Life on the Outer Coast

In my usual unsettled state before a seminar, paranoid about everything, questions like "will the speaker show up? were running through my head. One useful thing came out of my pointless nervousnes. I was searching for material for an introduction just in case John Straley didn't show up to do the honors and I found this T.S. Eliot poem that Nels used to end a piece on the Harriman expedition.

" We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time"

I was going to use it, even if it had nothing to do with the talk, because it had alot to do with why the seminar series exists. Fortunately, my fears were unfounded, Nels showed up 10 minutes before 7pm and John had 5 minutes to spare. I did find myself loading a slide try and fussing with the projector until 7:01,but it was much better than pacing.
Nels is a good speaker, really a good story teller. He is so animated and enthusiastic that it doesn't much matter what the subject, it is engaging. Maybe it is just the joy he expresses. The other very admirable habit he has, is to frequently say that he isn't judging, but observing. He actively tries not to alienate, but to bridge gaps.
It is much more difficult to sum up a talk that really is trying to convey ideas instead of facts. None of the facts were new to me, but I liked how he put them together. One of the ideas I hadn't thought about before was the dependence of agriculture in many states on the control of deer populations by hunting. The example he used was his home state of Wisconsin. He heard the same story from a farmer and a game manager, if hunting were to stop, agriculture would cease in 3 to 5 years because of the exploding deer population. The point was that all of us depend on hunting to support our life styles. Most of the foods that are raised in farms depend on hunting to control the herbivores that would chew away if unchecked.
The other good point was that animal rights activists were very interested in the individual animal, whereas wildlife biologists and many conservationists were interested in the population of animals. Not rocket science, but very nicely said.

Bird and other observations: On Tuesday I stopped briefly at Moller park and at Swan lake: Found fox and song sparrows and juncos at Moller. The usual suspects at the lake and the 4 coots and a (the) double crested cormorant.

Wednesday: Dock One heron on piling, one glaucous-winged gull. pelagic cormorants. I drove out to Starrigavan to see the oystercatchers reported on Sitkabirds. Met Lucy and Laura on the bridge. There were 7 on a small island mudflat not far from the bridge on the main road. They had a very interesting, but for me difficult to describe call. Watched them foraging for awhile. They flew off toward Old Sitka, not sure what sent them off, we had turned our attention to loons.
Also tried to refine long distance loon recoginition techniques. Lucy suggested that in addition to size of the bird the width of the white at along the throat and breast might be useful. The book she was using the Pacific loon had a much larger area of white. Can't really see that difference in either book that I have. I think I'll stick with the size and the dark necklace in Pacific or the white in the Common. Many loons will probably go unidentified.
Also saw a mergansers madly chasing fish, a Horned grebe, a kingfisher and two marbled murrelets. Lucy had 3 rather large Hydnum repandums that seemed to be in rather good shape for the end of November.

That evening left UAS for Ballet class about 7pm on Wednesday, it was cold and clear. Above the mountains could see a very bright red-orange Mars. On the way home around 9pm, saw some of my favorite winter stars for the first time this fall. Orion, Taurus (the celestial "V") and the Pleiades in the Southeast. Just past Morne island was somewhat annoyed at the brightness of what I thought was a dock light at one of the newer island homes. It was quite blinding with the frosty windshield. Well, it was the Mooon, duh. It was not far above the horizon south of Arrowhead, so I couldn't see it from town.

Thursday: frost on the dock at Galankin. The island lake had a layer of ice on the surface. Very quiet commute, just a handful of glaucous-winged gulls and 2 pelagic cormorants. Desperatedly in need of a scraper for the skiff, it was a little cold sticking my face around the outside of the cabin so I could see.

Dropped Ian off at school this morning, so saw that Swan lake was mostly iced over. The four coots were in the clear area and most of the gulls were gone.
Sunny, so I went out to Starrigavan to eat lunch and take a brief look before dutifully returning to my cave to grade exams. The grasses and other herbaceious vegetation were still covered with frost. The cow parsnip's structure was especially pronounced. Didn't find the oystercatchers, but did see a pair of Hooded mergansers, a teal and a robin. The robin found a sunny patch of pavement in the parking lot at Old Sitka to look for food.