{"id":2075,"date":"2009-01-20T10:46:24","date_gmt":"2009-01-20T15:46:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=2075"},"modified":"2009-01-20T10:46:24","modified_gmt":"2009-01-20T15:46:24","slug":"mid-winter-freeze-grips-outer-cape","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=2075","title":{"rendered":"Mid Winter Freeze Grips Outer Cape"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Giant Ice Floes Smother Wellfleet Shoreline<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Mid\u00c2\u00a0winter grips Outer Cape\u00c2\u00a0estuaries\u00c2\u00a0in smothering ice\u00c2\u00a0floes, blocking marine commerce and whistling year-around shellfish harvesting to an abrupt, if temporary,\u00c2\u00a0halt.\u00c2\u00a0 Winter transforms naturally beautiful Wellfleet from vacation paradise to raw, hardscrabble community.\u00c2\u00a0 Bustling, swimsuit clad crowds of tens of thousands dwindle down to a spare, gristled cadre of tens of hundreds of year ’rounders;\u00c2\u00a0folks as tough as the ice that surrounds them and as uniquely eccentric as each individual floe.\u00c2\u00a0 At Burton Baker Beach off Indian Neck, where Turtle Journal documented the first torpedo ray in Shocking Discovery! Torpedo Ray in Wellfleet Bay<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0in early November,\u00c2\u00a0floes have\u00c2\u00a0buried the shoreline and covered jetties like vanilla icing on Twinkies.<\/p>\n

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Wellfleet’s Uncle Tim’s Bridge over Frozen Duck Creek<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The newly renovated Uncle Tim’s Bridge\u00c2\u00a0braces for its first structural challenge as tons of compacted ice ebb and flow with tides, massing against pilings driven into Duck Creek’s oozy bottom.\u00c2\u00a0 The First Congregational Church towers on the horizon, ringing only ship time, one to eight bells in four hour sequences throughout the day to commemorate Wellfleet’s\u00c2\u00a0seafaring tradition.\u00c2\u00a0 (ASIDE:\u00c2\u00a0 As bells toll across the harbor each summer, it’s amusing to watch visitors compare wristwatches to six bells at 3 pm, wondering whether they’ve missed the blue plate special.)<\/p>\n

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Shellfishermen Chip Ice for Oysters\u00c2\u00a0in Frozen Chipman’s Cove<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Nearby Chipman’s Cove, where terrapin mating aggregations will kick off the 2009 research season in early May, has been sealed in ice about five inches thick.\u00c2\u00a0 Two very hardy residents slide along the ice and crack holes with picks in futile search for\u00c2\u00a0entombed shellfish.<\/p>\n

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Click Here to View Video in High Quality<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Ducks and Shorebirds Forage in Tide Exposed Shallows<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

A\u00c2\u00a0tiny section of the east shoreline of Chipman’s Cove\u00c2\u00a0is exposed by tidal forces, giving ducks and shorebirds a chance to forage for\u00c2\u00a0“fast food”\u00c2\u00a0in the brief,\u00c2\u00a0low tide interval before\u00c2\u00a0a new\u00c2\u00a0onslaught of\u00c2\u00a0ice returns.\u00c2\u00a0 By high tide, birds hunker along the lee shore to wait out the freeze.<\/p>\n

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Frozen Inner Harbor Invites “Boat Owners and Crew Only”<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Floating docks, under which harbor seals played and foraged a few months earlier (see Wellfleet Harbor Seals: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Thanks for All the Fish!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/a>), have been removed for winter protection, but signs still beckon “boat owners and crew only” to board invisible boats locked in too visible and too real ice.\u00c2\u00a0 Wellfleet, like its resident population of diamondback terrapins, has gone into winter brumation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Giant Ice Floes Smother Wellfleet Shoreline Mid\u00c2\u00a0winter grips Outer Cape\u00c2\u00a0estuaries\u00c2\u00a0in smothering ice\u00c2\u00a0floes, blocking marine commerce and whistling year-around shellfish harvesting to an abrupt, if temporary,\u00c2\u00a0halt.\u00c2\u00a0 Winter transforms naturally beautiful Wellfleet from vacation paradise to raw, hardscrabble community.\u00c2\u00a0 Bustling, swimsuit clad crowds of tens of thousands dwindle down to a spare, gristled cadre of tens of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[23],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2075"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2075"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2075\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2089,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2075\/revisions\/2089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}