ACROSTIC — Our inimitable constructors, team Cox/Rathvon, are in a green mood; this is the second excerpt in a row from a naturalist literary work and I feel like there have been a lot of other instances this summer. It could also be selective memory on my part because I like this kind of writing so much.

Today’s passage is from “Paddling North,” an award-winning memoir by Audrey Sutherland of her 800-mile solo kayak journey in Alaska, that she embarked upon at the age of 60. This excerpt refers to a migratory event that many of us will be witnessing soon; in New York, it’s Canada geese that tootle their way south.

The cluing today was replete with appropriate references, natural, nautical and northern — DOLPHIN, NARWHAL, POSEIDON, NIGHT SKY, UMIAK, TEMPEST and so on. And the passage itself was typically gorgeous, limpid and uncomplicated. Yet I made several mistakes. “VW” in the passage threw me at first; then, thinking I was clever, I assumed “VW bus” and created problems in the cluing for myself. I also had “ethereal” instead of ELDRITCH (probably from seeing EPHEMERAL in the same column), and “allegro” rather than SCHERZO.

I didn’t know ANHINGA, but I very vaguely remember a children’s book where fishermen sent birds to fish with ribbons around their necks to prevent them from swallowing their catch, and this might have been that type of bird.