We've been seeing quite a few red fox playing around in the field in front of our house lately.  This pair was digging into the snow, like they may be searching for food.  They're just beautiful!  As soon as they spotted me, they took off. TM

January 19, Charlotte (Map 45)
A muskrat nappedon the edge of the ice on Round Pond around 11:30 this morning.  At 2 pm it was g iving itself a bath. It didn't seem to notice traffic 15' away.  RF

A few other nifties that I might find on my hunter-gatherer perambulations, depending on the season, are the carnivorous snails, like the Waved whelk or the Moon snail.  The Moon snail takes a little more effort in processing, as it must be tenderized, but it is still a tasty morsel.  Preparation of most of my prizes, except for the vegetables, usually involves a generous but unmeasured amount of butter and garlic, and sometimes some horseradish, and wine for cooking and sampling until the stuff is ready.  I’m not sure Julia Child would be proud of me or not. Linda tolerates my efforts in her kitchen, but sometimes I catch her rolling her eyes when I come up with a new recipe.

I'm incredibly sad this afternoon.  Frank Wihbey, founder of Maine Nature News, has passed away.  He fell while hiking in California earlier this week.  

How It First Came About
It all started when a Maine Audubon member survey went out sometime around 1992 and got me thinking about one of the questions: “What improvements could be made...?” I replied “There is a time and subject gap in communications for natural history observations in the state.  The Bird Alert telephone message [no web then] is weekly, but only covers birds. The Society's Habitat magazine appears monthly, but is not really missioned to cover current observations.”

This led to a solution idea. I envisioned a tabloid size weekly on newsprint stock, similar to the shoppers’ weeklies distributed in some towns.  I imagined whom the circle of “reporters” might consist of, perhaps science teachers, game wardens, birders who had non-bird observations to report, et al. I wrote a prospectus and flew it by several people knowledgeable about communicating science to the public and working with natural history reports of “citizen scientists”.  My conclusion was that attempting such a project as a printed publication would not have been within the capacity of my time and energy.

The World Wide Web Comes on Stage
In 1989, Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web and gave it its name.  But it did not come onto my radar screen until fall 1995 when a wunderkind colleague took the time (thank you, Jenn!) to explain the Web concept and use of Mosaic, the first user friendly browser software.  I knew immediately that the Web was the ticket to get this idea off the ground!

Publishing on the Web obviates the need for printing and mailing costs, and has the further advantage of instant circulation. If I required correspondents to exclusively use e-mail for sending reports, then their observations and other information would be received promptly and would not have to be retyped. My job would be: organizing the information, light editing, uploading the finished product to the Web and managing the website.

In March, 1996 the Maine Nature News was born and has appeared weekly on Tuesdays ever since.  I have volunteered my time as Editor since then, until Robin Follette took over on August 1, 2006.  The corps of correspondents built slowly over time by word of mouth and “word-of-Web”.  All are volunteers who share an interest in Maine Natural history.

I invite you to become a Nature correspondent.  It's easy and fun.  If you are already a correspondent I hope you will support Robin in her new role and in her efforts to maintain something Maine has that only one other state (Vermont) has so far: your shared Nature journal!


Frank loved Maine's natural world. He started looking for someone to take his place before he retired so that there was plenty of transition time. He worked longer than he'd planned and now, four and a half years after we started talking about me sliding into his place, he hadn't been retired very long. We've lost a wonderful person. He was very kind and patient as I asked question after question, sometimes asking more than once. I'm incredibly sad.

Robin

Q.  We have a bird feeder and as the snow covers the ground lots of birds have appeared.  The other day one showed up that we had never seen before.  Tried Bird Plus on the iTouch without luck finally used the old bird book and decided what we were looking at was a European Goldfinch.  The best markings was a red face while the head was black on top with the rest white, the body was light brown on the back and mixed brown/white colors underside with the winds having a small patch of yellow on the edge next to black.  It was a little larger in size then the regular Goldfinches that we have by perhaps 20%.  We live in Presque Isle and out feeder is dominated by Chickadees. Our feeder is set next to our grape wines which they make great use of to hide.  Does anyone know if we have made the correct guess.  Tried for a photo but not much luck through the window into the sun.  E&EH

Q. Since I put my feeders out on Thanksgiving day, I've only seen 3 chickadees and a gray squirrel. Has it been too cold? Usually they're eating like crazy, especially in the morning and evening. Guess they've gone to the neighbors' feeders instead. Hope they visit me soon! KT