277
*
Lake Umbagog.
Cambridge River.
1897.
Sept. 25
(No. 4)
  We stopped for lunch at the Forks, landing on the
sand spit at the junction of the Swift & Dead Cambridge.
He [sic] [Here] we could command an extended view out over B. Meadows
which just below the river entered the forest. I took
several photographs here and two or three more above
in the open meadow for after lunch we paddled as far
as the haystacks (more than a mile by river above
the forks). Why do not Ducks frequent these meadows
more? The conditions seem to be perfect but the birds
are almost invariably absent although they frequently 
fly up or down over the meadows following the course
of the stream. We started nothing there today saw
a solitary Bittern. Deer tracks were more numerous
than I have ever seen them before. There was scarce
a square yard where one or more deer had not
left its foot prints. The grass all over the meadow (it
has not been cut this year) was trampled down
by these animals.
[margin]B. Meadows[/margin]
[margin]Why do 
Ducks avoid
these meadows?[/margin]
[margin]Deer tracks
very 
numerous [/margin]
  At the Forks Purdie & Will climbed the ridge to
look for some poplars, which, on June 14,1896, were
still hung with catkins and only just beginning to 
unfold their leaves although all the other forest trees
had been in full leaf for two weeks or more. I felt
sure at the time that these poplars would prove to
be something that was new to us but Purdie considers
them all P. [Populus] grandidentata. The leaves, however, have
red petioles, a characteristic which I do not recall
in grandidentata. P. [Populus] tremuloides is common all long 
this ridge & it was in full leaf on June 14, 1896.
I do not think that it is much if at all earlier
than the other species in Massachusetts.
[margin]Poplars
growing on
the ridges
near the 
Forks[/margin]