Summer Shoreline, Part 5 - Rough Water Vigil

Occasionally a pounding ocean surf  intrudes on even the mildest days of September. This particular morning only the eider ducks chose to stay on the water.

Eventually some of the them took refuge on shore too.

Swells rolled in from a tropical storm passing northward out at sea.

A grounded Herring gull weighed the chances that the surf would offer up something edible.

Laughing gulls made a rare roost on shore at Halibut Point.

Their black-headed breeding plumage was just beginning to molt to gray.

Double-crested cormorants also considered the turbulence of the waves in their calculus on hunger and fishing.

They preened and oiled their feathers in preparation for a return to the water. 

As for myself, I had the luxury of seeing it simply as beautiful.

Summer Shoreline, Part 4 - An Egret in the Cove

Although Great egrets can be a common sight on mudflats and marshes, prior to this summer I'd never seen one on the rocky coast of Halibut Point.
 

Of course I'm always  happy to find beautiful novelties here even if they're readily seen elsewhere. In the back of my mind was the question, "Is this just a lucky moment, or is there a reason it's here?"

The bird soon made the answer apparent. It had spotted food. 

 

Its prey appeared to be a cunner, a type of fish we boys used to catch easily on these shores but which seemed to have disappeared in my grandsons' era.

 

We used to consider cunners delicious but bony, with dangerously sharp dorsal fins.


 

The egret flipped the fish around to swallow it head first, fins flattened.

It was already scanning the shallows for another target.

 

Lifting this great body into the air required a great span of wings. It began a slow flight, with its neck retracted, which is characteristic of egrets, herons and bitterns. This distinguishes them from storks, cranes, and ibises, which extend their necks in flight.

  

Large numbers of Great egrets were killed around the end of the 19th century for their plumes to decorate fashionable hats.

 

In 1895 Cousins and Boston socialites Harriet Hemenway and Minna B. Hall, disturbed by the destruction of the plume hunters, organized a series of afternoon teas with other wealthy local women, encouraging them to avoid feathered garments. They also sent literature asking these women to, in Hall's words, "join a society for the protection of birds, especially the egret." Later that same year they founded the Massachusetts Audubon Society.

Its resurgent numbers have made the Great egret a conservation success story. This image of it in flight was ultimately chosen as the symbol of the National Audubon Society .

 

 

 

 

Mary Oliver, for all the senses

POETRY • MUSIC • PHOTOGRAPHY

Sunday, September 22, 4:00

 

Lanesville Community Center

8 Vulcan Street

 

Poems of Mary Oliver, read by Nan Webber

 



"Poetry has long been in my background. It has been as close to me as theater." 



"Mary Oliver is one of America's most admired poets. She is a naturalist in the vein of Thoreau who speaks with an everyday language. She represents us all." 

 
 

"I find her very spiritual. She considers animals to be her beloved friends - number one being her disobedient but adorable little dog Percy. I love the fact that she is so honest, and that we have claimed her as the William Wordsworth of this era."
 

Original clarinet compositions by Stephen Bates

 

"The audience will enjoy several of the arts blended, rather than just poetry as poetry, to hear the music that's in poetry, the artistry, all the wonderful colors that will bring the program to life."

 

Halibut Point photographs by Martin Ray

REFRESHMENTS 

$20 SUGGESTED DONATION AT THE DOOR 
for families, $15 EACH PER FAMILY MEMBER 

The program is a benefit for the Manship Artists Residency and Studios, Lanesville.

 

Summer Shoreline, Part 3 - Queen Anne's Lace

Queen Anne's Lace, possibly originating in Afghanistan, naturalized across Europe and subsequently colonial North America. It beautifies inhospitable locations although its self-sowing prowess is not so welcome in agricultural fields.

The disc-shaped inflorescence is an umbel of myriad tiny white florets that form a constellation around a single mysterious ruby-colored central flower.

As seeds develop, the umbel curls protectively into a bird's nest shape that has its own appeal to collectors of dried-flower material.

...with cow vetch, Vicia cracca

Besides their exuberant pattern the white flowers combine pleasurably with others, to our eyes, at least.



...with Elliott's goldenrod, Solidago latissimifolia

Queen Anne's Lace (Daucus carota) is a member of the parsnip family and a subspecies of the cultivated carrot. A biennial, it flowers, sets seeds, and dies in its second year. While very young in its first year the roots are edible.


...with groundnut, Apios americana

At one place on the moors of Halibut Point Queen Anne's Lace grows next to another plant whose underground tubers were traditionally gathered as food, as indicated in the folk names Groundnut, Wild Potato, and Indian Potato.

...with staghorn sumac, Rhus hirta

Queen Anne's Lace seems born to ornament every place where it takes root.

...a roadside near Halibut Point State Park

Summer Shoreline, Part 2 - American Oystercatchers

An adult American oystercatcher

Early in August this year I made a startling sighting on the coastline of Halibut Point. It came at a time when I was at least somewhat prepared for vivid coloration patterns by the through-migrating Ruddy turnstones. The new bird's long stout bill was proportioned like the broadsword of a medieval gladiator audaciously painted red-orange to advertise its lethal potency. A red ring that surrounded the yellow iris and dotted pupil emphasized the eye disc that stared eerily out of the black head above the bill. A human being decked out like that would provoke ambivalence. Does it stand there in jest, deviltry, or mysterious logic? Just the kind of presence a monarch might value to keep court life from getting stale.

A juvenile beside Herring gulls

Unlike various other shorebirds of my acquaintance the oystercatcher scarcely resembled a sandpiper. It made me think of an African stork. It was chunky and about the size of a crow.

This bird species is interesting enough to have attracted admirers, researchers, and advocates into a flock called the American Oystercatcher Working Group (AOWG). Their website is the only reference I've found to apply the wonderful descriptor 'pied'. It calls to mind patchy-patterned mustangs running wild on Chincoteague Island in Virginia which is in the central part of the oystercatcher's range.

Oystercatchers typically gravitate to sandy or gravelly beaches where they can probe for submerged food at the tide line. When it locates a shellfish with open valves, an oystercatcher quickly inserts its bill to sever the adductor chain that holds the halves together. It then extracts and consumes the soft parts.

Less commonly oystercatchers visit rocky shores such as Halibut Point. They pick individual mussels from a clump, hammer them to break through the shell, once again severing the adductor muscle to open the halves and consume the soft parts of the shellfish.

Their large size and white wing band make oystercatchers conspicuous in flight. They are also very vocal when alerted to danger, so you may hear them before you see them. Most likely they will see you first.

The species was hunted to near extinction in the 19th century for plumage and eggs. It has recovered significantly since the passage of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act in 1918 and has begun returning to its former range from refuges in the mid-Atlantic states. Oystercatchers reached coastal Massachusetts in 1969 and are occasionally seen as far north as Nova Scotia.

Adult (L) and juvenile (R)

Local birders have observed oystercatchers in the last few years trying to nest on the offshore islands around Cape Ann, where there are few if any mammalian predators. Gulls, however, take their toll on newborns.

The photograph confirms that oystercatchers are successfully breeding in Massachusetts. As the juveniles reach full size they closely resemble adults, with slightly duller plumage and grayer bills. Their eyes have not yet developed the bright orbital rings.

The AOWG offers some interesting observations about the birds' survival adaptations:

-Their counter-shaded plumage blends in surprisingly well in feeding habitat, particularly mussel and oyster beds, as well as on breeding habitat.

-The young can be heard calling from within the egg two days before they hatch.

-When eggs are present, at the approach of predators or humans, the tending adult slips off nest, usually unseen, while the intruder is still some distance away. It walks rapidly away some distance before taking flight. The bird then exhibits distraction behavior, circling back over the intruder in “butterfly” flight giving distress calls. It often adopts a mock sleeping attitude or mock brooding in an exposed location. In this posture it may allow predatory birds such as gulls to approach and rarely even touch it. Once displaced, the oystercatcher will run some distance, then resume mock brooding posture again.

- Precocial chicks are able to stand upright and run short distances within hours of hatching. They respond to parent alarm calls by running for cover, then lying immobile. Often they will not move until picked up. As fledglings they can escape gulls and peregrine falcons by diving under water, propelling themselves with their wings.

By late summer the oystercatchers begin their return to wintering grounds on the southern shoreline of the United States. They are a bellwether species of healthy coastal environments. We can hope that they will find our region increasingly appealing.

Summer Shoreline, Part 1 - Turnstone Territory

The Ruddy turnstone is the most common, and the most colorful, sandpiper at Halibut Point during August.

Ruddy turnstone adult

Adults have been here since the beginning of the month, working their way south from their tundra breeding grounds. They depart from those upper latitudes before their chicks have matured, presumably to leave as much food as possible for the young ones who will have to start their first migration unescorted.

Ruddy turnstone, juvenile

Juveniles begin to show up at Halibut Point in late August or early September. Their bright orange legs identify them distinctively on the shoreline.

Turnstones are named for one of their feeding methods when searching for small mollusks and crustaceans at the tide line.


They become adroit foragers at the edge of the sea where morsels are churned up in the turbulence. They always keep at least one eye on those beneficent waves.

 



At the beginning of August turnstones share the shoreline with only a few other bird species.

Herring gull

Perhaps it's their quickness that allows them to get along amicably with omnivorous gulls.

Common eider

With ducks they're no more than a passing curiosity.

Juvenile (l) and adult (r) turnstones with a Black-bellied plover

Eventually other shorebirds stop at Halibut Point in the fall migration to the southern hemisphere.

Ruddy turnstone landing beside
a juvenile Spotted sandpiper (l)
and a Semipalmated sandpiper (r)

American oystercatcher in background

Turnstones bring an end to the ornithologically drab summer months on the shoreline. Feathered as they are, it's an extravagant turning point.