August, September, November

No October this year:  We went straight from warm and raining September to November, with only a few days of strong winds in between to strip the trees.  Fortunately beech trees hang on to many of  their leaves through the winter or there would not be any color left at all.

Golden beech leaves

It was much too windy to go out on the water today, so we walked "the loop", a 5 kilometer walk that gives us some nice views of the mountain and then brings us home through The Flat.

Past the dinosaurs in the driveway

Over the hill 

Crossing Cascade Brook on Shindagan Road

A nice view of the mountain.  Someone put snow on top last night.

Cross Hill Road towards Campground

Schoolhouse Pond.  

A scruffy White-Throat in the weeds

Palm Warbler looking at me.

And wagging his butt at me.

A Yellow-Rumped Warbler not showing his yellow rump.

Stiff Weeds

Terry Pratchett had one of his characters refer to trees as "stiff weeds".  Like any garden plants, the trees around a house need constant tending.

So what do you do if the forest hasn't been weeded in a long time?  Call in a gardener.  In this case a very competent and efficient arborist.

At 7:15 a.m., 5 men, 4 trucks, a chipper and a Bobcat with a claw arrived.  At 7:30 a.m. the crane showed up.  Within 30 minutes the first two trees had been cut, lifted over a house, and cut to length, with the branches chipped.  By the time the rain came in at 1:00 p.m. and made the work too dangerous, 14 trees, many of them pines close to 90 feet tall, were all stacked up nicely to be carried away.

It was a pleasure to watch experts.  One man rode a bucket to the top and tied a cable to the tree, then moved lower and cut.  The crane lifted the tree down where it was grabbed by the Bobcat and cut up.  Where there were electrical wires in the way, the crane lifted them over.

No room for the bucket, so the crane provided a lift to the top

And lifted the top right off

And put it down in the right spot

Where the bucket could be used, everything went faster.   

Tie off the treetop

Slide down

Cut the tree

And away it went

Each one of those ballast weights weighs 5,500 pounds

Lift the tree over the wires and set it down

Roots, Rocks, And Water

This afternoon we decided to hike Cocoa's Path, a 1/4 mile trail to Great Brook.  Then we decided to follow the trail along the brook for another half mile to the lower cascades.  Then we kept on the trail for another mile and a half to the upper cascades....  Then we gave up and dragged our feet downhill.

The lower part of the trail is through a hemlock woods.  Hemlocks love cool shade and shallow soil, so there were roots all along the lower trail.  Going up we stepped over the roots.  By the time we got back down we just tripped over them.  Then as we climbed we entered a beech woods.  Fewer roots, more rocks.

And always, running water.

The lower cascades

The trailhead.  There are no poop fairies

Partridgeberry.  

I wish I knew mushrooms

Following after Janet

Hemlock roots. They were harder to avoid after the first 4 miles

Apparently Eeyore lives here

Golden-crowned kinglets are hard to photograph

Can you see the kinglet?

Goldthread.  With thin, yellow roots that taste good

The upper cascades

I still wish I knew mushrooms

The light at the end of the trail.