Archive for the ‘Habitat’ Category

The Great Escape — 10 April 2001

Tuesday, April 10th, 2001

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Male Fiddler Crab

Two days of bright sunshine baked the Land of Ooze, and its mud flats have begun to spring to life.  True, these critters aren’t turtles.  But they do live in the marsh creeks, they burrow under the mud for winter, and they are an imminent precursor of our beloved terrapins.

Water temperatures, even early this morning, had reached 52 degrees Fahrenheit.  Fiddler crabs sprang from the ooze, muddy mounds surrounding escape tunnels.

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Male Fiddler Crabs

They haven’t begun to march in armies yet, but they have emerged and that’s a welcomed harbinger of things to come.  Even in the grassy marsh, fiddlers are on the move.

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Springtime Duets

And it is springtime, so it shouldn’t surprise us that all God’s creatures seem to prefer a two-seater rather than flying solo.

Looking Back, Looking Forward —18 February 2001

Sunday, February 18th, 2001

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Terrapin Processing at Blackfish Creek

The terrapin field researcher faces a life of endless challenge.  Hours spent in stuffy work clothes, cramped office conditions without even the simple convenience of a chair to lighten the load, total reliance on private conveyance with no public transit available, and not the barest shelter from warming sunshine and cooling bay breeze.  Alas, a lonely, rugged life where a rock is your desk and the beach becomes your home.

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Yet, you can’t beat the company.  Whether human or terrapin, only the friendliest, most photogenic and curious join the party.

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And, in the world of terrapin research, life is a beach.  Although for some, I guess, they’d just rather be sailing.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF JOHN KRAMER

New Year’s Wish from the Land of Ooze — 30 December 2000

Saturday, December 30th, 2000

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Lieutenant Island Bridge Damaged in Storm — 18 December 2000

Monday, December 18th, 2000

Driving rain and gusts exceeding 50 knots slammed against the Outer Cape last night.  Augmenting an already significant tidal flow, the storm thrust tons of wrack and debris through the marsh channels and against the one-lane tinkertoy bridge spanning the Lieutenant Island causeway.

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Storm-Damaged Lieutenant Island Bridge

The windward railing collapsed under the strain.

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Storm-Damaged Lieutenant Island Bridge

Along the shoreline along Turtle Point and Turtle Pass, the storm wrack piled 10 to 20 feet deep and several feet high.  The surge reached far above the high tide line, raking nesting dunes and potentially drowning any lingering, over-wintered hatchlings.  The extent of this tide matched the late January storm flood of last winter.

Reclaiming the Beach — 27 November 2000

Monday, November 27th, 2000

Come November the Atlantic reclaims her summer gift: the long, deep, gentle shoreline of the Great Back Beach — nearly 30 miles of towering dunes and sun-baked sand.

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Ocean breakers, swelled by waves of nor’easter storms, chisel the shoreline, scooping mountains of beach to rebuild once-lethal winter sandbars which formed the graveyard of the Atlantic for countless sailing ships of yore, . . .

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. . . sculpting elegant curves and billiard-sharp angles to transform the sleek slopes of summer into Dali texture and Picaso form, . . .

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. . . and carving a new rugged face on Ole Cape Cod.

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