More than a foot of snow snuck in the first part of this week, in the form of several small batches, so when Wednesday’s already grim Winter Storm Warning included the words “locally higher totals possible” it was a good bet Fish in a Barrel Pond would get its fair share.
I awoke this morning to two terrible realizations. First, it was nearly half-past six, meaning I’d slept in like a slug. Second, it was Monday, and the return of Flashback Friday had faltered after only two weeks, despite my good intentions.
Yeah, yeah, I know. I can just feel the disappointment, but it’s not like you just found a leak in your waders or something. Besides, proper flashbacks should be unexpected, out of the blue, and a complete surprise to all involved.
My most recent post featured some mighty rugged poop and, while not a flashback, certainly was unexpected, out of the blue, and a complete surprise to all involved. The books could use some balancing after that, starting with this post, beginning with a nice photo of a stream:
Living in Vermont, fisher scat is as much a part of late winter as maple syrup, and I hope that if anything can make up for posting the scariest poop ever, maple syrup will. I like maple syrup so much that I have jumped at the chance to help some friends through the process. Continue reading
There is a bewildering variety of game cameras, or trail cameras as they’re sometimes known, available on the market today, and some of the most common questions from consumers regard the camera’s resolution. I would like to take a few minutes today and go over with you some of the more confusing aspects of pixels, mega pixels, etc.
I’d like to, but I’m not going to.
The resolution I am referring to is one I am making for 2013, and it is to use my game camera more.
One of the least expensive models at the time of purchase, it is very basic, but the first night I set it out it captured a few shots of a fisher snooping around not far from the chicken coop.
Since then, it has recorded the perpetrators of unauthorized construction activities …
even under cover of darkness.
At Town Meeting, back on the 6th, I was told Mud Season would begin on the 7th.
A protracted spell of unseasonable warmth made it even deeper and more tenacious than usual and, two and a half weeks later, it’s still not over. Entire dump truck loads of stone continue to disappear in the slop.
While several feet of saturated road bed thawed in the warm spring sun this week, the ice on the lake remained thick, but not to be trusted.
(A certain angler in Georgia asked yesterday, “How’s the mud crop look this year?”
Ha ha.)
At Town Meeting on Tuesday, our village’s road foreman told me “mud season starts tomorrow,” which was almost amusing, considering the fact that, as I walked to town that morning, it was still just 10 degrees outside.
Tomorrow then is yesterday now, and he was right. Mud season has begun, and it looks like it’s going to be a good one.
One thing I have learned at Town Meeting over the years is that, if one is requesting funds, one should not place a series of question marks where a dollar sign and some numbers should be. I absofreakinglutely guarantee someone will stand up, waving their town report in the air, and shout, “I ain’t votin’ to put no tax dollars to no damn question marks!” It’s all over when that happens.
That might work in the big city, but you’ll get called on it every time at Town Meeting. It also helps if the wording of your request reflects what you describe in your supporting documents. We’re kind of picky that way, wanting to know just what we’re getting into.
We used printed paper ballots for a school district consolidation question, as well as for our Presidential primary votes. Somewhere is a stack of ballots that have been set aside, to be counted later, because they were defaced on Tuesday, vandalized by citizens who just couldn’t follow instructions. I am sure the Secretary of State has dealt with these things before, but his staff must slowly shake their heads after every election as they go through these ballots. I don’t know how many there are, but it’s a pretty sure thing that more than a few of my neighbors saw the section of the ballot marked “DO NOT WRITE IN THIS SPACE” and took the time to write “I WRITE WHERE I PLEASE!”.
Another Town Meeting tip: when you have had your say and the Moderator replies, “That is an opinion, not a motion,” don’t stand there like a deer in the headlights! Look the Moderator square in the eye, say “Damn right it is!” and sit down. That’s what I do, anyway.
One of the final items of the day on Tuesday was our town’s highway budget. Even if our road foreman hadn’t already warned of the impending mud, his proposed budget would have been changed when the villagers got a hold of it. We changed it, alright. We motioned, seconded, and approved a little raise for our road crew because they do a heck of a job with what they have to deal with. Without them, how else would our mail get through?
My recent post, The Cry of the Sapsucker, consisted mainly of photos taken while drinking coffee in my blind, which is cleverly diguised as a house. Mike, who keeps the blog Mike’s Gone Fishin’…Again, commented that he, too, has a blind cleverly disguised as a house. Click that link. You’ll see that Mike does a lot more than take pictures out the window. The link to Mike’s Gone Fishin’…Again is a keeper.
Another friend, who lives in New Hampshire, almost all the way to Maine, sent a series of photos taken from his house of a bobcat he saw the other day.
It’s always a treat to look out the window and see something like that, and it’s great that the internet makes it so easy to share the things we see. I know it is appreciated by others because they leave comments, like the one on my post The Cry of the Sapsucker, calling it some “lazy-ass nature reporting”.
That comment came from Marc Fauvet, who keeps the blog the limp cobra (because fly lines are like wild snakes that need to be tamed …). Marc lives in Sweden, but that’s okay. His blog is beautiful, and a lot of fun. His “lazy-ass” nature reporting comment got me to thinking and, you know, Marc might be right. Maybe my pictures of a bluejay being disemboweled on the lawn were kind of lazy-ass.
Well, “kind of” ain’t good enough. We’re taking lazy-ass nature reporting to the next level by bringing you the first set of photos from our brand new concept, “Pictures Taken While I Slept”.
(Important Disclaimer: There are places where ice forms many feet thick and travel on frozen lakes is perfectly safe for a good part of the season. In other places, especially during a winter like this one, ice conditions can change from day to day, even hour to hour.
The strengthening sun creates soft spots as melt water collects in the dips between expansion cracks, and a route that was safe in the morning merits a second look after lunch. Faint tracks mark yesterday’s trail, which puddled up and froze over last night, leaving a thin veneer over a foot of nothing but slush and at least a bracing dunk.
If asked, Quill Gordon will tell you no ice is safe, but if you do find yourself crossing a frozen lake, check ice thickness often and be aware of changing conditions.)
¦¦¦¦¦
An overnight skiff of snow on the ice is like a clean slate. Any tracks or other signs of activity I see are recent, laid down only hours before my morning rounds. Otters, mink and squirrels are common, and I saw the tracks of a fisher cat last week but, far and away, the most common tracks I come across are those of coyotes.
It’s the time for pairing off and denning up, asserting dominance and proving worth, and the coyotes have been plenty active. Most are travelling in pairs, but a big, lone male has also been out and about.
A large part of Vermont’s economy depends on visits by people from other places. Her summers are bucolic, her fall foliage is legendary and, in winter, skiers flock to her slopes from miles around (spring is a tortuous slog through mud and black flies, better left unmentioned). After half the state was turned inside-out and strewn about the countryside by Tropical Storm Irene, I beat the drum as best I could and encouraged people to visit and maybe spend a little cash to help get us going again and, after what has been a mild, brown start to winter, I am happy to welcome our first real snow and the economic shot in the arm that comes with it.
There are perhaps four permanent residences on our hill, but there are twice that many second homes and vacation get aways. Some of those houses are rented out, short term, to people who come to ski at one of the nearby resorts. This weekend, every unfamiliar vehicle going up and down our road has had New Jersey plates.
Our road is not much, by most anyone’s standards. Mud in the spring, bumpy, rutted dirt in summer and fall, I think it is actually at its best in winter, when it is covered with a nice, hard layer of packed snow and ice, topped by a sprinkling of sand.
When this particular group of people from New Jersey is here, there is also a sprinkling of litter.
Come on, man.
They’re kind of wearing out their welcome. Maybe one cup doesn’t make a difference along a road in New Jersey, what with everyone throwing trash out their windows, but around here it sticks out like a sore thumb. So do they.
What follows was originally posted as a three-parter but, inspired by the love I feel today toward the residents of the Garden State, I have dusted it off, changed the formatting, and cleaned it up, presenting it now, as a gift to the Chamber of Commerce. Continue reading
More excitement, torn from the pages of the Woodstock Early Bird!
In an awareness-raisng example of Vermont’s long political tradition, strong “back and forth” broke out today as A Dozen Turn Out for “Occupy Woodstock”.
And late last week, thousands were left without power because some skwerl was monkeying around: Squirrel Shock Causes Power Outage”.
I like Woodstock and whenever I head there for a visit I make sure to go through Proctorsville and Cavendish so I can stop by Singleton’s General Store on the way, just in case.
Sign at Singleton's General Store
There was a time when I watched ice form with great interest, knowing I was stranded on an island until it was thick enough to cross (On Thin Ice). Now I watch ice form with great interest because it is so interesting to watch.
Calm, clear days give way to clear, cold nights and the stillness starts to settle in. Three weeks of progressively shorter days lie ahead — and the cold will surely deepen — but for now winter’s grip is tentative and weak.
I wouldn’t try walking across it just yet. Continue reading
The View from Fish in a Barrel Pond 