At Morgan Creek Today

The water level is starting to drop but there was still plenty flowing by to make for an OK stream watch snapshot.  I was joined for a bit by my friend Eric and his dog Willow.  Once she got restless they took off and left me in quiet solitude to finish the task.

I did not see the variety or number of critters I sometimes find, but there were still things to look at.  Loads of crawdads big and small.  Dragonfly larvae; slow moving, shield shaped, they remind me of little tanks.   A salamander, still breathing through gills, less than an inch long, almost translucent.  Small fish, big tadpole, lots and lots of wiggly caddisflies.

Many damselflies were in the air but I did not find their slender fairly-like larvae in the water.  With jet black wings and neon blue bodies I love to watch them dancing and flitting together above the stream.

Once I had finished my "work", I waded up stream in search of a spot deep enough to lie down in.  I heard something moving on the bank ahead of me and looked up in time to see a coyote staring back at me.  We met eyes for a moment and then he turned tail and trotted off in the other direction.  I found a hole thigh deep and lay down to float for a few minutes, get that deep cool way down into my flesh.

Post dip selfie

When the horseflies found me and started to bite, I headed home to chill in the AC.
I wish you all a very happy solstice.

Change of Plans

 In my last post I told of my impending trip to the Weymouth Center in Southern Pines, but in a flash everything changed.  I could have titled this post "shit happens"  because it did.  First David woke on Saturday night with vomiting and diarrhea.  I nursed him two days and he slept and I thought I had dodged the bullet and happily packed my bags and lots of groceries, along with all my writing accoutrements and headed out Monday afternoon to join my friends for gin and tonics on the porch, supper and chatting.  I unpacked that night, set up my little room, computer on the desk, my writing books in a stack to one side, journals on the other, pens in the drawer, clothes in the closet, I was ready.  Then it was my turn to wake retching.  Needless to say, this colored the week for me and everyone else.

I rested and was nursed until on Wednesday I felt strong enough to return home where I have continued to recuperate.  Only one of my companions was struck down, she on Wednesday night, returned home on Friday, two more were left standing and stayed the whole week, another, she who nursed us, returned home on Thursday and was also spared the crud.

It was not the week we had all been dreaming of.

I'm trying to move on, though it's hard to let go.  But here at home, feeling stronger each day, I've read, written, taken walks, worked in the garden a bit, eventually been able to cook and enjoy food again, slept and spent some quality time with my man.  Yesterday, I ventured down to the creek during the heat of the day.  Some of the mountain laurel were still in bloom, their white flowers hanging over the deep green, some falling, drifting down the stream or scattered on the mossy banks.  I rested my feet in the cool water, too chilly to go all the way in, I was satisfied just to soak my toes and feel the breeze, listen to the sound of the water burbling past, watch the play of light on the trees.

 

Sometimes, there is just no place like home

Everything's On The Move

It's been warm this week and after an inch of rain last night, a front pushed through bringing clear, dry air for the afternoon.  In the yard there are a few things pushing out, the blood root (above) started opening on Sunday along with quince and more daffodils.  The primroses open wider, making their Easter egg colors pop from the leaf litter, camellias continue and the plum trees (below) burst into bloom over the weekend.

In the veg garden the peas are starting to emerge and in the past week I planted carrots, beets and 200+ onion plants.  Tomatoes, eggplants, peppers and basil are snugged up in a corner of the bedroom in flats sitting atop a heat mat and under a grow light, germination was very good this year, despite some seeds dating back to the late 90's and early 2000's.  I store the packets in the freezer in plastic boxes and they can keep for a very long time.

This afternoon while touring the yard together to see what was new and exciting, I said to David "Look at that snaky root over there"  and then together we said "That's not a snaky root, that's a rooty snake!"  On closer inspection, it was a good sized black snake, basking in the sun and looking gray like a tree root because it was probably about to shed.

Later I took a long ramble through the woods and saw more critters doing the work of spring.  The lowlands were pulsating with the songs of peepers and chorus frogs.  As I passed by the pond, mud turtles plopped into the water off their sunning logs and hung near the surface, enjoying the warmth of the water after crawling out of their muddy winter beds.  I stood for a while on the bridge where the water from the pond flows down a waterfall into a creek.  The overflow was running high from last nights rain, noisy, splashing over rocks and eddying into a swirling foam galaxy at the bottom of the fall before rushing on down to Morgan. 

In the woods and along the stream banks the trout lilies are peaking, and the dainty white spring beauties are also blooming now.  I heard a pair of red-shouldered hawks and looking up spotted them right above me, having a courting conversation and when  the male flew with pine needles in his beak I followed him with my eye to the nest and made a note of which tree top the platform of sticks was resting in for future observation. 

I roamed overland, climbing up to a high ridge line that I seldom visit because it's a steep climb.  I had the urge because I know that too soon the ticks will be out and I won't want to go off the trail. Cruising along I was startled when I came upon this BIG snapping turtle right in the center of the trail.

I spent some time with this girl?  I think so, obviously on the move in search of a mate and a place to lay eggs, she was quite a distance from the nearest pond.  Her shell was easily 12 inches long. 

I tossed this pine cone down as a measure, it is 4 inches, same width as her head pretty much.  I admired her eyes, elephant skin, snout and that beak of a mouth ( if you click on the picture I think you can zoom in).   I kept my distance, I have read that a snapper can reach their neck out 12 inches in a quick thrust.  And check out those bear like claws!

I relish this time of year when the sap starts to rise in all things living, myself included.

An afternoon adventure up stream

After a dingy start, a wind blew in around midday, busted up the clouds, the sun came out and the sky went clear blue.  I pulled together my bag of tricks; water, snack, camera and journal and headed out on what I like to call a lark.  For a change of pace I headed up Morgan Creek to see if I could find a place that I had been told had a stone circle.  I walked along the level and slower moving section of the creek, where the bottom is wide and full of pine trees on the north side, steep rocky bluffs to the south with the sinuous grey roots of beech trees spreading out through the brown leaf litter like long fingers gripping the hillside.  Then both sides became steeper, a high bluff on the north side then gave way and I found the circle, set next to one of the biggest beach trees I've ever seen.

I thought "what a perfect place to have a winter solstice gathering, too bad it's on private land."  Just beyond this point the path peters out but there is an old bridge footing with a stone wall along one side, I guess this bridge was replaced by the one that now crosses the creek at Dairyland Road.  Closer to the stone circle I also found these stepping stones across the creek.  

All of this must have been created by John Hartley (who died in the summer of 2011), when he developed Oxbow Crossing back in the late 90's, but I had not seen it before.  It seems impossible, but the few times that I walked that far upstream, I somehow missed this place.  Now the stones are all covered with moss like they've been there for a century.

I rambled on back down to our land, taking in the sounds of the high wind in the trees, coming gusty on and off.  I listened to the sound of the water as it fell down the little shelves and falls, the water level high enough to make a joyful noise, but steady, not rushing, so the eddies were clear. 

 I watched a winter wren duck in and out of this trees roots, just the sort of spot they love to search for bugs and then hop up to a perch, their tiny tails pointed straight up into the air, bobbing and twittering before disappearing back under a root or into a cavity.

It was a grand day to be out after yesterdays gloomy rain and I wandered down to my favorite bluff of rocks.  Always near the winter solstice I make a special point of visiting the places I consider the topography to have the most power and this includes the big rock outcroppings.  I was out and about for nearly 2 hours and then came home to finish up the days chores, do a little stretching and hunker down to a supper of freshly cut broccoli, lentil and collard soup made yesterday and a grilled cheese sandwich, talk about your comfort foods.  I am feeling comfortable about now.

Dry Creek

I wandered down to Morgan today, curious to see what was left of it. The pond was very low- edges muddy and mucky for several feet. The understory felt thin, part from lack of rain, part from browsing deer is my guess.

When I got down to the big creek it looked like a rough cobblestone road. Only scattered pools remain, a few tiny fish still scraping out an existence, having managed to allude the herons that hunt daily in these remaining wet spots.

This is where we normally do the stream watch, no stream left to watch.

The microstegium- stilt grass- is really taking over the stream banks. We've tried to spray but it's just too much and keeps washing down stream from above, feels hopeless. I fear its choking out all the native plants.

I was rewarded with this one cardinal flower blooming in the stream bed just up from my swimming hole. I always ponder getting in my deep spot and cleaning it out when the water gets low like this but I never get around to it. I'm making do with the sound of the wind in the trees, which resembles flowing water or surf slipping over a beach, until the real sound of water returns.

On Turning Fifty

It was my fiftieth birthday on Saturday. I believe I won't live to 100 so I'm shooting for 75 as a ripe old age to wind up at. That means I've only got 25 years left to finish what I've started and everything I try to do seems to take longer than it once did. Oh well, we can only accomplish as much as we possibly can.

In honor of the day I took a long walk around the land, visiting all my favorite power spots and thinking about what I wanted from this year and the next third of my life. It was a phenomenal day which I took as a good sign, sunny and clear, blue blue skies, the trees still turning. Dogwoods flame with the lower leaves yellow and upper leaves red.

The Ginko Biloba on its' way from deep green to lime green to yellow to gold. We are placing bets on which day this week all the leaves will drop off, they tend to fall almost simultaneously.

On my walk down to the creek I drank in the gorgeous day. Dry leaves were swirling around and down, making a crinkling sound as they fluttered out of the trees, through the air and landed crisply on the ground. A giant oak fell across the creek in the hurricane Hannah flood making a perfect bridge, so I scaled it and crossed to walk with a new perspective from the other side. Over there the bottom land is broad and flat with tall trees, on our side are steep mossy bluffs, rocky and veined with ropey beech roots.

I wandered on down to the big rock bluff, getting there is treacherous, the path now so narrow that you can only put one foot in front of the other, 6 feet above the water on one side, a steep bluff on the other offering no reprieve, nothing to hold on to. But I precariously made my way along the ledge and then scrabbled up the steep slope to sit on top of the big rocks and study the way the big beech branches wrap around them at the top and the roots of the sycamores across the creek grow around the rocks below.

The water was flowing beneath the rocks at the bend at a level that created an echo and reverberation amplifying the burbling, gurgling creek, sending that music up to me as I sat on top, watching the leaves fall, feeling the air on my face, the sun on me and feeling pretty damn good about the place I am in my life right now. A pileated woodpecker called and flew across the sky, a portent of good things I'm sure.

The day progressed into a clear and starry night filled with friends and laughter, champagne and good food, fire and fireworks to send me into a festive new year and new beginnings. The 40's were my best decade of life so far and I think the 50's are going to be even more miraculous.

Celebrations continued into the week, between the fabulous election results- Go Obama!- and my B'day, I've drunk more bubbly in the past week than in the past two or three years, I'm drying out now and moving forward to bright days ahead.

Hurricane Hannah

We woke to rain and high winds that continued through the early morning, the edge of Hurricane Hannah as it passed through North Carolina. We had 5 inches of rain in that many hours. We managed to make coffee just before the power went out and sat in the shadowy house watching the rain and wind whipping through the trees. By 9:30 the power was back on and we made blueberry pancakes from the last handful of berries off our bushes.

The rain stopped so we headed down to check out how high the water was. Wow. We considered the idea of pumping up the inner tubes and taking a ride, the water was so high it was clearing all known rocks and obstacles but we came to our senses and decided the creek side view was exciting enough.

We were lucky here, to get only 5 inches of rain and only have the power out for about an hour. As I waded into the water to see how close to the edge of the raging creek I could get, I thought of an image of a woman in Haiti- standing in front of a tiny shack, the water up to her knees, with her few belongings in a plastic bag. That whole poor island is going to wash into the sea as they have cut down all the trees. As water swirled all around me, I had one brief moment of thinking I could feel what that woman might have felt. I can only imagine the devastation and the frightening prospect of having no idea what might happen next.

We are so lucky to have a high and dry safe house to live in.

Some scenes from here today.

A path disappearing into the water

Morgan Creek raging

The bridge floating over the pond creek, good thing it's tied to a tree

Me "surfing" on the bridge, Morgan Creek ripping along to my left.

The sun is out here now and the waters are subsiding, hope folks faired all right closer to the eye of the storm.