Who are the white supremacists? The neo-Nazis? ISIL? The Taliban? Boko Haram? These are some that we know about, but there may be hundreds of other such groups of militant, almost entirely male organizations that in various ways are trying to subvert the rest of us non-belongers and non-believers in devious and perverse ways that we have yet to learn about. 

Yes, a few women join in, but most of the women become suicide bombers and other sacrificial lambs to further the murky causes of these groups or are kidnapped and held against their will. Some of these groups such as ISIL and Boko Haram are simultaneously belligerent and religious, others are belligerent and political, some are anarchical.

But it is of interest that they are almost entirely male in composition. The human species has been dominated by patriarchs since we descended (ascended?) from other advanced primates. Fighting among ourselves has been the main means of advancing and maintaining such a lopsided hold on humanity. “Homo” from our scientific name, Homo sapiens, is from the Latin meaning man, the “sapiens” suggests that the man is the wisest of all the primates. But that is still debatable. As Thomas Henry Huxley was said to have remarked upon reading about Darwin’s “The Origin of Species and the Descent of Man,” in which the species “man” was to have come from apes: “Evidently, many of us have not come far enough.” And he’s right!

Women have been playing catch-up through the millenniums, but still have a long way to go to have the same kind of clout. Of the 193 member countries in the United Nations, as of this year, only l5 of them have female heads of state. But women are slowly gaining equality at the polls. As late as 1987, no more than 5 percent of our senators and representatives were women. Today it has jumped to 19.3 percent, but we have a long way to go before equality reigns.

There are many animal species in which the male is subordinate to the female. Killer whales are a well-known matriarchal society. Males are only needed for reproduction. After that, the females not only raise the calves they give birth to, they include their young in their female-led pods, even after they become adults. Elephants also form matriarchal societies. The males are needed for reproduction, but after that a social group of elephants is always under the leadership of an older female.

The chimpanzee, a close relative of man, lives in a male-dominated culture, but its near twin, the bonobo, resides in a female-dominated one. The chimpanzee male likes to beat his chest and can be very warlike with respect to other chimpanzee groups that interlope on his territory. Bonobos are much more peaceful and work things out with intruders diplomatically.

Among African lions, females make most of the decisions in a pride. Such a matriarchy may have evolved to keep male lions from eating stray cubs, something they are wont to do given the opportunity. Hyenas are also matriarchal, just the opposite of another animal with similar feeding habits, the gray wolf, in which the pack is led by an alpha male.

Some species have done away with male input totally. The Mexican six-lined racerunner is a female lizard in which reproduction is carried on by parthenogenesis; there is no need of male insemination or male sperm. There are at least two other species in the same general area, including the southern United States, that reproduce that way. The Komodo dragon of the southeast Pacific is large and formidable, but also parthenogenetic. She could be terrifying to any male that tried to mess with her. 

A guppy relative, the Amazon Molly, Poecilia formosa, of Mexico and the extreme American South has little use for the male, except that, in order for her to reproduce, she lets the male go through the sex act but does not use his sperm to produce young, which are in actuality clones of their mother.

Then, too, there are species, mostly fish, in which the female would rather live on her own and not be tied down with housework. The threespine stickleback is a local but cosmopolitan minnow-size fish species in which the male builds a tubular nest through which the female swims and deposits her eggs after fertilization. She then heads for the hills, leaving the housework and child rearing to the male. 

Seahorses and pipefish, in the same fish family and not unusual in our bays and tidal creeks, take the stickleback theme one step further. The males have a pouch, or marsupium, on their bellies in which the babies are raised. After depositing the fertilized eggs in the marsupium, the female is free to swim about with no child-rearing responsibilities. Some would say in such cases that evolution has gone too far. The male is left with nothing to do but eat and take care of the young. 

Neither extreme seems ideal. I’m not interested in the one lead by the male warrior groups with little tolerance for those who do not think like them. But, then, I wouldn’t like to become a male seahorse left with all the child-rearing responsibilities, either. Let’s shoot for a 50-50 outcome: as many female world leaders as males, as many female representatives and members of parliament as males, with equality throughout the entire sphere and see how that works before taking any drastic measures.

Larry Penny can be reached via email at [email protected].  

Eutropia in ecology is akin to functional Utopia in mankind’s world. There are levels of position and function, just as in modern society. Up-and-down-ness is based on food habits, sheltering niches, pecking order (without the pecking), growth and maturation, longevity, intelligence, learning, ritualism, compensation for acts of God, short-term success and long-term improvement, and generational transfer. The major difference, of course, is that ecology is based on an interacting group of millions and millions of different species, while mankind is composed of just one.

The two super groups interact with each other, more in terrestrial habitats than in aquatic ones, and those interactions define the ultimate direction and outcomes of them both. Which kingdom is changing the most rapidly, advancing or regressing, is a matter yet to be determined. For example, humans injure and kill each other to a far greater degree than members of the natural world, but on the other hand, humans have very much more complicated systems of management and with an almost infinite assortment of different tools of manufacture, we build and repair things of all kinds in order to pursue myriad self-maintenance activities. Only a few infra-humans use tools, and all infra-humans lead relatively simple lives.

Human life has become complicated to the point where people across the face of the globe now interact with one another, personally or electronically, on several different levels in a kind of expanding pluralism of activities and organizations, while almost all of the other members of the animal kingdom stick close to one type of habitat area. For example, cacti live in deserts, plains animals live on prairies, squirrels live in areas with trees, and so on.

Evolution on Earth has been going on for more than four billion years, since the first living thing came into existence and was able to reproduce itself ad infinitum. And while there have only been a few species that are considered humans, those in the genus Homo, there have been, perhaps, at least a billion plants, animals, fungi, bacteria, and other groups over that span — 99 more kinds than exist today, as evolutionists and paleontologists are wont to say.

One measure of a living species’ success over time is its longevity. For example, the coelacanth, now represented by two very rare species, has not changed much in 400 million years, and horseshoe crabs or their near lookalikes have been around for at least 300 million years. On the other hand humans have been here for less than half a million years. Today, we try very hard to keep the horseshoe crabs and the coelacanths from becoming extinct, but such conservation efforts have only been applied in the last 50 years or so. Before that, the two different forms made it to modern times on their own.

Just as human society is changing from generation to generation — as in the evolution of modern dance music from spiritual to ragtime to Dixieland to swing to modern jazz to various forms of rock ’n’ roll to rap — human culture in general is changing just as quickly. But all of the other species, with few exceptions, are getting by in much the same way they did thousands of years ago. One might say they lead a very boring existence compared to the modern post-industrial human. 

But then there is the old adage: If it works why change it? The Amish still till their fields with horse-drawn plows, not gasoline-powered tractors. Various Native American groups still catch fish and other food items the old-fashioned way. Even some almost ultra-modern humans gather mushrooms, leeks, clams, and other food items when they are not busy being ultra-modern. Schools for educating children have been around for a thousand years of more. At first they were simply teaching basic survival skills; now schoolchildren use computers and build robots in addition to learning the three-Rs and their more advanced forms, such as algorithms and the like.

The very successful red-breasted robin, a member of the thrush family, is distributed throughout the whole of North America. Generation upon generation over the millenniums, it has changed its way of extending itself very slightly if at all. Other species fell by the wayside for one reason or another, mostly because of very large episodic happenings like comet and large meteorite collisions, extreme changes in temperature from very, very hot, to the very, very cold that created the glaciers that covered most of Eurasia and North America from time to time.

But just as there are new religious sects, new entertainment venues, new sports, new fashions, new ways of living, new modes of transportation, and an ever-growing fascination with the cosmos and inhabiting it, there are new ecological types forming, known as novel ecosystems. These have come about mainly as a result of human ecosystem changes, those that brought species from one area of the world to a new one. The examples are never-ending: jumping carp from Asia, gypsy moths from Europe, a host of invasive plants brought to North America for one reason or another by immigrants, travelers, traders, and smugglers, not to mention federal and state agencies. Among them are phragmites, Asiatic bittersweet, Japanese honeysuckle, red oak wilt, Asian longhorn beetles, pythons, European starlings, kudzu, snakehead fish, and thousands of others that have upended traditional American ecosystems.

Even without the massive interventions of man by wars, various mining operations and mass clearings of tropical forests and woodlands for agriculture, the earth’s longstanding ecosystems are changing, the glaciers are melting faster and faster, the oceans are becoming more and more acidic, the human population has increased drastically within the last 150 years, while the numbers of the majority of animal and plant species are decreasing. 

It raises the question: How many generations from now will it take for the world to become one big mishmash novel ecological system? Anyone want to hazard a guess?

Larry Penny can be reached via email at [email protected].

The never-ending mobbing calls of common crows and fish crows continue, but one rarely hears a songbird sing as we approach the halfway point of summer. Most of the birds have bred. The osprey fledglings are learning how to dive for fish. Turkey families are breaking up in preparation for the fall harvest. The architect Amado Ortiz, who lives on the west shore of Three Mile Harbor, snapped a photo of a maturish bald eagle working on a big fish while on a tree limb outside his window. All of a sudden four crows spotted it and angrily mobbed it until it flew off and landed on top of a sailboat mast. No wonder the accepted name for a bunch of crows is a “murder” of them.

It’s the season of the insects from here on in. The snowy tree crickets have sounded off outside my house once thus far. Usually they are out in full force chirping away at dusk every evening by now. They’re a little behind this year.

The handful of monarchs that have been around so far have a bumper crop of milkweeds, orange and common, on which to lay eggs. A few tiger swallowtails flap by now and then, but almost everywhere, the only common butterfly is the cabbage white, an émigré from Eurasia. Several of our biggest wasp-hornets — the much-touted cicada killers after their penchant for stinging cicadas and bringing them back to their burrows for the larvae to feed on — were busy tending to several burrows at the end of Middle Line Highway where it meets Round Pond south of Sag Harbor last Thursday.

The most spectacular insect of the season this time around is the firefly or lightning bug, Photinus pyralis, a genus and species name that aptly describes one. The common names miss by a mile; it is neither a fly nor a bug but a beetle! This half-inch black-winged insect with head and thorax trimmed with an orange edge is one of the few members of the class Insecta that can actually light up. Its enzyme luciferase causes a chemical luciferin to emit white light flashes when its nervous system gives the order. Both sexes can emit light pulses. In the dusky hours of late July and early August, they communicate with each other with their flashes, ultimately, if all goes well, ending in mating, and thus reproduction of the species.

My grandson Kevin from San Francisco will be a senior in high school this fall and is here with me for a few weeks to study the fish in Southampton’s freshwater ponds.

But while we were eating dinner two weeks ago around 8 in the evening we simultaneously watched the fireflies lighting up outside my front window and became so enamored with their antics that we decided to drive around the neighborhoods to see what kind of a season they were having.

Fireflies lift off the ground or a leaf’s surface and light up again and again. When you are counting their flashes, you easily lose track of them. Is it the same one repeatedly emitting light time after time, or is it one or others nearby? Soon, everywhere you look one is popping off. They start low, but by the end of the show, some of them have ascended as much as 20 feet in the air.

So we drove around in Southampton Town east of the canal and East Hampton Town west of Montauk on three different nights between 7:50 and 9:20, covering major roads such as Noyac and Scuttlehole Roads, the Bridgehampton-Sag Harbor Turnpike, and the like, but also almost all of the back roads we could hit in the two-plus hours we had allotted ourselves. You won’t see many fireflies along heavily trod highways such as Montauk Highway and the Sunrise Highway. Is it because of the confusion of vehicle lights along those well-traveled roads or does it have to do with the bad air quality along them?

Deer Run, a little residential road over a third of a mile long off Deerfield Road in northern Bridgehampton, produced 32 flashes along its shoulders in a matter of a few minutes, yet on the much longer parent north-south Deerfield Road connecting Montauk Highway with Noyac Road we saw only 14 flashes. Bianca Lane at the end of Old House Landing Road in Northwest, just about a quarter of a mile in length, produced 15 flashes from one end to the other, while on a short stretch of Sammy’s Beach Road connecting Bianca with Old House we saw 12 flashes.

The point I am making is that where there are residences with lawns and landscaping, there are lots of fireflies, but where the land is open, not so many, even when the road passing through the open land is not that heavily traveled.

The roads with the most flashes per mile were Deer Run with 85, Scuttlehole Road between Butter Lane and Brick Kiln Road with 75, and tiny Golf Club Drive in Amagansett with 52. Oddly, perhaps, Lazy Point and Cranberry Hole Roads, which comprise almost four miles and run from one end of Napeague almost to the other, produced only one firefly flash. Apparently, fireflies don’t like long isthmuses. But coming back west from a bad count on Napeague, as soon as we hit Bendigo, Abram’s Landing, and Fresh Pond Roads, firefly flashes skyrocketed.

In all four cases, the flashes started around 8 and were most frequently observed between 8:15 and 8:50. A count from my window on a calm Sunday evening went from the first flash at 8:08 to 8:43, during which 122 individual flashes were recorded.

Lao-Tzu, the venerable Chinese philosopher who wrote the “Tao Te Ching” and is known as the father of Taoism, was reported to have said that you can know the world from your home as well as you can by traveling around it. As far as fireflies go, he was apparently correct. 

When I told a few friends the other week on a 90-degree day that I was planning to go fishing for cod, I received some strange and quizzical looks.

“You can catch cod in the summer?” asked one. “I thought that you can only catch them in the winter?” piped in another skeptical colleague. The fact is that codfish, which are also known by many as the winter king, can be found in pretty solid and consistent quantities during the dog days of summer. Granted, the ride to the productive grounds is not that close.

Distant wrecks located 20 to 40 miles offshore or various pieces on Cox’s Ledge, about a 30-mile ride east of Montauk, are the usual haunts to pursue such quarry. But when the weather conditions are conducive, traveling to some deeper offshore waters makes for a very nice and appealing diversion from the more typical local scene searching for sea bass, porgies, fluke, and other inshore species. 

Last Thursday, on one of the hottest and most humid days we have experienced this summer season, I hopped on the Viking Five Star, ably handled by Capt. Steven Forsberg Jr., for an early 4 a.m. departure for the cod grounds. The Five Star is a beautiful 65-foot custom-built fishing boat that is tricked out with all the comforts of home, most thankfully a fully functioning air-conditioner in the main salon cabin and forward bunk areas, a real blessing on that steamy day. Forsberg’s game plan was to take a nearly three-hour ride to one of his secret offshore wrecks.

No doubt about it, this family knows its cod. Of Norwegian descent, Forsberg’s great-grandfather Carl started the family fishing business in Freeport back in 1936 before relocating it to Montauk in 1951. And the main fishery the Viking boats focused on most of the year was cod. Winter or summer, it did not matter. People wanted to catch cod and good fishing was available most of the year.

“The wreck is sticky,” said the first mate, Bobby Schroeder, on the calm ride out, meaning that we were likely to get hung up frequently on some old trawler nets entangled on the wreck. “We may lose a lot of rigs, but the action should be good.” He was right. Within a few minutes after setting the anchor, a nice 10-pound cod was gaffed aboard by one of the seven anglers booked on the 12-hour trip. The bites below were quick and I landed two cod right off the bat. But my luck quickly petered out as I repeatedly got tangled up in the obstructions in the175-foot depths below, with several lost fish and rigs. 

However, those inconveniences did not dissuade the fishing powers and prowess of Vinny Esposito and his friend Frank from Wantagh. Originally from Canarsie, Brooklyn, these gentlemen were true cod pros who took the sport seriously. Taking along their own stockpile of freshly shucked skimmer clams for bait, they both lived and breathed cod, and it was a real spectacle to watch them catch one after the other throughout the day. If a Paramount movie were to be made, either of them could have come out of central casting and played Marlon Brando in a slightly retitled movie — “The Codfather.” They were that good.

Esposito topped off the family business that day by coaxing up a hefty 35-pound cod from the deep blue water on one of our last drops. It’s clear he made the cod an offer it could not refuse.

Closer to shore, the action continues to stay hot on a variety of species. “It’s summertime and the fishing is easy,” sang Harvey Bennett from behind the counter of the Tackle Shop in Amagansett. “Kingfish and blowfish are being taken in Three Mile Harbor and the snappers are getting bigger. Also, try a live snapper for fluke as bait near Napeague Harbor. It’s like candy for them and the fishing has been good.” Bennett also said that the porgy action is solid near the old hangar dock on Fort Pond Bay in Montauk, but he did say that the local freshwater scene slowed down in the most recent heat wave.

On another note, he added that he has heard several good reports on blue- claw crab action.

Bennett also reminded anglers that he will make personal deliveries of bait and tackle to those in the local area after normal daytime business hours. Bennett’s bright green Volkswagen Beetle (a.k.a. the Fish Bug) is hard to miss. In addition, the drive to secure more baseball equipment for children in the Dominican Republican is now in the bottom of the ninth inning. “The response so far has been good, but more is needed before we ship things off.” I’m sure the Fish Bug could be coaxed into making a pickup up of a baseball glove or two for this worthy cause.

Over at Mrs. Sam’s Bait and Tackle in East Hampton, Sebastian Gorgone relayed that the activity for snappers has been very good and that blowfish can be taken at the commercial dock on Three Mile Harbor. “Nice to see the blowfish supply up in these parts,” said Gorgone. “And the fishing for sea bass and fluke continues to be good on the east side of Gardiner’s Island.” Gorgone also added that action on the ocean beaches remains consistent for stripers and bluefish on small diamond jigs, as well as those intent on slinging bunker chunks or clams.

Farther to the west, Ken Morse, owner of Tight Lines Tackle Shop in Sag Harbor, was enthused by the weakfish activity in Noyac Bay, even as local water temperatures near 80 degrees. “Fishing for weakfish has been really good with some fish pushing up to six pounds.” Morse said that those who fish early in the morning have a decided edge, with smaller fish more prevalent in the midday sun. He added that blue-claw crab action has also been good in the local creeks and bays of late. “I took my daughter out the other evening and we caught a nice amount of large crabs. Fun times.”

A little fresh crabmeat on top of a seared cod fillet sounds good to me.

We welcome your fishing tips, observations, and photographs at fish@ ehstar.com. Find the “On the Water” column on Twitter at @ehstar­fishing.

Summer presses on, hot and humid with an occasional bout of rain. The beaches fill up on the weekend, the traffic is crazy mad on the South Fork’s main thoroughfares, County Road 39, Montauk Highway, Noyac Road, the Bridgehampton-Sag Harbor Turnpike, Route 114, and the Scuttlehole-Head of Ponds-7 Ponds-Mecox Roads, which wind through the fields of Bridgehampton and Water Mill and meet North Sea Road north of Southampton Village.

Notwithstanding the blue-green algae quagmires of Mill Pond in Water Mill, Lake Agawam at the foot of Southampton Village, and Georgica Pond in Wainscott, the rest of nature is doing well. Local songbirds have been able to produce two litters of nestlings, deer and turkeys have plenty to eat, fish crows and common crows are at it in Sag Harbor and its outskirts, the osprey are having a heyday. In the Long Beach-Sag Harbor neighborhood there are at least two new nests, six altogether, all with young. The new nest on a Scuttlehole Road utility pole was still active as of Monday, and the older nest in the horse pasture on Deerfield Road has not only ospreys nesting in it but house sparrows as well.

The bunker stocks, which help the osprey feed their young and which serve as feeding targets for the fledglings when they leave the nest and practice diving for the first time, are making their appearance. Fiddler crabs of two species — porcelain and black — are up and at ’em as soon as the tide begins to ebb. There are lots of egrets, herons, and other fish eaters at the edge of the salt marshes.

Jean Held had two monarch butterflies in her west Sag Harbor yard on Sunday, there has never been a bigger crop of blooming milkweeds — orange and common — along roadsides and in fallow fields, inviting whatever few monarchs that straggle by to land and reproduce. It is a great year for fireflies, and my grandson Kevin from firefly-less California can hardly believe his eyes when he looks out our living room picture window around 8 each evening.

Shorebirds are already returning and stopping by in goodly numbers from the tundra where they bred in May and June. Our own local breeders among waterfowl and waterbirds, the piping plovers, least terns, oystercatchers, and willets are winding up productive breeding seasons. The yearling geese, swans, and mallards are almost as big as their parents.

There are always downsides in nature to go along with the upsides. Mammal roadkills are beginning to mount up. I can’t drive a mile without seeing a gray squirrel roadkill or two. On Saturday, two large white-tailed does were left dead, intact, on the side of Sagg and Scuttlehole Roads. On Monday night while driving through Water Mill on Mecox Road, two adult does ran south from the north shoulder, one just getting by me to the other side, the other, braking as I braked, doing an almost instantaneous 180, and then disappearing in a field to the north. Fortunately I was only traveling at about 30 miles an hour and as usual my eyes were trained on both sides of the road.

On the same night I heard my first katydid singing off Merchants Path in the Sagaponack area. I’ve seen several mature snowy tree crickets around. Any day now the males will burst into a chorus, which will last most of the night as each rubs one sandpapery wing surface against another, equally gritty.

This has been the year of the gray tree frog. A few were still out trilling Monday evening; it was the only frog or toad song I heard. Gray tree frogs and spring peepers are great mosquito eaters, so let’s all cheer them on.

Chris Chapin, who used to lifeguard at Atlantic Avenue Beach in Amagansett, told me an interesting story about another common local amphibian, the hoppy toad, and a not so common reptile, the puffing adder snake. It seems that the restroom at that town beach used to drip water. Toads would enter it to stay moist and shortly after, a hognose snake, or puff adder, would sneak in to snag a toad or two, their favorite and mainstay food item in the wild.

Another reptile, the box turtle, which can live to be 100 years old like its much larger cousin in the Galapagos Islands, is making a late but prolific showing this July. Let’s hope that it is the start of a big comeback. Dai Dayton of the Southampton Trails Preservation Society has been putting up pretty box turtle signs on the sides of the road. Please don’t take them; they serve an important purpose. After all, the box turtle’s only natural enemy in these parts is the four-wheeled motor vehicle. 

Long Island is known for its fish and fishing. East Hampton Village is known for its waterfowl and muskrats. Now, a new denizen has popped into the picture — a freshwater catfish, complete with barbells around the mouth. Ken Keyser was there when one swam upstream under the bridge. Catfish are great objects of freshwater aquaculture. They are farmed in catfish ponds, especially in the South. They enjoy being fed as much as mallards and geese do. This one must have come up from Hook Pond, as we don’t have any catfish farmers on Long Island.

Meanwhile, in the woods the highbush blueberries are ripening, the black raspberries will be along shortly, along with the wine berries, beach plums, and wild black cherries later, and, finally, a little before Thanksgiving, cranberries will be ripe.

And what about those all blue indigo buntings breeding in the big treeless field that adjoins the South Fork Natural History Museum in Bridgehampton? That may be a first for Long Island. But watch out, the tropics are heating up, and it may be time for another big hurricane, or maybe even a big, big one. 

Larry Penny can be reached via email at [email protected].

The afternoon of July 3 was a perfect time to take a leisurely kayak cruise in Sag Harbor Cove. Due to other commitments this season, I had not had a chance to dunk my dinky little blue kayak into the water. Being nearly 6-foot-6 and one who labors with a ridiculously large size-16 foot, my kayak makes me feel as if I am snugly entombed in an odd-colored banana in a wobbly, old shopping cart. Comfortable? No. Practical and easy to store? Most certainly.

Comfort aside, I was really looking forward to my maiden voyage of the season away from the holiday traffic, jammed beach parking lots, and constant boat wakes of the more frequently traveled open bay waters. The peace and serenity of the back parts of the cove would be a much-welcomed change from the early summer hectic pace seen everywhere else.

Timed with a nice low tide, the bright sun gleamed off the water as I set out, and while its rays were intense, a nice gentle breeze from the west helped cool things off. While I was not surprised to see many houses along the shoreline being upgraded or rebuilt, it was thoroughly enjoyable to come across an assortment of aquatic creatures that typically inhabit such low tidal flow waters, including blue-claw and spider crabs, various whelks and snails of all shapes and sizes, oysters, clams, grass shrimp, killifish, and spearing, to name a few. The warm waters were teeming with life. 

But there was one particular item that could be seen everywhere in great abundance. The lowly bank mussel.

Citing a famous comedian’s well-known refrain, the bank mussel just can’t get no respect. It is clearly overshadowed by its very popular cousin, the blue mussel, which is highly treasured table fare. Cultivated lovingly in so many countries now, the market for this species continues to skyrocket in price and popularity. Yes, the blue mussel is king in the eyes of many, while the bank mussel takes the back seat as the joker. 

The muddy, dark-brown bank mussel, while marginally edible, has always had a low profile and little recognition. Hanging in clumps, standing upright like soldiers ready for inspection, or broken off from their ranks lying quietly in the shallow water, a huge population was in residence that afternoon on the exposed tidal banks. And that’s good to see. Prolific filter feeders that can live up to 20 years, the bank mussels serve to help clean our waters, especially in our creeks and salt marshes. 

They are tough, too. The bank mussel has a genetic makeup that tolerates huge temperature extremes. Whether it’s baking exposed on the edge of a marsh bank during a weeklong summer heat wave or clammed up during an extended deep winter freeze, bank mussels are just about impervious to all Mother Nature can throw at them. Not many other creatures I know have such tough-as-nails attributes.

While the bank mussel will never gain the status of its more prized relative, it is clear that this underappreciated shellfish serves a very important role within our marine ecosystem. No shame in that at all. But a little more respect for this very humble inhabitant of our local waters is most likely warranted the next time you walk, wade, or boat about our various East End estuaries.

Sebastian Gorgone of Mrs. Sam’s Bait and Tackle in East Hampton showed some respect for fishing conditions this week. “With all due respect, the fishing has been good,” Gorgone exclaimed. “Fluke and sea bass fishing has been productive on the east side of Gardiner’s Island and striped bass have been taking clam baits from the surf in recent days.” Bass can also still be had on the bayside. Gorgone said that a nice keeper bass was taken from shore on a small diamond jig near Sammy’s Beach in East Hampton.

Out at the Tackle Shop in Amagansett, Harvey Bennett said the action has been solid on several fronts. “Big striped bass have shown up big time in Montauk in the rips,” he said. “And the action along the ocean beaches has been good too, with some fish up to 29 pounds taken.”

He added that big bluefish can be had at North Bar and Gin Beach in Montauk, and that small bluefish (a.k.a. snappers) have shown up locally but are still very small. Bennett also proclaimed that the freshwater scene is still active on Fort Pond in Montauk, and that those big carp are on the chew again in Hook Pond in East Hampton. 

As per his continuing quest to send baseball gloves and mitts to underprivileged children in the Dominican Republic, the call for more used leather goods still beckons. “We’re getting to the ninth inning here,” he said. “The response has been good, but we need some more.” Check under your bed, garage, or the deepest part of your closet. 

The full moon this past weekend in Montauk did not disappoint those pursuing very large striped bass. The Viking Starship on Sunday night had a full boatload of fishermen and all went home happy, with most fish landed in the 25-to-40-pound range, including a whopping 53-pound pool winner for Tom Retzlaff of Setauket taken on a live eel. 

Capt. Art Cortes of the charter boat Halfback confirmed that the bass fishing is equally good during the day with fish up to 40 pounds captured, and that shark fishing has been good offshore, as the boat landed a 130-pound mako on Sunday’s trip. 

“The fishing inshore has really been red hot lately,” said Tanya Rade at the Westlake Marina in Montauk. “The bass fishing has been phenomenal, both day and night, and we have been selling a ton of eels for them too.” Rade said that the action for fluke has picked up considerably with a large number of fish up to 10 pounds weighed in recent days. Most of the action has been on the south side in deeper water. Smaller fish inhabit the local rips. For those intent on porgies and sea bass, the fishing has been equally productive.

“Offshore action for makos and threshers has been good too,” added Rade. Those focused on tuna report a pickier bite, with a few bluefin and bigeyes landed.  

As a reminder, the 17th annual Montauk Mercury Grand Slam charity tournament will be held Saturday and Sunday. Targeting four inshore species — striped bass, bluefish, sea bass, and fluke — proceeds benefit youth, families, and senior citizens in the East Hampton community. 

In addition, the inaugural Star Island Yacht Club fluke tournament is underway. The weeklong tourney started on Sunday and ends at 4 p.m. on Saturday. 

We welcome your fishing tips, observations, and photographs at [email protected]. You can find the “On the Water” column on Twitter at @ehstarfishing.

Of all of the many thousands of vertebrate species, fish being the most numerous, which one is the most famous for preying on its own? 

Why, Homo sapiens, of course. We kill one another with abandon and en masse as in the widely used term “genocide.” We very, very rarely engage in genocide for food, which is the main reason other vertebrates kill their own. While it has become extremely rare, cannibalism in humans still occurs here and there.

A kind of genocide practiced by a political entity in which thousands are slaughtered in a relatively short span of time is known as “democide,” a term refined by the late R.J. Rummel. A few primate species, of which we are one, from time to time kill a bunch of their own kind, but all other vertebrates to my knowledge practice neither genocide nor democide, but such a generalization needs a final proof. The killing of millions of Jews and others during World War II by Hitler and the Nazis is surely a case of such democide.

Wild vertebrates of one species kill vertebrates of another species in predator-prey relationships, culminating in the predator feeding on the prey. Cheetahs run down antelopes, lions run down wildebeests, wolves run down caribous, and so on. 

Our white-tailed deer, Odocoileus virginianus, are invariably a prey species. They are not meat eaters. When deer and other large prey species such as wild pigs, antelopes, wild horses, and the like don’t have predators other than humans to catch and feed on them, they reproduce prodigiously.

Such is the case on Long Island, which once had wolves, wild cats, and perhaps a mountain lion or two, all killed off soon after Caucasians settled here. Even after all of the natural predators were exterminated, deer remained in low numbers because the colonists fed on them rapaciously. For a long time deer were their only source of large meat.

Then came suburbanization, along with removal of forests for land to be settled, planted, and built on, all accelerated by railroad and then automobiles. As a boy in Mattituck on Long Island’s North Fork in the 1940s and 1950s, I might see a deer or two every other year. When I left the Army and came back to New York from the West Coast in 1961, deer had already become quite common. Indeed, on my way back to finish my degree at Cornell University in February of that year, I hit one on Route 25 a little beyond Riverhead while driving a station wagon I had borrowed from my brother. The deer died, the station wagon was almost totaled, and I found another car and started out again. This time I was much more circumspect and made it without incident.

The deer population continued to swell despite the attempts by farmers and others with special permits to keep them from damaging crops. Upstate, there had always been a hunting season for deer run by the Department of Environmental Conservation, and I tried it a couple of times unsuccessfully. Finally, the state began deer hunting seasons on Long Island, both shotgun (but not rifle) and bow and arrow. While the archery season was set in the fall, the shotgun season began every year in January. Eventually, does and then fawns were included in the annual licensed take.

Upstate the deer-hunting season always began in the fall, before the bucks had shed their antlers. When you saw an antlered buck, you knew you weren’t shooting at a doe, which was not allowed. However, come Long Island’s January season, following the molting of many antlers, you didn’t know which sex you were shooting at. Shotgun hunters began to take stags, does, and fawns. Over a three-week span in March and April 2005, an experienced deer counting team from upstate counted about 3,200 or so deer in East Hampton Town (including East Hampton Village).

Today, the deer population is probably still close to that number. To control the deer herd in the village, a team of vivisectionists was hired a few years back. They ran down adult female deer, removed their ovaries (a very ghastly process indeed), and tagged and numbered them. It went badly in at least three deer, notwithstanding efforts by Dell Cullum to stop the whole thing. 

In one case, Dell removed two dead fawns from one of the spayed does while she died in the arms of his wife. That form of birth control was rightfully put aside the following year, but as of this writing is being considered for this year.

Before adopting that method of reducing the herd, the village considered night sniper sharpshooters with automatic rifles and infrared spotting scopes from the United States Department of Agriculture.

Deer societies are matriarchal, just like elephant societies. If something happens to a mother raising a fawn or two, another female will take the motherless young into her care. Deer are not stupid. In terms of evolution, deer have been around for at least five million years, that is at least five times longer than us humans. There is much we don’t know about them; think how little we knew about dolphins before Cousteau and other marine biologists began to elucidate us. Deer are very complex, competent, and sentient creatures.

After watching deer observe a Long Island Rail Road train passing through Hither Woods, Russell Stein, who helped create East Hampton Town’s Natural Resources Department, once pondered whether deer believe in some kind of higher spirit the way humans do. Does are very protective of their fawns, just as human mothers are very protective of their infants. More than once, I’ve watched does keep their fawns on the side of a road until a vehicle passes.

I have nothing against fishing and hunting, but I do respect deer. I would prefer some kind of painless birth control, the kind we humans practice, rather than trying to reduce their population size with buckshot and arrows.

At the very least, why not have the shotgun season moved to the fall, as it is scheduled upstate each year, and make it bucks only? That way many bucks would not be able to inseminate does, which in the long term would lead to a smaller herd.

As far as the deer destroying the understory, one should drive along the back roads of Southampton and East Hampton and take a gander at the extent of coverage by huckleberries and blueberries in the woodlands on either side.

Larry Penny can be reached via email at [email protected].

There was a lot of noise going on. While there were plenty of boisterous and colorful fireworks blasting off into the night sky during the extended July 4 holiday weekend, the local fishing scene also witnessed its own cacophony of activity on several fronts, as angler participation leaped into full summer mode. Some much-appreciated warm and toasty weather did not dissuade many from either jumping in the bay or even the still-chilly ocean waters for a nice, refreshing dip, or from baiting up a fluke or porgy hook for a chance at a nice holiday dinner. 

While no fireworks were set off, the fishing action did exhibit some sparks as folks sailed off from dry land. I even ventured with some friends on Saturday morning in the still lumpy seas east of the Montauk Lighthouse. The bass action was picky. However, I did finally land my first keeper striper of the season, a nice 29-inch fish on a simple diamond jig. Bluefish were rather thick and helped fill the void. As it turned out, the incoming tide that afternoon saw an influx of sand eels move into the rips and a multitude of keeper bass were caught, including a 52-pound bass trolled up on the Capt. Mark. Sadly, we had prematurely called it a day at 11 a.m. As the fishing credo goes, we should have practiced better patience.

“Bassing has been good, but it should really be solid with the upcoming full moon this weekend,” predicted Capt. Mike Albronda of the charter boat Montauk. “Lots of bait around and the diamond jigging should be great.” Striper action should also peak for those who prefer the solitude and secrecy of fishing under the moonlit skies. The sale of small eels will likely be big this week, for that is the preferred bait of choice for those seeking larger stripers in the dead of night with the stronger-than-normal lunar tides. 

But striped bass and blues were not the only fixture on the fishing scene. Sharing the waters about a mile away in the still-dense Saturday morning haze was the outline of the Viking Starship, all 140 feet of her, anchored up near Great Eastern Rock. The boat was packed almost elbow to elbow with eager anglers reeling up a mix of large porgies and black sea bass. Recent action has been consistently good. The eagerly awaited sea bass season finally opened on June 27, and three fish over 15 inches can now be retained. 

“Action for bass and bluefish has been consistent,” said Tom (T.J.) Jordan at Gone Fishing Marina in Montauk. “And the sea bass fishing at Cartwright and Frisbees has been very good too since the opening of the season.” Jordan did not have any reports from offshore due to the recently persistent high winds and turbulent seas, but once the seas settle a bit, the activity should quicken for those in pursuit of sharks and tuna.

For flatfish fans, fluke fishing perked up a bit in the local rips off Montauk, said Kathy Vegessi, the patriotic, shoreside support arm of the open boat Lazybones. “The action has been good, with more keepers in the mix up to six pounds.” An outsize doormat of nearly 11 pounds was caught on the Miss Montauk II on Sunday. 

Harvey Bennett, owner of the Tackle Shop in Amagansett, was flying the French flag in honor of Independence Day with pride outside his shop. “We owe a lot to the French and how they helped us gain our independence, and people forget that,” proclaimed Monsieur Bennett, who had the Tour de France bicycle race on TV in his establishment. 

Turning to the fishing scene, Bennett said that Sy Ross of Springs and a buddy picked up six nice fluke between 22 and 24 inches off Accabonac Harbor on squid and spearing combos. He also said that stripers can be caught on clams from the ocean surf from Amagansett heading east to Gurney’s, and that shad, a particularly favorite food of large striped bass, can be still found in the nearby wash. A multitude of smaller bass can be had at Sammy’s Beach and Albert’s Landing on the bayside, he said. 

But Bennett was beyond enthused over the freshwater action. “I’m as happy as a clam at high tide about the action going on at Fort Pond in Montauk,” he added poetically. “Largemouth bass can be had on night crawlers and walleyes abound too. Great fishing.”

Those into light tackle and fly-fishing have also had some good innings of late. “Mostly sight fishing last week,” said Capt. Paul Dixon, an East Hampton guide. “When we had sun it was great for larger fish. When we didn’t have sun, we blind-cast and caught a bunch of schoolie stripers in the 15-to-22-inch range. Also, there are a lot of small blues off Cartwright Island.” Capt. Ken Rafferty also confirmed the solid bluefish action.

Sea bass were in very good supply on the east side of Gardiner’s Island, said Sebastian Gorgone of Mrs. Sam’s Bait and Tackle in East Hampton. “The sea bass have been big too, up to four pounds,” he said. “Fluke fishing was also good at Accabonac and Napeague Harbors.” Gorgone added that small stripers were plentiful inside Three Mile Harbor and Sammy’s Beach.

Action inside toward Shelter Island and the Peconics lacked some of the intensity of areas to the east. “Nothing very exciting going on as the winds have been a bit relentless for many,” said Ken Morse of Tight Lines Tackle in Sag Harbor. “Fluking has been slow, but there are blues off of Jessup’s Neck and some weakfish in Noyac Bay.”

For those anglers with a more competitive bent, a couple of fun summer fishing tournaments get underway in the next few days in Montauk. First up is the inaugural Star Island Yacht Club fluke tournament. The weeklong tourney starts on Sunday and ends at 4 p.m. on July 15. The entry fee is $400 per boat with a six-angler maximum. 

In addition, the ever-popular Montauk Mercury Grand Slam charity tournament will once again be held on July 15 and 16. Now in its 17th year, proceeds benefit youth, families, and senior citizens in the East Hampton community. 

It is presented by the Kiwanis Club of East Hampton and the Montauk Friends of Erin. Various prizes and trophies are given for the largest striped bass, sea bass, bluefish, and fluke for recreational, professional, commercial, and party boat divisions. Popular with children, the Wayne Clinch Kids Catch program will offer a new rod and reel and tackle boxes to 10 lucky kids under 13, and all will be entered in a drawing to win a seven-foot inflatable boat with a Mercury outboard motor. 

In addition, at the awards ceremony late Sunday afternoon, July 16, Capt. Frank Tuma Sr. will be honored as the Fishing Legend of the Year. The accolade is well deserved for Captain Tuma, a Montauk legend at the age of 92. Weigh-ins and events for the tournament take place at Uihlein’s Marina on West Lake Drive, and more information can be found at montaukgrandslam.com. 

We welcome your fishing tips, observations, and photographs at [email protected]. You can find the “On the Water” column on Twitter at @ehstarfishing.

Try to look beyond the madding crowd. There’s a lot going on in the world of nature, all of it free of charge. North America’s tiniest hummingbird, the calliope from the Pacific Northwest, has come to nectar alongside a ruby-throated male at Joanne Dittmar’s house in Springs on the bay just west of Hog Creek. Sibley defines it as an “accidental.” The ruby-throat is our tiniest bird species; just imagine how hard it would be to see a bird two-thirds its size with the naked eye as it whizzed by. 

The milkweeds, both common and orange, are coming into full bloom. Keep your eyes open for monarch butterflies. We hope they’ll be mating, then depositing their eggs on the milkweeds soon. The eggs hatch, the larvae feed on the milkweeds’ poisonous sap and thereby gain immunity from predation by birds and other animals.

Box turtles have been moving to and fro for egg laying and other domestic duties since the middle of June. Chris Chapin, a local realtor and naturalist, picked three off three different local roads so they wouldn’t be run over. On June 9, I found a large one that didn’t have such a savior freshly squashed into the pavement on Brick Kiln Road in Bridgehampton. Arrgh.

Joanne Dittmar has a big box turtle moving around on her property. She lives on a dead-end street so the turtle has more than a sporting chance to live to 100, which is not unusual for turtles and tortoises that are not run over or otherwise come to an untimely demise.

The ospreys that nest on the Noyac side of Long Beach and a pair that occupies a nest just north of the North Haven bridge are doing well with one exception. An adult osprey was run over and flattened on Short Beach Road on North Haven on Friday. Its nest is liable to fail, as it takes two adults to raise chicks to fledging and keep them alive for a few weeks thereafter. 

Some osprey pairs mate for life and for good reason. However, the two nesting on a platform at the edge of a pond near Hog Creek are a new pair, according to Joanne Dittmar, who watches them every year from her window. The previous female was quite finicky; this year’s is quietly resourceful.

Ospreys are one of the few bird species native throughout the world. Though decimated by the use of DDT and other insecticides once used to battle mosquitoes, they have climbed back and are doing well, particularly during the last few years, as the mobs of bunkers have returned to our waters. On the other hand, some nests are in the path of mosquito-control helicopters, while others are besieged by bald eagles, which are making a comeback on Long Island.

Whippoorwills may be doing a bit better in prime whippoorwill habitat. Two weeks ago, I heard three different males sounding off along Daniel’s Hole Road west of Route 114. I wonder if last year’s helicopter curfew encouraged them to try again, as there were only one or two at most off and on near the airport for several years prior to 2017. On the other hand, I didn’t hear any evening songs of hermit thrushes, which used to frequent that area of the South Fork’s pine barrens year in, year out.

Several “Nature Notes” ago I said there was no appreciable gypsy moth damage around. Apparently, I spoke too soon. Victoria Bustamante gave me an account of gypsy moth infestations on both sides of Route 114 north of Stephen Hand’s Path and running all the way to Daniel’s Hole Road. I checked on Friday; she was right. 

Next year could be the big one for gypsy moths; the first such in these parts since at least 2002. Victoria also reported that serious gypsy moth infestations dotted the trees on both sides of the Long Island Expressway, but that some trees that had been stripped bare were leafing out again following the Friday downpours of two weeks ago.

This year could be a very big chigger year, despite what Cornell Cooperative Extension says about chiggers not existing on Long Island. Terry Sullivan ran into a slew of them on a property near his house. They were the red adults, which feed on vegetation, rather than humans, but the larvae that stem from them are voracious as far as we homo sapiens are concerned. 

If you’re out hiking, you might have a hard time coming up with a black-legged (deer) tick or two, but don’t get too cocky, lone star ticks, the females of which have a white spot on their back, are all over and very hungry.

I’m predicting a big hurricane just as I did in April of 2012, the year that Superstorm Sandy hit at the end of October. 

Whether President Trump and his cohorts believe in global warming or not, water levels are rising. A part of the Antarctic ice shelf as big as Delaware is about to break off, and the glaciers of Glacier National Park are disappearing at a rapid rate. Remember, as sea level rises, so does the freshwater aquifer that lies atop it. Freshwater is less dense than saltwater. A case in point: On Friday while moving from Industrial Road to Second House Road in Montauk, I went past Brushy Island in Fort Pond, which only 30 years ago was populated with trees and brush. In the early 1920s when Norman Taylor defined the flora of Montauk, the island was home to Montauk’s only basswood. All I could see the other day was a single tree stump sticking up. Brushy Island is no longer!

One last wonderful bit of news: The Town of Brookhaven also has an airport, Calabro Airport. In the June 26 Newsday there was a big public notice that there is a plan to install solar panels on the ground throughout much of its open areas. The East Hampton Airport has even more open ground than Calabro. How about it, sustainability committee?

Larry Penny can be reached via email at [email protected].

Yep. It’s official. The days are getting shorter. 

As the season changes from spring to summer, it’s always been a bit hard for me to fathom that our exposure to natural daylight is already on the downhill. A sunrise of 5:15 a.m. on June 21 in Montauk is 5:18 a.m. a week later. It’s only a three-minute difference, but the daylight does begin to erode rather quickly.

Personally, summer does not really seem to commence in my own mind until the July 4 holiday weekend. And despite the rise in water and air temperatures we’ll experience over the next two months, the fact remains that with each passing day, our time to enjoy various daytime pastimes and activities begins to lessen. Such differences are subtle at first and barely noticeable. But before you know it, by the end of July, we’ve lost nearly 50 minutes of daylight. And by then, we do see and feel the difference. 

For aquatic creatures like fish, does the lessening daylight alter their habits? Actually, the answer is yes, for the most part. Many fish, too, begin to make an adjustment to their activities and feeding patterns as we move deeper into the summer months. 

For those anglers in pursuit of bluefish and, in particular, striped bass, a focus on fishing in the early morning and late evening or night during the lazy, hazy days of summer will usually result in greater action. The high noon, blazingly bright sunshine of mid-August is not exactly prime time for a fish like a striper to be on the prowl for food. They too become more lethargic in the midday sun, seeking deeper and cooler water, and become more nocturnal in their hunt for prey. It’s the same story for various freshwater species in our local ponds. 

So, while shorter days are now upon us, now is not the time to ditch the Ray-Bans and sunscreen. Quite the contrary. But it’s time to look more closely at the clock on the wall and the sun in the sky, and rethink our own schedules to better maximize the time spent pursuing various quarry.  

As if on cue, the early morning and evening bite for striped bass has already kicked into high gear at Montauk, as a large swath of sand eels have moved into the various rips and along the south side. And the fish being caught in recent days have been significantly larger, with a good number over 40 pounds landed on trolled parachutes, large tubes, and diamond jigs.  “Usually by July 1, we see the larger fish show up, so the timing is about right,” said Capt. Richard Etzel of the Breakaway. “Fishing has been very good.” 

The season for the other saltwater bass — black sea bass — opened for recreational anglers on Tuesday. Three fish over 15 inches can now be taken on a daily basis. The creel limit will increase to eight fish on Sept. 1. Commercial pinhookers, who have been allowed to keep up to 50 pounds per day since May 15, report that the start of the season should be red hot. “Lots of big sea bass around,” said Gregory Mechaber of the Capt. Mark. “Plenty of large porgies are also mixed in, up to four pounds too.” 

With the lessening of a persistent groundswell, fluke action also picked up a bit off of Montauk. Various open boats have taken part in the improved action, including the Lazybones, the Montauk Star, the Miss Montauk II, the Viking, and the Ebb Tide II, which saw fish up to 11 pounds weighed in during the recent calming seas. 

“Fluke action has become more consistent,” said Paul Apostolides of Paulie’s Tackle in Montauk. “Action from the shoreline has been a bit picky though, but some blues and small bass are running around, especially on the north side.”

Farther off the beach, the shark action continues to be consistent. The 47th annual Montauk Marine Basin shark tournament took place last weekend and the largest shark captured was a 384-pound mako on the Joy Sea, skippered by veteran Capt. Chuck Mallinson. The Joy Sea also captured the largest shark back in the 2013 tourney with a 377-pound mako.  Some good shark karma going on the deck of that boat for sure. The Sea Dreamer II took second place with a mako of 348 pounds, while the Tail Walker out of Connecticut placed a 243-pound mako on the scales to take third. 

While we are not in the middle of summer doldrums yet, the action the past week hit a bit of a lull according to Harvey Bennett of the Tackle Shop in Amagansett. “Fluke slowed down, but some nice ones were taken off Napeague Harbor,” said Bennett. “There are some small bass and big blues at Gin Beach in Montauk, and some weakfish have been taken at White Sands, too.”

Separately, Bennett added that his continued recruitment of used baseball gloves and mitts for underprivileged children in the Dominican Republic remains successful. “It’s been a great response so far,” he said. “But if anyone has any catcher’s mitts, that would be particularly welcome, as they are hard to find.” Check the back of your closet or garage and let Harvey know.

Up at Mrs. Sam’s Bait and Tackle in Springs, Sebastian Gorgone reports that the striped bass action at Main Beach and Georgica has perked up. “I had one customer on Sunday land several keeper bass on clams,” said Gorgone. “However, those who fished various lures had no action at all.” Slinging clams into the surf is a popular summer method to land stripers during the day, when artificials are regularly spurned. Gorgone added that the fluke action remains decent in the local area.

Farther west, action in the Peconics is mixed, with a smattering of fluke, porgies, weakfish, and large bluefish being the predominant catch. “Action from the ocean beaches has been quiet, but inside the bays, the activity has been pretty good,” said Ken Morse of Tightlines Tackle in Sag Harbor. Kerry Heffernan dead-sticked a seven-pound fluke fishing in local waters. 

Keeper-size striped bass have become harder to find as bay water temperatures have crept up over 70 degrees. However, the warming waters have kept the blue-claw crabs happy, with catches remaining excellent in the Sag Harbor area. Another active nocturnal feeder, blue-crabs are perhaps the finest table fare we have to enjoy on the East End.

We welcome your fishing tips, observations, and photographs at [email protected]. You can find the “On the Water” column on Twitter at @ehstarfishing.