November

From the Sconset Bluff

From the Creeks

November 22

We made the trip to Nantucket despite the weather forecast of rain and high winds.  It's a chance to see the next chapter in the yearly procession of plants.  A chance to hear the howl of the winds  and slap of the white caps on the sea.  A chance to be face to face with sunrises and sunsets. A chance to experience the raw wildness of the sea and nature.  

We arrived Friday with rains and hopefully the end of drought.  There was hardly any rain in August (1.4 inches), September (1.55 inches), and October(.53 inches).  That's according to my weather station, and I wonder if my rain collector is accurate in the northeasters with their slanting downpours.  In any event, it is a consistent measure.

Rain totals for August, September, November

2024:  3.5 inches

2023: 8.7

2022:  9.1

2021:  9.7

2020:  5.8

Scoters, long-tailed ducks, eiders, buffleheads, loons and grebes dot  the ocean, along with northern gannets, herring, greater black-backed and lesser black-backed gulls.

Harlequin Ducks

At low tide, I hiked to see harlequin ducks at the rocks off Sankaty Head.  They return to a spot they like , just as we do.  After a break in the rain, Josh and I walked the Creeks and see a palm warbler and a pie-billed grebe. 

American wigeon and a host of ruddy ducks at Sesachacha. Windswept Bog is closed to hikers until March 15, while the second stage of wetlands restoration takes place.

The late sunrises and early sunsets made for a cozy day on Saturday.  I finished knitting two  baby hats; football is scrambled except for Notre Dame's big win over Army.  Many boats were cancelled because of the high winds, gusting in the 40s.

Ginger Andrews suggested the birding group deal with the 25 plus mile an hour winds by hiking at Pines and Larches near Miacomet on Sunday morning. The bluestem grasses are golden in the slanted sun.  Yellow rumpled warblers surround us along the brushy paths.

Walking in Squam Swamp, the Tupelos are long leafless.  The mosses and holly trees are a green spot amidst the gray, until we reach the beech grove with its golden haze of leaves. No birdsong and only a couple of sparrows jumping. 

Tupelo’s at Squam Swamp

Beech grove

October in Nantucket

Like Thoreau, I have a longing for wildness. The more digital and technological life becomes, the more I love the wild.  It may seem strange to call an island favored by billionaires wild, but it is an island exposed to the winds and waves of the North Atlantic, a precious ecosystem of sand plain grassland, and more than 50% of its area is conserved.

My foraging year has included blueberries, beach plums and fox grapes, and this past weekend we scalloped at Pocomo. Yummy ceviche followed as we celebrated Josh's 75th birthday with his close friends David and Michael and their wives. We sent them home with our wild  fox grape jelly.

We took our first trip of the year to Great Point. Fisherman were catching false albacore when they could beat the seals.  We showed off our favorite Norwood Farm walk. Firey maples, late seaside goldenrod and late asters adorned the landscape.  Most of the pond lilies were gone, but blueberry bushes and cotton grass lit up the ponds .

As I hiked Windswept bog before departing, I chanced upon a rusty blackbird eating viburnum berries.  A clay-colored sparrow mixed in with white-throated and song sparrows. Several sharp-shinned hawks scuffled and sheared through the landscape.  There were late patches of the purple gerardia which was so prolix last month. When next I visit, the bright colors will be gone.

Cain’s Pond

Windswept Bog

Sharp-shinned Hawk

Rusty Blackbird

Green-winged Teal

Northern Seaside Goldenrod
Solidago sempervirens

Summer’s End

 On September 16,  I hiked Norwood Farm. The downy Goldenrod is in full bloom, contrasting with the deep red of the Little bluestem grasses. The Fox grapes leaves are yellowing; the aroma of overripe grapes perfumed the air . I felt like the member of a wedding party walking down the aisle as bouquets of sweet everlasting and downy goldenrod lined the path.

I enjoyed the quiet ( except for the jay's and towhees) after our 5 weeks of kids and grandkids visiting.  I love the hubbub and chance to be with family, and now summer's end signals the beginning of a quieter time.

Black Huckleberry

Aster

Tupelo

Norwood Oak

Sweet Everlasting and
Downy Goldenrod

The red Huckleberry and Crumpled elegant fern livened other spots, amid the spent Sweet Pepper (Clethra Alnifolia )and scrub oak.  An Eastern Garter snake slithers out of the sunny trail and into the brush.

There hasn't been much rain in a month, as evidenced by the dried up ponds:  the Norwood Pond, Corner Pond and Almanac Pond. And  Dried out marsh st. Johnswort at the edges.  There are Few sickle-leaved silk grass  remaining on the road , with a few asters on the side, including Late and New England asters( Symphotrichum Patens and Novo-Angliae.)

The dry weather has meant so many beautiful sunrises...and close to the autumnal equinox, they are due east from our bedroom window!  And with sunrises between 6 and 6:30, a lot easier to get up for!

The berry season now ending has been highly productive for us foragers:  blueberries, beach plums (12 jars of jelly)  and  grapes ( half of our takings has yielded 12 jars of jelly).

American Black Duck

Gull-billed Tern

 

Berry Time

 

Quiet walk this morning, August 26, at Windswept Bog. Fall encroaches. The weather has been crystal. A Merlin flashes from a pine tree top across the bog. An Osprey soars; a red-tailed hawk keers.

Bush clover is leaning and Purple Gerardia (Agalinis purpurea)is blooming in so many places along the edges, including in the "Alder Run."  The Downy goldenrod is starting.

The full grown Grasses are over my height and bending.  I walk through their aisle;  will I walk into another kingdom on the other side, like Narnis? A Sun shower sends raindrops flying.

Grapes are ripe; if they were lower down I would pick them! Instead,I head home to make our beach plums (18 cups from the Pout Ponds bushes) into jelly and watch a passing thunderstorm on the ocean.

Monarch butterflies in the garden daily.   Josh and I foraged for grapes on August 27. More than 6 pounds!  We will get a few more riper grapes when we return on September 8.

I have been delighting in reading Emily Dickinson, thanks to the Wauwinet Book Group.

A something in a summer's Day

A something in a summer's Day

As slow her flambeaux burn away

Which solemnizes me.

A something in a summer's noon—

A depth—an Azure—a perfume—

Transcending ecstasy.

And still within a summer's night

A something so transporting bright

I clap my hands to see—

Then veil my too inspecting face

Lest such a subtle—shimmering grace

Flutter too far for me—

The wizard fingers never rest—

The purple brook within the breast

Still chafes its narrow bed—

Still rears the East her amber Flag—

Guides still the sun along the Crag

His Caravan of Red—

So looking on—the night—the morn

Conclude the wonder gay—

And I meet, coming thro' the dews

Another summer's Day!

Emily Dickinson F104, 1859

August Nantucket Nature Diary

 Milestone Bog, August 8

Little ladies tresses in the grasses, Bush clover waving in the wind, Sickle leaved silkgrass and Early sweet everlasting on the paths, with Downy goldenrod peeking out. Faded yarrow still on  the verges.  There is WaterWillow/ Swamp loostrife in the ditches, faded steeplebush and American Burnweed. 

63 degrees at 3 pm, winds

August 10

See First solidago on road to Bunny Mellon beach ( 29A). Beach Plum picking at Pout Ponds (and August 16 and 22)

August 13-  I woke at 5:30 before the sunrise.  Watched terns rising and sanderlings darting at water's edge "down front".  Three ravens caucussed. Black-bellied plovers skirted the waves. Biked to Low Beach, hiked on the beach to Tom Nevers and back. An arctic tern amidst the flock. The aroma of the Sweet Pepper (Clethra alnifolia is diminishing)

August 15:  Kayak to Quaise Point, Medouie Marsh . Piping plovers and a roseate tern were the specials.

August 20: Eel Point Hike. Hiked out on the beach and back next to the marsh. Always amazed at how the marsh changes from year to year. What used to be a sandy road is becoming part of the marsh. Juvenile yellow-crowned night heron and a little blue heron were the birds highlights. Osprey still here.  The Sturgeon Moon rises after sunset, and the sunrises are now (conveniently) around 6 am.

August 23: Black Swallowtail on the verbena bonariensis in the garden.

Kayak to Medouie Marsh, Island Creek: 60 black-bellied plovers, 4 dowitchers, 2 Whimbrels and a green heron. Egrets roosting. Osprey still here.  The sweet pepper is complete

August 24: a bat on the window and the Milky Way at night. End of 5 weeks with kids and grandkids.

Weather

Mean temperature in August  69.3 (as of August 24) 1.34 inches of rain  (high of  83, low of 56.8)

Last year 68 degrees,  4.62 inches of rain  (high of 79.9 and low of 58.5)

July 2023  70.7, .80 rain, high of 85.9 and low of 61.5

July 2024  70.8, 3.19 inches  rain, high of 83 and low of 57

Whimbrel

Short-billed Dowitcher 

Black Swallowrail

Ruddy Turnstone

American Oystercatcher 

Piping Plover

Ruddy Turnstone

Little Blue Heron

Little Blue Heron