Spider webs in the fog

There was moonlight last night but the fog rolled back in this morning as heavy as ever. One thing that the fog does for natural history study is that it reveals the sheer number and variety of spiders in the neighborhood. It does this by coating the spider webs with droplets of moisture, turning them into jewel display cases and revealing their structure. There are a few of the classic orb webs. Another kind of web is a mat of spider silk on the ground -- spread out over a patch of grass or even on top of some hurricane debris. In the marsh, hundreds of the dead tips of last year's High Tide Bush (Baccharis or Iva) are crowned by a cocoon-shaped web. And all along the paths through the marsh there are trap lines -- either the foundations for a new webs or simply spider transportation from one side of the path to the other!

The heaviness of the atmosphere is not encouraging to the Purple Martins who make a lot of noise, as if discussing whether to bother to head out looking for insects; a few Barn Swallows are out scouting low over the reeds. I can hear a couple of desultory Yellow Warbler and Yellowthroat songs proving that these birds are still around (although, to my ear, they do not sound very enthusiastic and they soon quiet down). An Eastern Wood-pewee and a Red-eyed Vireo are calling/singing high in the oaks; this is a bird that breeds in the woods to the north but is only a visitor down here and again I hear it well enough but cannot find it in the misty glare. Sound travels well in the mist even as visibility is reduced to a few feet.

The air over the creek is a thick miasma but there are Least Terns venturing in and out; I suspect that in this light -- sort of a perpetual twilight -- their fishy prey might remain near the surface. Overhead something is calling loudly but I don't recognize the call and the caller is entirely invisible in the mist. Only by mid-morning, as the fog lifts, does the air traffic over the creek pick up. Now there are Common Terns and a Laughing Gull along with the Least Terns. Little by little the sun cuts through, the warblers and vireo resume singing, and midday turns out to be a mild summery day.

Eric Salzman