Carmans

Please enjoy my photos of a river trip that is not well known, not much taken -the Carmans. Many kayaks can be seen putting in to explore the Carmans tidal estuary, but the upper river on a perfect, breezy, summer day -my brother and I were its only travelers.

We parked one vehicle at lower lake in Yaphank, NY. Yes, that's YAP-ANK. It was a critical choice because the kayak rental opened at 9:30, about 40 minutes away in Northport, and we had to have the yaks back by 5 pm. They used to have their store on the Carmans river, right where we left one of our vehicles, but as they told it, they were dismissed by the town of Brookhaven (kayak rentals is a concessions business) several years ago. They don't know why. Neither do I, but I have a couple of theories. I just won't get into those here because I am not going to be wordy -right?

The old homestead at our put-in. On another trip, someday, we'd like to try farther upriver.

Here we launched. The river had good flow, quite a bit actually for a Long Island watertable river. My suggestion should you ever do the trip is to go within a week or two of a big rain. We had just had a month of serious rain and it gave us the water we needed, and a shame we didn't have the time to travel farther up river.

The flow is visible in this image.

 

Along the way, many floating docks.

 

Waterside alternates between dense thicket and woodland.

Many of the trees had small, pale leaves, and several were shifting for autumn.

 My least favorite part of the trip is the large lake, dammed at its southern end, in Southaven County Park. Kayaking its expanse is a bore. When I was a kid we used to come to this park to bbq under the pines. I still associate the smell of dry, reddened pine needle litter with hot weather. Sometimes we rented a rowboat. Out on the lake we we terrified of the waterfall at the dam -it seemed a vortex that we would be sucked into, never to be seen again. On this trip, we simply took out to the side of the falls, putting in just below. Doesn't seem so big anymore. It was at the falls that I found the puffballs. 

Just after the falls you pass under a highway. At times on the Carmans there is simply too much road noise, other times, not much at all. Several major structures cross the Carmans path -the Sunrise Highway, the Long Island Expressway, the Long Island Railroad, and LIPA powerlines.

We had a few extra minutes to travel south into the tidal estuary.

The leaves of oaks were the color of old Hudson River School paintings, and I begun to think of Long Island's own William Sydney Mount.

Beyond, the waters more choppy, the salt hay bending, thanks to afternoon's ocean wind.

In a future post, I'll describe some of the wildlife and plants of the Carmans.

Eh? Cool Coming?



I hadn't noticed. Seems one of the defining characteristics of not having a working computer at home is me not noticing what the weather will be doing in the near future. I hear there will be cool nights coming, sometime around this weekend? Yup, summer's sure over. I remember begging for winter to hang on last March for the sake of its tranquility. I'll admit I cannot stop stealing glances at all the garlic hanging from my ceiling. I want to plant it. NOW. I will fill up my entire plot. And then some.

Calling all yarders, empty lotters, small time farmers with room to spare. Let me entertain you. Please?

Computer Terminal

My computer has chosen to die today. Cause of death -possible faulty power supply, pending autopsy. 

I will not be able to buy the replacement part until sometime in October, at which time I will attempt to resuscitate. At one time this symptom was covered by a repair program (they are aware of the cheaply-built part), of which I took part. It seems the replacement parts are just as bad, lasting only as long as the originals -3.5 years. I will attempt the surgery myself -could it be more difficult than fixing my van? 

Any future posts will be on the sly, at work, or maybe on Betsy's computer, which is older than mine, and knocking on the wood, still chugging along. 

Fallen Fruit

Osage orange.

Puffballs

The old adage that you find only when you are not looking is particularly true for mushrooms. I found this puffball, probably Calvatia gigantea, while portaging our kayak in a field of crabgrass.

At home, the next day, I was to eat my first puff, which are usually more rounded.

It's mildly suggestive, no?

The underside shows its almost non-existent stem.

And the inside -how wonderful is that.  The odd shape of this puffball is responsible for the hole.  Usually these are solid all the way through.

One website suggested peeling the distinctive, outer layer. But peeling it was like peeling a hard-boiled egg when the shell won't let go. Probably unnecessary. I then sliced it.

This mushroom is a must eat. Not so much for the flavor, which is a good, mild woodsy taste, but because of its texture when cooked -it becomes almost creamy, almost. Amazing.

 

A New Perspective

Grandmas' tea, with van, from the window. It's grown to new heights lately.

Let seeing this old flower from a new vantage be a lesson to me. Constant worrying about my dead-end job that at the same time I fear to lose due to academic politics has me on edge. My old boss was demoted, my new boss is green, and a new school year begins tomorrow. Continuing to ask myself what it is I really want to be spending my time with, how it is I suppose to do better than today. 

I have a flurry of posts to get out over the next week, and then, posting will need to be somewhat intermittent for the time being. I have an exhibition coming up this winter, and possibly another this November, on which I must spend more time working.

High Rock Mycorrhizal

I had only been to Staten Island's Greenbelt twice. Once, a several years ago and then again this past spring for a late winter workshop on trail maintenance. Neither visit was comprehensive, leaving the vast majority of the trails unexplored. This time, I was going because I thought that woods of High Rock would be a good location to find edible mushrooms. And because it was mushrooms, I asked Marie and Vince to come along. 

High Rock Park is a hill landscape, only 90 acres, with a mature canopy of mixed red maple-sweetgum, oak-beech, and oak-tulip communities. The trees, the minimal understory, and abundance of leaf litter that I saw last March suggested to me that this would be a great place to find mushrooms. And, it was. Not steps from the parking lot, not steps from the entry road, there were mushrooms exploding through the leaf litter. 

The mosquitoes were more noticeable than usual, and that mixed with increasing humidity created the muggy, itchy feeling no one enjoys. After dousing ourselves in a deetless repellent that choked with the scent of hair spray, we were on our way. The red in white trail, the yellow trail, and then the green -all are good. The woods beautiful, the trails wide. Because of the hurricane, downslope trails were blocked by fallen trees, but generally easy to maneuver (I believe I belly rolled over one trunk).

Chicken

?

??

The large vernal pool (year round pond?).

Stinkhorn.

Bolete?

Boletus.

Myco-humorous.

For lunch, we drove to the greenbelt nature center. Afterward, we went off on the trail behind the center. There was little in the way of mushrooms in those woods until the forest changed to upland dry oak with an ericaceous understory (huckleberry?), not unlike those near the edges of the Long Island pine barrens. Here, we also found mushrooms, although with less frequency and variation than at High Rock.

Now that I've traveled more of the trails at the Greenbelt, I think I have learned to avoid the lowland woods if I wish to stay out of the bramble and briars, which are less interesting, and remind me too much of the suburban, disturbed nature in which the better woods are embedded. They also harbor more poison ivy, and with all the trees down, we had to limbo the vine more than once.  Moses Mountain, a unique or strange, small yet steep-sided hill feels like a vegetation-covered monument to construction debris (turns out, it is just that -thanks Robert Moses). At road crossings, garbage abounds, speaking more of a teenage hangout and trash thrown from cars than of a fine woodland park. And if it's mushrooms you are seeking, the lowlands also appear less fruitful. 

We decided that High Rock demands another trip, in autumn, but, I think, I can let the rest go. My mind has already started drifting towards another borough, another park: Van Cortlandt, where I am slated to pick up the trail work again this fall.

Taste Of Carmans

Full post soon.

Photophoria

New camera, meet your predecessor -a hard act to follow, no doubt. 

Marie, of 66sqft, has generously donated her certified, gently-used camera to my cause. 

Which is to take photos of things I've grown.

Thank you Marie, I am grateful.

Evening Relief

It had rained for two days, nonstop, before Irene. You remember that. We spent the first day in Bar Harbor avoiding the wet, but by evening, the clouds began to part.

The view from the woods edge.

And from the slick rocks covered in mustard seaweeds.

Which had mussels between them and occasional urchins.

And the coast had berries, like these.

Which dried blue.

And these plump reds.

That also came in orange.

And then the sun set, promising us a drier day.

A Thickening Plot

The weeds are high and abundant around the greater beach farm these days, with ragweed and mugwort taking center stage. You wouldn't know it from this photo, as it's from June, not long after we planted our tomatoes. So long ago...

Wednesday morning, there was an access-a-ride type van parked in front of the beach farm. I couldn't believe it -my garden neighbor's were present. I had heard that a school of some sort tended the plot, but their visit firmed my understanding of the situation. Standing plot-side was a youngish-looking man, glasses thick and slightly twisted, with striped shirt buttoned to the collar, and holding a hose to the black, shriveled vine of a former tomato plant. He watered under a constant commendation from somewhere else in the garden, a man I could not see. Your doing great. I went about my business, but I wanted someone to begin a conversation. There was a young woman present as well, but she didn't look my way and was tending to a group sitting in the picnic corral.

The voice approached while I was picking tomatoes. He commandeered the hose, sent the young man to the corral, and said to me that he would like to set up a watering system much like the one at our beach farm. I was skeptical, but who couldn't see that something was necessary.

I discovered that the group comes from a "school" in Coney Island, and that their cognitive and manual dexterity levels limit their ability to garden. I inquired as to why the garden was planted, hoed under, and planted again in one week's time (two groups at the school). I learned that the garden is not the interest of the caretakers present, but a woman who they work under who apparently worked especially hard to get these plots. She, however, never comes by the garden. I also learned that she refuses to give it up, although the only reason they were there that day was because... wait, stop. 

I already knew why they were there, and that reason was me. Last week I stumbled on the most important park ranger when she came by to unlock the garden shed about an hour after I had asked another ranger if he could do so. Why is she important? As fate would have it, she is the ranger we tried to see, checkbook in hand, only a month ago, but were dispatched by an artfully executed, federal run-around. So, why not introduce myself, then ask her to come take a quick look at the beach farm? 

She turned out to be a rather animated, quite friendly lady, with lots of garden stories of her own (she lives on Staten Island). And is terribly afraid of insects. The ranger moved to touch a leaf I had placed on the fence, but it was no leaf -it was a huge tomato hornworm attached to a leaf and she skip-jumped 10 feet back! Ha, we laughed, only in a city can you have a National Park ranger who is afraid of bugs. Afterward, I showed her the irrigation system, explained why the galvanized pipes are short-lived, and talked about needing more space. She then waded through weedy aisles to see which plots were tended and which were not. Upon her return, the ranger offered to add Betsy to the waiting list -something we tried to do last winter, but to no avail. She also took my email, so we may have communication.

The man -tall, balding, with glasses appeared familiar, looking somewhat like Mike Stivic from All In The Family. He confessed that the weeds were out of control, although I felt it necessary to point out that all his plants were dead. He explained that watering has been a problem, but I discouraged him from a more complicated watering system like ours. I thought a timer with a flood system or even a sprinkler would be better. Honestly, someone just spraying it once a week would be better and requires no extra work.

He said that they are supposed to come by three days each week, but haven't been here since they planted for all the kinds of reasons you might imagine. Then he told me that in early October there is a harvest festival for which they buy vegetables from the grocery store. They pretend that they picked them at the garden. Don't feel bad, I offered, most of us participate in that ruse. But I started to wonder what therapeutic or educational value this little bit of theater has for their clients. You have a man standing there watering a dead plant? It's absurd, even sad. 

I wondered what they were capable of doing. Could they weed, plant, pick? Is there a way to get the group involved, not just sitting at the picnic tables? And then I went fishing. I offered to help them out with their garden if they would cede a certain amount of their space to me. He reiterated that his boss won't ever give up the garden. But I am not asking her to give up the garden, I'm asking her to allow a garden to grow. We can work together to plant, to harvest, maybe to weed as well, and we'll keep it watered and growing. Or, if things must remain the same, I can help you organize your plot so that you get as much out of one that you are currently getting out of two. We'll water. And, greedy me -all I ask is that you cede a portion of those two plots to my growing obsession -I have six to eight hundred allium sets to plant in November. Think about it.

One of my neighbor's two plots in June. It's now full of weeds, tomatoes dead.

Post Irene

On Saturday morning, as Hurricane Irene approached NYC, we floated toward the beach farm with ease. Yet, on Wednesday morning, three days after its departure, I was stopped by a park ranger. Park's closed, he said, then, what's your business here? Garden, I said. Go on, garden's only thing open today. 

I wondered why. Meanwhile, military copters zig zag across the sky. The ranger, in earshot of the beach farm, was chasing away beach goers all morning. I bet they relished the opportunity to close Tilden beach so that it could be what it was intended to be -a shore bird sanctuary, not a hip, no lifeguards please, hangout. Although, it was a really nice beach day.

A few short minutes into straightening up the farm, I believe I discovered the reason the beach was closed, and possibly even the reason for the military -an invasion of hungry mosquitoes and biting flies! My ankles are still swollen with bites. Sometimes it seems that rain simply multiplies mosquitoes, as if rain was a cloning agent. I suppose that 10 inches of rain in two weeks is enough to create an army.

As for the farm, it really did take all the weather rather well, which appears to be the scenario across the NYC area if gardening bloggers' reports are any indication. I did lose a few tomatoes, too small to ripen, although one was large and ripening on the ground, unaffected by the drop. Not so many plums had dropped either. It does seem the plants are living in late September over late August, however. They are in a state of decline.

I picked a couple of stout carrots and some orange pixie tomatoes and, of course, a couple of pounds of green beans. I also began pulling bean plants to make room for more broccoli. I would say the peppers fared the worst through the storm, losing small, green peppers to the ground while heavy rains washed away soil from the roots. 

I think it is fair to say that peppers are finicky growers, difficult even, with the exception of the hot peppers like habanero. I got one orange bell out of the ordinary bell pepper plant and it had some circular rot spots. Others fell off prematurely, or had holes bored by insects. Even the poblanos have been poor producers. Meanwhile there are healthy looking pepper plants sprouting all over the side yard back at home -what gives? 

 The snap peas are beginning to poke through where cucumbers once reigned.

Many Trails Closed

Much like the roads, trails cut across grade and creeks turned to torrents in heavy rains. Many trails have been swamped, wooden bridges swept away, and trees fallen over.

See the New York New Jersey Trail Conference for news about hiking and camping in upstate New York. Also, the NYS Parks site for news about the same.

Trees Of Irene

Last Sunday morning no one was out. I think the only other time this happens is in the midst of a strong snowstorm. On a Sunday morning.

I stood on my stoop watching this eighty foot silver maple react to the wind. Windstorms over the last two years have taken out many of the silver maples that had been growing in the backyards of the quad (our small four blocks). 

It thrashed, flagellating itself on the brick building, but did not break. I suspect it has something to do with the warp of its trunk, which upwardly curves toward the southwest.

Tuesday's Litter Mob allowed us to get our hands sappy clearing one large white oak from a paved path in the Midwood. Nearby, a red oak had fallen across a wood-chipped path. It's always sad to see these trees come down, but the work was a welcome relief from picking up the trash left behind by cruisers.

Green-wood Cemetery has taken some damage as well, a good amount of it from Sunday afternoon's north westerly winds. All in all, however, it appears our neighborhood's trees have fared pretty well.

Up next, tales from the beach farm...

The Occidental Philistine

I've noticed recently that I haven't been prompted for any updates on my imac in about a year. I clicked software update and saw that it was empty. I googled it. Wow. Apple isn't writing any more software updates for my computer, not even itunes. Then I tried to watch a video online, and the site prompted me to update my adobe flash. I tried, but adobe said my system wasn't supported anymore. Oh. Cast out, left behind.

I sold my gas-guzzling '77 Ford F250 to buy this imac in 2004 when they were first G-fived and priced high. Intending to get 10 years out of this computer, I've just installed the last OS (10.5.?)  written for the G5 imac, crossing my fingers that the web won't drive this computer over a cliff before its time.

Many of you may be wondering where the hell all those awesome photos I used to publish have gone. Well, my 7 year-old camera, which is 49 in technology years, died about a month or so ago. At first, I replaced it with my wife's 8 year-old (56) camera. But that poor camera couldn't survive the lonely life of a widow, and took its own life just a few weeks after. Occasionally I find myself holding a no name camera that I believe my mother got for free when she bought something, maybe a hamburger. It says it has a 5 megapixel sensor, but that is only true at 72 ppi, which translates into a max printed image of 4 x 6 inches. It blows out the whites, has fixed focus (infinity) and generally sucks.

Although I can be quite wordy, believe me when I say that most of my posts have been built around the pictures. In fact, it was the digital camera that pushed me toward blogging.

And today, I see that Blogger has introduced a new blogger interface, with which I write. On first approach it seems that if they were going for clean, they may have gone too far. Of course, the blog looks the same, and I just may get used to the new interface. What I really want Blogger to come up with is an app for iphone should I get one of those some day, you know, after the money falls off a truck.

Moving On

I had nothing planned for today, so I took a walk in Prospect Park with Betsy after the walk around the neighborhood didn't satisfy. The basic image is asphalt covered in a blanket of small branches and leaves. Cars with whole leaves plastered to their sides like green decals. There are trees down too, but mostly large limbs fallen, especially at the high points, like Lookout Hill or along the road near the baseball fields. We didn't venture too far into the woods because the winds were still blowing. I picked up a large osage orange fruit. They've been shaken from their limbs. 

Should I have been surprised how many babies and toddlers were running around, center of the storm having just passed? 

A NYC news reporter said this morning that dogs were running around without leashes in response to a question about the condition of the streets in lower Manhattan. Then he asked a fireman if the road he was on would be closed because of flooding and the half-bored fireman lazily said it would close itself. The reporter repeated this (incredulous?) and then bid them to be safe. 

This too shall pass.

For The Record Rehash

I believe Irene will have completely essentially passed us by 9 am tomorrow 12 noon this morning. It's been a long 4 days since Irene was hanging around the bahamas, and the path of the storm was pretty clear at that time. The weather folks are making much of the rain, and there will be some moderate flooding, especially north and west as they say on the news. The chances of major salt water flooding is diminishing, except in the most typical areas. If wind is your thing, watch for it tonight, after midnight, to see the thrashing. Also, if your building is significantly tall, the more wind you'll actually get. Expect gusts around 30-60 mph.

 Looks about right on top of us. But little in its wake.

Coordinates: 40.3°N 74.1°W. Watch out Christie, she's riding up the GS Parkway.

Passing over NYC, 8:51 am. Start planning your Sunday afternoon.

With Nothing Left To Do...

The jugs of water, the spiral sausages, the laundry, parking the car in just the right place. I decided to entertain myself with a little garden work between the squalls. 

Grandma's tea has grown aggressively this month, reaching above the sill.

It will get whipped, no doubt, but its a tough ol' bird.

 The gaura droops under the weight of rain. Or is it the heavy atmosphere?

All our recent rains have also driven the max sunflower to rocket despite my hard pruning in July. I tied it into a bunch so that it can thrash as a unit. The side yard is a tangle of overgrown and under-performing plants. Almost all of the NEWFS native perennials I bought a year and a half ago have either croaked or underperformed. I suppose it's too hot here for plants raised in the eastern forest of Massachusetts. Meanwhile the blue asiatic dayflower and pinkish-white smartweed are flowering in abundance.

It wasn't until I started picking up the remains of sexual activity in the woods of Prospect Park with the Litter Mob that I understood that the paper towels I find in the side yard garden are the remains of sexual activity on our corner. What delight. As I worked the yard today, I flung each rag onto the sidewalk. Then, one by one, neighborhood ladies (the old school) emerged to hang out, chattin' it up about hurricanes and flowers, flooding streets and lousy gutters, which trees will fall and how my landlord caught one prostitute pooping in the front of our building.

A squall came on and we returned to our buildings. I took a shower.

Tropic Of Beach Farm

 Beach farm skies.

From the dunes, looking north.

From the dunes, looking south.

 From the dunes, looking dumb.

It was inevitable that we would pass handfuls of sightseers, one who announced to us that they just had to see it for themselves. But there isn't much to see at this time. Doesn't look much different than a winter's day, except for those swimmers. After I snapped these quick shots, the park ranger showed up beeping his horn. As we hustled back to the van he announced that we needed a permit to park there! Ha, I thought that was funny. Err, where do I get one of those surge permits. Must be habit.

Hurricane Haul

 It was eight am. No stop, no tolls.

 Tilden was wide open, with just a few characters hustling toward the shore.

But I went for these. The german stripe has been a disappointment this year and there was no way I was going to allow these two fall to the storm. Bad picture, good fruit. I also picked one that had the slightest blush of yellow on the bottom, where the germans start to ripen first. The remaining greens were left to fend for themselves, including a new flush of brandywine and black russians.

These were my second concern. Plums are determinate, meaning they set fruit in one or two flushes. I had hoped flush one had ripened, but I was forced to pick them a pale blush. I left the greens knowing a strong gale may drop them from the vine, much as what seemed the earthquake had done the other day. Truly, a mysterious pile of greens under the bush the morning after the quake.

I hate picking fruit before ripe, and there are camps on the practice of picking, I know. I would have left these another week.

The haul. Several carrots, a pile of semi-red plums, green beans of course, a few eggplants, mysterious and small self-dropping poblanos, parsley, basil, and those two giant striped germans. The basket is always full.

In other beach farm news...It's about to be a tropical storm. We expect some flattening. We expect to pull the green beans after the storm. They will be replaced by surviving broccoli starts.

This is the broccoli I purchased last week in Maine and planted this past Wednesday. I decided not to tent them despite the cabbage moths fluttering around. The gale will whip the tent and the tent will whip the broccoli to tatters. They can flatten and survive better on their own.

The cukes were pulled on Wednesday, and now that the wind is about to blow it appears the right decision. In their place, newly planted snap peas, which have not risen yet, and are hopefully waiting out the storm.

Incidentally, next to the flowering cilantro are all the carrot thinnings I attempted to transplant. While they looked pretty sickly at first, they now appear well-adjusted and healthy.

This one is healthy too thanks to the feast of parsley and carrot tops. It appeared that this swallowtail had just emerged, and was clinging without much movement to the fence post. Good luck little buddy.