San Juan Capistrano celebrates the return of its swallows. Hinckley, Ohio rejoices when the buzzards fly back in town. Holly Springs, Miss. holds an annual festival welcoming home its hummingbirds.
But our neck of the woods is left high and dry when it comes to lionizing migrating species, probably because the most familiar harbingers of a new season, robins, appear individually or in pairs as spring approaches instead of in great clouds of winged splendor.
Similarly, the winter migration of bald eagles to the lower Connecticut River Valley is intermittent at best, so it always seemed a little disingenuous for Essex to host an annual eagle festival – and apparently the Connecticut Audubon Society agreed because it pulled the plug on the event earlier this year.
I didn’t lose too much sleep when the festival took a nosedive because it had become more like Groundhog Day, treating our national symbol like an avian version of Punxsutawney Phil.
Perhaps another reason for canceling a celebration heralding the return of a seasonal visitor is the fact that some eagles are now making Connecticut their permanent homes. I’ve seen one flying near the Groton reservoir several times last summer, and while it always is a thrilling sight to observe an eagle in flight it steals some of the thunder from a big welcome-home party when the guest of honor never really left.
On that note, years ago I looked forward to the fall migration of Canada geese and felt pure joy when listening to their overhead honks in the middle of the night. I’ve always been swept away by Thoreau’s description in “Walden”: “Night after night the geese came lumbering in in the dark with a clangor and a whistling of wings, even after the ground was covered with snow.”
But guess what: Many Canada geese now hang around all year, and they’ve become like out-of-town guests who have overstayed their welcome. For many, geese are the scourge of golf courses, parks and other open areas to the extent that dogs are trained to chase them away.
Bears, I’ve noticed, are also getting the bum’s rush. A few years ago local newspapers would report the momentous occasion of a bear sighting on the front page; these days it barely makes the police logs, and only if the hapless animal toppled a backyard bird feeder and had to be tranquilized before being hauled unceremoniously back into the wilderness.
We’ve also had moose wandering through Connecticut from time to time, which isn’t too surprising since hunters shoot just about anything with antlers up north but are becoming something of an endangered species themselves here in southern New England.
Don’t get me started on coyotes and fisher cats – some otherwise rational people react as if a saber-toothed tiger were loose when one is sighted.
One species that doesn’t arouse such concern has become a regular seasonal visitor here, but unless you have a boat you probably aren’t aware of its arrival.
A few weeks ago, some friends and I spotted a few dozen seals while we were kayaking off Hungry Point on Fishers Island.
“It seems a little early to see so many of them,” I remarked to my buddy Frost White, and wondered if some, like Canada geese, had become year-round residents.
But local seal expert Brae Rafferty dispelled that notion and told me that the seals that swim to Fishers Island Sound from Maine and Canada have been arriving “pretty much on schedule.”
“They usually start showing up in late September-early October,” he said over the telephone, adding that at their peak in February the population could grow to about 300. That number has increased steadily for the last decade or so, said Rafferty, a senior instructor with Project Oceanology, a marine science and environmental education program based at Avery Point in Groton.
Project O, as it is known, has been studying the animals and organizes seal-watch cruises that will begin later this winter. Rafferty attributes the increasing seasonal seal population to an abundance of food and a lack of predation. The seals feed on hake, porgies and other fish, and while my friends and I were watching them pop up closer and closer to our kayaks we could see fishermen in a nearby boat checking them out as well. I hope they were as delighted as we were to witness the seals, even if they were probably going after the same catch.
Those who wish to see seals by kayak should be aware that federal laws prohibit harassing or even getting too close to seals, and Rafferty said a good rule of thumb is that if you see a seal that is sunning itself on a rock suddenly dive into the water, then you’ve probably gotten too close.
Whenever I go out to see seals by kayak I drift quietly a hundred yards or more from their favorite haunts at Hungry Point near the eastern end of the island, or the Clumps, small rock piles that extend as far west as Clay Point near West Harbor. I never chase the seals, but let them swim to me.
Naturally curious, they pop up and quickly duck back under, so that trying to photograph a seal in the water, I have previously observed, is like playing whack-a-mole. I also don’t stick around longer than 15 minutes or so.
Rafferty told me he wouldn’t be surprised if eventually some of the migratory seals decided to become year-round residents, and expressed hope that if that happened they wouldn’t get caught up in the heavy boat traffic in Fishers Island and Long Island sounds.
Part of me hopes some seals do make local waters their permanent home, but another part of me enjoys their seasonal arrival.
Either way, they’re a treat to watch – respectfully though, and at a distance.

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