most of this year.
We postpone the mowing of our fallow fields here until the fall to assure that their summer residents – multitudes of birds, insects, reptiles, and other animals – are no longer raising their families there.
The cutting is necessary to prevent quick-growing raspberry bushes, conifer trees, and other larger plants from reappearing and changing the density of the land cover. Many of us have created and maintained fields of wild grasses, sedges, and wildflowers because such environments are disappearing in the United States, stressing the species that breed and live in them.
For equipment buffs: Dennis is riding a Massey Ferguson 2850E tractor and pulling a Woods single-spindle rotary cutter. That type of cutter (or “mower”) commonly is called a “bush hog,” which is not quite correct.
A “Bush Hog®” is a brand name that applies to only one company’s type of field and brush-cutting machines: Bush Hog LLC, headquartered in Selma, Alabama. That company advertises that, when it first demonstrated its invention in 1951, an amazed farmer said: “That thing eats bushes like a hog.”
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on October 19, 2023.)
