full moon and high tide

The full moon plus last night's thunder storm (I missed the eclipse) and the following south/southwest winds produced another huge high tide and made it impossible for me to circumnavigate the marsh without hip waders (I have ankle boots but the water was a lot deeper in many places). So I reversed my usual pattern and headed towards the pond and then north along the banks and into the woods. The first bird I saw was a Merlin who posed prettily on the top of a dead tree and then took off. After the Osprey, most of my raptor sightings in recent weeks have been of Merlins, thus raising the question of whether I am seeing a succession of migrating birds or simply the same bird over and over!

I was able to get into the Sandy-blasted area near the head of the marsh (notable for dead trees and acres of pokeweed) from our old right-of-way. Aside from the now-usual woodpeckers, there were not many birds. Most notable were a fair number of White-throated Sparrows. Did they come in last night or were they already there, hidden in the low dense foliage? Another unanswerable question. A Winter Wren was singing away and there were a few House Finches and Goldfinches.

Last night's storm seems to have flattened a lot of the Seaside Goldenrod which, at any rate, is passing its prime. Now coming into view are some of the blue Asters which are, like many of our common floral groups, very difficult to pin down as to species. There seem to be two different species, one with heart-shaped leaves and light blue flowers, the other with white flowers that are slightly tinged with blue or lavender.

Eric Salzman