Past the ides of January

I once thought the ides occurred on the 15th of every month. That was incorrect. Wikipedia informs us that ides are “a day in the Roman calendar that fell roughly in the middle of the month. In March, May, July, and October it was the 15th day of the month; in other months it was the 13th.” It doesn’t inform us us why the ides varied from the 15th of some months to the 13th of others. Since it’s not March and I’m not Julius Caesar, I’m not going to worry about it.

For the past week or so, the edges of our driveway and the road shoulder in front of the house have been accumulating deer and turkey tracks. There have been no actual recent sightings of either critter however. I’ve been surprised that  the  dogs haven’t shown more interest in the tracks but perhaps the cold and the snow cover limits the scents from tracks.

deer track in the snow

Photo by J. Harrington

One of the back yard red squirrels has a snow tunnel to hide in and travel through along the  base of the  retaining wall behind the garage. I noticed a squirrel disappearing into the tunnel through a hole I hadn’t paid attention to. There’s also a gap in the snow cover at the base of the brush pile. I suspect there’s a “runny babbit” wintering under the brush but there aren’t any tracks near the snow gap so maybe it’s just a location on the lee side of the pile.

turkey tracks in the snow

Photo by J. Harrington

The good folks at the National Phenology Network have begun tracking the status of Spring down at the southern tip of Florida. That’s both a hopeful sign and a cruel and unusual punishment for those of us in the northern tier.

Item:

Lynn Emanuel - 1949-

I strolled through the neighborhood of beautiful houses
All of which I had written

Down the long dark street
Past the cemetery

Where all the tombstones
Had my small white face.

Over my shoulder burned the lamp
Of the moon.

The pages, in the wind, flew, were fluffed and ruffled
Like water by stones into a tune.

I watched the horse and the rat
The rabbit and fox

Leaving their tracks
On the snowy drafts.

The fox looked like me
Had my face

A long sharp chin
A shifty eye.

The wind riffled its beautiful pelt.
My spelling faltered

Under the spell of myself.

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A 'tail's tale in the tracks

This morning we slogged out to take a close look at the tracks that had us scratching our heads yesterday. The snow was deeper and more slippery than we anticipated. Upon closer examination, we believe the tracks that had puzzled us were made by a buck whitetail deer dragging his hooves at the tired end of rutting and hunting seasons. In fact, we think something spooked him as he was starting across the field and caused him to bolt back into the woods (third photo). The tracks suddenly head off at 90° from his line of travel and show leaps, not steps.

closeup of individual tracks

Photo by J. Harrington

hooves dragging through snow between tracks

Photo by J. Harrington

tracks stop, pivot, leap toward woods

Photo by J. Harrington

We are enjoying a second consecutive, and rare, day of sunshine. Last night's fog brought another morning of hoar-frost covered trees, sparkling against the blue sky. One of the amaryllis should be in full bloom sometime during the next few days. Meanwhile, we're slowly picking our way through the heritage beans cookbook we were given for Christmas, finding some recipes that look good for Spring and others that will hit the spot this Winter. For some of the bean varieties that came with the cookbook, we needed to go to the Ranch Gordo web site for recipes. In the process, we learned some things that warmed the cockles of our Black Irish heart, such as one recipe that came from the family of a bluegrass singer who was born in our home town just a few years ahead of us. That's the kind of coincidence that makes us feel right at home in the midst of a new adventure of heritage cooking to go with our artisan sourdough bread and our emphasis on local and/or authentic foods. We're going to keep our fingers crossed that the rest of this year goes as well as the first couple of days.

be careful

By Ed Roberson

i must be careful about such things as these.

the thin-grained oak.    the quiet grizzlies scared

into the hills by the constant tracks squeezing

in behind them closer in the snow.    the snared

rigidity of the winter lake.    deer after deer

crossing on the spines of fish who look up and stare

with their eyes pressed to the ice.   in a sleep.  hearing

the thin taps leading away to collapse like the bear

in the high quiet.   i must be careful not to shake

anything in too wild an elation.    not to jar

the fragile mountains against the paper far-

ness.   nor avalanche the fog or the eagle from the air.

of the gentle wilderness i must set the precarious

words.   like rocks.   without one snowcapped mistake.

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February, blown away #phenology

Midweek last the snow-covered slope behind the house, the one whose crest runs North-South, the one on which the pear tree stands, was marked by several well-defined deer trails leading to and from the pear tree. Then, we had several days and nights of strong Southerly winds. Now, the snow covering the slope looks unviolated, scoured clean, deer trails filled in with wind-blown snow. The heavily-hoof-trampled snow along the wood's edge has also been wind-wiped clean as a new whiteboard, untouched by any dry marker. Even snowmobile tracks along the road have been mostly erased. Since, thanks to our thaw-freeze cycle, much of the snow was crusted over and the recent snowfall was pretty light, it's not clear where the loose snow came from. I don't recall ever seeing anything quite like it.

before the wind, hillside snow with tracks

Photo by J. Harrington

The local squirrels, at least the reds and grays, are now chasing each other (reds on reds and grays on grays more than mixed) and wrestling in irrational exuberance of forthcoming Spring and expanded squirrel populations. The sun has returned North to the point that it's rising at the midpoint of the East-facing window in the office. We are now less than two weeks from the start of meteorological Spring. If the weather forecast is accurate, by this time next weekend we should be in the midst of a major melt. But first, there's tonight's and tomorrow's snow plus freezing drizzle mix to enjoy, with the possibility of more snow at the beginning of the week following next.

after the wind, hillside snow without tracks

Photo by J. Harrington

With luck, and good karma, sometime soon we should start to see the return of goldfinches and the arrival of Spring migrants headed North. Personally, I'm looking forward to enjoying a couple of morning sipping coffee and watching the downspouts flow and, maybe, the gutters overflow. I've enjoyed this season long enough. I'm hoping that the next strong breeze, come March?, will help me fly my dragon kite. There was too much snow cover around here to celebrate the official National Kite-flying Day on February 8.

Agoraphobia

By Linda Pastan

"Yesterday the bird of night did sit,
Even at noon-day, upon the marketplace,
Hooting and shrieking."

—William Shakespeare

1.

Imagine waking

to a scene of snow so new   

not even memories

of other snow

can mar its silken

surface. What other innocence   

is quite like this,

and who can blame me

for refusing

to violate such whiteness

with the booted cruelty

of tracks?

2.

Though I cannot leave this house,   

I have memorized the view

from every window—

23 framed landscapes, containing   

each nuance of weather and light.   

And I know the measure

of every room, not as a prisoner   

pacing a cell

but as the embryo knows

the walls of the womb, free

to swim as its body tells it, to nudge   

the softly fleshed walls,

dreading only the moment

of contraction when it will be forced   

into the gaudy world.

3.

Sometimes I travel as far

as the last stone

of the path, but

every step,

as in the children's story,

pricks that tender place

on the bottom of the foot,

and like an ebbing tide with all

the obsession of the moon behind it,   

I am dragged back.

4.

I have noticed in windy fall

how leaves are torn from the trees,   

each leaf waving goodbye to the oak   

or the poplar that housed it;

how the moon, pinned

to the very center of the window,

is like a moth wanting only to break in.   

What I mean is this house

follows all the laws of lintel and ridgepole,   

obeys the commandments of broom   

and of needle, custom and grace.

It is not fear that holds me here but passion   

and the uncrossable moat of moonlight   

outside the bolted doors.

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Where has all the wildlife gone, long time passing...

Late yesterday, as dusk was turning to dark, my dog, SiSi, let me know she needed to go out. We headed downstairs and to the patio walkout door. I opened it. She dashed out and through the wedged open screen door. (We don't want to let it freeze closed.) As I looked out toward the far slope, the shadow light shone on three, maybe four, whitetail deer.

deer track in the snow

Photo by J. Harrington

The deer, at least the three I could see most clearly, stood frozen in place, six or more eyes on the dog. SiSi either failed to notice the deer or didn't care since they were 50 yards away through snow shoulder-deep on a yellow lab-cross rescue dog. The deer just watched for 10 or 15 seconds. Then the tension got to them and a white tail-flag went up and 12 legs, maybe more, bounded up the slope and into the woods at the crest. SiSi finished her business, sniffed around for moles or voles or shrews under the bird feeder, and hopped through the open screen door and the walkout.

There's no doubt in my mind that if Franco, the Better Half's border collie rescue cross, had been in SiSi's place, he'd still be trying to herd that small herd of deer if he had to follow them all the way to Cloquet. I'm hoping we haven't used up a year's worth of luck on this one episode. We waited 'til we were sure the deer had moved on before we let Franco out to attend to business.

turkey tracks in the snow

Photo by J. Harrington

The deer I saw yesterday were the first seen around here in many, many weeks. There's still been no signs of the local turkey flocks. I'm pretty sure that it's been only deer that have been tearing up the snow and leaves looking for acorns, although there may be some unseen turkey tracks mixed in. We live in patience and hope for a return to prior year's patterns of more frequent sightings of our neighbors. The good news is a pileated woodpecker showed up at the suet feeder yesterday morning. There was no apparent streak of red on its cheek so it was most likely a female, or the observer needs new glasses.

Snowy Night

by Mary Oliver

Last night, an owl
in the blue dark
tossed
an indeterminate number
of carefully shaped sounds into
the world, in which,
a quarter of a mile away, I happened
to be standing.
I couldn’t tell
which one it was –
the barred or the great-horned
ship of the air –
it was that distant. But, anyway,
aren’t there moments
that are better than knowing something,
and sweeter? Snow was falling,
so much like stars
filling the dark trees
that one could easily imagine
its reason for being was nothing more
than prettiness. I suppose
if this were someone else’s story
they would have insisted on knowing
whatever is knowable – would have hurried
over the fields
to name it – the owl, I mean.
But it’s mine, this poem of the night,
and I just stood there, listening and holding out
my hands to the soft glitter
falling through the air. I love this world,
but not for its answers.
And I wish good luck to the owl,
whatever its name –
and I wish great welcome to the snow,
whatever its severe and comfortless
and beautiful meaning.

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Thaws melt snow tracks

The Minnesota Weather Guide marks today as the first day that normal temperatures reach 32℉ as Spring slowly approaches. The weather app on my phone says we should get got there this afternoon. Now, instead of continuing a trend of slowly rising temperatures, we can expect to drop back into the freezer for the next ten days or so. Maybe longer? Sigh. Will the tenacity of Winter make Spring all the sweeter when it arrives. Today's slightly milder temperatures suggest that will be the case.

deer track without the deer

Photo by J. Harrington

While researching muskrats yesterday, an interesting web page full of snow tracks popped up. Since our local snow is softening but remains on the ground, in fact, last night it got added to, today's probably a good time to share it with you. With luck, in a month or so it will be useless until next Winter. The Minnesota DNR has a nice set of tracking sheets that can help children learn about some Minnesota common animal tracks. I'm sure that we once again have a runny rabbit living under the front porch this Winter, not from the tracks (s)he leaves in the snow but the little round brown pellets left on the snow.

turkey tracks without the turkey

Photo by J. Harrington

Deeper snow, like the 12"+ we have in the front yard, makes it hard to identify tracks. Good tracking snow is only an inch or so, or even less, deep. We went back later in the day yesterday, when there was more light, but couldn't find any tracks left by the muskrat. That doesn't mean we didn't see one. Ted Kooser tells us about a similar experience in one of his Winter Morning Walks: one hundred postcards to Jim Harrison.

january 26

Overcast, cold and still.

A hundred yards ahead,
a coyote crosses the road at a lope,
stops on a rise, looks back,
runs on. It is less like
the shape of an animal running
than the shadow of something flying.
When I get to the place where I saw it,
no tracks in the snow.

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Solstice blues?

As we approach the longest night of the year in the Northern hemisphere, we have been encountering unusual, if not downright aberrant, behavior by emissaries of our local wildlife. It began, or at least we first noticed it, several days ago. We had filled the front sunflower seed feeder the day before and the next day it was almost empty. Usually, the front feeder is good for five to seven days feedings between fillings. Wondering if the birds knew of an impending storm we hadn't heard about, we refilled the large tube feeder.

feeder pole on the ground after whitetail attack last Spring

Photo by J. Harrington

Last night the Daughter Person and Son-In-Law stopped by. The Son-In-Law mentioned that, as they pulled in, they had scared a large whitetail deer away from the front feeder. We had a problem last Spring when one of the local herd bent the feeder pole and knocked the feeder to the ground. That time there had been tracks on soft, wet ground. This time the frozen ground, despite snow cover, displayed no evidence except a large distribution of sunflower seeds on the ground.

We've become accustomed to bringing the feeders in at night in Springtime, as the bears come our of hibernation looking for snacks. Bringing feeders in at night during the Winter because of whitetails adds a whole layer of irritation that may require serious reconsideration or reconfiguration of maintaining front feeders in addition to those on the back deck.

Speaking of the back, on our little patch of sandplain, we have not one but two separate eruptions of pocket gopher mounds that we've noticed in the last couple of days. Remember that we mentioned the frozen, snow-covered ground not showing deer tracks. If the ground is frozen, how is it that the pocket gopher are doing all their digging and mound making? We suspect if we tried to dig into one of their tunnels with a shovel, so we could set gopher traps, we'd find the ground is too frozen for human digging, absent a backhoe, which defeats the whole purpose.

last Winter's Solstice "bonfire"

Photo by J. Harrington

Is this all part of a new normal in the Anthropocene? Is this part of nature's revenge? In the quarter century or so that we've lived here, never before have we noticed new gopher mounds in the Winter, nor, with the exception of last Spring, have creatures other than bears and squirrels attacked our bird feeders. If anyone thinks they have a good idea of what's going on, please feel free to use the comment box. This is making us a little twitchy.

On the other hand, the sun is shining, we've passed through another spell of single-digit mornings to milder temperatures, a number of raptors appear to have arrived from Northern outposts and the Better Half is baking Christmas cookies. Before we get too unhinged we'll enjoy a spell of the good things in life.

Between Autumn Equinox and Winter Solstice, Today

By Emily Jungmin Yoon

I read a Korean poem

with the line “Today you are the youngest

you will ever be.” Today I am the oldest

I have been. Today we drink

buckwheat tea. Today I have heat

in my apartment. Today I think

about the word chada in Korean.

It means cold. It means to be filled with. 

It means to kick. To wear. Today we’re worn.

Today you wear the cold. Your chilled skin.

My heart knocks on my skin. Someone said

winter has broken his windows. The heat inside

and the cold outside sent lightning across glass.

Today my heart wears you like curtains. Today

it fills with you. The window in my room

is full of leaves ready to fall. Chada, you say. It’s tea. 

We drink. It is cold outside.

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Oh deer! Oh my! We can't bear it!

Early this morning, when we looked out the study window, the bird feeder pole was flattened to the ground and both the hummingbird feeder and the sunflower feeder had been trashed. We presumed that the neighborhood black bear had visited. S/he’s often stopped by in Springtime, before the natural foodstuffs have become abundant. On past visits, however, the glass hummingbird feeder has remained unbroken.

looked like a bear visited the bird feeder

Photo by J. Harrington

After we’d had a cup of coffee, we put on some shoes and went to clean up the mess. As we came closer, we noticed a number of what appeared to be mole or vole exit holes. They often feed on the feeder’s droppings. While picking up some broken glass, we got a closer look at the “holes.” They were the deep-set hoof prints of a whitetail deer!? A more mindful scan of the ground made soft by burrowers revealed several of our own footprints, more deer hoof prints, but no bear paw prints!

but these are not the paw prints of a bear, they're whitetail deer hoof prints

Photo by J. Harrington

We can easily understand one or more deer helping themselves to the sunflower seeds that covered the ground. We find it much more difficult to picture a deer knocking down the feeder pole and tromping on the sunflower feeder. On the other hand, we found no bear paw prints and can’t quite pictured a bear breaking the glass nectar feeder with his (her) paw nor biting the glass and breaking it. It's not hard to picture a whitetail hoof striking the glass feeder hard enough to shatter glass. We've been sitting in the woods several times when whitetail does stomped and snorted at us, trying to startle us so they could more readily figure out what we were.

There used to be a tv comedy named “Welcome Back Kotter,” with a teenage jd type named Vinnie Barbarino (John Travolta) who had an infamous line “I am so confused!” Vinnie usually ran his hands through his abundant hair while dramatically exclaiming his confused state. Our hair is no longer what it once was, but we join Vinnie’s perplexity in our assessment of what happened last night at our front bird feeders.

The Poet Contemplates the Nature of Reality

By Jill Bialosky

On the side of the road a deer, frozen, frigid.

Go back to your life, the voice said.

What is my life? she wondered. For months she lost

herself in work—Freud said work is as important

as love to the soul—and at night she sat with a boy,

forcing him to practice his violin, helping him recite his notes.

Then the ice thawed and the deer came to life.

She saw her jump over the fence, she saw her in the twilight,

how free she looked. She saw her eyes shiny as marbles,

as much a part of this world as the fence a worker

pounds into the earth. At night she still sat with the boy.

He’s learning “Au Claire de la Lune.”

Do you know it? He has established a relationship

with his violin. He knows that it takes practice to master it:

the accuracy of each note, to wrestle his feelings to the listener.

But he’s impatient. Sometimes what he hears and feels

are not always the same. Again, the poet says.

She knows if he tries to silence his fervor, he might not ever know

who he is. The poet contemplates whether a deer can dream.

Rich blood-red berries on a branch, pachysandra in the garden.

A soft warm bed in the leaves.

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Owls enliven the lulls of January #phenology

A fresh coating of snow brightens the woodlot and sharpens the shadows. Yesterday's storm left us with the lower end of the 3 - 6 inches forecast, but that seems to have been enough to void our mail delivery, unless there actually was no mail for any of the four adults at this address?

Fresh deer tracks crossed the fields today. Where did they come from? Where are they going? Why? Have you ever followed a deer's tracks just out of curiosity?

No new visitors at the feeders to report.  If Summer has its dog days, we think these may be Winter's equivalent. We presume it's only been goldfinches who have consumed about half a tube of niger thistle seeds.Early signs of cabin fever are starting to appear, not because we've been trapped, but due almost entirely to seasonal inertia. We'll try not to judge ourselves too harshly on that front since this is a season of introspection and quietude. Not much is happening in the North Woods.

barred owl in our wood lot

Photo by J. Harrington

We suspect that, somewhere in our nearby woods, a couple of bear cubs are, or will soon be, recent arrivals. We know there's barred owl living somewhere in the neighborhood. The fact that there seem to be several pileated woodpeckers also living around us bodes well for barred owl nesting sites. It's time, or past, for our local owls to begin establishing a territory and start mating behavior. Perhaps some warmer evening soon we'll take a moment or two to stand quietly and listen for any owl calls. At least we won't have to swat mosquitos at this time of year.

                     A Barred Owl

By Richard Wilbur

The warping night air having brought the boom

Of an owl’s voice into her darkened room,

We tell the wakened child that all she heard

Was an odd question from a forest bird,

Asking of us, if rightly listened to,

“Who cooks for you?” and then “Who cooks for you?”

Words, which can make our terrors bravely clear,

Can also thus domesticate a fear,

And send a small child back to sleep at night

Not listening for the sound of stealthy flight

Or dreaming of some small thing in a claw

Borne up to some dark branch and eaten raw.

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Winter #phenology, tracks in the snow

The snow-covered fields may look barren, empty. We know there's activity and life beneath the surface, and, at night, across the surface. Although the snow seems to make the sand plain look less inhabited than in warmer weather, it's much easier to find and follow tracks in the snow than across the grasses.

many tracks of ? across the snow-covered, frozen pond

Photo by J. Harrington

When we walked the dogs today, we saw tracks of:

• squirrels
• rabbits
• whitetails
• dogs, and, of course,
• humans

bird tracks on a snow-dusted deck

Photo by J. Harrington

Often, after a light dusting of powdery snow that covers the deck, we'll be delighted with a view of an abundance of bird tracks, usually juncos. If the snow is an inch or even half an inch deep, the tracks cave in on themselves.

If you're still stumped about what to get for someone on your list that enjoys the outdoors, even in Winter, consider a tracking manual.

With Passing Wonder I Notice the Tracks of an Animal

David Biespiel

It comes out of the language of nothing I recognize
Though it is something in you, at least as I keep
                                                     looking at you
And you turn back to me. I ought to have guessed
From the simple order of the tracks that you knew
Without looking what place in the wild night
The animal came from,
                     and through which of our windows
It has looked into, sometimes with an eye
On our waking, other times on our sleeping
                                          with the doorways open
Where, I suppose, the spirits of the defeated
Appear, white as lakes, carrying maps to someplace
Ahead of us, running now, and now you running,
And the animals guiding your footsteps,
Like a flake of snow,
You, without a single acquaintance among the spirits,
Or understanding, you so solitary in your running.
                                             And then the return—
And I assume you have nothing to say
And that if I wait there’ll be only the waiting
Then nothing but a moment of darkness
And a surprising order stirring in the head
Shaking off the early morning cold.
Then all at once a door closing,
                     an hour of answerless letting go
Like a last hammer of blue sky
Cracking the light.

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MAGA -- improve railroad travel!

We've spent four of the past six days on Amtrak's Empire Builder and Lake Shore Limited, traveling from St. Paul to Boston and back after a couple of days and a surprise birthday party in Boston for a younger sister. If we were the type to believe in such things, and we're working on that, we could readily believe that the picture below, taken at St. Croix Chocolate almost exactly one year ago, foretold our recent train travel.

did this foretell, by a year, an upcoming trip?

Photo by J. Harrington

We have vague recollections of other train trips, way back in the late 1940s or early 1950s, We think, but can't confirm, that train is how we traveled from Boston to Atlanta for a couple of years when our father was teaching at Georgia Tech. After our recent trip, and comparing it with plane travel, we'd really like to see Amtrak add some amenities and better market them. More comfortable seats and sleepers, more room in the compartments, some improvements in the menus, although the food was good, and some approached better, the offerings were uneven.

Polar Express at Union Station, Chicago

Photo by J. Harrington

Another noteworthy deficiency we found was the overall lack of decent wifi-internet access. It was entirely missing from St. Paul to Chicago on the Empire Builder and available from Chicago to to around Erie PA and then disappeared again. Also, lake effect snow managed to freeze closed the doors and stairs of several "first class" cars, so we had to detour through a couple of cars to de-train. That's not a fatal flaw, but lake effect snow can't be a surprise and obviously hasn't yet been included as a design basis for passenger rail cars.

Christmas Tree in Union Station

Photo by J. Harrington

Enough of the kvetching. Union Station's Christmas decorations were superb. South Station, in Boston, triggered an ear worm of Jimmy Buffet's old song, as delivered by Willie Nelson. (see below)

We enjoyed the trip, especially the company we traveled with, returned slightly worn but not much tattered and are now trying to finish Christmas preparations and a few projects we left behind while we were gone. It was fun to go traveling and nice to get back home again.

Railroad Lady

by Jimmy Buffett and Jerry Jeff Walker 

She’s a railroad lady
Just a little bit shady
Spending her days on the train
She’s a semi-good-looker
The fast rails they took ‘er
Now she’s tryin’, just tryin’ to get home again

South Station in Boston to the freight yards of Austin
From the Florida sunshine to the New Orleans rain
Now that the rail packs
Has taken the best tracks
She’s tryin’, just tryin’ to get home again

She’s a railroad lady
Just a little bit shady
Spending her life on the trains
Once a Pullman car traveler
Now the brakeman won’t have ‘er
She’s tryin’, just tryin’ to get home again

Once a high balling loner he thought he could own ‘er
He bought her a fur and a big diamond ring
She hopped on for cold cash
Left town on the Wabash
Never thinking, Never thinking of home way back then

But the rails are now rusty
The dining car’s dusty
The gold plated watches have taken their toll
The railroads are dying
And the lady she’s crying
Now she’ tryin’, just tryin’ to get home again

She’s a railroad lady
Just a little bit shady
Spending her life on the train
She’s a semi-good looker
But the fast rails the took ‘er
Now she’ tryin’, just tryin’ to get home again

On a bus to Kentucky and home once again 

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WInter's return #phenology

chickadee blown from feeder

Photo by J. Harrington

The seeds on the ground are covered with a crusted layer of snow. Chickadees frantically grab a sunflower seed or a smidgeon of suet from the feeders and dash back to a sheltered spot out of the cold, harsh wind. A pileated woodpecker pounds on the now frozen suet with success at flaking off edible chips. Winter has returned to the North Country.

(young?) pileated woodpecker feeding on suet

Photo by J. Harrington

We tried playing (again) with manual focus on our camera's telephoto lens. Autofocus gets all confused when we shoot through glass windows. We think we're starting to get the hang of it but we need to remember to hold the camera and lens from underneath, not from the side. These birds look cold because it is cold. The windchill is in low single digits, although the sun is shining. Roads over much of the state are a mess, ditches full of skidded vehicles.

icicles on birdbath's rim

Photo by J. Harrington

Last night's wind blew water over the edge of the heated bird bath, creating icicles which don't seem to belong on a heated birdbath. The snow-encrusted back yard remains essentially trackless. We suspect the four-legged critters that live around here are going to stay bedded down until the wind calms. We haven't seen any turkeys in long enough that we can't begin to guess where they are. The snow certainly isn't deep yet so they can get around without much trouble. Maybe they're taking a page from Robert Lewis Stevenson's book and spending Winter in a warmer nook. We certainly share the poet's sentiments.

Picture-books in Winter

Robert Louis Stevenson, 1850 - 1894

Summer fading, winter comes—   
Frosty mornings, tingling thumbs   
Window robins, winter rooks,   
And the picture story-books.   
   
Water now is turned to stone
Nurse and I can walk upon;   
Still we find the flowing brooks   
In the picture story-books.   
   
All the pretty things put by,   
Wait upon the children’s eye,
Sheep and shepherds, trees and crooks,   
In the picture story-books.   
   
We may see how all things are,   
Seas and cities, near and far,   
And the flying fairies’ looks,
In the pictyure story-books.   
   
How am I to sing your praise,   
Happy chimney-corner days,   
Sitting safe in nursery nooks,   
Reading picture story-books?

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Please be kind to each other while you can.

On the Nature of Winnie the Pooh Day!

The fact that today is Winnie-the-Pooh Day may have something to do with the fact that it's also A.A. Milne's birthday. I have a confession to make. I didn't become a fan of Winnie until long after I left childhood. Perhaps that's what makes him and his friends so extra special to me? It could have absolutely nothing to do with the unfounded accusations from those who "no" me that I've a large Eeyore-like streak running through my personality. Someone close to me even had the audacity to give me an Eeyore plush doll which lives on one of my desks. There's also a small, framed print of Pooh and Piglet walking through the Hundred Acre Wood and an unframed, large map of that same wood.

my alter ego? not at all

Photo by J. Harrington

• My favorite sweatshirt is emblazoned with the poster for the October 8 Joan Baez / Grateful Dead Peace Concert. A framed reproduction of that self-same poster is on the wall of our "scriptorium."


• We once had a yellow labrador pup named "Winnie" by the Daughter Person.

Our library currently includes:

• The Tao of Pooh and


• The Te of Piglet, plus


• Winnie the Pooh on Management
  (in my opinion, one of the best management books going), plus


• The Natural World of Winnie-the-Pooh,
a walk through the forest that inspired the Hundred Acre Wood

Childhood reading memories don't include Pooh, although I vaguely recall reading, and/or having read to me, Paddle-to-the Sea, which was originally published a few years before I was born. Looking at the Caldecott medal nominees doesn't yield any other titles that ring a bell, although The Wind in the Willows haunts my memory.

can you pick out the Woozle tracks?

Photo by J. Harrington

All of this thinking and writing about the adventures and life of Pooh made me go out and double check the tracks in the back yard, the ones coming out of our part of our own hundred acre wood. Some are deer, as we noted a few days ago, but on careful, close-up inspection, I believe some are Woozle tracks. I couldn't make out if any of the others belonged to a very important bear or a very small piglet, but, if we get fresh snow, I'll check again.

Us Two

By A.A. Milne

Wherever I am, there's always Pooh,
There's always Pooh and Me.
Whatever I do, he wants to do,
"Where are you going today?" says Pooh:
"Well, that's very odd 'cos I was too.
Let's go together," says Pooh, says he.
"Let's go together," says Pooh.

"What's twice eleven?" I said to Pooh.
("Twice what?" said Pooh to Me.)
"I think it ought to be twenty-two."
"Just what I think myself," said Pooh.
"It wasn't an easy sum to do,
But that's what it is," said Pooh, said he.
"That's what it is," said Pooh.

"Let's look for dragons," I said to Pooh.
"Yes, let's," said Pooh to Me.
We crossed the river and found a few-
"Yes, those are dragons all right," said Pooh.
"As soon as I saw their beaks I knew.
That's what they are," said Pooh, said he.
"That's what they are," said Pooh.

"Let's frighten the dragons," I said to Pooh.
"That's right," said Pooh to Me.
"I'm not afraid," I said to Pooh,
And I held his paw and I shouted "Shoo!
Silly old dragons!"- and off they flew.

"I wasn't afraid," said Pooh, said he,
"I'm never afraid with you."

So wherever I am, there's always Pooh,
There's always Pooh and Me.
"What would I do?" I said to Pooh,
"If it wasn't for you," and Pooh said: "True,
It isn't much fun for One, but Two,
Can stick together, says Pooh, says he. "That's how it is," says Pooh.

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The neighbors in Winter

Have you every thought about how dreary our Minnesota Winters would be if it weren't for local birds? Our backyard looks out on a mix of fields and forests, or at least woodlots, and wetlands. Snow cover offers many more and better opportunities to get a look at animal tracks than the dust and sand of  our other seasons. But, as much as I enjoy looking at tracks and figuring out, when I can, what made them, they offer precious little in the way of action or color.

grasses(?), herbs(?), forbs(?) and tracks

Photo by J. Harrington

Minnesota's Winter-resident avifauna provide plenty of each, especially if bird feeders are kept full. During the Winter, our feeders regularly attract chickadees, goldfinches, nuthatches -- both white- and red-breasted, purple finches, plus an occasional cardinal and transient junco or several.

red-breasted nuthatch on suet

Photo by J. Harrington

Then there's the larger birds like eagles, hawks, turkeys, and crows that offer a surprisingly large number of incidental sightings, as do the ubiquitous bluejays. With a reasonable collection of field guides, I can as readily identify most of the usual feathered suspects in Winter as I can in Summer. Not so the grasses, sedges and/or forbs that rise through the snow. The Winter identification guides I've been able to find so far focus on the Northeast. Since I came from that part of the country I'm reasonably sure that we in the Midwest have as many plants visible most Winters as they do back East. Fortunately, one guide does include the Midwest so that can complement the other guides I'm planning on adding to the library. I'm still working on getting to recognize many of the botanical neighbors in the Winter when they're not bundled in flowers, fruits and leaves.  The human neighbors around here are often harder to recognize. We haven't even met some of them yet, although they've lived here for years. We recognize vehicles and give the raised finger wave on the road. All of us tend to keep pretty much to ourselves, but then no one's put out a feeder for us. Can country folk do block parties where there are no blocks?

Fortune [The neighbors will soon spread their confounding potluck before you.]

By Dobby Gibson 

The neighbors will soon spread their confounding potluck before you.

Dressed in period garb, they wear sandals with socks.

They subscribe to Life magazine to experience

the present as if it were already the past.

Their flowering trees were engineered to never drop fruit.

Overhead, constellations of stickers glow from bedroom

ceilings as souvenirs from a time when life was lived outdoors.

All conversations end in silence. The trick is to make it purposeful.

It’s not going to get any easier, for these are the CliffsNotes.

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The scents of seasons

© harrington

Old tracks and daily dustings of snow create snow dimples. The tracks lose all definition and become simple depressions in fresh snow cover. Unless, that is, you're a dog or have a sense of smell that works as well as a dog's. Taking Franco the Rescue Dog (we needn't go into who rescued whom) for his afternoon walk, I noticed he was determined to explore what used to be there -- in those tracks -- and left behind those wonderful smells. I wonder -- if I could sniff the way he does if it would be useful, enjoyable, or just sensory overload? When there are fresh deer tracks, he is ever so eager to follow them. Other times he uses the same pattern I was taught to follow if I lost a blood trail, mark the sport where you're starting and make wider circles until you cut it again. I remember reading, over the years, that some scenting conditions are better than others, as I recall, warm and damp were better than most others. Winter's cold and, sometimes, damp, so I suppose that benefits Franco explorations ("But it's a dry cold" he says).  Would that I had his enthusiasm for most things in my life. Having a pet like Franco makes me aware of how much pleasure I can miss just because I'm not in the mood. That, in turn, reminds me to work on my Zen acceptance of what is and enjoyment of the pleasures that are mine if I'm just open to them. I don't recall ever seeing anything about Buddha's reincarnating in rescue dogs, but neither have I read everything there may be on this subject. Stop by again some time soon and see what other wonderful aromas are arising in My Minnesota. (Hint, imagine Spring coming soon full of fresh, damp earth smells. What about the aroma of mucking out and spreading the manure from the barn across the road? Can you tell if its a cattle or a horse barn?)