Category Archives: wild things

Stories in the snow – tracks

Nature, Rural Life, wild things, , , , , ,

I’ve always been fascinated by the stories of lives otherwise unseen that winter reveals. So it was a real treat, on Saturday March 5, to join Shirley French at her property on Cranberry Lake as she led a session for DCLA (Dog & Cranberry Lakes Association) members on Tracks in the Snow.

Illustration of animal tracks

I  think someone must have had what my grandfather used to call ‘a hotline to the clerk of the weather’! Certainly, we were blessed with an almost perfect day – snow fresh enough for distinct tracks, cold but not too cold, dry, and reasonably bright.

A group of a dozen or so intrepid trackers, including two delightful young girls bursting with enthusiasm and curiosity, gathered on Shirley’s land for an initial briefing on what we might find. Helpful illustrations of the tracks we were likely to see supplemented what we had already gleaned from a video of winter visitors that Shirley made available before the event.

Intrepid trackers

A story of a fox, a weasel, and a snake (and other animals)

Unsurprisingly, the first tracks we spotted were those of the ubiquitous white-tailed deer, as well as squirrel and rabbit.

However, there was real excitement when we spotted some intriguing tracks leading up over a rock. Of course, we had to investigate! Skirting carefully up the slope behind the rock we discovered the partially eaten remains of a snake, likely a water snake. Who dragged it there? At the time, we didn’t arrive at a clear answer. But later Shirley went back and measured the footprints on the rock. The narrative that emerged was that it was a fox who left the snake’s remains. The fox likely stole the prey from a weasel, an animal that could access a snake hibernaculum, perhaps in the side of a small island just offshore across the ice.

Prints on the rock
Walk to the intriguing rock
The remains of a snake

The ongoing story, as captured by video footage in the days that followed, included visits to the snake by a leery crow and a nibbling racoon; fox and porcupine also passed by.

It’s worth noting that this rock was already of interest as Shirley had previously identified a mink den beneath it, sharing some lovely footage of their comings and goings in her preliminary video.

Further explorations

We continued our explorations, edging out towards the lake and clambering up rocky paths, all the while noting the evidence of abundant life written in the snow. The distinctive tracks of porcupine often include the sweep of their dragging tail alongside their clawed toes – four at the front, five at the back. Turkey tracks are like direction markers, though they point back in the direction they’ve come from rather than forward to where they are going! We saw both of these.

Measuring a Track
Porcupine trail
Turkey trail

It was truly exhilarating to forge a path through the snow to one of the highest points above Cranberry lake. What a view!

What a view over Cranberry Lake!

Many thanks to Shirley for her leadership, the sharing of her knowledge and the invitation to walk her land and to all the participants, especially the youngest ones, who helped make this a captivating and magical experience.

Written for and published in the Dog & Cranberry Lakes Association Newsletter, June 2022

Last year for the DCLA Newsletter I wrote about my attempts at getting to know our trees in The Year of the Trees

Wilderness, wonder and intentionality

First Nations, Nature, wild things, , , , , ,

Nestled in the woods just north of Frontenac Provincial Park, Wintergreen is a year-round education and retreat centre. Their focus is education, culture, and the environment and they offer courses and retreat and meeting facilities for individuals and groups.

Wintergreen - the lodgeInside the lodge

This last weekend we had the pleasure of staying two nights in the main lodge, a wonderful, off-grid straw-bale building with a green roof. The lodge sits in a meadow, immediately surrounded by flowers, herbs and vegetables with the forest beyond.

The garden

Wintergreen’s 204 acres features mixed forests and meadows, granite outcroppings, ponds, marshes, and a glacier carved lake – we managed to explore a good part of this during an awesome two-hour wilderness hike.

Glacier carved lake

I watched a beaver slide into a pond and swim across it, my first certain sighting. Less romantically but no less a landmark, I picked my first tick off my clothing as we sat on the dock by the glacial lake. With ticks increasingly present – even in Toronto this summer – and concerns about Lyme Disease, this is something we all need to know about!

Forest trail

I stopped worrying about sticking to ‘the beaten track’ (sometimes we lost the trail for a while) and soaked up the beauty of the woodland, the lake and ponds, the rock, as we explored, occasionally investigating one of the wilderness cabins (including a hobbit house) that dot the property. We did do a thorough tick inspection when we got back to the lodge, though.

Hobbit House (and hobbit?)

Earlier that day, I had joined thirteen other women in ‘Celebrating the Sacredness of Woman’, a workshop led by Julie Vachon a Metis woman who has studied with many elders and has attended ceremonies over the last 18 years. Among other things, we shared a new moon pipe, part of a ceremonial setting of personal intention at Sturgeon Moon, the August new moon. At a moment when my life is literally at the cusp of a major transition, this was moving and profound, as well as joyous.

This was one of those magic times outside time that feels utterly ‘meant’!

By the lake

 

See also Wintergreen Studios – a piece of heaven at the edge of wilderness – a Google Story for more photos!

 

Capital time

Art & culture, Food, Leisure, Museums & galleries, Ottawa, Sightseeing, wild things

(Written early in September but delayed due to lack of time to sort out our photos!)

Ottawa.

Where are all the people? On a Saturday early in August, it seemed so quiet compared with Toronto! We realized how true it is that everyone leaves this city of politicians and bureaucrats at the weekend when we found it thrumming on Monday night.

Diving into Canadian history; the Museum of Civilization is amazing, beautifully put together in a wonderful building designed by First Nations architect Douglas Cardinal, but also overwhelming. We drank deep of the First Peoples’ Hall, wandered across a continent and  through hundreds of years of history in the Canada Hall and came ‘Face to Face’ with some key Canadian personalities – I was pleased to find I already knew at least something about many of them. (The Wikipedia article gives a great overview).

Museum of Civilization, Ottawa Museum of Civilization, Ottawa   Museum of Civilization, Ottawa Fabulous ceiling at the Museum of Civilization, Ottawa   Museum of Civilization, Ottawa Zen Garden, Museum of Civilization, Ottawa

Chinese Fireworks over Lac Leamy in Gattineau (the Quebec side of the Ottawa river), were more spectacular even than our expectations of them.

Ottawa Ottawa - Skunk A day to recover from intellectual indigestion, sandwiching our exploration of the Byward Market  (one of Canada’s oldest, fabulous foods, with funky shops including a run of high-end boutiques to the east) between exceptional local food for both brunch and dinner (Navarra and Fraser Cafe)  – it was particularly fun at the latter to let the chefs decide what to feed us! Paul risked expulsion from our hotel room – any closer to the skunk he photographed and I would not have wanted him anywhere near me.  Strange that, in our capital city, we also got our first sightings of both a groundhog and a beaver.

Parliament Hill, Ottawa Parliament Hill, Ottawa   Parliament Hill, Ottawa Parliament Hill, Ottawa   Parliament Hill, Ottawa Parliament Hill, Ottawa

Parliament Hill, Ottawa Mosaika - Parliament Hill, Ottawa (great sound and light show about what it means to be Canadian) It seems as if much of Canada needs to be experienced from the water. Ottawa is no exception – you gain a really good sense of how things fit together (and we still find ourselves awed by the immensity of the rivers). Having absorbed the overview, we headed up the Rideau Locks to Parliament Hill. History and citizenship came together as we toured both the exterior and the interior, visiting the House of Commons and Senate, as well as the library, the Peace Tower and some of the committee rooms. Later that evening, we returned for Mosaika, a fabulous exploration in sound and light of what it means to be Canadian projected against the Parliament buildings.

Of course, this being  August, we couldn’t skate the Rideau, definitely on our list of ‘must dos’. So I guess that means we will be back . . .

(There are more photos in our gallery.)

Even the birds sing in a different vernacular . . .

Nature, wild things, , , ,

Something quite magical about Toronto is that it is cut through with ravines, carved when the glaciers melted.  It is amazing to wander or cycle along a creek, steep banks to either side, almost without awareness of human habitation; just cool greenness.

Cycling home through Taylor Creek last week, I reached a marshy, open section of the ravine, cattails rimed with the gold of evening. I was stopped in my tracks by the choral konk-a-ree calls and scarlet flashes of the Red-winged Blackbirds. Definitely a foreign language!

Red-winged Blackbird

Photograph of Red-winged Blackbird by Alan And Elaine Wilson

A visitor

wild things,

As I came into the office this morning, I noticed the twitch of a big, fuzzy shape in the window above the back door . . .

Raccoon Above the back door in our office at 14 Balsam Ave. Raccoon Above the back door in our office at 14 Balsam Ave.

(click on the images for a larger version!)

Raccoons look so amazingly cuddly, with their soft fur and big, dark ringed eyes! Actually most people here recognize them as disease ridden pests that chew the roofing shingles (and most everything else), raid unsecured bins, are almost fearless and pose a number of health risks.