WHO SAYS THE BASEBALL SEASON IS OVER?!
This is a follow up to my last report telling of the birthday party at the campground. Here, we are playing a different style of baseball using a lobster buoy for a bat and a float for a ball! I didn't invent this kind of game, but witnessed it one winter when a kid and his dad were having a great time using these tools for a hit or two. Can you guess where we were playing? Remember, it was cold and windy on most of the beaches.

Now for more serious business....I wonder if you remember my writing about a pheasant that took a dust bath in my vegetable garden? That bird continues to hang around and surprises us now and then. My daughter was driving up Parker Head Road and took this picture of our resident pheasant. It seems to have escaped the hunting season, but looks like it had an encounter with a car. It only has one leg, poor thing. But what a beauty this has become with its mature male plumage. Let's hope it continues to survive. Too bad it doesn't have the capability of a lobster.....to grow new legs.

Yes, you can't keep me off the beaches even though the tides are now high when I like to hike. I did go down into Totman Cove despite its being a high tide. The wind was blowing strong and I thought there might be some interesting beach debris. This is what I found. How much of these items can you identify? First of all, most of the beaches have Oak leaves mixed in with the seaweed that washes in on these November days. That dark seaweed is actually edible....Dulse it is called, and the waves brought in a nice clump. The white decorated seaweed has an interesting worm that makes a coiled calcium castle on its "leaves". This is Spirobis, and for some reason, grows quite prolifically in this cove. There is a large razor clam and a piece of white birch bark in the mix. In the large Surf Clam are several interesting things...an acorn cup, a crab claw, a small piece of wood, a live small surf clam (!), and a sanddollar. The sanddollar is found live in this cove if you walk out far enough, but I had never seen one wash in on this beach in Totman Cove. This one was unique, however. The "fingers" of a small kelp holdfast are clinging to the round sanddollar. No wonder it washed in with this "sail" to move it along. You never know what you will find on our beaches here in Maine. Every tide brings a new and interesting assortment of life and its remnants. That is what keeps me out there, hunting (without a gun)!
11/15/07 Ronnie on the prowl.