The Pakenham Hills were perfect for a field trip today — fresh, fluffy snow six inches deep that we could walk through easily, unusual rocks and logs to play on, and abundant dry firewood for a lunch fire. The forest was criss-crossed with tracks we identified as Coyote, Snowshoe Hare, White-tailed Deer, Fisher, and various [...]
We lazily walked in to a place we know as "Rock-wall Pond" at Pakenham, finding a Spring Peeper, Wood Frog, and Leopard Frog, and many American Toads beside the trail, and passing pale asters as we went. We ate lunch on flowing steps of thick moss on a rocky hilltop, and resumed our ambling. When [...]
Birds were singing — we heard a Winter Wren, Ovenbird, and Northern Waterthush. Biting flies were out, and we had recently emerged Black Flies in our faces, but they weren't quite biting yet. We directed out attention to a much neglected corner of our Study Area — the far southwestern corner, in fact. The small [...]
The number and range of things to see increases tremendously as spring arrives. We hadn't quite entered our Study Area when a Great Egret flew out of it, big and white against the blue sky, and bucking the strong north wind. Once in, under a little grove of Red Maples we noticed that the leaf [...]
Conditions were almost perfect in the Pakenham hills today: a refrozen snowpack we could all walk on, with animal tracks showing in a light layer on top; brilliant sunshine to warm us (it was minus 18°C); ices as smooth as a skating rink running down a hill (for inveterate sliders); and a steady wind (to make the [...]
In planning for today's field trip, we had to make a decision about snowshoes three days ahead of time. During January, daytime temperatures had been at or above freezing for weeks (this being about 6°C above normal), but then the weather had turned cold and added five inches of fresh snow. Would the shrunken snowpack [...]
There were animal tracks all over the place at the Study Area, but apart from a few squirrels, we really had to search to see anything with fur on it. There were the footprints of all sizes of dogs along the walking/skiing trails, deer tracks crossing those trails, and muddy raccoon footprints leading from one [...]
Macoun leader Rob Lee lives in the forest, and today we explored part of it. We found a good lunch place where the bare deciduous trees (Sugar Maple, Beech, and Ironwood) let a little sunshine in, and a few White Pines provided dead, dry branches for a hot, steady fire. The temperature never got above [...]
Our Study-Tree Woods is only 10 acres in extent, yet after 25 years of choosing trees, new Macoun members can still find ash trees and ironwoods that no one else has ever studied before. We spent the morning hours touring all those that current members are following (and picking new ones). One very large White [...]
Indian River is a minor watercourse that runs slow and deep out into the farmland of Lanark County, but has its origins in springs and lakes in hilly country. We settled down for lunch in woods beside the last stretch of rushing water above miles and miles of marshy meanders. The steep valley sides seem [...]
