Tag Archives: Water

Certified Wildlife Habitat

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Small sign saying Certified Wildlife Habitat on metal post, near raised bed, and steps to front door of house.

It’s official. We’ve been designated by the National Wildlife Federation as a Certified Wildlife Habitat. This means that our garden “provides natural sources of food, water, cover, and places to raise young, and is maintained in a sustainable way that incorporates native plants, conserves water and doesn’t rely on pesticides.” We posted our sign in our front yard. We are one of over 227,000 such gardens in the United States, and they are hoping to reach 300,000 this year.

In order to be certified, you fill out a form at https://www.nwf.org/CertifiedWildlifeHabitat and give a donation to the organization. It’s on the honor system–you tell them the sources of habitat in your yard, in several categories. For food in our yard we have native plants, berry bushes, and fruit trees, as well as our bird feeder, and the pond. One of my favorites is evening primrose that grows wild. We keep several, only cutting in places that don’t work to have a tall plant–last year there were goldfinches all over this plant, and hopefully more this year.

Goldfinches eating seed on round plant head.

We provide water especially with the pond. The pond serves so many purposes–food, water, a place to raise young (the tadpoles!), cover for frogs. When I walk in the morning, I see birds bathing, bees taking a drink, frogs sunning and snatching flies. But any kind of water brings wildlife to a yard–small or large. We also have a bird bath near our patio, and see birds and squirrels getting drinks there.

Cover is used to protect from bad weather, hide from predators, or hunt prey. Around the edges of our yard there are trees and bushes, and piles of branches that provide cover for small critters, and places to raise young. Ever since the orchard trees and hazelnut bushes have grown up, birds are always perching there, sometimes on their way to the bird feeder, sometimes eating insects. I’ve posted about the robins raising young in a nest on our back porch. But we’ve also seen young squirrels in trees, and chipmunks coming from underground.

As for sustainable practices, we never use pesticides, and we compost our food waste and leaves. We conserve water with our rain barrels, and if the pond needs topping up, that comes from the rain barrels too. We try to incorporate native plants wherever we can–mostly by not pulling the weeds that emerge on their own: violets, pansies, daisies, wild strawberry, goldenrod among many others. I use an app to identify plants that come up. We do also have invasive plants that we are trying to get rid of.

The official designation and sign were a gift to ourselves, and to make our intentions more visible in the neighborhood. Most of the actual habitat is in the back and side yards. Have any of you participated in this program? Maybe you might like to check it out. There are little things that each of us can do to care for the earth community, and foster habitat for wildlife.

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Frogs and tadpoles in the pond

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Green frog, with green head and brown body, perched on gray stone facing the pond water.
Green frog on stone at the edge of the pond.

The green frogs are back in the pond. I saw one about a week ago, but yesterday I managed to get a photo. As I got near, another frog dove down to the bottom–so there are two. Once again it is lovely to sit by the pond quietly, watching them sit quietly. And we now have the added pleasure of hundred of little tadpoles. I stopped scooping out algae to avoid scooping out the babies, so the pond isn’t so “pretty” to human view, but the frogs, tadpoles and honey bees seem to really like the algae. The frogs like to hide under it, the bees land on it to drink, and apparently it is good food for the tadpoles.

I was also happy to receive three new plants of sweet flag–or kiwhoswasq, as I learned in Passamaquoddy class. That means “muskrat root”, since apparently muskrats eat it, and it is also a useful medicinal root. It should do well in the pond, and multiply itself there. It doesn’t look like much yet, so I will wait to post photos. Meanwhile the ferns are coming back on their own.

Green ferns in water with algae on surface.

Finally, one more picture of the frog, after it jumped down to the water, sitting on a white rock, surrounded by the tadpoles. They are all over the pond now, especially around the edges.

Green frog with brown stripey body, sitting on white rock in water, with tiny dark tadpoles swimming nearby.

The Beach in Winter

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Ocean waves coming in against rocks bright with sunshine. In the distance, island trees, clouds and blue sky.
Ocean, rocks, sky, sun, clouds

I needed this winter afternoon at the beach. We went to Kettle Cove, where it was windy, sunny, and warm–well, in the forties anyway. So now my heart is calmed and refreshed. There is a quiet that comes from the sound of waves and wind, the feeling of our feet walking on sand. We always say we should go more often, but it takes some push, some energy to get ourselves there. Funny that, because it always feels so good once we arrive.

Even though I am retired, I’ve been doing too many days of projects–still plugging away at the boxes for the archive, among other things. Don’t we need this other rhythm? The one of being in the presence of all that is bigger than we are?

And there was evidence that the wind and the waves had been bigger than the beach recently, maybe when the recent huge storm came through. The wooden walkway was broken apart, and there was erosion in parts of the shore. We are so small, and what we can build is so puny. But all of that is okay–it’s part of what brings the feeling of magic to our walks on the beach.

Broken wooden walkway with brush behind and a stream of water underneath, through the sand.
Broken walkway

So we come home again, and the great quiet is within, the mysterious gratitude for life, in the midst of all its challenges. Can you feel it? How does it come to you?

Lunar Eclipse

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I woke at 3 a.m. and saw the bright full moon through my window. I woke again at 5:30 a.m., but could not see the eclipsed red moon because it was hiding low in the sky behind the many trees and buildings around our house. Still, I dreamt about the lunar eclipse all through the night. First I saw it like a giant pale cookie with a bite taken out. Then I was talking about it with others, and talking about other lunar eclipses. In my dream, I told someone about the memorable total eclipse on the night when the Red Sox were winning the world series for the first time in 86 years. That was October, 2004. We lived on Cape Cod. We were watching the baseball game, and periodically, I’d go out the front door to watch the eclipse. In my dream, I talked about how one of the effects of being old was that I remembered other lunar eclipses, and didn’t have as great a need to see this one. In a later dream, a group of people were getting ready to create a ritual to honor the moon–children, adults of all ages–and I was getting a drink of water, and then, trying to find a mug to hold more water to bring to the ritual, but everything in the cupboard was plastic or otherwise weird. Random people, both known and unknown to me. When I woke up, my cat Billie was at the window looking outside, but neither of us could see the moon. Still, we were feeling it I think. Yesterday, Margy and I filled in and dropped off our election ballots at the City Hall dropbox, and then we drove to Kettle Cove to be with the ocean. The weather was warm, sunny. I took my shoes off and waded in the water on the shore, took some photos of rocks and seagulls. We gathered seaweed to bring back to the garden. But mostly, we just sat in chairs on the sand, and listened to the surf, felt the breeze on our skin.
Seagull standing on the sandy wet shore, with surf rolling in on the right side.
A lunar eclipse feels like a transition, an omen–but for good or ill? The 2004 eclipse was good news for the Red Sox. Undoing the reputed curse of the bambino. But election day is not like a sports game, despite the way the media often frame it. Lives are at stake. When I was quite young, I was a sort of anarchist, and I heard the Emma Goldman quote, “If voting changed anything, they would make it illegal.” I am less dismissive with age. Even if I am voting for the lesser of two evils, I will do so. And I think of the people who died to bring the vote to women and to black Americans. They knew it was that important. But perhaps the quote holds true now, because there are politicians who are trying to make voting illegal–at least for the people they are trying to exclude. Still, I don’t hold with fear-mongering. No matter what, we keep doing whatever we can do, with whatever energy we have, for justice, against oppression, for compassion and respect for all beings. We can’t see the future, we can’t know what wonders might emerge over the horizon. As Rebecca Solnit reminds us, that is a source for hope.
Dark gray huge boulders on a rocky shore with ocean water behind, fading out into the horizon.

Rain, lilies, and tiny frogs

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White water lily blooming in pond.

We finally got two solid rain storms this past week after a long drought. What a relief! And now four very tiny frogs have appeared in the pond. (I don’t know what happened to the one we had before that was a little bigger.) A few days ago, this new water lily flower started blooming, and today when I went out to see it, it had disappeared. But I found three of the tiny frogs perched on lily pads! The fourth was on the other side of the pond on a rock. I didn’t look too closely under the water to investigate the missing flower, so as not to scare the frogs.

But slowly I sat down near the edge of the pond and watched for a while. A dragonfly came and perched on blue flag iris leaves. The frogs stayed on their pads.

Tiny frog on a lily pad
Second tiny frog on another lily pad

Taking close-up photos makes the frogs appear larger than they really are. They are only about an inch long nose to backside. I wonder if maybe it was the rain that enabled these small frogs to travel from some other place to our little pond? I feel refreshed by the rain too. Cool nights with windows open, listening to the dark sounds. Lovely.

To Be of Use

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Chipmunk drinking at the pond

Yesterday morning, I was sitting next to the pond, writing in my journal. After I’d been there, and quiet for a long time, this chipmunk approached the other side of the pond, climbed down the rocks and took long drinks of water. After a couple minutes, it quickly climbed back up the rocks and ran back into the field behind.

If you’ve been following my posts recently, you know that I’ve been dealing with chronic illness causing me to have much less energy this summer. So my relationship with the garden has changed. It has been less purposeful and project oriented, and more, “Let’s see what the yard wants to do this season.” To listen more, to do less, to observe more, to try less–and I’ve learned so much, actually.

It’s true that we had already done a lot to shape the yard–we planted many fruit trees and bushes, let wildflowers grow, planted perennials, pulled invasives, and created the pond last year. Some of the plants that were in the pond didn’t survive the winter, and I did add a few more this spring. But it wasn’t enough to prevent algae from flourishing. So periodically, I get inspired to pull out as much as I can. But I’ve also noticed that bees love to perch on the algae, to get a drink of water presumably. (There is always enough algae left for them.) It gives me gratitude to know that this pond, imperfect though it is, has been of use to these creatures in a drought-burdened summer.

Bees on green algae

Lately, my old nemesis the squirrel has come back to start eating peaches. But since I was doing so much less to nurture the peach tree–less holistic sprays, less thinning of peaches, and so on–and since I had somewhat resigned myself to having no peaches after last year, I haven’t been stressed out about that. And the squirrel or squirrels seem more mellow as well. The peaches are actually very crowded together, and every couple days, I twist off a few tightly squeezed ones, even though they are not ripe yet, to make room for the others to grow bigger. I’ve put a few on window sills in the house to see if they will ripen. I tell myself the squirrel is also thinning the peaches. We are collaborators, rather than enemies. Who knows, maybe there will be enough for all of us?

Squirrel sitting on a branch in the peach tree nibbling on a green peach.

In a world with so many horrors that I can do nothing to stop, or even to protest, I am grateful to be of use to these small companions who share our back yard with us.

[And thanks to Marge Piercy‘s poem, To Be of Use, for its evocative and helpful title.]

Pond lily opening

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The first pond lily bud appears on Saturday in our pond.
It starts to open slowly on Sunday.
I sit by the pond during the morning to watch it as it changes.
very slowly…
It is so meditative to sit by the pond watching the lily. I also see a frog, and some dragonflies. I add some water to the pond from the rain barrel, which is why the lily now seems deeper in the water.
As it opens it forms a little white cup, with yellow peaking out from the center.
It reminds me of an egg.
It doesn’t fully open on Sunday, and once the shade of the trees cover the pond in the early evening, it closes up again.
This morning, early, it is still closed up. I watch for a while, and then go inside to eat breakfast.
When I come back out mid-morning, here it is in all its beauty!

Cardinal at the Pond

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Cardinal ready to drink water at the pond

Today is the new moon. This morning I sat near the pond, reading my journal from the date of the last new moon, as is my practice. Then along came this cardinal landing on a rock on the other side of the pond, about 12 feet away from me. After I took this photo, it flew away, but then he came back a little while later, and took a sip of water. We know that having the pond is beneficial to all sorts of wildlife in the yard, but this is the first time I actually observed a bird taking a drink, especially with me sitting right there. I am grateful for this cardinal’s visit, and his acceptance of my presence in his ecosystem.

Some thoughts to remember from the journal: It is good to be claimed by this ecosystem. It is good to listen to the earth, to the plants and all beings, and to the spirits, and to follow their lead about what to do to tend this garden, and when.

Frogs and More Frogs!

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Today I saw four frogs in the pond! When I went outside before breakfast, there was plenty of weeding to do in the orchard, but I was drawn instead to bring my camera and just sit by the pond. When I first walk back to the pond, the frogs often jump from where they’ve been sitting, and swim down into the deeper water. Two of them went under with a little squeak. But there were three plops both yesterday and today, so I knew there were at least three frogs.

Tiny frog #1 floating under reflected ferns yesterday
Tiny frog #1 sitting on a stone at the edge of the pond yesterday.

If I sit quietly next to the pond, eventually they come back to a sitting spot. So I wait. Today I was able to take pictures of three of them while I sat. But I find myself favoring the tiny little frog that was the first to come to the pond. Soon I imagine we will give them names, but for now, I am identifying them by number. This one is so very tiny. At most an inch and a half head to backside, and skinny. Also very friendly. She often perches near where I sit.

Tiny frog #1 swimming closer to where I sit today. You can see her feet clearly against the white of the rocks below.
Tiny frog #1 looks like she is watching me over the edge today.

Yesterday, I was also able to take photos of frog #2, who was a little bigger than frog #1. But today, I saw both #2 and #3 after they re-emerged, and came to sit/float near each other by the little beach. #3 looked so much fatter/bigger than the other two, but then I realized depending on the angle, frog #2 could also be somewhat fat. I think they were about 2 1/2 inches long.

Frogs #2 and #3 on the rocks near the beach.
Close up of Frog #2 from yesterday
Close up from behind of Frog #2 yesterday

So Frog #3 is the largest, and seemingly the shyest. Quickest to jump back into the water, so far. But I got several shots of #3 today. And then, just as I was about to leave, I saw another tiny little frog floating nearby, between me and the beach. So Frog #4. More like #1 in size.

Frog #4 floating near the pickerel weed.

It is just so amazing to watch the wildlife in the pond. I can sit and sit. I also saw dragonfly nymphs again. But eventually I got hungry so I came inside for breakfast. I feel so grateful.

Pond Frog Sitting

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Photo: Tiny frog sitting on a large stone at the edge of the pond

Today the frog in the pond let me take its picture! I came outside this morning and just sat for a while at the edge of the pond, writing in my journal and being quiet under a cloudy sky. It felt a little bit peculiar to be done with the work of building the pond. To let go of the strange obsession for finding stones that has filled the last several weeks. I have been working on the pond since April! I didn’t see the frog at first. I was glancing around at the yard, and all the ways that Margy and I get overwhelmed trying to care for the land. We are old, we are disabled, we are ignorant of the many needs of plants, just beginners. It is hard to be good stewards of the land. There is always more to do than we can do. So I make a decision to let go: let go of the burden of it, let go of the overwhelm, let go of trying to do more than we can. Here I am, it’s a new day: be amazed at life!

At some point, I decided to walk around the edge of the pond to look at how the plants are doing. And then I suddenly saw the frog, sitting quietly. No plops into the water, no jumping away. Just sitting quietly, paying no mind to me while I was also sitting quietly, and now walking quietly. (Perhaps it has figured out that we people who come to this pond are no threat–we can share the pond?) It was on a big stone at the bottom of the beach, with its eyes out of the water and its very tiny body in the water. Its head maybe a half inch long, its body another inch, long folded legs. It let me take its picture many times. When I walked back to my chair, this is how it looked from over there, almost invisible, but now visible to me:

Photo: Can you see the tiny frog on the mottled stone near the deeper water, five stones to the right of the red stone?

When I came back inside, I did more research, and this frog seems to be of the species called the green frog–the most common frog in our region-it can be green, olive, brown. (One site joked–close your eyes and think of a frog–that is the green frog.) It is likely a female, because the tympanum–the round “ear” circles behind its eyes–are the same size as its eyes. In males, they are larger.

UPDATE: I’VE GONE ROUND AND ROUND ON THE IDENTIFICATION OF THIS FROG. I WONDERED IF IT COULD BE A FEMALE BULLFROG, BECAUSE THE DORSAL-LATERAL RIDGES GO BEHIND THE EARS, RATHER THAN DOWN THE BACK. BUT THEN I REALIZED IT WAS MUCH TOO SMALL FOR A BULLFROG. I AM BACK TO THINKING IT IS A GREEN FROG. SEE THIS CAN YOU ID THE FROG SITE.

I sat with the frog for quite a bit longer, until some raindrops started falling on the water, on me, on the frog. I stood and looked away for a moment, and when I looked back she was gone without a sound. What a lovely teacher she was for the practice of sitting quietly, for letting go, and being amazed by life.