Author Archives: Ric Brewer

Hansville Greenway

Join the Natural History Society on Monday, April 14th, for a choice of two walks in Hansville. We will all meet in Hansville, and walk a mile to Point No Point Lighthouse. Some people may then choose to return to their cars. The rest of us will hike a 7-mile loop, with naturalists Michele Olsen and Wendy Feltham leading the hike. We will look for signs of spring in the forests, marine mammals, seabirds, forest birds, and Hansville’s resident California Scrub Jays. Please RSVP to Michele for details and signups:  charlies1st@icloud.com.

Polystichum munitum (Sword Fern)
Ribes sanguineum (Red-flowering Currant)
Hylocomium splendens (Step Moss)

Dungeness Spit

by Cheryl Lowe

Dungeness Spit, a narrow 5-mile arc of sand, gravel, and cobble jutting out into the Strait of Juan de Fuca, is the central feature of the Dungeness National Wildlife Refuge. The spit, sometimes only 100 ft wide at the highest tides, protects a complex of lagoons and tide flats that shelter migrating shorebirds in spring and fall, a bay for wintering waterfowl, and expanses of eelgrass meadows rich in marine life. Rising above the base of the spit on the west side is a quiet forest of Douglas fir, western hemlock, western redcedar, Pacific madrone, and red alder. 

Dungeness Spit

The spit, fed by a regular influx of sediment from nearby bluffs in a process known as longshore drift, continues to grow lengthwise approximately 15 feet per year. The accumulating sands and gravels are reinforced by a complex, woven spine of driftwood and adorned with a rich variety of coastal dune plant species. 

Dungeness Spit Driftwood, Stones, Kelp

The Dungeness National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1915 as a refuge, preserve, and breeding ground for native birds. Over 100 species of plants have been recorded here, along with 244 species of birds, 29 species of mammals, 8 species of reptiles and amphibians, and 26 species of fish. For more info, go to  https://www.fws.gov/refuge/dungeness

Surf Scoter

The Burke Museum

by Chris Jones

The Burke Museum at the University of Washington was established in 1885 by the “Young Naturalists’ Society,” a group of teenagers passionate about studying and preserving the natural world of the Pacific Northwest. Their collection of specimens grew, and in 1899 it was officially designated as the Washington State Museum.

Today, the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture is dedicated to preserving and sharing our natural and cultural heritage. It serves as both a research hub and public museum and is a leader in the university museum world.

The Burke integrates the fields of archeology, anthropology, biology, and geology and engages with local Indigenous communities to research cultural history, co-curate exhibits, and preserve artifacts. After three years of construction, the museum and its 18 million biological specimens and artifacts moved to the “New Burke” in 2019. There are visible labs where visitors can watch researchers working.

More information: www.burkemuseum.org

A Special Lagoon

by Wendy Feltham

Chinese Gardens Lagoon is one of the jewels of Port Townsend. Surrounded by a beach, a forest, and farmland, this lagoon is home to resident and migratory birds. I walk around this lagoon often, seeking the birds that make this area their home— Great Blue Herons, Mallards, Bald Eagles, and Spotted Towhees. 

Chinese Gardens Lagoon

The lagoon changes with the seasons. In winter, many ducks, including Hooded Mergansers, Green-winged Teals, and Northern Shovelers, find food and safety from hunters here. Yellow-rumped Warblers thrive in the Wax Myrtle shrubs. In summer three swallow species swoop along the water’s edge. Savannah Sparrows nest in the grasslands that Ft. Worden State Park won’t mow until the young have fledged. 

Yellow-rumped Warbler

Recently I’ve noticed Double-crested Cormorants resting on the old pilings, especially those at the far corner where people can’t approach. I’ve watched herons and mergansers catch Three-spined Sticklebacks, and lately even huge Pacific Staghorn Sculpins.

Great Blue Heron & Leptocottus armatus (Pacific Staghorn Sculpin)

A few years ago Ft. Worden State Park and the Friends of Ft. Worden created the Chinese Gardens Interpretive Trail, with signage by painter Larry Eifert. This project highlights the wildlife as well as the historical use of this area, which was part of a series of wetlands and ponds used by Tribes and Chinese families: http://www.tribalmuseum.jamestowntribe.org/hsg/exhibits/chetzemokatrail/northbeach.php

Snowflakes

by John Goldwood

As we head into the winter months, we’re filled with anticipation of our first snowfall of the season here in the Puget Sound low country. Will we have a White Christmas, or will we need to wait for the colder months beyond?

Alnus rubra (Red Alder)


For one young man living on a Vermont farm in the late 1800s, his initial interaction with snowflakes led to a lifelong passion and worldwide recognition as ‘The Snowflake Man of Jericho.’ Wilson Alwyn Bentley, born in 1865, was fifteen years old when his mother provided an inexpensive microscope for him to view snowflakes. The incredibly delicate crystals seen through the microscope sparked his lifelong interest. At nineteen, he acquired a compound microscope and a large studio camera and became the first person to photograph a single snowflake on January 15, 1885. For the next fifty years, the first snowfall would find Bentley setting up his equipment in an unheated shed at the farm to capture on glass plates the magnified images of snowflakes. He eventually photographed nearly 6000 individual snowflakes. His images have been published in college textbooks and the Encyclopedia Britannica and used as inspiration by artists and jewelers. His snowflake photo plates are found in many museums including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and the Smithsonian.

Holodiscus discolor (Oceanspray)

When the next snowfall arrives, I hope you will be inspired to rush out with your magnifying glass and enjoy those beautiful snow crystals!