Surprise Walk

When I got in to work this morning, I found myself immediately headed back outside. One of the staff was out sick and his Tuesday Morning Walkers were there for their walk, but had no leader. So, I was drafted. I stuck my belongings in the office, grabbed my camera and binocs, and off we went.

I was a little trepidatious because I haven't walked the trails since this fall, and that was once in October when I came for the interview, and once in November when I was house-hunting. And Gary's been doing these walks for a couple years. He's quite a knowledgeable naturalist and I couldn't imagine that I, the newbie, would have anything new and exciting to impart to the walkers. But, one just never knows.

It was a beautiful crisp winter morning. The snow is mostly gone, but there is plenty of ice on the water.

We found some goldenrod galls, which I dutifully cut into in search of larvae. Two had holes on the outside, a pretty good indication that a chickadee or some other small bird had gotten there first. A third one, however, yielded a brown larva. It was either dead or a pupal case. The wind blew it away before I could make a close examination, though.

The woods around here are just full of oak trees, so I had everyone find an acorn cap. Soon I had them all blowing shrilly on their new acorn cap whistles. I usually do this with kids, but even adults have fun making these cheap noise-makers.


WARNING - what follows may be too gruesome for some people.






Our best find of the day was this partially eaten mouse. It hadn't been dead long (day-wise, not minute-wise). The spinal chord was severed, and only a little bit had been eaten.

What could have done this? Canids were out - they'd just swallow a small morsel like this whole. We considered a raptor, which will often snap the neck of its prey, but why would it leave it behind? Then someone suggested a weasel. Hm. This is a very good possibility. Weasels bite their victims on the back of the neck, and sometimes weasels don't eat their prey. Whatever the reason, it was a nifty find.

The next question was: what kind of mouse is it? I've addressed this a couple times in the past: deer mice and white-footed mice can be difficult to tell apart.

Deer mice, however, do have a definite bi-colored tail: dark above and white below. They also have a small tuft of white hairs at the tip of the tail. The deer mouse's tail is usually a bit longer than the animal's head+body length, where as the white-footed's is slightly smaller. I didn't get this measurement, but the tail coloration is leading me to believe that this is a deer mouse.

So, you just never know what you will find when you go out for an explore. You might not find anything that strikes you as "wow," but then again...maybe you will.

2010 Retrospective

2010 was a year of many changes in my life.

In January we found out that the state's financial crisis was such that environmental education was no longer a going concern. The staff at the two Adirondack Park Visitor Interpretive Centers were the first to feel the headman's axe, but we wouldn't be the last. By December twelve of NY's sixteen environmental educators, and four outdoor education centers, were cut from the system.

Thus began a year of uncertainty. I spent many hours traveling to job interviews. I drove to one interview in a blizzard,

and another in a heatwave.

From Maine,

to Maryland and finally Michigan, I put hundreds of miles on my car. There were phone interviews in Texas, Wisconsin, and Indiana, and applications sent to Washington, Montana, Illinois, and more. Luck was finally with me this fall in Michigan.

Yet despite the dread that comes with pending unemployment, there was a lot of joy in my life this last year. Much of that was due to one special lady:

Jackie is one of those rare people you meet if you are very lucky in life. When Rachel Carson wrote how if she could have a word with the good fairy who blesses all children at birth she'd ask her to give them a sense of wonder that would never go away, she never knew that the good fairy followed through on this wish in the person pictured above. I met Jackie a couple years ago and found in her a botanizing friend whose keen interested and love of plants (and nature in general) left me in awe. Thanks to her enthusiasm and joy in sharing her finds, I added many, many new plants to my life list.

green violet

maidenhair fern (not new, but delightful at any time)

nodding trillium

yellow ladies slipper

gaywings

dwarf sand cherry

star-flowered solomon's seal

spiked nutrush

tubercled orchid

and racemed milkwort, to name but a few.

Wildlife also came into my life. Every spring I watched for the wood turtles as they crept from the woods to lay their eggs by the sides of the roads. I've never seen a single nest hatch out babies, but perhaps one day they will.


I delight in snakes, and red-bellied snakes are among my favorites. This darling guarded my vegetable garden.


I've seen but a very few porcupines in my life, and each one has taken me by surprise. This one was ambling along the road one afternoon as I drove home from The City. I slammed on the brakes and backed up, grabbed my camera, and leapt from the car only in time to get a quick shot before it disappeared into the wetland.


I watched this delightfully fluffy peep as it scurried among the rocks of the Ice Meadows in search of its mother, who was flying nearby.


I also spent some time with another Adirondack botanical legend: my friend Evelyn. Evelyn is a botanist of the old school variety, who knows her plants like the back of her hand. Bryophytes are a special favorite of hers, but she also knows the secret places where rare wildflowers grow.

showy ladies slipper

northern green orchid

pink pyrola

Evelyn discovered a "field of boulders" that has confounded many a geologist. Tafoni, they are called, and are stunning in their formations, which are riddled with holes that defy the imagination.


I watched a bumblebee seeking pollen in the confines of gentian, buzzing that special buzz that shakes the pollen loose.


Jackie showed me skunk cabbage "fruits" - something I'd never seen before. These woody formation boggle the imagination.


She also added fringed gentians to my life list, at Orra Phelps Preserve, a small park I've wanted to visit for several years but never knew how to find!


Giant lobelia were also new to me. Odd, isn't it, how many of these flowers are a purple-blue color?


We had some great rains this fall, swelling the Hudson River to levels usually reserved for spring runoff!


And as the fall drew to a close, I harvested the last of the produce from the garden - dried beans. I covered the garden in black plastic, to help kill off the weeds should I be there the following summer, yet somehow knowing that this would be my final harvest from Newcomb.


November found me driving back and forth to Michigan in search of a new place to live.


Moving day arrived in mid-December. Thanks to the efforts of friends and family, we got the Uhaul loaded and were on our way.


Many "props" from my old office have found a new home at the Dahlem Center. Some other items have migrated here, too, like my giant house plants and my fox.


It wasn't long before I started to add new sightings to my life lists. A new mammal took first place: the fox squirrel.

New plants soon followed suit: wild yam,


and bittersweet.


And even though I have often lived where opossums are present, they remain a rare animal for me to see.


2010 was indeed a year of highs and lows, of endings and beginnings. And while some people in my shoes might sigh at the losses I've faced, I have chosen instead to see the glass as half full. Instead of sobbing "I have to leave the Adirondacks" (and I did do plenty of that), I choose to say "I got to spend ten years in the Adirondacks," which is more than a lot of folks get.

And now the adventure called life continues in a whole new setting. There's no dust forming on this naturalist. It's onwards and upwards for me, with a whole new state to explore.

I hope 2011 is as full of promise for all of you as well.

Falling Waters Trail

About 4:00 this afternoon Toby started to get a bit antsy. Can't blame him, cooped up in this tiny abode all day. The day was on again, off again weather-wise. First all grey and cloudy, looking like it might rain at any moment, then blue sky and sunshine, only to turn dark and threatening again within the hour. Sun, clouds, sun, clouds, sun, clouds. All the while, the temperature steadily dropped. We were over 50*F last night, and now we are close to freezing.

We couldn't go out earlier in the day because the handyman was here doing repairs. But by 4:00 the coast was clear. I decided to head over to the Falling Waters Trail.

You might recall that I visited the western terminus of this trail back in November while on my house-hunting trips. That end was in Concord, while today we picked it up on Weatherwax Street (Road?) right here in Jackson.


I believe this used to be a railroad bed, which has now been paved and made into a biking/walking/jogging trail. From this end it is over 10 miles to Concord.

Despite it being about 5 PM, the sun was still up. It's a phenomenon to which I am still adjusting. Michigan is on eastern standard time, but we are at the western edge of the time zone, so the sun rises later in the morning and sets later in the evening.

We hadn't gone more than a quarter mile up the trail when I heard a rustling to my left. At first I thought it was the wind rustling the leaves, but even though the wind was blowing quite steadily, the sound didn't match. Then I saw them. Can you?

Here is a close-up of the middle of the above photo:

There is a second one just behind this one; take another look at the first photo.


Along the sides of the path there are tangles of vegetation, but also little pockets of wetlands. I think I saw a muskrat lodge in this one. I'll have to come back when the weather is warmer.


Asian bittersweet is quite a problem around here. It's a terribly lovely plant with its decorative fruits, but as a non-native vine, it runs rampant over here, strangling the native vegetation. Even worse, it hybridizes with the native bittersweet, which was never terribly common to begin with.


Here you see a good example of how strong the wind was blowing: normally Toby's ears flop downward.


We found some lovely wild grape tendrils.



Along the path there are little "side streets" that go out onto private property. Each is very well marked as private - no trespassers welcome.

After we went about a mile down the path, I decided it was time to turn back. The sun had set and while the sky was lovely to watch, I wanted to get back to the car before it got too dark. Rush hour is one thing to contend with, but the deer herds are quite out of control here and this was the perfect time of day/night to miss seeing them as they dart out across the roads.

So, the dog and I have completed another preliminary exploration of a nearby trail. It reminds me of the Glen Lake Bike Path back in Glens Falls. I can't wait to see it in its spring and summer glory.