In the Right Place: Sheets and Sweeps

Weatherwise, we’re still having morning temperatures in the mid-20s (F) and afternoon highs in the mid-30s. This seems to annoy the sea ice, which sometimes softly creaks and groans when it has to expand and contract.

One of the best places to watch restless sea ice around here is Patten Bay just off the still-snow-covered Surry Wharf. Two fairly significant streams near there feed the Bay with fresh water, making it a little easier for the salted sea inlet to freeze a few of its surface inches.

At low tide, the ice covers the near sea bottom there like a pristine satin sheet thrown over a rubble field:

Farther out, however, the forming and melting ice create graceful, sweeping passageways:

(Images taken in Surry, Maine, on February 5, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Form and Function, Part II

Yesterday, you saw here images of two of the four working fishing vessels that moor regularly at Naskeag Harbor in the winter; today, you’ll be seeing the remaining two vessels, both of which are Down East-style designs. It was a special moment.

All four boats were photographed at the same time late Saturday afternoon, when they were caught in the spotlight of a very low setting sun. The sun’s searching rays skimmed virtually horizontally, not piercing the water, allowing its slight chop to remain the color of a sapphire in low light. But those last sunrays of the day strafed in over the water and found the boats, which flared brightly in places for just a few minutes as dusk settled in to calm things.

Above, you see Captain Morgan, mooring the farthest out near the end of Harbor Island. You get a good view of the mast and boom that control her scallop dredge (“her drag”) and of her “shelling hut” (or “shelling house”) behind the wheelhouse. This equipment will be gone by lobster season. Below, you’ll see Dear Abbie: (correctly spelled with her full colon [:]) in the initial Comment space. Her slightly different shelling hut is highlighted as is her signature orange “mooring ball” (or “mooring buoy”).

(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on February 3, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Form and Function

Here you see a very low setting sun dramatically spotlighting the port side of Tarrfish in Naskeag Harbor Saturday. She’s one of the local vessels that was designed for hauling and tending lobster traps in the summer, but is modified in the winter with a mast and boom for scallop-dredging (“dragging”).

The spotlighting emphasizes the character of American-styled lobster boats, such as Tarrfish, that are built based on concepts originating in Down East Maine. Above the water line, the smooth-sheared hull sweeping from a higher bow and the slightly laid-back wheelhouse windows are Down East characteristics.

These American-style vessels are significantly different in design from the Canadian Nova Scotia -style vessels commonly known as “Novi” boats. One such vessel is the Christopher Devin III, which was photographed in the Harbor at the same time as Tarrfish was. Novi hulls are more rounded under water and acutely stepped up above at the bow, while their windows are forward-slanted.

In case you’re wondering, that’s a trap rack on Tarrfish’s deck; it will be used to stabilize stacks of lobster traps when they are transported next season, but is now a convenient place to hang gear. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on February 3, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Waters, Wiggles, and Lichens

Here you see the final falls of Patten Stream delivering cold, clear, fresh water into salty Patten Bay yesterday. The fulsome stream is a significant passageway for a number of fish species, including American eels. (Yes, eels are fish.)

Usually starting in March, the eels wiggle their way upstream as tiny transparent babies (commonly called “glass eels”), trying to avoid being caught in fishermen’s nets. Some of these migrants will return downstream years later as opaque adults that are longer than a yardstick and ready to begin their long, slithering swim to the Sargasso Sea. They’ll breed and die there.

You may have noticed the orange growth on some of the rocks in this image. That appears to be common orange lichen (Xanthoria parietina), which also is known as maritime sunburst lichen. It often grows on walls, hence it has the scientific epithet “parietina,” which means “on walls.” This lichen has been the subject of much scientific inquiry. If fact, it was chosen as a model organism for genomic sequencing. (Image taken in Surry, Maine, on February 3, 2024.)

In the Right Place: February Caprices

Yesterday was mostly drab here, but the temperatures were in the mid- to upper-30s (F), which meant that we had a February melt. Here you see the warmth revealing tractor traces in our north field and destroying the evidence of the many critters that sneak through there:

As that was going on, the pond ice was being softened, offering the prospect of having some clear water there soon until fickle February decides – and she almost certainly will – to freeze things up again.

Meanwhile, there’s hope embodied in knowing that, deep below that melting pond ice, muck-entombed painted turtles exist somewhere between life and death, oblivious to February’s caprices. They always have emerged in the spring, and we’re counting on them to do so again this year. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on February 2, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Laying Low

Fickle February arrived yesterday morning carrying a very low tide that indiscreetly exposed the bottoms of Fishing Vessel Tarrfish and Great Cove.

It’s just as well, Tarrfish needed a rudder repair and the blanket of sea ice in the Cove needed a rest. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on February 1, 2024.)

January Postcards From Down East Maine

January was named after Janus, the Roman god of beginnings and ends and change. This year, the month lived up to its name with dramatic examples of Climate Change. We experienced sunny vistas and blinding snows; bitter cold and unseasonable warmth, and dry days and rainy days that sometimes became hurricane-like. There were times of heartbreaking damage from super-high tides and record-breaking winds, and times of sunny serenity and joy.

Let’s begin this month’s Post Cards with some of January’s sunny serenity and joy.

Of course, there was that special beauty that can occur during snow storms, when color almost disappears and that unique grayness-and-whiteness of a snowy day dominates unless we see an indominable primary color.

However, as mentioned, there was damage and ugliness in January. Power lines and trees came down across roads, shorting out electricity and blocking traffic; docks that extended elegantly into harbors one day that were destroyed the next; coasts that were festooned with seaweed and debris from eroding shores, and many residences and businesses that were flooded.

In the flora department, fortunately, most of our area’s old, specimen trees not only survived, they became works of art. The Camperdown elm in the Cemetery, the weeping beech on the ridge, and the ancient apple trees by the WoodenBoat Lane curve stood tall all month. Moreover. we had winterberry berries that lasted all month and our Christmas Day Amaryllis that failed to do its job in December became a Martin Luther King Day Amaryllis in January.

As for fauna, our hearty residents didn’t seem to bat an eye when the weather got dicey. Wild turkeys hunkered down and appeared when the sun came out, white-tailed deer bucks and does went about their browsing on frozen ground and in snow, and some herring gulls slept through the hard times.

On the working waterfront, the fishing vessels were equipped with masts and booms for winter scallop dragging and sometimes developed icicle teeth during snow storms. Meanwhile, recreational boats snored away in their storage sheds.

The January full moon is known as the Wolf Moon because it arises when wolves howl. This year, it rose in rough, red form into a cloudy sky, then, it became silver when it ascended above our atmosphere. Toward the end of the month, the Wolf Moon became and Egg Moon as its luminosity waned.

Finally, we come to the best of the month— the spectacular January sunsets and afterglows, often the best of the year due to the more southerly perspective of our sun. This year, the spectacles didn’t disappoint.

(All images in this posting were taken in Brooklin, Maine, during January 2024.)

In the Right Place: Winter Morning Moon

At first light yesterday, the moon was sailing high and far in a cold, blue sky, no longer a full Wolf Moon; now, it is a disappearing Egg Moon. It is “waning” (losing luminosity) and “gibbous” (humped, malformed). It was at a reported 80 percent luminosity to us from reflected sunlight in this image.

The moon will continue to lose that luminosity until it disappears from unaided sight on February 9, when it becomes a “new moon” (no visible moon). After that, it slowly will become a “waxing” moon (gaining luminosity) that again will become gibbous after the sun illuminates 50 percent or more of the surface that we see, but not all of that surface. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 30, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Nonpolitical Graft

Here you see the scarce Camperdown elm that I monitor regularly. This image was taken as the snow was stopping yesterday. The elm seems to be writhing in grief over a cluster of graves in the center of the Brooklin Cemetery.

The gravestone, but apparently not the body, of Rodney S. Blake is there. He reportedly was a 19th Century Brooklin sailor who was lost at sea. I’ve been unable to find the history of this particular tree, but it apparently is over 100 years old. 

All Camperdowns (Ulmus glabra “Camperdownii”) apparently are infertile cultivars produced by grafts, not seeds. They all can be traced back to a unique tree created about 1837 in Dundee, Scotland, by David Taylor, the head forester for the Earl of Camperdown. He reportedly found an unknown young species of tree that was elm-like, but contorted. He grafted a cutting of his find to a young Wych elm, then planted that cultivar in the Earl’s garden, where it remains today.  

Grafts from the Taylor tree started the line of Camperdowns that exists today, according to reports of the species’ history. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 29, 2024.) Click on the image to enlarge it.

In the Right Place: The Mornings Before and After

Here you see the sporadic snow sprinklings that started yesterday morning before I secluded myself for some serious National Football League pigskin engorgement:

Below you’ll see what they’ve become by this morning, when we know who will be playing in the Super Bowl:

By the way, though the NFL footballs are still often called “pigskins,” they’re reportedly made out of a synthetic rubber bladder and a cow leather casing. However, the earliest form of football was actually made out of inflated pig bladders which were covered in leather. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 28 and 29, 2024.)

In the Right Place: The New Brooklin Bridge

The old Brooklyn Bridge in New York City, designed by John A. Roebling and finished by his son Washington Roebling, spans the mighty East River there and is famous for being the first suspension bridge to use steel for its cabling, among other things.

The new Brooklin Bridge in the Town of Brooklin, designed and built by Lance Wyeth, spans a meandering stream that runs into Great Cove and is famous for being the first bridge that could survive the icing, thawing and violently high winds and tides that we have had on our shore:

We kept losing the prior Brooklin Bridge, which was a heavy plank staked down into the ground near the foot of our shore stairs.

Lance, our gracious neighbor and an extraordinary builder, voluntarily created a system that affixed the plank to a long stabilizing board, all of which floats up and down via deeply-driven. capped reinforcement bars that run from within the ground through the wood. So far, it has survived some fairly severe tests. Thanks, Lance. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 23, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Acceptable

Here you see a frequent sight at Naskeag Harbor: A fishing vessel being cleaned up after a morning of dragging for scallops, while the first herring gull is arriving to get some scallop “guts” that might be thrown overboard:

Scallop fishermen shuck the abductor muscles out of the mollusks and sort them for sale; the other parts of the animals – the shells and “guts” (stomach, gills, nerves, testicles, ganglia, etc.) – are thrown back into the sea. What retail stores advertise as “scallops” (and what we eat) really are just the muscles that the complex scallops use to open and close their shells.

By the way, when asked this week how the scallop season was going, a senior Captain texted with usual Maine succinctness: “The season has been ok.” I interpret that as not good, not bad, but acceptable for a very specialized, often hard, and sometimes risky occupation. He also stated that the fishermen “have all been hoping that the [scallop per-pound] price would go up a little.” If it does, that might make the season improve in the fishermen’s opinions from okay to good, but not great. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 25, 2024.) Click on the image to enlarge it.

In the Right Place: Howling Time

The first full moon of the new year rose fuzzy and burly yesterday over cloudy Mount Desert Island. It was about 258,855 feet from earth at the time.

Once it arose above our murky atmosphere, it became more moon-like:

The January full moon traditionally is known as the Wolf Moon because it arises at the best of time year to hear wolves howl at night, according to the Farmers’ Almanac collection of Native and Colonial American moon names. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 25, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Brilliance

Sometimes photographers take an image of a subject and they later find out that the image really is about an originally unseen different subject. For example, yesterday we were in Blue Hill while it was snowing, and I was doing a some snowfall shooting from the parked car. Then, Barbara said, “Did you see that Christmas ball over there?” This red Christmas ornament that you see here was hanging alone in a roadside spruce, perhaps overlooked when the decorations came down:

I hadn’t noticed the ornament, but I took three quick shots of it at different shutter speeds (to make sure I captured some falling flakes) and we drove off without further ado. When we got home and I began to edit the day’s snow images, I discovered the wonderful winter landscape scene that was reflected on the ball – an intriguing image within the intended image:

Sometimes Barbara makes me seem brilliant. (Images taken in Blue Hill, Maine, on January 24, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Turkey Tactics

We see fewer wild turkeys in the winter. They spend more time in the deeper woods looking for food, while also avoiding the visual and windy exposure of our mowed fields. Here in this image you see a small flock (or “rafter”) of wild turkeys that briefly came out of a thick stand of conifers into the sun on Monday.

Note that these birds are all mature males (or “Toms”). Toms often collect together in the winter and then separate and compete with each other when the breeding season starts in the spring. Young males (or “Jakes”) also flock together in the winter. During winter days, you’ll see mature females (or “hens”) eating and traveling with their most recent young (or “poults”), but the youngsters are learning to be more independent and often separate from their moms into nearby trees when roosting at night.

By the way, one of the quickest ways to tell a male from a female wild turkey in the winter is to see whether the feathers on their sides and breasts have crisp black edges that form a scalloping design (male) or brown edges that are not as distinct (female). Males also have horn-like spurs on their lower legs, while it is extremely rare for females to grow them. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 22, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Safari Sighting

If you were describing this scene orally in English and knew what you were looking at, you might say something that sounded like this: “Look, there’s a giraffe in snow!”

The tall, small-headed animal called a giraffe is a tree trimmer; so is this contraption. The equipment was produced by a Minnesota-based company that intentionally named itself “Jarraff” [always pronounced “giraffe”] Industries and adopted an image of an African giraffe as its trademark. 

More specifically, the equipment shown here is cataloged as a “Jarraff All-Terrain Tree Trimmer,” but it’s usually just called a “Jarraff” (again: pronounced “giraffe”). As indicated, it’s used to clear tree branches, especially those alongside the road and near power lines.

The telescoping boom on the trimmer can extend to 75 feet on the latest models and has a 180-degree tiltable saw at the end, according to the published specifications. That boom is made of non-conductive fiberglass that can operate along medium voltage power lines without causing power outages. The beast was at rest yesterday at the Naskeag Point parking lot, where it has been parked for some time. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 22, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Turbulence

Here you see a gathering of ancient apple trees that seemingly are shuddering in yesterday's sharp cold:

Below, you’ll see an iced-up old Camperdown elm braving the day alone:

Yet, today is predicted to be the beginning of a warming spell in this first month of the new year. After that, the polar vortexes may bring some really crazy weather, according to recent reports, and the ongoing El Niño may decide to do a little freewheeling intervention.

The theme for 2024 appears to be turbulence, which usually isn’t good for older things, whether they grow out of the ground or post photographs. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 21, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Insults

This morning, we continue to remain trapped in the week’s Arctic air. As you see, during the cold spell, we’ve gotten some sun to dapple the hard snow, but it’s effect otherwise has been nothing but decorative, not perceptively warming:

Yesterday afternoon, the ice gods apparently decided to add insult to our injury and dump a little snow on us. We and our neighbors hunkered down and waited it out:

By the way, the idiom “to add insult to injury” reportedly came from one of Aesop’s fables as told by the Roman poet Phaedrus in the 1st Century. In the story, a fly bit the head of a bald man who instinctively swatted at the fly, but only whacked himself hard in the head. The fly jeered at the man, saying that his unthinking action had added insult to injury. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 18 and 20, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Topsy-Turvy Times

Last year was the warmest year on record and the first two-thirds of January of the new year seem to be trying to make up for all of last year’s warmth. This month’s country-wide temperature is 1.2 degrees below average through mid-month and more than 56 percent of the contiguous United States was covered in snow this week, according to yesterday’s Washington Post. Next week, we’re supposed to have an unseasonable thaw.

Too many things are not as they should be these days. Which brings me to today’s photograph. It’s our Christmas Amaryllis, which failed miserably at its job and turned out to be a mere Martin Luther King Day Amaryllis. Nonetheless, it’s pleasingly poignant to watch a tropical flower bloom in the middle of what may become Maine’s coldest January on record. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 18, 2024.)

In the Right Place: Seeing Red

Yesterday was too cold and snow-laden to engage in my favorite pastime of walking through the woods with no particular destination in mind. But I did drive by this well-connected local landmark, which is known as “The Red House” around here.

The place always looks patriotic (or at least historic) when it is sitting in white snow under a blue sky. And, it looks appropriate for cold weather, which is why New Englanders decided to have houses connected to barns and other utilitarian spaces. Of course, you’re more likely to find a car and a truck in the barn today than you are a couple of cows. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 18, 2024.)