by elizabeth5047 | Dec 31, 2010 | Uncategorized, Wildlife
I am reading a book called Kingbird Highway by Kenn Kaufman. In the 1970’s, he is traveling the United States trying to set a record, to see 650 different birds in one year. He is hitchhiking and camping and has lost 35 lbs. It’s not surprising that the subtitle is The Story of a Natural Obsession that Got a Little Out of Hand. This is the Preface: “People always called us ‘birdwatchers.’ But if we had been, there would be no story to tell. Nothing could have been simpler than ‘birdwatching.’ An activity that by name would have required nothing more than one person, alone, watching birds, any birds. The birds rarely would have watchd the person in return: perfectly independent, birds had no reason to care about humans. So the watching would have been one-way, and the matter would have ended there, with no ramifications. But in the early 1970’s, we were not birdwatching. We were birding, and that made all the difference. We were out to seek, to discover, to chase, to learn, to find as many different kinds of birds as possible–and, in friendly competition, to try to find more of them than the next birder. We became a community of birders… …This is the story about that time. I was fortunate enough to be traveling throughout North America, in pursuit of birds, during that formative era. It was a good time to be on the road, a good time to be very young, a good time to learn and travel and grow while we played this great new game called birding.” If only that game...
by elizabeth5047 | Dec 6, 2010 | Uncategorized
In November I went birding for the first time in earnest as part of a course I took online from Cornell. It was a good course but what I really loved was the day I spent in the field with John and Pat Thaxton from Northern New York Audubon and Leah Filo from the Wild Center. John very cleverly describes the sense of wonder I absolutely felt that day in this fun recap, dated Dec. 6, entitled, “Bliss You.” https://blog.timesunion.com/adirondacks/ I have refilled my feeder for the first time in a few years and am happily getting acquainted with the birds who hang around. I love the humble, busy...
by elizabeth5047 | Nov 28, 2010 | Uncategorized
I spent an excellent Thanksgiving weekend visiting Wilton, CT where I lived for a few years in the 1970’s. The landscape is different there. The woods are wide open and gentle. I saw a number of huge, smooth and apparently wildly healthy beech trees. The rocks are different too–no big glacial erratics but some interesting granite cliffs in the woods where I used to ride my pony so many years ago. The stonewalls are still there even if the open farm fields are now full of houses. ...
by elizabeth5047 | Nov 23, 2010 | Uncategorized
Last week on one of the Boquet Mountain trails I saw a magnificent tree–a white pine. It is nearly 14 feet in diameter and surrounded by branches that whorl their way up like a spiral staircase. The lowest branch is stout and sturdy, barely more than 18″ from the ground. It spreads horizontally, the sign that it grew unencumbered by competitors. It makes me wonder how many years it has witnessed and who of the local hunters, hikers, birds and beasts have noticed it. In my yard outside the window there is another huge white pine that has been growing in the village all the while the other was in the woods. It has survived a hurricane, a severe microburst and countless wind storms since I have lived here. It seems to guard my yard and my...
by elizabeth5047 | Nov 15, 2010 | Flora, Uncategorized
The outing of outings today with the reconvened Champlain Valley Botany Class that Jerry Jenkins taught in June at Black Kettle Farm. Sheri Amsel is pictured examining the dried capsules of Willowweed (Epilobium sp. ) on the outskirts of the Webb Royce Swamp after a morning of discussion about meristems and winnowing and umbels and glumes and gossamer. John Davis introduced me to the concept of an aerial ecosystem populated by all the spiders that I thought were suspended from the sky. Who knew...
by elizabeth5047 | Nov 14, 2010 | Uncategorized, Wildlife
This morning as I filled my Bialetti at the sink a fox trotted in the driveway. S/he checked the ditch along the road and finding nothing appealing continued toward the house. I reached for my camera and cracked the door to try to get a photo. Predictably as soon as I turned the handle the fox bounded to a safe distance. It turned to look at me but decided not to stick around for coffee, heading toward the compost behind the...
