June 21, 1990 - Montauk: A Living Museum in the MistC12 The Suffolk Times • June 21, 1990
Montauk: A Living Museum in the Mist
By Paul Stoutenburah
Friends of ours had been asking us for
a long time to visit them out at Mon-
tauk and we just never seemed to get
around it. Often we go out to that area
to bird around the Point during the win-
ter, but seldom during the summer and
never as a so- called tourist. This would
be a new role for us and we looked for-
ward to our short stay in our nearby va-
cationland.
One thing would be in our favor: We
would be there before the summer crowd
arrived and before the traffic buildup that
you just can't escape. We would stay in
a small cabin near our friends' home,
which would give us the illusion of va-
cationers yet would be close enough to
reacquaint ourselves once more with
good friends. We arrived on Thursday
and immediately were given a tour of
their wonderful grounds. There was a
pond nestled near the main house with
several families of young geese under
the watchful eyes of the adults. At the
other end of the pond the nose and
mostly submerged head and body of a
muskrat swam toward the opposite
shore where there was a clump of young
cattails. They'd surely be on his menu,
for their diet is mostly vegetarian.
As we walked about I slowly realized
that we were quite high up and at one
point I could see the ocean lying there
like some gigantic blue -gray blanket to
the south. Out on the horizon lay an
ominous bank of fog that for the past
four or five days had rolled in and out
like some huge smokescreen. We would
see more of that fog as the evening ap-
proached.
Relaxing and Reminiscing
For hours we reminisced about old
times as we sat on the lawn and enjoyed
the quiet atmosphere of this lovely area
just off the beaten path of the roadway.
What I thought to be a least flycatcher
darted for its perch on a dead limb of an
old apple tree to snatch an insect from
the air before retiring to its lookout.
Then for the next half -hour it continu-
ously flew off on its mission of food -
getting.
Later my eye spotted four or five
birds in the top of a big holly tree next
to the main house. They took on the
sleek lines of waxwings and sure
enough, when my binoculars focused on
them, I could see their crests and yellow
edging of their tail feathers.
That evening as we cooked over our
gas camp stove, we laid out our plans
Focus on
Mature
for the next day. We'd visit the fish
docks and wander about the shops like
true tourists, but that would take up
only a small part of our time. The rest
would be walking the beaches of this
point of land where the ocean and sound
meet.
We started our second day with a trip
to the Montauk Point Park. Here only
two overnight fishermen campers were
to be seen. Evidently the heavy fog that
surrounded the Point had kept visitors
away. We found ourselves in a mystical
world of swirling, minute droplets of
fog. We could fee it on our skin. The
wonderful old lighthouse would be there
and then disappear as a new wave of
heavy -laden fog rolled in. We had the
Point to ourselves.
Down along the beach that wonderful
smell of the sea began to fill our nos-
trils. A cormorant bobbed to the surface
only to look around and disappear on
his lonely journey along the sea floor.
The rough surf that is usually found at
the Point was gone and in its place a
quiet, slow roll slid up along the beach.
Gulls, the endless scavengers, were
picking up meals of blue mussels. The
richness of the mussel beds off the
Point were evidenced by the windrow of
shells along the high -tide mark of the
beach. Even an occasional grackle or
red - winged blackbird would be seen
walking along the wet kelp looking for
its seafood dinner. They a r e
opportunists of the first order.
Oyster Drills at Work
Among the windrow of mussels we
couldn't help noticing the perfectly
round holes in many of the shells. Here
one of the "drills" had found a meal.
These small snails have the ability to
cut through shells of all sorts to get at
the soft inner meat. No wonder the oys-
termen had such a dislike for the "oyster
drill," for it must have raised havoc
with their livelihood.
We walked for miles along the north
beach, stopping here and investigating
this or that. We had no timetable to fol-
low, no place in particular to go. It was
a wonderful feeling. We'd hear boats
offshore, but the fog kept them hidden
and only rarely gave us a glimpse of
them as the curtain of mist would open.
Later we'd visit and photograph the
Photo by Paul Stoutenburgh
WORK OF THE OYSTER DRILL These perfectly round holes are
cut into many different kinds of shellfish besides the blue mussel. At one
time they were a real problem to the oystermen.
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fishing boats, many of which were still
tied up at the docks. Had the fog kept
them in? We even went into town and
rubbed elbows with the true vacationers
who seemed more at home with that
kind of surrounding than that of a
foggier beach.
Our last walk took us out to the
point opposite Gardiners Bay at the
Walking Dunes. This is an incredibly
wonderful area just before you come to
the fork that goes to the state park on
the ocean. We visited this area over 40
years ago when we were first married. It
was the time when hardly anyone went
there. It was a time when you could
camp there and we did just that, right on
the edge of Napeague Bay.
The Dunes in Bloom
Today we found the same blossoming
yellow Hudsonia sprinkled through the
sandy lowlands. Hudsonia is a plant of
the sandy, hot areas behind the dunes.
It's found also in the poorer soils
throughout the pine barrens. Blossom-
ing along with it was the Carolina
sandwort. Another indicating plant of
this and region is the bearberry that
covers the land in huge blankets. Its red
berries later will provide a good, nutri-
tious meal for a wide variety of wildlife.
I was anxious to get to the Northern
point on the bay for it's there I'd be
able to see the spoil islands more
clearly with my binoculars. We'd been
seeing terns all day flying by with bait
fish, so we knew there had to be a
nesting site nearby. A few weeks ago
we were guests at Gardiners Island and
we found no tern colonies there, so the
spoil islands had to be active. Sure
enough, when I focused on them I could
see the terns milling about. I could also
see it was well posted with "Keep Out"
signs. That was good, for they need all
the protection they can get.
We'd had more than enough time to
reacquaint ourselves with this wonderful
part of our East End. I was particularly
glad to see both the state and the county
had enough sense and foresight to pro-
tect and preserve these large parcels of
this fast - disappearing landscape at Mon-
tauk, not only for our present
generation to enjoy, but also so that all
those who follow will be able to know
what our East End once was like.
We cover the waterfront
The Suffolk Times
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