Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
3 different Sights at Trail Wood
Trail Wood #18.09 by Earl Plato
Edwin May Teale and his wife Nellie were always walking Trail Wood pathways. This day was no Exception.
“ The feature of our walk in the March sunshine today is creatures doing something different. In the Wild PlumTangle. We see a cottontail rabbit carefully going over the surface of the snow. It is gleaning fragments of cracked corn scattered by the wind. Out in the open downward from the catalpa tree we discover jays, grosbeaks, and smaller birds picking at he snow. We tun aside to investigate several of the dark, slender, cigar-shaped seedpods dangling on the catalpa have split open. The birds ae consuming the watery seeds that speckle the ground. A red squirrel that has found a snug winter home under the roof of our garage provides the third of these instances of creatures engaged in unusual activity. I see where it has torn apart a mud dauber’s nest and added meat to its diet by consuming the wasp pupae within.”
Writer’s note: Be observant. Whar three different things will you see in nature this week?
Edwin May Teale and his wife Nellie were always walking Trail Wood pathways. This day was no Exception.
“ The feature of our walk in the March sunshine today is creatures doing something different. In the Wild PlumTangle. We see a cottontail rabbit carefully going over the surface of the snow. It is gleaning fragments of cracked corn scattered by the wind. Out in the open downward from the catalpa tree we discover jays, grosbeaks, and smaller birds picking at he snow. We tun aside to investigate several of the dark, slender, cigar-shaped seedpods dangling on the catalpa have split open. The birds ae consuming the watery seeds that speckle the ground. A red squirrel that has found a snug winter home under the roof of our garage provides the third of these instances of creatures engaged in unusual activity. I see where it has torn apart a mud dauber’s nest and added meat to its diet by consuming the wasp pupae within.”
Writer’s note: Be observant. Whar three different things will you see in nature this week?
Alive and Revived!
Trail Wood #17.09 by Earl Plato
Dead? Teale tells us otherwise.
“ When I come up to it, I find the gray squirrel lying on its side on the grass. Its eyes are wide open. But it is rigid and unmoving. It gives every appearance of being dead. Minute follows minute without any sign of life. … it remains inert in the sunshine. At last from where I stand a little way off I see a twitch of one hind leg. Then it lifts its head and lets it fall back again. Slowly it makes a few jumps and a rest and revives from its profound state of shock. It struggles to its feet, It flips its banner tail/ t makes two or three tentative jumps. , then flattens out in the grass again. For several minutes it rests, Then another few jumps and a rest. And so by degrees it attains a tangle of bushes, then a tree. And so it disappears. It had not sustained any important physical injury. But for a half an hour after its narrow escape the high-strung animal had been in a state bordering on “catalepsy.”
Writer’s note: The white cat is not mentioned again.
One lucky squirrel, eh?
Dead? Teale tells us otherwise.
“ When I come up to it, I find the gray squirrel lying on its side on the grass. Its eyes are wide open. But it is rigid and unmoving. It gives every appearance of being dead. Minute follows minute without any sign of life. … it remains inert in the sunshine. At last from where I stand a little way off I see a twitch of one hind leg. Then it lifts its head and lets it fall back again. Slowly it makes a few jumps and a rest and revives from its profound state of shock. It struggles to its feet, It flips its banner tail/ t makes two or three tentative jumps. , then flattens out in the grass again. For several minutes it rests, Then another few jumps and a rest. And so by degrees it attains a tangle of bushes, then a tree. And so it disappears. It had not sustained any important physical injury. But for a half an hour after its narrow escape the high-strung animal had been in a state bordering on “catalepsy.”
Writer’s note: The white cat is not mentioned again.
One lucky squirrel, eh?
Monday, February 9, 2009
The White Cat & the Squirrel
Trail Wood #16.09 by Earl Plato
Writer’s Note: According to my parents “Whitey” our white cat was born the same year as I was. For eight years Whitey was my cat. No albino but pure white she was a skilled huntress. More than once she brought her prey back to our little farm. Sadly one day she dropped the body of a beautiful meadow lark at our door. Sometime in her eighth year she disappeared. I missed her. Edwin Teale, as a trained naturalist, watched a white cat on his Trail Wood property. He wrote on that March date: “ My eye is first caught by its little leaps and that as it forages over the ground for food. I watch it for a moment or two before I become aware of a large white cat that has wandered from a neighboring farm. It is crouching low in the grass. Its eyes follow every movement of the squirrel. For some reason that usually alert animal seems unaware of the cat. It even turns its back to the danger. That is the signal. The white cat streaks torward it and makes it leap. With the squirrel in its mouth it begins to run, making surprising leaps with so heavy a burden. Shaking off my surprise I set out in pursuit. The white cat drops the squirrel and scuttles into the protection of he Wild Plum tangle.”
Note: Teale writes next about survival..
Writer’s Note: According to my parents “Whitey” our white cat was born the same year as I was. For eight years Whitey was my cat. No albino but pure white she was a skilled huntress. More than once she brought her prey back to our little farm. Sadly one day she dropped the body of a beautiful meadow lark at our door. Sometime in her eighth year she disappeared. I missed her. Edwin Teale, as a trained naturalist, watched a white cat on his Trail Wood property. He wrote on that March date: “ My eye is first caught by its little leaps and that as it forages over the ground for food. I watch it for a moment or two before I become aware of a large white cat that has wandered from a neighboring farm. It is crouching low in the grass. Its eyes follow every movement of the squirrel. For some reason that usually alert animal seems unaware of the cat. It even turns its back to the danger. That is the signal. The white cat streaks torward it and makes it leap. With the squirrel in its mouth it begins to run, making surprising leaps with so heavy a burden. Shaking off my surprise I set out in pursuit. The white cat drops the squirrel and scuttles into the protection of he Wild Plum tangle.”
Note: Teale writes next about survival..
Trail Wood #15.09
Trail Wood #15.09 by Earl Plato
Writer’s Note: Three times U have been to Thoreau’s Walden Pond all during the summer time. The first visit in 154 I walked to he edge of the pond. Across the way was Thoreau’s cabin. Edwin Teale writes about Thoreau’s winter experience at his pond. Teale wrote.: “ Beside that larger body of water, Walden Pond, Henry Thoreau listened to the same sound of winter ice movements. “ The pond began to boom about an hour after sunrise when it felt the influence of the sun’s rays slanted upon it from over the hills …” he writes in the “Spring” chapter of Walden. Local anglers fishing through the ice believed the “thundering of the pond” scared the fish and prevented them from biting. This booming of the ice we hear but rarely at Trail Wood.”
Writer’s Note: Three times U have been to Thoreau’s Walden Pond all during the summer time. The first visit in 154 I walked to he edge of the pond. Across the way was Thoreau’s cabin. Edwin Teale writes about Thoreau’s winter experience at his pond. Teale wrote.: “ Beside that larger body of water, Walden Pond, Henry Thoreau listened to the same sound of winter ice movements. “ The pond began to boom about an hour after sunrise when it felt the influence of the sun’s rays slanted upon it from over the hills …” he writes in the “Spring” chapter of Walden. Local anglers fishing through the ice believed the “thundering of the pond” scared the fish and prevented them from biting. This booming of the ice we hear but rarely at Trail Wood.”
TRAIL Wood March 3rd.09
Trail Wood March 2nd by Ear Plato
We revisit Trail Wood and Edwin Teale and the next day- March 3rd.
“ Where a stand of staghorn sumac once grew at the edge of Wild Apple Glade, only the silvered trunks and branches now remain. They lie fallen, jumbled together like discarded and weathered antlers.”
Writer’s note: The following Teale offering conjures up old memories - ice fishing on Lake Erie. Sounds - would be ominous sounds and groans
“ Last night the temperature dropped to zero. Already on this morning of sunshine it has risen to 22 degrees. I assume this sudden change, accentuating the tensions inherent in the ice is responsible for the dull cannonading I hear.”
Writer’s note: How do you describe those noises of ice contracting on Lake Erie? Scary? Yes. This past weekend. February 7, 2009 over a 100 American ice fishermen had to be rescued off a broken away ice floe in Lake Erie. I have experienced something similar. Going out a small crack and accompanying “wonk” sounds of ice movements. Coming in the crack had opened up to several feet. What to do? Walk eastwards toward Buffalo, New York a few miles. Pull your ice sled over the ice mounds and come ashore safely. All that time we heard the thundering sounds of ice contracting.
We revisit Trail Wood and Edwin Teale and the next day- March 3rd.
“ Where a stand of staghorn sumac once grew at the edge of Wild Apple Glade, only the silvered trunks and branches now remain. They lie fallen, jumbled together like discarded and weathered antlers.”
Writer’s note: The following Teale offering conjures up old memories - ice fishing on Lake Erie. Sounds - would be ominous sounds and groans
“ Last night the temperature dropped to zero. Already on this morning of sunshine it has risen to 22 degrees. I assume this sudden change, accentuating the tensions inherent in the ice is responsible for the dull cannonading I hear.”
Writer’s note: How do you describe those noises of ice contracting on Lake Erie? Scary? Yes. This past weekend. February 7, 2009 over a 100 American ice fishermen had to be rescued off a broken away ice floe in Lake Erie. I have experienced something similar. Going out a small crack and accompanying “wonk” sounds of ice movements. Coming in the crack had opened up to several feet. What to do? Walk eastwards toward Buffalo, New York a few miles. Pull your ice sled over the ice mounds and come ashore safely. All that time we heard the thundering sounds of ice contracting.
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