Refuge As Art Museum

Thursday morning I got up to join Alan and Will on the weekly bird census. I did bring my camera, but my focus was improving seeing and identifying birds. The weather was gray and cold, with rain due imminently.

As we walked along the impoundment, one thing I noticed was the remains of bird nests along the trail. I had walked next to several of these many times and never noticed the nest. I guess my skills of observation have room for improvement. I'll have to make a mental note to check these locations next year.







The predominate color in the refuge is brown. That's why anything green stands out. It's amazing that the muskrats can find green stalks below the water.





Over the course of this year, I've noticed small piles of rocks, popping up around the refuge. I wondered about the story behind why they were there & who was creating them. Since it was such a mystery, I hadn't taken photos of them before. Here are some examples that I noticed on our walk today.










Well this week Tom Hart, the artist / curator of these exhibits shared the story behind these works of art and how he started making small these piles of rocks in the Great Meadows google group.

As we walked around the refuge, I also notice a few art installations created by Nature, herself. Hope you enjoy them also.


I love the way the leaf, is positioned in relation to the curves of the grain in the wood


The combination of fungi and the burl forms a natural face

We Are Not The First

Unfortunately, the temperature Wednesday morning was warmer than predicted and the skies were mostly cloudy, trending towards totally cloudy. That was not a good omen as I met Ken Proulx in the parking lot. Ken is another talented photographer, that periodically visits Great Meadows.

After yesterday's eagle visit we were hoping for continued freezing overnight pushing the birds closer to our cameras on shore. Unfortunately, the reduced light made photography more challenging. I played around with using my flash with as many failures as successes.

It was a cool, gray, quiet, almost boring morning. While walking along the upper impoundment near the poison ivy bench we saw coots running out of the reeds, collecting into a tight group. When they exhibit this sort of behavior, you start looking for the threat. Soon we spotted it. The eagle was content to make a fly-by pass, deciding that there was too much water and hunting coots would be too much work. Almost as quickly as they came together, they started attacking each other, and ran away to disburse.









A group of coots has many collective nouns, including a "codgery", "commotion", "fleet", "shoal", and "swarm" of coots. When we first saw them, this was definitely a commotion.

It was fun photographing with Ken. He has great eyes.   I hear most birds long before I see them. While wandering around he spotted this Brown Creeper. They are tiny, camouflaged to look like the trees. They are similar to the nuthatch, except for the fact that nuthatches general walk down the tree trunk, brown creepers climb up!



Sorry Alan, he was just poking beneath the bark, no signs of a nest.

There was a small flock of Goldeneye ducks in the upper impoundment. Thankfully one got within camera range and parallel to shore to show their distinguishing characteristic.




I always think of woodpeckers on trees, so I find is humorous when you encounter them on the cat tail reeds. The Downy Woodpecker was just doing was woodpecker do, looking for bugs.


An unusual viewpoint of the Downy Woodpecker


A more typical pose


After finishing our photography of animals I decided to go check out the stone foundation that's back in the woods. It is a reminder that long before we started coming here, other people had tamed the area, erected buildings, which have long since disappeared except for some tell tale signs like a foundation, some bricks, and a bit of mortar.

Solitude

One nice thing about the approaches to the bridges being flooded is that since most people don't bring their "Wellies" to Great Meadows once you have waded through the water you pretty much have the refuge to yourself. Today it was cold, but sunny. There was lots of animal activity. I pretty much had the place to myself. It doesn't get much better than that.

Walking in from the parking lot, I started looking at all the frosty plants. But in the end I found these patterns the most interesting. Can you identify what they are?






Give up? They are the mud in the path freezing and taking the shape of the ice crystals.

The first thing I noticed was that a lot of the water in the impoundments was frozen. As a result the geese and the coots were crowded together in the patches of open water.




Coot on ice braking duty


Must be warmer than standing on the ice


Canada Goose comes to evict the Occupy Concord movement


Suddenly, I heard a lot of noise from the far side of the impoundment. Looking over, I noticed many birds rapidly moving across the water. Looking up the cause of their sudden activity was apparent, as a mature Bald Eagle was doing a bit of "fly fishing" or hunting as the case my be. The photos aren't great because of the distance. If I had known there would have been excitement, I would have set up where the reeds wouldn't have been in the shot.








Having struck out the eagle retreated to the trees near the treatment plant. I relocated to a spot where the reeds wouldn't interfere. I waited 40 minutes. The coots came back, but the eagle was content to sit in the tree.

There was a lot of animal activity this morning.


Some of these birds are not like the others. Buffleheads in the midst of the coots.


Finally saw the Belted Kingfisher inside the refuge


The consensus of the experts is that this mystery bird, is just a Goldfinch in nice light.


House Finch




Down by the river there were quite a few bluebirds, flying to and fro. Only on occasion would they stop at the Winterberry bushes. I am still hoping to improve upon last winter's Bluebird images. Today, I was able to capture a few nice portraits.


Male Bluebird


Female Bluebird




The ubiquitous sparrows seemed crowded out of the lime light by the flocks of bluebirds, goldfinches, and downy woodpeckers I encountered. This Song Sparrow posed so nicely I had to include him.




I don't know if this fish (yellow perch or raccoon perch (Perca fluviatilis)) was stranded by the receding water or whether he was caught by the tail. I do know that it wasn't there on Sunday when we walked through the water across the bridge.




I think I have enough photos of Downy Woodpeckers, but walking through the forest, I encountered this one. The colors in the background were so nice, I couldn't pass it up.