18 YULUNOUSTAUDUBON] BHD 
Marie Mayflower Remembers 
by MARIE NILSSON 
Marie Mayflower was a camera enthusiast, loved wildflowers and birds. 
She cherished the memories of her many adventures out-of-doors. She 
framed each one as a picture to be enjoyed over and over. 
The marsh was a special world. One day she began with a stroll 
along the shore of a large lake. It was good to feel the water with her 
toes. She turned over the smooth pebbles and small stones, rounded by 
the rolling in of the waves, brought there by the glaciers thousands of 
years ago. How bright they looked in the water, dull in the sand. Plants 
could not grow on the lower beach because of wind and blowing sand. 
She thought about this and plant succession as she climbed a low dune. 
Grasses bound the sand on the upper beach building up dunes. Other 
plants struggled for a roothold. [The dunes were followed by ridges, 
swales and marshland. 
A fascinating environment for most living things, including a walk- 
ing stick insect that fell on her shoulder as she passed under a scrubby 
Black Oak tree. Walking sticks do not walk, they just pretend to be a 
twig. Marie Mayflower placed it on a twig to quiet its nerves while she 
studied its singular beauty and features so suitable to its way of life, 
and to photograph it. 
The reedy sounds of the marsh were all about—Red-winged Black- 
birds, Bobolinks, marsh wrens, the tranquilizng “song” of Mourning 
Doves. A pair of Green Herons flew up into a Black Oak. It was the time 
for pairing. A dragon fly made a sudden foray for food. It returned to 
its perching place, protected by wind, to dream in the sun. 
She noticed a garden spider had snared and wrapped up a dragon 
fly. "he condition of the web told the story of a fierce battle. 
There were duck sounds on the sluggish river draining the marsh. 
Marie Mayflower bending low, stealthily crept to the top of the ridge, 
feeling like an Indian. Suddenly eyes met hers. A Green-winged Teal was 
standing in the bearberry and juniper tangle not far from the water. 
