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Cranes Return

1/27/2015

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The 2015 Sandhill Crane festival will take place January 17 and 18 at Hiwassee Wildlife Refuge. Early reports of Sandhill Cranes in Meigs County appear elsewhere in this issue of The Chat.

On December 21 of last year I joined the Tennessee Wild Meetup for Sandhill Crane viewing at the refuge. Fog shrouded the landscape and enfolded us. It cut visibility of distant parts of the refuge, but we saw cranes on both the near and far side of a small bay. Sounds enveloped us as they can on foggy days. The rattling call of cranes greeted our ears as flock upon flock flew across our field of vision. Many circled and landed as we watched.  An immature Bald Eagle flew over as well.

We saw one Whooping Crane, cloud white against the gray Sandhill Cranes, and representing a species back from the edge of that abyss called extinction.

The rare Whooping Cranes called to mind a rarer species I once viewed on Cape Cod. I boarded a whale watch boat in hopes of viewing the antics of Humpback Whales. That hope was not realized, but I was lucky to see three Northern Right Whales. A pair of adults swam side by side, as a calf acrobatically rose out of the water and energetically waved its tail flukes and flippers.

With only three hundred Northern Right Whales remaining, the three I saw comprised one percent of the world wide population. They became rare because they were easily hunted and easily retrieved. Whalers called them “the right whale to kill.”

Overhunting may have contributed to the demise of the Whooping Crane as well. Despite their rarity and protected status, Whooping Cranes were shot in Georgia and Texas the previous year.

The Sandhill Cranes we witnessed this day were once considered a rarity as well. Sandhill Cranes were rare enough in Aldo Leopold’s day that he was certain they would soon be extinct. His essay, “Marshland Elegy,” was his farewell to the cranes. Only careful management brought them back to the large and growing population that graces our wetlands and skies today. I hope we can see such success with the Whooping Crane and the Northern Right Whale.

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Annual Chincoteague Pony Roundup

1/25/2015

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“Annual Chincoteague Pony Round Up” was my first commercially published work. It appeared in Cappers (Topeka, Kansas) in 1988, shortly after I worked the summer and fall as a seasonal Park Ranger at Assateague Island National Seashore, Ocean City, Maryland. Cappers used one of my photographs of the wild ponies as an illustration for the story. 


Picture wild horses charging down a sandy beach on a remote island.  Suddenly they stop near a patch of fresh grass and an older mare takes up her station in the lead.  Meanwhile the stallion takes a position in the rear of the group.  As the herd begins to graze, a young foal steps to its mother’s side for a drink of fresh warm milk.  As the small band of horses goes about its business, ocean waves crash a few feet away. 

Such a scene is not just imagination, for these are the feral horses - feral is the word for a domestic animal that returns to the wild – of Assateague Island.  A heard of 150 grace the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge on the south end of Assateague Island,

This wildlife refuge lies on the Atlantic flyway, the easternmost route for North America’s migratory birds, and was established for the snow geese in 1943.  When land is set aside for one species, many others benefit.  One which benefits from the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge is the wild pony.  Their range is preserved forever as part of the refuge.

This arrangement also benefits the fire department of nearby Chincoteague Island, for they are the legal owners of these horses which graze on the refuge under special permit.  The horses are better known as Chincoteague ponies, and their status as ponies or horses has been debated.

Each year, during the final week of July, the firemen don cowboy clothing and round up their ponies. The roundup takes place on Monday and Tuesday, and the animals are corralled on the island. On Wednesday they swim across a strait to neighboring Chincoteague Island.

Thousands of people come each year to see the ponies swim and to see the Thursday auction. The foals are sold to the many buyers anxious to add the sturdy animals to their herds.  Generations of life on the wind-swept island have made the ponies hardy, and they pass on their hardiness to future generations.

On Friday the adult ponies and any unsold foals swim back to Assateague Island.  Enough foals are returned each year to maintain the herd, and some horses are added from time to time to keep the herd strong and diverse.


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Edge

1/18/2015

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This year, instead of Christmas cards, I sent a mini chap book - seven poems on twelve pages. This was the longest of the poems, and my favorite.
 
Ecotone… a transitional area of vegetation between two different plant communities… - Encyclopedia Britannica

Edge 

Sunrise tinges the edge
where marsh meets sky,
land meets water, night meets day
and life meets death.

 

Among predators bearing tooth and claw,
I feel at home in this place.
I gather meals among the sedge.
We hunt and eat along the edge.

My paddle bumps gunwales,
pulls up insect eating bladderwort.
Half-digested bugs are black specks captured
when the plant’s translucent bubbles implode.
 
Sundew leaves radiate on stalks
like the orb, the spider’s web.
Red and green leaves stretch outward.
Sticky hairs ensnare flying food.

Pitcher plant leaves curl into vases.
Half filled with water they drown
flies trapped by downward pointing hairs
slowly digest their prey for minerals.

Fingerlings and dragonfly nymphs
swim among the maple roots.
Feed on mosquito larvae.
Feed the perch I catch for dinner.
 
The maple swamp is green
this spring day as bud scales
open to release tiny red flowers.
They offset green leaves

as will the red fruits I once called
helicopters and dropped to watch
the wings spin but give no lift,
except on windy days.

Blue Jays call from branches,
grab nestlings and eggs for lunch.
Red crested woodpecker
drills a snag for ants.

Green leaves prepare
to turn red in fall;
gather warm thin sun
make sugars to feed the tree.

Today I cruise the marsh
among fertile fronds of ferns.
dislodge the red brown spores
which give cinnamon fern its name.

Land barely wet, barely on
the edge where sterile fronds
grab sunbeams, make food in
leaves that are not leaves at all.

A month ago they curled,
fiddle heads like knobs on violins
above the swampy ground
home to snakes and frogs.

Cleaning the day’s catch by the fire
I contemplate herons. Like
spectacled scholars they stand,
beaks waiting along the edge.

Like old men they lift knees high,
put feet carefully down.
Better fishers than I, they impale
fish, snakes and frogs.


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Just in Thyme

1/6/2015

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A poem for those           
Who say they must rhyme
I nearly finished it
Ran out of time
Made roasted chicken
With thyme and lime

I watched a June Bug
Oh bug of June!
Cross forest floor
‘Neath radiant moon
Spring will come
But not too soon


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Haiku for the New Year

1/4/2015

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Old hopes fade away

Buds prepare to yield blossoms

Old moon rules skyline

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