WELLFLEET — A home listed for sale off Chequessett Neck Road has raised the blood pressure of preservationists because it is part of a cottage colony that has for 72 […]
Archives for 2020
NATURAL SELECTION
Outer Cape Outage Revives Osprey Debate
Audubon and Eversource disagree on how to keep nests off power lines
Over 100 years ago, in an agrarian Massachusetts, farmers began training ospreys to nest — not in trees, but on man-made platforms. The intent was to use the birds of […]
RACISM REPORT
Black Lives Matter Signs Provoke Vandals
Wellfleet police warn of ‘zero tolerance’ for spray painting
When Barbara Rushmore’s “Black Lives Matter” sign was stolen from in front of her house on Commercial Street in Provincetown’s East End around July 4th, she assumed that someone from […]
ANIMAL KINGDOM
Bats Take Over Town Hall
Eastham learns how to gently remove flying mammals from public buildings
EASTHAM — Bats took over town hall last week, displacing town employees and moving last weekend’s early voting for the Sept. 1 primary election outdoors. Town Administrator Jacqui Beebe said […]
THE SCUTTLEBUTT
A Noble Rite of Passage Lives On
Zach Salvador brings in his first giant bluefin
One of the biggest heartbreaks for me through the years living here every summer is watching this classic fishing village become less and less of that. Families who could no longer […]
SHARK WATCH
Is Awareness Just a Sometime Thing?
New technologies are adopted, but they still have a long way to go
WELLFLEET — A familiar foe still lurks in the summer waters, but the unfamiliar foe floating in the air may be distracting from it. With Covid-19 keeping beachgoers vigilant about […]
PEOPLE OF THE FIRST LIGHT
Eastham Looks to Set the Record Straight at 400th
Campfire series invites Indigenous historians to shift the storytelling
EASTHAM — Since 1620, the English side of the story of the Pilgrims’ landing at First Encounter Beach, and then Plymouth, has been the version most people learn in these […]
FAIRWAYS
Golf Holds New Appeal and Old Lessons
Playing regularly reveals more about the game, and life
Early on in the coronavirus “quarantine,” many people began new hobbies and activities, or revived old ones that they hadn’t participated in for years. Some people have exercised more or […]
HOMESTEADING
Those Chicks You Got in April Will Be Laying Soon
If your adolescent chicken starts to crow, you’ve won the pullet surprise
When we became backyard chicken farmers five years ago, I had oodles of enthusiasm, but very little actual knowledge of chickens. I didn’t know, for example, that our six brand-new […]
GRAVEYARD SHIFT
‘White Bronze’ Monuments Speak of a Forgotten Fashion
Made of cast zinc, they adorn the graves of Victorian-era notables
When the sun is shining, they glow with a bluish hue, standing out from the luminous white marbles, polished granites, and matte-black slates. There are not many of them in […]
GALLERY
Mailboxes, Straight to Your Heart
Because letters keep us near, while we’re apart
When we moved to Wellfleet, my daughters considered it a major upgrade that we’d be getting a mailbox. We had gone from one remote village to another, but this one […]
KITCHEN TABLE
Sweet But Subversive Maple Walnut Pull-apart Bread
From Rage Baking to refocusing women’s power
Two years ago, after watching the Kavanaugh hearings, Katherine Alford chose one of the first recipes she would contribute to the Rage Baking collective: Maple Walnut Pull-apart Bread. Like other […]
APPRECIATION
To Peter Watts, Who Captured Wellfleet’s Timeless Luminosity
With thanks from one here, still walking in the landscapes he painted
Thank you, Peter Watts. The loss of any artist is a double shock, as it dawns on us what has ended. Not only will we never again catch his eye, […]
NAVIGATING BY THE STARS
Mercury and Virgo Raise the Bar on Practicality
A time to step up wellness, work, and organization
When a planet spends time in the sign it rules, it is said to be in its domicile, one of the five “dignities” that determine the level of influence it […]
RARA AVIS
This Week’s Bird Sightings
Confirmed bird sightings on the Outer Cape in the week preceding the Independent’s deadline on Tuesday, Aug. 25, included the following, based on a report prepared by Mass Audubon’s Wellfleet […]
