Woods Wanderer

A sunny day with temps in the high 30s.  Good day to head for the hills, so that’s what I do after a few hours of desk work.  “Is that a robin?” I ask myself, catching the shadowy shape of one on a rooftop while loading gear into my car.  On second look, it’s gone.  Maybe I was just imagining it.  Too early for migrating birds.  After all, there’s still a foot of heavy snow on the ground.

Stepping out of my car at the trailhead, I immediately hear the rush of water.  I walk over and, sure enough, there’s Preston Brook open and running fast towards the lowlands.  That puts a smile on my face.  I strap snowshoes to my rucksack and shoulder the load.  A trail of hard-packed snow points up Honey Hollow Road – closed for the season to all vehicles.  Then I begin what should be my last winter hike, going deeper into the mountains.

For nearly an hour I trudge steadily uphill, putting one foot in front of the other.  My dog Matika dashes from one sniffing spot to the next.  The woods are full of good smells this time of year.  Hares, squirrels and other forest creatures are awakening and moving about.

When the road levels out a bit, I fasten the snowshoes to my boots and leave the trail.  Matika runs across a thick crust of snow.  I sink no more than an inch into it, pleasantly surprised by this ease of movement.  Good thing.  Soon I’m following the trace of an old skidder trail next to a deeply cut ravine, descending rapidly towards the brook.  It’s a bushwhack now, just me, my dog and the trackless wild.

A smile breaks across my face when I spot the brook again.  It is rock-strewn and running hard, but still wide open and as clear as any mountain stream gets on a cloudless day.  The sun burns bright through naked trees, warming my face.  I’m hatless and in shirtsleeves now, yet still breaking a sweat.  Matika catches a scent then so do I.  It’s the nearly forgotten smell of the earth just beginning to thaw out.  Several days before the equinox, it is almost but not quite spring.  I caress exposed ferns and moss growing on the side of a huge boulder before following the brook farther downhill.

Matika cavorts about the woods, delirious with the freedom of the hills.  I tramp along as if living a dream.  The warm season is about to unfold in all its muddy, wet, bug-ridden glory.  And that’s a prospect that makes me happier than words can say.

Tags: Green Mountains, hiking with dogs, mountain stream, seasonal change, signs of spring, snowshoeing, the wild

Record breaking warmth descended upon New England last weekend, giving everyone cause to celebrate.  It came just in time for Easter.  No doubt more than one churchgoer said a little prayer of thanks for it.  More hedonistic folk headed for the beach to bask half naked in the sun.  At the very beginning of the heat wave, I celebrated the only way I know how.  I grabbed my rucksack and headed for the hills immediately following a round of writing.

By the time I had pulled my car into a small turnout next to Preston Brook, it was noon.  The air temperature had soared into the 60s by then, making short work of a remnant patch of snow nearby.  I wasn’t sorry to see it go.

I hiked up the dirt road following the brook until I heard the roar of water from the gorge.  I stepped into the woods and went over for a quick look.  Sure enough, the brook was completely free of ice and cascading down through the rocks with all the force that early spring runoff could muster.  A quiet little stream in mid-summer, Preston Brook was a raging torrent that afternoon.  And I reveled in it.

I broke a sweat as I bushwhacked farther up the hollow, following the stream back to a favorite camping spot and beyond.  Matika cavorted about just as happy as any dog can be, lost in the many sights, sounds and smells of the wild.  The sun blazed through naked trees, illuminating club moss, polypody and evergreen woodferns springing back to life from a forest floor covered with bleached leaves and other detritus.  Rivulets of water ran everywhere.  My boots sank several inches into the spongy earth but I didn’t mind it one bit.

After hiking a while, I came upon a fresh rectangular cut in a dead tree – the handiwork of a pileated woodpecker.  Matika sniffed the pile of wood chips at the base of the tree as I looked around for a shady spot to break for lunch.  I found one beneath an old hemlock.  There I listened to the brook while scribbling in my journal and munching away.  A pair of deer stumbled upon us and Matika immediately gave chase.  But she turned right around the moment I called for her to return.  Good dog!

The brook sang and my heart sang with it – a wordless “Hallelujah!” at the dawn of a brand new growing season.  During the course of the hike I found coltsfoot in bloom along the dirt road.  Its small, yellow, daisy-like flower was a sure sign that I wasn’t dreaming.  I reached down to touch it and was amazed, as always, by the power of regeneration that is so common in this world yet no less miraculous.  And the squirrel that Matika and I passed on the way out seemed as happy as we were just to be alive.  Yet another winter has come and gone.  And all three of us have survived it.

Tags: bushwhacking, hiking with dogs, mountain stream, renewal, signs of spring, waterfalls

With temps in the 30s and a 90% chance of rain, I wasn’t real excited about going for a hike today.  But it was either that or mope around the house all afternoon.  So I changed into wools and thermals, and went out the door.

The moment I stepped into the woods, I knew I’d made the right decision.  With the ground giving way underfoot and nothing but trees all around, I immediately felt my nerves uncoil.  Five or ten minutes later, as I was leaving the logging road and starting to bushwhack, I sensed an old, familiar self returning.  It’s like that sometimes.  After a long winter, I don’t even know who I am any more.  It takes a cool, wet forest to remind me.

I walked past patches of snow still on the ground – reminders that winter just ended, and that one last snowstorm is still quite possible.  Here in New England, spring is the least predictable of all the seasons.  And that’s why I was still dressed for the colder weather.

My dog, Matika, frolicked through the forest, hot on the tracks of wild animals, occasionally flushing a ruffed grouse.  I can only imagine what she was thinking as she sniffed the fresh piles of deer pellets.  Maybe she too was feeling a wilder self return.

Angry about the poor health of loved ones, the fallout of a bad economy and never having enough money, I hiked furiously at first.  I swept around a frozen beaver pond, hellbent upon moving forward like I had somewhere important to go.  Then I stopped in a nearly pure stand of white birches as if stopping the madness.  I looked around and saw only mist and stillness.  I listened and heard only forest silence, until a pileated woodpecker let out its manic cry in the distance.  And that’s when it started to drizzle.  But I didn’t care.

Sweating in so many layers, I shed my sweater and rolled up my sleeves.  Then I meandered aimlessly through the forest, sometimes following a trail, sometimes not, as the mist thickened around me.  Matika flashed a great big smile at me and I returned it – both of us in dog heaven.

Back on the logging road, I left deep boot prints next to moose tracks while walking out.  I didn’t even try to dodge the pools of meltwater.  I sloshed through them like an eight year old trusting his rubber boots.  Then I crossed a brook with a short, easy hop.  The open brook’s babble and bubble was music to my ears.

Returning home, I marveled at how dismal the day looked from inside the house, and how chilled I felt all of a sudden.  So it’s a good thing that I went out today.  Otherwise, I might still think that it’s still winter.

Tags: bushwhacking, hiking with dogs, moods, signs of spring

When does spring begin?  Everyone has a different idea about that.  For some spring arrives when the crocuses pop up.  The more skeptical wait for lilacs.  Many look for robins feeding in their front yards.  For me it’s the return of the red-winged blackbirds.  Once they’re back, everything starts changing and changing fast.

I heard the red-wing’s unmistakable call the other day, while I was indoors reading.  I got up and went to the kitchen window and, sure enough, there it was on the ground right below the bird feeders.  The red and yellow markings on that bird are distinct.  The red-winged blackbirds are back.  The calendar on the wall tells me they shouldn’t be, but they are.

Judy and I spotted a tufted titmouse at the feeder nearly a week ago.  According to my bird book titmice don’t migrate, so seeing one doesn’t really count as sign of spring.  But we couldn’t help but take it as a good omen.  The red-winged blackbirds appeared shortly thereafter.

The grackles and cowbirds have also returned.  My wife doesn’t want me badmouthing those troublemakers like I did last year, so I won’t say anything more about them.  It’s clear, though, that the red-winged blackbirds are only the beginning of a great migration north.  The robins can’t be far behind.

We have twelve hours of daylight now.  The Vernal Equinox takes place the day after tomorrow.  While that doesn’t necessarily mark the end of winter this far north, there are several indications that spring has come early this year.  The first green shoots of day lilies have pushed up in my front yard.  The grass is greening.  Mud wasps have already appeared on my porch.  And while there’s still plenty of snow in the woods, the snow piles around town are almost gone.

Where are my binoculars?  I keep hearing an unfamiliar bird song and want to go out and identify it.  Yeah, I’ve got the fever already.  No, I’m not foolish enough to put away my snow shovels just yet, or peel the caulk from my windows.  But there’s no sense denying what I see, hear or feel . . .

Suddenly a great weight has been lifted from my shoulders.  Soon my hiking boots will be caked with mud.  Bring on the cold rain.  I’m ready to wander aimlessly through a misty awakening forest as polypody and evergreen woodferns slowly spring back to life.  Something deep within me is stirring.  You can wait for a 70-degree day if you want, but I’m calling it right now.  It’s spring!

Tags: backyard nature, birdwatching, signs of spring, songbirds

A cardinal sings its heart out from a nearby tree.  The ground out my back door is barren, muddy and soft.  The first light arrives before breakfast and lasts until dinnertime.  Something wild is stirring within me now, but it’s way too early for spring.  Here in the North Country, we know better.  We know there’s at least one more deep freeze in store for us, along with several more winter storms.  This is March, after all, not April.

Oh sure, this freeze-and-thaw routine is good sugarin’ weather, but the sap can run for well over a month before the first bud on a maple tree opens.  You might find the first purple fingers of skunk cabbage punching through the snow along the edges of wetlands, ponds and waterways, but don’t go looking for any other wildflowers just yet.  You might see a robin on an exposed patch of grass, but it’s wintering over – not a migrant.  No, don’t start thinking spring just yet.  We’re still on the frosty side of the vernal equinox.

There are lots of tracks in the snow now.  The wild animals are stirring.  Won’t be long before they’re prowling around our trashcans.  Thought I smelled a skunk the other day, but maybe that was just wishful thinking.  Yeah, you know you’re in a bad place when you start longing for skunks.  What can I say?  Not everyone living this far north is into winter.  I’m tired of pretending that I like cold and snow just because I live in Vermont.

The wild stirs deep within.  I’m trying to ignore it.  I have a lot of work to do and can’t go gallivanting into the woods just yet.  All the same, a trail is calling my name.  My dog stares at me.  “Do you hear it?” she asks with her eyes.  Damned dog.  If I listened to her, I’d never get any work done.

I’ve been productive lately.  My head is full of ideas.  Oh sure, I’m getting soft and fat sitting here in front of this computer screen typing away, but I’m getting things done!  So forget those wild urges.  There are still piles of dirty snow out my window and the sky is endlessly overcast.  March is an excellent month for finishing projects started last fall.  Besides, it’s way too early for spring.

“Do you hear it?” my dog asks again.  I tell her that I’m trying to ignore it.  But something tells me I’ll be walking a trail later on today.  The sun blazing through a crack in the clouds will change everything.  Then I’ll pull on my boots and slip out the door.  Better get some work done this morning while I can.

Tags: nature in winter, signs of spring, the wild, Vermont

After parking my car where Preston Brook spills into the Winooski River Valley, I hike the narrow dirt road up a steep grade into Honey Hollow.  There’s a dusting of snow on the ground and flurries in the air, but I’m dead set upon finding springtime here on this early April day.  I follow a deer trail down to the brook once I’m above the gorge.  The trail empties into a small clearing a short while later, where a hungry deer have foraged beneath a lone apple tree.  From there it’s an easy bushwhack along the stream, back to the base of Camel’s Hump – my favorite Green Mountain.  I set a steady pace to keep from wearing out too quickly.

I’m looking for signs of eternal renewal but my dog, Matika, doesn’t care.  Any day in the woods is a good one to her.  She leaps over a feeder stream, does a 180, then leaps over it again for the sheer joy of leaping.  She scratches here and there, sniffs, and runs about wildly.  She couldn’t be happier.  As for me, well, I’m halfway between being in my body and in my head – between sensual awareness and philosophical abstraction.  I hope to tip the balance towards the sensual before day’s end.

Preston Brook roars as spring runoff cascades through the rocks.  It is a bank-full tumult of whitewater racing out of the mountains, teasing me with mere glimpses of its clear, green pools.  This stream won’t be fishable for another month, but already my thoughts have turned towards the speckled trout lurking in dark corners just beneath the surface.  Icicles dangle from the moss-covered trees that have fallen across the torrent.  I look for a stonefly shuck amid the rocks along the stream’s edge but don’t find one there.  Soon, very soon.

Beneath my feet, the ground is soft, spongy, and covered with forest detritus.  In wetter places, I sink up to my ankles in mud.  While stepping over blowdown, I notice tiny, club-shaped reproductive organs arising from a patch of moss – a sure sign that the growing season has commenced.  The Christmas ferns, polypody, and evergreen woodferns pressed to the ground by winter are starting to rebound.  Deep green clubmoss pokes through patches of snow, making me think of a different era when the growing season was very short, indeed. And for a split second I feel Neolithic – fresh from the Ice Age.

Coltsfoot appears suddenly before me on a mudslide.  I am shocked by its tight curl of yellow petals on the verge of opening.  Already?  A bit later I spot a robin on the branch of a young maple tree – something common in the lowlands this time of year but rare here in the mountains.  Looking around, I notice the hemlocks adding welcome color to an otherwise brown and gray forest.  I thank them for it.  My eyes hunger for green.

Miles deep in the hollow, I take a seat next to the brook and rest.  Matika has a cup of kibbles for lunch while I eat a handful of nuts, a granola bar and a few pretzels.  Before long I’m chilled by my own sweat, so I pack up then tag the narrow dirt road for a long walk out.  I daydream along the muddy lane, recollecting other walks here in years past – many, many walks.  Growing older isn’t so bad.  My vault of pleasant memories overflows.

Through a break in the trees, I see Bone Mountain in the distance looking very cold and gray.  No matter.  A gust of warm wind blowing up from the Winooski River Valley reminds me what time of year it is.  I pass a dozen green shoots of wild lilies breaking through the earth.  Then I smile.  Yeah, it’s that time of year and I can feel a vital part of me thawing.  And before I get back to my car, I’m already planning my next outing.  This time of year, I can’t get enough of it.

Tags: awareness, Green Mountains, hiking, signs of spring

Robins are what come to mind when most people think of birds returning in early spring, and sure enough they do, but assorted brown and black birds soon follow.  Sometimes these darker birds beat the robins to the punch.  It’s hard to say who actually reaches the North Country first.  All I know is that while looking around for a delightful, red-breasted songbird, I often spot a great flock of red-winged blackbirds gathered high in a naked tree, or a smaller gang of grackles on the ground.  When the dark birds arrive, they’re hard to miss.

I don’t know what the proper name is for a flock of grackles, but the word “gang” seems appropriate.  They act like gangsters when they arrive at the feeder, pushing aside the finches, sparrows and other small birds to make the food source their own.  Like gangsters, they ally themselves with similar birds, namely cowbirds and starlings.  They aren’t above raiding other birds’ nests for eggs, and will even take out a songbird on occasion.  They are, in fact, very opportunistic creatures, feeding on worms, insects, small reptiles, fruit, seeds – pretty much anything they can find.  Not what we generally associate with springtime.  Nothing like thrushes, vireos or sweet-singing warblers.  Yeah, these are the tough guys of the winged world.

Recently my wife, Judy, has been perturbed by the grackles voraciously eating the suet that she hung up for the cardinals, woodpeckers and other birds that have wintered over.  Every morning she looks out the kitchen window and sees a grackle picking away at the suet all by itself.  She insists that it’s the same fat grackle, day after day, but later in the morning I usually see a half dozen of them out there munching away.  I think they’re taking turns.  Either way, they’re eating us out of house and home.

Menacing or no, Judy and I agree that grackles are quite beautiful in their own right.  The iridescent blue sheen of their heads is quite remarkable, even by avian standards, and if you look closely you’ll even see a little purple or green there.  If they weren’t so common, birders and other aesthetes would probably hold them in high regard.  Maybe they secretly do.

For years I have been arguing that wild nature is both harsh and beautiful, and that the true wonder of the world is bound up in the tension between the two.  Yesterday I finished writing a set of philosophical essays emphasizing this point.  In general, I’ve encountered considerable resistance to this worldview – most people preferring to think that it’s a dog-eat-dog world, or that nature is fundamentally benign.  Meanwhile, the spring season slowly advances and those pesky grackles keep munching away.  Judy is making sure to get plenty of pictures of them.

Tags: seasonal change, signs of spring, songbirds, wild nature

Last week I hiked the trail around Indian Brook Reservoir just to stretch my legs.  The Reservoir was completely iced over and the trail was half a foot of packed snow, but it was good getting out.  I’ve been feeling cooped up lately so it was a pleasure hiking long and hard enough to break a sweat.  Besides, the air temperature was hovering right below freezing – a balmy, late-winter day by Vermont standards.  That and the bright sun shining through the clear sky overhead made me reconsider my bias against the season.  Maybe winter isn’t so bad after all.

On the far side of the Reservoir, I found a tiny hemlock cone in the middle of the trail.  I looked around then plucked a few more from the snow.  I did the same beneath another hemlock a short while later.  I put the cones in my shirt pocket and finished my hike.  Back home I found a place for them atop a stack of books.  I knew what would happen.

The next day, the cones opened up, exposed as they were to indoor heat.  I smile every time I notice them.  The first hemlock cones of the season – proof positive that winter is on its last leg.  The way I see things, these small cones mark the beginning of a new growing season.  Spring can’t be that far away.

Last Friday an exceptionally warm wind blew out of the southwest, driving temperatures into the fifties.  I swapped out my winter coat for a rain jacket and went for a long walk on the Rail Trail.  Plowing through the punky snow was as difficult as walking a sandy beach, but I didn’t care.  I reveled in the melt-off going on all around me, dreaming of things to come.

Right now it’s snowing outside.  I just returned home from a short walk on the edge of town where a wicked wind blew the white stuff horizontally across the trail.  I froze one half of my face on the way out, and the other half on the way back.  So it goes.  I probably won’t be outside again today any longer than it takes to shovel a path to the car.  But the hemlock cones resting atop my books still make me smile.  I know what’s coming.  It’s just a matter of time now.

Tags: signs of spring, Vermont, walking