Tales From the Wild Side
Spring 2021
Board of Directors
President Ilka Milne
Vice-President Mike Hammond
Secretary Gaby Emond
Treasurer Henry Van Ael
Committees
Newsletter Ilka Milne & Bob Saunders
Website Ilka Milne & Bob Saunders
Events Ilka Milne & Bob Saunders
Boardwalk Ahlan Johanson & Mike Hammond
Publicity Henry Miller & Ilka Milne
Stewardship Liaison Gaby Emond
Action needed to defend the native bluebird
Article by Henry Miller
Sixty years ago naturalists were alarmed to see that the bluebird populations were drastically declining. Two invasive species, the house sparrows and the starlings were driving the bluebirds away and nesting in the limited numbers of natural cavities found in trees and fence posts where the bluebirds themselves liked to nest. In efforts to help the bluebirds, many different groups built bird houses designed specifically for them and hundreds of “Bluebird trails” were established throughout North America. Over the years the bluebird numbers have gradually increased, and today more and more Bluebird trails continue to be created.
The following is some advice to anyone wishing to help our bluebirds: Choose a birdhouse design that has been specifically created for them. You can find many of these designs online and just need to choose the one you like and wish to build. The ones I construct are made of rough cedar and are very simple to make, something very important to me since I cut out all the necessary pieces for 100 to 150 boxes yearly. I then bring these pieces to various classrooms in our local schools for completion by the students (like Mrs. Bonner-Vickers grade 8 class we spoke about last time)
For Bluebird houses to be utilized, they need to be placed in a habitat suited for them. Bluebirds will nest in town if there’s a large enough yard there but they prefer open fields with a small bush near the actual house site. The bush is used by the nestlings as they leave the nest and learn to fly. The first nestlings to leave the nest then hide in this bush until the female has coaxed the last little one out. Avoid placing the box near barns or any other buildings where house sparrows may reside. The entrance holes, although being too small for starlings to enter, are large enough for house sparrows to do so. Bluebirds are very particular when choosing a box to nest in. They prefer the wood’s natural colour, but if painted, a brown or light blue colour. The nesting boxes should be placed 50 meters apart and the house has to be cleaned out each fall.
Protecting birds from predators can be very difficult. There’s not much that can be done to prevent hawks, merlins, eagles, and other birds of prey from attacking adult nesting birds, but predators on the ground such as skunks, weasels, raccoon, other mammals and snakes can be prevented from eating the eggs and nestlings using a variety of control measures. For example, a well-greased steel post or a wooden post wrapped with heavy plastic such as crazy carpets, are too slippery for the predators to climb thereby making the nests inaccessible and keeping the eggs and nestlings safe. Most birdhouses in our ‘Bluebird Trails’ projects are however placed on fence posts where there is no control. What I do, if there is a predator problem, is move the whole trail to an entirely different but safer location.
House wrens too sometimes pose a problem. They fill their nesting box full of twigs and then proceed to fill adjacent houses with twigs as well, even if they’re already occupied by eggs or nestlings. Blowflies may also be problematic by laying their eggs in the bluebird nests, The larvae then suck blood from the nestlings which alone has little effect on the young birds but is harmful if they have been weakened by cold, wet weather. The larvae pupate beneath the nest, so if the nest is cleaned out in the fall, they can easily be removed and crushed which in turn keeps the overall fly numbers down. A tiny wasp (nasomia) also helps limit the blowfly population by eating their pupae.
Weather is a major determinant in the survival of bluebirds with mortality being high in prolonged wet, and cool conditions. On the other hand, hot, dry, weather like we had last summer is conducive to high survival rates. Pesticides are another problem. When crops require the usage of either an insecticide or herbicide many birds living nearby perish. Sick and dying birds in the wild ordinarily hide in the grass to die, thereby making the general public unaware of their deaths. When pesticides are used in the vicinity of birdhouses, they often hide in them as well.
Many thanks to our local Sportsmen’s club members who have volunteered to maintain the ‘Bluebird Trail’ network for the last 29 years. This project is currently being expanded with the addition of another trail thanks to a couple more volunteers. This winter I needed to construct more birdhouses for the proposed trail expansion, but with the Senior Centre workshop being unavailable due to COVID restrictions, this became quite difficult. Jim Pochailo volunteered to help by using the saws from his own workshop. Together we worked outside last December and cut our parts for 24 new birdhouses. Some of these new nesting boxes were used to replace older broken ones on the already established trails while Bob Saunders, another volunteer then used the rest of the boxes to create the new ‘Bluebird birdhouse trail’ along LaVallee Road North.
Now we just await the return of the Bluebirds, hoping they survived the ice storms in the south.
More information about bluebirds can be found on this website here
Note. Henry writes articles that appear periodically in the Fort Frances Times, under the heading “Tales From the Wild Side”. This is from May 5.
Spring Fever
By Henry Miller
Spring has arrived, muskrats are on the move. This muskrat was seen walking across the Nordic Ski Club parking lot on Feb. 2.
Muskrats spend most of their lives in water where their waterproof fur, paddle-like hind feet and flattened, furless tail acting as a rudder, are important assets. They can remain under water for a little over 3 minutes at a time. Muskrats feed upon pond weeds and other plants, as well as insects, frogs, and fish with cattails being their most favorite food. In winter they build ‘push-ups’ by chewing through the ice and creating a house of frozen vegetation to use as feeding and resting stations.
Rather than building a house, muskrats often burrow into the bank of a lake or stream and construct a bank den with many entrances below the water level. The den may have several chambers in which a number of muskrats may live. Occasionally overcrowding occurs and one or more of the young are driven away which is perhaps what happened to the one in this photo.
The behavior of some animals is often similar to that of humans. Remember the days when you were young and went to large gatherings to have some fun or perhaps to just meet someone of the opposite sex. When ravens flock to a frozen carcass of an animal exposed as the snow melts, the juvenile ravens often find their mates among the crowd. Once paired up, the mating ritual begins. The ravens fly across the sky, swooping and twisting where after a few rolls, they plummet to the earth only to swoop up and repeat the whole performance. Thereafter a nest is soon built and a new generation begins.
The Canada jay also known as the gray jay or whiskey jack is another early nester. In late February or early March a nest of twigs, moss, feathers and fur is built making it very well insulated to help keep the eggs and nestlings warm during the cooler temperatures common at this time. Since the female remains on the nest for 17 to 22 days and never leaves the nest until the young are fledged, the male and juvenile birds bring her food to her. Much of this food has already been gathered during the previous fall and winter by the two adults and their juvenile offspring from that spring. The food was glued to tree trunks by a sticky mucous produced from the specialized salivary glands of these birds and is now awaiting consumption.
Side note to Henry’s Muskrat: While doing an owl survey, nearing my last station for the night and approaching midnight, I heard a rustling in the grass. I turned on my headlamp and watched a muskrat, mostly hidden in the grass, waddling toward me. He (well, it could have been a she) emerged onto the road, stopped and looked at me for some time. I knew exactly what he was thinking, “gosh, what is the proper etiquette, should I go over and introduce myself?” After pondering this for awhile, he must have thought, “gee, I just don’t know what to do, I guess I’ll just keep moving along, I’ve got things to do” But he stopped in the middle of the road, looked back, and again, I knew what he was thinking, “I hope I wasn’t rude, maybe I should go back”. Well, that muskrat just couldn’t make up his mind, and finally decided to simply walk away. How many times in our lives are we faced with those same decisions!
Field Trips
Mission Accomplished
Early in March I received a request from a friend to check on a cabin owned by his cousin, who hadn’t been able to visit it all of last year owing to the pandemic and the resulting border closure. He had nightmares of trees crashing into the cabin, beavers incorporating the dock into a house, and every other disaster one could imagine. It was very easy for me to relate to this, for once, after being away for two months, I returned to find beavers had used my bridge to build a dam. Water flowing around the ends of the dam had completely washed away the road on either side of the bridge. A couple of thousand dollars and two months later that problem was solved.
Unfortunately, the request came two weeks after rising temperatures had begun to rapidly diminish the supply of skiable snow needed for the 25 km trip to the cabin. Nevertheless, this was a challenge I couldn’t refuse. Tuesday afternoon, the same day I received the request, I headed out for a test run, skied down the creek, out past its mouth and onto the lake. There still was a hard snow/ice mixture over the ice on the creek, which made for perfect ski conditions and I made good time to the lake. Out on the lake much of the snow had melted, and there was now a layer of slush over the ice in some places and pools of water several cm deep over the ice in other areas. But I had no problem skiing; the trip was easily doable, albeit with wet socks and boots. I called Henry and Ilka – they are always up for the sublime and even the ridiculous – and they quickly agreed to go; the only problem being the trip would have to be postponed until the next weekend, as Ilka had considerable school preparation that needed to be done first.
That night the temperature dropped significantly and the ice froze solidly. I skied down the creek but couldn’t make it even as far as the mouth of the creek – the ice was just too slippery. Time for a new plan. The next day I switched back to my plastic skis and put on skins. The water on the ice had become rock hard and smooth as far as I could see. I was able to ski but had to concentrate hard to keep from falling, and even then, I did come down hard onto my hip once. Aha, a new plan. I could skate out to the cabin! The lake was like a gigantic skating rink! Now, I hadn’t skated since I was in school (and that was a long time ago). Well, never mind, the next day I drove into town and bought a new pair of skates from Taggs Sports. I would use the extra week learning to skate. No problem.
I walked down the creek the next morning to the mouth and laced up the skates, took a few steps and soon discovered the water on surface, which had formed that mirror-like surface, had now seeped through the ice, leaving the surface of the lake irregular and bumpy, completely unsuitable for skating. But, hey, perfect for biking!
Naturally, I knew that with slicks on my bike I probably wouldn’t get far, but still, who knows, there’s always a maybe. So, later that day I brought my bike down to the creek, and …….… quickly decided that I would prefer to continue living. I ordered studded tires from MEC but I knew they wouldn’t arrive by the weekend. And so on to the next plan.
Which was back to the original plan. By this time a pattern had developed: during the night, temperatures dropped and the ice in the morning was hard and slick, but during the day, with warmer temperatures, the ice became soft and wet, and easily skiable with skis and skins. We could walk, with running cleats over our boots, in the morning, and switch to skis when the ice softened a bit later in the day. Now, to wait until the weekend when Henry and Ilka would be able to go.
Saturday morning, the first day of spring, found us walking down the creek pulling sleds and ……..soon returning to the cabin to find a new pair of skis for Ilka. Their sled had overturned while pulling it overland to avoid an open section of the creek. Oh, yes, I neglected to mention that in the meantime open water had begun to appear below the dams on the creek. Unfortunately, when the sled turned over, the tip of one of their wood skis broke. These were an old pair of Swedish Sundins from the mid-70s that Ilka’s mother had owned. Henry and Ilka had just finished spending several hours completely and lovingly refurbishing them. Sigh.
With that sorted out, we continued walking down the creek and out onto the lake. The ice everywhere was rock solid. Conditions were perfect. And to top it off, the sun was shining brilliantly! It didn’t take too long for the ice to warm up and we switched to skis. But for some reason Ilka and Henry were unable to get a glide with the skins on their skis and they switched back to walking, which they did for the remainder of the trip. Luna was having a great time, covering twice the distance as us.
A friend of theirs had mentioned that the ice near Turkey Island is unsafe at this time of the year owing to currents, and we assumed that the same would be true for Camp Narrows. At first Ilka and Henry were a bit hesitant about the ice, even though we could see that it was clearly thick and strong enough. But the previous day there had been a tragic accident on Lake Despair when a person riding an ATV broke through the ice, and that would unnerve anyone. We were heartened to see two trucks on the ice near Naicatchewenin, and later, four snowmobilers and two on ATV’s speeding right down the middle of Camp Narrows.
Earlier, before reaching Moore Island, we visited a small rocky island that is the home for a colony of about 100-200 pairs of Double-crested Cormorants and 30 pairs of Herring Gulls. About 50 gulls had already arrived a day or two ago, and were lounging about, waiting for ice-out before nesting. They flew off and rested on the ice until we left the island. The cormorants make a nest of sticks, which are added to every year, and are cheek to jowl on the island. I’ll restrain myself from going off on a tirade about the completely unnecessary, abominable and unethical cormorant hunt that the Ontario Conservative government has instituted to appease fishermen. As an aside you might be interested in reading “When The Ice Goes Out on Doré Lake”, an account of three summers studying cormorants and pelicans by Thijs Kuiken.
The remainder of the trip went without incident, other than Ilka breaking through a thin bit of ice on a portage and getting her boot so stuck in the mud that it took quite an effort to retrieve it. We avoided Turkey island by taking a channel to the north, necessitating a 300 m portage across grass. Snowmobiles had used this route, possibly to avoid thin ice on the other side of Turkey Island, so we had a wide path to pull our sleds through. Shortly after, we arrived at the cabin, and found it in good condition. By now we were happy just to relax – even Luna was dragging her tail by the time we reached the cabin.
We spent a pleasant evening and night, and after breakfast left at nine. The forecast had called for rain developing during the day, and although darker clouds began developing, it didn’t begin to rain until minutes after arriving home. The return journey went well, with Ilka and Henry walking all the way and me walking halfway and skiing the remainder. Henry remarked that if the Inuit had names for different kinds of ice, they must have at least 30. The texture and appearance of the ice changed constantly, but it seemed quite solid, other than a few small open sections near the shore.
Our good luck, however, ran out as we neared the mouth of the creek. The day previously the temperature had risen to 17C, although with the wind flowing over the ice it didn’t feel that warm to us. It was obvious there had been a significant change in the ice. The closer we got to the mouth of the creek and shallower water, we began seeing more open spots with mud exposed close to shore and small holes with open water further from the shore. We threaded through these and edged closer to the shore to be safer. As we turned the last corner, we found ourselves breaking through a thin layer of ice into 10 to 15 cm of cold water over top of another sketchy layer of ice.
At this point we had two options; head further into the middle where the underlying ice might be more solid, or keep close to the shore where the ice would be much weaker as a result of the cattails absorbing heat and transmitting it to the ice, further weakening it. But breaking through ice in the middle of the creek would be catastrophic, breaking through closer to shore, we would just get wet. We had no other choice, as the cattails blocked the way to the shore, and the ice was completely unstable within the cattails.
I knew it would be just a matter of time before one of us would break through, as Luna was doing just that, as she motored on ahead of us. I sloshed on with my skis breaking the thin ice and wallowing in water, with Henry and Ilka close behind. Within seconds there was a shout – Ilka had broken through! Henry quickly went back to help her out – and promptly broke through himself. At this moment the picture I have in my mind is of Ilka struggling to hold on to her sled, with Henry flat on his back doing a back stroke to move back onto sturdier ice. A fine time to go swimming! Initially I had no idea how deep the water was, but Henry was soon on solid ice while Ilka was standing in waist deep water trying to extricate herself out of the water. There wasn’t much anyone could do for Ilka, other than take photos. She eventually emerged, shook herself off and we continued the last couple of hundred metres to safer ice. She only broke through a few more times; somehow Henry managed to avoid her fate.
Body temperature soon warmed their clothes, but, unsurprisingly, both were quite happy to change into dry clothes at the cabin, which we reached soon after. We all agreed that we wouldn’t be going out onto the ice again this year, and I even had to promise my kids I wouldn’t do so. Another great trip with good friends!
Open water at the start of the trip
ILKA giving us swimming lessons
Night Sky
MESSIER 104 THE SOMBRERO GALAXY
Article by Fred Pugh
Messier 104, The Sombrero Galaxy, was discovered on May 11, 1781 by the French astronomer Pierre Mechain. Charles Messier observed and made notes about the galaxy, intending to add it to his catalogue, however it was not formally added as M104 until 1921. M104 is a majestic, nearly edge on spiral galaxy that shines brightly at magnitude 8, has an angular size of 9 x 4 arc minutes and resides in the spring constellation of Virgo (figure 1). It lies at a distance of 29.3 million light years and has a diameter of approximately 50,000 light years. The Sombrero Galaxy can be seen in 7 x 50 binoculars but because of its small size it will be difficult to distinguish from a star.
The Sombrero Galaxy was so named because of its resemblance to a sombrero. The large bulging nucleus is very bright and there is an obvious dark dust lane running the entire width of the galaxy that circles the entire galaxy like a ring. It is a beautiful sight and this has made it one of the most photographed objects in the night sky. The dark ring is full of hydrogen and dust and is very active with new star formation. There is a very large population of globular clusters in the halo around the galaxy with estimates being between 1,200 and 2,000 which is about ten times more that our galaxy has. A supermassive black hole resides at the centre of the Sombrero. Data from the Hubble as well as the Canada-France-Hawaii telescope on Mauna Kea in Hawaii have determined that the speed of the stars revolving around the core are not possible unless an object of at least 1 billion solar masses is present at
the centre of this galaxy. This is the largest black hole known in any of the relatively near galaxies to our Milky Way Galaxy. The mass of the entire galaxy is a large 800 billion solar masses and it is rushing away from us at a speed of 1024 km per second.
I took this photo of The Sombrero Galaxy on May 3, 2016 (figures 3,4). It was a very warm night and the sky was excellent but the constellation Virgo was very low to the horizon in the south which meant I would be looking through the thickest part of the atmosphere. Since the galaxy is telescopically very bright, I decided to go with a relatively short exposure fearing overexposure. In hindsight I could have gone with a little longer exposure time but was relatively happy with my first pass at this target. I recently went back and re-processed this data with newly learned skills and was able to improve on the final result.
My work flow for creating this photo is as follows:
Telescope – Celestron Ultima 8 Schmidt Cassegrain
Focal length – 1280mm
Focal ratio – f6.3
Camera – SBIG STF 8300C
Camera Temperature – set to -16 C
Mount – Celestron CGEM DX
Light Frames – 13 at 3.5 minutes each
Dark Frames – 10 at 3.5 minutes eachFlat Frames – 10 at .01 second each
Dark Flat Frames – 10 at .01 second each
Inspected all frames for tracking errors and other problems, all were kept
Converted all frames from RAW to FITS files
Stacked in deepskystacker to reduce noise and enhance signal
Imported into Photoshop to stretch data, smooth remaining noise, enhance color and sharpen
I could not resist the temptation to include a stunning shot of this beautiful galaxy from the Hubble Heritage Collection (figure 5). Needless to say I am humbled.
GLOBULAR CLUSTER MESSIER 13
Article by Fred Pugh
A globular cluster is a large collection of very old stars that are gravitationally bound and packed together into a very dense, roughly spherical shape containing from 100,000 to more than a million stars. Our Milky Way Galaxy contains at least 160 globular clusters that orbit the galaxy above, below and within the plane of our flat, disc shaped galaxy (figure 1). The nearest globular cluster is M4 at a distance of 5,500 light years and M54 is one of the most distant at 70,000 light years. Our solar system is 4.6 billion years old but the stars in the globular clusters including M13 are up to 13 billion years old which is the same age as our galaxy. The age of the universe has been estimated at 13.77 billion years. Stars in globular clusters contain almost no metals, which astronomers define as any elements heaver than hydrogen and helium, the building blocks of the universe. Stars that contain metals like our sun
came in later generations. This is one of the tools that astronomers use to determine the ages of stars. The formation of globular clusters is not well understood but it is now believed that most globular clusters contain an intermediate sized black hole at their centre and Hubble has confirmed this belief.
M13 was discovered by Edmond Halley in 1714 and Charles Messier added it to his catalogue in 1764. M13 can be found in the constellation Hercules between Arcturus in the constellation Bootes and Vega in the constellation Lyra (figure 2) and has been described as the finest globular cluster in the northern hemisphere. From our mid northern latitudes, M13 is circumpolar and can be seen for at least part of the night all year round. At magnitude 5.8, it is just within naked eye visibility from a dark sky site, however with the naked eye it will just look like a very faint star. With binoculars you will see that it does not have clean edges like a star but instead looks fuzzy. In a backyard telescope M13 is a glorious sight and looks like a handfull of diamonds sprinkled on black velvet. M13’s distance is estimated at 22,200 light years and has an angular size in the sky of 20 arc minutes which corresponds to an actual diameter of 145 light years. There are approximately 300,000 stars in this cluster and the total mass of the cluster is equivalent to about 1/2 million times the mass of our sun. The stars near the centre of M13 are approximately 500 times denser than in our stellar neighbourhood and are packed so tightly that sometimes they collide. These collisions result in the formation of a new star called a blue straggler which contrast with the very old, mostly yellow and red stars and are of great interest to astronomers.
I shot this photo of M13 (figures 3 and 4) on June 11, 2020. It was very near to the summer solstice and there was a half moon in the sky so the sky was very light and to further complicate things, it was also very windy. Because of the brightness of the sky and the wind I tried to keep the exposure as short as possible. Fortunately M13 is telescopically a very bright object and a fair amount of detail can still be recorded in a short exposure. I have photographed this object a few times in the past with another camera and telescope but always in poor conditions that were not good enough to photograph anything else except maybe the moon. I would like to re-visit M13 some day to make a proper effort on a dark night and use a much longer exposure. A longer exposure will show many more faint stars in the outer regions of the cluster.
My work flow for creating this photo is as follows:
Telescope – Stellarvue SVA130T 5.1” Apochromatic Refractor
Focal length – 650mm
Focal ratio – f5
Camera – SBIG STF 8300C
Camera Temperature – set to -24C
Mount – Celestron CGEM DX
Light Frames – 29 at 30 seconds each
Dark Frames – 14 at 30 seconds each
Flat Frames – 10 at .01 second each
Dark Flat Frames – 10 at .01 second each
Inspected all light frames for tracking errors, in this case all frames were kept
Converted all frames from RAW to FITS files
Stacked in deepskystacker to reduce noise and enhance signal
Imported into Photoshop to stretch data, smooth remaining noise, enhance color, sharpen and crop
Clear skies!
MESSIER 57 THE RING NEBULA
Article by Fred Pugh
The Ring Nebula was discovered and catalogued on January 31, 1779 by Charles Messier who described it as resembling a planet and about the same size as Jupiter. William Herschel coined the name planetary nebula in the 1780’s for nebulae resembling The Ring Nebula and the name has stuck until today even though they have nothing to do with planets. The Ring Nebula is located just south of the bright star Vega in the small constellation Lyra (figure 1) and is a very small 1.4 x 1 arc minutes. At magnitude 8.8 it cannot be seen with the naked eye and is difficult to see in binoculars but is very easy to see with a small telescope. The distance to M57 is 2,783 light years and the outer ring of the nebula as about 2.4 light years across. A planetay nebula a type of emission nebula that is formed when a dying intermediate mass star similar to our Sun balloons into a red giant and then sheds its outer layers into an expanding shell of dust and gas. This shedding of outer layers happens without a catastrophic supernova explosion and occurs in stars that are no larger than 8 times the mass of our Sun. A small, very hot and dense core about the size of the Earth is left behind and is called a white dwarf. Most white dwarfs are composed of carbon and oxygen nuclei swimming in a sea of electrons. A teaspoon of white dwarf matter would weigh up to 15 tons. With a temperature of about 100,000 degrees celsius, the white dwarf energizes the expanding shell of dust and gas with ultraviolet radiation causing it to glow. The blue color in the interior of the ring is caused by doubly ionized oxygen and the red outer shell is from hydrogrn and nitrogen. After about 4 billion years the white dwarf will have cooled down to 6000 celsius and eventually it will cool enough to become a black dwarf.
I took this photo of Messier 57, The Ring nebula on June 3, 2018. The sky was very light because the summer solstice was less than 3 weeks away but it was the first light for my new 5.1 inch Refracting telescope. I wanted to work out the bugs before the dark skies arrived. Since the sky was very light and it was only a test anyways, I used short 20 second frames. I discovered later that I did not have the correct spacing between the telescope and the camera. This error caused field curvature, meaning the stars in the centre of the photo are round but the farther away from centre, the more oblong the stars become (Figures 2,3). Fortunately The Ring Nebula is telescopically a very bright object so I was able
to capture a reasonable photo even with the light sky, very short exposure and field curvature (figures 4,5).
My work flow for creating this photo is as follows:
Telescope – Stellarvue SVA130T 5.1” Apochromatic Refractor
Focal length – 650mm
Focal ratio – f5
Camera – SBIG STF 8300C
Camera Temperature – set to -28C
Mount – Celestron CGEM DX
Light Frames – 15 at 20 seconds each
Dark Frames – 10 at 20 seconds each
Flat Frames – 10 at .01 second each
Dark Flat Frames – 10 at .01 second each
Inspected all frames for tracking errors and other problems, discarded one for bad tracking
Converted all frames from RAW to FITS files
Stacked in deepskystacker to reduce noise and enhance signal
Imported into Photoshop to stretch data, smooth remaining noise, enhance color and sharpen
Poetry Corner
Aaron Wenger lived for several years in the Rainy River District, raising a family with his wife Carol in a wood-heated cabin without power or running water, commuting to teach physics at Rainy River Community College in International Falls. He now lives in Grand Rapids, MN but still owns and visits the family cabin at the mouth of Stamp Creek on the NW Bay of Rainy Lake whenever he can. For the past year, owing to the the border closure caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, he has been pining away, longing to visit the area he dearly loves. In between a busy life of making maple syrup and searching for antler sheds, he manages to find time to write poetry (haha, sorry Aaron, I know you’re a bit busier than that). Here are five of his poems.
Wind Promises
On one cycle or another I have closed
fast on midnight, riding an ebony road
carved just for me laid through the woods
and poured across the granite hills.
Shattered moonlight has scattered its shards before me
and laid hard shadows across me as it rushes by.
It becomes a feather soft lover touching only so quickly,
only so lightly as I ride the night on a dark machine.
And I have ridden the darkness, riding tar like pliant glass slipping
along summer timelines,
streamlined and wrapped round me,
a velvet glove over pearls meant only for me,
seen only by me this night.
And the wind, she whispers promises she can’t keep.
Laying her over hard, tach coming up on red, holding her back
till its just right, we cut curves outta shadows.
Riding fallen moonshine cross a summer’s night,
I push her hard while the rpms steepen.
Letting her run faster now, all deep sound and night vibration.
A sleek black dream, wet asphalt slides under me
a white line running downtime to sometime, to darkness,
carressing slippery rocks all steamy with the night.
And the wind, wind whispers old promises she’ll never keep.
Night opens just for me, shakes moonshine hair loose, strokes my face.
Seduced by speed, airstream moans through parted lips.
And I am beyond it all, riding way in front, seeing all slowed and silky,
the future caught in the act of becoming past.
Riding hard on the night, I have seen white clouds dipped to earth,
held tight by new hay fields, and seen velvet deer
sudden as apparitions shining in my lights.
Ridiing fast through cold mist, seen Venus, Moon, and Jupiter
strung across July’s sky and have heard night sounds of
wolves and woodcock celebrating life.
And the wind whispers to me promises impossible to keep.
Fireflies et al
July nights ripe with the sexy smell of cornfields in tassel, in heat,
lit up by lightin storms flashing in our eyes, burning our adolescent souls,
while the night held fireflies in its dark.
Only a few days to live, needing so bad to find another, flashing their little lights
saying “I am here, I am here”, waiting to see another light
all made desperate by mortality in the night.
And I have come to think of us as fireflies. Little islands of conscious thought, knowing
mortality, and the numbers of our own night.
Centuries we’ve thrown at coming to know, coming to understand a bit, measuring
lightspeed, calculating starflight and charting
A galaxy, so many stars holding planets by gravity tight, some are in the zone
of water and of rock, of firefly life.
Blue planets round a kind yellow star, glowing with water, all the stuff made by stars before,
carbon, oxygen, nitrogen
all the stuff of generations before.
Truly gotta wonder what out there looks back at our small yellow dwarf and wonders,
“are they there”, is there a light in the night?
Trouble is in the distances, trouble in the times of flight,
way too far, way too long for the fireflies
to find one another before hard daylight drives them down.
Fireflies like us, they are burdened by having hearts too old,
hearts too primitive
to ever bear what power they have found hidden in the physics of things.
Hearts rooted in mysteries, myth, and gods,
hearts way behind what tools they have found.
Change of Perspective
I’d like to fly through Orion’s eyes
and watch the nebule glow against god’s void
from the other side.
I’d like to hold this galaxy, all its stars and conscious planets
in my heart like a breath held tight
during starflight.
I’d like to look back over Orion’s shoulder and see one small yellow star,
maybe a flash of blue,
and there see all our dreams held in perspective.
June:
I knew a June once upon time. She might have become my stepmother
when I was bout four.
She carried beauty about her with grace and kindness.
She was loud as a thunderstorm on a hot summer night
and as graceful as lightning among the clouds.
I think too beautiful, too loud, maybe too exciting for my dad the Preacherman.
These days I still love the audacity of June. Every tree in a hurry to leaf out,
all the grasses pushing against each other just to lead to seed in August.
The peepers spending their energy stored over their Winter in the mud,
to call desperately in the hopes of being one of the breeders.
I swear I can feel the greenness in my very blood, feel the need for hurry myself
after a long Winter of whiteness.
I walk among my wild flowers,
and celebrate wildness among my tamed life.
I bless the storm coming, its smell in the air, its unaware fierceness
that cares not a whit for my house roof.
Wind Promises:
On one cycle or another I have closed
fast on midnight, riding an ebony road
carved just for me laid through the woods
and poured across the granite hills.
Shattered moonlight has scattered its shards before me
and laid hard shadows across me as it rushes by.
It becomes a feather soft lover touching only so quickly,
only so lightly as I ride the night on a dark machine.
And I have ridden the darkness, riding tar like pliant glass slipping
along summer timelines,
streamlined and wrapped round me,
a velvet glove over pearls meant only for me,
seen only by me this night.
And the wind, she whispers promises she can’t keep.
Laying her over hard, tach coming up on red, holding her back
till its just right, we cut curves outta shadows.
Riding fallen moonshine cross a summer’s night,
I push her hard while the rpms steepen.
Letting her run faster now, all deep sound and night vibration.
A sleek black dream, wet asphalt slides under me
a white line running downtime to sometime, to darkness,
caressing slippery rocks all steamy with the night.
And the wind, wind whispers old promises she’ll never keep.
Night opens just for me, shakes moonshine hair loose, strokes my face.
Seduced by speed, airstream moans through parted lips.
And I am beyond it all, riding way in front, seeing all slowed and silky,
the future caught in the act of becoming past.
Riding hard on the night, I have seen white clouds dipped to earth,
held tight by new hay fields, and seen velvet deer
sudden as apparitions shining in my lights.
Riding fast through cold mist, seen Venus, Moon, and Jupiter
strung across July’s sky and have heard night sounds of
wolves and woodcock celebrating life.
And the wind whispers to me promises impossible to keep.