August 29 a slight shower in the night and then cloudy all day with a few minutes of sprinkles -- certainly we are in a dry pattern when rain clouds are so coy. The other curiosity of the season are the mosquitoes. They seem smaller, quieter, and just as numerous as before, but they can't keep up
with me when I walk, but once I stand still they are all over me, especially sneaking under my hat brim. So now I have a tendency to keep moving unless I spray on repellent, which I did when I checked the trees the beavers had been working on around the Boundary Pool. But too often a second look only makes apparent what you didn't notice on the first look. The beavers had not touched the maple I pulled down for them, but I noticed three other freshly cut stumps,
two near the maple and the other just in the water of the pool, and yesterday I had the impression that only the maple had been cut, which is unlikely because there were no trunks connected to these newly noticed stumps and to get them out the beavers would have at least had to have walked over the maple crown I laid out for them. I checked the dam and there were some nibblings there, but nothing big.
Then when I went up to the big poplar they are cutting, not only did it look like they had cut some more but I saw the stumps of two smaller trees, but perhaps I simply didn't notice them yesterday.
When I look at the photos from today and yesterday it looks like they didn't gnaw any more on the big poplar. The difference was the light. Yesterday the trunk was bathed in sunlight and today it was cloudy, and without the sunlight there seemed to be many more white chips of gnawed trunk and the wound in the tree seemed to be deeper. Sunlight is over rated as a revelator. Indeed I walked along the back edge of the shady Last Pool and took a photo looking back at the poplar which on a cloudy day looks like it is bleeding white wood.
And on one of my quick walks down the road I saw a large partially eaten caterpillar.
It was still cloudy before dinner and I expected the darkness to prompt the beavers in Boundary Pool to get out earlier, but when I got there at 6pm I heard not a sound from the lodge, and all was quiet for another fifteen minutes. Then I heard the vaguest semblance of a gnaw. I heard my first hum at 6:36, and then some wide awake gnawing. Last night those preliminaries lasted about a half hour before any beaver came out, but tonight an adult beaver was out at 6:39, and the way it appeared gave me a little pause. It swam out of the entrance facing but stayed under and didn't surface until it was ten yards up the channel heading up pond, perpendicular to me, like it was avoiding me. Then it curled in back of the lodge. Otherwise it didn't act like it knew I was there and soon I heard some gnawing along the far edge of the pond but I couldn't see the beaver. Then another beaver came out and took about the same route. Meanwhile I still heard gnawing from the lodge but only a few whines, and by the sound of it from just one kit. And for the next half hour that's all that happened. After they made their entrances I didn't see those two beavers again. I walked back to the house along the ridge closest to the pools, but I didn't hear any gnawing. I didn't go down to check likely spots, I could see the cut maple from the ridge. I think I might be the cause of their shyness. During the the early part of the summer, I was religious about not using bug repellent when I tried to watch them. But of late, I have earned so many bites during the summer, that now I put repellent on exposed skin. At first I don't think the beavers associated the perfume smell with me, now thanks to my clumsiness, I think they do. So tonight only two adults came out and the third adult or yearling stayed by the chute from the lodge proper to the drying off chamber to keep the kits out of the pond, and they were quieter because they were told by the adults to keep it quiet. Not sure how to test the theory. The lodge has no mud on it so it is possible they can smell me while they are in the lodge, especially the repellant perfume. So tomorrow night I will use mosquito netting and try sitting in a
different spot. Or the next night. Barred owl calling in the night.
August 30 brief shower in the night and then a cloudy morning, threatening, but no rain. So I was soon working the water pump. Back on the Island I repeated my bike and hike to Shangri-la Pond but this time I checked the new beaver lodge at the old dock at the end of the north cove of South Bay first.
There wasn't much more on their little cache in front of the dock.
I walked along the shore and saw that they ignored the first few clumps of alders and nannyberry, then I took photos of the area where they were cutting those trees. I mostly saw alders cut.
They made a nice swath in the vegetation along
the shore.
And then I saw an unfamiliar violet flower on a
vine, like a congeries of pods opening but a flower not a fruit.
The vine appeared quite strong like it was tying the other vegetation into submission and hanging out the flower to mark each conquest.
I headed to Shangri-la Pond going along the ridge south of the pond which afforded me a good view of the maple the beavers cut last week. They had cut all the branches, cut off half the trunk, and stripped all the bark.
I could see a platform of mud nearby with some stripped sticks on it. But more interesting was a crisscrossing of thicker logs on a bit of mud in the middle of the grasses in the middle of the pond. I hope I get a chance next week to see a beaver nibbling there.
I was surprised that they hadn't cut down another red maple. Last week when I was on the that side of the pond I thought I saw gnawing on another. I continued down the ridge and saw that they didn't do too much more with the basswood the cut up on the cliff. There was nothing new to note at the
lodge. Thanks to the lack of rain, the pond is lower, but not as low as it was last year at this time.
I thought they might have cut some cattails below the dam, but certainly not many. I saw that they had cut a tree on the east shore of the pond so I went down to check that out, a sugar maple as yet untrimmed or tripped,
and there is another trunk back at the stump waiting to be cut.
And another large tree also being cut.
I walked over to the little canal always jumping with frogs I heard some bleeping in the grass. I knew the sound and it didn't take me long to find the snake with the frog in its mouth.
Both the snake and frog were relatively small, and the snake big enough to swallow the frog in just a few minutes. The frog bleeped bravely to the end. The yellow stripe down the middle of the snake's back waxed into a rather puissant bolt of yellow as the frog was massaged down the snake's gullet.
Soon enough the snake's tongue was darting about in triumph. I didn't seen any more basswoods cut. Maybe the beavers are losing their taste for that as the leaves get drier. I crossed the East Trail meadow where fortunately an old boardwalk helped me get through the fiercesome false buckweed vines. I wanted to get a glimpse of the Second Swamp Pond, didn't have time to explore it. Of course, I headed directly to the otter latrine on the north slope and as I came up on the ridge, I recalled all the times I anticipated seeing otters in that pond. Just as I saw the pond, I saw what I first thought were two osprey take to the air. Then I saw that I had alarmed an osprey and a heron, and then when I got a full view of the pond, I saw a kingfisher dive down for a fish. All to prove that the reason otters are not here has nothing to do with the lack of fish to eat. The pond still seemed full
but there was no sign that beavers had moved back into the lodge. The lodge was bristling with pileworts and no stripped sticks on branches floated around the lodge.
The dam was as inscrutable as always. No signs of otters either. I didn't cross the dam but angled back to the old East Trail so I could see how the cardinal flowers were doing. I saw three patches, one as dazzling as I'd ever seen along this little creek, and some turtle head flowers were close
by.
Of the other two patches of cardinal flowers, one was also doing quite well. Usually the little creek dries out in the summer, this year the flowers were still feeding off standing water. I didn't see any birds, but I didn't linger anywhere which is what you have to do to see the birds as they
quietly fatten up for migration.
Back at our land, I decided to check the Boundary Pool beavers before dinner again. I washed the smell of bug spray out of my hat, and to fend off the mosquitoes took a head net and some gloves. As I went down the Grouse Alley, I scared off a deer who was at the other end. I went to the ridge west of the pond but kept a bit to the north facing the slight breeze from the south, I also kept better hidden behind trees and bushes. Unfortunately the farmer over the east ridge was haying and his tractor kept up quite a drone. Then the unrepelled mosquitoes while safely behind the netting were still loud. And a sportsman was getting his shotguns warmed up for the goose hunt which begins at first light on September 1. I moved close so I could hear the beavers. I heard some water glogging and then some gnawing from inside the lodge but not until 7 did I hear signs of life and even by 7:15 no beaver had come out. I don't think I have anything to do with. The experts are right about beavers living on a 25 hour clock, though experts suggest that beaver only "decouple" themselves from the natural cycle of day and night in the winter. I have often seen beavers and whole colonies quite out of a synch with day and night in the spring, summer and fall. In the year I've known this colony, I've been surprised at how early in the evening I sometimes see activity
and then was surprised at seeing them come out very late. So I think these beavers tend to drift out of the 24 hour schedule becoming active a little later each successive night until they correct themselves and get back on schedule. Or perhaps I have it backwards, and they are presently correcting that recent propensity to go out too early. That probably makes more sense since the adults probably want to check the rambuctiousness of the kits, better that the humming start at dark than almost two hours before dark. Of course I hope the beavers come out earlier. I should add that last year, after not seeing the beavers in Wildcat Pond in the evening, I reasoned they must be out later in the morning. They weren't. Much we don't know about beavers.
September 1 no big hike yesterday but I did check on the Deep Pond beavers as I took my walk down the road. On the way down I saw one beaver by the dam where I had earlier left an aspen branch. When I came back it was too dark to see any beavers. I walked out to the dam and a beaver splashed me, dove
and surfaced at the far end of the pond. Then another beaver swam out from that part of the dam where the beavers fashioned a little wallow below the dam. It didn't splash me but gave me a hard look. I also saw an orange caterpillar.
This morning I walked around the Boundary Pool to see what the beavers have been up to. They still haven't touched the maple that they cut and I pulled down for them. I decided that it was facing the wrong way so I turned it around so the trunk faced the pond, easier for a beaver to pull it into the
pond. I still think they are trimming other small trees at the same spot, but maybe I just notice a little more each time I come by. I didn't notice any new work on the east shore, nor up the slope. I walked down to the upper shore of Wildcat Pond and was about to announce that there was new work there when I saw an elm gnawed to a toothpick, and still standing.
I didn't touch it, in case my pulling down trees makes them untouchable for these beavers. Along the east shore of Boundary Pool there appeared to be more new work, especially cutting and stripping elms.
Maybe my hovering over them in the evening prompted them to do more work over here.
I continued up the pools and didn't see any more fresh work. I don't think the beavers have been back to the big poplar. Then I checked their trail to elms in the clearing above the pools,
and there I saw that they cut another tree just
a couple feet into dark woods.
Hard to read the beavers' mind.
With our last renter out of the house on the island we aimed to spend the night which meant I could go out and check on the beavers there. I decided to walk up the south shore of the Second Swamp Pond and then sit by the Lost Swamp Pond and then by 6pm take up my vigil behind the Big Pond dam where I saw the beaver come out the other day at around 6:20. When I came down to Otter Hole Pond an osprey flew off quite loudly with a fish in claw. It flew over a pond of varying shades of green grass.
When I got up to the upper end of the pond, the
osprey flew off another high tree, calling loudly. I took a photo of that meadow of green.
Up at the Second Swamp Pond I sat on the high rock south of the dam and had water to look at. I saw a few ducks, probably woodducks around the beaver lodge. I suspect the beaver are in the upper pond closer to the shrubs they can eat. I think they save the larger trees around the lower pond for winter fare.
I wonder if all these ponds will turn into meadows or the beavers will find enough space and variety to keep going as long as they want. And then I had to contemplate the Lost Swamp Pond. On the way I saw my first blue asters.
At the pond, once again a noisy osprey was waiting for me, then flew off, this time over the far ridge. I saw geese in the southeast section of the pond, and they were soon joined by two deer, perhaps doe and fawn placidly grazing.
I didn't see any evidence of beaver activity, and I wonder if these beavers have moved up pond, as they did years ago, once again closer to shrubs they can eat. Then it was time to go to the Big Pond and I made it into the pine behind the lodge so stealthily that I saw a family of mallards at ease on
top of the lodge.
I had a pleasant hour behind the lodge, though I didn't see or hear any beavers. I did see another deer browsing along the far shore. I saw a woodduck seemingly motored by its back and forth neck going through the pondweed picking off bugs. I saw many frogs jumping a top the same pondweed. And pondweed carpeted most of the pond between me and the dam.
I saw a heron on the far shore that never seemed to move but looked quite alert. I saw black birds swarming down into the cattails but didn't get close to me. But no beavers. Perhaps all beavers are on a late schedule. I got closer to take a photo of the top of the lodge so I could compare it to the last time I was here on August 17.
The lodge looks different though you might not be able to easily tell which photo was taken two weeks ago -- the one on the left. As I walked down to South Bay through the meadow I enjoyed a perfect sunset light for enjoying the colors of the goldenrods and asters.
Over the last few days I have neglected to the
note the presence of a companion in most of the watches, today at the Big Pond, and during my vigils at the Boundary Pool Pond. Red squirrels can't resist a chorus of derisive nattering in my direction and then they are off getting fat for the winter.
September 2 Back at the land to water the garden and I had time to check on my experiment with the Boundary Pool beavers. They didn't touch the maple I reoriented for them. Then I checked the elm barely standing at Wildcat Pond. Still standing. The trouble with checking beaver work everyday is that
despite their reputation for being busy, they often leave work unfinished. Then, of course, I start to worry that they have gone. In 2005 beavers in the First Pond left at the beginning of September. So I looked closely for new work and I saw what looked
like fresh dredging in the canal between Logdam and Last pools
and I saw another tree cut up on the ridge along the trail that leads directly down to the front of the lodge
and I saw clear evidence that they had stripped
more bark off the fallen elm closest to the shore.
As I continued up the east shore of the pond, I saw the barred owl we have been hearing so often at night. Coming out in the meadow I saw purple asters
and I always enjoy a photo in the my shade to
accompany the garish photo of the flower in sunlight.
Many bluejays today.
September 3 foggy morning on the river, and then it cleared hot and sunny. I biked over to the entrance to the state park and then took the short cut to Otter Hole Pond and up the woods to the Second Swamp Pond. The osprey didn't fly off today until I got to the pond filled with water. I sat and contemplated the Second Swamp Pond in the shade of the south shore where I could catch a good breeze. Only thing stirring were a few deer flies and mosquitoes. Then I sat in the shade by the Upper Second Swamp Pond, had lunch, and contemplated the marsh above the pond where I aimed to go and find where the beavers have. First I had to cross below the Lost Swamp Pond dam so I went up and looked over the lodge by the dam. Beavers might be there. Some twigs from bushes were sunk next to the lodge
and there was cut grass about, but I could see through the sticks of the lodge. I think beavers would push up some vegetations to cover the lodge and keep it cooler inside. So I think muskrats are using the lodge. But the dam has been visited by something wider than a muskrat, judging by the trails
up in the grass.
There was more cut grass near the lodge towards where muskrats often have had burrows, but no sign of burrowing there, that I could see.
I saw a couple of turtles on the pond, a couple mallards, but no geese. I heard some shotgun blasts aimed at geese coming from South Bay. Then I headed into the tall asters, golden rod, and was even treated with a patch of purple asters.
I found some deer trails but the going didn't get any easier as I headed down to the upper end of the Upper Second Swamp Pond into tall meadowsweet so thick I couldn't get down for my annual close-up of a burmarigold.
There are two old bank lodges down here. I was unable to find them, not even a clue as to where they might be. I saw no beaver work so I pressed on along what deer partings I could find and headed toward where I thought there must be a canal heading up pond. It crossed my mind that despite the wet summer all this vegetation might have sucked up all the water, but my hunch proved right. I came upon the narrow channel, quite muddy and fresh mud on the bank.
I found where the beavers had been. Last summer I found the beavers up here but the going was easy then and I could follow cut trees into the pools where they spent most of the summer. I didn't find a lodge up there but I found a comfortable arrangement. Today I could hardly walk, even up the canal.
Then I found more dredging and a wider trail that led to bushes the beavers have been trimming. They cut the green sprouts coming up between the woody cuts they made last year.
I pushed up the trail though it narrowed, hopping to find more ambitious gnawing at bigger shrubs, but I didn't.
So I went back to the channel and up it and then off on another promising path heading toward some willow, again I found some green shoots nipped but no meals off the stands of larger willows.
Plus I was looking for some gangway to what I hopped was a homey pool of water fashioned in the meadow, but I only got tangled in willow and had a momentary panic that if I wasn't careful I could be turned around in the noonday sun with vegetation up to my neck and no clear view through thickening
willow bushes. Not even a mad dog let alone an Englishman could find me. That said, I did stumble upon several closed gentian plants
bristling with expectant knobs of blue.
I went back to the where I thought the canal was and couldn't find it. However, I could see the ponds below and angled back and found the end of the canal with some evidence of dredging to save water as the water dropped thanks to a week without rain.
I tried to follow the dry canal and that became a path soon closed to me by tall willows. Last summer I thought the pools were oriented toward the north side of valley and I angled up that way and did find a grass filled pool but no sign that beavers had made themselves at home in it. I kept trying to find beaver paths or work, as I stayed on dry meadow, but only managed to work up a sweat, so I pressed on to shade, hoping to find a beaver cut tree. No. So exhausted, I went over to the wooded ridge and realized that I really hadn't gone up as far as I did last summer. The lush meadow completely defeated me, though I did discover that the beavers had a way up into it. I still don't know if they have a world in the middle of it. I'll have to park myself by the dam some night to see if beavers come down from the meadow or come out of the lodge there and go up into it.
I was just over a high ridge from the Third Ponds, so over I went, pausing to contemplate some of the beautiful granite rocks.
The pond where I saw beavers two years ago is choked with grass, though there are channels from an old bank
lodge, no signs of any beaver activity.
The big pond below is more open but no obvious signs of beaver activity there.
Those ponds drain to the east. Then I headed back to the ponds that drain toward the East Trail Pond. Ten years ago beavers were here. Now it is meadow.
I studied that from a granite face shaped to lie in, nice with the wind blowing right at me.
I headed up to the ridge then across the East Trail Pond creek and then thought I might as well check Shangri-la pond since I was so close. Crossing the East Trail Pond meadow I saw a monarch caterpillar curled in a leaf having lunch.
I saw that the Shangri-la Pond beavers trimmed a bit of the crown from the maple that fell on the east shore. Most of the leaves were gone too, but deer probably munched them. I saw a precocious maple in beautiful fall color,
hurried aging because the beavers have girdle it a couple months ago. Walking on the ridge south of the trail, I saw that there were stripped logs near the lodge.
And then along the north shore they cut down another tree, and its colorful crown was in the green grass of the pond waiting for the beavers delection.
I decided to come out before dinner and get video of the beavers feeding off the tree. And that's what I did. On my way back to Shangri-la I took a look at the old dock lodge at the end of South Bay. Thanks to the lack of rain, the water level of the river has dropped a foot. The beavers here might have to do some dredging. The beavers weren't out when I walked along the ridge south of the pond.
I parked myself on the high ridge above the lodge. I noticed another little nest in the pond grasses where they are stripping logs and sticks.
I looked forward to seeing a beaver there, but in a little over an hour, all I saw were painted turtles on a chunk of stump in the pond, a snapper swimming underwater and frogs hopping hither and yon. This might be the warmest day for awhile so who can blame amphibians and reptiles from taking advantage. I head the yuk-a-yuk-a of a flicker, saw the osprey perch atop a tree across from me, then do a double take looking at me and fly off. I saw phoebe and heard a pileated woodpecker, a lively time, but no beavers. All the colonies seem to be on a late schedule.
September 4 I kayaked over to South Bay in the late afternoon, hot but relieved by a light north wind when I found it. I saw a cormorant fishing the north edge of Granite Slate shoal and two cormorants sunning on the rock just off the headland, swimming off as I paddled by, leaving three seagulls and a preening goose behind. As I turned into South Bay I saw an osprey make a skimming dive and come up with a fish. I grabbed my binoculars and tried to see if the fish was twitching with life or was already half dead. Hard to tell, and if a big bird swooped me up, I'm not sure if I'd be stunned with the novelty of it or writhing in pain and panic. The water level has gone down a good six inches in the last week but that didn't seem to change the fish fries' friendly set up along the south shore of the bay. In the shade of a big willow a dozen or two of small fish gave me an
identification quiz. I got one rock bass right, and a sunny, and a small pike, but then I was puzzled by three or four, foot long fish with the scales of a carp, red at the end of their fins and tails, swimming with a delicacy one doesn't associate with carp. Never seen them before, and I was not sure of the perch shaped fish with a black mark on the side of the head. I didn't see much action under the thick layer of water lilies, and the lilies seem to have mostly quit blooming. They had a long season of stretching beautiful white petals out to the sun. Not many turtles about -- sun is no longer a novelty as it was some days earlier in the summer. Then I tried to sneak up on three young geese diving tail straight up and legs pedaling in a clearing between the lily pads. I didn't have to sneak. They didn't notice me. I couldn't see what they were eating but it was definitely bite size leaving nothing to drip out of their beaks. Other geese on the rocky shore were also cool, despite it being open season on them. Two mallards took fright as well as a smaller blacker
duck that I couldn't identify. Going down the south shore of the north cove I looked for otter scats and saw none. I am puzzled. The best summer for fish in this bay and still no signs of otters. As I got closer to the marsh at the end of the cove, I
saw a heron awkwardly drying off. It was perched on some leaning cattails and when it propped its wings out too far lost its balance. Finally it kept wings in and just stretched its neck up in true obedience to the sun. I paddled in front of it, no
reaction, on my way to check the beaver work. Last time I looked the beavers had cut one trunk in a clump of three alders. Now there are none, but they don't seem to have extended their work farther up the shore, though I didn't go up far. Usually I do but the very glary sun was right in my eyes so I turned. Paddling home I saw another heron higher atop a tree at attention in the sun. The heron at the end of the cove was now fishing again in the shallows. Something, at least, relishes these hot, humid September days.
September 5 very hot day, up to 90, relieved somewhat by a 30 mile an hour south wind. I did chores at both houses and we decided to spend the night at our land. We had an early dinner and I headed off to check on the Boundary Pool beavers, this time putting on plenty of bug repellant, and I even
took a mosquito net hat just in caee there was no show and I had to simply endure the mosquitoes. It continues to be dry and the vegetation off the ground is wilting and the remains of vegetation on the ground are quite crunchy. So I did my best deer
imitation as I approached the ridge above the pond, stopping and starting, and then I tried to keep on rocks going down the ridge. Half way down I could see that the duckweed on the water was rather broken up, and not from old age.
The canal heading up pond was a solid green. I also heard gnawing and humming. The latter came from the lodge and at first I thought the gnawing did too, but not all of it. I saw a beaver in the pool below me, head up, eating away. Fortunately there was a large tree between me and the beaver, and when I sat down, I couldn't see the beaver so I moved four legged belly up trying the best I could to keep my hands and feet on rocks. I made it down to a spot where I've been before and began taking video of the beaver below while keeping an eye out for
other beavers. The beaver below me soon got up on the shore and began stripping bark off the elm there. They had cut the elm a month ago, and I remember that just after they cut it, I hid myself above expecting the whole family to come out for a meal.
They more or less ignored the elm for a month. It was too close to the lodge, but now, with the water level in the pools getting perilously low it was time to eat the elm, hence no trail of a swimming beaver through the duckweed in the up pond canal. The beavers quite neatly showed what bark means to a beaver. It gnawed off a ten inch strip of bark and then ate the whole thing much like we'd eat a hot dog. Meanwhile I spied another beaver a bit more up pond working on another log. Then a third beaver, an adult, swam out of the lodge and I thought it was going to go
over the dam but it drifted over to the east shore where I knew there were fallen elms to gnaw. I heard gnawing coming from three points around the lodge, and from inside the lodge, I definitely heard one kit whining, and then I definitely heard another. Kits are born the same day, yet the second whine I heard seemed much weaker, seemingly from a much smaller and less capable kit. I think one kit came out, with the usual charge, swimming around the lodge with quick dives here and there, and I lost sight of it. I slid down the ridge a little more and just saw an adult beaver leave a stripped elm in the water along the east shore. Then I lost track of all but the beaver just below me. It swam back around the lodge and as it did another adult swam to the west shore to more or less pick up where the other beaver left off. Then it went farther down the downed elm trunk and bit off some twigs with big leaves. It started swimming toward the lodge and I thought perhaps it was going to bring something in for the kits -- judging from the resumed whining the one that swam out went back inside, but instead the beaver pulled up short and
started eating all it had collected. I later saw another beaver wrestle a log out of the muck and carry it toward the lodge, but I couldn't see if it took it into the lodge. It was getting dark, though since clouds had moved over, there was an evenness to the gloom which I knew would make it easier for walking home. And another adult beaver came over to the elm making it harder for me to quit my spot. Plus the whining of the kits was getting so insistent, I just knew they had to break out, but they didn't. So I tried to ease myself up the ridge as quietly as I came down but one beaver was up on the ground under the elm trunk and beavers out of the water are righly more jumpy than beavers in the water. So it charged into the water, toward the middle of the pool, but not back into the lodge. The other beaver turned and followed but came right back to its stick.
I continued to retreat, and soon at least one beast dove back into the lodge, greeted with quite a chorus of whines. I felt like I was restoring beaver family values. I am not sure why the adults seem to be hogging all the food and keeping the kits mostly inside the lodge. From what I've seen one kit at least always bothers the adults when it is out so maybe the adults simply want to eat before they have to put up with the kits. I'll be curious to see if there is any fresh work in the pools above this one. While there is less water in the whole system, to me there doesn't seem to be any reason for the beavers to panic. I suppose the duckweed slows evaporation. Half a chance of rain tomorrow, but two remnants of hurricanes have missed us, maybe the next one will give us a couple inches of rain. We need it. Oh yes, while one of the beavers was eating at the elm trunk, I saw a grey squirrel hopping along the trunk. It changed course about ten feet from the beaver, got up the big tree between me and the beaver, and then came down only to see me. It took us both in stride
September 6 it was cloudy all day and threatening in the evening so I didn't bother the Boundary Pool beavers. In the late afternoon I did walk around to see how the smaller pools were faring in the drought. A kingfisher flying low zoomed up from the First Pond as I approached so there is
still life in it, as much as the pond itself looks a bit wearied.
The small pool above it where I had seen turtles and frogs in August was now completely dry
with the prints of raccoons and
herons dancing around the remains of tadpoles.
I did hear a frog jump in the grass. There were still enough frogs to make a minor commotion up at the Turtle Bog even though there is just soggy grass around a few puddles. There is still water in the valley pool, but how churlish to suggest that there is anything lacking this wet
summer. What's a few dry pools to the waves of goldenrods in the inner valley, best display ever.
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