Dear Readers, Residents,This past June, I was lucky enough to spend a couple of days at the Field Ornithology camp of Audubon in Maine. Here is the story I wanted to share with you in support of our preservation efforts here in Scarsdale:
I knew it was going to be perfect with Kim and Kenn Kaufman and Scott Weidensaul, three of the most important names in Ornithology today, in attendance as teachers, but who knew I would even learn more about Emily Dickinson ?
It all started when I walked in to the dining hall and was
attracted to a newspaper clipping on the cork board. It said a new picture of
Emily Dickinson had been found, finally after the one we have all come to see
so many times. I thought “great”, but
why Emily Dickinson in Maine, Audubon ?
Interesting enough, the answer came that night when we
learned about Hog Island’s history. Hog Island had been an inn till 1910 when
Mabel Loomis Todd, original editor of Emily Dickinson’s poetry and her husband
bought the property. They were living in Amherst, MA and her husband was an
astronomer there.
would vacation in the summer. One day we hiked to the home they used in the summer. They showed me the desk Mabel Dodge would have worked on, it is still there in what is now called the “Queen Mary”…They showed me a dusty trunk as well, bearing witness to all that lovely poetry that came to us via Hog Island and now, I who had been to the Emily Dickinson’s homestead in Amherst finally understood how all that poetry that was found after her death, became the poetry books we have…The part that was passed on hastily by the tour guide, came to being. They found her poetry, and then it was published… An affair helped along the way. Birds have a way of connecting the dots…
Our days on Hog Island were just as exciting as that first
bit of information. Hog Island was being run by Maine Audubon when it was
transferred to main Audubon and programs started all over again. The buildings
are now refurbished, many different programs being run, from Field Ornithology
to the Art of Birding. Check out http://hogisland.audubon.org
for some Fall programs still available among which Fall Migration on Monhegan
Island…
The whole island can also be rented for those interested.
The week we left a sailing group was coming to have the island for a week.
Hog Island is about 330 acres and is easily reached by boat
from Bremen, another Audubon site in a matter of minutes. Once on the island,
there are dormitory style rooms, with hot running water and great meals. Most
days we were on a boat cruising the bay with excellent commentary by Scott
Weidensaul or Kenn Kaufman offering their knowledge on the avian population we
were witnessing. Nearby is Egg Island where puffins have been brought back thanks
to the novel methods of Steve Kreiss (http://www.audubonmagazine.org), also one
of the teachers during our week, and the cover story of the current issue of
Audubon magazine.
They are really this small, picture below… We were able to catch them mist
netting and then banded them. Once you hold one of these in your palm, you are
transported to another dimension of the universe…
Our days started at about 7:00 a.m. breakfast and went on
till about 9:00 p.m. with a little break in between. Among the activities:
Early
Morning BirdWalk
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Intro
to Ornithology
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Shakedown
Cruise
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Hog
Island Hike
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Eastern
Egg Rock (for puffins)
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At
nights more talks about Migration, Hog Island history, etc.
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Here below, a fishing boat in the colors of the sunset:
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| One of the many nesting warblers making their home on Hog Island |
And these were the puffin shaped cookies at the farewell
dinner:
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