I have been putting this off for a very long time.
Each time I thought about starting this blog, I hesitated — mostly because I don’t have a specific topic or angle I want to focus on. In the past, I wrote an anonymous blog about grief and mental health, which helped me through an Extremely Difficult Time. Now I’m grateful to be in a Pretty Nice Time, and it turns out I still want to publish some words on the internet in my spare time.
Is it a waste of time and money, though, to agonize over sentence structure and pay for a domain and hosting just so I can have my little hobby blog that no one reads?
Maybe. But if there’s one thing I am very good at it, it’s wasting time and money on the internet to make myself feel better, so let’s go!
I spent the majority of June out on Monhegan Island, which is 10-12 miles off the coast of Maine (the distance depends on the tides and who you ask).
I feel ridiculously lucky. My husband’s family has been coming to the island for generations, so there is pretty much always a bed for us here. This summer is the first time I’ve spent more than four consecutive nights here, though, which has made a huge difference. I don’t feel like I have to cram all of the island (the hiking, the donuts, the views) into such a short span of time.
Last fall, we went on a guided bird outing on the island with Kristen Lindquist, which really gave us the birding bug. We’re extremely far from experts, but we are slowly getting better at identifying (the most common and obvious) birds.
One day, I’ll rent a big fancy telephoto lens to bring to the island and take incredible photos of birds and seals. Until then, my 18-135mm zoom lens will have to do. Also, the identification efforts below are based on the Merlin app and a lot of Googling, so cut me some slack 🙂
The two most exciting finds were a Great Cormorant at Pulpit Rock and a Green Heron at Ice Pond, neither of which I had seen before:
Then we saw birds that aren’t necessarily rare but that we don’t have at the feeders in our backyard, like the Yellow Warbler, Willow Flycatcher, Red-winged Blackbird, Eastern Kingbird, and Black-throated Green Warbler.
It’s hard to go 15 minutes here without hearing a Common Yellowthroat, Black-capped Chickadee, American Goldfinch, or Northern Cardinal.
You can find American Robins and Mourning Doves pretty much anywhere in the US, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t photo-worthy!
This Mourning Dove was really giving me an eye, and I only understood why when I looked a few branches over. My assumption is this is the other parent and their fledgling:
There are of course many seabirds, like Black Guillemots and gulls:
And I would be remiss if I did not include the patron saint of Monhegan Island, the Ring-necked Pheasant. Oddly enough, I do not have any photos of a male, which are very showy and elaborate. I just have a lovely photo of a female posing for me and a slightly out-of-focus one of a female with a chick.
And for good measure, this gorgeous cat. That’s all for now! Hopefully you will hear from me again soon.
Rebecca Bass 