🥳 Happy Birthday, puddle! 💐 💝 & hearts ; ❤️

 

Hurricane Lee is now a post-tropical Tropical Storm strength storm

 

 

Wonders of Nature: The Feather Star

This beautiful creature is a Crinoid called a feather star. Since the class Crinoidea belongs to the phylum Echinodermata, feather stars and their close relatives sea lilies are also related to sea stars (starfish), sea cucumbers, and sea urchins.

The crinoids are the oldest class of echinoderms. Fossils of extinct species show that they were in existence as long as five hundred seventy million years ago. Like other echinoderms, crinoids display pentaradial symmetry. They may have five arms or many more, but those arms often grow in multiples of five. Also like other echinoderms, if a crinoid loses an arm, it can grow it back.

Feather stars, which live in coral reefs and often have symbiotic relationships with small creatures such as shrimp, can swim through the ocean waters or crawl in their habitat with their many arms, that are called temen.

Read about crinoids and see gorgeous photos at One World One Ocean: Blue Zoo: Crinoids [Click]
Read specifically about feather stars and see more gorgeous potos at A-Z Animals: Feather Star [Click] and Feather Star: Meet the Fascinating Marine Creature [Click]

Here’s a relevant 2022 article: Scientists found a new sea creature with 20 'arms' and named it after a strawberry [Click]

Male Juvenile Rose Breasted Grosbeak

 

Northern Lights over Malletts Bay, Vermont!

photo credit: Adam Silverman Photography


THIS is what was happening on Tuesday evening, right there at our boat,
Loch Nest, while I was home dealing with food poisoning!
~ listener

 

Blue Sky Day with Cloud

 

Mount Mansfield

 

22 Years Ago...the Twin Towers

 

🎉 It's listener's Cake Day! 💐

 

High Level Talks

Caption: U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, Monday, June 19, 2023.

“It’s a lot harder effectively negotiating with my kids than it is with our Chinese or Russian counterparts.”
- Secretary of State Antony Blinken as quoted in AARP Bulletin, July 2023

Flowers Along the Path

Honey Bee on Echinacea

 

This one made its Chrysalis ON the zipper!

 

New Monarch Butterfly

The First Labor Day Parade

The first ever Labor Day parade in the United States was held on September 5, 1882 in New York City.

History of Labor Day at the Labor Department [Click]

Teamwork! (They're actually walking in a circle too)

 

Amazing!

 

(And now it's September!) 11 year old Juggling 6 balls

 

All the performers are age 11 to 18! (and there goes August!)

 

Under the Big Top ~ Circus Smirkus

 

Late August Garden

I Have a Dream!

                               

LOL

 

Sixty years later

For the 60th anniversary of the march, attendees share their memories of the nation-changing event

In Their Words: March on Washington Participants Look Back on Historic Day

Watermelon Time

Eat it by the slice with a dash of salt, or try these recipes:
15 Juicy Watermelon Recipes [Click]

New Chrysalis

 

Monarch Caterpillar just about to spin its Chrysalis

 

Gorgeous Day on the Lake

 

Spinnaker Kitty is a Sweetie

 

Another young grand at the helm!

Age 5 years and a few weeks.

In fact, she was also at the bow. She loved standing at the bow with the wind in her face and announcing "Waves Ahoy!" whenever a motorboat sent some our way. Given that it was also blowing whitecaps, she was a real hoot.

Grandad Wil held onto the back of her life vest until she insisted:

"Don't hold me, Grandad!" So he quietly employed the Spinnaker halyard.

Just Like Mother Used to Make

  

Ready for Harvest on the Farm

 

In Vermont, we call 'em Creemees!

Eating Out at Lou's in Hanover NH (Dartmouth College)

  

View from the Vermont Interstate

 

Sunset from the boat slip

Rock Point (folks actually dive off those cliffs)

 

Stairway in Burlington, Vermont

 

The Spinnaker on Loch Nest is Royal Blue