A tree tunnel

It’s another hazy, summer day at Roundtop, though not as uncomfortable as the haze might suggest. The days of 95+ degree weather are gone, at least for now. Haze, humidity and 85 degrees feels a lot more comfortable. The evenings are enjoyable again, too, and the idea of an evening walk no longer sounds like a death march.

I’d like to think that the time of 95 degree days are gone for another year, but it’s far too early to make so bold a statement. I can hope that’s the case and it’s not an impossible dream, but given climate change and the fact that it’s only early August, it’s too soon to do much more than hope.

My photo today is of a tree tunnel along Siddonsburg Rd. in Monaghan Township, York County. The township road crew recently had to trim the lower branches of the trees to keep them from hitting taller vehicles, and the result is a pretty neat, little green tree tunnel. Most places would probably just remove the trees, but here we just trim them up into tunnels.

August sunrise

Usually I associate red sunrises with stormy weather, but I took this photo yesterday morning and the rest of the day was storm-free. A sunrise this spectacular doesn’t come around every day. I was walking Baby Dog when the sky first lightened, but I was close enough to the cabin to race back and grab the camera. I tossed Baby Dog in the car and drove down to an open spot so I could take a shot.


Poor Baby Dog! At first she thought her walk was over far too soon, and then she thought she was going someplace exciting. Dogs just don’t appreciate sunrises.

Days have shortened again to the point where I need to wear a headlamp during my early morning walks with Dog and Baby Dog. So far I’ve been able to dispense with it once I walk my way out of the woods and my eyes adjust, but the progression of shorter days is quite noticeable already. I saw “already” as though I’m surprised. I guess I am. For some reason, I expect the longer hours of daylight to last longer than they really do. Perhaps it’s because I think of shorter days with cooler weather and not during 90 degree temperatures.

Middle Creek - art and wildlife

Yesterday I took a few hours and went to Middle Creek Wildlife Management Area, near Kleinfeltersville in Lancaster County. I had a double purpose in mind. Naturally, I wanted to see whatever birds were around, but the day was also the last day of the annual three-day Middle Creek Wildlife Art Show. So I could look at birds and bird art all at the same place.

August is often a decent month for birding, if you can find a place where the shorebirds gather. When you live inland, as I do, finding good mudflats is always weather-dependent. Middle Creek can sometimes be that good inland site, at least it can in a dry year or when the lake is partially drained. 2012 is not that year. The heavy thunderstorms of the past week or so have raised the level of the lake so that mudflats are pretty much non-existent right now.

But that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything to see. Several hundred Canada geese still hang out there, as were 3 snow geese, probably injured birds that couldn’t migrate north. Songbirds abounded and the wading shorebirds, the herons and the egrets, were happy enough along the water’s edges.

There’s a green heron in the background of my mallard (or is that a mallard x black duck?) photo today. Can you see it?

One of the reasons I wanted to take in the art show was to take another look at a Peregrine Falcon painting, subspecies Anatum that is now extinct in the east, done by Dave Hughes. I first saw the painting at Hawk Mountain last weekend when Dave had just finished it. He was one of the attendees at the Kittatinny Roundtable and brought his latest creation along so we could see it. This weekend he was one of the artists exhibiting at Middle Creek, and his Peregrine was now gussied up with a frame and Dave’s signature. My second photo today is Dave’s work before it was framed and signed.

Hazy morning

Hazy sunrise on E. Siddonsburg Rd., Monaghan Twp., York County, Pennsylvania

Hazy, humid days in August are a given in any year in southern Pennsylvania. Today’s haze is notable only because it’s a bit hazier than usual. In the early morning, the haze can create an unusual light for an hour or so before fading to run-of-the-mill haze.

By this point of the year, summer haze has really kicked in. It’s no surprise that I have a lot of humidity here. My region contains and is surrounded by Appalachian mountains and forests. Forests, of course, pump huge amounts of water into the atmosphere. Each tree is like a pumping station that’s running full time during the summer. It’s not just the Smokey Mountains that are smoky.

I try to view the haze as a good thing—transpiration working properly to produce rain and create more oxygen in the atmosphere. Without it, we’d all be flopping like fish here on the earth. So despite what the humidity in the air does to photography, I won’t complain too much about it.

The nights are often hazy, too, and that part I don’t care for, as it limits decent stargazing. This is especially true now with the annual Perseid meteor shower gearing up. Earth is already entering what Spaceweather.com calls “a broad stream” of debris from Comet Swift-Tuttle and a fireball from that was spotted over New Mexico last night. Although the meteor stream is still low at about 10 meteors per hour, forecasters expect the shower to peak on August 12-13 with as many as 100+ meteors per hour. Roundtop is a decent place to watch for meteors, as the mountain is pretty far from the worst of city light pollution. But haze obscures the view too, and of course weather overhead, close to earth, is always a worry.

But the meteor shower is still more than a week away and that’s too far away to worry about clouds or storms just yet. If the weather permits, I’ll be out on one of the ski slopes watching one of nature’s greatest shows.

A little purple should always come your way

Burdock

Even burdock is pretty when it’s in bloom. At least I think so.

Of course, in another 4-6 weeks, the blooms will be gone and the dock (or is that the burrs?) will be brown. Dog or Baby Dog will casually brush by them and come home covered in the stickers, which I will need to cut out. By then, I won’t be enjoying them very much.

Burdock was the inspiration for Velcro, or so I’m told. I’m regularly inspired by nature but not usually in that way.

At the moment I find the plant attractive, though any kind of bright purple flowers are hard for me to resist. And since most of the forest and my surroundings are unremittingly green right now, it doesn’t take much more than being non-green to catch my eye.

Even this normally rather annoying weed has its own moment of beauty.  Just because I spend most of the fall trying to avoid it or cutting it out of the dogs' fur doesn't mean that I can't enjoy the few moments of its life when it is more pretty than it is annoying. Nature has a way of putting beauty where and when it's least expected.  Even the burdock has its day.

Storms

along Beaver Creek

Last evening produced a thunderstorm of the kind I only see once or twice a year. The lightning was right on top of me, the strikes came fast and furious. All the animals, even the ones who are normally oblivious to storms, were scared, wincing or cowering every time the lightning flashed and again when the thunder rattled the cabin.

Fortunately, nothing struck at the cabin itself, though at least two of the strikes were within 100 yards of me, which is too close for my comfort. Storms of one kind of another are a way of life at the cabin, and I more or less have gotten used to them. When you live in the woods and storms come through regularly, you have to learn to live with them. Storms are a lot different and considerably more intense in the woods than when you’re in a city or a town. Trees sway overhead, leaves fall, rain pelts the windows like hail, branches fall onto the roof. I can tell by the sounds outside if the storm is intensifying or diminishing. Sometimes I can’t tell if the sound itself is from rain hitting the leaves or wind tossing the leaves and limbs around. They both sound much the same—loud.

I’m glad I have radar on my phone. I can watch the storm cells march across the mountain and figure out how much longer it will be until the worst of the storm is past me. I find it a lot easier to get through the worst storms when I can calculate that it’s going to be over in 5 or 10 or 15 minutes. Not knowing how long the storm would last, as in those pre-radar-on-the-phone days, was a lot worse.

I have other ways of calculating storm difficulties, too. For rainstorms, my basement is usually dry for the first 3-4 inches. More than that, unless the ground has been dry for a while, I’d better start checking the basement and getting the pumps ready.

Winter storms can be particularly tricky, though lately those have been few and far between. Ice is a big worry, as limbs and trees can crack under that weight, and often electricity goes out too. It’s scary being outside during an ice storm, and those storms can go on for long enough that sooner or later I have to take the dogs out. It’s no fun listening to and seeing trees crack and crash to the ground every few seconds while a dog is sniffing around trying to find the perfect place to pee.

I’ve been through a few honest-to-gosh blizzards at the cabin, though none of those too recently either. With those, worrying about the electricity going out is always in the forefront of my mind. That happens a lot because the electric line comes up the mountain through the forest, traveling for at least a mile before reaching a road. Trees are always falling on that line.

I do what I can to ready myself for such storms. I have water on hand. I have a propane fireplace for heat in the winter. I have pumps and back-up pumps for severe rain. I keep the phone charged so I can watch the radar. And mostly I just wait for the storms to be over.

Not just Maude and Mergatroyd

Near the village of Uno

It turns out that the two white-tailed deer, nicknamed “Maude and Mergatroyd” by my neighbor are really Maude, Mergatroyd, Mitzi, Melissa and Mabel. Yes, there are five of them. Oddly, none of the five doe appear to have fawns this year. Two of the deer are smaller than the other three. I suspect they are last year’s fawns, but that still doesn’t account for the other three, seemingly-fawnless deer.


Very young fawns don’t follow mom as she grazes the day away. They hide. For the first week or so, fawns usually spend the day flattened in a spot mom has determined is “safe.” Actual safety varies. During the first week of camp this year, a fawn was “hidden” in the camp’s fire pit for a day. Very young fawns might not move for any reason—more than a few have been killed when fields are mowed right over a fawn. After that first week, fawns usually spend the day lying down but with their heads and ears up. If danger approaches, they revert to their flattened position to avoid detection, but are more likely to get up and run during an actual threat.

Fawns don’t begin to travel with mom much before they are 4-5 weeks old. By this age, they will choose their own bedding site, and mom will have to call them as even she might not know exactly where they are.

At this point in the summer fawns should be old enough to travel with their moms, so seeing this many doe without any fawns seems odd to me. Dog and I startled these five as we began our early morning, pre-dawn walk. I know we woke them up from their sleep, bouncing them out of their beds as we passed perhaps 40 feet away.

Is it possible any fawns are still young enough to stay put when their moms bolt away at our approach? That’s possible, I guess, but for a fawn that would likely be 6 weeks old by now, that wouldn’t be my first guess. More likely is that these doe don’t have fawns and their female fawns from last year are still running with the older doe. But if I see any fawns in the next week or so, I’ll be sure to adjust my thinking!

Damaged

My climb up the ski slopes on Wednesday evening gave me a different view of the tornado damage that occurred on Roundtop a year ago in April. Starting this spring Roundtop hired a logging company to remove and salvage the wood from as many of the downed trees as possible. The photo I took on Wednesday shows how the area looks now that logging is completed. From this distance it looks more like a park than a forest, though when I’m closer it still looks like a forest, though a badly damaged one.


The worst damaged area is about .3 mile from my cabin and I can still remember how that storm looked and sounded when it blasted down the hill. Last night I had another ominous-looking storm, with rolling black clouds that turned day the color of night. But last night’s storm couldn’t compare to the one that brought the tornado, fortunately. I’ll probably measure all future storms against that one. I tell people that was the worst storm I experienced in 20 years of living in the woods, and I hope I won’t be around the next time there’s another one. I’m not sure if the odds are in my favor for that or not.

Evening with a view

Looking to the north from Roundtop

 Yesterday evening was clear and not too hot, so I took advantage of that to walk up one of the smaller ski slopes to take in the view. Today is hazy and much hotter, not the kind of weather for that kind of walking! I’ll wait until the weather is cooler and the hawks are flying before I hike up any of the bigger slopes.

While I was up there, the local band of Canada geese performed their evening flyby. This year’s young are now airborne but still gaining strength. Flybys are usually limited to dawn and just before sunset. The young birds are now strong enough to make a full, wide circle around the entire mountain before settling onto one of the ponds. Just a week or so ago, the extent of their flight was a beeline line between the ponds.

 

The current flock is 26 strong, 6 parent birds and a total of 20 young ones, pretty much evenly split among the three couples. I would not be surprised to learn that the couples were raised here too. The three groups are always together and seem to get along without friction.

I was also treated to a round robin of dueling eastern pewees. At least three of them were calling, one right after the other. Two were very close, the third not much further away. It won’t be much longer, no more than another month, before their haunting call will disappear from the woods for another year. They are the last summer bird to arrive in the spring and pretty much the first to leave, though the barn swallows leave at much the same time.

For the moment, summer has a hard grip on the mountain I can already see towards the end of it for another year. 

Summer sightings

I know summer is wearing on when I see fledglings out and sitting on perches. The eastern kingbirds I saw this morning are still young enough to require feedings by the parent birds, but they are no longer nest-bound. The two were well able to fly but mom or dad was still supporting their insect habit.


Even the fawns are growing up, though they are still spotted. The one I saw last evening was alone but seemed full of itself, saucy even, giving me a look that seemed to say, “You can’t catch me, so there!” With that it kicked up its tail and its heels and danced off into the woods. Such youthful exuberance, as yet unchallenged or tested by life’s hard knocks.

In another week I could legitimately start fall hawkwatching, though early August only brings out the hardcore hawkwatchers. We usually couch our own abundance of enthusiasm by saying it’s just to get the eyes and the binoculars dialed in before the action really begins. Early August hawkwatching is usually more about catching up on the doings of other hawkwatchers since the end of the last migration season. By the time the socializing is up to date, maybe the hawks will really be on the move. Sometimes we actually get rewarded for our early season efforts, especially on days with a bit of a northwest wind. Perhaps 10-12 birds, the first double-digit day of the new season, might be counted. Still, you need to be something of a hard-core hawkwatcher to spend all day on a mountain top and only see 10-12 raptors. That would even be a good day in the early season.

Still, a couple of fledged eastern kingbirds and a smart-alec fawn are enough to get me thinking about the fall to come. So what does that say about me?

Misty mountain morning

Roundtop is turning green again, after weekend rains provided a half-decent soak. The rain should have raised the level of Beaver Creek somewhat so the adventure camp kids will benefit from that, if not the crayfish and frogs they will probably catch.


The leaves that dried and fell from the extended lack of rain still litter the mountain, making it look a bit odd to my eye. The trees are all green again but when I look at the ground, it is covered with yellow and brown leaves, almost like fall.

Much of the underbrush or yearling plants of the understory didn’t make it through the rainless time, so I can see the ground again and see a bit deeper into the forest than before. When I look through the trees at the leaf-shrouded sky I am trying to tell if the canopy is a bit more open than before. I can’t tell, and if there’s any difference it sure isn’t enough to matter.

What I am noticing is the shortening of the days. The evenings are a bit shorter and the mornings even more so. This morning under a clear sky, it occurred to me that in another week I will probably need a headlamp to start my morning walk with Dog. This morning I thought about it for the first time in months, but I waited for a minute or so and in the interim the sky lightened enough to do without.

Rain and finding normal again

Raindrops on spruce

Rain! It is much needed and should do a lot to ease the damage caused by the lack of it over the past few weeks. It’s too soon for the grass to turn green again, but I’m sure it will. Overnight I had just under an inch of rain, most of which fell gently enough to soak in. This morning I saw a few small puddles but water wasn’t gushing down the lane or off the mountain.
Lately I’ve been a bit bored with taking summer photos in the season’s harsh light and distant haze. This morning’s fogginess makes the mountain look a lot more interesting to me again. That, and a new and empty photo card had me snapping shots like crazy.

The rain comes too late for the spotted touch-me-not plants that withered and died, leaving the ground bare of vegetation where they grew thickly. It comes in time to save the local corn and boost the water in Beaver Creek (and elsewhere). So for at least a little while the mountain will look and feel “normal” to me again.

I have lived in my cabin now for more than 20 years, and over those years I’ve developed a sense, perhaps a memory, of how the forest looks and feels, for lack of another word, in all its seasons. I know when the migrating birds should arrive and leave. I know when the trees should turn color in the fall. I know what winters and summers should feel like. I know what blooms here and what lives here, what the sky looks like when the weather will turn nasty. And I know that things are out of whack.

That sense began slowly, when I started noticing that leaves fell later and later each year. They now fall a good three weeks later than they did when I first moved here. I know that the trees are budded and leafed out far too early for the warblers that arrive in the spring. That used to be such a beautiful thing, a perfect balance in nature, with each species arriving at just the right moment, coinciding with the first appearance of the insects each preferred. The ground-loving warblers arrived first, then the mid-canopy birds and finally the ones that sought food from the highest branches of all. Now, the trees are nearly fully leafed out by the time the first warblers arrive, even though the warblers are coming earlier too.

My sense of normal is solely based on my observations of what happens in the forest around me. I have nothing but anecdotal evidence to support what I’m saying. Others do the science, though the science supports my observations.

A new article to be published in an upcoming issue of Rolling Stone starts off with this: “ June broke or tied 3,215 high-temperature records across the United States. That followed the warmest May on record for the Northern Hemisphere – the 327th consecutive month in which the temperature of the entire globe exceeded the 20th-century average, the odds of which occurring by simple chance were 3.7 x 10-99, a number considerably larger than the number of stars in the universe.” If you’d like to read the full article, it’s here.

Two deer

Not Maude or Murgatroyd

The two deer that seem to always wait at the bottom of my lane were dubbed Maude and Murgatroyd by my neighbor. He can’t tell them apart and neither can I.

It made some sense that they would hang out in the 5x10 patch of grass between the lane and the woods when the weather was sweltering. The grass there wasn’t entirely brown, the woods were just a jump away, and the small open area at least held the promise of a breeze. But now that the weather has broken, Maude and Murgatroyd (spelling uncertain) still haunt this small patch.

They’ve nearly been hit more than once because, as deer will, instead of retreating to the woods on the side of the road where they are standing, they decide they must retreat by crossing the road and jumping directly into the path of the oncoming car. And naturally, we can’t really see them until we are right on top of them.

I have tried, when I can see them, driving past them very slowly, hoping they will not jump onto my car. This has had an unexpected result in that now I can get nearly close enough to touch them before they move. If I rolled down the window, stuck my arm out of the car, and if they’d let me approach another 5 feet, I think I could touch them.

They are not quite tame enough to be handfed and not nearly spooky or wily enough to stay out of trouble. The 4 year old neighbor adores them, though she is just a bit too noisy for them. Her squeals of delight when they tiptoe into her front yard while she is in her playhouse can be heard all over the mountain. That’s usually followed by the two deer crashing down the side of the mountain by my cabin, which sets the dogs to howling again. Then the deer gallop through the other neighbor’s vegetable patch and flower garden, while she was at the far end of the garden, armed only with a hoe.

This morning? Maude and Murgatroyd are back in the 5x10 patch of grass. We’re still trying to avoid hitting them.

Too hot!

Normally I love the Tuesdays I spend down with kids from adventure camp down at a little bridge across Beaver Creek. I have to admit that yesterday, with its 97 degree heat, wasn’t one of my favorites. There’s just no way to enjoy spending the day outside when it’s 97 degrees and humid.

The kids didn’t seem to mind. The first giant crayfish they caught was all they needed. Suddenly the creek was full of kids catching crayfish of all sizes, from large down to nearly microscopic. They also snagged a few frogs, a couple of salamanders and even a few minnows, which are quicksilver fast and hard to catch. The kids quickly settled into groups working in teams so they could outwit and herd the crayfish into the nets. A few decided to “guard” the prisoners to keep the frogs and crayfish from escaping the bucket. A few others decided to create a dam to keep the crayfish was escaping downstream.

By noontime I was wilting and by the time camp ended I was ready for a cool shower and some air conditioning. Sometimes I long for the days, a mere 20 years ago, when summers in the woods were cool enough not to need air conditioning. Fortunately for me, this latest heat wave is ending today. As long as the afternoon storms don’t damage anything at the cabin, the cool air that accompanies them will be much appreciated.

I know it’s not just me that will appreciate cooler weather. My hens haven’t laid an egg since the latest heat wave began—not that I blame them. And my elderly Dog isn’t much interested in a long walk either. I’ve been seeing deer along the edges of the roads, no doubt hoping to catch something that resembles a breeze. Cars whizz by and the deer just stand there. They aren’t going to move until they are good and ready.

The storms are coming, and I hope some rain comes with them. It’s only the lightning and the wind that won’t be welcome.

A (very) little rain

Brown-eyed susans

A bit a rain dampened Roundtop this weekend, though I seem to have missed the bulk of it. I had enough rain to dampen the forest, but only a few miles away more than an inch was recorded. I could have used more than fell here but at least there was something.

Even that was too late for some of the forest flowers. The spotted touch-me-not, among others, have shriveled and died. As a result, I can now see the ground in portions of the forest, instead of the knee-high understory that covered it as recently as last week. The rain also knocked down the yellowed leaves that made the forest look as though the season was early autumn.

I hope I had enough rain to replenish the little stream where the camp kids will attempt to terrorize catch crayfish tomorrow. With the next few days edging near 100 degrees again, any benefit from the rain is likely to be short-lived. Still, a bit of rain is better than none.

What rain I had did wonders for these brown-eyed susans. They bloomed almost overnight. I have been watching this patch on the edge of the forest near the cabin for a while now, waiting for the buds to bloom. And waiting. Even on Saturday the patch was not completely out. It was only during this morning’s walk with Dog that I saw they were all finally fully open. And now I am eager to revisit other spots on the mountain to see what else a little rain has done.

Odds and ends

Bird song was much in evidence this morning for some reason. Is it that the morning was overcast and hazy? Is it that sunrise already creeps up minutes later than just a few weeks ago? No matter.

This morning the distant call of a yellow-billed cuckoo from somewhere over on the other side of the mountain was enough to keep my ears perked up during my morning walk with Dog. I’ve never seen the cuckoo on Roundtop but it’s not hard to know when one is around. It is very persistent and calls over and over again, often moving around between calls so that each is in a slightly different spot.

The more common of the summer residents were all out this morning, too. I expect to hear a pewee and a phoebe each morning. Ditto the Carolina wren and the squabbling blue jays. Also this morning I heard both wood thrush and ovenbird. Both had been quiet for some weeks during nesting duties. Does the new round of calling mean nesting is over, that the birds are in between multiple nestings or did the first nest fail? Even the hummingbird put in an early morning appearance.

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And from the "it never fails (and I’m convinced it’s a conspiracy) department: Just when a class X1.4 solar flare is released, prompting a good possibility of aurora borealis displays this far south, the forecast for the weekend is for cloudy skies. Really, overcast skies and a high probability of auroras must go together. I can’t even tell you the last time I had clear skies when the aurora probably was high.

Dry

Perhaps you are wondering, “Why is she running fall photos in July?” The answer is that these are not photos of fall foliage. I took them this morning.

The lack of rain is starting to have a devastating effect on the forest here on Roundtop. The grass is as brown as ripe wheat. The forest understory is crackling and withered. And now the leaves on the trees, even large trees, are yellowing and falling to the ground. At this point, the majority of the yellowing leaves are from tulip poplars. At first I thought the yellowing was restricted to the trees at the forest’s edge. Naturally, those would bear the brunt of the sun and its heat. That is not the case, though I do think those edge trees look worse than the ones deeper into the forest.

Though tulip poplars are the species that is most affected by the dry weather, they aren’t the only one. Locust trees are affected, too, and even a smattering of white oaks are among the leaves scattered on the ground.


Although the last week’s heat wave has dissipated, this week’s temperatures have been normal. But a week of extreme heat followed by a week of normal heat but no rain is enough to weaken even the largest trees in this forest. It has now been more than three weeks since any measurable rain has fallen. June’s precipitation was actually above normal, but all of it fell in the first few weeks of the month.


The only chance of rain in the forecast over the next week or so is in the low possibility for thunderstorms. So this situation is only likely to worsen. I’m not one who enjoys thunderstorms—lightning has struck too close to the cabin and winds strong enough to down trees have worried me too many times for that! But I’m starting to hope for a thunderstorm to bring some much-needed rain to this forest.

Blessed relief!

Indian pipes

The heat wave has finally broken, after topping out at 101 degrees F. on Saturday. Storms rumbled past that evening but missed me entirely. I don’t mind that I didn’t get the wind or that lightning never struck closer than a few miles away, but I sure could have used some of the rain. A week of temperatures that ranged from 93-101 just sucked the moisture out of the forest, leaving it wilted and crackly.

So perhaps the drying out and thinning of the forest understory is the reason why I was able to see these Indian pipes. Indian pipes are a parasite, technically, and not a fungus, which is what you’d probably guess they were if you didn’t know. Without chlorophyll, it’s a plant, a parasite of a fungus that takes nutrients from a tree. And Indian pipes need nutrients both from the host fungus and the tree, making it a double parasite. They were one of the first woodland plants I could identify and probably the first I ever remember seeing, somewhere way back in my childhood. I still think they are a neat plant. They don’t grow very large, usually around 4-6 inches tall. Occasionally I see a taller grouping that is 8-10 inches tall, but those aren’t typical.

American beech trees are a host for the fungus that Indian pipes like, and my front forest has several of those. This little group is just a few of the 12-15 pipes I found yesterday under one of the beech trees.  The others are still just poking their heads out of the ground.  These are still growing and while the heads will always droop, the plant will uncurl more than they are right now. The plant is also called corpse plant and ghost plant, and it’s waxy to the touch. If you pick them they wilt and turn black right away. I learned that at a young age, too.

Still in the heat wave

Chickory

Day one of the latest heat wave is over, and I’m currently in the middle of day two. I will need to make it through Saturday, with a forecast of 100°F, to reach the end of the worst of this heat.

In the woods where I live, the temperature is always a few or several degrees cooler than in the surrounding towns, though I never get a break from the humidity. Today at noontime it is already above 90°, which makes me think the prediction of 96 for today could be on the low side.

The heat just sucks the moisture out of the ground. Last evening Dog was klutzing around in the forest undergrowth and it sounded like he was breaking glass. Every twig, every leaf he touched just crumbled. The corn is so dry its leaves are curled up and look like pineapple plants. An outside plant that I watered one evening is dead and brown by the next.

Even leaves on some trees are turning brown and falling to the ground. So far I’ve seen mostly tulip poplar or maple leaves. Likely, the leaves that fell came from previously-damaged or weaker twigs. I’ve seen this happen before, though always in September after a hot, dry August. It does not bode well, methinks, to see this in early July.

Although no rain is in the immediate forecast, I’m already hoping for a wet or a cool August. This heat wave is more like August, anyway, so perhaps August will do something else this year. I can only hope.

Too much heat!

Nature's snowflake, Queen Anne's lace. I wish I had a few of the real snowflakes right now.

The current heat wave is too hot for me to be spending much time outside gallivanting through the forest. I am staying where it is cooler. When I am outside I am usually sitting, often with an icy beverage in one hand.


I did, however, still manage to see something I found interesting. I’ve been spooking a deer, a doe, about once a day when I am outside. Usually my first sighting of her is when she bounds away, often from very close by. She’s surprised and startled me a couple of times. I figure she has a fawn hidden somewhere nearby, a fawn that is still too young to be following mom around. I don’t expect to find the fawn until mom is convinced the new baby is ready for travel.

What has surprise me is how close the deer has been to me when it takes off, and I have wondered where it could be hiding so that I couldn’t see it. And I’ve finally figured that one out.

Last year during Snowtober, my lane was so cluttered with tree halves and large limbs that it took me hours to clear it. The rest of the forest was just as thick with broken limbs and trees, too. In the past when I’ve cleared brush, I would just drag it off into my brushpile in the woods. After Snowtober so many trees and limbs were down that I couldn’t even reach my brushpile. The whole woods looked like a brushpile. I just dragged the limbs off to the side of the driveway and left them there; even so I had to struggle to find somewhere to leave them or had to toss them atop the other limbs that came down but didn’t land in the driveway. The side of my driveway looks like an impenetrable barrier now.

This mass of limbs and half-trees is proving to be useful for the deer. Many of those downed limbs are a single main branch with lots smaller branches at the end of it. Those smaller branches don’t lay flat on the ground but instead create a kind of mini-teepee. Dead leaves still cover the branches, and the deer crawl into the circle of the smaller branches and lay down inside. When they do that, they are invisible to me. The deer, and this doe in particular, just stays inside that circle of branches unless I walk too close to her. Then she bounces up and rushes away, but I never knew she was there. If she hadn’t run off, I would have passed within 10 feet of her and never known it.

Surviving the heat

A strong thunderstorm blew across Roundtop Mtn. around 4 a.m. this morning, disturbing my sleep. The dogs cowered under the bed, and once I was half-blinded when I was looking out the window at the moment of a lightning flash. Instead of cooling things down, the air turned steamy and warmer within moments of the storm’s passing.


Last night the fireflies were out by the dozens. Earlier in the summer I worried there were fewer of them than usual but no longer. Until the storm was overhead and forced them into hiding, the fireflies created their own tiny versions of lightning in the forest.

So now the heat wave is here and the forest life is slowing down to deal with it. My chickens retreat under the cabin during the day, where it is cooler. Birds are quiet earlier in the day. The deer are also in hiding, emerging only at night; I see their tracks along the bank of the nearest pond. It might not just be the heat that keeps the deer from appearing either; the dreaded deer flies have arrived, too, harassing deer and humans alike. Deer flies have a nasty bite, but they spend more time circling the target of their attention than biting. Still, the constant buzzing noise and the anticipation that at any second the deer fly might land and bite is enough to drive deer and humans half-crazy.

For the next few days until the heat breaks sometime next week, my own forays into the woods will be limited. Like the deer l am likely to emerge outside only at night, or in the faded light of early dawn.

Heat wave's a coming

Are you ready for the heat wave? I’m not. Heat waves are why I don’t like summer. Even as I type, one is building up, planning on settling in for a few or several days. It was only a few years ago that I discovered different regions have different definitions of what constitutes a heat wave. In this area, a heat wave is at least three days with temperatures at 90°F or above. Usually, this is accompanied by high humidity, too.

California and other drier areas say a heat wave (or a heat storm as it’s called in their parlance) is when the temperatures reach 100°F for three or more days over a wide area. Other countries also have their own definitions. In the Netherlands, for example, a heat wave means five consecutive days above 77°F, with at least three of those days above 86°F, though they use the Celsius scale, so it’s 25°C and 30°C for them. Australia’s version is that a heat wave is five consecutive days over 95°F or three consecutive days over 104°F.

Anyway you look at it and anywhere you live, a heat wave isn’t going to be a lot of fun. Here at the cabin I am somewhat sheltered from a “minor” heat wave. The leaves of the forest canopy take the worst of the sun, but that helps me down at ground level, at least until the humidity gets bad. Nothing shelters me from the humidity.

Heat waves are a good time to take Dog swimming. Even though he is old now, he still swims a bit and walks through the pond a lot. Baby Dog, since she is a dark brown color, which is akin to me wearing dark clothes in the summer, would benefit from a cool swim but she refuses. Every summer I try to get her in the water, even to wade, to no avail. She will have none of that wet stuff no matter how much she sees Dog (or me) enjoying it. Maybe this year I’ll get her into that pond.

Thoughts on kids and camp

Roundtop peeking over the neighboring hill

Ah, another Tuesday, another day of adventure camp. For once the weather held no threat of anything—neither thunder nor heat nor anything nasty. In fact, the weather was perfect—clear and cool. The kids had a good session, too. One group caught the mother of all crayfish. Really, the thing was like a small lobster. And it was finally caught in a net, after what seemed like hours of kids screaming directions and advice to the kid who was holding the net. When it was finally landed, they all cheered. I know the kids are having fun. I just hope that translates into spending more time in the outdoors.

My general impression of the kids is that they don’t have nearly as much knowledge of the outdoors as the kids I worked with even four or five years ago. By the time I was their ages, I had caught countless crayfish, knew the names of lots of birds, knew what poison ivy looked like and didn’t scream every time I saw an insect. These kids can’t tell a robin from a goose, don’t know enough to look in puddles for frogs or interesting animal tracks and don’t even try to be quiet when they are walking through the woods. With the kids I see, very basic knowledge of the outdoors is missing. What’s perhaps even scarier is that these are the kids who are interested enough to come to an adventure camp in the first place. What the kids are like who don’t want to come to adventure camp, I can’t even guess. And remember, these aren’t kids who’ve spent their lives in a city for the most part either. They are kids from small and medium-sized towns and the suburbs.

What I’m afraid that will eventually translate into are large numbers of adults with very limited or very shallow knowledge of the natural world. In the future, as we face ever more extreme weather, and our ever-growing population forces ever more choices about sharing the earth with its other inhabitants, I’m afraid the choices that will be made won’t be the best ones. Those kids don’t know it yet but their future, and those of their own children, will hinge on making the best choices humans can make, and to do that they need to know and understand a whole lot more about how the world works. I sure wish I could do more to help that happen.

A little gratuitous beauty

Farmer lily

Roundtop Mountain’s early-season mini-heat wave is past its prime, if not quite done with and out the door this morning. For that alone I am in a celebratory mood, so it’s a good time to post a photo of a bit of nature’s gratuitous beauty. This cloudy morning the farmer lilies are blooming. Some were still closed up after the night but most were open and ready for their close-up. I could not disappoint them.


Like black raspberries and new fawns, late June is also marked by farmer lilies. They line the roads leading up the mountain as thickly as crowds at a New Year’s Day parade. They are 6-10 blooms deep in the ditches and often run on for the length of a football field. If you can’t count at least 100 blooms while standing in one spot, you must be inside. With the curtains drawn.

It’s not only the farmer lilies that are appearing on the mountain either. Other midsummer blooms, like chicory, are also starting to add some color to the summer green. I haven’t yet seen any brown-eyed susans but they can’t be far from showing up either.

The Canada geese babies now resemble their parents and no longer look like featherless chickens. They still can’t fly, and the parent geese still shepherd them everywhere, but already they look a lot more like adults than goslings.

Fawns are beginning to appear on the mountain, too. They’ve been born for a little while now, but are only just starting to be big enough to accompany mama on her daily rounds. Many are still hidden, curled up during the day while mother grazes on the ski slopes.

Officially, summer has only just begun but here it looks and feels like midsummer. To me, the July 4 holiday has always marked the “middle” of summer—six weeks after Memorial Day (the unofficial start of summer) and just nine weeks before Labor Day (the unofficial end of summer). I suppose that thinking is left over from my school days when Memorial Day and Labor Day pretty much bracketed the end of one year and the start of a new term. So whatever the calendar says, my thinking has its own version of summer.

3H's are here...and a small brag

View to the east on a hazy morning

The 3H’s are here, and the only thing good I can find to say about it is that the dreaded three will leave tomorrow. This morning the haze was already in evidence, and the humidity was cloying even as early as 7 a.m.

It’s a lot easier for me to put up with record-breaking heat and humidity when I know it won’t be here for days on end. Of course, anytime heat like this comes to an end that probably means thunderstorms and the dangers that often accompany them. Still, the heat will end and that’s the important thing for now.

So I am simply trying to bask in the idea that it’s only this afternoon to suffer through and the weather will be better tomorrow. Wrong as forecasts often are, I’m still glad I live in a time where people have some idea how long bad weather will last. I don’t even want to think about how anxious I would be about this weather if I didn’t know it would end tomorrow. Imagine living in a time where you had no idea if you’d have one day of record-breaking heat or 15 in a row. Or if you didn’t know the back edge of that winter blizzard was just one county to the west and would be over soon. All I can say is I’m glad I wasn’t living then.

On a side note: yesterday marked my 1500th post to Roundtop Ruminations. I started the blog way back in August 2005, so I’ll soon be coming up on my seventh anniversary with it. Back then it never occurred to me I’d still be posting in 2012.

A day at camp

Down along Beaver Creek

Yesterday was my first day of adventure camp for this season. For me, camp means spending a day with kids down on Beaver Creek at the bottom of Roundtop Mtn. I show them how to catch crayfish and frogs and salamanders and anything else they can find, and I get to spend the day outside.

The weather yesterday proved fine for the event. The early morning was cloudy, not always the best for crayfish catching, but the kids still found some. The groups that arrived after noon when the weather was sunny caught crayfish faster than I could keep up with how many they caught. I’m sure they found at least 30.
The kids caught the same poor pickerel frog three times. It had a damaged toe, so I know it was the same one. I kept releasing it after each group of kids left so it wouldn’t get stressed, and the next group of kids kept catching it. The crayfish ranged in size from nearly invisible to big enough to eat. The kids were also much impressed by the sheer ugliness of the hellgrammite, the aquatic larva of the dobsonfly.

The idea of the camp is to get kids outside and interested in something other than video games. I don’t have each group long enough to actually teach them very much. I consider it a good session if the kids have fun and get to see and catch a variety of stream denizens. My hope is that their fun will translate into wanting to do something outdoorsy another time and maybe another and then yet again.

Mountain babies

Ah, for just another week of this lovely weather before the dreaded 3H’s take over. Alas, that is not to be. So I took advantage of the good weather this past weekend to wander around the mountain as much as I could. Once the hot weather kicks in, my walks are shorter and often less enjoyable. No one—and especially not me—likes hiking when covered in sweat.

What I saw on my forays were the first appearances of a whole variety of mountain babies, most of them as clueless as only babies can be. Everything from just-fledged barn swallows to goslings to fawns let me approach much closer than their parents were comfortable with. The youngsters are so clueless that even a dive-bombing or a snorting parent didn’t budge them. Kids! What are you going to do?

The antlers of the male deer are in velvet already. At one point this weekend I saw a nice buck calmly grazing in someone’s front yard (they weren’t home). It was the middle of the afternoon and the deer looked as calm as someone’s cow. He looked as though he did that every day and maybe he does. Sometimes it’s not just the babies that are clueless.

And speaking of babies—tomorrow marks the first session of adventure camp for me. I’ll spend the day down at a really nice stream with at least six groups of kids. We’ll catch crayfish and frogs, probably salamanders, too. I hope the wood tortoise that was such a hit last summer is still around. I’m going to have more kids at one time than I did last year. So this noon I ran out and bought more minnow nets—great for reaching across the stream to get at balky crayfish—and another bucket for temporarily holding our prisoners. As a result, I won’t be online tomorrow, but I will have a report on how things went on Wednesday.

Not hot, hazy or humid

I am enjoying these all too few, lovely days of June, those rarest days of almost summer, when the weather is neither hot, hazy nor humid. If the entire summer remained as nice as the weather was this week, I’d thoroughly enjoy summer. That won’t happen, of course, especially not in these days of a warming climate. In fact, by Tuesday of next week, the weather will be hot and humid and hazy—the dreaded 3H’s of summer.

The 3H’s typically last for at least good two months, now. A wait of two-and-a-half months before the weather breaks is not unlikely. Even mid-September can sometimes be sweltering, and by then even most of the summer aficionados are weary of it. Oh, we will have (I hope) a few days of rain and a few days of not-quite-so-terrible weather along the way, but they will seem few and far between to me. I know it will be more than two months before the year truly turns towards fall and nicer weather.

In the worst of the summer I tend to read books about Alaska, hoping the descriptions of unfathomable cold help me survive the worst of the heat. Around August, I begin to search web cams in the Yukon and northern Alaska, looking for that first bit of “termination dust” (new snow on the high peaks) that promises an eventual break in the heat down here.

But for today and for another few days, I don’t need to think about that. I can enjoy the bright, clear mornings and the crisp nights that call for a sweatshirt.  I can enjoy the deep green forest of midsummer. And I will start counting the days to when the weather will turn cooler and more pleasant again.

After the rain

Ironweed or wild butterfly weed

Yesterday I was supposed to lead my first outdoor awareness session of the summer with kids from the neighboring adventure camp. Instead, it rained buckets all day long, and the camp director wisely decided the kids wouldn’t have a great experience hiking down to the stream. It rained so hard that I got soaked even in my tried-and-true backpacking rain jacket for just the few minutes I took the dogs outside. It wasn’t only the kids who wouldn’t have had a lot of fun in that kind of weather!


Each summer I take the kids down to a little stream and teach them how to catch crayfish, frogs and salamanders. Last year they also routinely found a lovely old wood tortoise who didn’t seem to mind one bit being handled by a lot of kids. That tortoise was a big hit. The whole point is for the kids to enjoy themselves outdoors and experience a little bit of what goes on beyond their video game consoles. It would be nice to think that the experience whets their little appetites for more such experiences. That’s probably wishful thinking on my part, but I do what I can in the short amount of time I have with them to broaden their horizons a bit.

Anyway, yesterday the hike and critter-catching session was cancelled. I’m sure the critters were hiding from the weather, too. This morning the sky was crystal clear. Except for the leftover puddles, I couldn’t have guessed that the day before was such a washout.

Ironweed, or wild butterfly weed, is just starting to bloom along the forest edges, I noticed. The leaves and tiny flowers on this one still carry the drops of yesterday’s rain. Do I call every flower I photograph my favorite? I think I do, and when I am photographing one that one is my favorite. I know I particularly appreciate the pink-purple shade of ironweed and its showy size. If I do have a flower preference it’s for anything of strong color and good size. I’m not a huge fan of teeny, tiny little flowers. I like something with a strong sense of its own importance. Ironweed is one of those.

Almost!

Farmer lilies

It’s no secret to readers of Roundtop Ruminations that the wild and showy farmer lilies are one of my favorite flowers. And I am happy to report that they are almost ready to pop. The morning as I was leaving the mountain I checked a favorite spot to see how they were coming along. They are almost out. In fact, I expect they will be out by evening.

Farmer lilies love the sun, closing up at night and then opening spectacularly each morning. If it’s not sunny they will not deign to open their flowers and will stay closed until the sun strikes them again.

I am also happy to report that my half-grown chickens have figured out how to navigate the ramp up to and into their chicken house. After only a few days, they’ve already perfected the routine. At dusk they all troop up the ramp, one after another, to reach the safe and dry, straw-ladened roost. After they are all in, I close the door behind them, which keeps them out of sight of possible predators. In winter the closed door will keep them warmer, too. The little girls are growing up!

How they've grown!

First morning in their new coop!

I have been busy this week putting together a new chicken coop for my little chickens. The once tiny chicks are now feathered and ready to be outside, if still only half-grown.  I was more than ready to get them out of the cabin.  By the time they are this size they are already masters at kicking bedding out of their pen and creating a mess.

The Rhode Island Red girls look pretty much the same, though one has been the "bossy hen" since she was 2 days old.  The black sex-links are different enough to tell apart.  They are a cross between a Rhode Island Red and a barred rock hen. You can see that one has a reddish "bib." Another has a reddish "cape," and the third has almost no red.at all.  The Rhode Island reds are a lot bigger than the black ones, and I'm sure that's not because the reds are a week older than the black chicks.  The black chickens are going to be medium-sized hens and the reds will be large.

So far, the young ones haven't figured out how to go up their ramp to reach the nice chicken house that is complete with nesting boxes and a roosting perch. They seem to love their extra space, and one has already found a worm this morning.  Worms are like treasures to chickens.  Whenever one finds a worm, the others all try to steal the precious worm from her.  This results in chicken mayhem, with five chicks racing after the chicken with the worm while that one is desperately trying to keep the worm for herself.  This morning the winner put herself into a corner to keep the others away while she gobbled the worm. 

Appalachian Trail walk - part 2

Each year about 1500 people start hiking the Appalachian Trail in northern Georgia with the intention of walking the entire 2,175 miles of it. Generally, something over 300 finish it that year.
Most quit in the first week or so, deciding that life on the trail is not for them. Injuries or illness forces another large percentage off the walk, and that can happen at any point along the trail. Some of the rest do finish, just not in the year they start the hike.

The two most common groups of people who attempt and finish the hike are those recently out of school and recent retirees—the footloose and fancy-free. More than a few people quit their jobs to hike the trail and more than a few take advantage of being laid off from work to hike the trail.
 
Most begin the hike on their own, without a hiking partner. Often, this is because the logistics of two acquaintances having the time and means in the same year to make the hike is challenging. Still a sizeable minority do plan a hike and finish with a partner. Parent-child combinations are more common than you might expect, though friend-friend, both of the same and opposite sex, are the most common.

Typically, people who start the hike at about the same time continue to see each other throughout their long walk and often become friends, joining up to hike with each other for a day or a week, off and on throughout the hike. Through hikers sign trail registers along the way, and this is how they know where and when a compatriot passed the register. Cell phones are common, of course, but coverage can be spotty in the mountains. The trail register is used as much as the modern technology.

Shelters abound along the trail, notorious for their mice. Even people who hike together will likely not always walk together. Sometimes “together” simply means agreeing to camp at the same spot each night. Differences in partner height can make walking together uncomfortable. A tall person takes a lot fewer steps per mile than a short one. Trying to adjust your own pace to someone else’s slower or faster one is a lot more tiring than walking at the pace that’s comfortable for you.

It takes 4-5 months, on average, to hike the entire trail. Hikers typically cover 12-16 miles a day, once they get their trail legs underneath them. You will not be surprised to learn that the distance hikers cover at the beginning of the hike is much shorter at the start of the trail than by its end. For the first 2-3 weeks, hiking distances are often in the 8-10 mile range. The best way to train for the long hike is to walk long distances with the same pack you will carry during your walk, and virtually no one has the time to do that properly.

If a hiker makes it to the halfway point, as the two I met on Sunday already had, they will almost certainly finish the hike. After 1000 miles or so, the body is well-used to the daily physical stress of the walk, and a hiker has already proved they have the mental attitude they need to finish.

I rather envied the two I met--healthy and strong, able to put aside work or family life, unwilling to sit idly by while life races past--all to pursue a dream that called to them.  It's easy to stay in the  main stream of life, to follow the kind of life that "everyone" lives.  It takes a different sort of person to step away and do something different.  I take my hat off to you.  Good luck to both and safe travels.

Appalachian Trail Walk - Part 1

Stile along the Appalachian Trail across the Cumberland valley

After a stormy start to the weekend (tornado warning but no tornado!), Sunday morning dawned clear and perfect. I decided to do something I’ve wanted to do for some time—walk a section of the Appalachian Trail through the Cumberland valley. This part of the trail used to be—and still was the last time I walked it—the road-walking section of the AT, as it’s usually abbreviated.


Hikers walking the 2,175 mile trail need to cross the miles-wide valley to get from one mountain range to the next. The valley is rich with farmlands, and for many years the trail association couldn’t get permission for the trail to cross the privately-owned farms. Happily, those days are now in the past, the trail is finally routed off the roads. Today, this section is easy walking across fields and through woods.

I’ve passed the trail sign along the road I don’t know how many times, each time reminding myself that I want to hike this section and then promptly forgetting about it until the next time I drove past the trail sign. But this time, I didn’t forget and the weather was perfect.

After some deliberation, I brought along Baby Dog as my companion for the walk. I was tempted to bring the now-elderly Dog since I knew the walk was an easy one and that I wasn’t going to walk for but a few hours. In the end, Dog was sleeping and Baby Dog needed some exercise, so I brought her instead. I’m glad I did. Dog doesn’t do open stairs where he can see through them. He never has. If he’d encountered the stile that would have been the end of my walk, as I couldn’t lift him over and I know he would refuse.

I must also report that I’m incapable of walking 100 yards without taking a photograph. My walk on the trail was only about 2 miles long (with another 2 miles of road walking to return to my car). When I did the math, I discovered I’d taken a photo every 197 feet of my walk. No, I won’t force them all on readers of Roundtop Ruminations. However, you’ll see the better ones over today and tomorrow.


I started my walk along Rt. 74 near Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and headed north. I soon came to the aforementioned stile, crossed the field and climbed over a second stile on the far side of the field. I saw barns and houses in the distance but the trail stayed well away from them. After the stiles, the trail entered a narrow band of woods and stayed there throughout my walk. The AT is marked with white blazes about every 100 yards. A double blaze means the hiker is nearing a turn.  Except in a few sections, this would be a tough trail to get lost on. The footpath is well-traveled, and the blazes are always freshly painted. 

The woods were teeming with birds—orioles, pewees, mockingbirds, robins and towhees—to name but a few. Baby Dog proved an eager companion, though couldn’t resist barking at another dog we encountered and two through hikers—those trying to finish the trail in a single season—we encountered.

Hikers most commonly head north along the trail.  It starts at Spring Mountain, Georgia, and ends on Mt. Katahdin in Maine.  Some hike in the southbound direction, but most prefer to follow the spring northward. A man local to my area was the first ever to hike the Appalachian Trail in a single season.  I met him several times before his death.  He re-hiked the trail a couple of times after the first trip, the last when he was 80.  He found the Maine section pretty tough going that last time.

From now through early July, the hikers who started their trips back in March or early April are reaching this point of the trail.  This area is the halfway point of the trail.  A marker not far away used to mark the spot, but the trail keeps getting rerouted, and the precise halfway point keeps changing, too.  Yesterday I met one NOBO (northbound) through hiker and one SOBO (southbound) through hiker.  They were both intent on keeping moving, so we said our "good mornings" and each of us went on our way. 

I’ll have more photos from this short walk tomorrow.



Please, not again!

Roundtop Mountain and several counties surrounding are now under a tornado watch. The weather looks threatening, if not particularly tornado-ish to me at the moment. I’m guessing the critical time will be in the 5-6-7 p.m. time when the day will be at its warmest and the air at its most unstable.

Tornado watches are somewhat common. I’m guessing we see 5-8 of them a year. Tornado warnings, the alert that’s posted when someone actually sees one, are a lot less frequent, fortunately. As uncommon as they are here—after all I’m not in Kansas—I’m hoping the one that chewed up a lot of trees on Roundtop last April is the closest I’ll ever have to be to one. After that one, the odds should be heavily in my favor. Or so I tell myself.

Perhaps that’s why I’m so cavalier about today’s watch. I’ve been there. I’ve done that. “Lightning” or a tornado won’t strike twice in the same place. Right? Right?