Bird studies with a camera

by Frank M. Chapman

45. Hackensack marshes in August.

On a bright August morning I mount a spur of trap rock which reaches out from the western base of the Palisades, and from this elevation have an uninterrupted view over the meadows. The cool, invigorating air foretells the approach of autumn; it is brilliantly clear. The Orange hills stand out with the distinctness of Western mountains. The sun is at my back, and the light shows the meadows to the best advantage. At this distance I get the effect of only the masses of color; tracts of yellowish green meadow grass tinged with copper, and in places thickly sprinkled with the white flowers of the water hemlock and water parsnip; streaks of light green wild rice, and sharply defined areas of dark green cat-tail flags. The grass grows on the drier land, the wild rice in the small sloughs and creeks which are bordered by the flags. In the spring the wind blows the pollen from the cat-tail blossoms, and a shifting greenish vapor floats over the marsh; in the autumn a heavy westerly wind raises the seed-bearing down high in the air, carries it over the Palisades, across the Hudson, and it descends like a fall of fleecy snow on wondering New York.

The marsh is a vast arena inclosed by the Palisades and Passaic hills; it is a great plain, with blue stretches of the winding river appearing here and there, and the haystacks are the huts of aborigines. I half close my eyes, and it is a copper-yellow sea. The grasses roll in undulating waves, capped by a white crest of parsnip and hemlock blossoms; the dark irregular patches of flags are the shadows of clouds, the light streaks of wild rice are shoals, a hovering Marsh Hawk is a Gull. A stately white-winged schooner^[45] comes up the river; her hull is hidden by the meadow grasses; she is sailing through the sea of my fancy.

This is an impressionist’s view of the meadows. Now let us leave our rocky lookout and examine them more in detail. The meadow we are leaving is a meadow of all summer; the one we are approaching is a meadow clad in all the glory of its August flowers. One might think Nature was holding a flower show here, so gorgeous is the display. The railway track at the edge of the marsh is apparently an endless aisle bordered by a rich exhibit of flowers. Clusters of thoroughwort and purple loose-strife grow so abundantly they give color to the foreground, through which wild sunflowers make streaks of gold. There are solid beds of purple asters on the drier land, and delicate snow-white saggitarias in the sloughs. Jewel flowers sparkle through the flags, and convolvulus hangs from the reeds, its own foliage scarce showing, or, growing with the fragrant climbing hempweed, it forms banks of dense vegetation. The scarlet lobelia darts upward like a tongue of flame, startling in its intense brilliancy. There are burnet, vervain, gerardia, and running groundnut. But it is the marsh^[46] mallow which, more than any other flower, gives beauty to the meadow. It grows here with wasteful luxuriance, and the dark masses of flags serve as a frame for this floral picture. Out in the marsh it grows in equal profusion; the meadow is hung with small pink lanterns, as if for a fête. A single flower of the marsh mallow commands the attention of the most unobservant, and when growing in abundance it excites enthusiastic admiration.

46. Marsh mallows.

Nor is the animal life of the marsh less interesting than its flora. Meadow mice nest beneath the haycocks. Were it not for the minks and Hawks which prey on them, they might become a scourge throughout the surrounding country. Muskrats are living in peaceful security in their snug summer homes, hollowed from the banks of the streams. They are the true villagers here, and pass the winter in icy huts, like Eskimos. Out in the grasses Short-eared Owls are hiding. Their day begins when the sun disappears behind the Orange hills; then one may hear the “quawk” of the Night Heron. Red-winged Blackbirds nest here, and in the autumn they gather in great flocks and feed on the wild rice.

47. Wild rice.

Long-billed Marsh Wrens—small, nervous, excitable bits of feathered life—are abundant in the flags, and to them they attach their large woven nests. Except for a harsh, scolding note they are silent now, but earlier in the year the marsh is musical with their rippling songs. The fervor of the love season overcomes their fondness for the dark recesses of the flags, and, singing, they rise into the air as if driven upward by the mine of melody which explodes within them.