Most of us are familiar with poison ivy and know to avoid its shiny three leaf plants and vines, but not everyone recognizes even poison ivy and knows the painful itching that can occur from contact with this plant, especially those who have never seen it. We have many visitors from Quebec here, and apparently Read More …

Here in Ogunquit we have a bee, butterfly and bird garden, a gift to the town, on the Marginal Way. The idea is that this garden, planted with sweet fern, butterfly weed and cone flowers among other plants, will attract these insects and birds, a noble plan. However, it’s not clear to me if pesticides Read More …

If you read last week’s blog about Doug Tallamy, that University of Delaware professor who advocates planting native trees and shrubs, you might have realized that there were a few key ideas missing. You might have thought that letting bugs and caterpillars chow down on your shrubs and trees might be going a bit far Read More …

Have you heard of Doug Tallamy?  He’s chair of the Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology at the University of Delaware. He’s visiting Maine this summer, lecturing as he moves up the coast, and recently he spoke here about the necessity of planting nativetrees and plants. Why? What’s wrong with planting ornamental plants from Japan Read More …

Ogunquit Beach hosts more of our federally and state protected piping plovers than ever before, a good sign of a healthy beach with few predators.  At best estimate we had 18 adults, 15 chicks and 3 fledglings – chicks with their flying feathers but not ready to fly on our beach.  These are amazing birds, Read More …

Beach patrols will return again this year after a highly successful year last year, reminding beach goers our beach is a non-smoking, no alcohol beach and keeping people our of our fragile dunes.  For the first time in many years, our beach was so clean due to the beach patrols, that no end of the Read More …

I know there have been a lot of jokes about crabgrass – that weed that infests so many lawns. Growing up, I don’t recall we ever had crabgrass. We had a back field that had, well, field grass and wildflowers, but we kept that pretty much mowed down, but in our lawn? Just good old Read More …

Our real composting began in earnest after many summer trips to the transfer station. We love the local summer melons, but there are few messes worse than melon rinds and seeds that have been sitting in your trash in the summer heat waiting for a transfer station trip. They quickly turn rancid and rotten and, Read More …

If you have a lawn or yard that usually puddles up when it rains, you might be interested in a free offer from FP Environmental Associates, the environmental group working with the town and the Conservation Commission. FP Environmental is offering to visit your property and suggests solutions to most drainage problems you may have Read More …

Many of us would love to tap into the vast resources of solar energy for our homes, but we lack the space or the proper southern exposure to be able to do this. While it is not within the Ogunquit Conservation Commission’s mission statement to work on solar energy possibilities, this might be because solar Read More …