We love August here on Skinny Island.  Maybe it’s the native in us.  Pretty much everybody else has had enough of summer by now, although for the second year running it’s been mild in these parts.  It’s been much worse in New England, where most of the folks around here hail from, than here.  I have to laugh.  There’s a restaurant a mile south of us on the beach that perpetually advertises Whole-Belly New England Clams, whatever those are, on their cute little chalk board by the A1A.  No Fresh Florida Seafood, just New England Clams.  But I digress.  We are fond of August because others aren’t, yes, but for other, more subtle and meaningful reasons as well.

You start seeing the proliferation of sandspurs here in August.  They are green and tender at this stage, and not the threat they become when dry, brittle, and scattered.  We love sandspurs; they’re a part of who we are, and our first line of defense.  They keep me young by reminding me of my childhood.  I was forever pulling sandspurs out of my feet, something which could have been avoided had I worn shoes, which i did not until forced to at age 11 or 12 by some assistant principal or other.  (But they never could get me to wear socks.)

Things start changing weather-wise in August, too.  I guess it’s easier to see here on the coast than inland, but the air is different; the clouds are different.  We actually start feeling Fall here in August.  It’s not so much a temperature change, as an atmospheric  change.  Storms in the Atlantic start ramping up in August, and peak in September, but even when there are no brewing storms there’s a lot more activity. We traditionally start getting more quality waves in August, after our flat June and July.

And then there’s the light.  I don’t think Faulkner was thinking of Skinny Island when he wrote The Light in August, but it applies.  It’s different; something you note. The sun is already way south on the horizon when it comes up, so the angle is far different, all day, than it is at the solstice.

We are seeing  few more birds on the beach now, too.  The greatest numbers, of course, are during the migration south to escape the cold north, but we do have a few residents through the summer.  We’re seeing a few more sandpipers and willets now.  Interestingly, there are two distinct willet families in North America, the Western Willet, and the Eastern Willet, indistinguishable most of the year.  They both live near bodies of water, and both enjoy small crabs and other crustaceans.  Both are also in decline.  The western branch have abundant habitat for nesting, but not food.  The Eastern bunch have plenty to eat, but are losing habitat at an alarming rate.  It appears the westerners sometime travel east to eat, but there’s no evidence the eastern clan go west for accommodations.  Both have their priorities right.  All of which has nothing to do with August, except that the willets we’re seeing now might be westerners, for all we know.  Everybody you see on the beach is from somewhere else.  I guess maybe they’re here to pick up a few Whole-Belly Clams down the road.

Limpy