Ellen Rathbone: Tracking Adirondack Insects

As many of you have probably figured out by now, two of my passions are tracking and books. A few weeks ago a fellow blogger, who is also a field guide fanatic, wrote to me about a new field guide that is just hitting the market: Tracks and Sign of Insects and Other Invertebrates, by Charley Eiseman and Noah Charney. Well, what right-minded tracking bibliophile could pass up such a title? I had to order it. The book is so freshly off the presses that there was a small delay in shipping, but this morning it arrived.

Now I know what you are thinking. She’s gotta’ be nuts if she thinks she’s going to follow beetle footprints! And you’d be right – that would be nuts, at least here in the woods it would be nuts. But tracking isn’t strictly looking for the proverbial footprints in the sand. A “track” is a footprint, but “tracking” involves looking for all the other “signs” animals leave behind: droppings, eggs, nests, dens, feeding sites, shed fur/skin/feathers, etc. So, in the case of insects, one can certainly look for footprints (especially if sand is around), but one should also look for insect cases, holes in trees, chewed leaves, cocoons, nests, and so on. It is for these clues that I bought the book.

Many’s the time I’ve gone out with students and while pulling apart the trunk of a rotting tree encountered various and sundry signs of insects. They might be tunnels, they might eggs, they might be cocoons or webbing. Invariably, one of the students asks “what’s that?” Most are satisfied with “that’s a cocoon,” or “those are insect eggs,” but the curious naturalist in me wants to know more. Whose cocoon? Whose eggs? I’m hoping this book will provide the answers. Just flipping through the pages, it looks pretty darn promising, for it is chocked full of good quality photographs and plenty of descriptive text.

In the opening remarks the authors mention looking for the signs of “slug teeth.” Slug teeth? Slugs and snails don’t have proper teeth like you or I; they have an apparatus called a radula, which is a rasping mouthpart used to scrape thin layers off their food of choice. Last summer I found a large snail in the garden and commenced trying to capture its portrait with a camera. I held it on a leaf in my hand and it slowly oozed around, investigating this new environment. When it reached the edge of its leaf and found itself facing my naked hand, the first thing it did was try to sample me with its radula. For someone notoriously squeamish about invertebrates on bare hands (they have strange feet and might bite), you can imagine this was a startling sensation. Luckily for the snail, I didn’t fling it from my hand. I did shake it, though, enough to discourage its continued sampling. But I digress. The point is that on the right surfaces (not my hand), one can actually see the marks made by a slug or snail’s radula as it scrapes together a meal. How cool is that?

How about leaf mines? These are the tunnel-like lines you find wandering around on a leaf, like someone has turned it into a foliar etch-a-sketch pad. These tunnels, for that is indeed what they are, are made by larvae that live between the epidermal layers of the leaf. That’s a pretty small space, so one can only imagine just how small the larvae must be. If one investigates the marks closely, one will likely see that one end of the tunnel is narrower than the other, for the larva grows as it tunnels/feeds. Eventually, unless it is eaten or parasitized by some other critter, the larva pupates and emerges as an adult – look for the appropriate exit hole. If you are really lucky, you might even find the cocoon still nestled in the leaf before the adult hatches. With this field guide, you have a fair chance of learning to identify which leaf mining insect it is.

There’s even a section on galls! This is very exciting, because galls are one of nature’s treasures. I’ve written about some of the galls I’ve found, but finding information on galls hasn’t always been easy. Thank goodness for the internet, which can be a field guide in and of itself, provided you know what you are looking for and that you use reliable sources. But now I have a field guide in hand that has almost 30 pages just about galls! Can life get any better?

A whole new world of possibilities is now laid out before me. I can hardly wait for my next adventure outside. Pretty soon I’ll have to hire a Sherpa just to carry all my field guides every time I head out into the woods, but it will be worth it so I can learn a bit more about the critters that call the Adirondacks home.

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Alan Wechsler: Why I'll Never Be A Winter 46-er

I was driving over Cascade Pass with a friend recently when we noticed all the cars parked near the trailhead to Cascade and Porter mountains, the two easiest of the 46 High Peaks.

Was there a party going on? There must have been hundreds of people climbing that peak on this warm Saturday in mid-March.

Then my friend hit upon it: it was the last day of winter. Anybody wanting to gain the honor of "Winter Forty-Sixer" needed to climb these peaks by the end of today, or have to wait another season.

Which is exactly why I never plan to achieve that goal of climbing New York's highest peaks in the winter.

It's not that I don’t like being in the Adirondacks in the cold weather. Far from it, as anyone who reads this blog knows. In fact, it’s my favorite time of year: the deep snow. The crisp bite of the air. Those impossibly blue skies. The way the low winter light makes the trees warm and the shadows long all day long. I love winter.

I just find the rules of the Winter Forty-Sixers a bit contrived for my tastes.

Some background: Forty-sixers are those who have climbed all 46 of the Adirondack peaks more than 4,000 feet high (actually, several are below 4,000 feet, but we won’t get into that). Winter Forty-Sixers are those who have climbed all those peaks in winter.

There are well over 6,000 Forty-Sixers (I’m in there somewhere, having completed mine in 1995). But we had all year to complete them.

However, there are only about 450 winter Forty-Sixers. Winter adds so many difficult elements to the mix that many Forty-Sixers would just rather not bother. There’s the short days, the ice and snow. There’s gated or unplowed roads to trailheads, and the extra work of wearing snowshoes or crampons. Not to mention the expensive winter gear, and of course the general risk of being far from help amid extreme temperatures.

All those challenges that keep some hikers away helps draw me to the peaks in the winter. But I still don’t want that coveted “W” with my "46-R" logo.

Why? It’s the rules. To be a Winter Forty-Sixer, you have to climb all the peaks during the winter season. Not one day before or after.

I don't fault them for the rules. You have to have some kind of rules for these things. It just seems silly.

I once climbed Skylight, High Peak #4, in early December. We camped out near Uphill Lean-to, in temperatures that went down to the teens. Didn’t sleep at all that night; nose ran, sleeping bag too constricting. I love winter but hate cold-weather camping. Still I survived and got to the summit in six inches of snow in time to catch the dawn.

Doesn’t count, though. Too early in the season.

Once backpacked to Redfield, High Peak #15, and trailless to boot, in an early April blizzard. Three feet of snow on the ground. Spent several hours with a friend, pushing through snow-covered spruce trees to the viewless summit that seemed to never arrive.

Doesn’t count. Too late.

I can think of a half-dozen other peaks I’ve climbed in winter conditions that wouldn’t qualify due to the calendar. And guess what: I ain’t going back.

These days I climb the mountains I feel like. Earlier this month I wrote about my 10-hour trip to Allen, one of the most remote of the High Peaks. I did it not because I wanted another mark on my tick list, but because it sounded like a great challenge and I knew conditions were good.

So I’ll keep climbing peaks in winter, but don’t expect me to exhaust the list. Some mountains – the Seward range, Seymour, Blake, Tabletop, to name a few – are just too much a pain in the neck to bother with.

However, I didn't finish my story about climbing Redfield. When we came down from the summit, snow-covered and exhausted, my friend and I found our lean-to inhabited by two beautiful college girls from Montreal, who were in the process of building a fire. And I had even brought a Nalgene bottle filled with wine. A winter hiker's fantasy come to life.

If you can guarantee me conditions like that again, I’ll have my backpack ready in minutes.

* * *
For more on Forty-Sixers, click here.

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The Almanack Celebrates Five Years With History And Humor

The month of March marked the fifth year anniversary of Adirondack Almanack. In the past five years the site has grown to include over a dozen regular contributors. We've hosted hundreds of discussions (a few of them heated, others enlightening, some even funny), but through it all I think it's safe to say the Almanack has offered its readers a unique look at life in the Adirondack region from inside the Blue Line.

I thought that on this occasion I'd take a look back at how regional online media has changed in the last five years. You might recall a similar look at the local blogosphere that I did in 2006, and again in 2008. Looking back on the events since Adirondack Almanack was launched in 2005, I think the last few years might be considered the beginning of a new micro-era in local media, one that follows the movement of local media online between 1997 and 2003.

First a little history, setting aside the earlier digital communities like Usenet, GEnie, BiX, CompuServe, e-mail listservers, and Bulletin Board Systems (BBS), widespread availability of news and commentary online is now a 15-year-old phenomenon. You can see some great historical moments at the detailed Timeline of New Media History at the Poynter Institute, and a look at early newspaper online failings at Gawker's Valleywag blog by Nicholas Carlson.

Although Poynter's timeline cites a Columbus Dispatch deal with CompuServe in 1980 as the first online newspaper, suffice it to say that newspapers and other media outlets began going online in large numbers beginning in the mid to late 1990s. According to Chip Brown in the American Journalism Review, there were just 20 newspapers online worldwide in 1994, and some 5,000 by 2000 (almost 3,000 in the US).

That trend holds true in the Adirondack region as well. According to the Internet Archive (which is probably close to accurate), the Glens Falls Post Star was first out of the box locally when they launched their online site in 1997.

North Country Public Radio went online the following year (1998), just in time for the arrival of Brian Mann, who moved to the area to help start the station's news bureau.

The Plattsburgh Press Republican didn't arrive online until 1999.

Apparently the laggard of the local daily news bunch was the Adirondack Daily Enterprise. Archived pages of that paper only stretch back to 2003, although it's possible they had a simple site up before that. [Do let me know if any of these dates are wrong].

Right behind the newspapers were an early corps of online citizen journalists, diarists, and commentators. According to a short history of blogging written by Rebecca Blood, at the beginning of 1999 there were just over 20 known "weblogs" (remember that word?). By the end of 2000, there were thousands of newly dubbed "bloggers" keeping various permutations of online diaries, lists of links, and commentary.

The rise of blogging platforms like Blogger (1999, Pyra Labs; sold to Google in 2003, the same year TypePad was released), and WordPress (released in 2005), helped popularize the idea that anyone with basic internet and computer skills could publish their own content easily. In today's new media environment everyone can be a producer of online content (print, audio, and video).

By the time Adirondack Almanack was launched in 2005 there were about 10 million active bloggers (in others words, those still publishing three months after launching their blogs). There was just two local blogs then, Dale Hobson's Brain Clouds, begun in 2002, and Mark Hobson's (no relation) Landscapist, begun in 2003. Adirondack Musing began on the same day as the Almanack in March of 2005. Although some purists might differ as to whether or not it qualifies as a blog, Mark Wilson began regular postings of editorial cartoons at EmpireWire.com in 2001.

Today, local media have legions of mostly unread bloggers with NCPR's The In Box blog, begun last year, being the notable exception.

Blogs have grown in popularity in the last few years in particular with studies showing that about twenty-five percent of Americans now turn to blogs at least weekly.

In 1995 Newsweek ran an article by Clifford Stoll (hat tip to Dick Eastman), on why the internet will fail. It's a hilarious look at the what the naysayers were offering in the early years of widespread internet access. Here are a few excerpts:

Visionaries see a future of telecommuting workers, interactive libraries and multimedia classrooms. They speak of electronic town meetings and virtual communities. Commerce and business will shift from offices and malls to networks and modems. And the freedom of digital networks will make government more democratic.

Baloney. Do our computer pundits lack all common sense? The truth in no online database will replace your daily newspaper, no CD-ROM can take the place of a competent teacher and no computer network will change the way government works...

How about electronic publishing? Try reading a book on disc. At best, it's an unpleasant chore: the myopic glow of a clunky computer replaces the friendly pages of a book. And you can't tote that laptop to the beach. Yet Nicholas Negroponte, director of the MIT Media Lab, predicts that we'll soon buy books and newspapers straight over the Internet. Uh, sure...

That was good, but here's my favorite:

We're promised instant catalog shopping—just point and click for great deals. We'll order airline tickets over the network, make restaurant reservations and negotiate sales contracts. Stores will become obsolete. So how come my local mall does more business in an afternoon than the entire Internet handles in a month? Even if there were a trustworthy way to send money over the Internet—which there isn't—the network is missing a most essential ingredient of capitalism: salespeople.

Wonder what Stoll is up to these days? Turns out not much. His 1995 book Silicon Snake Oil is now available for 75 cents plus shipping from Amazon.com.

Here's a prediction of my own; something I've been thinking about lately. Network news and cable TV in general will be dead before newspapers. The reason? The high cost of cable TV service compared to the readily available access to online video from sites like Hulu, YouTube, and Netflix. An increasing number of people are looking for TV programming "outside the box" and that trend is expected to grow dramatically in the coming year.

Another prediction: desktop computers will shift from their current look to the iPad model. Horizontal touch screens will shift our gaze from the monitor to the actual desktop, so sell your traditional computer monitor maker stock now. This shift will also hasten the end of newsprint as consumers shift to these more portable (and more ergonomic) readers.

Nine out of ten Americans now access the internet. Fifteen years from now, the way we encounter media will have been dramatically transformed.

What are your predictions?

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Adirondack Family Activities: Adirondack Fish Hatchery

After being closed for the coldest months, the Adirondack Fish Hatchery is once again open for tours. Though fishing with children is a wonderful activity, having the ability to see the rearing of landlocked Atlantic salmon is well worth the trip. Most children, and adults, don’t realize that a good portion of the fish they catch in the Adirondacks have been raised in one of New York State’s 12 fish hatcheries. Each hatchery specializes in producing a select few species of fish.

The Adirondack Fish Hatchery facility in Lake Clear, located about 12 miles from Saranac Lake, produces 30,000 pounds of salmon yearly for release into regional lakes and rivers.

“There are two sources for eggs,” say Adirondack Fish Hatchery Manager Ed Grant. “The wild fish we catch from the pond and those we harvest from captive fish. That is about 500,000 eggs from wild fish and another 700,000 eggs from captive fish for 1.2 million eggs a year. That is the goal and we usually make it.”

The facility is open for free guided tours. The indoor visitor center contains a self-guided tour with a pool containing salmon, a monitor showing brood fish in a pond, and other exhibits on fish propagation. There is also a video in the Visitor’s Center showcasing the method necessary to produce all that yearly landlocked salmon. Inside the hatchery are 16 tanks holding approximately 275,000 fish; each tank is about 31’ in diameter and holds 8,000 gallons of water. Three of the tanks house the brood stock, the fish used to produce the eggs and milt for the next year’s stock, while the other 13 tanks hold the fingerlings that will be released into the wild now that it’s spring.

According to Grant tours are given throughout the summer and fall as well as certain times during the spring. He recommends that individuals call first during the spring if a tour of the whole facility is requested. Otherwise drop by the Visitor’s Center and Hatchery starting April 1 from 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. The springtime is a busy time as the staff is preparing to release the yearlings and fry into lakes and rivers.

“We have different ways of stocking fish,” says Grant. “The yearlings smolts go right into Lake Champlain. They are able to find a healthy habitat but they are not able to imprint. We also stock about 300,000 non-feeding fry in the Boquet, Ausable, and Saranac Rivers each year. A fry is a fish that first hatches from the egg and has lived off its yolk sac for a while and then it will start looking for natural food. Fry are placed and will stay in the river’s water stream until reaching the smolt stage. The fry then leave the stream environment for lakes but it has imprinted on a section of the river by its keen sense of smell. By requiring a certain number to imprint, we hope to recreate that natural process.”

For children it may be an opportunity to view a salmon for the first time. The next occasion that child and fish may meet could be in a match of wits over a hook and line.

The Adirondack Fish Hatchery is located off Route 30, approximately one mile south of Lake Clear. Call 891-3358 for more information.

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Let's Eat: Prohibition and the Burris Whiskey Jug

In 1918, Congress passed the 18th Amendment to the United States Constitution, banning “the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States …for beverage purposes.”

The new law was widely unpopular. One Adirondack camp owner asserted, “We looked upon Prohibition as a great disaster. There was no sense of guilt in breaking this law. Everyone we knew shared our sentiments.”

During the “dry decade,” some Adirondackers found their isolated homes and camps made perfect spots for defying the ban on alcohol. Rumrunners smuggled booze from Canada through the Adirondack Park, finding it easier to hide from or outrun Federal agents in the woods. Adirondack neighbors looked out for one another, storing contraband and secretly gathering to enjoy a variety of smuggled or home made brews.

Clyde Adelbert Burris (1883-1957) lived on Pleasant Lake. Like many Adirondackers, he engaged in a variety of work to make ends meet. He worked as a painter and carpenter throughout the year. In the winter he cut and stored ice to sell to campers in the summer and made rowboats which he rented for fifty cents a day, on the honor system. During Prohibition, Clyde Burris made alcohol.

He owned and operated two stills near Pleasant Lake in Fulton County. One was located off the present-day East Shore Road “behind a big rock.” He sold whiskey by the gallon or in teacups to neighbors at “tea parties.” His granddaughter, Joyce Ploss, recalled discovering Burris’ hidden liquor bottles: “At the top of the stairs [there] was a panel which covered a secret room under the eaves. The whiskey was stored in this secret room, and we found many gallon jugs there, waiting patiently to be put to use.”

Ploss also discovered some of her grandfather’s handwritten recipes for making beer (in 6 and 20 gallon batches), and Tokay, alder berry, dandelion, and black sherry wines. His recipe for “Elder Blossom Wine”:

1 quart of blossoms with stems picked off and packed down

Pore 1 gallon of boiling water over them, let stand 1 hour then strain

Add 3 pounds sugar and let it boil a few minutes

Skim well and let stand until luke warm or about 70 [degrees]

Then add 1 grated lemmon and ½ yeast cake

Let stand in warm place for 24 hours and strain again

Then bottle but do not cork tight until it is through fermenting or the bottles will break

When it does not work any more it can be corked tight

On March 23, 1933. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the Cullen-Harrison Act, which permitted the sale of certain types of alcoholic drinks. In December that year, Congress passed the 21st Amendment, repealing Prohibition altogether.

Come see Clyde Burris’ whiskey jug (2004.21), and more, in “Let’s Eat! Adirondack Food Traditions” at the Adirondack Museum in Blue Mountain Lake. Open for the season on May 28, 2010.

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Adirondack Bracket 2010: The Round of Eight

A few surprises to report as the 2010 Adirondack Bracket winnows itself down to the round of eight.

First off, mushrooms topped pond hockey. Actually, not too much of a surprise with ice-out at hand and the damp woodland floor being exposed by receding snow drifts. If you are new to identifying mushroom varieties in the Adirondacks, there's probably no better place to start than Mushrooms of the Adirondacks. It's a start because the book covers only a relatively small portion of the hundreds of varieties to be found (go chanterelles!). And do we really need to remind you that it is always a wise move to double and triple-check the edibility of some mushroom varieties before trying to impress your friends with your outdoor culinary skills. Mushrooms will now take on Triclopyr, vanquisher of Black Brook, for a chance at the final four.

John Brown got by birders—a surprise to nobody—becoming the only individual person to advance (Au revoir, Sammy Champlain, see you in 2109!). The craggy-faced insurgent will now face the even craggier cairns of Krumholtz and cairns. They caught Yellow Yellow still hibernating.

And the team that lived by the upset, Talk of the Town were out of talk and/or out of town (always a risk during spring break), getting sunk by Lows Lake—that deep Adirondack treasure and essential destination for canoe campers. Lows now faces the only endangered species to survive into the round of eight: the Adirondack logger. Which, of course, is our way of saying buh-bye to the Bicknell's thrush. With breeding season approaching, it is best you stay focused, anyway. This little bird was beaten by Planning Boards, who will meet Backyard Sugarin' as it looks to extend its run a little longer (with the help of cold nights). Given recent moves by local Adirondack planning boards to outlaw small flock poultry raising (Backyard Chickenin') and outdoor wood boilers, this next round might not be all that sweet for these sugarin' saps.

Join us later in the week as we reveal the final four and work toward the thrilling conclusion of the 2010 Adirondack Bracket this coming weekend.

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After 30 Years, Some Adirondack Rivers Are Still in Limbo

Peruse the colorful Adirondack Park Agency land-use map and you’ll notice that many of the region’s rivers are overlain by strings of big black circles, small black circles, or open triangles. These rivers are part of the state’s Wild, Scenic, and Recreational Rivers System (WSR).

And then there are the eight rivers overlain by open circles. These are “study” rivers, candidates for the WSR system.

The legislature first asked the APA to study these rivers in the 1970s—more than thirty years ago—and the APA did recommend that all eight be added to the system, but apparently for political reasons, they never were.

The rivers are the Osgood, North Branch of the Saranac, North Branch of the Boquet, part of the Oswegatchie, Main Branch of the Grass, Pleasant Lake Stream, East Stony Creek, and the Branch.

In addition, the APA identified in the 1970s at least eight other waterways as potential study rivers: the Chubb, Little, Jessup, and Miami rivers, Hays Brook, Otter Creek, and Fall Stream.

WSR rivers receive an additional measure of protection from development—something that doesn’t always sit well with local politicians and landowners. This, no doubt, is the reason that no river has been added to the system since the late eighties.

The Adirondack Explorer brought attention to this issue in a series of articles five years ago. The articles inspired the Adirondack Mountain Club (ADK) to deploy a team of volunteers to paddle a number of rivers in the Park to ascertain whether they should be added to the system.

ADK Executive Director Neil Woodworth told me he hasn’t given up on the WSR initiative. As a matter of fact, the club has drafted a bill to declare the Chubb—a lovely stream that winds through the High Peaks Wilderness—a Wild river. This is the most protective designation.

Yet Woodworth said this isn’t the right time to introduce the legislation, not with environmentalists fighting to restore cash to the Environmental Protection Fund and waging other battles as well. “The bill is certainly important, but we have other issues and other priorities right now,” he said.

Although WSR provides some protection against development, critics say the restrictions need to be strengthened.

Consider the Chubb. The proposed Wild stretch passes through one parcel of private land where there used to be a small hunting cabin. Several years ago, the cabin was replaced by a large house. Even if the Chubb had been in the system, that would not have prevented the construction of the house. APA regulations allow landowners to replace an existing structure with another. The new structure can be bigger, taller, and more obtrusive, as long as it’s not closer to the water.

As of today, all or parts of fifty-one rivers in the Park—totaling more than 1,200 miles—belong to the system. It looks like we’ll have to wait till next year, or longer, to see if the Chubb becomes the fifty-second.

Photo by Phil Brown: a paddler on the Osgood River.

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NYS Comptroller Reports on Economic Benefits of Open Space Conservation

NYS Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli released a report late last week that argues for the economic benefits of open space conservation [pdf]. According to John Sheehan of the Adirondack Council, "this is the first attempt ever by the state's top elected financial officer to quantify the value of undeveloped forests and open farm lands."

The report comes at a time when the Legislature is negotiating the 2010-11 state budget, including the Environmental Protection Fund and its Open Space Account. This year's budget contains $212 million for the EPF and $59 million for open space protection -- land acquisition and conservation easements (purchase of development and recreational rights on private lands).

The Senate has proposed a $222-million EPF for the fiscal year that begins April 1, with little detail yet available on specific categories. The Assembly yesterday proposed an EPF of $168 million, with $44.3 million for land. The Governor -- whose proposal came out first, back January, had proposed a $143-million EPF, with zero for land.

“Open space can provide a variety of public benefits, including storm water drainage and water management,” DiNapoli said. “Open spaces also provide a more direct economic benefit through tourism, agriculture and the forestry industry. All these benefits should be a factor in land use decisions from Montauk to Massena.” Here is an excerpt from Dinapoli's press release on the report:

Agriculture is among New York’s largest and most vital industries, encompassing 25 percent of the state’s land and generating more than $4.5 billion for the state’s economy each year. In 2007, the income generated directly by farms, combined with income generated by agricultural support industries and by industries that process agricultural products, totaled $31.2 billion.

The study noted that open space contributes to the state’s economy by providing opportunities for outdoor recreational activities. DiNapoli also noted that open space often requires fewer municipal services than lands in other use and tend to generate more in municipal tax revenue.

Open space helps control storm water runoff, preserves surface water quality and stream flows, and aids in the infiltration of surface water to replenish aquifers. When lands are converted to other uses, the natural benefits provided by open space often must be replaced through the construction of water treatment facilities and infrastructure to control storm water, all paid for through local tax revenue. A series of studies have found the preservation of open space to be a more economical way to address storm water requirements.

DiNapoli’s report recommends that New York State consider:

* Allowing municipalities to establish community preservation funds
* Evaluating the adequacy of protections for lands providing benefits for municipalities
* Improving state-level planning for open space to address long-term funding needs
* Improving the administration of funds for open space programs
* Encouraging private land conservation

Map: 2009 APA Land Use Map

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Bank Swallows: Thurman, 1955

O swallows, swallows, poems are not
The point. Finding again the world,
That is the point….

From “The Blue Swallows,” Howard Nemerov

In the mid-fifties, when I was four or five, I started visiting an old bootlegger’s hideout in the woods of Thurman with my friend Dinah, Dinny, who was a year and a century older than I was, and infinitely wiser, and whom I admired and adored.

The place belonged to her father, a surgeon who was our landlord in Schenectady. You reached it down a narrow track that opened into a long oval drive surrounding two or three acres of Arcadian white pines. The house stood at the end of the long oval, atop a bluff surrounded by a 180 degree bend in Patterson Brook. A wide screened flagstone porch supported by large pine logs gave way to a central frame structure two stories high, with one-story lean-tos built off the sides housing another bedroom, bathroom, and the kitchen.

A balcony surrounded the central hall and led to the upstairs bedrooms, which were small and rough, the bathrooms wainscoted and tiled. From the balconies you looked down on a large living room of cozy bamboo couches and chairs, coffee tables, lamps and magazine racks filled with Life, Look, National Geographic, The Conservationist, Field and Stream, and Superman comics. A bear rug covered the floor in front of the fireplace, another decorated a wall, and a moose head hung over the wide, open hearth fireplace.

The electricity came from a generator in a log shed located out of earshot at the far end of the driveway, a big Chrysler six that ran only in the evening, used enormous amounts of gas and had to be frequently coaxed into life by the caretaker, Ken Bonner, whom I knew twenty years later as an old-time fiddle player in Stony Creek. The kitchen had gas appliances, and they burned gas and kerosene lamps in the rest of the house when the generator was on the fritz, which it usually was.

A concrete ramp outside led downstairs under the kitchen into the “cool cellar,” where the family stored vegetables and beer, and which had originally been the liquor vault. In bootlegging days cars backed down the ramp, loaded up and made the quick shot to Saratoga, Albany and points south. Sometimes Dinny’s older brother Jeff trapped porcupines and raccoons there.

At first the deep woods’ sensory field disoriented me. Lying alone in my bedroom, with animals prowling sometimes audibly outside, I felt even at five or six connected to a greater if more uncertain and more thrilling reality than the one on the street and in the yards of downtown Schenectady and along the Mohawk. Waking in the night I couldn’t identify or locate the sound that came from the wind in the trees, which reminded me of the bodies and pews rustling together in church and seemed to come from everywhere. The creek roaring below after a night of rain brought a similar far-off echo of white noise, a gigantic hush that drowned out the noise going on in your head. Perhaps that was the first time I noticed the world slapping me into attention.

The place generated other patterns. The days had a morning adventure and an afternoon adventure—catching frogs, rock hopping in the creek, fishing. We played on the sawdust mountain outside the mill at the end of the driveway and came home with its rich piney smell on our bodies. Cool evenings by the fireplace, the doctor or his brother, also a doctor and a jazz clarinetist, told stories. They were not sportsmen themselves, but their colleagues nearby were, and we heard a lot about fishing, hunting and wildlife.

With Jeff we crawled through the alders to the edge of clear pools in Patterson Brook and spied on wild brookies hovering on their fins as if in midair, magnified in the water’s lens. One evening at dusk, driving home from the rodeo at 1000 Acres, we skinny-dipped like trout in Stony Creek. That was interesting and the last time the adults allowed it to happen.

The Hudson braided under the Thurman Bridge a couple of miles from camp among green islands supporting rare ice-meadow flora, the consequence of jagged bergs scouring the wide low banks each spring, which we knew nothing of at the time. Beef cattle grazed on the bigger, grassier islands downstream.

On the Thurman side a cut-bank fifty feet high ran along the river, nesting habitat for a huge colony of bank swallows, thousands swirling in the evening light for mayflies hatching off the broad shallows when we drove back to camp with ice cream cones.

After I moved to Hadley in the summer of 1969, I would cross the bridge and turn right into the maze of dirt roads that ran among the knobby mountains between there and The Glen, trying to find the camp and measure it against my memory. Usually I got lost, but more than once I made my way down an overgrown path in the woods to the broken down generator shack and bare concrete cellar hole. The ramp to the booze vault was still intact but the house a pile of ash. The chimney survived. How could such a thing have happened? Dinny’s father had lost the place in a bad real estate deal, it had changed hands and been left uncared for. It burned. The next time I found it nothing remained of the huge pines but a few redwood-sized stumps.

Much else had changed in the ten years since I had stayed there. When I heard that Dinny had died of cancer a few years ago I remembered the last time I’d seen her, when she and her father had driven into the four corners of Stony Creek on a summer afternoon in the mid-seventies at the precise moment when I happened to be crossing the street from one bar to another with a beer in my hand. The doctor had retired. Dinny was married, a nurse, employed and mainstream. They had been cruising the old roads and visiting their former haunts.

The doctor followed me to our rented farmhouse five miles from the town center at the headwaters of the creek and I made them tea. It seemed wrong to him, I could tell, that I had turned up uncertainly employed and rough in such a place, a counter-culture outcast. Dinny and I talked awkwardly about their attempt to find the cellar hole and recreate in their minds the way the place had felt back when the pines and house still stood.

But what struck her the hardest, she said, was the swallow colony, wiped out by Ddt, sand mining or some combination of both and whatever other outrage we couldn’t imagine. It was the last such profusion of animals, almost Serengeti-like, we remembered in the Adirondacks. “It’s so sad,” she said, mourning we weren’t even sure what. I know now that it was the beginning of the long sorrow, the realization that no elsewhere existed for us any more that would somehow keep alive the expressions of an earlier reality in the sounds of wind and water, and the whirr of thousands of tiny wings.

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Newcomb VIC Offers Family Bluebird Nest Box Workshop

On Saturday, April 3, from 1:00 - 2:30 p.m., the Visitor Interpretive Center at Newcomb will host a Family Bluebird Nest Box Workshop. This will be an opportunity to learn about bluebirds, their lifestyles and their habitat.

Bluebirds can be found in the Adirondacks and are attracted by some open grassland such as a yard and a nest box or two. Participants will learn about bluebirds, how to make your yard "bluebird friendly" and join with VIC staff to build a nest box. Nest box kits are available to purchase for $10.00 each. Pre-registration is required by Thursday, April 1st.

For information and to register call the Newcomb VIC at 518-582-2000.

The Newcomb VIC is located on NYS Route 28N just west of the Hamlet of Newcomb, Essex County.

The Adirondack Park Agency operates two Visitor Interpretive Centers at Newcomb and Paul Smiths. The mission of the Agency, which is headquartered in Ray Brook, is to protect the public and private resources of the Adirondack Park through the exercise of powers and duties as provided by law. For more information on the Adirondack Park Agency, call (518) 891-4050 or visit www.apa.state.ny.us.

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The Return of the Black Flies

According to my friend Edna, black fly season has begun. Edna is one of the fine folks who participate in our local Bti Program, and it is through the efforts of her team, and other Bti teams around the Park, that our black fly populations are greatly reduced.

A couple weeks ago I stopped to talk to Edna as she was roping off the muddier parts of her driveway. I wanted to give her photographs of our “new” beaver pond because the Little Sucker Brook, which is now Little Sucker Pond, is one of her treatment sites. She told me she hadn’t been in there yet, but the test sites she had visited were still full of larvae in suspended animation – it was too soon to treat.

Last week I stopped by again while she was raking her front lawn. “Have you been in to the beaver pond yet?” I asked.

“No – I’ve been too busy treating other streams,” she replied.

“Really? I thought you said the larvae weren’t active yet.”

“They are now, and in huge numbers.”

It seems that the early spring-like conditions have warmed the streams enough to wake up the dormant larvae and before long we will be needing our bug shirts.

Black fly season usually doesn’t get into full swing until late May or early June around here, which is why all the locals are busily raking lawns and sweeping the winter’s sand into piles as soon as the last pile of snow vanishes, and sometimes before. They all want to get essential yard work completed before the black horde descends.

Birders have learned to tolerate the biting insects (adult females, who seek a blood meal before laying their eggs), donning bug shirts and bug dope, and even early spring wildflower enthusiasts have learned to tolerate the little buggers, within reason. But the insects are persistent, known to follow potential prey in large swarms. This can be a problem for tourism in the North Country, and in some extreme northern areas even the livestock suffers, leading to decreased meat or milk production, and sometimes even death.

With all this negative baggage, it seems that black flies need some good PR. A friend of mine commented that black flies had better have some sort of benefit, because otherwise they were just the Spawn of the Devil. So, I decided to find the silver lining of the black fly cloud.

Let’s begin with the larva (the little black squiggles on the leaf in the photo). Really and truly, it is a rather beautiful, and fascinating, creature. From its mouth it spins a silken thread which it forms into a sticky pad on some underwater surface. The only requirement for this surface is that it be in moving water (slow or fast, depending on the species), and that it be solid and stable. Rocks, woody debris, canoes wrapped around rocks…it’s all the same to the larva, as long as the surface isn’t slippery. Then the larva grasps this pad with a ring of hooks that are located on its nether regions. Thus established, the larva hangs on and thrusts its head into the flowing waters, extending two fan-like structures from its mouth that filter edibles from the current. Edibles for a black fly include very fine detritus, algae and bacteria. In other words, black fly larvae help keep our streams clean and healthy.

The days pass in a filtering oblivion. Perhaps the larva has relocated, moving slowly by alternately grasping the substrate with its ring of hooks and the fleshy proleg located on its thorax (near the head). Kind of like an inchworm. Should the current sweep it away, it spins out a silken life line and usually manages to get back to safety.

When it is time to pupate, the larva covers itself in a rigid cocoon, sort of like a sack, with the opening facing down stream. From this opening it sticks out its head and thorax. Attached to the thorax are two feathery tufts – gills, which ripple in the current and extract enough dissolved oxygen to keep the pupa alive.

More time goes by, and with the magic that only Mother Nature can wield, the pupa turns into an adult. The newly developed adult crawls out of the pupal case and, wrapped in a bubble, it floats to the surface and flies away. Some species of blackflies have been known to fly 80 km or more from their hatching grounds! And now the trouble starts, for the adults have only one thing on their minds: reproduction. And this means the female needs her blood meals.

We should count our blessings, really, because here in the North our species of black flies only produce one generation per year. Why, we could be living in the South, where several generations spring up each year, like rabbits. On the other hand, most of those species seem to prefer feeding on birds and non-human mammals. There’s always a trade-off.

And so, to save our tourism, to help out birders and botanists, to alleviate the nuisance that is The Black Fly Season, we now have The Bti Squads. Bti stands for Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis, a naturally occurring soil bacterium that was first discovered in Israel (hence the name). Studies showed that it was highly toxic to the larvae of mosquitoes and black flies, insects that in some parts of the world are vectors for many diseases.

Teams of trained professionals mix up a solution of Bti and pour it into streams when the black fly larvae are at a specific stage of their lives. The bacteria get into the guts the unsuspecting larvae and kill ‘em off within a couple minutes. Not all larvae are wiped out, though. Even though there is only one generation per year, they aren’t all hatched at the same time, so the Bti Squad has to treat the streams several times over the course of the season.

One is led to wonder, though, if there is any “collateral damage” wreaked on other species living in treated waters. Studies conducted by the EPA and various other organizations have shown that when used in proper amounts, beneficial insects (mayflies, stoneflies, caddisflies), other invertebrates (snails, bivalves, crustaceans), and fish (trout and bluegills) are not significantly impacted. Additionally, Bti has been proven to be non-toxic to birds and mammals (including people).

So, to recap, black flies are important filterers of our waterways. In fact, when water gets too full of organic matter or nutrients, the amount of dissolved oxygen decreases and very little can survive in it. Black fly larvae are indicators of good, clean water.

And let’s not forget that all-important food chain! Black flies are important food items for many critters further up the chain, like dragonflies and some species of birds. Fish eat them, too – at least the larvae. Maybe they eat adults – are there black fly flies used in fly fishing? And just for the record, those who claim bats eat black flies need to remember that these are diurnal insects, whereas bats feed at night.

So, while many of us would just as soon not have to deal with another black fly, we should all remember that every living thing on this planet has its rightful place. It’s only when the delicate balance is thrown out of whack that problems occur. So, greet the black flies this spring with a smile, for they will fill the bellies of the birds, dragonflies and fish that we love to encounter come summer.

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This Week's Adirondack Web Highlights

• Rural Blog: Rural Wages Rarely Exceed Average
• NY State Archives: Youtube 1980 Olympics Video
• Matthew Dennis: Seneca Nation's Cigarette Fight
• Sandra Hildreth: Adk Landscapes and Mandalas
• The In Box: What if Little, Enviros Joined Forces
• Alpinist: Adirondacks Lost and Found
• Batavia Daily News: Mitchell Sabattis

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Going Solar:Another Way to Help Save the Adirondacks?

If global warming is ever to be reversed, or even slowed, Americans must consume less of the energy produced by coal fired power plants.

Wind and solar power are among the alternatives New York State is promoting, said Adele Ferranti, a Queensbury resident who’s a project manager at New York State’s Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).

“Every little bit helps,” Ferranti said. “The potential for reducing emissions is tremendous; we can make a significant dent in the consumption of energy.”

More and more people are taking advantage of alternative technologies, Ferranti said.

“They’re doing it because it’s the best thing they can do for the environment,” said Ferranti. “They’re replacing the energy made by burning fossil fuels with clean, natural power.”

Among the Lake George residents reducing carbon footprints are Rebecca and Candida Smith. The daughters of the late sculptor David Smith, they live part time at the home and studio he created in the hills above Bolton Landing.

A few years ago, they contracted with GroSolar, a Vermont company recommended by author-turned-environmental activist Bill McKibben, to install solar energy systems in the property’s three buildings.

“Global warming caused by human activities was a problem I had been aware of for a long time but it was too big, complicated and scary for me to bear thinking about for long,” said Rebecca Smith.

But after recent visits to Australia (“where I was relatively close to the ozone holes in Antarctica and actually felt how much stronger the effect of the sun was down there -- it burned into my eyeballs painfully at times”) and Great Britain (“where climate change was an accepted, observable reality that government was starting to do something about”) as well as extensive reading on the subject, Smith said she became “interested and excited about the new technologies and decided to see what could be done at my family's home in Bolton.”

Smith adds, “One person can't do much, but there are many, many people out there doing lots of things and I am inspired by being part of that effort.”

According to NYSERDA’s Adele Ferranti, New York State offers financial incentives to homeowners like the Smiths to encourage the use of alternative energy. “Our goal is to build an infrastructure that will not only make solar power more affordable but reduce the consumption of fossil fuels,” Ferrante said.

Eliot Goodwin of GroSolar says that New York State will pay 40 to 50% of the costs of installing a solar energy system in the form of a rebate. “The homeowner is also eligible for a 25% state income tax credit and a 30% federal tax credit,” said Goodwin. “This works out to be about 60 to 65% of the costs paid for by outside sources.”

Nevertheless, the initial investment is expensive. Whether an alternative energy system is cost-effective depends upon how one determines value, groSolar’s Eliot Goodwin suggests.

“Is a car cost effective? Is a marble countertop cost effective? Is a pool cost effective? Is a hot tub cost effective? Is it cost effective to have no mountain tops left from coal mining? Is it cost effective to no longer have clean air to breathe?” he asks.

Still, Goodwin said, “With solar, no matter what, the system will pay for itself in its lifetime. You can usually expect a 7-11% return on your investment and you can also expect the house to increase in value by as much as the system costs.”

Short-term costs are offset by long-term savings, and, of course, by environmental benefits, said Rebecca Smith.

“By my calculations, it will take about 9 years to pay for the solar panels (which are under warranty for 25 years).” said Smith. “I don't regard this as a money-saving strategy in the short run but as an investment that will pay off in dollars and environmental benefit in the long run. The satisfaction of making a difference is a really great feeling and it inspires me to do more.”

According to Fred Brown, the property’s year-round caretaker, approximately 80 flat solar panels were installed on the roofs of three buildings last spring.

“The system is comprised only of solar panels and an inverter,” said Brown. “ The panels produce direct current (DC) electricity which is steered toward the inverter where it’s converted into the Alternating current (AC) electricity, the same kind of power you get from the power grid."

The power is not stored, but, rather, either used immediately or sent backwards through the meter, creating dollar for dollar credits in a process known as net-metering.

“We send power to the grid and the meter runs backward,” said Brown.

“During the summer solar panels create more energy than the owner can consume and the utility is required by law to buy it from you and credit your account,” said Rebecca Smith. “The power companies now depend on the small percentage of solar owners to feed in a critical extra margin of energy during the peak summer months.”

For Rebecca Smith, the environmental benefits of using alternative energy are local as well as global.

“If warming trends continue, there won't be maple trees in the Adirondacks for our grandchildren,” she says. “I decided that it was better to be part of the solution than part of the problem.”

Every year, more New Yorkers are adopting that attitude, said Eliot Goodwin.

“We have approximately 75 installations in New York under the current programs. There’s probably another 2-300 installations in the state divided amongst 30 other installers. People care about the world they’re leaving to their children.”

Photo: A solar-powered workshop on the David Smith estate in Bolton Landing.

For more news from Lake George, subscribe to the Lake George Mirror

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Adirondack Bracket 2010: The Round of Sixteen (Part 2)

The round of sixteen match-ups continue. The upper right division of the Bracket saw a stunning upset of our Adirondack Olympians by the opinionated crew from WNBZ radio's Talk of the Town. No doubt threatened cuts to the Olympic Regional Development Authority annual budget from the New York State Senate rattled the concentration of the younger, more athletically inclined, better-dressed, more polite, and far less gloomy team. Way to go, talkers, you move on to face Low's Lake, an issue you have often argued into submission. Low's Lake bested road salts, a perennial threat to the health and beauty of our waterways through the excessive application of State DOT crews and local plow fleets.

Loggers left Adirondack movies (a squad with a storied past and promising future, and here) on the cutting room floor.

Loggers now face the sole surviving 2009 final four contestant Samuel de Champlain, who made short work of timber rattlesnakes to advance.

In the lower right regionals, the return of sub-freezing temperatures has extended the run for Backyard Sugarin' (a former regional magazine editor insists that the title of this useful how-to guide sounds dirty). They brought a premature end to the impressive run of special congressional elections in Adirondack Districts which stemmed from President Obama's nominations of Hillary Clinton and John McHugh to federal posts. It is worth noting that the third and last special election will be held this November, as Senator Kirsten Gillibrand officially defends her appointment.

Backyard Sugarin' now confronts ANCA, one of the least identifiable acronyms within the Blue Line (Adirondackers Need Clearer Acronyms!). ANCA has made an impressive show under rookie coach Kate Fish. Established in 1953 to promote community, cultural and commercial development within the park, the organization, known as the Adirondack Park Association changed its name in 1983 after a dozen years of exchanging misaddressed mail with the Adirondack Park Agency and the Association to Protect the Adirondacks. They defeated the APA's proposed boathouse regulations.

Planning boards—who most recently lost rookie talent when the northern Adirondack Town of Franklin abolished its newly formed board—made it past another 2009 final four contender, Warrensburg's World's Biggest Garage Sale. They now face the most enduring summer residents: Bicknell's thrush (who are looking to a possible final four match with birders). This should be interesting, as the planning boards might have something to say about these little critters' habit of building summer homes at high elevations.

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This Week's Top Adirondack News Stories

• Common Ground Calls for Park Stimulus
• State Police Expanding At Ray Brook
• Broadband Coming to Tupper Lake
• Essex Ferry to Vermont Reopens
• 7 Local Campgrounds to Stay Closed
• Dems Budget Rejects Park Closings
• Senate Plan Kills ORDA, Prisons
• Olympians Rally For Local Ski Hill
• Gibson Out As Protect’s Executive Director
• NCCC Adds Four New Programs

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Adirondack Music Scene: Fiddles and Family Events

This week I think of the most intriguing show looks to be in Raquette Lake. Check out this nifty video of Trish Miller clogging and John Kirk playing the tune, Irishtown Breakdown on the fiddle.

I also want to call some attention to The Adirondack Bluegrass League. They have a very thorough calendar listing events held all over the park and beyond.

Thursday, March 25th:

In North Creek, Diz at Trapper's Cabin . He starts at 7 and plays until 10 pm.

Friday, March 26th:

In Canton, The Hazel Pearl Band is playing the Blackbird Cafe. The band plays from 7 - 9 pm.

In Plattsburgh, Professor Chaos at Gilligan's Getaway an all ages show starts at 8 pm.

Saturday, March 27th:

In Potsdam, Hamlet: The Met Opera Live in HD. At the Roxy Theater starting at 1 pm.

In Lake Placid, Hamlet:The Met Opera Live in HD. At LPCA starting at 1 pm. Tickets are $18 for adults and $15 for seniors and students. Running time is 3 hours and 45 minutes with intermissions.

In Raquette Lake, Trish Miller and John Kirk will perform from 7:30 - 9:30 pm at The Raquette Lake School on Route 28. Tickets are $12.

In North Creek, The Noodlemen at Laura's Tavern start at 9 pm. I looked around online for these guys and I think I found them but there is no way to prove it so I won't include the link because what if there are other Noodlemen out there and I'd be steering you wrong.

In Potsdam, The Orchestra of Northern New York presents "Carnival of the Animals". the concert is from 7 - 9 pm at SUNY's Helen Hosmer Concert Hall and features creatures created by Camille Saint-Saens and Dr Seuss.

In Canton, Sweet Adelins St. Lawrence Chorus's annual barbershop performance. The 7 pm concert is being held at the Canton High School.

In Queensbury, The last Saturday of the month Coffee House Open Mic at the UU Church is held from 7:30 - 10 pm. A donation of $4 includes light refreshments.

In Saranac Lake, The Back Porch Society will perform at the Waterhole Upstairs Music Lounge starting around 9 pm. Cover of $5.

Sunday, March 28th:

In Potsdam, Hamlet: The Met Opera Live in HD Encore Perfromance, at the Roxy Theater starting at 1 pm.

In Hadley, The Siver Family in conjunction with The Adirondack Bluegrass League will perform from 2 -3 pm.

Tuesday, March 30th:

In Saranac Lake, The Adirondack Singers will rehearse for their annual Spring Concert. New members are encouraged. For more information contact Val at 523-4213.

Photo: John Kirk and Trish Miller

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The Changing Face Of Bird Migration

On any given spring day here in the Adirondacks you are bound to hear an American robin calling from a treetop or front lawn. And then you ask, when did they get here? Later that day as you are paddling along the shoreline of a quiet lake you see an osprey circling overhead as it hunts for fish. Again you ask, When did they arrive?

Do these birds all arrive at once or is there some sort of bird-migration-schedule that our feathered friends use on their northward journeys?

A simple answer is yes, they do arrive on somewhat regular schedules. But as with all things in the world of biology, it is not that simple.

Let's look at the big picture first. We know that birds arrive in the spring and we can kinda guess-within a week to 10 day margin-when they might arrive. Someone once told me that our Adirondack hummingbirds arrive within a week, either side, of Mother's Day. That's true.

Our summer visiting common loons are usually on lakes and ponds just at or near complete ice out. Come to think of it that's pretty easy for a loon to determine as they fly 500-1000ft in the air getting a loons-eye view of what lakes are open.

But looking at the nuts and bolts of migration we see there are many biological signals that kick these birds into migration mode.

Deep within birds there are biochemicals, testosterone and estrogen, surging through veins and into cells. This in turn signals other processes to begin: reproductive parts start to increase in size; increasing day length signals readiness for migration; and there is a general restlessness that birds exhibit as they begin orienting their movements towards north or south, depending on the season.

As all this occurs, birds then get an uncontrollable urge to eat and fatten up as a result. This is good because the fat is the fuel for long distance migration.

But back to the main point-are birds on a schedule? One way to answer this is to look at the "waves" of different species that arrive in our woods, fields, or wetlands.

As March began we noticed bunches of Canada geese, and snow geese in flight far overhead. A week later we take note of our first red-winged blackbird down by the swamp or cat-tail marsh. About 2 days later the common grackles find their way into the fields and call to announce their arrival. Cardinals, brown creepers, and golden-crowned kinglets begin singing their songs for the early riser.

As I write this blog near the end of March we find the arrivals of song sparrows and fox sparrow to the neighborhood. My guess is that next week will bring tree swallows, northern flickers and white-throated sparrows.

April is when the migratory birds really make their presence known across the Adirondacks. Belted kingfishers will be seen along the shorelines of ponds, American kestrels(small falcons) will be hunting for the first crickets from telephone poles and wires. Great blue herons will be fishing among the grasses of the beaver swamps, and eastern phoebes will be scolding us from the roofs of backyard sheds.

Think of bird migration as a large conveyor belt cycling though the spring months and dropping off species of birds at timed intervals. But keep a sharp eye about you because the bird scene changes daily and then weekly.

Personally I'm looking forward to late April when the wild flowers have poked through the dead leaves and the sounds of the first warblers fill the woods and finally reach my winter-weary ears.

Photo Credit: Canada Geese-Wikipedia

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Moose on the Loose at the Adirondack Museum

On Sunday, March 28, Ed Reed, a wildlife biologist with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation Region 5 office in Ray Brook, will offer a program entitled "Moose on the Loose in the Adirondacks" at the Adirondack Museum at Blue Mountain Lake, as part of the Cabin Fever Sunday series.

Following are details from a museum press release: Reed will review the history, current status, and future of moose in New York State. Moose were native to New York, but were extirpated before 1900. The expansion of moose from Maine and Canada across New England reached the state in the 1980's, and the population is now well established and self-sustaining.

Biologists estimate that there are around 500 moose in the state, with the population expected to increase rapidly in the next decade. The program will cover food habits, breeding biology, habitat needs, mortality factors, and recreational values of moose.

Ed Reed has worked for DEC for twenty-five years in fisheries and wildlife, and has been the big game biologist for Region 5 since 2001. His main areas of expertise include management of whitetail deer, black bear, and more recently moose. Ed received a degree in wildlife biology from Colorado State University and has worked in the outdoor field for over 35 years.

The program will be held in the auditorium, and will begin at 1:30 p.m. Cabin Fever Sunday programs are offered at no charge to museum members. The fee for non-members is $5.00. There is no charge for children of elementary school age or younger. Refreshments will be served. For additional information, call the Education Department at (518) 352-7311, ext. 128 or visit the museum's web site at www.adirondackmuseum.org.

Cabin Fever Sunday programs are sponsored by the Glenn and Carol Pearsall Adirondack Foundation.

The Adirondack Museum tells the story of the Adirondacks through exhibits, special events, classes for schools, and hands-on activities. Introducing the special new exhibit: "Let's Eat! Adirondack Food Traditions." The Adirondack Museum is supported in part by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a State Agency.

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Ellen Rathbone: On Collecting Bird Feathers

I have come to the conclusion over the years that collecting things is a very human trait. I suspect this harkens back to our prehistoric selves, whose days were filled with collecting, be it foodstuffs for later consumption or burnables for the evening’s fire. With the advent of the corner market and central heating, most of us (at least in this country) no longer have “real needs” that are fulfilled by the urge to collect. As a result, we turn our craving for collectibles to other things, which in my case includes books and sand.

Collecting objects from the outdoors is therefore a natural habit. Who among us as a child didn’t come home with pockets full of rocks, or pluck a few flowers to present to Mom? Even as adults we eagerly pick up nature’s little treasures when they come our way. Two of the more commonly collected items are feathers and nests.

I’m always torn in two when a child comes into the lobby all excited to show me the feathers he found along the trail. First I congratulate him on such a wonderful find and try to help him identify the bird from which they came. But then I have to play the heavy, telling him he cannot keep the feathers. Many a crest has fallen when those words are spoken, and often the accompanying adults are equally unhappy, if only because the child’s bubble has been burst.

While in today’s world it is probably safe to say that the greater majority of feathers and nests that are brought into the home are honest finds, there are two federal laws that make it illegal: the Lacey Act of 1900 and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918. The first bit of legislation prohibited interstate commerce in wildlife (birds, mammals, et al), while the latter concentrated strictly on birds. Both laws were drafted in an effort to save many bird species from extinction, a fate that was looming thanks to the over-popularity of birds in the fashion industry.

Back in Victorian times, the use of birds’ feathers on hats was all the rage. In fact, it wasn’t long before mere feathers weren’t enough, and soon wings and even whole birds started to show up on the millinery creations of the time. I’ve seen photographs of some of those hats, and the sheer size of them is mind-boggling, but when one looks closely to see the birds and nests that decorate them, it is staggering.

While doing research for an exhibit about the history of birding several years ago, I read many accounts of the gruesome feather trade. Birding as a hobby was becoming popular at about the same time, and many an eager bird enthusiast would follow directions to an egret colony (for example) only to find the ground littered with the stripped, bloody and fly-covered carcasses of the adults (the feather hunters were after just the breeding plumes, which were ripped from the backs of still living birds), while overhead in the nests the young cried as they perished from heat and starvation. Tales of inhumane treatment of birds span the globe, from the United States to the tropics, from the New World to the Old.

It was thanks to the efforts of two women, Harriet Hemenway and her cousin Minna, that the above-mentioned laws were eventually passed. The long and the short of these acts is that it is illegal to collect birds or anything belonging to birds (eggs, nests, feathers). This applies mostly to our migratory native birds, not necessarily to game birds (such as turkeys) or non-natives (like starlings). The only people who can legally collect eggs, feathers, nests, or even whole birds, are those who have the proper permits from the state and/or federal governments. This includes educational institutions, like colleges and nature centers.

So, when Johnny comes in with a blue jay feather, I have to tell him he cannot keep it. The odds are that Johnny probably found the feather on the ground, he didn’t kill the bird to get it. Still, one cannot determine the truth beyond a shadow of a doubt just by looking at the feather. If one is found to be in possession of bird parts without the proper paperwork, one could face a hefty fine and possibly even time in jail.

In today’s world that may seem a bit extreme, but it was only a hundred years ago that many of our most glorious birds were facing extinction due to a fashion craze. Thanks to some timely legislation, we can all enjoy seeing herons and egrets, bluebirds and hummingbirds today.

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Ice Climbing: Reflections on the Season's End

A few days after we had climbed the Chiller Pillar, a one-pitch ice route near Whiteface Mountain, my ice-climbing partner Steve Goldstein of Latham called me up.

“If I had seen this article in Rock and Ice, I might not have led that route,” he told me.

“What article?”

“A climber was critically injured in Colorado. He was climbing an ice pillar and it collapsed under him.”

"Oh. Would that have kept you from climbing the route?"

"I dunno," he said. "Maybe."

It’s easy to ponder the transitory nature of ice when you're climbing it. Rock-climbing routes rarely change. You can climb a face once, come back ten years later and the holds will still be the same. In fact, a critical hold breaking off a popular route often makes news in climbing circles.

Ice routes change not only year to year but week to week. In fact, ice can change even as you're on it, turning softer and wetter from the sun. And it’s quite common for large pieces of ice to fall off as you ascend, hacking and skewering your way up the face.

Ice climbing is surely more dangerous than rock, and never more than when the temperature goes up. In February, 2002 a climber was killed at Pok-O-Moonshine while climbing the Adirondack classic testpiece Positive Thinking. The route detached from the wall when the climber about a hundred feet off the ground.

The first pitch is thin to begin with. It’s more of a veneer of ice, pasted to a featureless rock slab for a hundred feet. It also faces east. “A few hours of strong sunshine causes the ice to detach from the smooth, crackles rock,” reports Don Mellor in the book Blue Lines, the region’s ice-climbing guidebook. Even in the best weather, he adds, “the first pitch is often a frightening, crackless shell.”

As the weather warms, ice routes disappear. At this point, there’s only a few routes left – thick, protected from sunshine and at higher elevations, according to Rock and River's climbing site. We climbed at Pitchoff Mountain's North Face last Saturday, in fact, and Central Pillar was in fine condition, albeit soaking wet.

Warm-weather ice climbing has its advantages. Pick placements are easy to make in the soft ice, and you don't risk frostbite while belaying. On the down side, you get sponge-wet gloves from dripping routes. And routes tend to disappear quickly.

Yet with an end to the season well in sight, it’s hard to say no to one more trip.

Which brings me back to Steve and the article he saw in Rock and Ice, a popular climbing magazine. The article told of a severe injury on The Fang, a freestanding pillar of ice near Vail, Co. A climber, who had spent 15 years preparing to ascend this Rocky Mountain jewel, fell a hundred feet when the six-foot-wide ice formation collapsed beneath him.

It was a dangerous route, but very different from Chiller Pillar. Still, it was just as well Steve hadn't read the story yet. And we approached our route with caution.

The Pillar had a strange look to it – more like white frosting than blue water ice. And there was a horizontal crack only a few feet from the top, which meant the climb had settled at some point, detaching from the final few feet.

Yet is was a cool day, with no sunshine to cause undue melting. The route was thick, and tapered from the bottom to the top. The wall around it looked dry, and the ice itself held the test-screws we placed at the base.

“You can top-rope it,” I told Steve. That meant we could scramble up an easier way and set up a rope on the top, which would hold him in case the ice collapsed.

“I should be OK,” he said, and began to tie into the rope to prepare to lead.

Safe ice climbing is about knowing the conditions, and making judgment calls. At the end of the day, though, there's a bit of faith involved. You believe you are strong enough to climb to the top, and you believe the ice is strong enough to hold you up.

In this case, both climber and ice rose to the occasion. But I stood far back from the route as I belayed him. Just in case.

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Adirondack Bracket 2010: The Round of Sixteen (UPDATE)

Adirondack Bracket fans, welcome to the Benzene-Toluene-Ephedrine-Iodine-Phenylpropanolamine-Crystal methamphetamine-Sweet-Sixteen. The field is narrowing and the narrative is coming into focus. Chris Kowanko, the Renderer bros. and the whole crowd at Upper Jay Upholstery and Furniture —home to the Recovery Lounge—got the stuffing knocked out of them by a handful of bad mushrooms. They could have benefitted from a class in basic mycology. The mushrooms now face pond hockey, which put those cougar sightings on ice, and is said to be making a real comeback (beats waiting for the peewees to clear out of the rink).

The town of Black Brook, coached by Howard Aubin and LeRoy Douglas, displayed their unique style of environmental sensitivity with a proper burial of Jenks swamp, the state-protected wetland bisected by the Adirondack Northway, that nobody in their right mind would have built on anyway. Their pep squad of attorneys chanted from the sidelines, "make a federal case out of it!"

UPDATE: Black Brook now faces an equally potent wetlands menace in Triclopyr. This APA-sanctioned herbicide will be applied to Eurasian watermilfoil beds in Lake Luzerne. The public has been assured that this chemical will not harm grasses in areas where the lake water is used for irrigation. Studies have yet to be conducted, however, on its effect on municipal commitment to preventing invasive species from entering our lakes in the first place. One thing is for certain, however, in the Adirondack Bracket, it proved toxic to frankenpines. Strong stuff.

The lower left regionals witnessed an upset in the contest between birders and—the latest salvation of struggling hamlet economies and declining school populations—broadband. The unexpected outcome of this mismatch between fast and powerful telecommunications and what by any measure must be considered a rag-tag (though incredibly patient) bunch, turned on a simple miscommunication. The birders turned out in vast numbers, flocking to the Bloomingdale Bog, expecting to catch a rare glimpse of the broadbanded boobyhatch. Their tweets alone crashed the fledgling broadband network.

Birdiers go on to face the very ostrich-like John Brown. The martyr of Harper's Ferry, perhaps boosted by a New York Senate reprieve on the possible closure of his Historic State Park, took 2009 Final Four contender Northville-Placid Trail in stride on his way home to the Plains of Abraham.

The second match-up in this region features the enduring pate-fluff of the Adirondack high peaks, Krumholtz and Cairns (not to be confused with the legal firm, Crumhorn and Korn) who were just too much for some of this area's art centers to surmount.

They will face the legendary Yellow-Yellow, vanquisher of bear-proof canisters, and most recently of Moriah Shock and Lyon Mountain correctional facilities. In fairness to Moriah Shock and Lyon Mountain, they were both put on New York State Senate's endangered species list before being devoured.

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Adirondack Family Activities:Lake George Opera's Three Little Pigs

This year Lake George Opera’s Opera-To-Go is performing another adaptation by John Davies of Opera Tales. Davies, a bass-baritone has performed with a variety of opera companies such as Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco and Philadelphia as well as many others. Then in the 1990s, as a means to entertain his own children, Davies hit on a combination that worked. He merged classic fairy tales with classic music in a way to engage and entertain children of all ages.

Each Davies children’s opera takes recognizable tunes and pairs them to a story with a lesson, similar to the classic Bugs Bunny cartoon that showcased The Barber of Seville. In this performance one little pig goes to the library as she researches how to build a house. The Three Little Pigs converges with Mozart’s Don Giovanni as the wolf pretends to be a statue and ends up being invited for dinner with a second little pig and trouble commences.

For Liz Giblin, Director of Marketing for the Lake George Opera, Davies’ children’s operas not only take classic operatic ideas and themes but have a strong educational element to them as well. Each year the company performs for schools throughout upstate New York, the Adirondacks and western New England as well as a series of free performances for families.

“The Opera-To-Go program has been going into communities and schools since 1985,” Giblin says. “Children aren’t only exposed to opera but to good lessons within each of the classic fairy tales. The Three Little Pigs shows how everything you need to know is in the library. Last year’s opera was about the danger of talking to strangers. Another opera was about the Golden Rule. Children are not only exposed to opera but also exposed to stories and music. Obviously we are an opera company so want people to know that opera is available to everyone not just an older generation.”

The 45-minute opera of The Three Little Pigs will be held at the Charles R. Wood Theatre in Glens Falls free of charge at 1:00 p.m. on March 27. According to Executive Director Bill Woodward seating for the operatic performance at the Wood Theatre is on a first-come, first-serve basis. The 299-seat theatre will be open a half-hour before show time.

“This a great opportunity for kids to come and see opera where it is reachable. It is a fairy tale and children are mesmerized with the singing. It’s a good way to assimilate them to opera,” says Woodward. “Parents will enjoy it just as much as the kids.”

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