The Loch Ness Monster in our pond?

A warm, cloudy morning with light winds from the southwest. There was a Great Blue Heron at the neck of the pond (where the water flows in and out of the marsh, where the little fishies play and where the GBH loves to stand and catch them). There was also a strange ripple in the pond coming straight toward me as I stood on the near bank. I expected a giant fish or mammal or maybe even the Loch Ness monster to appear. Instead it turned out to be a D-c Cormorant who popped up in the pond just in front of me, as surprised to see me as I was to see him. He (or she) weakly tried to take off, flapping away on the surface of the pond and landing for a moment on the other side before finally being able to take off. When the tide is at medium level (as if was this morning), the cormorants have discovered that they can do some underwater fishing and it seems that they can stay under for quite a while!

Once again, Royal Terns came up the creek early in the morning in some numbers. There were gulls in the mix as well: at least one Laughing Gull (not a common bird on the creek) and a number of Ring-billed Gulls -- at least one of which chased a Royal Tern that had caught a fish, trying to make it drop its hard-won catch. Surprisingly enough, the gull was able to keep up with the tern and gave up the chase only after it was mobbed by several other terns that came in, seemingly to help their colleague.

A nut note: there were no Black Walnuts this year and only a few Hickory nuts but it has been a banner year for acorns. They make quite a bang when they hit the roof and cause still more noise when the squawking Blue Jays come round looking for them (as is well known, Jays are acorn specialists and, along with the squirrels, they squirrel 'em away against hard times (yes, they remember when they hid them -- at least mostly).

Eric Salzman