Field Journal Blog 4

It was Monday, October 19^th, 2009 around 9:30 a.m. It was sunny, but cold about 1^O C. In the past week it was cold with a large amount of precipitation, followed by a dry but frigid (mountain day and) weekend. I had my first observed snow in the purple Valley on Friday at 6:30 a.m. We had no accumulation of snow. There was a moderate amount of wind that would blow intermittently.

There was frost on the flower boxes on the bridge leading into the cemetery. It was relatively thick. I left my finger on the frost for a few seconds and did not fully thaw the wood I had touched. There was also some frost on the roofs of several of the buildings in the cemetery and in select patches of grass that were particularly well shaded. By the time that I had left, there was no longer any visible frost in the cemetery area.

I heard a chattering noise, which was not a bird, as I had originally thought, but a small red squirrel. I also saw a blue jay fly across the cemetery, along with some black capped chickadees. This is drastically less animal life than what I had seen a week before at the same time. In part, this is probably due to some staff mowing the cemetery lawn with a large sit-on mower towards the end of my visit, which was very loud and could have scared off animals. However, this does not explain the difference, as there were few animals before any mowing. The weather could be at fault, but it does seem early for most of these species to leave the area. Perhaps the cold temperature this morning deterred too much animal activity.

The weather has had a noticeable effect upon the plants in the area as well. The butternut, formerly misidentified as black walnut, had lost all of its leaves and nuts. The leaves were still green and often still attached to a branch while lying on the ground below the tree. The leaves were wet and soggy, unlike the crisp maple leaves that blanket the ground within the woods. The Norway Maple is still green, and still has most of its seeds attached to its branches. The seeds are brown and have a dry, brittle and ribbed texture along the wing, and a smooth texture along the seed, itself. The pokeweed’s leaves were dead, but still attached to the plant. They lazily dangled, soggy, and wet. They were still green, but darker than the living leaves. The berries were all gone. Elsewhere in the cemetery, there were large pokeweed plants that still had living leaves and even some unripe green berries. The dramatic difference in timing seems strange, given the close proximity.

The sumac, which had fuzzy branches and fuzzier red fruits, still had a few leaves. Unlike the other plants, the leaves that were still on the tree were furthest out along the branches, near the fruits. This happens because the leaves closer to the center are shaded from the outer lying leaves. Since the shade provides warmth, rather than cold, the lower leaves change color later. This temperature does not explain the phenomenon, I suspect that this might have to do with attracting birds to the fruits or the amount of sunlight reaching the leaves, as both could explain why the leaves at the ends of the branches would turn last.

The honeysuckle that dominates large portions of the woods, still had green leaves that had a rough texture, and shriveled red or orange fruits. Buckthorn also had green leaves, but still had lots of black berries that looked very ripe. Grape had lost its leaves, but had some shriveled small grapes. The white snake root had seeds where its flowers used to exist, which had soft and scratchy white flowers.

The winged euonymus’ leaves were still green, which seemed strange because I have seen these plants with bright red leaves in town, along in the area outside of pine cobble. Due to the warmer climate at pine cobble, I would expect that the plants there would change later than those on campus.

Stephen Maier

17 October 2009

This morning, Saturday, October 17, 2009, I visited the West Clark Woods with a friend. I wanted to share the beauty I have been hoarding to myself within these grounds with someone else; therefore, I asked my roommate if he wanted to join me in nature. He accepted my invitation and we entered at 11:15 a.m. on this clear, 40°F morning.

Our focus this morning was on touch and textures in nature and we wasted no time feeling everything in sight. We picked up sticks, rocks, downed trees, leaves, and anything else in sight. The sticks were dry and lifeless, which was expected, considering they were broken branches on the ground. The rocks were as cold as ice. I picked one up and juggled it in my hands before I had to drop it due to its frigidity. The tree trunks on the ground were saturated with water leading me to believe that some form of heavy moisture soaked this wood. What could be responsible since it hadn’t rained in two days? Perhaps the rain was so forceful all week that the wood was drenched and did not have sufficient time to dry out. Or maybe the dew, which is now turning to frost, seeped into the wood and never evaporated. Complicating my suppositions is the canopy situation. The canopy overhead has thinned with time allowing more sunlight to reach the wood and dry it out, leading me to believe the dampness must be from recent moisture, not the rain showers. However, the lack of canopy also facilitates the penetration of precipitation into the forest, which coaxes me into thinking that the rain may have reached the wood without resistance, therefore saturating it with water that cannot be released over two days. I can’t be sure of really happened.

As soon as we stepped foot in the woods, we noticed the carpet of leaves on the forest floor. If I hadn’t been here before, I would not have been able to tell you what the ground looked like. The birch trees were almost completely leafless. Approximately 75% of all the deciduous trees’ leaves had been shed and created a colorful layer on top of the ground. I picked up a fallen leaf and then extracted a living leaf from a nearby tree of the same species to compare the two. Though the leaves maintain the same shape, their differences are noticeable. The fallen leaf is brownish-orange. It is paper-like in texture and has no friction when I run my fingers along it. On the contrary, the living leaf is green and has prominent veins that can be easily felt. It also has a moist, oil-like texture. Though the two leaves look the same, excluding color, they are very different when inspected with touch.

Our analysis of texture reached its climax when my roommate discovered a shedding paper birch tree. Together we scrutinized the finding. The tree was twenty-five feet tall and had the white, paper-like bark, characteristic of paper birches, on its upper half. Its lower half was intriguing. There was a distinct line where the bark ended and it became a layer of wood that surrounded the trunk. Half of this layer was a dark brown color and the other half was divided between a fiery red color and a saffron color. At the bottom of the tree, the trunk was exposed which helped us determine that the middle layer was neither bark nor tree trunk. Upon this finding, my roommate detached the middle layer from the trunk. He removed it in one piece in shell-like form. We were both in awe. We felt as if we were disassembling a tree, deforming nature. It was a fascinating feeling.

But avoiding our sentiment, the red portion of this layer was soaked while the saffron part was dry. I was curious of two things at this point. Why is some of this layer wet and some of it dry? And why is it divided into several different colors? I had, and still have, no credible speculation for either question. Perhaps the middle layer was only attached to the tree at the dark brown end and the tree was still providing moisture to it, but the water did not travel throughout the entire layer of wood and left half of it dry. But that doesn’t consider an explanation for the color. I am eager to consult someone of higher knowledge to understand what is occurring on this birch.

Update            By: Claudia Corona            10/20/09

Naked. If I had to describe the forestry surrounding Ford Glen Brook today, naked is the word I would use to describe it. It’s been a week since I last came to observe my site, and already I feel as if I’ve missed out on big changes. It feels as if everything has gone away.

I’m not walking into the trail, I am tramping all over it. The ground floor is covered in about 2 inches of leaf litter and as I go down the path, my boots can’t help but make noise, “Crunch, crunch”. It’s incredible noisy for such a calm environment, so I stop. I crouch down and pick up a leaf on the ground. It feels rough, brittle and dry. I look ahead, farther into the Ford Glen Brook trail, and notice that the leaves no longer form a carpet of red and gold, but of pale brown cover, which, according to my boots, are cantankerous.

I kick off the leaves in one spot of the trail, and dig with my fingers into the dirt. I rummage and rummage until I feel I’ve gotten about 3 inches deep, and then take that chunk of soil out. The soil is a very dark brown, almost black in color. It’s definitely moist, but not damp enough to stain my fingers with mud or grime. I never noticed before that soil contained more than dirt. This soil had small twigs, leaves, and rocks the size of very small pebbles. It was bumpy and soft, and smelled of pine sap. Briefly, I wondered what the soil by the brook might feel like, and I decided to go and find out.

On my way to the brook, I look around and notice lots of Christmas ferns and Lady ferns, more than usual. But then I also notice that most of the other plants that were around last week, like the Jack in the pulpit and Dame’s rocket, are not there. The death of many plants that can’t handle the 30 degree weather amplifies the presence of all the plants that are still alive, and can trick one into believing that those still alive are reproducing quickly, when really, they are just the only plants still alive. I can easily discern many of the red maples have begun to turn, or turned fully, The Japanese Barberry on the Ford Glen Brook trail is no longer its dark green color, but now an orange-yellowish color and it still has its red, oval-shaped berries.

As I was jumping over fallen logs and rotten trees, I saw something I had never seen before, a pine cone! But it wasn’t an ordinary sight, all of the pine cones I saw had blotches of what looked like white paint on them. I really couldn’t believe that there were so many pine cones here, so I picked one up. It was about 6 inches high, an inch in diameter,  with all that “paint”. I touched the white “paint” and it was very sticky and smelled strongly of something minty. I finally recognized it as pine sap oozing from the pine cone when I broke the pine cone in half, but I don’t know what tree the pine cones were falling from.

I finally made it down to the brook and dug deep into a steep slope that had some soil exposed. The soil a few feet from the brook was significantly smoother and wetter. It was muddy, and when I rubbed the soil in my hand, it stained my fingers. There were very few twigs in the soil, and almost no rocks. It was much softer and squishier, vaguely reminding me of clay. But this wasn’t surprising, being so close to the brook meant the soil here is more exposed to the water, and whenever the brook gets lots of rain, it probably gets high enough to drown the soil in water, which would explain its constant muddy-like state.

Streaks of light penetrated the top of the trees while I was walking back on the trail. I’d never seen sunlight penetrate the tree tops in my site before. That’s when I looked up and realized that there WERE no tree tops! All of the leaves that had once soaked up the sunlight had fallen onto the path and enabled the sun to brighten up the forest. Everything looked so bare, and yet so full; of leaves, sunlight, and in a few weeks, of snow.

At 9:37 pm I hopped in my car and made the drive out to Wall’s Pond for a nighttime visit. It was cold, about 30 degrees, and utterly windless. The sky was clear; I knew there was a sliver of moon up there somewhere but could never find it. The stars were magnificent.
I got out of my car and approached the pond slowly. There was some sodium glare from the parking lot streetlights to guide the way and lights still burned in the conservation building. Fort Hoosac, the huge brick house where the first-year art history graduate students live, was ablaze with electric light and it cast long shadows from the eastern side. I switched on my headlamp as I walked through the gates, heading at once under the big sugar maple to investigate the tilting white pine I had noticed on my last visit.
It was hard to tell in the dark, but there appeared to be no change. I poked around the southern edge of the pond, careful not to tread too close to the edge which I have learned is not always a clear boundary between turf and water. The stillness was crushing. The only sounds around the pond were my own footfalls and I quickly leapt out of the thicket at the southern end to take a turn around the outside of the pond.
I walked back to the entrance and turned north, walking up the western side of the pond and switching my headlamp into wide-angle mode. I had gotten about halfway up that western edge, when I heard a rustling in the strip of ash and beech behind the western cow fence. I whipped my head in the direction of the disturbance and pulled out my backup flashlight, flooding the tree line with sharp white light. Nothing. I waded into the bushes a bit, but still saw nothing. I switched off both my lights and stood for a moment, softening my auditory focus and tuning in for any sound at all. Nothing. Not a cricket to be heard, not a rustling of leaf or shrub. A faint mechanical hum from the conservation building. But from nature herself, nothing. The sense of intense stillness and solitude hit me again, though where it had unnerved me first, under the maple, now became a comfort. There was a certain measure of safety in the tranquility now and I continued my rounds.
As I rounded the northwest corner I swung my light out, scanning the pond’s whole surface from the highest elevation I could get. The lily pads were sitting on the surface, I saw no blossoms at all, and the water itself was absolutely placid. Again I strained for any sound at all. Something dropped from the top boughs of a white pine at the south end of the pond. No other noise at all. Just then, the college bells pealed out 10 o’clock. The man-made sound roused me and I continued my walk.
My light fell on the grasses at the edge of the water. In the still, thick air they were completely immobile, every single leaf was frozen in place. The harshness of my headlamp’s light cast a strange, clinical feeling over the motionless shrubs, heightening their stillness. It was as though the pond itself was an elaborate sculpture, a glass masterpiece, part of the museum, a work of art in which all the choices had been made and were now frozen in perpetuity. I probed the darkness around me for some contradiction to the freakish, empty silence. I walked quickly down the eastern edge, I even ventured off into the hemlock grove off the southeastern corner looking for something, anything to report. It was empty.
I walked back around the southern end of the pond to the entrance, moving quickly through the thick, dense air. I paused under the big maple again to listen and jot some notes. I looked up through the branches and noticed (finally!) the leaves nodding ever so slightly in the meager breath of breeze that had just sprung up. I watched them for as long as the puff held out, until they returned to stillness. Soupy, still nights like this are common in a New England fall, as are wild, windy ones. I’ll come back soon for an audio recording to capture the silence, because, in all truth, it’s well worth hearing.

Gordon Smith

Natural History of the Berkshires

10/19/09

Field Journal #4

When I went to my site at about 2:30 pm last week on Thursday, the weather was partially cloudy, and reasonably chilly. While it was not threatening to snow while I was there, there had been a hard frost the previous night and there was a short period of snowfall the next morning. As such there were many changes in my site that I noticed while I investigated parts of my site though touch.

The first change that I noticed before I had even entered my site was that the sensitive ferns were completely gone. In their place were large clumps of brown, dry and brittle stalks that crumbled at a light touch. Interestingly, now that the sensitive ferns are no longer obscuring the view, some bracken ferns were visible in the patch where the sensitive ferns had been. While these brackens are dying, they are not as of yet dead, still retaining some moisture and pale green color.

Another plant that seems to have been a completely destroyed by the frost was the Virginia creeper. The vines on trees are now completely bare, and the leaves of the shoots on the ground are brown and shriveled. The leaves, though they seem dead, are surprisingly not dry and brittle in the way the sensitive ferns were, but still seem reasonably moist.

Among the ground vegetation that was still green, an interesting pattern became visible. The garlic mustard (which I had known would last the winter) and the goutweed both felt waxy to the touch. Additionally, another plant similar to goutweed had many small hairs on the surface of its leaves. I connect these attributes because I recognize them as strategies that low water area plants use to retain moisture. It struck me that they could also help in winter conditions: the waxy coating which in deserts limits transpiration could in winter help insulate and retain the limited amount of liquid water the plant receives. The hairs, which in deserts served the same purpose as the wax, could hold heat in their microenvironment in the same way that human hairs retain heat when stood on end.

Deeper into the grove I began to look at the trees. The Norway spruce trees are still quite healthy looking; their needles were still dark green and supple. Also, on the ground surrounding these trees I did not see any of the short flat needles, which led me to believe that either the Norway spruce does not shed needles (which I doubted), or it shed its needles earlier in the season, in which case the needles are now buried under a thick layer of white pine needles. Interestingly, 10 minutes of Internet research seemed to point to the first option that they do not shed needles under normal circumstances.

The white pine tree still looks quite healthy, and the ground in a large radius of the tree has thousands of brown and brittle needles covering it. These needles have been there for some time: the tree is quite large and therefore shed its needles early on in the season.

The maples in my site and around it are now all easily identifiable by color: all are sugar maples in various stages of leaf loss. One large sugar maple on the east edge of the site has lost nearly all its leaves, and those that remain are very yellow. The leaves on the ground, while dry, are not brittle. The silver maple, on the other hand, did not change color before its leaves shriveled up brown and dropped in large numbers. They, like the fern, crumble at a touch.

Near the end of my visit, a hawk flew in and landed on a tree not 5 feet from me. It had a curved black beak, a mostly white belly with some brown feathers mixed in, and a brown back. It looked at me casually as I slowly approached, and preened itself almost arrogantly as it ignored me. Unfortunately, some people on the path began to shout at each other and it flew off, but not before I had seen its red tail. At this point I assumed that it was a red tailed hawk, which I later confirmed.

Eric Outterson

Professor Hank Art

October 9, 2009

3:00 PM

4:10 PM

55ºF

The Familiar

I arrived at Stetson Woods today knowing exactly how to be prepared.  I quickly greeted a breeze-free mist and my ever faithful stratus companion. I told him, “I almost thought you wouldn’t come this week!”  Seattle’s weather seems to enjoy excursions to Stetson Woods exactly when I do.  Ignoring my anything but fair-weather friend, I stepped down into the damp soil where I encountered another acquaintance, a mosquito.  After making sure that there would be no bad blood between us I moved along, confident that I knew the neighborhood well.

An unfamiliar chipmunk, however, greeted me with a quiet “cheep” and quickly darted under one of the many large schist rocks that sit on the hillside near Thompson Chapel.

Eager to be better acquainted with this shy personality, I lowered a stick into his hiding spot, only to hear “cheep” from an adjacent rock.  He quickly darted out from under this rock and under scurried another.  I searched hard, but had no luck finding him. I followed the central swath of rocks and realized that for every visible surface rock, there were at least three or four concealed beneath thin leaf and soil cover. I could see why the chipmunk could escape from me so well.

With my friend gone, I had choice but to listen to see where he would turn up.  Unfortunately, all I could hear at first were noises caused by people; cars started up and passing pedestrians talked about missing Mountain Day.  Strangely, there wasn’t even a light breeze to ruffle the leaves in the trees.  For the next ten minutes the woods failed to produce sound.

I decided to take the time to dig in the dirt around the site.  I encountered many asymmetric leaves that appear to slippery elm, but I can’t seem to pinpoint the tree.  In combing the bramble for evidence of the tree location, however, I unearthed more signs of human influence.  Mosses and leaves had helped a large block of cement masquerade as another piece of schist.  I wondered if the Stetson woods were ever a drop site for used construction materials.

Suddenly, two successive bird calls interrupted those thoughts.  The first called from high in the canopy (with a quality of sound I thought similar to a crow) that started high and then dropped in pitch “Bee-ooo.”  The other had a similar falling sound made a “tcheeew, tcheeew” sound.  I thought I heard a third, but it was the familiar and (subjectively) cute “cheep” from a chipmunk I’d stepped near.

Aha!  I saw where he was this, time and I wasn’t going to let him get away without getting his picture!  Unfortunately, auto-focus only caught pictures of branches in his front before he disappeared by a tree stump.  Examining where he had disappeared I realized that the six to eight inch schist and decaying root system provided a perfect cover for the small mammal.  Using a small stick, I could reach straight easily two feet into a tunnel system..

Brushing off leaf cover in an 8 foot radius I was able to spot 3 different escape routes the chipmunk could have chosen.  The most prominent emerged beneath the roots of red maple on the southern edge of the site.  The hole initially appeared to be a modest two inches wide, as many leaves and thin roots obscured entrance.  Brushing them aside revealed a burrow 12-14 inches in diameter and at least 2 feet in depth with a few pill bugs, millipedes, and ants.

Suddenly, my ears ring from the four o’clock chapel chimes. I was ready to give up on this chipmunk when suddenly four crossed my path.  Two stopped face to face inches apart with the other two looking on.  As the chapel bells began to play an unfamiliar song, one fell, exposing its large white belly and then began to wiggle upright.  The upright chipmunk leaped onto the recently fallen one and three or four seconds later, they and their two companions scurry off.

As everything quieted down again, I was stunned.  My visit had begun with great predictability and quiet but ended with orchestrated scene.  The seemingly familiar Stetson Woods still has a lot left to show me.

Look Closer…         By: Claudia Corona         10/07/09

I walked on a path of red and gold today. No, not of carpets, but of leaves. Yellow leaves, gold leaves, red leaves, leaves in-between, lay on the Ford Glen Brook path as well as around the trees, no longer scattered but piling up. Where a week ago, I could once see the bedrock beneath my feet and the soil smearing my boots, I now saw leaves.

I wondered why there were so many more leaves on the ground now, and the wind patiently answered my question tickling my ears and moving a few strands of my hair. It was a persistent wind, and the leaves were in no mood to resist staying on their branches after having worked all year, so they gave in and fell, thus coloring a once boring brown ground into a red and gold one, making anyone traversing the path feel humbled to be in the presence of such beautiful natural change.

It was loud, and too quiet, at the same time. The leaves I stepped on lacked the melodious crunching sound of “foot on leaf”. I could hear that Ford Glen Brook however, demanded attention. I walked over to it, and noticed that the brook was definitely much fuller than it was a week ago. It then became clear to me that the volume of the rushing water had made its sound more pronounced and mighty, explaining all its attention-seeking uproar.

But I had a mission today. My task was to see or hear fauna. So I treaded the trail as quietly as I could and when I thought I had gone far enough into the forest, I stopped. I looked to my left for about ten minutes and just as I was about to call it quits, out of the corner of my eye I saw movement. Something yellowish fluttered down from a birch tree. The beat of my heart quickened at the hope of having spotted a bird. It twirled in the air, but it had no wings, no body, no head; it was a leaf, gliding to the ground. I talk about this because it happened several times in the thirty minutes I spent looking for fauna, ten minutes on each side (left, center, right). I would be looking at one place to see if I could spot an Eastern chipmunk like I had my first visit here, or maybe hear a woodpecker like I had my second visit, but nothing! Briefly, I could hear crows cackling in the distance, but they weren’t in my site, so they don’t count, technically.

Continuing my stroll on the red and gold carpet I briefly wondered if it was opposite day. At least, that was my take on the sights before me. Many fallen logs that were once dark brown were now covered in luscious green fungi. The fungi felt soft and rugged, and had a rotten smell to it. But the interesting thing was that blotches of fungi only covered the top half of the log; there were very few patches of fungi on the bottom half, and rarely on on the bottom sides.  I noticed the same thing on fallen logs with the polypore (mushroom without a stalk) mushrooms growing on them, they only grew on the top or on the upper sides, acting as soft white selves, but none occupied the bottom half. The wood that hosted both the fungi and the mushrooms felt damp, just like the leaves felt wet and I discerned another relationship in my site.

Filling up the brook wasn’t the only thing that the recent rain had done! As it fell down on the ground, it not only soaked the leaves and trees; it also signaled a green light for the fungi and mushroom bacteria, which took advantage of the moist state of fallen logs and decaying trees. The fungi and mushrooms sprouted all over the damp logs and then reproduced where it was wet, which would be the top half, because this was the target place of falling rain!

It is amazing how nature works! I thought that nothing was going on today at Ford Glen Brook, but that was only a facade. If you look closer, you can see plenty of activity, from fungi reproduction to red carpet leaf making to water volume rising, it is happening. We just have to look at the small things sometimes to be able to explain the big picture.

Today, I decided to try a different approach to analyzing my site. I started out to Tyler House Woods slightly later than usual, around six in the afternoon. The sky was just beginning to shift to the darker colors of night, but it was still before sunset.

As I began my ascent up Tyler Road, I heard the barking of dogs. They were most likely the same dogs that I had seen chasing the deer a week earlier. Their barking pierced the night’s silence, along with the continuous chirping of crickets.

The parking lot was more crowded than usual, and there was more activity as the residents of Tyler House returned for the night. The lights of Tyler were on and their golden light illuminated the parking lot. From one window came the faint beat of music, and I could hear murmurs of conversations within.

I continued to the edge of Tyler Woods. The sky was getting slightly darker, and the glow of the street lights was slowly becoming visible. I sat down on the curb separating the parking lot and the woods. In my other reports, I was relying too much on my sight, looking at things, identifying them, and then listing them. This time, I wanted to focus on the atmosphere of the site instead of just making lists of plant life.

I closed my eyes, as I did so, the symphony of cricket chirps again filled my ears, and, as if keeping beat, a stead crackling sound interrupted the chirps as leaves fell from the tree tops and slowly floated to the forest floor.

Adding to the music was the wind. I listened as it traveled from one side of the forest to the other, rustling the tops of the trees as it went. It was not just one loud rushing sound, but I could hear the wind approach, coming closer and closer as it moved above the tree tops.  Its strength seemed almost overpowering as it forced the trees to bow at its command, and the leaves too obeyed as they were ripped from the branches and tossed downwards to the forest floor.  I breathed in deeply the cool, night air and for once felt a part of my site, not as an observer, but as a living, breathing part of Tyler Woods.

I opened my eyes and stood up from the curve. With my journal in hand, I walked from the pavement into the forest. As I walked, the sound of the leaves crunching under my feet was almost deafening. There were definitely more freshly fallen leaves covering the ground since last week. With the stillness and quiet of the night, I could hear more than usual. The small animals which usually eluded my eyes could now be heard rustling through the fall leaves. They were most likely small chipmunks and squirrels rummaging through the debris. There were no signs of birds as the sun was going down and all the birds had gone in for the night.

As I made my way through the periwinkle valley, a pair of bright, sparkling eyes shined in the distance. A small, tan colored cat stood on the path. Its muscles were tensed and it stood frozen as it noticed me. I crouched on one knee, trying not to frighten it, and slowly crawled toward the cat. Yet, every step forward I made the cat made one step backward. I decided to give up and stood up to leave, and the cat, now certain that it was free from danger, decided to curl up on the path and sleep.

Going later in the day exposed me to a new side of my sight. I felt connected in a way that I was not before. It was not just about looking at the sight and identifying what was there. That approach, although useful makes one somewhat detached from the sight, but to take time to sit and try to feel a part of the site was something I had not accomplished before. It is now a place I want to go to, not just for class, but to find peace and tranquility.

Stephen Maier

Thursday, 10 October 2009

Today, Thursday, October 10^th, is the first dry day of the week. There is no rain and no moisture on the ground. It is a perfect day to venture into the woods, as the sun is out with few clouds blocking, the temperature is around 60°F, and I finally have some downtime. I approach the West Clark Woods with a mission: I want to focus on the animals and small life in the vicinity. I have had great luck over the past four weeks in these woods locating fauna and forest life and I hope today will be no different. This feeling of fortune travels throughout my body as I approach the entrance. It’s going to be a good day! I gaze ahead towards the summit of Stone Hill and I see horses and cows grazing in the land while humans walk through. Animal life should be booming today. Seeing these animals on the hill seems to confirm that the animals appreciate the weather too.

I enter the site at 1:45 p.m. and immediately seek out the large tracks I had spotted on my visit last week. I trust they will provide insight about these woods. As I traverse the woods descending the hill to the northwest, I get my first glimpse of small life. A tiny, half-inch spider with all eight legs in tact crawls across the blank page of my journal. I wish I had seen from where he had come, but just seeing him is satisfying enough. As he inspects the white paper, I wonder, Why is it that little insects like to use my things as landing pads? First a dragonfly landed on my computer. Subsequently a fly took advantage of the white keyboard. A tussock moth caterpillar somehow crept onto a page of my journal without my noticing. Now, this spider scrambles on the page… I am pleased, for my luck with the wild has yet to run out.

I follow the tracks to the path I had discovered last week. I navigate through the now familiar woods on this small trail with what seem to be horse-hoof prints. A large pile of feces, just off the trail, supports my speculation, but I refuse to conclude these are horses until I actually see a horse or two in these woods. The path leads to an open grove on a small hill with scattered eastern hemlocks. I notice a small opening at the bottom of the slope, so I pursue it. Smaller tracks lead to a tiny clearing, perhaps 5’x5’. I find an abundance of Japanese barberry shrubs and apples scattered on the forest floor. My mind wanders. What animals would eat berries and/or apples and has four-toed tracks much smaller than those of a horse? Perhaps there are foxes, coyotes, deer, or some other small animals here that visit when I’m gone.

I take a break from my investigating. I lie supine beneath the hemlocks in the grove. It only takes a minute or two before my mind begins to question again. I am certain that there are bears in the Berkshires, but do any of them call the West Clark Woods home? This would be prime real estate for them. The hemlocks are thick enough to climb; the branches appear strong enough to support their weight and the tree limbs are plentiful enough to assist in the ascent.

While I am busy thinking, several birds begin to sing and disrupt my thought processes. I wait a little while, closing my eyes to enjoy their songs and their voices seem to be growing louder. Slowly, I turn around to peak. There are about six small, brown birds with black and white faces in the thickets behind me. They appear to be searching for food. These birds were not the only wildlife keeping me company, though. On the hill in the grove, I see the tail of a squirrel darting up a tree. It suddenly stops, then begins calling up the tree. I have never heard a squirrel make a sound prior to now and I am shocked. It is now 2:45 p.m. and I decide to leave. On my way out, a small red squirrel sits on a downed tree munching on an acorn. If we could communicate, I’d tell him to enjoy his lunch. I never did see the horse, but I will be back next week with high hopes.

10/9/09

As I walk into the environs of Wall’s Pond today, I’m struck instantly by the fiery red maple at the north end of the pond, which has begun to shed a large number of leaves and is now fully engulfed in an autumnal inferno of bright orange and red. It’s a cool day, temperature in the mid-fifties. The wind makes it feel cooler, though, and the steady rain this week has left the ground soft, moist and springy. The sky is a dull, concrete gray, and the chromatic explosion at the north end of the pond is made that much more dramatic in contrast to the slate skies.
Other changes foliage include a little more yellow and light orange interspersed among the beeches and maples along the west side cow fence and the maples at the entrance. The vegetation around the edge of the pond is looking a bit browner than last week, although the ferns and shrubs along the southwest shoreline retain the same verdancy I noticed in my first visit.  The water lilies and lily pads continue to dwindle slowly. They also look browner and there are far fewer closed water lilies than last week. Those that remain are all open, as if to gather up as much sun as possible before the cold really sets in.
The most dramatic shift from last week is on the south shore of the pond where a once-vertical white pine has tilted, Pisa-style, a good 45 degrees into the water. I walk over to it to investigate. It appears that the roots on the inside (pond side) of the tree have lost their footing, that is to say, water and time have eroded the soil underneath the tree and caused it to lean precariously out over the pond. It doesn’t look recent and I worry that I may have simply overlooked what now seems to be a very dramatic natural event. I can’t be sure. I wonder whether all the wind and weather this week perhaps exacerbated what was already an unstable condition for the tree. It’s not out of the question and for a moment I imagine big chop on this pond kicked up by a windstorm in the middle of the night, crashing endlessly against the tall pine and finally succeeding in undermining its defenses. A fantasy, to be sure, as there’s simply not enough fetch (surface area over which waves can increase) on this pond to raise any real chop with the wind we had this week.
As for “small things” I observed surprisingly few insects today. In general the occasional bumblebee or dragonfly joins me, but today my only winged companions are a few gnats by the shore and a solitary mosquito that follow me as I make my rounds. The bugs all move sluggishly, as though slowed down by the dropping temperatures and shorter days. I hear the low, constant chirp of crickets by the water’s edge but never see an individual.
The animals are similarly scarce, possibly put off by the rainy day throngs at the art museum. Indeed, humans are the most noticeable animal life in the area around the pond today; even the mallards are nowhere to be seen. I do, however, spot a small eastern chipmunk, about 5-9 inches long, flitting about in the shrubs along the south shore. Thereabouts I also see a good-sized gray squirrel that I later spot again, running along the fence that bounds the east side of the meadow and the backyards of the South St. houses. I wander into some hemlocks a few yards outside the fence separating the pond from the rest of the Clark campus, just to see what else I can see. Atop one of the hemlocks sits a lone crow, cawing. It flies away as I walk over, but another swoops in soon to take its perch. Among the hemlocks, some unseen activity in the high branches brings a steady shower of pinecones down on me and I soon leave the area.
I circled the pond several times before going, looking for anything small and alive, and finding nothing. As I left for the day I glimpsed two Holsteins roaming the field at the foot of Stone Hill, safely on the other side of the fence. A disappointing show for my site, to be sure, but I eagerly await a night visit and (hopefully) some more animal company.