Following the Sliding Otter

Sometimes the best laid plans can be waylaid by the weather.  I had taken the day off, as had my husband, so that we could go skiing with our friend, Betsey.   But the weather turned warm, too warm, and the day was much too foggy for any kind of decent skiing.  So, what to do with a free day, even though the weather is less than ideal?  Well, there is no bad weather, only bad clothing for the weather, so I took advantage of the free day to join my fine all-weather friend, Al, to track an otter whose slides he had found just down the road from his house.  

I had to chuckle when I saw the slide and what Al had carved in the snow next to the track: "OTTER" with an arrow pointed to the slide.  Always the teacher, he wanted to make sure that any passers-by would know what they were looking at if they wondered.

But what a slide!  This otter was determined to take the easy way at every opportunity, even travelling uphill.  Al had followed the trail from the road, through the cemetery and the woods, down to Center Pond, encountering mink tracks along the way.  Most of the time, the otter had traveled on its belly.  Since Al had followed the tracks in one direction, we backtracked the otter from Cemetery Road to wherever it started its sliding journey.   Through the field, into the woods, across Nelson Road, down the stream and into the marsh, where a pattern emerged: three or four steps, then a slide, three steps, slide, four steps, slide. On level ground or should I say, ice, the otter couldn't sustain a long slide, but had to give itself a little help.

I had noticed, as Al and I were walking along the Nelson Road another time, a large mound in the marsh.  It looked like a boulder, but at the time, the water was not frozen enough to bear our weight, so we couldn't check it out.  But today, here we were, in the middle of the marsh, just steps away, so we detoured away from the otter trail to check out the mound.  It wasn't big enough to be a beaver lodge, but it was a nice size for a muskrat lodge.  Sure enough, it was not a boulder, but a muskrat lodge, built with mud, moss, cattails leaves, and other wetlands vegetation.   Very different composition from a beaver lodge, but durable enough to provide shelter from the elements.

Sliding through the cemetery (the dark line is a vole tunnel)

Muskrat Lodge--Al provides a size perspective.  It was about  2 feet tall.  

The Lichen man.  Or that's what we call it. 

Otter scat and urine.   

Here's a mystery--who put these steps in this beech tree?  There are only about 5 steps and  no other evidence of  a deer  stand or steps that had been removed higher up in the tree.  This tree is located close to the ball field behind the Babe Ruth field backstop.   Anyone know anything about it?  

Lichen with orange stocks.  Can anyone identify this type of lichen?

Having confirmed my suspicions on the mysterious mound, we returned to the otter tracks. Over beaver dams, around and over open water, we found it harder and harder to follow the trail.  But eventually, we found a spot where the otter had come up on a bank and deposited scat and urine.  Usually, otter scat has fish scales, but this scat did not.  We hypothesized that the otter might have eaten a frog, a nice easy meal this time of year since frogs hibernate in the winter.  After we found the scat, we pretty much lost the trail, but we kept going.  Along the way, we found a few cranberries, which we enjoyed and some old mink tracks, but the otter trail had gone cold.   No matter,  it had still been an enjoyable adventure.   A satisfying way to spend a foggy January morning, topped off with our usual cups hot cocoa and Al's delicious gypsy soup.    

Around Center Pond

One of my favorite places in Nelson is Center Pond.  I skate on it in the winter, swim in it in the summer and explore around its edges regularly.  Today was a perfect Sunday afternoon, albeit a little cold, for a walk on the ice.  Bailey and I enjoyed walking and observing the stark beauty of nature in winter.   I decided to take advantage of the late afternoon light and use my creative side to photograph the wonders I observe.  Bailey, on the other hand, used his superior sense of smell to explore the land in a very different way.  It was so interesting to see the intensity of his concentration and what he could discover with his nose.   I couldn't capture that with a photograph, but I'll share what I observed instead.

 

I love Ice!

Okay, I don't like driving or slipping on ice, but that's not what I'm talking about here.  I love the many forms that ice can take in the winter time.  The bubbles of ice in a stream, the thick, dark ice on a snow-free pond, the skim of ice that is just beginning to form on a puddle or pool.  The patterns of crystals are fascinating and I find myself inclined to lie down in the middle of a frozen pond and just stare into the depths.

This is along one of the streams that comes down off of Murdough Hill.  I love how the ice  rings the  tree.  

So here are some photos of the ice that forms on a small ledge along the Murdough Hill Meander trail.  It is the ice that led to the trail turning away from the wetlands for a short detour up the hill.  Most of the year, this spot is just a ledge with dripping water, not very impressive.  But when the winter is cold enough, this humble spot is transformed into a place of magical beauty.   My photos don't do it justice.   I welcome my neighbors and friends to come and judge for themselves.  

RNTL Property, AKA, Roxbury Nelson Town Line

  So today, Inauguration Day and Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, is a perfect day to get out into the woods to celebrate a holiday.   I can't think of anything I'd rather be doing.  Al and I decided to meet at our friend, Wendy Byrns', house in Sullivan, find the Nelson town line and follow it down to a place where we had explored before, a place where we had previously come upon a post in the woods with the initials "RNTL".    When we first found this post, we both thought that it was actually a piece of land for rent, ie, "RNTL property,"  until we realized that the post marked the line between Roxbury and Nelson.  Before, we had come on this spot in the course of a hike down and along the shores of Woodward Pond.  It seems like sometimes, we are playing a game of connect the dots, hiking in a new area to connect with an area in which we have explored before.   And today, we definitely covered some new ground.

It was a cold day, so we were "layered up" and had brought extra clothing just in case.  We started our hike before 8 am, after warming cups of tea in Wendy's kitchen.   We headed into the woods right behind Wendy's house, and soon found ourselves on a steep slope, looking down at a stream.  So many times when I am in the woods, I have a pre-conceived notion of the direction which I should travel.  And if I don't think about it and pay attention, I could so easily go far astray.  My instincts were to follow the stream down the hill, but Al pointed out that it was the wrong direction, and that following the stream would lead us away from the town line.  Seeing the sun rising in the southeast, I realized that he was right.  It's as if my internal GPS needed to be re-directed.  Once I became aware, it was much easier to stay on course.

We discovered that this area is full of trails, which we chose to follow for a time, because, as Al puts it, "trails  are there to get us to a point where we can bushwhack."  Bushwhacking and following animal tracks leads us to the good stuff, like porcupine dens, or kill sites, cellar holes and mammoth trees.  Well, we didn't find any kill sites this day, but we did find porcupine tracks, deer (as usual) tracks, snowshoe hare, fox, coyote, probably dog, red squirrel, and yes, bobcat tracks.  We also found some old cabins below Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music, one that is particularly large and clearly not in use anymore except by the mice and squirrels. It's a shame really as it is a nice large cabin and looks like it would have accommodated a goodly number of people.

Since I have been out hiking with Al for more than two years, I have gotten used to his habit of quizzing me on the identity of various trees, shrubs and other plants.  And I have gotten pretty good at correctly identifying trees by their bark.  I have to say that I am pretty proud of myself and pleased that I have acquired this skill.  But Wendy hasn't spent as much time as we have, so, while she took the same tree identification course that Al and I did at the Harris Center last winter, she still has to work hard to remember the different features which distinguish the common tree species in our area.  But she is game for being tested and she feels the same satisfaction as I do at identifying trees correctly.  So today was a test, but it's all about the learning, and we spent a great deal of time asking "what kind of tree is this?" and trying to figure out the answers.  In the process, we all learned something and fine-tuned our knowledge of the woods.  Ash, beech, all manner of birchs, sugar, striped and red maples, hemlock, spruce, red oak, service berry, black cherry, hop hornbeam and quaking aspen:  these were the mental work of our hike today.

We also wanted to find the town line and follow it.  We came upon a tree which had been flagged with orange survey tape. Because of our experience a few weeks ago in following the town line between Stoddard and Nelson, I thought that the particular way which the tree was flagged indicated a town boundary.  Rather than hanging the tape from a branch as we often see to indicate a property line, the tape had been wrapped around the trunk of the tree. This, in addition to spray painted trees, was very similar to what we had seen on our previous hike.  Our hunch proved to be accurate, and while we were able to follow the line for quite a way, we didn't make it all the way to the stake which we had found on our previous trip.  But we did find another "RNTL" stake, right at the beginning of a stone wall adjacent to a trail which led down from Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music.

We followed the line a little further in the time we had left before I had to be back for another commitment and along the way, we found another beech tree with many claw marks.  We also found the first bobcat tracks of the day, which is always very satisfying to me, since it has taken me a long time to easily recognize bobcat tracks.

Speaking of time, we checked the time and found that I only had about 15 minutes to get back to Wendy's house, so it was a speedy trudge out of the wood on that path up to Apple Hill Center that we had crossed earlier.  It was a lot steeper than we expected and we couldn't move fast, but eventually, we made it.  Wendy paused to sit on the swing below the buildings at Apple Hill.

Usually once we get to a road, we are pretty much finished with new sights and sounds, but not today.  Today, we followed, though not too closely a skunk as it ambled down the road.  I don't usually expect to see a skunk this time of year, so it may not have been healthy.  It was especially telling that it was out in the middle of the day and that it continued to go down the road.  In fact, after I left to run my errand, the skunk moved around Wendy's house, and when I returned, I saw it wandering down the road again.

Just the same, it was an interesting sighting for the end of our hike.  And how we enjoyed the delicious end to our hike, which was a Wendy-made gypsy soup, with lots of tasty, crisp vegetables.  The food, the companionship, the discoveries: all add up to a full and satisfying day.  Well worth braving the bracing cold morning.

a fungus growing over  survey tape on a fallen tree

Black cherry pits pile at the cabin, courtesy of the mice.

Interior of the abandoned cabin below Apple Hill

Exterior of the abandoned cabin.   Too bad it's abandoned--it has a lot of potential.

Whew, we made it to the top of the hill and now we can swing!

We gave this skunk a wide berth.  The skunk is the dark spot at the upper left  side of the road.

Bobcat State of Mind, Part 2--the pictures

Some of these photos might be a little gruesome, but nature isn't all nice sunsets and flowers.  Nature is life and death, and the more time we spend in the woods, the more we come to appreciate the struggles that each animal faces just to find food and survive. The bobcat we tracked spent a lot of time weaving through the woods, looking for prey or a place to bed down.  We also found many places where either the deer or squirrels dug under the snow to find food.

Bobcat Track, looks like a double register, that is, the bobcat stepped in its own track. 

Squirrel leg bones from foot to hip

Gray squirrel skull with a great deal of flesh still on it, indicating a  fresh kill. Note the  red incisors.

What is that bright orb burning through the mist?

Gray squirrel from above.  

Here is how we found the kill site.  We believe that a red fox got this squirrel.

Deer hair.  Pile number one

Deer hair, pile number three.

More deer hair, pile number two or three.  

Al in the Lead Mine between Hardy Hill  Road and the Nelson Road.

The exit from the Lead Mine toward the Nelson Road.