Woods Wanderer

A couple days ago, as I was raking in my yard, I felt a powerful urge to hear spring peepers. It’s that time of year. No doubt they are starting to mate. So yesterday I set my rake aside, pulled on my hiking boots, and headed for a section of the Rail Trail that cuts through wetlands and woods.

Clouds gathered overhead as I stepped out of my car and meandered up the trail. No matter. I was wearing a light jacket and hat. Let it rain. With temps in the 50s, I was comfortable enough. A few sparrows flitted through nearby bushes. A red-winged blackbird called out. Then I heard a solitary peeper singing from the wetlands through which I passed. Or thought I did. Maybe it was just my imagination.

A little over a mile back, I reached the ephemeral pools where I’ve heard those little frogs singing in years past. Sure enough, a few cried out. Their shrill, high-pitched mating calls were music to my ears. This is the sound of eternal renewal, I thought as I sat down and listened to them. Once again, wild nature is awakening from its long winter slumber. Soon there will be wildflowers breaking through the bleached forest duff.

During the walk back to the car, I looked into the smaller ephemeral pools along the edge of the trail. I spotted a cluster of frog eggs just beneath the surface in one of them. I moved in close to snap a picture.

Just then an inhabitant of the pool surfaced, staring right at me as if to say: “Who goes there? What are your intentions?” I managed to snap a photo of that creature before it slipped out of sight.

Then the clouds darkened and a light rain commenced. Suddenly a few peepers called out from the sprawling wetland on the other side of the trail. A few more joined the chorus, drowning out the sound of falling rain.

I took my time finishing the walk, enjoying the stark beauty of early spring along the way. I heard a few more peepers in the wetlands where I thought I first heard one, but they fell silent as I walked by. No matter. All is right with the world when the frogs are doing what they are meant to do.

Tags: early spring, ephemeral pools, spring peepers, walking, woods and wetlands

I drove into the Adirondacks the other day to spend a night in the forest. The following day I would hike with my friend Rob at Ticonderoga, but I wanted to camp out before then. It had been too long since I’d last been alone in the wild for more than a few hours. I desperately needed a woods fix.

I left my car at a trailhead parking lot then hiked a mere half mile to a small, nondescript backwoods pond. The trail to it went straight up the mountainside like a goat path. The so-called primitive campsite at the pond was nothing more than a large stone fire pit surrounded by trees. I pitched my tent nearby. The open ground between my camp and the pond was too boggy to walk on, but a narrow path went down to an abandoned, overgrown beaver dam at the pond’s outlet. There I could draw water.

Temps dropped fast that afternoon as it started raining. While I was in shirtsleeves at first, I soon donned a sweater, jacket and rain hat. I wandered around for hours, grooving on the deep forest quiet as it rained. I took shelter beneath on old white pine for a while. The rain stopped just before dusk, so I peeled away the plastic bag covering the wood I had collected beforehand and started a fire. I enjoyed ramen noodles, a beef stick and hot tea while tending a small smokeless campfire.

Darkness settled slowly over the dripping forest. A few spring peepers called out, then more chimed in, then more, until a full chorus broke out. After dousing the remnant embers of my campfire, I donned a headlamp and meandered down the narrow path to the pond. I expected the frogs to quiet down as I approached, but they ignored me. I knelt on a flat rock at the pond’s edge, turning off my headlamp and setting it aside while splashing water into my face. The frenzy of amphibious mating calls seemed to grow louder as I knelt there. Looking up through total darkness, I noticed that the sky had cleared. I saw the Big Dipper pointing towards the north star. And that’s when I felt it: my presence in the universe, on a planet teeming with life. The chorus was deafening.

A barred owl joined the peepers as they sang all night. I slept the best I could as temps continued dropping. I turned over frequently to keep my old bones from aching too much. The peepers quieted down as the sun rose, falling silent as I munched a granola bar in morning warmth. Then I packed up and hiked out, happy to have gotten what I came for.

Tags: Adirondacks, early spring, forest solitude, spring peepers

Yesterday I went into the woods searching for the sights and sounds of spring. I wasn’t disappointed. Despite naked trees and the conspicuous absence of green, woodpeckers telegraphed their desires, ruffed grouse drummed, and a chorus of spring peepers announced the beginning of the season.

I went searching for vernal pools and found them in likely places – slight depressions in the forest floor where snowmelt collects this time of year, where small colonies of frogs magically appear to croak away any remnant of winter.

I knelt down next to a pool oblivious to the cool dampness still in the earth, and watched the frogs swim about. The water’s surface rippled every time the frogs sprang forth. They croaked alarm to each other regarding my presence then went about their amphibious business unperturbed. I wasn’t a threat as long as I didn’t move.

A bit later, on a south-facing slope soaking up the sun, I found a patch of wild leeks flaunting their verdure. I tore off the tip of one and chewed it. The pungent flavor was both familiar and heartwarming. Then I spotted them: small patches of round-lobed hepatica in bloom among the leeks. Their delicate petals burst forth atop fuzzy stems curling away from the earth. The first wildflower of the year was emerging so early I could hardly believe it.

I left the woods feeling a little giddy. I get that way every time the wild takes me by surprise. I went searching for spring and found more than I could have hoped for. After all these years, you’d think I would have it figured out by now. But there’s something about the natural world that’s eternally new, especially on days like these.

Tags: renewal, signs of spring, spring peepers, vernal pools, wild leeks, wildflowers, wood frogs

Yesterday I went back to that little pond next to the Rail Trail, looking for spring peepers.  With temps in the forties, a mostly cloudy sky overhead and a slight breeze, the weather was more in keeping with early spring.  In other words, it felt more like a peeper kind of day than it did the last time I had walked the trail.  So I was in the mood to listen to those harbingers of the season.

The little pond is a wetland, really.  It only fills with water in the springtime or after a heavy rain.  It’s more than a vernal pool, though, which is also a good place to look for breeding frogs this time of year.  I reached the wetland after walking no more than twenty minutes.  Man on a mission, I passed up several patches of wildflowers along the way.  I longed to hear spring’s chorus above all else.

Upon reaching the wetland, I heard a solitary frog singing loudly and persistently.  I crouched down in the brush near water’s edge, hoping to hear more.  My dog Matika wandered off to sniff.  Although I had come out to stretch my legs, I remained still a long while, giving the wary frogs a chance to get used to me.  Sure enough, a second peeper started up, then a couple more joined in, then a few more until a full chorus rang out.  I just crouched there smiling.

The singing didn’t last.  It never does in the middle of the day.  But I heard enough peeping to fill with vernal joy – the kind of elemental happiness that one can only feel after a hard winter.  No, it wasn’t a particularly long, cold or snowy winter, but it was a hard one all the same.  It usually is for people like me, who need constant exposure to nature’s endless regeneration in order to keep faith with the world.

Afterward I didn’t so much hike as merely drift down the trail.  I watched the sun play peekaboo from the clouds, and listened to robins chirping from the tops of poplars already starting to leaf out.  I admired the vibrant Kelly green of nearby pastures, and smelled the fresh manure spread across them.  I didn’t mind it.  Here in Vermont, manure is as much a part of spring as the peepers.  And somehow it all fits together nicely, as if part of some grand design.  But it’s only spring, I kept telling myself.  Don’t make any more of the season than it is.  Only spring.

Tags: renewal, spring peepers, springtime, Vermont

Even though I had the house all closed up yesterday morning, I could hear a cardinal singing loud and clear from its treetop perch.  I didn’t dare look out the window because I knew I wouldn’t be able to resist the blue sky.  I was hellbent upon getting various literary tasks done before noon, but it seemed rather foolish to write about the natural world while it was springing back to life just beyond my walls.  What would Thoreau do?  Eventually, I stuffed a compass in my pocket, slipped on my hike boots, and headed for the hills.  No doubt my dog, Matika, wondered why it had taken me so long to do so.

After watching a big old turkey crossing the road, I stepped into the woods.  I needed to hear the high-pitched symphony of spring peepers and had in mind a beaver pond where I was sure to find them.  Just before leaving the last semblance of a trail, I spotted coltsfoot in full bloom – not all that unusual in mid-April.  But the spring beauty that I found a few minutes later took me completely by surprise.  A week early, at least.  I dropped down to my knees and snorted the flower as a drug fiend snorts cocaine.  The result was just as narcotic.

I flushed two deer from a streambed while bushwhacking through some brambles.  Matika immediately chased after them but turned around when I called her back.  Good dog (sort of).  We hopped over the stream and continued deeper into the woods, skirting the beaver pond.  Its shimmering waters were clearly visible through the naked trees, but I wanted to reach a favorite spot on the pond’s opposite shore.  That would take some doing.

My passage through the forest wasn’t very direct.  I traveled from one patch of green to another, looking for more signs of the season.  I found a few mottled trout lily leaves springing forth, then stumbled into some fresh leeks.  I chewed a leek just for the sharp sting of it to my palette.  Matika sniffed the tracks of animals that had passed this way recently.  We reached the far side of the pond sooner than expected.

A Canada goose honked as we approached the pond’s marshy shoreline.  There I sat on a fallen tree, with Matika resting by my side, long enough for the peepers to resume their trilling.  They had fallen silent during our approach but started up again once we were quiet and still.  The goose floated closer, honking continuously as if to evict us.  She eventually got her way.  Matika and I moved away after the peeper chorus had sufficiently scrambled my brains.

A few wood frogs croaked from an ephemeral pool that we passed on the way out.  They stopped as soon as I went over to inspect their haunt.  I searched for more wildflowers in bloom but found none.  No matter.  An unblinking sun burned high in the sky and all I could think was this: How lucky I am to be alive on such a beautiful day.  I drove home slowly, very slowly, irritating the other drivers on the road who had places to go and things to do.  Too bad I couldn’t have walked home.  I really shouldn’t have been behind the steering wheel of a car in my condition.

Tags: bushwhacking, Canada geese, hiking with dogs, spring peepers, springtime, wildflowers