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Sydney Michalski

@sydneymichalski.bsky.social
3.6K followers 280 following 4.4K posts

nature-enthusiast, amazement-prone, sharing wonder sydneymichalski.substack.com rivenjoiner.com

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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
Door-knocking for Dems! Strength in Solidarity - Community is Resistance! Even in deep-red rural Maine, we met neighbors who get it, voting blue up and down the ballot as a first step towards a better future 💙 One amazing 80+ year old lady said we made her day - but she actually made ours! 1/
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
As summer winds down, the chickadees return. Feels like our favorite neighbors have come home from summer vacation :) #WildBirds #BlackCappedChickadee 1/3 Read more: sydneymichalski.substack.com/p/sunny-flow...
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Clipboard - check. Flyers - check. T-shirt - check! Getting ready to go knock doors around my town for the first time - soooo nervous! 😂 Yesterday, I didn’t know one person in our town that wasn’t Republican. Now I know 3 :) 1/5 #BlueWave #VoteBlue
A woman wearing a Freedom Democracy Truth t-shirt is holding a clipboard and campaign flyers, ready to go door-knocking for Maine Dems.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Our Maine native bumblebees are such a wistful beauty, and their story hits me right in the heartstrings every fall… They are ground-nesters, and our temperatures are too harsh to sustain a colony over the winter. 1/ sydneymichalski.substack.com/p/sunny-flow...
A Maine native bumblebee rests on a tall sunflower.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
🎶 yawn and stretch and try to come alive 🎶 This late-summer bumble bee looks just like me, stumbling towards that cup of ambition! 😂🐝☕️ Read more about Sunny Flowers and Snoozy Bees in the latest issue of 🌿 Nature Moments 🌿: sydneymichalski.substack.com/p/sunny-flow...
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Two great ways to say #FDT! Now available at 🌿 Nature Moments Gear, where nature + activism go hand-in-hand. #SeeYouInTheStreets #VoteBlue nature-moments-gear.printify.me
A mock-up of a navy blue t-shirt with a subtle FDT message - Freedom Democracy Truth in rainbow ombre text. A mock-up of a turquoise t-shirt with a subtle FDT message - Frog, Duck, Turtle written beneath silhouettes of each animal.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Bye, Susan! So good to see ProPublica's reporting about Susan Collins' corruption come out just in time for mid-terms! I hope every Mainer sees this :) Anyway, this is the LTE I sent to the Bangor Daily News 1/ www.propublica.org/article/fbi-...
propublica.org
The FBI Anti-Corruption Squad Was Circling Susan Collins — Until Trump Got in the Way
After the FBI caught a defense contractor’s CEO making illegal campaign contributions, it sought to launch a sweeping political bribery probe involving Collins and others. Then the second Trump admini...
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Oh, you know, just getting ready to put out yards signs for every Dem candidate, right here in the middle of our MAGA neighborhood :) #BlueWave #GetOutTheVote #MaineDems On Saturday, we stopped by the Maine Dems office in Machias to see how we could get involved. 1/
4 campaign yard signs for Maine Democratic candidates: Troy Jackson for Senate, Hannah Pingree for Governor, Matt Dunlap for Congress, and Keith Newman for State Representative.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Have you ever really, really listened to a dabbler dabbling? Volume on, and prepare to be enchanted! 🦆💚 #Mallard #NatureVideos #LakeLife Read more at this week’s Nature Moments🌿 sydneymichalski.substack.com/p/our-local-...
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
smh Painful how well this one meme sums up the state of our nation right now.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
My family is a little blue dot in the midst of deep-red territory. And we’ve heard that old, tired sneer, “Well if you think it’s so terrible, why don’t you just leave?” But this is our home :) So we look for our people and for opportunities for change - and this is the story of one conversation 1/
A woman is wearing a light blue t-shirt with a nature landscape design that says "Not Today, Fascists."
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Simple acts of kindness that remind us of our shared humanity seem naturally abundant along the shores of summer lakes. Read more in this week's 🌿 Nature Moments! substack.com/@sydneymicha... #Katahdin #BaxterStatePark #MillinocketLake #LakeLife
Two canoes drift peacefully on a bright blue lake, with mountain foothills on the horizon. Millinocket Lake, near Baxter State Park, Maine
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
A #dragonfly story. This young Autumn Meadowhawk pick a hunting perch, and ignored me as I scooched up close. She launched into the air in a blur and looped back to her starting point. And I watched her chomp down the last shiny bits of a hapless fly! (sorry I didn’t catch that part 🪰💀😂)
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Sunflowers 🌻 One of the last blooms of the season in our garden. They save it all for the waning days when the crisp breezes have put us on notice, condensing the blazing glow of the numbered sunny mornings into a buzzy celebration of summer life. ☀️🐝
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
The carrots are blooming, and apparently it’s a black tie event! #WhiteAdmiralButterfly
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
Sibling love lol #OffToCollege
A screenshot of text messages between siblings, after the older brothers have gone off to college and the teen daughter is an only child for the first time, reads:

Older brother: How’s life without us?

Younger sister: Actually super nice! It’s all quiet and clean. It’s amazing! I think my skin looks better too.

Older brother: Bruh.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
There are, not one, but *two* varieties of wild orchids growing in our little patch of Maine woods! In the golden light of a setting sun, it’s hard to imagine anything more magical. #Wildflowers #Helleborine Read more at Nature Moments: sydneymichalski.substack.com/p/wild-orchids
sydneymichalski.substack.com
Wild Orchids
I honestly could not believe it when I discovered that there were, not one, but two varieties of wild orchids growing in our Maine woods.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
Just added these new FDT designs to Nature Moments Gear where nature and activism go hand in hand 🌿 I was looking for a way to more fully express my absolute disapproval of the travesty currently oozing around the White House, and all his enablers. #FDT nature-moments-gear.printify.me
A product photo shows a turquoise t-shirt with nature silhouettes of three animals, with text beneath, reading Frog Duck Turtle. It’s an FDT jab with a nature twist.A product photo shows a navy blue t-shirt with three lines of text in rainbow lettering, reading Freedom Democracy Truth. It’s a subtle FDT jab with a pro-democracy focus.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
Susan Collins will use her Todd Blanche vote to campaign like she cares about what’s right 🙄 But she’s still just what she’s always been - bought and paid for. I hope Mainers know that and are done with her - but this is what I wrote to the Portland Press Herald: 1/ substack.com/@sydneymicha...
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 01/08/2026
I’m not always impressed with the common names assigned to our wild flora and fauna. Sometimes I wonder if the namers are entirely qualified. But whoever named the Ebony Jewelwing got it just right! Read more about Maine’s Great Heath in the latest Nature Moments 🌿 open.substack.com/pub/sydneymi...
An emerald green dragonfly with shimmery black wings is perched in bright sunshine on a reed over the water. This is an Ebony Jewelwing, at a small pond in Maine’s Great Heath.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
The carnivores are blooming 😳 Read more in the latest episode of Nature Moments: open.substack.com/pub/sydneymi... #Sundew #NaturePhotography
open.substack.com
This Is Not My Story
The carnivores are blooming, and other tales from my kids’ adventure.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 29/07/2026
The first rule of berry-picking is you must eat some berries while you are picking. The second rule of berry-picking is you must eat some berries while you are picking. Because how else will you be able to look someone dead in the eye and say with authority, “These berries are delicious!” 🫐💙🌿
A bowl of ripe high-bush blueberries is held next to the clusters of green and pink berries still ripening on the bush.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 26/07/2026
#WildflowerHour #WetlandPlants Pickerelweed may not sound like much, but it’s quite the stunner! Echo Lake, Acadia National Park, Maine
Along the shady shores of Echo Lake in Acadia National Park, Pickerelweed blooms in blue-violet spike blossoms with glossy green leaves. In the sunny background, the bases of the water reeds are red and gold.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 25/07/2026
Um, yes please! Shout out to La Laiterie, the brilliant new cafe in Jonesboro serving up French cuisine randomly in rural Downeast Maine ☕️🥐❤️
A coffee-scape, on a marble tabletop. A cortado in a clear glass with a foam-art heart, and a latte in a stoneware mug with a form-art fleur-de-lis.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
When you lose yourself in nature for a moment, nature teaches you something about itself - and also something about life! Blueberries in a cluster each ripen in their own time. Outward conditions appear the same - something inside is making a difference🌿 sydneymichalski.substack.com/p/each-in-it...
open.substack.com
Each In Its Own Time
There is wisdom in the blueberries, and they will share it with you when you sit with them for a just few amazing moments...
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
Good morning, sweet bee! This is actually the first time I’ve caught a bee sleeping on a blossom. It was there last night when I closed the garden gate, still there this morning, all dewy, when I opened it. And off on its busy way again once the sunshine warmed its wings 💛🖤 🐝💛🖤
A Tri-colored Bee is a native Maine bumblebee with black and yellow stripes and a bright orange band near the tail. This bee is covered in morning dew, resting at the center of a bright pink Cosmos blossom.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
The Ghost Pipes are peeking out from among the mosses once again! A lovely, fascinating, truly unique forest blossom that I look forward to every year :) Read more at Nature Moments🌿 open.substack.com/pub/sydneymi...
A cluster of white Ghost Pipe flowers unfurl from the mossy forest floor. Ghost Pipes, Monotropa uniflora, are a unique forest flower with no chlorophyll. They are iridescent white, curving upward from the mosses in summertime, where their roots draw nutrients from a a combination of tree roots and forest floor fungi.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Republicans are struggling to find a campaign message right now given the current state of endless war, rising prices, Trumporrhea, corruption, and incessant pedo-protection. So they’re resurrecting the red scare. 1/ substack.com/@sydneymicha...
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Reposted by Sydney Michalski
Mother Jones @motherjones.com · 15/07/2026
On Monday, Joan Sebastian Guerrero was shot and killed by ICE agents in Biddeford, Maine. Reports say Guerrero was authorized to legally work in the US and not even ICE's target. @annayeo.bsky.social was on the ground Tuesday in Biddeford and spoke with locals—including one man who knew Guerrero.
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Reposted by Sydney Michalski
Petra Michaela @petramichaela.bsky.social · 11/07/2026
Fill a birdbath during a heatwave. Plant flowers for bees and butterflies. Leave a small corner undisturbed for wildlife. Notice the small lives moving through your garden. These things don’t make headlines, but they matter.💚
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 11/07/2026
#Bloomscrolling #Wildflowers This is Dogbane - a wild understory shrub with adorable flowers, which is a favorite food for the Milkweed Tussock Moth. Read more at: sydneymichalski.substack.com/p/who-are-yo...
A close-up image of a cluster of small peppermint-striped flowers in a dappled forest. Wild Dogbane, in Downeast Maine.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 10/07/2026
This flower is as tall as I am!!! Meadow Rue starts out as a little mound of leaves. Then it sends up a flower stalk. That grows. And grows. And grows! Now it’s five feet tall, and has finally opened up into a fireworks display of white and gold. What a show-off 😂 #bloomscrolling #wildflowers
A tall white stalk blossom has tiny fireworks-burst white and yellow flowers, waving in the summer sun against a forest background. This is Meadow Rue.
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Reposted by Sydney Michalski
acadia23.bsky.social @acadia23.bsky.social · 09/07/2026
Thank you, so true. The gloom and doom is exhausting. Mainers are ready to roll up our sleeves and get to work. Anyone insisting Collins has already won needs to shut up and get out of the way. The rest of us are picking up brooms and starting the hard work of cleaning up this mess. Onward!
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 08/07/2026
You don’t always know what you’re holding behind those floodgates until a couple of unrelated events and the kindness of strangers suddenly flings them wide open. 💔❤️ substack.com/@sydneymicha...
substack.com
SydneyMichalski🌿NatureMoments (@sydneymichalski)
This turned out to be an overwhelmingly emotional day. I knew I was a bit fragile, the whole Graham Platner discourse having triggered my sensitivities around our national culture of dismissing victim...
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Perfectly stated.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Graham Platner just had another skeleton fall out of his closet. #BelieveVictims #BelieveWomen I visited his campaign website, and this is what I wrote: 🧵
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 05/07/2026
#bloomscrolling The cranberries are blooming and I am once again amazed by the absolutely endearing beauty of all the stages of our food before it reaches the table 💚 For more amazing Nature Moments, find me on Substack :) sydneymichalski.substack.com
A close up image of tiny cranberry blossoms. Long trailing vines have waxy leaves, and the flowers bloom all along the length. They begin as pink buds, and open into downward-facing blossoms with a long orange center and four white petals curving gently away.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 01/07/2026
My favorite 🦋 is always the one right in front of me, and today it’s a White Admiral. They feed on juices from decaying fruit and flowers, so I rarely find them on a pretty background - but if you’re looking for something classy to elevate your compost pile, nature’s got a 🦋 for you!🤣 #Butterflies
The White Admiral is a black butterfly with bold white stripes in each wing. The bottom edge of the wings feature orange and blue dots. This White Admiral is resting in gravel, apparently collecting some sort of mineral from the pebbles.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
The United States right now is the answer to the question “What if our government and our religion were both just profit?” and it’s a question we already knew the answer to but we asked it again anyway and here we are.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
Oooooookay, these two are definitely family or else they would be scolding and chasing each other like lunatics instead of calmly scouring the gravel driveway for niblets while I sit quietly videoing them and forgetting - for just a moment - that the world is on fire 🤣🐿️ #NatureVideo #CuteSquirrels
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
Sent this LTE to my local paper, in deep red rural Maine where I hope maybe, just maybe, some people might finally start to wake up from the Republican long-con: If Republicans really intended to make America great again, and improve life for ordinary Americans, they would have done it by now. 1/
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 24/06/2026
Look who I found! #CrabSpiders are so cool - they change color between white and yellow, and they are so feisty with those outstretched arms 🤣 Read more: substack.com/@sydneymicha... #BlueFlagIris #Wildflowers #Wildlife #NaturePhotography
A bright yellow Crab Spider is poised for hunting with arms stretched wide, perched on the bright purple petal of a Blue Flag Iris.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 21/06/2026
The thing about a wildflower field is that it invites everyone to the party. I saw three different species of tiny butterfly in a five minute walk. Electric-blue damselflies played hide-and-seek in the grasses. Soooooo, I’m in no hurry to mow - because 🌸all this🌸 is happening! #WildflowerHour
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 21/06/2026
#Stunday #SeaGlass always catches my eye. Just bits of litter from ages past, relentlessly tumbled by ocean waves - now, the simple beauty of one of life’s tiny treasures :) #BeachDay #SummerFun www.amazon.com/Sea-Glass-Portraits-simple-treasures-ebook/dp/B0CLL2T8WS?ref_=ast_author_mpb
See glass glows in summer sunshine at the Maine coast, with blue waters in the background. A carefully balanced stack of smooth white beach stone, frosted white sea glass, and emerald green sea glass form a vibrant cairn in a sparkling setting.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 20/06/2026
#BlueSkyArtShow #Curve The gentle curve of a Stargazer lily in full bloom… #NaturePhotgraphy #Macro #Flowers Shop prints at: pixels.com/featured/1-l...
A close up of a Stargazer lily petal, bright pink in the center with white edges, curves into a dark teal background. The image is moody and dramatic, just like the fragrant, showy blossom.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 20/06/2026
A sweet little #fawn is all tucked in to a grassy nook, nearly invisible, protected by stillness and camouflage while Mom is off grazing. That nose-twitch!😍 #NaturePhotography #Wildlife #CuteBabies
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 19/06/2026
#TigerSwallowtail thoroughly enjoying a chive blossom *happy sigh* And this is why you plant chives! #Butterflies #NaturePhotography #NatureNewlsetter open.substack.com/pub/sydneymi...
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 18/06/2026
#BabySquirrel alert! 🐿️ Every year, the new baby squirrels love to play #peekabo in the hollow of this wild cherry tree. #NaturePhotography #Forest #NatureMoments
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 18/06/2026
#CommonLoons are year-round inhabitants of coastal #Maine. In winter, they are mostly gray, but in summer they transition to formal-eveningwear-black. #BirdOfTheDay #Black #Moments #NaturePhotography #Birds
A Common Loon bathes and preens on Fox Pond in Hancock, Maine. His black wings and black head are outstretched as he lifts himself briefly out of the water to shake out his feathers, displaying a speckled back and signature neck-band.
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Sydney Michalski @sydneymichalski.bsky.social · 17/06/2026
🌿happy sigh🌿 The Hummingbird Clearwing Moths have arrived. What a special little creature. #Moths #HummingbirdClearwingMoth #Pollinators #NaturePhotography #NatureIsAmazing
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