November is ending

 I didn't take many photos in November. 

Well, not many Landscape - Forest scenery. 

I think it is because this is my adjustment period from fall to winter. 

I enjoyed  watching the barberry plants in the woods change. These plants make great plantings in a suburban area but when they invade the woods, they make for prickly walking.

They are fun to photograph in the fall and winter. But I they don't provide wildlife with a meal. Well, I take that back. The birds eat these and spread it in their poo creating a thick undergrowth of plants that change the pH in the soil. These thickets are a wonderful Wood Tick Habitat. 

So, I have a love/hate relationship with them. I fight them on my land but it feels like a losing battle as my neighbor's 500+ acres of forest is infested with them.

Never the less. They are beauties to photograph.

There are morning frosts that are sometimes just so stunning and other times you just have to find the small things close to the ground to look at.

Some days a person get brilliant fleeting moments of color in a sunrise or sunset.  Sometimes those times are so incredibly beautiful in a very pastel way.

Yesterday we had dense fog and poor visibility. I still had to get to town but I took the scenic route and stopped at my favorite bridge on a back road.

By the time I was done in town, the fog was so dense it was hard to see. This is another reason I am grateful I am not doing the 60 mile round trip to work at odd hours anymore.

However, in a way, I thought the fog was beautiful. 

Today, I hope to get out and explore what froze in the creek last night as the temperatures went from 40 degrees to 21. And IT is snowing! :)

Time to think about some fun things. Like. ...

Experimenting with the Christmas Chair. The Jury is still out on this as I am going for less 'stuff' this year. But I did bring it out and set the jointed bear I made sooooo many years ago on it. As with most of my Christmas Stuff, it will constantly change.

Afternoon walk

I wanted to see if I had marked the trail well enough. There is a spot in the trail that gives the hiker two choices.
Either choice is good and will lead to the same place.

Once marked it seems they are so easy to follow. Well, they really aren't. But I had redone some of the notches on the trees anyway.

Down in the valley the snowmobile club folks had taken a bulldozer to the creek. They must have retrieved the culvert and put it back down as a crossing.

This will hold until the next big snow melt or flash flood. The dozer filled in the area with loose soil. Erosion was never an issue until they started moving the earth around.

Here is the hole that they filled in again. It was about 6 feet deep.

I followed the valley to the end and searched out the spot that used to have a 'waterfall' of sorts.
I found it. Of course everything had changed drastically since spring. We'd had a few mild flash floods and as with this area, it rearranged the land. The shot below is the current version.

This is from 3 years ago.

I love how things never really stay the same.

After I visited what I call 'the spring falls' [a large spring is above this area and flows through water cress and rocks before it burrows into the land and joins the main creek] ~ I went to the Long Rocky Dry Run.
It is one of the harder places to get to.

Here is a view from above it after I climbed out.

Don't be fooled by the photo, the steep sides are challenging. Rock and mountain climbing are good skills to have here.

As I went home I stopped by another place that had changed quite a bit with the freezing temperatures.

One of the places I like to jump over the creek is here. This was Sunday.

The above shot is in the same place but on Friday.

The volume of water has changed in certain spots too. Here it was again on Sunday.

And here it was on November 11th.

The heavier flow of water has shifted to the opposite side of the rocks changing the whole look of the little pond area.

However, the trout didn't seem to mind a bit.

I could have spent hours exploring more. But daylight fades early and chores must be done.
I headed home.

Hiking in the creek is refreshing

On a hot summer day.  As pictured, I wear my Vibrams to walk in the creek.  I stay nice and cool while the heat and humidity soak up the woods.  I've had these 'shoes' now for three years and absolutely love wearing them.  That is, in case anyone was interested.

Morris and I came down through the woods and meandered along the creek.
What was our purpose?  To check fences of course and then to just wander and look at things.

We found some Self Heal growing in the woods.  This is commonly found in the pasture also.

The Elderberry bushes are beginning to blossom:

We found poison ivy [not in my woods or near the creek, but I thought I'd add it here because those who got into it last week did not recognize it and are suffering for it now.  It was located behind the mailbox and next to where they did all the work on the phone cable.]

This was hidden in with the native pink rose.

This was near the phone 'box' near the road.

Truly truly, if you live in a wooded area please be aware of these plants!

So Morris and I continued on our merry way through the creek.

He is a pretty smart little dog.  When it is hot.  He walks right in the creek instead of fighting the tall grass.  But when the creek gets too deep, he leaps to the bank and runs through the grass until he can drop back into the cooling waters.

 The grass is so tall!  He could get lost in it!

But being the 'cool' dog that he is.  He picked a shady spot and stood in it to cool off.

And then we found the dreaded Wild Parsnip.  The roots are good to eat in the early spring and late fall, this is an invasive weed.
If you break the plant while it is in blossom and get the sap on your exposed skin, and it gets exposed to sunlight, you will get a burn from it.
Not that I am going to test it out any time soon.

As a blossom, it is pretty though.

Last stop before going home was sitting in the creek on a boulder and cooling off a bit before hiking back home.
The gnats finally made it impossible to enjoy it any longer.

We had a wonderful time doing nothing but exploring.
Morris was very happy.

Morris was also very worn out when we did get home.
He napped on the couch the rest of the day.

Whatever you do, enjoy your summer days.
Remember, winter comes too soon!