Waxwings

Nature never ceases to amaze me as it provides for the proliferation of life.

When birds migrate, their food supply is crucial. So it happens that this time of year as the female red cedar trees are draped with succulent berries, the cedar waxwings are moving through in large flocks. They can be seen resting on power lines or collectively swirling through the villages. Then they disappear into the trees. Eastern red cedars keep their foliage and are the prevalent green in our winter landscape. They are easy to spot.

My property has lots of indigenous vegetation, including cedars. The male cedar develops tiny cones and pollenates the females. Sometimes the trees are so laden with pollen, the branches practically smoke as the wind whips through them.

flock Flocks feed voraciously in the cedars around my house.

vertical'

Cedar Waxwings are handsome birds with colorful plumage, a rakish black mask and crest.

tail The tail is striking and looks as if it was dipped in yellow paint.

trailers The name of the bird comes from the waxy red secretions found on the tips of the secondary feathers.

down  Down the hatch. Cheers!

 

Critters

About ten years ago, I began nurturing an oyster garden. It has not been without some pitfalls like high wave action, sedimentation and algae blooms. But despite that, the oysters have thrived and grown into a series of small reefs. The reefs attract a myriad of other organisms, not just oysters. As the oysters spawn and grow, so does the size and complexity of the reef.

I take water quality data around the reefs twice a week and submit the information to researchers at UNCW and ECU. I see shrimp and fish interacting with the reefs. One day measuring salinity, I stood in waist deep water with a school of taylor blues swimming circles around me. I’ve also seen green sea turtles feeding there.

barnacles                                      Barnacles grow abundantly on the reef.

anemone Sea anemones wave arms in the moving current.

eggs A blenny laid it’s eggs in an empty oyster shell.

oyster toad Reef inhabitants include young oyster toads.

mud crab Mud crabs find a bountiful food supply in and around the reef.

spider Spider crabs are common residents.

stone crab I’m also finding some stone crabs in the system.

snappers One of the most interesting critters in the mix are the snapping shrimp. About 2 inches long, they look like a small lobster.

butterfly One late Summer day, I caught and released this butterfly fish.

shucked Some critters live inside the oyster itself, like the pea crab in the oyster on the right. In it’s protected environment, the crab feeds on plankton brought in by the oyster and it’s relationship is  parasitic. Locally, the pea crab in an oyster is deemed a culinary delicacy.

 

 

Cars

A weekend trip to Raleigh a few weeks ago was a nice change of pace from the riggers of mid-winter on Cape Hatteras. While there we happened upon a new exhibit at the North Carolina Museum of Art.

Porsche By Design, Seducing Speed is a collection 22 automobiles manufactured by the renown German auto maker. The popular show runs until February 2.

Copy and paste for the museum’s web site:

Porsche by Design: Seducing Speed

Porsche has long been one of my favorite cars, and I thoroughly appreciated the chance to see them as art forms.

1938 In 1938 Porsche built the Type 64 Berlin-Rom Racer. The aerodynamic design was way ahead of it’s time.

1949 The 1949 356 Coupe was one of my favorites. It has a 40 hp 1100 cc 4-cylinder engine.

McQueen Then there was Steve McQueen’s gorgeous 1958 Speedster.

speedster McQueen’s Speedster has a 1600 Super  88 hp 4-cylinder engine

 

Carrera The 1964 356 C Carrera Coupe also caught my eye.

356 C The Carrera was built with a 1966 cc air-cooled 128 hp 4-cylinder engine that could rev up to 6000 rpm’s. It’s top speed was 125 mph.

 

901 This 1963 prototype 901 was the precursor to the 911. It has a 2 liter 128 hp 6-cylinder, single overhead cam engine with a top speed of 125 mph.

911  This 911 Carrera was built in 1974 and  set up for some serious racing. It has a 3 liter air-cooled 6 cylinder producing 316 hp at 8,000 rpm’s. Top speed is 155.

917 K The 1971 Porsche 917 K had a  600hp 4907 cc 12 cylinder engine with a top speed of 223 mph.

908 K Porsche’s 1968 model 908K prototype was a 2990 cc 8 cylinder air-cooled engine developing 350 hp with a top speed of 200 mph.

926 C The 1990 Porsche 926 C has a 3200 cc 6- cylinder engine boasting 750 hp and a top speed of 215 mph.

Hybrid Porsche’s 2010 model 911 GT3R Hybrid is a prototype equipped with a water-cooled 410 hp 4 liter 6-cylinder engine. It also has 2 electric motors (202 hp) and is an all-wheel drive vehicle. It’s top speed is 175 mph.

Panamericana In 1989 Porsche made the Panamericana, a one of a kind concept car with a top speed of 162 mph. It has a 3162 cc 6-cylinder  275 hp engine. 

Joplin Janis Joplin’s 1965 Porsche 356 C Cabriolet was getting a lot of attention.

Janis

It brought back memories of driving my very own 356 A, a 1959 Convertible D. As the successor to the Speedster, only 1332 of them were built at Porsche’s Drauz plant.

Years ago I was a motor-head. In high school I loved fast cars, and drag racing.

My dad bought 2 used 1958 Volkswagen beetles and I rebuilt a 1600 Porsche engine for one and had some fun. In those days, it was called a Poor Man’s Porsche. Dad was mechanically inclined and it rubbed off on me. It was the best of times. We tore them down and rebuilt them at home in the laundry room.

Right after high school I found an old Porsche, abandoned in a parking lot. The motor had been stolen and the owner was going to junk it. I bought it for $50 and in the course of a few years began restoring it.

jacked up In 1968 when I was 19 years old, I was right in the middle of fixing up the Convertible D. Here I was rebuilding a 1600 N engine that I’d bought in pieces.

As a day student at George Mason, it became my mode of transportation to class everyday. During a period when I was doing body work, it was a sight to see, speckled with gray and black primer. That same time, I was employed at a Mercedes Benz dealership, and got some expert advice from knowledgable German mechanics.

I loved the deep sound of the air-cooled engine resonating as I drove into tunnels and underpasses around DC and Virginia. Drifting through the s-curves on Carlyn Springs Road was another joy. All the Porsche owners flashed their headlights at one another. For a while I was one of them.

Convertible D All I have left are the memories and a few old Polaroids.

1959 As time passed, I became more interested in hanging out at the beach and surfing. The Porsche was involved in a bad traffic accident and we sold it in parts.

 

 

 

Getting to the Point

This has been a year of some personal loss and heartbreak, and I’m glad to have it behind me.

There is so much to be thankful for. The Summer and Autumn have been exceptionally gorgeous, especially in light of the severe storms the past few years.

December has almost turned into winter, and things on the island have been relatively quiet preceding the holidays. Yet a few weeks ago on the 5th, I had a first glimpse of a snowy owl. They are generally rare to the region, but not unheard of.

The first reported sighting was weeks prior, and Cape Point saw a deluge of photographers and naturalists looking for the wayward creature. My reaction was to wonder, at what point will the onlookers be harassing the bird or distressing it in some way. Certainly one’s discretion to minimize impact is important.

I felt guilty about venturing to the point with so many other folks, but when the bridge access to Hatteras Island was shut down for repairs, the onslaught of birders was also shut down considerably.

owl

With hardly any one else around, I was directed to a location where I saw a big white spot in the distance. Sure enough, there it was, perched on a piece of driftwood. I was able to get reasonably close with my 500 mm telephoto.

There was intermittent rain and light overcast, perfect for shooting a white bird in the wide open tundra of Cape Point.

Two weeks later I ventured out again with my long time friend Ray Matthews, and the owl was nowhere in sight. We surveyed the area with binoculars and discovered a falcon perched on a piece of wood. We advanced some, yet respectfully kept our distance.

falcon

It was a peregrine falcon, a frequent winter resident of Cape Point.

The Point is an amazing place. There’s always something interesting going on, and you never know what you’ll see or experience.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU ALL!

Skipjack and Cold Front

I’m often asked what my favorite picture is. The answer is that I can’t single out any one, from many preferred images.

One of my most endearing shots was taken the day before Thanksgiving, 31 years ago. I was into my second season of oyster dredging on the Chesapeake Bay, aboard the sailing skipjack, Virginia W.

There were reports that the day before another workboat, Hilda Willing, had dredged its limit of 150 bushels near the mouth of the Choptank River. With oyster populations in steady decline, that was a rare occurrence.

So early that Wednesday morning, all the Tilghman Island skipjacks set out for the same spot. There was no wind, however an approaching cold front was forecast to sweep in. We had our sails up ready to work. A light breeze began to fill in, though we were still underpowered and moving at a slow pace, barely able to pull a single dredge.

skipjack frontSkipjack and Cold Front-1982- prints available on request

As was typical of my working the middle deck, throwing the starboard dredge, I had my Nikonos rangefinder camera by my side. The massive clouds of the cold front began rolling in, getting closer. I looked over to see the Sigsbee, full sails up, waiting for wind. I took 6 shots, then put my camera away.

The front was an ominous sight as we prepared for more breeze. We tied 4 reefs in the main, deployed a second dredge and began catching a few oysters. Our speed increased, a gust of wind hit, and the boat heeled over, filling my right boot with sea water. There were some tongers  working nearby, and maneuvering was tight. Coming about for another lick, we had a near collision with one of them, our massive bow sprit crossing over his cabin top.

By that time it was blowing a gale, and impossible to control the boat safely. We dropped our sails, deciding to call it quits after bringing in 4 bushels and headed home for the Thanksgiving holiday.