A Watering Hole

One of the brooks comes down the mountain and flows through the apple orchard. John and I went out four days after the first day of spring when the snow was three feet deep and so crusted that we did not need snowshoes to move around. It was fun being taller for a few hours! I saw that the orchard brook was open in this one spot and there were tracks down to the water. Foxes are using this spot for their water. If you look carefully on the left end of the open brook, you may see the faint tracks. Below, I have a closer shot of the tracks. They are faint and difficult to see.

I don't really like foxes. They have been known to eat kitties.

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Ladybug Trails

Tracks of a Multicolored Asian Lady Beetle

Working in the kitchen late at night, John noticed marks in the dust covered windows. A fascinating pattern of marks, triangular and linear, was in the dust. Ladybug tracks — the invasive, house-infesting ladybugs. I photographed the ladybug trails as soon as he pointed them out to me. How dirty have windows gotten when you can see bug tracks on them? It's pretty bad. But I still haven't bothered to clean the windows because the dust here is still unbelievable bad.

A secret ladybug message written in dust

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Some Random Shots of Summer

One of our day lilies

I am fascinated by the stigma

A geometer moth

Another, different, brown geometer moth

Bumblebee on red clover

Five-toed raccoon track and tiny, round Zorro the Cat
tracks in the mud after a flash flood.

Dwarf zinnia that Ironman successfully planted

They bloomed continuously until the first heavy frost in September.

A Carolina grasshopper

Yellow woolly bear caterpillar

An unidentified warbler

Question Mark Butterfly

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A Raccoon Warning

Some of the many tracks on my windshield.

I got up early on July 7 to let the cats out while it was still cool. That's when I saw the raccoon tracks on my car's hood, windshield and roof. After the raccoons massacred chickens in late May, we had been, and still are, very watchful for signs of any more raccoons coming too close to the barn and house. It was very creepy seeing that a raccoon had climbed to the top of my car in the middle of the night. Was this a ploy to show dominance? To show that they could still sneak up on us? Since we had killed three of its comrades in May, this very well could be a show of strength. 

It isn't paranoia that makes me think the raccoons have these motivations for stomping on my car. In reality, animals and humans have spent centuries performing dominance displays. There was no food on the top of my car for the raccoon to take. It seems clear to me that the act was a demonstration by the raccoon. It gives me a whole lot of respect for the critters. And it has taught me to be very careful when I go outside in the dark. It wasn't too long ago that there was raccoon rabies in the Northeast Kingdom.

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Fisher Cat Tracks

The day after I scared the fisher cat from the barn, we looked for tracks. We found them in a drying stream bed near the barn. He came from the other side of the road. John has seen the fisher a couple more times as he went out "on patrol" after dark. The fisher was in the tall grass by the edge of the road, staring into the light of the flashlight. Usually the fisher cat's claws wouldn't be so ominously big, but he was walking in mud, which probably enhanced their size.

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Cats on Tuesday: Possum's Portrait

Click on the photo to see a large photo in a new browser window.

Hi again everybody! I'm back! And I've been missing this group. Here's Possum. I got a new camera to backup my Canon DSLR (which I almost killed when I fell into the river kayaking — but it's been fixed). This was taken with an Olympus Tough 8000. On the day that I took the photo, I was learning how to use the new camera. And Possum was cooperating for once and looking beautiful as always! Below is her footprint in the snow. It's interesting because usually you don't see cat claws in their tracks. I think she was trying to "hold on" since the snow offered little traction to her little cat paws. I am looking forward to visiting all of you tomorrow evening!

Possum's Set on flickr

Thank you for stopping by!

To visit other participants, visit Gattina

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Rabbit Trails

Snowshoeing through the hemlock grove on the property, I found that the rabbits have been quite active and have left not only individual trails but major highways that they travel regularly. In fact, I found a wild lavatory (below) at the far end of the hemlock grove and wonder if this is where the rabbits go:





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Turkey Trails

The turkeys came back. They followed our snowshoe trail in the field. Some went "off-trail" and others kept to the trail. At the crab apple tree they stopped for snacks. Some turkeys even fluttered into the tree for better pickings. I kept the contrast on the photos high so that the three-toed tracks could be better seen.

Snowshoe trail on the left. Turkey tracks in the trail and on the right of the trail.




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