South Shore Journal

Snowbound

 
As of last Friday, this house in Marshfield looked the way most of us felt: snow-blasted.

 
But not all is lost. For those nature lovers out there, the fact is that snow makes some critters more visible, and even forces some into the open to find food. This short-eared owl on Duxbury Beach is part of a dying breed. Only one nest can be found in Massachusetts now, at a protected location. Needless to say, seeing one is quite a surprise for anybody in the state these days.

 
Other species come south when the winters up north aren't to their liking. Duxbury Beach has also been the home of this common redpoll, one of a flock of about fifty birds hanging out on the dunes. Don't even try to find one in summer in Massachusetts. It's a lost cause.

 
Glaucous and Iceland gulls, known as our "white-winged gulls," find our beaches in winter, like here at Ocean Bluff in Marshfield. Their overall whiteness makes them stand out from our usual trifecta of great black-backed, herring and ring-billed gulls.

 
If nothing else, the snow once in a while makes us look at our world a little differently.

 
These pictures were taken off the driveway at the North River Wildlife Sanctuary in Marshfield.

 
And, of course, some thnings don't change at all. Our little screech owl friend is still sitting in the sun in Marshfield, as it has been for two months. It winked at us the other day, making us believe that some day soon, all the snow will be gone, and we'll get on with our normal lives.

But at What Cost?

Remember what the world looked like prior to last Friday afternoon? Remember how green the grass looked, how enjoyable it was to just drive, or maybe take a walk on a nature trail? And now look at eastern Massachusetts. And it's all our fault.

Oh, I'm not suggesting that Mother Nature would punish our corner of the earth just because our Friday Morning Birders saw a new bird this week, tying the record we've been chasing for the past three weeks, but it's so totally obvious she did. Think about it. Two weeks ago, we noticed we were getting close to the record, so what happened? That Friday morning she unleashed a rain storm that nearly blew us off the bluff at Manomet Point. Last week, we were bold enough - David Ludlow, myself and ten participants - to venture out in the face of impending snow. We found that bird, and then BOOM! Eighteen inches of snow.

With the weather predicted for that afternoon, we decided to go coastal. We stuck to the Scituate shore, picking up all the usual winter suspects: mergansers, loons, grebes, eiders, scoters, goldeneyes, cormorants and gannets. At Third Cliff we spotted an anticlimactic snowy owl (having already seen one on Duxbury Beach earlier in the winter) and some shorebirds as well. A Bonaparte's gull at Peggotty Beach joined the three regulars (herring, ring-billed and great black-backed). We even found a white pigeon.

But it was on a whim that our luck finally turned. Every Friday since 1988, this program has run, or at least been offered. Some weather and holiday cancellations have occurred from time to time. To date, the most species of birds ever seen in one calendar year of Fridays was 220, amassed in 2000. With two weeks to go in 2008, we had 219. We turned down Lighthouse Road to head for Cedar Point and Scituate Light. And there it sat, a peregrine falcon on the rocky low-tide area.

Then the snow started to fall, and that's one story I don't have to repeat, as I'm sure you all know it by now. Although technically David and I have this Friday off, we've giving it up to go for the record. And at the moment, the weather forecast looks bearable. But shh, don't tell Mother Nature. We're starting to feel embarrassed about what we've wrought.

One to Tie, Two for the Win

I started out the day after Thanksgiving like I do every year, going for a walk outdoors. The sun was just coming up as I headed for More-Brewer Park in Hingham, and, I'm happy to say, the tradition continues.

I thought it was just a coincidence last year when for the second year in a row I stumbled across a flock of wild turkeys on the day after their darkest day. Now I know, though, that the turkeys are trying to tell me something. Before I even reached the woods this time, they appeared. One at a time, one...two...three...ten...twelve...fifteen...sixteen female turkeys crossing the road! That's three years in a row, and although they're trying to tell me something, I have no idea what that something is.

Circumstances later in the week found me in Plymouth. I had two meetings lined up, and decided to get there early and wander about a bit. Fun! I visited the West Plymouth Recreation Area and communed with the red-breasted nuthatches hanging out among the pines. From there, I checked out Jenney Pond, and then headed to Sharon for another appointment. There I ran into Massachussets' official heroine, Deborah Sampson, in front of the Sharon Public Library. Hmm, what a coincidence. I think I have an article on her coming out in South Shore Living magazine...

Friday's tradition continued this week as well, as our Friday Morning Birders picked up where we left off two weeks ago. This week's destination was a no-brainer, even for bird brains like us. Snowy owls, populous in Massachusetts this year because of a good breeding year (thanks to a high number of lemmings in the north) and pushed south in search of food (a lemming population crash caused by an overpopulation of snowy owls), had been spotted on Duxbury Beach. With four weeks to go in the calendar year, David Ludlow and I are doing our best to break the Friday Morning Birders record of 220 species sighted in one year. To date, we had 217. We surprised ourselves by making number 218 before we saw the snowy owl. A razorbill sat on the water in the distance, barely discernible bouncing on the waves. The snowy owl? Bonus! That got us to 219. We found more red-breasted nuthatches (or as we call them, RB Nuts), playing beneath the Myles Standish Monument in Duxbury. By the way, does anybody know what he's pointing at?

So with three weeks to go, we need one to tie, two for the all-time record. Can we do it?

Stay tuned.

A Cave Swallow Would Have Been Nice

But we didn't find one. Sometimes the best laid plans of mice and men end up caught in a trap. Or something to that effect.

Oh, we had a plan. It happens every Friday. We have a plan, a target bird, then all goes awry. Outdoor life is completely unpredictable. My father and I used to work together as landscapers in Hingham. He described that existence as "writing your plans on an ice cube." Weather can change so many things, so quickly, you have to be ready to turn on a dime and change directions. Like the wind.

And so it was that we did so on Friday. Cave swallows, blown up from New Mexico and Texas by last week's powerful southwest winds, had appeared all over the Massachusetts coast, including at Scituate's Egypt Beach and the Glades. Our problem was that the birds appeared on Saturday and Sunday, and Friday Morning Birders wouldn't be coming around again until - you guessed it - Friday. But we still had to try.

We started at North Scituate Beach, catching sight of many of the winter residents we'll be sharing our offshore waters with for the next few months: red-throated and common loons, horned and red-necked grebes, harlequin ducks, and more. I had a sighting I knew was a bird of prey, perched atop an offshore rock, but it was turned facing out to sea, so all we were getting was a brown back. The American flag out there should have tipped me off. It soon took off and revealed itself to be an immature bald eagle! What a stirring sight.

We headed up into the Glades, wandering the road to the first open area where the bedrock lies flat and opens the view to the sea. A northern mockingbird attempted to throw us off course with an odd call, one just not heard 'round these parts. It may have been trying to distract us from the late northern parula that we found in a nearby cedar tree. The little warbler was supposed to leave two weeks ago, according to our handheld migration calendars. Guess parulas can't read. Moments later, at Pulpit Rock, a ruby-crowned kinglet began to call. There it was, beautiful, majestic Pulpit Rock, named in the 1800s by summer tourists for its looming presence over the rest of the rocks below, a perfect place from which to bellow out a fire and brimstone sermon. And there our birders were, ignoring it and staring directly into a cedar.

We continued through the Glades to find robins and cedar waxwings in large numbers in the coastal forest. A lawn near the end of the road proved to be good feeding grounds for dark-eyed juncos and other birds, including a fox sparrow and a vesper sparrow. Off the point, three dozen harbor seals piled onto a rock that was just too small tol hold them all, or so one (one who was not a seal) would think.

Marching back through the cold, the same lawn beckoned to us. This time, it was two pine siskins that sounded their presence, northern birds that occasionally deign to visit us southern Massachusetts dwellers. By the time we left the Glades, we barely had time to drive back to the office. We swung past Musquashicut Pond, found a winter wren, more ducks and some swans acting as icebreakers, as the northern end ofthe pond had frozen, and headed for home.

One last stop had to be made. As we drove down the Driftway, a hawk watched us pass. We spun around and pulled up alongside it, and there it sat, a young red-shouldered hawk. From the passenger's seat, I snapped away.

Sixty species of birds, but not a single cave swallow. But, to paraphrase John Denver, I am no longer a poor man, for I've seen an eagle fly. I'll get my cave swallow some day. It just means I have to get outdoors one more time, and that's enough to keep me going.

The Oddities of Jenny Pond

When I was a kid, in what now feels like the 1400s, we used to visit my grandmother down in Plymouth. That used to mean one of two things: feeding ducks at Jenny Pond or going through the old Cranberry World visitors center on the waterfront. So many memories are associated with the latter, including sampling juices and cocktails at the end of the tour and watching the endless loop of old TV commercials that ran in the exhibit. Does anyone remember Mr. Hooper from Sesame Street pushing a handcart through the streets hollering "Cranapple! Cran-Grape!"?

Jenny Pond today, though, holds different significance for my life. It's a regular destination for our Friday Morning Birders' group, especially in the colder months. There are a few regulars that we expect to find there throughout the year. In the summer, it's the black-crowned night herons that roost in the low branches on the far side of the pond. In the winter, it's a singular bird: the lesser black-backed gull.

This particular bird - at least we figure it has to be the same one - has been coming back to Jenny Pond for several years. If he has anything to do with the rest of his tribe, he's supposed to be breeding up in Greenland (one now breeds on Appledore Island in Maine, but that one is banded, and this one is not) before heading to warmer climes for the winter. Most of the population spreads out across northern Europe and Asia. Not this guy. We've seen him atop light poles, on fences, once even on the cupola of the John Carver Inn.

The lesser black-backed is not to be confused with our much more common gull, the greater black-backed. A side-by-side comparison would show the obvious reasoning for the names. If you have a single black-backed gull that looks small,and you're unsure whether or not it's a lesser, check a few things: look for a smudgy, unclean-looking head, yellow legs (the greater has pink) and a dark grayish, not-so-much-black back.

But there's more to see at Jenny Pond. There are plenty of beautiful wintering ducks on the pond - like the gadwall pictured at left - and then there are the year-round resident mallards. And then there' s the duck we haven't figured out yet. If we had to name it, we'd call it Baby Huey.

It's obvious that it (I, at least, have no clue as to its sex) is part mallard. It's got a mallard head and a set of curly feathers near the tail that also mark it as such. But it's much bigger than a mallard, and the rest of the body coloring is obviously different. What could be bigger? A swan or a goose of some kind, of course, but how do we explain the color? Who knows. And is that mom or dad in the background?

In most parts of the United States, the sighting of a lesser black-backed gull would send birders scrambling to the shore (sadly, I can't say the same for Baby Huey). On the South Shore, it's not such a huge thing. For the moment, we have one of our own. But some day, it'll be gone. Gulls are famous for short life spans. If you're keeping a life list, take the opportunity to check this one off, and to enjoy the beauty of Plymouth in late fall.

Some Fall Views

Life has gotten in the way over the past few weeks, a new, precious life, to be precise. While my wife and I have welcomed our first son into the world, my time outdoors has been limited. But the few times I have been out, I've been able to snap some photographs that have captured some of the essence of the season. Here they are, with brief comments. I'll resume normal postings next week, as I return to the great outdoors more frequently.

This guy, a yellow-bellied sapsucker, we found down at High Pines on Duxbury Beach. We have four woodpeckers that are quite common in our region - downy, hairy and red-bellied woodpeckers and northern flickers - then yellow-bellied sapuckers, pileated woodpeckers and, extremely rarely, red-headed woodpeckers. On the list, therefore, of woodpeckers we expect to see, this comes in fifth of seven, a nice sighting.

I was walking through the Daniel Webster Wildlife Sanctuary talking about foliage with a friend when I heard a peep, and saw a chipmunk scurry away. Once in his heart-shaped tree hole, it pointed a wary eye out to watch until we walked away. I had time enough, though, to snap this shot.

We have a weird relationship with eastern bluebirds at Daniel Webster. Is it the wood? Is it the grass? Are we too close to the ocean? Whatever the reason, bluebirds visit the sanctuary in spring, inspect the boxes we have throughout the grasslands, then fly away. They return in the fall and inspect them again. And that's it.

I'll spare you the gory details of this sighting, other than to say there was an English house sparrow involved that would rather have not met this merlin, a small bird-hunting falcon. We found it atop a utility pole in the heart of Center Marshfield, and in the end, we were the spectacle. When two vanloads of people are staring at something through binoculars, people want to know what the heck is going on.

We got grackled. One rainy day at the office I heard a squawk outside my window, pulled up the shade, and was blown away by the sight of several hundred common grackles at our feeder stations. When they arrived, our regulars - chickadees, titmice, nuthatches and woodpeckers - vanished from sight.

Although much maligned for their noisiness and belligerence toward other birds, grackles can be quite beautiful. The iridescence of the feathers on their heads can be stunning when viewed up close. My advice? When the warblers are gone for the year, the leaves are off the trees and snow is on the ground, examine a grackle. You'll see what I mean.

This great blue heron was rushing from one side of the Green Harbor River to the other on a very foggy Friday morning. His cousins, the black-crowned night herons which we had tried to visit, were nowehere to be found.

Elsewhere, this northern harrier was taking a break from hunting over the grasses of Mounce's Meadow in Marshfield. While the grounds have gone from meadow to community gardens and corn fields over the past year, they're still good for birds. Meadow voles, which have been wreaking havoc on locally grown pumpkins, are simply delicious to predators like the harrier.

It's a shame that something so beautiful can be so bad for us. Invasives species like bittersweet provide their pulse of color to the late fall, but do so at the expense of some of our native plants. Perhaps the color is their defense against us tearing them out. We hate to destroy what's beautiful, even when it's the right thing to do.

Fall is nearly over, but we'll keep rolling right into and through winter. This Friday, it's Friday morning birders, and Saturday it's a walk at Daniel Webster Wildlife Sanctuary in search of hawks and owls. I'm still checking in on the North Hill Marsh Wildlife Sanctuary every week, compiling data for our migration season waterfowl survey. As always, I hope to see you on the trails.

Before the Deluge

Gather 'round, one and all, and I shall tell you about life outdoors before the rains came.

It's been an interesting few weeks around the region, and, according to my calendar, I guess I'm one who would know. On September 7, we had the remnants of a storm that wiped out our Cuttyhunk trip, something that is also happening today. On the 9th, Mass Audubon held its annual staff outing at Moose Hill Wildlife Sanctuary in Sharon. I joined many of my fellow Auduboners on a walk to the bluffs of the hill and then ran off to Logan to fly to Rochester, New York, for the evening. The next morning I gave a talk as part of a panel on "Choosing the Right Publisher for Your Local History" at the annual conference of the American Association for State and Local History. That night, I was back in Dartmouth, Mass., to give a talk on the Breeding Bird Atlas 2 project for the Paskamansett Bird Club. Forty-eight hours, a radio PSA recording at WATD 95.9 FM and one natural history book club meeting (William Cronon's Changes in the Land) later, I was off to Block Island. Check that story out in the post preceding this one.

On the 16th, our regional conservation scientist, Robert Buchsbaum, arrived to help me flip over forty coverboards at our North River Wildlife Sanctuary in search of red-backed salamanders. We found eight, twice as many as we found in the spring. As this study is still young, we have no idea what those numbers mean. That night, I gave a talk at the Sturgis Library in Barnstable on puffins. Thursday, I met with friends Mark and Fred and a reporter from the Boston Globe regarding our upcoming New England Military History Symposium on November 1, and on Friday morning, our birders traveled to the Cumberland Farm Fields in Hanson and East Bridgewater in search of sparrows (we got indigo buntings and pectoral sandpipers, and lots of them). On Saturday the 20th, my wife and I visited the beluga whales and Stellar's sea lions at Mystic Aquarium, and on Sunday I covered the Foundation for Coast Guard History's plaque dedication at Beavertail Lighthouse in Jamestown, Rhode Island, for a few magazines.

Monday, I stayed local. I started the day at our North Hill Marsh Wildlife Sanctuary in Duxbury, taking the first stab at our waterfowl fall migration survey (lots of Canada geese, but an equal number of wood ducks, and one pied-billed grebe). I then gave a talk on lighthouses at the Duxbury Senior Center, and then moved off to the Daniel Webster Wildlife Sanctuary, where I walked out to find our Owl's Quest box. Back at the North River Wildlife Sanctuary, I walked out to find our Hannah Eames Quest materials, marveling at mushrooms, like the hen o' the woods pictured here, along the way.

Wednesday, it was back to Daniel Webster to help David Ludlow and Duxbury Conservation Agent and super volunteer Joe Grady pace off and mark the parking lot for our annual Farm Day event, and on Thursday, it was back to WATD to do a live in studio appearance with Rob Hakala and the morning news, again on Farm Day. That afternoon, I gave another talk, on the Ocean Act, at our Boston Nature Center in Mattapan.

Friday morning, with David Ludlow tied up in Farm Day duties, I led Friday Morning Birders alone. The coming rains kept most of our group at bay, but a few hardy souls trekked out with me to Ferry Hill thicket (ruby-throated hummingbird, Carolina wren and the fruit of the Aralia spinosa, or Devil's walkingstick, shown above) and Duxbury Beach. We spent the bulk of our time on the beach, finding mostly black-bellied plovers, dunlin and eventually a flock of approximately 400 sanderlings, but were nicely surprised by a young American golden plover, hunkered down against the wond and rain, right next to immatue black-bellies. We spotted a common loon on our return trip, but then, with an hour and a half to go, well, that's when the rains came. We finished birding by van, and retreated early to the North River sanctuary.

And the rain has never really stopped. We cancelled Saturday's Farm Day, much to our chagrin, and, as I said earlier, were the sun out now, I'd be heading to Woods Hole for a run out to Cuttyhunk Island. Ah well, it'll all pass. At least I hope so. There's still lots to do this fall, and I'd like to be outdoors to do most of it.

Rushing Through Labor Day

Summer ended in a blur for me, with all the great things I had going on. The past ten days or so have been overwhelmingly beautiful, allowing me to both get some work done at home (staining the deck, planting the mums, you know, the "honey-do" list) and enjoy the beauty of the Massachusetts landscape.

I woke up the day after the Isles of Shoals trip at 4:30. Hard to believe, I know, but my friend David Ludlow and I decided we needed a "nature day," a day to roam and be away from anybody else's schedule. And roam we did, right up through Boston before the traffic could get started, so we could be at Plum Island in Newburyport just prior to 7 a.m. That's with a Dunkin Donuts stop, of course. We had to pick up our wood ducks and red-winged blackbirds before heading for the island.

Our day consisted of four distinct wildlife stops, and one stop for fried clams at Bob Lobster. The Parker River National Wildlife Refuge had been sending out reports of clouds of thousands of tree swallows all week long. The shiny blue-backed little birds were staging for the trip south. I still laugh whenever I see them in these numbers. In doing some research on 18th century Massachusetts, I came across the theory that tree swallows spend their winters in the bottom of ponds, only to emerge in the spring. Yes, I laugh now, but I know that someone had to make a guess as to where they were when the snow hit, and at that point, that guess was as good as any. Anyhow, at one point in the day, we were standing near a pond, and the birds decided to come straight at us, making for an amazing experience.

We had some fun with a number of brown thrashers that appeared briefly and then disappeared as soon as they saw us. We ran into four, throughout the refuge. We walked out onto Sandy Point, finding a couple of piping plovers and a fellow birder named Chris. He asked if we'd seen any American golden plovers, and then, answering his own question, pointed one out in flight. David and I later found three more. We also scored a stilt sandpiper from the South Tower before heading elsewhere for the day.

Out on the mudflats we sorted through the thousands of shorebirds to focus on a young Forster's tern. At the Martin H. Burns Widlife Management Area, we picked up a chestnut-sided warbler and a young winter wren working on its song. Nelson Island proved to be quite quiet.

On Tuesday morning, I led the historical tour of Hull for the teachers newly arriving in the local school system, and on Wednesday I had the opportunity to lead a group of senior citizens from Hingham on a walk around Daniel Webster Wildlife Sanctuary. We had two dozen wood ducks in the wet panne, with phoebes flitting here and there in search of bugs, and a pair of blue-headed vireos in the Piggery Loop. Thursday brought the final Duxbury Beach Program birding trip of the summer season, and a few red knots. Friday Morning Birders returned to Duxbury Beach to successfully find a migrant lark sparrow, pictured fuzzily (is that a word?) at left.

Sunday sent me offshore, on the first of the September trips to Cuttyhunk Island off the South Coast. If the weather holds, I'll be back out there two more times this year. While we never expect quantities of birds on the 'Hunk, we do expect an interesting sighting or two. On the way south we watched a northern harrier working the ridge of Naushon Island, amidst the clouds of tree swallows that had gathered there. High atop Winter House, one of the island landmarks, we noted a solitary common nighthawk. Two American kestrels worked the thickety fields beyond Lookout Hill. American oystercatchers waved us good-bye from the harbor.

Yesterday we reserved for local birding, as Friday Morning Birders did a Scituate thing. I was a bit tired, having seen Batman: The Dark Knight the night before and getting less than five hours sleep, but still found I could focus my eyes if needed. We found a Baird's sandpiper amongst the many shorebirds of the mudflats on Justice Cushing Road, and wandered through the Glades in search of migrating warblers. No such luck, although we did find red-eyed vireos to be the bird of the day. Musquashicut Pond was quite quiet, as was the Old Driftway bean field, Driftway Conservation Park and other spots. The heat continued to build as we walked, making for slow birding, and a scattered gang. Still, we finished up with 52 species for the day.

Today, Hanna is upon us. Our second Cuttyhunk trip might not run tomorrow, which would be a shame. The Seabirds and Whale Tales cruise out of Plymouth has already been postponed. Well, 'tis the season, I suppose. I'm just hoping for good weather come Friday, as I head for Block Island...

August 21 - Hay Now

Yesterday was my hay day. I have one every year, and every year I suffer pretty badly from hay fever. But it's all worth it.

The rest of the last week has been pretty fun, too. Thursday, the 14th, was a Duxbury Beach day, of course, and Friday the 15th our Friday Morning Birders gang hit Third Cliff in Scituate in anticipation of catching some of shorebird migration. Check out the two pictures to the left. Shorebirds are masters of disguise. The first pic is a wide shot of the rocks we were searching through. The second is a zoom of the same picture. Semi-palmated plovers, semipalmated sandpipers and ruddy turnstones were there by the hundreds. We just had to scope them out. We also found a few young little blue herons and a marbled godwit, a lifebird for me, I think. I have to check.

We stayed along the Scituate coast that day, finding least sandpipers feeding in both the least and most expected place, the mud (expected) of the public works departments grounds. A young red-tailed hawk overlooked the proceedings, eventually calling out some undecipherable emotion from its spot in a dead tree.

Saturday was a fun one, too. I led a trip called "Summer Walks in Abington," leading a group of 11 through Island Grove, Mt. Vernon Cemetery and Ames Nowell State Park. We talked about the Civil War history attached to the former, the romantic idealism of the second, and the readable land-use history of the third. Along the way we met broad-winged hawks and black-and-white warblers, belted kingfishers and red-eyed vireos. Sunday morning I gave a talk on the history of Hull for the town's Jewish community at a celebratory breakfast for one of that family's most inspirational leaders.

Monday night I spent at dinner with Audubon friends in planning a trip to Michigan next year to find, among other species, Kirtland's warblers. That gave way Tuesday morning to a trip to Gurnet Lighthouse at the end of Duxbury Beach. We had to hustle, as severe thunderstorms were moving in, but everybody who wanted to climb the tower did so. The rest of us watched the tree, barn, bank and cliff swallows and chimney swifts swirling in the nearby skies.

We headed back down Duxbury Beach today, finding the birdlife to be somewhat quiet, save for the short-billed dowitcher at left that joined us for an up close and personal view. This afternoon I led a writer around Hull to get her some ideas for a book she's working on about the region. We did Fort Revere Park and many other high points.

But back to the hay. David, our property manager, had already mowed the fields last week, and on Wednesday, Les, our volunteer, tedded them with a small tractor. My job, with Les jumping in and out, was to catch the hay bales as they came out of the chute and stack them on the wagon. In all, our team stacked 406 bales.

So what's the big deal? Those bales will end up on family and school hay rides for the next year, and they'll be seating for the music shows at Farm Day on September 27. They'll also end up on roadsides around the South Shore, absorbing runoff from construction projects before it's allowed into our streams, rivers and ponds. I do a lot of things for Audubon of which I'm proud, but this one day a year is always at the top of that list.

August 7 - Beachin' It

It's always fun when Robert comes to town. I mean, how many people get to say they have a "regional scientist" to chat with whenever they have a question about the natural world?

We get him at least once a year for a dedicated public program, and many more times to ourselves. Mass Audubon, thanks to the generosity of Duxbury Beach Reservation, Inc., runs a series of programs on the beach throughout the summer, free adult programs on Tuesday and Thursday mornings and free kids' classes on Saturday mornings, all through July and August. Once a year, we get Robert and his bag of scientist's goodies.

This year, Robert had his usual equipment: field guides to birds, plants, seaweeds, etc., plastic containers for holding samples, hand lens. He also, though, brought down a bigger piece of equipment that I got to lug around in between uses, a good-sized seining rig. We were going fishing.

We started on the beachside, under overcast skies that threatened imminent rain. It actually lent a cooling effect to the day, which was certainly welcome, considering the summer it's been. We wandered from high tide line to low tide line, finding and dicussing rockweeds, plovers (semipalmated and piping), and seaweeds, where they live, how they procreate, their anatomies and more. We tried the seine, to no avail. All it served to do was temproarily slow the circulation in our legs, Robert's and mine. Definitely not swimming weather.

We meandered over to the bayside, spurred on by a plant identification question. Was it coltsfoot? No, Robert said, that bloomed much earlier in the year. The yellow flowered plants we were inquiring about were two distinct species, field sow's thistle and spiny-leaved sow's thistle. A horseshoe crab burrowed herself into the mud. We seined, and in came the silversides, the mummichogs and the sand shrimp. Our ladies, our dedicated Tuesday and Thursday morning crew, scoured the net for any small fish that may have been left behind, gently picking them up and tossing them back into the ocean.

Crabs then stole the show. We had just been discussing invasive Asian shore crabs and what they were doing to displace "our" green crabs (in reality, green crabs had invaded our shores in the 1820s, and are an invasive species as well; they've just been here so  long we consider them "ours"), when a green crab scuttled off under the water. Robert pounced with a plastic container, and brought it out for examination. The poor little guy was missing a claw. The horseshoe crab had been missing a tail. The Asian shore crab we found moments later was also missing a claw. The hermit crabs, though, all seemed to be in one piece. Each. Not one giant hermit crab made up of several others. That would be weird.

It was a day that could have gone on forever, but alas, the other side of my worklife - the one that consists of sitting in front of a computer - beckoned. The rain held off during the day, but arrived with a vengeance later that night, spooking me out of a sound sleep around 1 a.m. I wonder how the creatures of the seashore react when storms like last night's come up? Do they run and hide (like me), or does it even register with them on an emotional, or need-for-safety level?

Hmm, I think I'll call our regional scientist to find out.