May 3, 2026: Boneyard Beach

During our visit to South Carolina last week, we went on an excursion to Capers Island, the southern tip of 66 miles of protected barrier islands which starts just north of Isle of Palms.  We walked a long stretch of the shoreline facing the open Atlantic Ocean, through a habitat called a boneyard beach. 

The name stems from the dead, weathered tree trunks that resemble dried bones.

These are mostly oak trees, who's strong wood can survive the harsh elements for many years as the ocean advances.  There are also palmetto trees on these shorelines, but due to their soft wood, they are worn away soon after the ocean descends upon them. 

Live palmetto trees at the highwater mark with recently killed trees in the intertidal zone.

Barrier islands on the east coast are losing an average of 15 feet of land per year.  Some years they lose none, others they may lose 50 feet or more. Despite the efforts to hold back erosion on developed islands such as Isle of Palms, each time we visit, the ocean has clawed its way closer to the structures on the beach.  

While in the lowcountry, I saw a couple of shorebirds I haven't seen before, both of which do make appearances on the New England Coast.  The most interesting was the American Oystercatcher.  This is the only bird in our area that has the ability to open hard-shelled mollusks such as oysters, the bird's primary food source.  And an oyster bed exposed at low tide is exactly where I found it. 

American Oystercatcher searching an oyster bed for a good prospect.

Oystercatchers roost away from the shoreline at hightide, but as soon as the tide goes out enough to expose the oyster beds, they swoop in to look for vulnerable oysters.  The preferred method to consume an oyster is to thrust its sharp beak into a slightly open oyster and immediately sever the muscle that the bivalve uses to clamp its shell shut. 

Oysters exposed at low tide.  (I ate a few of these last week!)

Once severed, it's easy pickings to pluck out the good parts.  This process however, isn't risk-free.  It the bird misses the hinge muscle, the mollusk can clamp down on the bird's beak holding it in place, and if the oyster is securely attached to the ground, the bird will be held captive until the tide rises, which could mean the demise of the bird.  A second, safer, but more labor intensive method, is to hammer away at the oyster until the shell cracks, at which point it can reach in to cut the muscle and open the shell.  [Ref:  Cornell Lab of Ornithology]

The other new bird I saw was a Whimbrel, which doesn't spend much time on the New England coast.  It stops here only to refuel on its way between breeding grounds in the arctic and its summer domicile anywhere from the mid-Atlantic to the southernmost tip of South America.

Hudsonian Whimbrel on  the mudflats of Pitt Street Bridge 

The whimbrel uses it equally highly adapted bill to consume a different form of seafood, crustaceans, with its preferred dinner being the fiddler crab.  It uses its long, curved beak to probe down the fiddler crab's tunnel in the mud to extract it, often eating it whole, but perhaps removing its claws and legs first.  [Ref:  Cornell Lab of Ornithology]

Fiddler crabs in South Carolina

One more animal I'll mention is a mink that we saw running along the edge of a saltwater marsh at the Pitt Street Bridge.

A mink still damp from its swim in the saltmarsh.

It was behaving just like the minks at Lake Wicwas which travel the shoreline of the lake, moving back and forth between land and water using their excellent swimming and running abilities as they hunt for food.

Back home in New Hampshire, I was happy to see the Trailing Arbutus had bloomed.

Trailing Arbutus - the sweetest little flower you'll ever meet.

These incredibly sweet smelling flowers are the first of the deep forest flowers to bloom, and will soon be followed by many others.  It's also called the Mayflower, supposedly named by the Pilgrims in the first spring after arriving in Plymouth, and named for the boat that brought them to America.  It was voted the state flower of Massachusetts by the school children in 1918.

The red maples were just starting to put out their pretty red flowers as we left New Hampshire to head south.

Red maple flowers.

By the time we returned, small leaves and seed stalks had formed.

One more warm day and I expect lots of things will pop!

March 9, 2025: Tall Timbers at Ten Thousand

The past week was spent at altitude in the beautiful surroundings of Steamboat Springs, Colorado:  7000' in the city, 10,568' at the top of the ski area.  

Looking west over the Yampa Valley from the top of Mr. Werner in Steamboat Springs.

We've been to Steamboat Springs many times, but it's still strange to see such tall trees growing at 10,000 feet elevation.  

Snowshoeing at 9400' elevation in Rabbit Ears Pass we were surrounded by towering Lodgepole Pines.

Trees peter out in New Hampshire around 4000', and by 5000' there's nothing but scrub.  But in the Rocky Mountains trees grow robustly at well over 10,000'.  Part of the difference is due to the lower latitude - even Steamboat Springs, located in northwest Colorado at a latitude of 40.48 degrees, is more than 200 miles south of Meredith at a latitude of 43.66.  But other factors including better soil conditions and less severe winds in Colorado are probably even more of a contributor to the difference.

At the city elevation of just under 7000' many species of trees grow at elevations where no tree can survive in New England.

Aspen (above) and Cottonwood (below) along the Yampa River.

The Yampa River is also the life source for many animals, especially in winter. 

The Yampa River, fed by springs in the Flat Top Mountains and plenty of snowmelt.

There are lots of mammal tracks leading down to the river, as well as various birds gathering along its course to secure food, including osprey, magpies, and ducks.

A pair of Mallards that decided to spend the winter in the Yampa River.

A Black-billed Magpie perched over the river.

We returned home early Saturday morning to a cold and blustery New Hampshire day, but that didn't stop the mink from making its daily rounds.

A mink passes along the Wicwas Shoreline Saturday morning.

Mink live as far west as Colorado, primarily along the rivers, as riparian habitat is their preferred territory.  One's not likely to see them at high elevation though, even if the trees can thrive there.

Clouds form over Storm Peak.

Thanks VP for another great visit to the 'boat!

December 1, 2024: Thanksgiving Snow

The first snow came to the lake late this year, falling right on Thanksgiving day.  It played havoc with travel north of Concord, but it sure made for a beautiful Thanksgiving Day in the Lakes Region.  The morning started with a Barred Owl giving thanks for a good population of little rodents this year.

I only noticed it when it glided down through the air, a flash of brown against a white background.  I lost it when it blended into the shrubs on the ground, but waited for it to take flight again.  The sortie was apparently was fruitless, so it found a new perch to watch and wait, and from its observation post it clearly detected my motion as it stared right at me for the picture above.  After a short stint it decided it wasn't a promising hunting spot and flew to a different post a few dozen yards away.

On the move.

Settled onto a new perch, but still watching me!

I don't know how long it sat there.  

Other avian visitors this week included more migrating ducks:  common mergansers, hooded mergansers, and a large flock of mallards.

Five ducks, almost in a row.  Hooded Mergansers.

Mallards - over a dozen in this flock.

A lone female Common Merganser on a quiet Thanksgiving morning.

The first snow always gets me excited to go right out and see who's been sneaking around the lake without anyone knowing.  Thursday night's tracks revealed several deer, a fox, and a mink - probably the same one I saw last week.

A deer print, and below, its track along the trail.

A nice fox print in wet snow.

And mink tracks, which I wouldn't have noticed weren't for the calling card it left me.

Mink scat - small and twisted.

I'll end with one more picture of our first snow, and a couple from the day after, which is often the prettiest day of a winter event.  

Here's to many more winter scenes as the new season begins - December first is the first day of meteorological winter!

November 24, 2024: How old are our Boulders?

Much of New Hampshire's rugged beauty is the result of glacial activity that took place some 12,000 years ago as the last ice-age retreated.  The Laurentide Ice Sheet, which was over two miles thick at its peak, retreated north over thousands of years, with its last remnants in New Hampshire melting approximately 10,000 years ago, but the specific time frame of its final demise here is uncertain.  

As the glacier pushed south from the artic it cut deep gouges which formed many of our lakes, and sliced off parts of mountains forming ledges with fine views.  It also scoured off soil and dragged and rolled large chunks of rock with it in a continental-size rock tumbler.  As the planet warmed, less snow fell, the glacier slowed its movement, then stopped.  As it melted it left those boulders wherever they were at the time, sometimes far from their original formation.  These are know as glacial erratics and  can be found throughout much of New Hampshire, including all around Lake Wicwas.

An erratic beside the Arbutus Hill Trail in Hamlin.

A carefully balanced boulder, delicately placed by the glacier.

The most famous erratic in New Hampshire is the Madison Boulder which is as big as a house.

Madison Boulder.   White Mountains New Hampshire photo.

The largest erratic I've found in Meredith is in Hamlin, right beside the Yellow Trail to Crockett's Ledge.  If you hiked that trail you've surely noticed it.

This is right at the junction of the two Yellow Trails heading up to Crockett's Ledge.

A professor at Plymouth State University, Professor Simon Pendleton, and one his students, are studying glacial history and they're using these glacial boulders to determine more accurately just when the last glacier retreated north through the Lakes Region.  Prof. Pendleton has identified a small number of boulders in the Hamlin Town Forest to study as part of his research.  Each boulder was selected based on criteria that makes it most suitable for testing, and the stewards of the Town Forest worked with Prof. Simon on the selection process and approved the rocks for sampling.

One of the boulders selected for research.

The dating process involves chipping off a small piece of the boulder to bring it to the lab for testing.  The testing process is long and detailed, but involves crushing the stone to a fine dust, separating the small amount of beryllium within the rock, and then analyzing the beryllium for a specific isotope which is created by cosmic-rays from the sun.  By measuring the amount of this isotope they will know how long the boulder has been exposed to sun, thus providing a date for when the glacier melted which left the boulder exposed to the suns cosmic-rays.  For those interested, you can learn more about beryllium-10 Cosmic-Ray Exposure Testing here.

Of course, this isn't actually how old the rock is - the White Mountains were formed 100-120 million years ago - but it will give us a better idea of when the last ice sheet left the Lakes Region and allowed our current fauna and flora to attain a foothold.  This data will also help us understand how our planet and its present-day glaciers will behave in our current warming climate, as well as the impact it will have on Earth's existing inhabitants.

It will takes weeks to process the samples, and then many more to analyze and interpret the data, but when the results are published I'll report them here.  Professor Pendleton has also offered to give a presentation on the results, and lead a guided tour to the testing sites in the Hamlin Town Forest to show us the specific boulders tested, talk more about the testing and its significance, and let us know how long ago you would have been standing at the edge of a glacier.

Moving forward in time a hundred or so centuries, let's see some elements of that renewal of life that have survived.  This week a couple of female Common Mergansers spent a rainy day on the lake fishing.

It makes me wonder if the reason we haven't seen many migratory ducks since the Wood Ducks early on is because we've had such good weather.  Perhaps they only stop by the Lakes Region when weather is poor and they want a short day of travel.  

I've also had some fun, though fleeting glimpses of deer, mink, and otter.  The otters numbered three, and were out frolicking in the lake as they made their way from one shore to another.  Hopefully there will soon tracks in the snow to follow their path.  The mink I saw was swimming right against the shoreline, hopping up onto land here and there to follow a scent or something else of interest, then right back into the lake.  No picture of him either, but here's one from a similar scene a few years ago.

Mink are just one of the thousands of creatures that have returned and survived for all these years since the area was swept clean of life thousands of years ago.

An AI generated image of New Hampshire shortly after the Laurentide Ice Sheet retreated.

We can be thankful it will be long time before North America is swept clean again.

Happy Thanksgiving!  

March 17: 2024: Mink on Thin Ice

It's a busy time of year with so much happening all at once as the world wakes up from its winter slumber.  One cold morning as I was enjoying the interesting patterns that formed on the lake over night, a flash of brown scooted onto the thin ice from shore and bounded across the lake right in front of me.  It was one of those lucky occasions when I had my camera in my hand.

Mink on the ice.

No problem with traction for those claws.

A mink doesn't worry about falling through thin ice - when it came to edge of the ice it just slipped into the water and continued on its way.

That was on Wednesday.  The day before was bright and windy and that took a big toll on the ice with the wind really breaking things up.  

The ice started breaking up on Monday.

Getting wider under the March sun on Tuesday.

The wind blew shreds of ice up over the transition point which glistened like diamonds in the sun.

By noon on Tuesday there were large expanses of open water.

By Saturday, most of winter's ice was gone with just one ice patch blocking the passage on the west site of Bryant Island.  It's possible ice-out will occur later today which would make it one of the earliest ice-out dates recorded.  

Many geese have now arrived and they're fighting over the best nesting sites in the marshes.  We've also seen bald eagles almost every day this week, both circling over the lake and sitting on the ice, perhaps feeding off things that were blown up onto the ice with the wind.

A couple of bald eagles survey the lake.  Are they looking for a nesting site?

In addition to annoying the Canada Geese endlessly, one afternoon an eagle flew right over me and landed in a tree, and had a heated argument with a red-bellied woodpecker that was not happy with its presence.  The two of them made quite the ruckus.  Here's a clip of the interaction - the eagle starts and ends, with the woodpecker calling out in the middle.  

This went on for quite some time.  Between the eagles, the geese, the mallards, and the red squirrels in the forest, it's been a noisy week.  Now we just need the wood frogs to join in.

The mergansers have also been plentiful this spring with a couple of different groups congregating on the lake.  I saw a few altercations of males chasing males, but mostly they seem well behaved as they figure out how to pair up for the mating season.

A couple of available female Common Mergansers.

And a male about to go...

under the ice for a fishing excursion.

I didn't realize that like Wood Ducks, Common Mergansers make their nests in tree cavities up to a mile away from water.  The female chooses the nesting site and builds the nest, and I believe the female also selects her mate, the one she finds most desirable after observing them all strut their stuff.  After mating, the male is done and leaves the child rearing to the mother.  I'd love to know how she gets a dozen little ducklings to travel a mile through a thick forest back to the lake.

The beavers also came around as soon as the ice opened up enough for them to swim along the shore line, and they are already building their scent mounds to mark their territory.  

I've also heard spring bird songs this week including the Song Sparrow and even a Carolina Wren (though that was a bit south of the Lakes Region, along the high banks of the Merrimack River in Concord) so the great migration is underway.  But this entry is long enough, so those will have to wait for another week.  

This is a great time to get outside to watch the world wake up and break into its triumphant return to life.  Just remember to wear your mud boots, and that tick season never ends - I've already found one deer tick - so take appropriate precautions.  

Mr. Mink won't be able to take short cuts across the lake any more, but for us, it's a time of renewal, rebirth, and rediscovery.

Blueberry buds, red and swelling with spring life.