On Giving Up Brown

Without doubt the social distancing that's required of us now on the pathways of Halibut Point diminishes our enjoyment of the Park. But I'm realizing that the restriction of normal human contact has a give-and-take April aspect like this month's temperamental weather itself and extends the period of wintry introspection that prepares me for the vivid encounters of spring. I am aware in these topsy-turvy days of my ambivalence about re-engaging with the usual hubbub of energies. The annual social renaissance will be both more selective and richer.

Although we are more than a chronological month into Spring my sap has not fully come back up from the roots of solitude. A bit of warmth touching the color brown is enough to soften the monochrome of solitariness.

Blue, a cold color, makes the browns come alive. The grace note of a squirrel's animation sparks a leafless tree into fuller wonder. If you're a derivative creature like me who can't live entirely on sunshine, air and rain, it helps to remember where your treasure is stored.

The embrace of blue empowers a banquet of browns in the dormant landscape. Water and sky strike my eye with a chilly aspect. I'm drawn toward visual entertainments on the leafless land.

Sweet repetitions of phoebe, phoebe, phoebe overhead nevertheless prove nature's intentions of proliferating itself on the receding frontier of brown.

A  phoebe inspects the renovated Visitor's Center to see whether last year's nesting spot under the eaves still holds promise for procreation. It settles instead on building its family residence under  a sheltered overhang in the quarry wall.

Eastern Phoebe

Perched on a branch over the palisade the phoebe models color subtleties that blend it protectively into the background yet make it an elegant palette of brown.

Hickory leaf

Brown is the overt color of decomposition and decay. All organic individuality in nature returns to humus that fertilizes new beginnings, and to the busy soil of endeavor where life's strenuous reach takes hold.

The freshness and vigor of green signal a new proliferation of growing cells to fund all possible activity. I give it's pace and responsibilities a reluctant greeting. The spongy, muddy, reassuring earth recedes from view beneath the clamoring verdure.

Blueberry budding

In the pact with life every continuing organism resumes its cycle of testimony to the work of bearing fruit.

Wings and Waves

A Northern Gannet flying above the Halibut Point surf

A perfect confluence of weather and near-shore fish brought surf and Gannets together in an early April coastal drama.

On the wing

Scanning for fish

Circling flock

Plunging dive

Returning to the sky

A bird flies over the collision of elements that sustain it.

Winter in the Rear View Mirror

The winter slipped by Halibut Point without much of the usual seasonal hardship, though the sea water often resembles a forbidding liquid crystal. Somehow that deep and chilling beauty draws me into union with itself. My temporal life separates from it just far enough to feel the joy of individuality, and the awesome recognition that my particle of consciousness will one day be re-absorbed to the infinite. Staring into the omnivorous sea brings on a hypnotic, seductive, repellant vertigo.

As tides recede the cold wind and waves freeze water in singular ways commanding "Look at me!" while gulls mind their own business overhead.

Puddles of meltwater go their own crystal way under starlight when the solar torch diverts to the other side of the world.

In the morning new masterworks of ice sculpture appear on the cliffs of Folly Cove.

The surface of the Babson Farm Quarry generates its own intrigues as water changes state from life-giving liquid to inert, cryptic solid.

The Quarry cliffs host their own cryogenic ornaments wherever water flows out of seams to glaciate in wintry air.

Seasonal adaptations turn cedar foliage from jade-green to bronze,

but the winter was mild enough to support Yellow-rumped Warblers along the rim of the Quarry,

and to keep this White-footed mouse from retreating into full hibernation.

This year's mild temperatures and infrequent snow will have varied impact on local organic life, and may be related to larger global shifts.

At a time when an invisible virus has emptied metropolitan streets, the underlying realities of nature promise an enduring universe outside the realm of desire.

Dancing in the Street

We interrupt our regularly scheduled Series to bring you this report from the field of Life Goes On.

A pair of Tufted Titmice took to the street on Gaffield Avenue,

feeling the Rhythm of Spring at the required social distance.

Nonetheless, one got Rhythm in its feet

and caught up its partner in the dance.

Spaces between the shadows came to life

as its call was answered.

Being in Rhythm is just a matter of time.

Birds under Water 4 - Deep Divers

A series on birds at Halibut Point 

with diverse adaptations

to finding food below the water surface:

Dabblers, Plungers, Divers, and Pursuers.

Ring-necked Ducks

Occasionally fresh-water birds like the Ring-necked Duck that normally dive for plants and seeds in shallow lakes, stop for a rest along this coastline. The Halibut Point environment challenges them in many ways.

Greater Scaup

A bird like the Greater Scaup is an unusual visitor from the muddy-bottomed salt water bays where it can find food such as clams and plants.

Three scoter species in flight

The deeper-diving sea ducks have had to evolve a balance between lightness for flight and heavy musculature to reach the ocean bottom in search of food. They are buoyant enough to float and stay warm in their 'default' resting state with the least counter-acting effort to 'corkiness' in swimming under water.

Black Scoters, male and female

Notice how much lower these sea ducks sit in the water than the two species above. By compressing their feathers they become less buoyant in preparing to dive.

White-winged Scoters, male and female

Diving creates a problem for birds: They need a continuous supply of oxygen and must get rid of carbon dioxide, but diving requires breathing to stop. For starters, divers have greater blood volume and store more oxygen, as oxyhemoglobin in blood and oxymyoglobin in muscle, than non-divers. Tufted Ducks, for example, have 70 percent more oxygen per kilogram of body weight than Mallards. ¹

Surf Scoters, 2 males and a female

These birds are sitting higher in the water than the Black Scoters pictured above. They have achieved resting buoyancy and insulation by fluffing their inner feathers, incorporating air within their down beneath the guard feathers.

Birds that are foot-propelled in water generally hold their wings tightly while diving and swimming, so as to streamline the body. Eider and scoter ducks, however, keep their wings partially extended to help in propulsion and maneuvering. ²

King Eider

Carbon-dioxide buildup stimulates birds to breathe and can ultimately force breathing — death for a diver. To counter this problem, divers have a better buffering system that allows them to accumulate more carbon dioxide before breathing. ¹

Long-tailed Ducks, 2 males and a female

About six seconds into a dive, a reflex causes general metabolism to decrease. The heart rate slows by about 50 percent, and blood is shunted from the skin, viscera, and musculature — body parts that can tolerate limited oxygen — to the heart and brain, which require a constant supply. The actions help conserve a limited oxygen supply. If required, rapid muscular activity can be accomplished anaerobically. Lactic acid that builds up will be removed metabolically after oxygen is restored. ¹

Long-tailed Duck preparing to dive

Long-tailed ducks are the deepest divers in the duck family, reportedly capable of reaching depths of 200 feet. Their bodies are more streamlined than scoters and to a greater extent able to use their wings for propulsion, to some degree “flying underwater” in the manner of penguins. ³

Sources
1. Eldon Greij, "How Birds Are Able to Dive and Swim Below the Waves," www.birdwatchingdaily, October 4, 2018.
2. Paul R. Ehrlich, David S. Dobkin, and Darryl Wheye,
web.stanford.edu/group/stanfordbirds/text/essays/Swimming, 1988.
3. Chris Leahy, The Birdwatcher's Companion, 2004.