A quick little hike about two hours long…

It’s late February, and after a long winter with mere moderate amounts of snow, we’ve had a good series of heavier accumulation.  With six or so more inches fallen on Saturday night, and a 40F forecast for Monday, I saw Sunday as the opportunity to get out in the woods before it all started melting…

Back into the woods, down a familiar ravine and back up the facing hill, I made very slow progress… with over two feet of very fluffy snow, my snowshoes seemed to do nothing. The path I was cutting sank a good foot below the surface. Yet, I’m sure without the snowshoes, I would have found it even considerably harder (but softer?) to trudge.

I checked my owl house. Still no residents, judging from the snow accumulated at the entrance and on the perch. Yet there seemed to be no residents in the woods as a whole. Where normally I might see a network of animal trails on the fresh snow- deer, squirrel, rabbit, fox, and the like- I saw no tracks at all. With all the deep fluffy snow, I imagine it was too much effort for the animals to travel, and so they were all hunkered down. No doubt that evening they would take advantage of my freshly carved trail making for easier passage.

I went deeper into my familiar woods into one of the black spruce bogs. There’s no tranquility like a sleeping spruce bog in the winter.

At one point, I heard the Phoebe-like call of the Chickadee. Later a raven flew over. Finally I crossed some deer tracks on high ground that looked to be from that morning. There was life awake in the forest after all.

I circled back out of the bog and found my way back to crossing my trail in. The hike out was a breeze comparatively, as I could enjoyed the freshly cut trail I had earlier stomped out. I’d like to return in a day or two and see what tracks took advantage of the new thoroughfare.