Foggy Dew



It’s a chill, foggy day with the sun showing as a pale disc surrounded by a diffuse glow as its rays try and bite through the mist. Fog droplets condense on the bare tree branches and give a constant patter of drips onto the fallen leaves as an accompaniment to my steps. The pond level has been allowed to drop and everyone is very sedate this morning. Maybe the ducks and geese are finding it easier to reach choice morsels below the surface as they upend, so everyone is replete and in a good mood. The cormorants are in their proper positions, surveying the scene like lords of the ponds, unchallenged by belligerent goosey usurpers.

Further on, more than a dozen volunteers from the local Lion’s Club are at work on a sub-pond. They are cleaning up the fringe and planting the bank. Chilly work that requires that lots of coffee is drunk. A long table has been prepared with large pots, paper cups, sugar and cream. Temptation is strong, but I press on.

By the time that I reach the pet store with its auto-doors that snap voraciously at me as I hurry past, my scarf and hat are moist with condensed fog; my one and a half miles to my morning coffee is almost over.

There at last, I settle at a table and notice that the bookstore is ready for the population’s effort to keep their New Year’s resolutions. A large table is set out with ‘dieting tools’ – self help books, calorie tables and personal logs. We’re ready to move into an austerity phase after the indulgencies of the holidays. Feast, then famine is the traditional rollercoaster that we’re all stuck with.

Small World


Have you pondered and lost sleep over what happens to a leaf cutter ant when her teeth get worn down and she can’t cut it anymore? Is she reduced to bringing smaller and smaller bits of leaf back home until she gets laid off, or does she get left out there on her leaf, gumming away the rest of her days?

                                                                                              Gaurdian.co.uk

  A collaborative etymological project from guys at the U of Oregon and Oregon State U – the Ducks and the Beavers for the sporting types amongst us – have settled the issue. She changes her job. She takes up carrying leaf parts for the young blades who can slash with abandon, thus improving the efficiency of the whole operation and getting more leaf bits back to grow the fungi that the stay-at-homes are farming. A nice laid-back approach to career progression, no hanging onto jobs to avoid loss in status there.

Another exciting snippet from the insect world comes from the scientists at Yale who have been checking out the amorous behavior of the Squinting Bush Brown butterfly. Flashing each other is their preferred approach to getting together. Males like to do their flashing in the moist weather, leaving the females to get their own back by flashing at the males in the dry season. They have white centered spots on their wings that reflect ultraviolet light for effective flashing, maybe that’s why they are reduced to squinting. 

Snow at Salt Creek



A clear, crisp, sunny day and an expedition snowshoeing into see Salt Creek Falls is called for. The snow base here is about four feet and our snowshoes sink in about a foot. The water flow over the 286-foot drop is spectacular. Ice is hiding the columnar basalt producing the drop. The spray has colored the ice with a green-yellow tinge and there are strong blue shadows.   The coloration is possibly due to many fragments of moss or lichens of that color that are abundant here. The salt content of the tributary streams is high and may also contribute to the color.


Upstream of the falls, the creek is running fast with the occasional still pools. Here the stillness of the forest is near absolute with only the smallest rare disturbance from a clump of snow falling from the high branches and being returned to its original powder crystals as it falls. Colors are stark. A black and white palette would almost be adequate to paint the scene with the water black, the trees black and the snow white, with the only color from a strand of pale yellow-green moss or a blue tinge in the depths of the holes in the snow made by walking poles.




Coming out with a short detour brings us to Diamond Creek. The stark winter palette is relieved in the view up the creek as the gap in the forest allows us to see the sun reflecting from the distant treetops. The pale green is a welcome contrast.

Returning home alongside the river that alternately rushes over shallow rocks and then slows to regions of deeper pools, we see cormorants taking advantage of these fish rest stops. We pass a colony perched individually on rocks waiting for the next dinner bell. A particularly large individual occupies one rock, bigger than the rest, with its flat top decorated in a random white pattern. This is clearly the favored viewing point. A little farther on, a small herd of elk were lolloping through the birch trees completing our winter scenic and wildlife fixes.

Whales Tale

 
Whale Tail  from freenaturepictures.com

New Years day and we’re off to the coast to watch the whales go by on their way to their maternity and nursery ward at Baja California. With an estimated sixteen hundred gray whales due to parade past in the last week of December through the first week of the New year, we should have a chance of seeing one every thirteen minutes (on average). Of course, averages aren’t too kind when you’re standing, staring out to sea, with a brisk offshore wind and an air temperature around freezing. A large pod might have passed just before we set up or just after we packed up. Life can be a gamble at times.

The strong swell and offshore breeze, gave the sea a corduroy texture. With our binoculars we saw lots of birds fishing just in front of the glassy faces of the waves and further out, we saw the occasional suspicious vee-shape spray. Could they have been whales blowing? Or might they have been spray from a breaking wave way out to sea? H’mm, this is definitely a case for the willing suspension of disbelief if the numbness in our fingers is to be brushed aside as worthwhile inconvenience. 
         Waves on New Year's Day
The ponds have quieted down with the higher water levels after the increase in the height of the river. The geese have opted for large flock, grass feed events in the sunshine that we are currently enjoying. The peace can’t last too long. We await developments.