Winter’s over or just about and there is a lot I won’t miss – like putting on all the winter duds – coat, hat, boots, gloves – before even going outside, for example.

Or those cold winds whipping snow against the house, filling the driveway and walkways with the white stuff; beautiful to be sure, but a nuisance as well.

What I will miss are the eagles.

We’ve had them before in winter. Some winters we would see them just once, like the time we had a carpenter reshingling the side of the house and he called to us, pointing at the tallest tree around. And there at the top was an eagle – not for long – because crows and other birds were attacking it, doing nothing more than annoying it to be sure, but that was enough. The eagle flew out of the top of the tree and disappeared.

Sometimes there were just rumors that there were eagles flying around our tidal estuary, looking for an easy meal.

But this year a pair was here. We would often see one or just once both of them gliding around. Looking out over our tidal river and long sandy beach, gulls on the beach and on our tidal river, would suddenly spring into the air, circling the tidal river; the ducks resting on the beach edge would head into the water, while high overhead, we could see the eagle’s broad wings catching the updrafts, circling over the tidal river and southern beach.

Only once we saw one of the eagles dive into the river mouth, but a building blocked our view. Did it catch a fish? duck? A gull? We never knew.

But mostly we would see an eagles white head and tail feathers, circling and once we saw the eagle mount higher than any bird I have ever seen.

Were the pair spending the winter around our tidal river and estuary? Or were they the pair, as a wildlife biologist friend suggested, seen on the York River 7 or 8 miles south? “They have a big territory,” he pointed out. I’m sorry they don’t stick around.

I assume they are gone now, back north where fewer people will be this summer; to a place where the fish are plentiful and the living is easy.

We’ll miss them.

State Senator Tom Saviello of Franklin is trying to have the Maine Legislature’s Joint Standing Committee on Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry OK a bill that would take away a town’s right to pass their own ordinances about using pesticides and place this in state control.

In state control. Not local control.

Local control is one our basic Maine freedoms.

These Maine towns already have some kind of pesticide ordinance:
Allagash, Amherst, Arrowsic, Brighton Plantation, Brunswick, Castine, Coplin Plantation, Cranberry Isles, Harpswell, Lebanon, Limerick, Limestone, Montville, Newburgh, New Gloucester, New Sweden, Ogunquit, Owl’s Head, Portland, Rangeley, Rockland, South Portland, Southport, Standish, Sweden, Waterboro, Wayne, and Wells.

The issue is not just a town’s right to pass safeguards against synthetic and chemical pesticides, but local control itself.

You can email at [email protected]. You can also contact everyone on the committee by emailing the clerk of this committee at [email protected] .

If Saviello’s town of Franklin wants to poison its children, adults and pets with pesticides, let them vote for it.

Help stop politicians trying to rob us of our local control.

If you read last week’s blog then you know that our town may open up formerly protected areas within 75’ of streams for single family homes andsmaller structures such as decks. This will be left open to voters.

This all began when the Planning Board considered adopting changes to its Shoreland Zoning and Stream Protected Zone to be in line with the Maine state suggestions. These changes were not necessary but suggested by the town’s code enforcement officer.

The most controversial of these changes involved the chance for property owners to build within the Stream Protected Zone.

Our town’s attorney suggested separating this controversial part from the rest of the suggested changes and offering two ordinances to the votersin June. This is what will probably happen.

How many properties would be affected? Two are in or almost entirely within the stream protected zone. Other properties might be as well. The code enforcement officer mentioned that even if a property had, say, 20% of its needed land for building within this zone, or even if you owned theproperty before this protection was passed, you could not build your home or smaller structure there.

One case involved a home owner whose home came right to the edge of the protected zone and asked to build a deck that so the family could enjoy the natural area near the stream. The deck would be in the protected zone. The home owner was refused.

Here we have a classic case of property rights versus a town’s right to protect its streams and rivers from possible pollution.  Is there a middle way?

Here is what the changed ordinance affecting these property owners would say:  If a property owner wants to build a one family home on this currently protected land, then he or she could go before the Zoning Board of Appeals. If the Zoning Board of Appeals allowed him or her, then the property owner could go before the Planning Board.

The Planning Board could decide what kind of environmental protections the property owner would need in order to build the single family home or other structure or reject the plan.

This way, the property owner at least has a path open, now he has none.

You be the judge!  Should the town vote to keep the same stream protected zones? Or allow property owners a possible path to build what they wish to build on their property in stream protected zones?

Our conservation commission urged a change in the Shoreland Zoning a few years ago. This change would apply the same 75’ setback from any body of water, including streams not defined by the Maine DEP, as streams such as water flows usually 1-2’ wide.

These small flows can flood roads after a hard rain.  Apparently the Maine DEP finally recognized one of these narrow flows as a ‘stream.Voters voted to define these flows as streams and part of the Stream Protection Zone. Nothing could be built within this 75’ zoneWater testing suggested one of these ‘streams’ to be carrying pollutants to our tidal river and ocean beacThe Conservation Commission urged the town to apply for a DEP Clean Water grant and after winning the grant, hired an environmental company to test the town’s streams and riveFollowing extensive water testing and an analysis of the DNA from the water samples the principal cause was found to be dog feces. People were not picking up after their pets or tossing their pets’ ‘land mines’ into the town storm drains.

All the streams in our town end up in the ocean and in areas along our beach where people swim; in winter, clammers work the tidal river. This pollution could make swimmers sick and close the clam flats.

Recently the town’s code enforcement officer suggesting making the town’s Shoreland Zoning agree with the new Maine state suggestions. These changes are not necessary, but one would allow a property owner to build a single family house within the 75’ Stream Protected Zones. The owner would go before the Zoning Board of Appeals and if approved, head to the Planning Boar

Soon the Planning Board will decide whether or not to make these changes to the town’s Shoreland Zoning and if it decides to do so, put them in an ordinance that the town will vote on in June.

Should the town open the door to building in this protected zone?

Would allowing houses in this stream protected zone wipe out years of work by the Conservation Commission, town and environmental company to clean up the rivers? Could the town ensure the clean stream and river water we are finally achieving?

You be the judge.  What should the Planning Board do?

(To be continued)

Lose power much? We seem to lose power a lot more here than when we lived in upstate New York.  We seem to have lost power routinely several times a year since we moved here nearly 20 years ago.

Twice I remember losing power in upstate NY during the 30 years we lived there, once, for about two hours; the other time, for about 6 hours.

I can’t recall anyone in Upstate buying a generator.  Generators here seem almost as plentiful as the family car – a near necessity.

We would probably join the crowd, except our lot is too small; we have no room for a propane generator and less room for a gas generator unless we put it out where the snow is deepest

We have fireplaces but no place to store wood. We do have wood pellets with special trays for burning them, but when we lost power a few years ago for 40 hours, the pellets and even those paraffin logs hardly heated the house.

So what can we do if we lose power?  Bundle up?  Head to a motel?

There’s hope for people like us.

Tesla has a backup storage battery – the Powerwall – and Maine’s Pika Energy Company also makes a backup battery. Ideally these would be hooked to a home’s solar panels.

But what if your house isn’t aligned for solar or too shady?

The Tesla battery can store energy from our CMP power, but the cost installed to power our two Rennai propane heaters, our fridge and a few light outlets would be nearly $12,500 with one Tesla Powerwall. The Pika battery is more expensive and designed for solar.  These are the only household storage batteries I know about.

With Tesla’s using more of their huge Nevada desert factory and their plans to sell their Powerwall and solar equipment at 800 Home Depot stores as well as perhaps the Lowe’s chain, prices for the Powerwall may fall.

I hope so. One of these back up batteries may be our best bet to see us through the cold winter hours when we lose power.

Otherwise we might have to bundle up and head to a motel.

Let’s look at what we all know is happening.We’ve heard a lot of talk about sea level rise. Portland has seen some of its streets near the Old Port flood during annual high tides and friends who have lived for decades on our tidal river now find their lawn flooded at the highest tides.Sea level rise is tied to global warming. We have been setting records for warm years now year after year according to the climate scientists.Because the earth is warming, our oceans are absorbing a lot of this heat. Last year according to the NAT our oceans were warmer than they ever have been, and the last 5 years have been the five warmest on record. When water is warmed up, it expands.But there’s more. As the temperatures rise, some glaciers and ice sheets are melting into the ocean.

Since the ocean’s warming, some of the sea food we love no longer thrives offshore. Gone are our sweet Maine shrimp, for example.

Moreover, the ocean’s absorbing now about 30% of the CO2 in the atmosphere. Because of this, our shellfish – clams and oysters – may soon have such a problem making their shells that they will disappear from our coast.

And that’s not all.

Our seaweed seems to be changing from our long leafy kelp we see on the beach after a storm, to bushy reddish seaweed. This might be a problem.

The kelp we are so familiar with helps hide many young fish like cod and Pollock, as well as small lobsters and clams, while giving them a good food source.

The invading bushy, reddish invasive seaweed gives these small fish, lobsters and crabs little protection and no food.

You can guess what might happen to what’s left of our fish as well as our crabs and lobsters.

The sea level rise; the changing seaweed and the disappearance of some of our most sought after fish and Maine shrimp, as well as in the years to come, our oysters and clams; our lobster haul probably a lot less – all of this seems to be tied to the ocean warming just a few degrees.

What a change from when we were younger, but it is happening now.

The newest strike? Roundup can severely impair your immune system, brain function and digestion according to a new French study.

Doctors, scientists, and environmentalist already know that Roundup has been linked to prostrate, breast and lung cancers; kidney failure; severe birth defects; heart disease including heart failure; attention deficit disorder; brain cancer; autism; depression; Alzheimer’s disease; colitis; Lou Gehrig’s Disease (ALS); Parkinson’s Disease; multiple sclerosis (MLS); liver disease; chronic respiratory disease; non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma; pregnancy problems including infertility, miscarriages, stillbirths; and extreme inflammatory bowel disease.

Doesn’t it make you wonder why Roundup and its main ingredient glyphosate hasn’t been sent to the showers and banned from the game years ago?

Doctors also knew that Roundup and its main ingredient glyphosate caused problems with peoples’ gut bacteria but recent studies have shown that this could be even more severe than previously thought.

Gut bacteria helps us digest food and helps keep dangerous bacteria from affecting us. This gut bacterium is what doctors say is part of the human microbiome that helps us digest what we eat, protects our immune systems and helps our brains function.

Now these microorganisms have been proven to be severely impaired by Roundup and its main ingredient, glyphosate.

Roundup is pricey and a host of other products available at your local hardware or garden center work just as well and are much safer.

Why put you, your family and friends in danger by using anything with glyphosate like Roundup?

Is using this stuff worth the risk?

Look in our fridge and you’d see a plastic V-8 bottle, jam bottle, yogurt containers, lettuce containers, a buttermilk bottle, and a jug of Maine maple syrup.

Look in our cupboards and you would find half a dozen pill and supplement bottles, a couple of chocolate and candied ginger containers, a peanut butter jar, vinegar and salad oil bottles – all plastic.

The bathroom has plastic shampoo and conditioner bottles, hand lotion, toothpaste tube, witch hazel, hydrogen peroxide, liquid hand soap containers, aloe Vera tube, and 20 various pill, skin and eye medication bottles – all made of plastic.

Your computer, car, printer, and bike – all have plastic components – look around – you’ll be amazed.

I read somewhere that the production of plastic has increased to 300 million tons from around 1.7 million tons in 1950. Of course many of us recycle our plastics, yet the estimate is that only about a quarter of plastics are recycled, and even though a few of us may recycle our plastics they will never biodegrade

Instead, plastics can leach toxic chemicals into landfills or oceans. And that brings up another problem:  our oceans have tons and tons of tiny plastic bits floating in them, some microscopic, some the size of a grain of salt that fish swallow.

Then we eat the fish. Plastics we might have once used, then, may end up as part of our bodies.

And this is made even more possible when you learn that a global study completed last year found that 83% of the world’s tap water has microscopic pieces in it. In the United States, 94% of our tap water has microscopic pieces in it the study showed.

You have to wonder – are we turning into plastic people?

So what are these e invasive plants you can’t buy anymore? We finally found the list after some wandering around on maine.gov; that website is like entering a dark cavern with wrong turns and blind alleys.

Look the list over – you can find it here:

https://www.maine.gov/dacf/mnap/features/invasive_plants/invsheets.htm

I have no idea why anyone would buy a couple of these ‘invasives.’ Take for example, Japanese Knotweed. Why buy this when it grows on roadsides and is there for the taking?

Or garlic mustard. I had never seen the stuff until it began growing under our trees and in our gardens. I read somewhere it is the most common understory plant in New England. Want some? Drop me a note.

And you see purple loosestrife growing in roadside ditches – I understand this is no longer considered a threat since some sort of bug keeps it under control.

Many of these ‘invasives’ are beautiful – matter of fact, you may have planted some because they are so striking, like the Yellow Iris, a truly stunning flower, or useful, like the Japanese Barberry or Common Barberry for that matter. Some of these invasives would make a beautiful border between your property and your neighbors’.

The problem is that they take over areas where native Maine plants grow. So the question is, do you want to these non-native invasive plants to grow in your garden or yard instead of a native Maine plant? Should you eradicate these invasives from your yard and garden

That’s your choice, but it seems clear that this new Maine law is one of those that will remain ineffective as long as you can stop along the roadside and dig them up for yourself.

Here’s a way to beat the winter this week.

If you have a big garden, own some woods, grow vegetables and flowers that you sell at a farmers’ market, or just like to garden, then you might want to drop by the 2018 Maine State Agricultural Trades Show in Augusta at the Civic Center starting Tuesday, January 9 and going until Thursday, January 11.

If you are an organic grower or are interested in an organic garden or farming, then you might want to visit the Civic Center on Tuesday, the 9^th, since that is the Maine Farmers and Growers Day (MOFGA) at the Agricultural Trades Show.

MOFGA will be hosting a series of presentations – an Organic Basics and Certification from 9 till 10; a dairy lecture from 10 till 11 with emphasis on value added goods to help make up for any dairy losses; and from 11 to 12, a look at the plant diseases seen by the Maine Department of Agriculture in the past year. The afternoon session will help organic farmers with their ‘no spray’ agreement. All of these sessions will be held in the Piscataquis Room.

Meanwhile, in the Sagadoc Room, the early 9-10 session will focus on organic pricing looking at various crops, the effect of inflation, and price changes over the past 10 years. The second session, from 10 to 11, will explore our soil’s health and your water quality protection, and the last morning session from 11 to 12 will be a panel looking at small woodlot management.

The afternoon session from 3 till 4 will be a forum for flower growers and information, questions answered and an opportunity to share ideas with other flower growers.

What better place could you be in the heart of winter than at an agricultural trades show looking at the many exhibits, hearing a presentation or two and dreaming about or planning your garden?

What a way to beat the winter!