by Mary Grow “It’s a sad, sad situation. People love the chairs,” Winslow Parks and Recreation Director Amanda McCaslin said regretfully. The chairs she meant were the wooden Adirondack chairs that used to be in Fort Halifax Park, near the Kennebec River. Early in June, unknown people apparently threw them into the river. Since they […]
by Roland D. Hallee A reader recently asked about the Japanese beetle, and the lack of them so far this year. She said they usually devour her roses, but has not seen one this year. So far, It’s difficult to say definitively if it will be a bad year for Japanese beetles, but there are […]
by Roland D. Hallee For some reason, this year, I am getting more and more questions about poison ivy. Where is it? What does it look like? What do you do about it and how do you treat it? All very legitimate questions. As we all know, poison ivy and other members of its family […]
by Roland D. Hallee The house mouse is becoming more and more of a nuisance at camp, and to say the least, are not welcome. My neighbors are fighting a constant battle with them, and until Saturday, my wife and I had been free of them. They have intruded our camp and when we uncovered […]
by Roland D. Hallee It has already been a month since my wife and I moved to camp for the summer. With the annual trek comes the installation of the bird feeding stations that are all around us. We get the usual local congregations of chickadees, nuthatches, gold finches, blue jays, woodpeckers and occasional wanderers […]
by Roland D. Hallee Last Thursday night my wife woke me from a sound sleep to listen to something outside our camp. Well, being somewhat groggy, I didn’t hear anything, and went back to sleep. It wasn’t long afterwards that she woke me again. “Can’t you hear that?” she inquired sounding a little frustrated – […]
by Roland D. Hallee Where are the June bugs? Although they are called that, they usually make their first appearances in May. Generally, June bugs, Phyllophaga, do make their appearance in mid- to late-May. So why are they called June bugs? It all depends on what you want to call them. They are also known […]
by Roland D. Hallee This week, this tidbit came in my email inbox. According to Smith’s Pest Management, be ready for a summer invasion of pests in Maine, following the state’s mild winter. Maine’s mild winter may have been a welcome break from the cold, but according to one pest expert, it came with a […]
by Roland D. Hallee While driving through the countryside, you may have noticed some small bodies of water that are there in the spring, but disappear as summer proceeds. These vernal pools are essential to our ecosystem. Vernal pools provide important breeding habitat for select amphibians and insects, spiders, and crustaceans. Vernal pools are typically […]
by Roland D. Hallee “It’s that time of year, again.” Probably one of the most over used phrases in the English language, and one that I loathe to hear. Why? Because when you come right down to it, everyday is that time of year for something. Anyway, here we go. It’s that time of the […]