Nature Note #155: Review of the Year
What a strange year it's been. Again. As I sit at home with my parents in Massachusetts where I started off 2015, I'm doing what all people do at this time of year; looking back at the accomplishments, failures, regrets, ideas, and events that defined the year. Normally, I reserve this space for "Bird of the Year" and gloat about how my journey to getting 200 species of birds on my life list has been the triumph of my year.
Instead, it was finding full time work and graduating from a stay-at-parent's-home adult to a fully fledged living my own life adult. It's been a strange journey and while I've been happy with how I've been doing, I have also been looking forward at what's next.
2016 obviously. But that's just another year. Another set of 366 days (it's a leap year, don't cha know?) to fill up with happiness, anxiety, rage, tears, sweat, thought, and experience. This year, I've decided to give a rundown of the main events for each month as well as the bird of that month, ultimately leading up to the bird of the year.
This is unusual as I have reserved this as a nature blog in the past, but now instead have started writing more for my heart and imagination and less for my mind and more concrete thoughts. As Mum says, I have to focus on the now, as the past is past and the future is merely unfounded anticipations of future moments. So instead of waiting for good ideas to come to me, I will actually sit down and write my thoughts, feelings, desires, and ideas, I will just do that. Write. Just Write. It's not as if I need an introduction to it or anything...
Just so I don't start rambling, I suppose I better get to the main event.
The Month by Month Recap of Gareth's 2015
January
While the first part of the month was dry and uneventful, eventually the dreaded Snowpocalypse arrived bringing with it a fury that hadn't been matched in years and somehow seemed to be foreshadowing where I would be working in the future.
With that said, I searched for full time work while birding for sea ducks and other winter migrants along the coast. I also helped out with the Superbowl of Birding for the second winter in a row. The experience was magical and allowed me to get a lifer in the form of a Dovekie (Alle alle). While that's impressive in and of itself, the bird was particularly hard to spot, floating like a discarded styrofoam cup in the Jodrey Fish Pier harbor in Gloucester. As they are only 8" long, it's a miracle I spotted the little titch. I suppose that is what made it all the more rewarding.
February
Winter continued with a vengeance and it seemed as if the snow got higher with each passing week. By this point I was going to be working at an environmental education camp in Saco, ME for the spring and at Mass Audubon's Wildwood in Rindge, NH and was wondering what to do after that.
Full time work still seemed to be a dream at that point with most positions focusing on the warmer months of the year. A different dream became reality after another lifer came from Gloucester, this time in the form of a Short-eared Owl (Asio flammeus). It was amazing that I even got to see it in broad daylight and along Route 128 South near the bridge before you get to those series of roundabouts and wind turbines. The other drivers were aggravated by my sudden slowdown and interest in the trees rather than the road and using the power of the horn, forced me to press on rather that getting into a fender bender. It was well worth it though.
March
After working in Maine for three weeks, all my patience, diligence, and zeal paid off when I was offered and accepted a position at the Rosamond Gifford Zoo in Syracuse, NY and started my journey to independence.
While Maine itself wasn't a bad experience, it taught me that not all environmental education places are created equally and that some of the values they held were at best, questionable. With that said, I did manage to get an unusual nemesis bird while I was there.
Typically speaking, Red-breasted Nuthatches (Sitta canadensis) aren't that difficult to locate if you happen to have a large amount of conifers nearby, but they had avoided me for all of 2014 and now I had the chance to see and hear some. Well worth the three week trip to Maine for that!
April
This is when the birding temporarily slowed down and "real life" started happening instead. It was especially hard for Alison and I as we had been together 6 years and only spent several months apart in the years before. Before I left, we spent a lot of time together when we could, knowing that after the summer we would be living together as a couple for the first time. It was going to be hard, but we'd done it before and we knew we could do it. Before I left, I assisted her with the task of putting up fencing before the Piping Plovers (Charadrius melodus) set up shop for the season. Sure enough in mid-April in Westport, the newly arrived migrants were prancing about looking to impress their mates and herald the birth of new offspring.
After running around getting set up with an apartment, finalizing the papers with work, and getting settled with the idea of living alone (at least for a while) in central New York, I moved to Syracuse with a new job and life awaiting me. I wasn't excited about living in the city (and aren't especially excited about it now either), but I knew it was an opportunity to get full time experience in a new area of both education and zoology.
May
As I started exploring the surrounding areas looking for places to go birding, I found that Beaver Lake Nature Center, Three Rivers State Game Land, and Montezuma NWR were just the sorts of places that I wanted to explore and live near. While I had slowly gotten used to the wailing sirens, honking cars, and droning traffic near the apartment, I felt very alone. I talked to Alison nearly everyday and my parents every Sunday and yet that didn't fill the void. The void that contained friends and chances to get out and connect. Now, alone in a new city, I wondered if I'd ever find my place in the social scene at work or with a group somewhere in the city.
That's why I went birding I suppose. The longer I spent at the apartment, the more alone I felt. I didn't particularly want to get to know my neighbors either. Instead, one pleasant, yet buggy evening, as I explored Three Rivers, I was able to heard and see many birds I cherish. Displaying American Woodcock (Scolopax minor), cooing Pied-billed Grebes (Podilymbus podiceps), whinnying Sora (Porzana carolina), and serenading American Redstarts(Setophaga ruticilla).
Seeing the woodcocks in particular filled me with joy as their mating display is one of the most interesting shows to witness in the springtime. Dumpy, cryptic shorebirds that look like a loaf of burnt bread with bulging eyes and a 1" diameter dowel strapped to their face, the males produce a nasal grunt (the act is called "peenting") several times before launching themselves skyward upon whirring wings. As they spiral upward, their primary feathers begin to vibrate, creating a jibbering twitter that continues until they plummet to earth, land, wait for a few moments in silence, and then begin to grunt once more.
June
As the summer season started revving up, I felt like it was the right time to start another blog called "Sparrow's Eye" to focus on my feelings of being in a new place. This would eventually fall through as if I were to identify most closely with one of the seven deadly sins, Acedia would be my middle name.
(You guys have Google Translate and Wikipedia, you look it up!)
Anyway, it fell through and I instead focused my attention on the wild neighbors I met outside. I am, of course referring to the Floridian Wood Rabbit on the little green patch outside my apartment window and the Melanistic Squirrel of Carolina. Birding also took a hit that month with only a few visits to speak of. Montezuma NWR served as my chance to see my first of the year Purple Martins (Progne subis) slicing through the marsh air on ebony-indigo wings.
July
Foraging came into vogue with the slow heat of July. Sumac berries were on my mind with the light taste of sumacade. For those of your who don't know how to make sumacade (a contraction of the words "sumac" and "lemonade"), I produced a blog post about the only fishing trip I've done all year and making sumac lemonade that is linked here. The sumac lemonade helped with the stress of work and city life.
The buzz of people in an unfamiliar location was a change from what I was used to, but didn't stop me from feeling lonely. This was cured by a visit home during the July 4th weekend where I got to be with Alison. I was so happy for the first time in weeks to be with the woman I love and spend time reconnecting, two heartbeats connected by hundreds of miles, together again for a fleeting weekend in the summer. While helping with her plover job, I got to see the beach where her "plovers" were tending their cotton ball young and watched the tenuous balance between these small birds and the lumbering vacationers from upstate. Seeing American Oystercatchers (Haematopus palliatus) definitely sweetened the pot as well.
August
The countdown to Alison's arrival had begun with a massive end of the month party. Being able to see all our friends from all walks of life was an amazing experience and knowing that we are loved by so many people warms my heart and brings tears of joy to my eyes. The day afterward was rewarding both in regards to friendship and gaining another life bird. While swimming in Westport, we snorkeled amongst the seaweed, watch a fire rainbow grow upon nearby clouds, and witness the stopover of Black Terns (Chlidonias niger). These little black darts were winging their way over the water's surface using their keen eyes to spy the fish, dancing like strips of silver in the salty shallows. This was a wonderful "night cap" to my summer season.
September
Alison's arrival heralded a new stage in our relationship; actually living together as a couple. Despite having been together for 6 years, we had never formerly lived together until now. I resolved to take her everywhere that I had discovered during my summer ramblings. In that first month, we visited Three Rivers and Montezuma allowing us to see Blue-winged Teal (Anas discors), an unusually annoying nemesis bird for me in recent years and a lifer Merlin (Falco columbarius) for her. Migration seemed to promise much, but in the end, we didn't get round to seeing many migrants after all. It was at this point that I realized that reaching 200+ species this year might be a long shot.
October
October was a quiet month with Alison and myself celebrating our 7th year as a couple. We met in college and always have been a good match for one another with similar interests, social abilities, and studies at school. As the weather started to cool and then warm again in defiance of the season it was, we were able to watch a late flock of Bonaparte's Gulls (Chroicocephalus philadelphia) on Lake Oneida near Bridgeport, NY. Their delicate bills and dove-like faces really set them apart from their raucous Ring-billed (Larus delawarensis) cousins. Halloween remained quiet and uneventful as well.
November
Stress seemed to define this month. Feelings of inadequacy at work coupled with the terrorist attacks in Paris made me feel woeful and lost. The world seemed to be going to hell in a hand basket crafted of shit. Each day seemed to be a test of my patience and resolve with the guidance and love of my family and friends steering me towards a more hopeful December. The only bird that seemed to pick me up was a small squadron of American Coots (Fulica americana) that were patrolling Great Meadows earlier in the month, bobbing energetically up and down like toasted carbon grey balls on the waters surface. They were a delightful sight indeed.
December
The last month of the year was filled with the usual holiday stress of buying items from our capitalist economy, complaining about how we're suckered into the deals every single year and how this year we won't be suckered into it again, and then going out to buy more things. Being able to spend Christmas with my parents was especially good as I had been missing them terribly. Even as the "year of the independent adult" began, it was still nice to see them. No "new" birds had been glimpsed this month, but after a lovely walk at Heard's Fields in Wayland, we watched a lone Red-tailed Hawk (Buteo jamaicensis) fly into one of the bare trees, watching us with the singular curiosity that seems to fill all wild animals as well as ourselves. Watching for danger and out of interest. We could have been the third or thirtieth humans that hawk saw that day, but it paid us the same intense interest that most birders would give to a Code 3 or 4 any day.
Instead, it was finding full time work and graduating from a stay-at-parent's-home adult to a fully fledged living my own life adult. It's been a strange journey and while I've been happy with how I've been doing, I have also been looking forward at what's next.
2016 obviously. But that's just another year. Another set of 366 days (it's a leap year, don't cha know?) to fill up with happiness, anxiety, rage, tears, sweat, thought, and experience. This year, I've decided to give a rundown of the main events for each month as well as the bird of that month, ultimately leading up to the bird of the year.
This is unusual as I have reserved this as a nature blog in the past, but now instead have started writing more for my heart and imagination and less for my mind and more concrete thoughts. As Mum says, I have to focus on the now, as the past is past and the future is merely unfounded anticipations of future moments. So instead of waiting for good ideas to come to me, I will actually sit down and write my thoughts, feelings, desires, and ideas, I will just do that. Write. Just Write. It's not as if I need an introduction to it or anything...
Just so I don't start rambling, I suppose I better get to the main event.
The Month by Month Recap of Gareth's 2015
January
While the first part of the month was dry and uneventful, eventually the dreaded Snowpocalypse arrived bringing with it a fury that hadn't been matched in years and somehow seemed to be foreshadowing where I would be working in the future.
With that said, I searched for full time work while birding for sea ducks and other winter migrants along the coast. I also helped out with the Superbowl of Birding for the second winter in a row. The experience was magical and allowed me to get a lifer in the form of a Dovekie (Alle alle). While that's impressive in and of itself, the bird was particularly hard to spot, floating like a discarded styrofoam cup in the Jodrey Fish Pier harbor in Gloucester. As they are only 8" long, it's a miracle I spotted the little titch. I suppose that is what made it all the more rewarding.
February
Winter continued with a vengeance and it seemed as if the snow got higher with each passing week. By this point I was going to be working at an environmental education camp in Saco, ME for the spring and at Mass Audubon's Wildwood in Rindge, NH and was wondering what to do after that.
Full time work still seemed to be a dream at that point with most positions focusing on the warmer months of the year. A different dream became reality after another lifer came from Gloucester, this time in the form of a Short-eared Owl (Asio flammeus). It was amazing that I even got to see it in broad daylight and along Route 128 South near the bridge before you get to those series of roundabouts and wind turbines. The other drivers were aggravated by my sudden slowdown and interest in the trees rather than the road and using the power of the horn, forced me to press on rather that getting into a fender bender. It was well worth it though.
March
After working in Maine for three weeks, all my patience, diligence, and zeal paid off when I was offered and accepted a position at the Rosamond Gifford Zoo in Syracuse, NY and started my journey to independence.
While Maine itself wasn't a bad experience, it taught me that not all environmental education places are created equally and that some of the values they held were at best, questionable. With that said, I did manage to get an unusual nemesis bird while I was there.
Typically speaking, Red-breasted Nuthatches (Sitta canadensis) aren't that difficult to locate if you happen to have a large amount of conifers nearby, but they had avoided me for all of 2014 and now I had the chance to see and hear some. Well worth the three week trip to Maine for that!
April
This is when the birding temporarily slowed down and "real life" started happening instead. It was especially hard for Alison and I as we had been together 6 years and only spent several months apart in the years before. Before I left, we spent a lot of time together when we could, knowing that after the summer we would be living together as a couple for the first time. It was going to be hard, but we'd done it before and we knew we could do it. Before I left, I assisted her with the task of putting up fencing before the Piping Plovers (Charadrius melodus) set up shop for the season. Sure enough in mid-April in Westport, the newly arrived migrants were prancing about looking to impress their mates and herald the birth of new offspring.
May
As I started exploring the surrounding areas looking for places to go birding, I found that Beaver Lake Nature Center, Three Rivers State Game Land, and Montezuma NWR were just the sorts of places that I wanted to explore and live near. While I had slowly gotten used to the wailing sirens, honking cars, and droning traffic near the apartment, I felt very alone. I talked to Alison nearly everyday and my parents every Sunday and yet that didn't fill the void. The void that contained friends and chances to get out and connect. Now, alone in a new city, I wondered if I'd ever find my place in the social scene at work or with a group somewhere in the city.
That's why I went birding I suppose. The longer I spent at the apartment, the more alone I felt. I didn't particularly want to get to know my neighbors either. Instead, one pleasant, yet buggy evening, as I explored Three Rivers, I was able to heard and see many birds I cherish. Displaying American Woodcock (Scolopax minor), cooing Pied-billed Grebes (Podilymbus podiceps), whinnying Sora (Porzana carolina), and serenading American Redstarts(Setophaga ruticilla).
Seeing the woodcocks in particular filled me with joy as their mating display is one of the most interesting shows to witness in the springtime. Dumpy, cryptic shorebirds that look like a loaf of burnt bread with bulging eyes and a 1" diameter dowel strapped to their face, the males produce a nasal grunt (the act is called "peenting") several times before launching themselves skyward upon whirring wings. As they spiral upward, their primary feathers begin to vibrate, creating a jibbering twitter that continues until they plummet to earth, land, wait for a few moments in silence, and then begin to grunt once more.
June
As the summer season started revving up, I felt like it was the right time to start another blog called "Sparrow's Eye" to focus on my feelings of being in a new place. This would eventually fall through as if I were to identify most closely with one of the seven deadly sins, Acedia would be my middle name.
(You guys have Google Translate and Wikipedia, you look it up!)
Anyway, it fell through and I instead focused my attention on the wild neighbors I met outside. I am, of course referring to the Floridian Wood Rabbit on the little green patch outside my apartment window and the Melanistic Squirrel of Carolina. Birding also took a hit that month with only a few visits to speak of. Montezuma NWR served as my chance to see my first of the year Purple Martins (Progne subis) slicing through the marsh air on ebony-indigo wings.
July
Foraging came into vogue with the slow heat of July. Sumac berries were on my mind with the light taste of sumacade. For those of your who don't know how to make sumacade (a contraction of the words "sumac" and "lemonade"), I produced a blog post about the only fishing trip I've done all year and making sumac lemonade that is linked here. The sumac lemonade helped with the stress of work and city life.
The buzz of people in an unfamiliar location was a change from what I was used to, but didn't stop me from feeling lonely. This was cured by a visit home during the July 4th weekend where I got to be with Alison. I was so happy for the first time in weeks to be with the woman I love and spend time reconnecting, two heartbeats connected by hundreds of miles, together again for a fleeting weekend in the summer. While helping with her plover job, I got to see the beach where her "plovers" were tending their cotton ball young and watched the tenuous balance between these small birds and the lumbering vacationers from upstate. Seeing American Oystercatchers (Haematopus palliatus) definitely sweetened the pot as well.
August
The countdown to Alison's arrival had begun with a massive end of the month party. Being able to see all our friends from all walks of life was an amazing experience and knowing that we are loved by so many people warms my heart and brings tears of joy to my eyes. The day afterward was rewarding both in regards to friendship and gaining another life bird. While swimming in Westport, we snorkeled amongst the seaweed, watch a fire rainbow grow upon nearby clouds, and witness the stopover of Black Terns (Chlidonias niger). These little black darts were winging their way over the water's surface using their keen eyes to spy the fish, dancing like strips of silver in the salty shallows. This was a wonderful "night cap" to my summer season.
September
Alison's arrival heralded a new stage in our relationship; actually living together as a couple. Despite having been together for 6 years, we had never formerly lived together until now. I resolved to take her everywhere that I had discovered during my summer ramblings. In that first month, we visited Three Rivers and Montezuma allowing us to see Blue-winged Teal (Anas discors), an unusually annoying nemesis bird for me in recent years and a lifer Merlin (Falco columbarius) for her. Migration seemed to promise much, but in the end, we didn't get round to seeing many migrants after all. It was at this point that I realized that reaching 200+ species this year might be a long shot.
October
October was a quiet month with Alison and myself celebrating our 7th year as a couple. We met in college and always have been a good match for one another with similar interests, social abilities, and studies at school. As the weather started to cool and then warm again in defiance of the season it was, we were able to watch a late flock of Bonaparte's Gulls (Chroicocephalus philadelphia) on Lake Oneida near Bridgeport, NY. Their delicate bills and dove-like faces really set them apart from their raucous Ring-billed (Larus delawarensis) cousins. Halloween remained quiet and uneventful as well.
November
Stress seemed to define this month. Feelings of inadequacy at work coupled with the terrorist attacks in Paris made me feel woeful and lost. The world seemed to be going to hell in a hand basket crafted of shit. Each day seemed to be a test of my patience and resolve with the guidance and love of my family and friends steering me towards a more hopeful December. The only bird that seemed to pick me up was a small squadron of American Coots (Fulica americana) that were patrolling Great Meadows earlier in the month, bobbing energetically up and down like toasted carbon grey balls on the waters surface. They were a delightful sight indeed.
December
The last month of the year was filled with the usual holiday stress of buying items from our capitalist economy, complaining about how we're suckered into the deals every single year and how this year we won't be suckered into it again, and then going out to buy more things. Being able to spend Christmas with my parents was especially good as I had been missing them terribly. Even as the "year of the independent adult" began, it was still nice to see them. No "new" birds had been glimpsed this month, but after a lovely walk at Heard's Fields in Wayland, we watched a lone Red-tailed Hawk (Buteo jamaicensis) fly into one of the bare trees, watching us with the singular curiosity that seems to fill all wild animals as well as ourselves. Watching for danger and out of interest. We could have been the third or thirtieth humans that hawk saw that day, but it paid us the same intense interest that most birders would give to a Code 3 or 4 any day.
......
As the year ends, I have started planning for the new. The world became a stressful place this year, but hopefully we can go out with the old and in with the new. Hopefully, by focusing on the now, it will bring me closer to what I want to achieve in the coming months.
As for Bird of the Year 2015, I think that I will give it to the Red-tailed Hawk. While it wasn't as flashy as the life birds I saw this year, it reaffirmed for me the mantra of taking it slow and be observant to the world around me. Sometimes we need to step back to see how far we've come and as I look over this eventful year, I am proud to see that I've come a long way and have much to look forward to in the new year.
Merry Christmas and I'll see you all in the New Year.
Very nice Gareth.
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