November 19: Breakwater

Watching the tide rise

as we walk the breakwater

full of words unsaid.

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October 15: Flood tide

full moon high tide
washing over the jetty
and then the moon itself

December 13: High tide

 

 

brimming harbor high tide

we skirt waves both ways

on the edge of green depths

 

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February 4: White goose

My husband and I got up early this morning in order to hit the Rockland breakwater before work--in hopes of seeing a Ross's Goose that has been hanging out there at lower tides amid a flock of Canada Geese. This goose is very similar to the Snow Goose that sometimes passes through this area in late fall/winter, only about half the size. It breeds in the Arctic and usually winters near the Gulf Coast, so this errant bird was a bit off course. We'd never seen one before.

Fortunately when we scanned the water just offshore at the breakwater "beach" this morning, this little white goose was easy to pick out of the crowd, even though all the geese were sleeping. Since we both had to rush off to work, we worried that our only view of this life bird might be as a floating white blob with its head under its wing. But just as we were getting ready to walk back to our cars, it woke up and then briefly stood up out of the water atop a rock, as if to show itself off to us before shortly thereafter drifting back to sleep on the water. Apparently the flock is a drowsy one that early in the morning.

Although not so drowsy that when I returned to my car and then decided five minutes later to go back to the beach with my camera and try to get a photo, I found that the entire flock of about 70 geese had disappeared. Only a spanse of exposed rocks remained. The flock, I found, had shifted to an inlet on other side of the breakwater, and most of the birds were back asleep.

Drifting offshore,
does the sleeping white goose
dream of ice floes?

Can you pick out the little white Ross's Goose?

December 22: Grosbeaks to start

Our local Christmas Bird Count--the Thomaston-Rockland Count--is held on the last Saturday before Christmas, so today was the day! My husband and I have been the coordinators of our section of the count circle for something like ten years now, and every year we feel a similar excited anticipation of what we'll turn up this time around.

We knew today was going to go well when we pulled in a little late to the initial meeting spot, and our fellow birders had already spotted a flock of Pine Grosbeaks feeding in a nearby crabapple. Pine Grosbeak is an irruptive species; it prefers the northern boreal forest but occasionally pops down to New England during winters when the fruit and spruce cone crops up north are poor. I'm not sure we've ever even had Pine Grosbeaks in our count section, so it seemed a good omen to see them at the beginning of our long day of counting every bird we find in our section.

We ended the day with a possible section-high total of 51 species, including lots of ducks (for the first time we can remember, all water was ice-free), more grosbeaks, Purple Sandpipers on the breakwater, Razorbills in outer Rockland Harbor, and a flicker (which should have migrated south by now). We even spotted a Gray Seal checking us out as we walked on the breakwater.

Female grosbeaks
appear dull
only from a distance.

March 16: Finally!

I've lost track of how many times I've gone to the Samoset to look for the snowy owl first reported there over a month ago. Less than a week from the vernal equinox, I'd given up hope, figuring the owl was on his way back to the Arctic by now. This winter has seen a record number of snowy owl sightings across the country, dozens in Maine alone. I've been feeling like a birding loser, unable to see a snowy owl in the one year when they're virtually everywhere. (One even showed up on Hawaii!) I could have driven three hours down to York to see the one that's spent the winter at Nubble Light, or looked for the one reportedly still lingering at a dairy farm in Clinton, but with all the owls out there, I'd really wanted to see the one closest to home (and which I came so close to seeing back in early February--see post for February 12).

When I heard from two different sources that the Samoset bird was still around, my hope returned. With a use-it-or-lose-it vacation day today, I figured this was my last chance. It's supposed to warm up significantly over the weekend, which will probably send most of our lingering winter birds northward. I headed over to the Samoset directly from a massage, figuring the relaxed frame of mind would help my quest. One person I know had seen it near the ponds, so I parked near them and walked the paved path through the golf course from there. Many geese, but no owl near the ponds. I heard my first blackbirds of the season singing from the reeds. No owl visible on the golf course. No owl visible on roof tops. I decided that at the very least I could walk along the shore bluff and count waterfowl. A song sparrow flew past. A loon drifted offshore. I looked down at the stony beach...

And there he was: a big, white snowy owl perched on a rock, impassively turning his head to look back at me. I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that I was so relieved and happy to finally see the owl that I burst into tears. I watched him for a while until, satisfied and happy, I finally decided to move on and leave the bird in peace, wishing him a safe flight back to the Arctic tundra and good luck in finding a mate and lots of lemmings to eat there.

I took the long way back to my car to see what other birds were around. Song sparrows, cardinals, and robins were all singing. A flock of grackles flew over. Pairs of ducks bobbed off the breakwater and in one of the resort's ponds. A big harbor seal perched atop one of the rocks offshore, as if beached there by the low tide. Dozens of robins hopped around the golf greens, hoping for worms. A pileated woodpecker swooped past. Clusters of pussy willows edged an alder thicket. A junco trilled from atop a tree. The very air is breathing "spring." I don't know how much longer the owl will linger now, but I am very grateful he hung out long enough.

On spring's wet threshold,
snowy owl lingers, robins
sing their merry songs.

February 17: Not the owl I was looking for

Yesterday a friend shared beautiful photos that he got of the snowy owl flying a few days ago near the Rockland Breakwater, and I have to confess they were taunting me. Having some free time this morning, I decided to try yet again to see this elusive and charismatic bird. There was no one walking on the breakwater when I arrived, so I was hopeful. But a quick scan showed it free of birds, as well. A walk on the Samoset grounds also proved fruitless. No agitated crows, no white lumps in the distance.

But I decided to make the most of my outing and see what else was around. In the waters around the breakwater I observed several loons fishing for crabs, a horned grebe, and some buffleheads. A string of eiders drifted past, and a merganser flew overhead. On the beach a ring-billed gull interacted with two herring gulls. And then, a big bird flying over the water caught my eye. It was bulky like an owl, but not white, so not the snowy. I got a better look with my binoculars and was astonished to realize that it was an owl--a short-eared owl! Not at all what I expected!

I've only seen short-eared owls flying over fields, flapping and gliding, dipping low over the grass, turning acrobatically in mid-air. This owl showed the same flight behavior, only it was over the ocean. I watched its every move, fascinated. It swooped low over the water. What was it going to do, catch a fish? Where was it going? Was it going to fly across the outer harbor over to appropriately named Owls Head?

Eventually the bird landed on leeward rocks near the end of the breakwater, out of sight. I didn't want to walk out to try for a closer look, because I'm sure that would have flushed it, causing it needless stress. So after waiting a bit to see if it would move to the top of the breakwater, I left. No snowy owl, yet again, but I was not at all disappointed at what turned up in its place.

Ocean a wide field
for a stray owl to explore.
Cold rocks offer rest.

February 12: Not finding the owl (again)

Yesterday at 7:40 a.m. a friend emailed that there was a snowy owl on the Rockland Breakwater. I got the message at 8:30, was down there by 9:00. Of course by then it had flown (probably away from the people walking on the breakwater). But from the path I could hear a bunch of crows making a racket--the kind of racket they make when mobbing an owl. I could see them going after something on the roof of one of the buildings at the Samoset Resort, which abuts the Breakwater Park. But the roof itself was not visible from any angle on the ground, alas. And even more unfortunate, I had to be back in Camden by 9:30, so I couldn't wait around for the owl to get fed up with the crows and move on to a hopefully more visible perch. So I left frustrated in my owl quest. (My friend later confirmed that the owl had indeed flown from the breakwater to the building the crows had pegged.)

This is not the first time I've missed a snowy owl. For several winters during my childhood a snowy owl would perch on the roof of the historic Finnish church in South Thomaston; my dad and I drove down there several times to see it without success. Unlike many birders I know, I'm not a "bird magnet." Cool birds don't come easy to me.

My husband and I went back early this afternoon and walked all around the Samoset grounds despite the icy blasts of wind coming straight off the water. Lots of Canada geese, a few mergansers, but no snowy owl. I guess I'll just have to take comfort in knowing it was there yesterday, even if I couldn't see it. (As small consolation, I did see a pileated woodpecker fly across the road as I was driving back to Camden.)

Owl not seen, again.
Yet I could feel its presence
in that Arctic wind.

November 27: Breakwater, High Tide, New Moon

The title sums it up. My husband and I decided to take advantage of both a rare, work-free Sunday and relatively mild weather by getting out for a morning walk together. Our destination: the Rockland Breakwater. However, we weren't really thinking about the fact that high tide during what can still be considered the new moon might make walking the mile-long granite jetty a challenge. With about an hour still to go till full high tide, the end of the breakwater just before the lighthouse was already underwater, stranding the lighthouse as its own little island in the middle of outer Rockland Harbor. Strong winds also complicated the situation, pushing waves up over the ocean-facing side of the breakwater even at its beginning, where the wall is highest. We walked out a short distance, dodging spray, but when waves began to spread across the entire width of the wall, we decided to turn around. We weren't the only ones. The weather wasn't quite warm enough for anyone to want to risk being soaked in icy sea water, or worse, stranded on the wrong end of a flooded sea wall.

New moon, high tide, full
harbor, brimming breakwater.
We skirt the edges.

April 1: Calm Seas

I walked on the Rockland breakwater after work this afternoon with my friend Brian and his dog. It was truly the calm after the storm. Big wads of seaweed were strewn across the top of the breakwater, tossed there by recent high tides. Something big had clearly happened out there. But today the wide sky opened clear and blue above us, the sea calmly lapped the shore, the tide had pulled back to an unthreatening distance, and even the birds seemed mellow--except one insistent cardinal whose repetitive whistle sounded like a siren. We saw several loons pausing on their journey back to inland waters, some mergansers, eiders, and a small group of lingering long-tailed ducks carrying on a late afternoon chat. They seemed in no hurry to be heading northward. The air was mild, no breeze at all. Two biplanes flew over like we were in some weird nostalgic old movie. Looking back at the granite jetty as we were leaving, the long line of massive cut stones shone golden in the late light, stretching out like a delicate bridge to the lighthouse at the end.

Hold this memory:
loon's red eye gazing back, calm.
Blue skies, blue water.

Photo by Brian Willson

Simplistic, perhaps, but sometimes it's the most basic and ephemeral of images that stick with us the longest, something spotted along the road as we drove past at 50 MPH, a single bird glimpsed in a bush, the way the light shone for just one moment on a particular rock or tree.

January 24: Ducks, Laughter

With cloud cover and no wind, today was even warmer than yesterday, perfect for a walk on the Rockland Breakwater. Calm seas at low tide made it easy to get good looks at two seals sunning themselves on an exposed rock. And ducks--at least for the brief moments they showed themselves between dives. Buffleheads popped up and down like pool toys, black ducks foraged in the shallows close to shore, and red-breasted mergansers cruised past, showing off punk hairdos that got wilder with each trip underwater.

And long-tailed ducks gabbed away in floating groups of magically shifting numbers, individuals suddenly surfacing where no duck had been before. Or entire rafts all disappearing at the same time, right on cue. Focusing my binoculars on a duck that suddenly became a widening circle of ripples on the water, I was reminded of a stanza from the Wallace Stevens poem "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird": "I do not know which to prefer,/ The beauty of inflections/ Or the beauty of innuendoes,/ The blackbird whistling/ Or just after." Only my version would end with the lines, "The duck floating on the surface/ Or just after."

Photo by Wolfgang Wander, courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.

Male long-tailed ducks in their winter plumage are beautiful birds: predominately white, with a grey and black cheek patch, pink and black bill, black body, and spectacularly long black tail feathers that they can twitch like a split whip. These are pretty boys who seem to spend much of their winter vacation preening, posturing, diving, and making a lot of noise. Long-tailed ducks were called "oldsquaws" for many years, because the males' yodeling sessions sound like a bunch of gabbing women. (The term "squaw" has since been recognized as offensive to many Native Americans, precipitating not only an official name change for the duck but also many places in Maine.) If I remember my high school Latin correctly, their Genus name Clangula means something like "full of noise." To me their calls sound like musical gobbles--"Ow owlup, ow owlup!"--and never fail to make me smile as I try to imagine what these chatty drakes have to say to one another. Are they comparing notes on a nearby group of females or where to find the best mussels? Reminiscing about their Arctic summers? Talking trash about who has the prettiest feathers?

Later today, I came across a cartoon that made me laugh so hard I couldn't stop. I was crying, unable to speak. It completely set me off, so that for hours after even something mildly funny was enough to send me into uncontrollable laughter again. In the throes of my own raucous laughing, I thought of those ducks babbling away at the breakwater. Maybe they were simply sharing jokes. What better way to while away the long winter?

Yodeling sea ducks,
I want to share your gossip,
hear Arctic secrets.