Green Sunfish

A few years back while carp fishing I noticed this gorgeous sunfish on a bed. In the water I could see its fins tipped with a bright orange edge. I caught the fish and found out it is a Green Sunfish. Green Sunfish are native to the middle part of the country. They can be found as far north as Minnesota and down to the Gulf of Mexico. However, in our area someone must have let them go because they are not native.

There is a difference between introduced and invasive. Many species we have here are introduced. There weren't black bass in many parts of the country until transported by people to fill lakes. Brown trout are native to Europe and Rainbows are from the western part of the country on the Pacific slope. There are of course many fish and animals that are invasive and can take over a habitat. Starlings, House Sparrows, and Mute Swans are my nemesis as a birder. These Green Sunfish I believe are either in the category of invasive or soon will be. Like Mute Swans, they are beautiful.

That first year I caught the Green Sunfish, there must have been more, but I just saw the one. A lot of years I will see how many species I can catch. My best year was 33 species in MA/RI/NH. This involved being invited on my friends boat for Sea Bass and Fluke, but also chasing Golden Shiners, Common Shiners, and other less sought after small fish. Every year I'd go to the same spot and catch the Green Sunfish.

The sun angle was better for seeing in the water than
for pictures, but you can get an idea of how many fish
were there.

The last time I went two years ago, I could clearly see sunfish swimming in the shallow water. There were quite a few and catching a couple on worms was easy. It didn't take a genius to see the population was rising.

I went to the same spot today. Before I walked down to the water, I could see many in six inches of water. Instead of worms, I brought my little six foot, 2 weight fly rod and a pheasant tail fly. It didn't take long to catch one. I didn't need to cast. In fact, I had to stand back from the shoreline despite my rod only being six feet because they were hugging the shoreline. I could see into the water very clearly because of the sun angle. In about eight feet of shoreline I could easily see fifty sunfish. I caught a few mostly for science.

I caught a few pregnant females as small as two and a half inches. The males were roughly 5-6 inches. The bigger males easily bullied the littler ones out of "their"spot. Most of the fish had the bright orange fins. Others has dark lines down their side. At first I thought they might be hybrids but after catching a couple I saw the bright orange fins. There is no doubt, these fish are taking over this waterbody and driving out native sunfish.

Filling voids the last ten days

June is a weird month for me.The flurry of fun during the spring is over. Yet, the real summer has yet to begin.I usually go through a mini depression , which is why I have scheduled my vacation the last two years in June.  The excitement of spring birding and spring fishing is over.  New Hampshire natives are still dealing with black flies. Despite the often perfect weather I find June to be a tough month for me to enjoy.

Pictures like this suck. This fish is a legit
twenty five pounds, but you'd never know
it by the picture

To keep busy this year, I tried to give myself goals or things to do during each week since I got back from Maine. Finding things to do on my days off is easy, but keeping myself entertained after work is a little bit of a challenge. So at the end of each week I have created a list for the upcoming week. I may not get to everything but at least I have goals. In the post below I wrote about the Tropical Kingbird at Daniel Webster. Going  to see it was at the top of the list for that week. I went after work on a Monday night. The last two weeks, despite my lack of writing have been productive.

Last week I had Thursday/Friday off. I went striper fishing all day both days. Thursday was epic. I caught fifteen stripers, six were keepers and three were over 25 pounds. I got almost all of the fish on a Sebile Stick Shad. Friday I only caught six. I got one keeper about 30 inches. The fish were fussy and I caught all of them on squid. I snagged a couple of squid that drifted by in the current.

After I got home on Friday, I got a text that Sandhill Cranes were reported near T.F. Green Airport. So off I went looking for them. I was the last one to see them. They flew off twenty seconds after I got there. If I would have stopped at just one more red light or left my house twenty seconds later I would have missed them.

Sandhill Cranes

This week one of my goals was to buy a book. I am a reader, but have only read two books this year. I just hadn't found any that really interested me. I went to an actual bookstore and browsed. The bookstore is in Plainville, MA and owned by Jeff Kinney. Kinney is famous for the "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" series. It was nice just to go in a bookstore for the first time in years. I ended up buying "A Moveable Feast" by Hemingway. The book is Papa's memoirs from his time in Paris in the 1920's. I read the first chapter that night while eating shrimp that I bought on sale at Stop and Shop, thus making myself a character in just about every Jimmy Buffett song.

Tuesday night I met my friend Dave in East Providence. We caught a few schoolie stripers. It wasn't great fishing, but it was nice to catch up with him.

Wednesday I had tickets to an Oldies concert. Laurie and I purchased tickets for the "Happy Together" tour at the South Shore Music Circus. The concert were original members of bands from the 60's. It seemed as though most of the bands peaked around 1967. The line up was great. The opening act was "The Cowsills" from Newport, RI. Their biggest hits were "Indian Lake" and "The Rain, The Park, and Other Things" From there were The Classic IV ("Spooky Little Girl Like You", and "Stormy" ), The Buckinghams ("Kind of a  Drag", "Hey Baby, They're Playing our Song", "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy"). Following The Buckinghams was Gary Puckett. He had a lot of classic songs such as "Young Girl", "Lady Wilpower" and "Woman, Woman"

The Buckinghams

Gary Puckett

Next was one of the founding members of Three Dog Night, Chuck Negron. He brought the house down with "Joy to the World". He played a few songs then came on The Turtles. They had a bunch of hits. They played "Elanor" and "She only Wants to be with Me". They finished with their biggest hit "Happy Together". All in all, it was a really fun night.

Chuck Negron from Three Dog Night
This guy is 77 years old!!!

Tonight, Thursday, I went to a social gathering of my bird club called "Birds and Beer". Members of the club met at the Tilted Barn Brewery in Exeter, RI. The brewery makes their own beer (obviously) but they also grow their own hops. I had one beer, but really enjoyed getting together and just talking birds. The weather was beautiful and we all got to hear grey tree frogs singing while sitting outside at the picnic tables.

Bird Nerds
photo credit Jan StJean

I have the next two days off. I should find fun things to do. Come Saturday night I'll put a list together to see what I can accomplish next week. 

Tropical Kingbird at Daniel Webster

 

Tropical Kingbird

 Today I saw one of the rarest birds I have ever seen. A Tropical Kingbird has been at Daniel Webster Wildlife Sanctuary for a few days. I went to see it after work. Tropical Kingbird's northern most range is mid-Mexico. A few will stray into southern Texas and Arizona. So, seeing one up here is insane. Although I only got a few proof pictures, the views in the scope and binos were awesome. Besides the Tropical Kingbird, I got some great pics of other birds from the blind.

   Normally, I'd be pissed if I saw a picture of a hawk from underneath. Like, ready for a fist fight mad. But this red-tail was sitting on the blind by the bird feeders. Everyone that went to the sanctuary had to walk within eight feet of it. It didn't care. The picture I have of it looking down at me is really the first in a series of it preening its feathers. It was finally driven off by birds harassing it.

Barn Swallow

Fledgling Barn Swallow

Feed me, I'm hungry!

Tree Swallow

Tree Swallow

Grackle eating a frog

Baby and parent Tree Swallow

Eastern Kingbird

Red-Tailed Hawk

Downeast Maine Vacation

Laurie and I went on vacation in Maine over the last week. The trip had more downs than ups, but we made the best of what we could. The plan was to drive to the eastern most point in the U.S. on Monday. Tuesday I had a trip reserved to Machias Seal Island to see puffins. After the trip we had reservations at the Acadia National Park campground from Tuesday night until Saturday. We had a boat trip around the island and a "ghost walk" planned for the days in Acadia/Bar Harbor but didn't book them until we knew when we would have the best weather.

The trip to Machias Seal Island was going to be the highlight of the trip for me. The island is off the Maine/Canada cost ten miles out to sea. Thousands of Puffins, Razorbills, and Arctic Terns breed there. There is only one boat with a permit to land on the island (Bold Coast Charters). They start taking reservations on January 4th and they sell out for the year by Jan 5. The boat lands on the island and you walk out to blinds where you are watching and photographing the seabirds from three feet away. This is high on my bucket list for the whole country. I have dreamed about this trip far longer than I have been a serious birder.

My trip started ominously. We were leaving Monday morning for Maine, but Sunday night I got an email from Captain Andy saying the trip would probably be cancelled due to bad weather. We still had to make it up the coast "just in case". The trip ended up being cancelled due to high winds, rain, and eight foot seas. I did my best to not let it ruin my trip but I was crushed.

Besides rain all day Tuesday, it rained Thursday afternoon into Friday morning. Bar Harbor has a touristy "puffin cruise" to a smaller breeding colony. You can't go on the island, but I at least could have photographed puffins. We made reservations on Thursday for Friday. Although Friday was beautiful, the wind kicked up 6-10 foot waves and that trip was cancelled. I thought about going on the same trip Saturday (meaning we would get home from vacation about midnight) but the marine forecast was bad again,so we left Saturday.

Now that I got the negatives out of the way here are the highlights.

Monday we drove straight to West Quoddy Lighthouse, the eastern most point in the U.S. We hung out there for two hours before going to our campground. Besides the lighthouse, there were trails along the "classic Maine Coastline". It was a pleasant surprise.

Easternmost point in the U.S.A. marker

 After we left the lighthouse we had a 30 minute drive to our campground in Cobscook Bay State Park. Our site was right on the ocean. We were about twenty feet above the water on a bluff. The view was awesome. After we set up camp we found out my trip was cancelled.

 We packed up Tuesday morning and had a short two hour ride to Acadia/Bar Harbor. We went to Bar Harbor and got a blueberry pie slice at a favorite coffee shop. It started raining soon after. We didn't do much on Tuesday other than set up camp and take a nap. It stopped raining in the evening. We stopped at Thunder Hole where the water was surprisingly flat despite a rainy day. We went up Cadillac Mountian for a very short time. Although the weather was clearing it brought a crazy NW wind that must have been forty miles an hour on the summit.

Wednseday was going to to the best weather day of the trip and we knew it ahead of time. So we packed as much as we could into the daylight hours of the day. The hike I most wanted to do last September but ran out of time was Bubbles Pond. We parked at Jordan Pond House and walked a hiking trail to carriage road to the pond. It was a relaxing forty five minute walk. At Bubbles Pond we saw tiny baby brook trout, tadpoles and a resting female Merganser, and a loon.

Tadpole

Brook Trout Fry

The view of Bubbles Pond from our rock seats

When we left Bubbles Pond, Laurie and I went back different ways. She went back the way we came. I went over Pemetic Mountain. The distance was about the same, but I obviously went up and back down a mountain. It was the only real hike I did all vacation. The view from the top was spectacular.

From Pemetic, I could look down on the Bubble
Mountains and see the famous Bubble Rock

The hike down was really steep and had two ladders that I had to climb down into a chasm. The chasm was rushing with runoff from Tuesday's rain. It was a challenge to say the least.

 I had to be down at noon because we had tickets for a boat trip out of Northeast Harbor. There wasn't going to be any Puffins, but we would hopefully see other wildlife and scenery. The cruise was two hours and forty five minutes well spent. The boat was the Sea Princess

The first point of interest the boat passes is Bear Island Lighthouse.

 Then we pass this outcrop where seals come out to rest. There were both grey and harbor seals. This is just one small part of the rock which was probably 150 yards long

 The bird below is a Black Guillemot. They are pretty common along the coast. They are related to Puffins (sigh)

 One thing that attracted us to this particular  boat was a 45 minute stop on Little Cranberry Island. You can't really go far in 45 minutes but we got to stretch our legs and buy a soda. What I love about these little islands is you walk from one postcard to another.

After departing Little Cranberry Island the boat takes a ride into Somes Sound which was considered a fjord, the only one on the East Coast.  This picture is important. Samuel Champlain used this falls to collect fresh water for his men to resupply the ship in 1604.

 After our boat trip we took the Bar Harbor Ghost Tour. We did not see any ghosts. It was fun though

 Thursday morning the plan was to do as much fun stuff as we could before the rain started. The first place we went was Bass Harbor Light. You have almost positively seen this lighthouse in landscape calendars. I did my best to try to recreate the photos I've seen. We also saw a Bald Eagle from the lighthouse. The forth and last of the trip.

From the lighthouse we tried to do a little birding but the biting insects were fierce. I had hoped to bird on Hio Road which is a fireroad on the west side of the island. The bugs were too bad to enjoy birding. So we went a couple miles away to Ship Harbor. I hoped the ocean breeze would help with the bug problem. Being on the ocean at Ship Harbor was probably the highlight of my trip. We saw Black Guillemot and Common Eiders. What made the place special were the Harbor Porpoises we saw feeding from shore. For about fifteen minutes we watched Harbor Porpoises chase and feed on bait. They don't stay up for more than a few seconds so getting a picture was hard. 

Far away but the black spec below the arrow is a fin of a
Harbor Porpoise.

Friday morning we went to Waterfall Bridge on one of the carriage roads. I ended up going all the way to the waterfall. It was beautiful after a night of rain

A view of the fall and the road.

 We drove to Champlain Mountain where the Precipice Trail is closed off due to a family of Peregrine Falcons. There are four babies on the cliff. The National Park Service sets up a scope from 9-12 in the morning to view them. The parents usually don't stay with the young. This is one of the parents circling the cliff.

Our boat trip for 1:15 to see Puffins, Lighthouses, and Seabirds was cancelled before noon. This left us an afternoon to fill. We went back to Northeast Harbor where we got a late lunch of steak and cheese sub from a food truck. We walked around the harbor as fog was rolling in. Then we went to an Azalea Garden to kill time. 

 After we left the garden I just tried to find things to do that would "button up" the vacation. We stopped at Bubble Pond again because I wanted to check out a different view. Then we went to Thunder Hole which finally lived up to its name.

After we left Thunder Hole we went back to Bar Harbor. I decided to try the Lobster Ice Cream. I expected it to be disgusting, but I found it to be pretty good.

Saturday morning we packed up our tent which had been home for four nights.