A meal of small plates

An accumulation of small things can add up to a banquet of delights.

Deep in the woods by a stream I found a pure white orchid, about 18″ high, that I had never seen before.

Being me, I of course identified it as something only known in Maine at one site nowhere near me.

I was wrong. My white orchid was actually a purple orchid, a Greater Purple-fringed Orchid, Platanthera grandiflora, to be more precise, which perversely is occasionally white. I was forced to accept this when the second stalk more sensibly produced pale purple flowers. The turncoat sister stalks in the background of this shot.

Despite its deceptive behavior, it is very beautiful.

The American Chestnut has pretty much disappeared after the chestnut blight imported from Asia killed about 4 billion trees in the 20th century.

But every now and again one decides to grow, and lo and behold there is a very healthy-looking sapling on the edge of my field, maybe twenty feet tall, and in full flower:

I know that they often start off fine, and then succumb a few years later, usually before the tree reaches sexual maturity. That this one is flowering suggests it is currently beating the odds, so for now I am just enjoying it:

The Red-winged blackbirds have been nesting on my beaver pond, and the young have now fledged. They are still being fed by their diligent parents.

The mother (bottom) has caught a dragonfly (look carefully). The fledgling, top, is starving.

She moves higher,

then stuffs the dragonfly into the youngster’s mouth (the mother is on the right). She had two to feed, and kept up a steady flow of provisions.

Otherwise, all is calm. The American Black Ducks have seven ducklings, and the stray loon was still there when I wrote this, and apparently healthy. (He/she has now moved on.)

And I am replete.