Nature Connection: Nothing Ever Remains The Same

 As summer winds down and local schools open, our road traffic will soon slow and crowds will thin out. The summer birds have been quietly gathering, and some have already departed for their southern wintering grounds. Shorebirds from up north are now on many beaches taking a rest and filling their gullets. Dragonflies are laying eggs, tadpoles are emerging as frogs, and many of our field flowers are going to seed as goldenrod gives our landscape a last blanket of yellow blossoms before everything starts to fade.

 It has been said that nothing is stable but change, and if one is an observer of nature, that is borne out almost daily. Nothing stays the same for long. Most flowers only bloom for a week or two, birds only sing for a few months, if that. For a few months the woods, fields, oceans and ponds are full of babies, but they grow quickly and by fall are ready to experience the world on their own. Not all, of course, but many. 

 Once school begins our beaches are empty once again. They will still attract people, but the crowds of mid-summer will be gone. There will still be swimmers and surfers, kayakers and sunbathers, but in more manageable numbers. 

 Roads, too, will be easier to navigate, and I’m sure none of us will miss the long lines of traffic, especially on cloudy or rainy days. Road work will resume right after Labor Day so don’t put away your GPS quite yet. Don’t give up your meditation and deep breathing either. The crowds won’t be holding you up, but all the paving, tree cutting, sewer pipe placing, and road widening will offer their own traffic challenges.

 If you’re out and about, you’ll notice acorns and nuts ripening and, in some spots, falling already. Seeds are blowing through the air or dropping to the ground as well. If you have a native garden or a pollinator garden, please don’t clean up or deadhead your plants. Many will reseed themselves, but they also provide food for birds and safe havens for insect eggs. This is an important element of this type of garden. By all means pull invasive plants and others you don’t want to multiply, but if you like plants like bee balm, they need to reseed themselves. Cutting them down now will mean no new plants next summer.

 Many birds change plumage with the seasons, and goldfinches are an easy example to spot. As the males molt their bright yellow feathers the new feathers will be olive brown like those of the females. For a few weeks they will appear a little spotty as the yellow feathers don’t all molt at once. If you’re lucky enough to have scarlet tanagers around, they molt in a similar fashion, leaving them to also look more like the females of the species.

 There are a lot of changes taking place all around us every day, but the older I get the more those changes seem to speed up. Everything feels a little different, looks a little different, feels a little different. We adapt to the seasonal differences but the longer we live the more cultural and local changes we experience.

 Some of the changes are wonderful. Whales have returned. So have seals and sharks. I realize the latter aren’t everyone’s favorites, but they were actually here before any of us so let’s adjust. People have realized the importance of our freshwater ponds and are working to open traditional runs for the herring that return each spring. Cranberry bogs that are no longer producing are returning to nature and many cranberry growers are working with more sustainable and less toxic practices as we’ve learned more about how those were affecting our environment.

 Every year more and more people move here, buy property here, open businesses here. Housing is at a premium, and to be fair, multi-unit housing is more environmentally friendly than single-family homes. I understand it is a huge change aesthetically, but it may be the price we pay for other decisions, such as allowing international corporations to buy and sell short-term rentals, summer homes for their CEOs, etc. with little or no control from any of our towns. The last statistic I saw said almost half our real estate is tied up in seasonal homes or short-term rentals. All those homes are out of the market for local workers and families, a very large change that got even more intense after COVID.

 Wildlife needs room to move, to reproduce, to feed, to just live their lives. We are fortunate to have the National Seashore, but all our neighborhoods were once wildlife habitat. This means we have some wildlife that is adapting to suburban life. Deer and rabbits drive gardeners crazy, but let’s face it, they have to eat, too. Coyotes and foxes, skunks and raccoons, turtles and toads all need safe places and learning to live with them means we have to make some changes as well.

 Changes in attitudes help a lot. Over the years we’ve learned that many ideas we may have grown up with were wrong. We’ve learned that we are not all alike and to celebrate that instead of condemning the differences. We’ve learned that humans are not the only worthy beings, but part of a really large ecosystem called Earth.

 Nothing remains the same, and although sometimes we bemoan the things that are lost, it is good to remember what we have gained in tolerance and understanding. Seasonal change is always a good time to clean out the junk we’ve accumulated and reconsider what we think we want or need. 

 We are living in a challenging time, a time that invites us to work together to change the things that could make the world a better place for all of us.