Posts Tagged With: nature

A Note to the CEO of Nature’s Little Engineers, Inc.

From: Quill Gordon, Neverwas Nonesuch Angling Society

To: Bucky Beaver, CEO Nature’s Little Engineers, Inc.

Dear Mr. Beaver,

I thought we had an agreement. Several years ago, your grandfather moved his operations to a previously abandoned dam and pond, raising water levels to the point they threatened to inundate one of the roads I maintain on behalf of the Neverwas Nonesuch Angling Society. Evidently pleased with what he had done, he then invited several families of muskrats to move in with him and they began digging tunnels into the road bed.

I understand that these are things beavers and muskrats do but these activities created a potentially dangerous and expensive problem for me. I pleaded with your grandfather and the questionable elements he associated with to cease and desist but they would not listen and I am sure your family has shared with you the story of what happened next. Please accept my belated condolences. Continue reading

Categories: Humor, nature | Tags: , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Opening Day is Three Days Away

Each year, the week before opening day, I take my list of things to be done around Fish in a Barrel Pond and make a little schedule. I carefully find a block of time for each of the 4,000 things to be done — an hour here for this job, two hours there for that, completing each task as quickly and efficiently as possible — and when I am done I feel like the most organized and disciplined man in the world.

I then take that schedule and tear it into tiny pieces before the gods of such things have a chance to laugh at my plans. They will find plenty to laugh at in the days ahead.

Fish in a Barrel Pond April 23, 2011

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Categories: +The Neverwas Nonesuch Angling Society, Loons, nature | Tags: , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Yesterday There Was Snow, Today There Are Flowers

Winter is dead. Oh, sure, there will be a few snow squalls and maybe even a storm in the next three or four weeks but a few sickly patches of rotten snow are all that remain of the 10+ feet that fell over the course of the past seven months (some of those patches are still three feet thick). The edges are pulling back and the coltsfoot have begun to bloom in the bare spots along the roads.

Coltsfoot sends up leafless flower stalks as soon as the snow retreats. Early bees and other insects find coltsfoot a welcome source of nectar and within a few days the coltsfoot will be thoroughly pollenated and their bright yellow blooms will go to seed, looking like tiny dandelion heads. By June the leaves will be up, some a foot across, gathering energy for next April’s blooms. They may not be much to look at but the blooming of the coltsfoot is one of the surest signs of spring in these parts.

The members of the Neverwas Nonesuch Angling Society are a curious bunch and I get at least one phone call a day from this member or that, asking me when the ice will go out. I’ve watched a lot of ice in my time and I do my best to give them the benefit of my vast experience, telling them that if I could predict that sort of thing I sure as heck wouldn’t be doing what I do, which lately has involved a lot of counting Band-Aids™ and rolls of paper towels.

The edges of Fish in a Barrel Pond have begun to melt and holes are opening up. Only three or four inches of lake ice remain, beneath what is left of this winter’s snow, and it is going fast. It better go fast; I’ve got 20 people showing up in two weeks and they are going to be eager to fish.

Fish in a Barrel Pond April 14, 2011

Categories: +The Neverwas Nonesuch Angling Society, nature | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Brief, Tropical Interlude

For being the season of hope and renewal, spring can be surprisingly grim.

 

Grim enough, even, to cause a severe flare-up of a latent case of the shack nasties, treatable only by a quick trip south. Less than a couple of hours from the dirty, glacier-like crust back home, Mrs. Gordon and I were both pleasantly surprised to find ourselves in tropical warmth, surrounded by thousands of colorful butterflies at Magic Wings Butterfly Conservatory and Gardens in South Deerfield, Massachusetts.

 Knock it off. If a butterfly doesn’t make you smile, there is something seriously disconnected and wrong with you. Continue reading

Categories: +Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , | 2 Comments

An Impressive Start to Mud Season

A stiff, warm breeze has kicked the process of melting into high gear and mud season is upon us. Driving on an unpaved road can be an adventure this time of year, even for those who have experienced mud season before. Four wheel drive certainly helps, but so do ground clearance and a certain amount of good judgement.

We wondered all morning, Mrs. Gordon and I, if anyone would get stuck today and if so, whom. It’s early yet, so there is still time for my choices (the weekend people from New Jersey) to hit the ditch but they catch a bit of a break today by not being the first to get stuck in the mud of our road.

That honor goes to a tiny little car from Massachusetts.

And it only gets worse from here!

I once came across a Hummer with Massachusetts plates, stuck in a ditch during mud season but did not have my camera along so I had to settle for laughing at the driver before shifting into low and leaving him behind, not even twenty yards up a hundred yard hill. It still bothers me to not have a photo of that Hummer in the ditch so when the driver of this car knocked sheepishly at the door, looking for help, I said, “Sure! Just let me grab my camera.”

Frankly, I’m surprised they made it this far up the side of Nonesuch Mountain and I’m not sure why they kept trying to go further, but they did, plowing with the skirting at the nose of the car until they were stopped dead in their tracks. I did give them credit, though, for staying out of the ditch.

Of course I’m going to take pictures.

 It doesn’t look like things will be drying out any time real soon — and I certainly don’t expect people will stay off our road — so maybe we can look forward to more entertainment like this in the next couple of weeks. And if, as I’m taking pictures before pulling you out, you ask how (other than a large 4×4 truck) I avoid becoming stuck in this springtime morrass, I will tell you I just don’t go out and about. That’s not dry Yankee humor; it’s good judgement.

Categories: Humor, nature, Rural Life, Vermont | Tags: , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

When Skwerls Attack

According to this article from the March 15, 2011 Bennington Banner, a local neighborhood is under siege. Residents are scared and you, no matter where you live, should also be concerned about this growing menace. It is spring and, once again, bushy-tailed terrorists are working on their goal of total world domination!

These skwerl attacks are apparently “unprovoked” and target humans as they go about their business, shoveling snow and clearing sidewalks for the safety and convenience of all. I have known for years that these attacks are part of an ongoing plot to TAKE OVER THE WORLD!

If you don’t believe me, check out this web site: Scary Squirrel World

In these troubled times we must all remain vigilant!

(Posters from www.scarysquirrel.org)

You have been warned!

My good friend, Eugene, has had his own encounters with the Bushytails:

Careful with that Axe, Eugene

I, myself, have been on the forefront of this ongoing battle:

A One Way Ticket to Exile Island

Categories: Humor, nature, Vermont | Tags: , , , , , | 2 Comments

Signs of Winter’s Demise

The calendar puts it only a few days away but, for me, it’s not really spring until someone spots a pair of turkey vultures sharing a dead skunk on the shoulder of Rte. 5. We have a ways to go yet, before the peepers are in the pussy willows and the anglers are on the pond, but things are looking up, knock on wood.

Rain and melt water are absorbing into the snow on top of the lake ice, creating a thick layer of slush so heavy the ice groans loudly under its weight.  Meanwhile, the snow piles out front are shrinking, the hay rake is once again exposed, and the driveway is a mess during the day but, man, you should hear the racket when it is driven on in the morning after freezing at night.


Continue reading

Categories: Humor, nature, Rural Life, Vermont, Winter | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Vermont Ice Storm, Part II: Rhapsody in Blue (10 Photos)

With no wind and not a cloud in the sky, this afternoon turned out to be quite stunning.

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Categories: nature, Vermont, Winter | Tags: , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Vermont Ice Storm, Part I: The Day After (10 Photos)

Ice storms can be devastating and we dodged a bullet with this most recent one, up here on Nonesuch Mountain. The power stayed on and we did not get anywhere near the forecast amount of snow to complicate things so, for now, it looks like broken branches are the worst of the damage. The town road crew (bless their hearts) did a bang-up job getting our road clear, adapting to the icy, wood-strewn conditions by putting a plow blade and chains on the front end loader and shoving everything to the side, to be dealt with later.


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Categories: nature, Vermont, Winter | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Winter’s Back is Broken (and Mine is a Mess)

Meteorological winter, the coldest (on average) 1/4 of the year, is over. Winter’s back is broken but, as I’ve written before, you can’t shoot winter in the head and put it out of its misery. We must wait as winter kicks and fights with everything it can muster at this late stage of the game, while spring slowly asserts itself, a little bit at a time. Unfortunately, on days like yesterday, when a warm(-ish) breeze from the south brings mild temperatures and rain against driving snow and the cold(-ish) air still hanging on, both seasons end up looking foolish and the dooryard fills with slush.

We’ve had enough snow this winter that we were saying, “yeah, yeah, we get it” about four feet ago and we are ready to move on to the next season, which around here is mud. A lot of barns and other buildings collapsed last month, crushed by the weight of snow. Crews dug and raked as best they could, trying to lighten the loads on other roofs, but poor timing, gravity and uneven weight distribution continued to wreak destruction. Even with the sounds of catastrophe ringing through the valley, it was tempting to look at the roofs under my care, scoff, and say, “Hah! They’ve held more snow than that!”

I admit here and now, that is exactly what I did. Continue reading

Categories: Humor, nature, Rural Life, Vermont, Winter | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

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