Day 227: August 14th – Changes

Rainy and cool (71), calm winds

       Throughout the course of the year, the theme of change has permeated this blog.  Obviously, it’s not of my doing, however, as I’m only the messenger.  One of the beauties of living in the northeast and one of the main reasons we have chosen not to live permanently in the “sunshine state” is the fact that the changes in nature that occur over the course of a year are profoundly manifest here in the “empire state”.

       I’m not saying that you cannot observe the seasonal changes elsewhere, but they are more subtle in some places than in others.  Several of the changes we observed today as we travelled about in the steady but gentle rains.  The first was the appearance of the fall wildflowers when we visited the Shawangunk Grasslands National Wildlife Refuge at the old Galeville Airport.  We have visited this site on many occasions and each time we go, it has a slightly different personality.  Today, the fields were ablaze with color, even under the drab gray skies of a low pressure system.  Goldenrod, Queen Anne’s Lace, Purple loosestrife (see yesterday’s blog), Bird’s foot trefoil, and this amethyst hued Bull thistle covered most of the landscape wherever we gazed.

       Later in Montgomery at the Benedict Farm Preserve, I found a splendid field of yellow.  The Evening primrose is a beautiful wildflower also called “suncups” in some parts of the country.  It’s not hard to see how it got this nickname.  I don’t recall finding it in such concentrations as I did today.  It is truly a sign of late summer and the onset of the fall color-scheme.

       Even the birds are undergoing a change of wardrobe as the shed their gaudy “hey look at me” plumages for more subdued “can’t see me” colors.  One of the most pronounced changes is in the plumages of the Bobolink.  You’d be hard pressed to even identify it as the same species.  Gone are the brilliant cream colored hoods, the white backs and the strongly contrasting black bodies.  Fall brings in a much softer brown shades, still a handsome bird but in a different extreme.

Bobolnk - Fall plumage

       Finally, we got a shot of a young House finch (or so I surmise).  His colors are again subdued to help survive these “formative years”.  He need not draw any undue attention to himself while he is not yet seeking a mate or capable of reproduction.  That change of plumage will come when the bird “comes of age” as it were.  In the meantime, he will join the throng of many fall and winter plumaged birds adorned in the less attention drawing shades of brown, gold, and tan.  Stay tuned for more changes that are yet to come.