January 5, 2020 - Happy New Year!

Welcome to 2020!  Perhaps you've heard of the "First Day Hike" initiative.  It was conceived by the Massachusetts State Park with the inaugural First Day Hike taking place at Blue Hills Reservation just south of Boston in 1992 [Ref:  Wikipedia] and now is promoted by dozens of outdoor oriented organizations.  New Year's Day 2020 was fortunate enough to occur after a nice fresh layer of snow arrived, so we put on the snowshoes and took a hike up Ladd Mountain in Meredith, and it was beautiful.

A winter wonderland on New Year's Day.

Right at the top we saw a fresh set of porcupine tracks traversing the summit from north to south.

The unperturbed track of the porcupine.

These tracks illustrate perfectly the attitude of the porcupine, safely ensconced behind its prickly barricade.  No other animal I know of walks along so slowly and nonchalantly, just making its way to its favorite hemlock tree to feast on some tender twigs and needles.

Taken a few years ago by my trail camera.

Winter is having a little trouble finding its rhythm this year, with only one cold spell, lots of warm weather, and alternating fronts bringing rain and snow.  There are still openings around the edges of the lake as well as many streams, and even in low spots in the forest.

Warm weather means open wet spots into January.  This is in the middle of the trail up to Ladd Mtn.

The birds are fine with the warm weather; with the feeders out, the usual collection has returned, including large flocks of goldfinches.

Sometimes they'll let a chick-a-dee join them.

We also have a regular visit from a Hairy Woodpecker.

I'd love to know if it's the same one that stops by every day.

The dark-eyed juncos appeared with the very first snow, being true to their alternate name, "snowbird".

There are no pictures from this next bird episode, but Linda saw an animal far out on the lake, which turned out to be a crow pecking at something in the ice.  The next thing that caught her eye was a large bald eagle flying straight at her from the spot the crow was at.  My guess:  the eagle saw the crow, and expecting to find something it could steal, swept down to take it away, and then flew off, either with or without something to eat.

On a walk below some power lines I came across the culprit to a power outage that struck a couple of houses on Harris Cove.

A burnt tree trunk that fell on the power lines.

I had met the line worker who had cleared this tree which fell on the power line and been pretty well charred by the time the circuit breaker cut the power.  Those line workers are pretty hardy souls, as this fault was over a tenth of mile from the nearest access point on some pretty rugged terrain.

Another interesting find before the most recent snow was this curved track out on the ice.

Hop, hop, hop, sliiiiide.

The widely separated plops following the slide tell me it must have been an otter out playing in the slush, but don't ask me how it managed to make that banked curve.

I'll end with a panorama from the top of Ladd Mountain - don't wait until 2021 to go there!  Let me know if you need directions.

Looking across Lake Winnisquam towards (left to right) Lake Winnipesaukee, Gunstock Mtn, Lakeport and Laconia

October 20, 2019: Bucks on the Prowl

I've seen quite a few signs of white-tail deer lately - the bucks that is - out and about, claiming their territory.  I caught this guy on my trail camera one night this week.

A nice size buck cruises its territory.

The most visible signs are the many "scrapes" they make on the ground. 

The buck was facing to the left, kicking debris to the right to clear the soil.

These are commonly seen near hiking trails because bucks with a rack of antlers appreciate the easy travel along cleared trails.  The scrape above shows that the buck had dug up leaves and such and thrown it back a good ten feet.  The scrape itself often has a triangular shape where the buck used its front feet to dig at the ground. 

The typical V pattern made by the front hooves.

After making a scrape a buck will urinate there so it can soak into the bared ground, thus letting its scent linger for several days.  This provides a mating signal to the females in the area, as well letting other bucks know that this territory - and its resident females - have been claimed. 

Another technique bucks use to mark territory is called a rub. 

A rub on a young hemlock tree.

I found this rub on a hemlock tree this week in the same area.  A buck will rub its antlers on a tree, often an aromatic hemlock, to leave another territorial marker.  Deer have glands near their eyes which add their unique scent to that of the freshly released hemlock bark which intensifies the marker.

Deer aren't the only creatures out prowling around in the dark these days.  The sunrise in late October and early November is the latest we get all year (later than at the winter solstice due to daylight savings time) so it's the least painful time to get up to witness the birth of a new day.

The first peak of sun rises over Lake Winnisquam.

This week I took the short hike up Ladd Mountain in the Chemung area of Meredith to indulge in the beauty of early morning.

Mist on Lake Winnisquam

It's an easy 1-mile hike up, and when I was there this summer I thought it would be good vantage point with an eastern exposure overlooking the northern end of Lake Winnisquam.  I wasn't disappointed.

Dawn breaks over Meredith.

It's hard to believe we still haven't had a hard frost.  One morning the temperature dropped to almost freezing, low enough that in an open field with a lot of radiational cooling, I saw my first ice crystals of the season. 

First ice, only in open areas on the very lowest lying leaves.

Earlier in the week I was out on Turtle Island in Lake Wicwas doing some fall clean-up and saw that the turtle nests laid way back in June had hatched out.

Holes and shells where baby turtles emerged from the nest.

The shell fragments are soft and leathery feeling.

I had forgotten how late in the year snapping turtle eggs hatch until my brother sent me photos of 21 little guys hatching out from a nest in Canterbury on October 1st.

Just two of a litter of 21.  Photo by Glen Powell.  (Thanks for sharing!)

Snapping turtles have evolved with a very strange property related to hatching eggs.  The sex of the turtles that hatch is dependent on the temperature while they are developing in the ground.  Temperatures below 77 degrees F will result in only male turtles, while temperatures above 80 produce only females.  Between these temperature there will be a mix of sexes.  It seems like a strange way to balance the population, and it makes me wonder if they will evolve quickly enough to maintain a successful population at our latitude as the planet's temperature increases.

There were a lot of photos being shared of the rainbow that appeared on Friday.  I was lucky enough to be out on run and saw it shimmering over the hills north of Lake Wicwas.

Rainbow over Wicwas, seen from Wicwood Shores Rd.

At least one adult loon is still on on the lake, and one of the chicks remains glued to her (?) side all the time. 

One of the chicks, most likely with mom.

They separate only to dive, regrouping as soon they surface.

It's a pretty sight to see loons on the lake in autumn.

There were a lot of gorgeous colors around the Lakes Region this week before the storm that blew through on Wednesday night stripped many leaves off the trees, but there is still plenty of color to be seen this weekend.

Still nice colors west of the lake as of yesterday (Oct 19th).

One of these nights we'll get that first hard frost.