Outdoor Adventures with Gary Lee - Vol. 319
You didn’t have to go extremely far to find flooding yesterday as New York City and much of New Jersey got much more rain than they needed in one day. The city had over two inches in one hour and New Jersey had six inches which flooded most places where it fell. Two people were killed in this flooding.
Back down in Texas where the flooding occurred last week killing 132 people and over 140 still missing, they got 4 to 6 inches of rain and they had to suspend search efforts as the waters in that area again rose to flood levels.
Locally this same storm system hit areas around Utica with a tornado and high winds and rain killing three people in the area, including two children. Power was out in many areas for three days and more. We got enough rain to water the flowers and garden, but it came down hard in just a short time, up to an inch in most places.
The Dragon Bravo Forest fire on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon started as a lighting strike and then it was being maintained as a control burn that got out of control. During firefighting efforts, there was a chlorine leak that prevented water drops to slow the fires' progress in twenty to forty mile an hour wind. Then it grew to 5,000 acres and consumed between 50 and 80 structures including the historic Lodge built on the north rime in 1937 and others including the NPS administrative buildings and visitor facilities. Another fire, the White Sage Fire, is also burning on the north rime, taking much of the fire fighting forces to fight this 40,000-acre fire. The North Rim of the Grand Canyon will be closed for the season it was reported.
My flowers are just loving it, the passing rain showers that is, and the woods are soaking up most of it as water stopped going out of my pond just yesterday. Last year it stopped going out in May but then the rain came quite often, and it flowed out of the pond for the rest of the summer. These hot days are sure to warm area waters as most swimmers say the temperature is warm down more than six feet from the surface.
I got into Woodhull Lake one day this week and never saw a Loon on the entire lake. Talking with some camp owners there they said they had heard them calling but they had seen no adults with chicks. I went from there down to Sand Lake to check on the Loons there and I had Loon calling from the far end of the lake before I ever got a boat in the water. I looked with my binoculars and saw that there was a chick about a week old with the calling adult. Checking to find the nest site and collecting the eggshells a big black cloud finally moved right overhead, and it started raining. I dragged the kayak up on shore and put it between two trees making a shelter from the downpour. The loon mate showed up during the rainstorm and they went out into the big part of the lake. I got back on the water and found the nest site on an island that they had never used before. There were some Tree Swallows feeding fledged young nearby as green drakes flies were hatching off the water giving them a mouth full to feed their young. Some Cedar Waxwings were also bug catching as they flew out over the lake picking off the big flies. These birds are late nesters usually doing it in August. On some of the islands I checked for a Loon nest there were many carnivorous plants, sundew, yellow horned bladderworts, and pitcher plants. The sundew catches bugs if one lands on their shiny sticky leaves, the horned bladderworts catch bugs under the bog mat in bladders off their root system and the pitcher plants consume bugs that fall into the liquid in their open leaf pitcher bug trap.
The Annual Loon Census is this Saturday from 8am to 9am and there are many lakes in the area that no one is watching that day. You can look this up on the Adirondack Center for Loon Conservation website and find one no one is looking at and take an hour out of your day to check for loons and chicks on some of our local lakes and ponds. On the map red dots are being watched, green dots are open to being watched. Some that have adults and chicks not being watched are Little Safford, Independence Lake, Cascade Lake, Sagamore Lake to name a few, check the map for a lake near you and check it out.
Annual Loon Census action but that’s another story. See ya.
Photo above: Yellow Horned Bladderwort & Sundew
