January 26, 2025: Fire & Ice - and Airplanes!

While Los Angeles is burning, the rest of the country is freezing all the way down to Texas and Louisiana where New Orleans saw 10" of snow.  Even central Florida saw temperatures in the 20's yesterday.  In Meredith we had subzero lows for five days in a row with a low temperature of -21.5 degrees on Tuesday.  

Temperature at Lake Wicwas

The cold put a chill on some outdoor activities but we did take a couple of short excursions, including a quick and windy walk in the Thompson Wildlife Sanctuary in Sandwich.  We didn't see any birds, but the mountains were beautiful.

Mt. Chocorua looms over the wetlands at the Thompson Audubon Wildlife Sanctuary

Some animals hide out in protected areas during cold temperatures.  For example, deer will stay in their dense deer yards protected from the wind and radiational cooling by thick hemlock trees.  Others will spend more time in underground dens where the earth stays tens of degrees warmer than the air.  But the poor birds have to go out at first light, the coldest part of the day, to start their search for the calories they burned just to keep warm over night - a small bird can lose ten percent of its body weight on a single cold night.  Small rodents like mice can store food in their dens, but apparently they still head out in frigid weather as evidenced by the many tracks I've seen on my short walks.

Grand Central Station of the mouse world.

Their tiny feet leave clear imprints in the cold dry snow.

Even their light tail makes a mark as it plops on the snow with each hop.

There's been a small flock of six to eight mourning doves here lately, perching in the branches of the oak trees and gleaning seeds from under the bird feeders.  

A pair of mourning doves perches on a cold winter day.

Despite the cold temperatures there are sounds of spring in the air.  Almost every time I'm out on a sunny day (which has been every day) I hear the drumming of woodpeckers resonating through the forest.  They are already staking out their claim on territory and calling in a mate.  Both Hairy and Downy woodpeckers have long courtship periods.  They start courting and nest hunting and construction in January, but won't actually lay eggs until April.  But that drumming in January is always a welcome sign of longer and warmer days ahead.

Gathering its winter calories.

The cold weather did in fact allow the Alton Bay Ice Runway to open this week and we stopped by yesterday to see if there was any action. 

It was a cold morning, but there was a constant stream of planes coming and going.  I counted about 40 planes parked on the ice.

At one point there were five lined up on the taxiway waiting to cross the runway to the parking area. 

Stacked up like Chicago O'Hare in winter.

Other than Alaska, this is only FAA approved ice runway in the country, so it's a big draw for pilots to check off on their bucket list.  Here's a sample of some of the wide array of aircraft taking advantage of this rare  opportunity.  

This was a neat pusher biplane.

Landing gear equipped for snow, ice, or tarmac.

This one must be cold to fly.

Even a helicopter.

They even had ground control to manage all the traffic.

I'll share a couple of videos of the action too:

With this weather, the runway should remain open for the foreseeable future if you want to check it out.

So the big winter ice events of 2025 have begun!  Don't forget to get to Meredith Village for the Pond Hockey event this coming weekend.  It will be back on Meredith Bay with all the fixings:  food trucks, vendors, even a music stage!  And though we are short on snow, what we have received has stayed fresh due so it's pretty and wintery even if skiing is limited and there's been no snowmobiling other than on the lakes.  

But thick ice and even a little snow is good; we'll take whatever winter weather we can get - it's all better than being on fire!

December 12, 2021: Tracking Season Begins

Heading out into the woods on the morning after the first snow of the season always raises my curiosity as to what I'll discover has been out walking around the forest without my knowledge.  Add the forgotten beauty of what winter in New Hampshire brings to the landscape, and it's a highly anticipated moment.

I expect to see tracks of the common forest animals:  squirrel, fox, deer, perhaps coyote or turkey.  Less likely to be found are tracks of bobcat, fisher, mink, or weasel - I'm lucky to see these just a few times over the winter.  Sometimes if snow comes early enough in the year I'll find bear tracks, but probably not in mid-December unless it's been unusually warm.  This year, the first snow-covered morning revealed mostly mice!

A long trail of a mouse hopping across the snow.

Their tiny feet left clear tracks in the thin layer of snow.

The tell-tale drag of their tail indicates its a mouse rather than a vole which has a shorter tail.  

Mice, having a prodigious breeding rate, are the primary food source for many winter predators so it's no surprise that their tracks most often take a bee-line from one hiding spot to another but occasionally there is a zig or a zag.

A quick change in direction.

Note also the change in speed of its travel as shown by the increased distance between hops; perhaps something startled it and it dashed to its nearest hole.  

It's amazing how many mice burrows there are throughout the forest, completely unnoticed except when there's thin layer of snow on the ground.  They like to have their entrance holes protected so they can peek out to make sure no one is lurking behind them, ready to pounce upon them as they exit.

Safely guarded on the rear by a tree.

Or under a log.

This one has two small trees standing guard.

Later in the winter when the snow gets deeper they won't ever expose themselves.  Instead they'll excavate a network of tunnels under the snow that connects their dens to their food stores.  I won't see them, but the foxes will locate them with their incredible hearing and know just where to pounce down through the snow to catch them as they travel their hidden network.  

But on this morning, among all those mice and squirrel tracks, where were the fox?  I didn't a single track.  As the light of day grew brighter I saw the fox had also been out, but it was on the lake - which couldn't have had more than an inch of ice on it at that point in time.  With a weight only around a dozen pounds distributed over four paws they don't need much ice to make it worth taking a shortcut across the lake from home to hunting grounds.  We often get to see a fox on the lake at least once a year so that's something else to anticipate now that the lake is frozen.

And frozen it is - almost.  On windy December 7th there was still lots of blue water.

December 7th

But by this morning there was a beautiful sheet of smooth ice on the lake.

December 12th

I don't know if it will last through the warm stretch forecast for next week; ice-in hasn't been declared yet, but there will be some mighty fine skating out there if it gets cold enough to freeze safely before the next snow.

January 23, 2011

More snow and more cold weather is keeping Lake Wicwas in the deep freeze.  Several inches of snow fell on Tuesday, but unfortunately we also had some freezing rain mixed in which put a frozen crust on top of the new snow.  But it was followed up with a bit more snow, and then several more inches on Thursday night into Friday, and this last storm was all cold, dry powder, leaving a great surface for weekend snow sports, at least for humans.  This was the view northeast from the White Mountain Ledge on Saturday; Mount Chocorua is just visible on the far left.

Looking Northeast from the White Mountain Ledge

Deer Signs on Arbutus Hill

The wildlife isn't as thrilled, as indicated by the lack of tracks around the lake.  The deer in particular have a hard time moving around in deep snow, hindered even more with a sharp crust in the middle of the snow pack.  I took a ski in the Hamlin area to both the White Mountain Ledge and along the Arbutus Hill View trail, and saw only a few fox tracks up near the Red Trail along the ridge, and some deer tracks on Arbutus Hill.  The deer had been by just a few hours before, as the tracks and scat were on top of the previous day's snow.

There were also signs of browse, including scrapes on these birch trees, with scrapings well above my head indicating a fairly good size deer.  (Linda likes the colors of new snow under the tree cover on a bright, cold day!)

Deer Browse

Barbara R. Smyth Trail

The bright blue sky and brilliant sun made for another fabulous day; I captured this scene along the Barbara R. Smyth trail where deciduous tress and the recent  logging let in abundant sunshine.






Today I took a ski on the lake; it's been cold enough that the air vents on the beaver lodges haven't even thawed out.  Again, not many tracks, but the cold didn't stop this mouse from making his rounds up and over this lodge.

Mouse Tracks on a Beaver Lodge

After investigating a hole in the lodge it traveled all the way across the ice to far shore, carving a drunken path on its way.  But it made it to the trees before an owl saw it.

Blue Jay Landing Site

Here's an interesting pattern left by a Blue Jay landing in the light snow, with its individual feathers leaving their own imprint.









If you haven't seen the article in the Weirs Times about the Wicwas Lake Grange, you can find it here:  Weirs Times 20 January 2011 Edition.  It has some nice history about the Grange as well as the local area.  We are fortunate to still have this Grange which is named after the lake, as many have closed.  Both the Winnepesaukee Grange in Meredith Village and the Garnet Hill Grange in Center Harbor have closed, merging with the Wicwas Grange.

January 2, 2010

Mouse Tracks in Fresh Snow

New England weather - where else can you have a whole season's worth of weather in just one week?  After the snow on Sunday night, there were a couple of days of cold, windy weather that were very much like the depth of winter.  Most of the animals around Lake Wicwas were hiding safely in their home; the only signs of life for a couple of days after the snow were a few mouse tracks, one set of porcupine tracks, and a couple of fox tracks.

Fox Tracks near Bryant Island

But then the weather warmed up, and the activity increased greatly.  On an early morning ski I found some some perfect fox tracks going right across the middle of the lake. Each toe pad was imprinted, as well as even the toenails.  This pattern clearly shows the different size of the front (larger, on the left) and rear (smaller) paw.










The low, early morning sun provided good contrast for animal tracks, as well as the patterns made in the snow by the wind, and reflections off the ice where the snow was blown away.

December 30, 2010 Sunrise

 

The warm weather also brought out lots of deer activity, with many sets of tracks along the usual deer paths.  By Friday and Saturday it felt like spring with temperatures up into the 40s, warm sunshine, and the chickadees singing like it was late March.  The squirrels were very active, running up and down the trees and all over the ground collecting food in the warmer weather.  I sometimes think they they're in cahoots with the birds when I watch the nuthatches shoveling seeds from the feeder to the ground!

Temperatures today were bit cooler, but with a warm front bringing more humidity, and with the lake still cold, fog formed right on the surface so thick we couldn't see across the cove.