Eastern Coyotes Come to Town

For several weeks there's been some neighborhood commotion over the coyotes who have made their presence known. One woman spotted a single coyote coming out of the woods while she was walking and said to me, "I saw this dog that had the body of a fox but the head of a wolf and it was big as your dog(a lab mix). It poked its head out of the woods as I passed on the road. It was beautiful." Another woman was very happy to see it after she had heard so many reports of its existence. She finally saw it one morning chasing a rabbit through her yard. Many of us, if we hadn't seen one by December 30th were disappointed as if we weren't among the elite. We would pass each other on the road and the question would inevitablly rise from one of us "Have you seen the coyote"? I finally saw one, the one we're calling "the blonde one" while walking my dog quite late, around 11 pm. It was a very large dog, and a dirty yellow white. It hung around the snow banks and did a lot of weaving along the road as if trying to dodge its own shadow. It kept far enough away so I was comfortable but it was bit unnerving. I feel awe in the presence of the wild. I'd never been that close to a truly wild animal not in a cage except for a bear once in California. I love sharing my neighborhood with wildlife but I worry: Will people keep them safe and themselves, too. Will they be tempted to feed them and create problems such as coyotes becoming agressive around food? Will they keep their cats in, especially at night? I hope I'll see them again. I am pretty certain that I will because they'll have some pups soon. There's just enough woods here for them and for that we're fortunate.

Seasons' Transitions

Last night we fell back in time. Somehow it feels connected to the oaks and their heavy plum and rust colored leaves, their obstinence in holding on, or holding back. Last year it was a disaster, the early blizzard fell on trees and the weight made them crack and groan. The pain of the forest was audible, trees crashed to the ground, limbs were torn, and homes of several animals were demolished. This transition from fall to winter is gentler this year, in fact, some of summer still lingers in the crickets and a few cicadas that insist on clinging to the bark and sounding off like broken car starters. The robins still circle around the yard -- I have so many earth worms! Raking leaves, I can scoop up fist fulls. If only I ate worms!
   This year, I won't rake back near the woods. But most of what's around the yard I'll take up. There must be a lot of tiger moths about -- I've seen so many wooly bears this year -- found some small ones dead in the road not too far from here as I walked Morris. Perhaps pesticide killed them. This is still a neighborhood that values a big green lawn.
   Last year, next door to me, a 1920s, kidney- shaped pool, full of bleach and shock was emptied into the forest. Then it was filled in with soil from the garden so that the garden is now a sunken garden inviting flooding and soil erosion. And just as sudden, the forest grew quieter. The frogs -- and there must of been a good-sized bull frog and lots of smaller ones -- were silent. Such disregard for animals makes my heart break.
Last year I didn't hear the peepers.
   The squirrels are out digging like mad, small groups of gray squirrels with black squirrels are on the lawns. I worry about those chemicals in the grass and what that will mean for squirrel reproduction. My grass is chemical free (hopefully). I am sure there are chemicals from the rain and run off from neighbors.
Morris finds a few squirrels that have darted out before the cars. He always looks for them  as we circle around. His nose needs to find them every time, they're in the leaves on the side, no one has buried them.
I read a story once about a person who felt compelled to bury all road kill in ceremony. Sometimes I feel like that.

Squirrels

Slowly I am seeing more and more furry friends: cottontail, chipmunk and squirrels! A beautiful woodchuck is still around and at night there's a lone owl, hooting away. Last year its hoots were reciprocated but this year, it seems for naught, the messages are falling on a dark woods with no response. Two bird houses are at full capacity -- one with wrens, the other chickadees. I think the chickadees got there first because last year it was the wren's chosen spot.

Wren. It is so obvious that I'm being watched.

Weird Flies seem to be mating in the woody area

Please leave a comment if you can 

Identify this insect/ fly? It's on everything right now. This is Sassafras. But it's on Rhodies, etc. in western Ma.

Poison on Your Lawn

This morning two squirrels before 9:00 am. Put out critter food: corn, sunflower seed, peanuts. All the feeders are down and put away. Mass Dept. Of Wildlife guesses there may have been a virus that went through over winter or we had a proliferation of squirrels the year before from the bumper crop of acorns. Three years ago we had so many acorns that my son's car was damaged -- it looked like dough that someone had repeatedly stuck their finger into.  I'm hopeful as the months pass that I'll see more squirrels.
My concern is the prolific use of lawn pesticides being used everywhere for "green lawns." Alternative grasses, clovers, flowers, mosses, ferns, could populate spaces and poisons, because these chemicals are poison, could be curtailed. I wonder how long people spend thinking about what they're doing when they have their lawns treated? If they have one thought it is probably what they will pay for the treatment and not the cost to the environment or their own health. Squirrels bury their food in those lawns. Fireflies breed in them. There are homes that I pass where I need to hold my nose because the smell of chemicals is so strong. Leeching in the ground water, it is only a matter of time before you drink it.
 

Also missing are chipmunks

I miss squirrels and yes, maybe it's too early to see chipmunks. But we haven't seen those either. I did hear that there is a fisher but I haven't seen it. It really couldn't eat everything, could it? And I've seen a gorgeous woodchuck with a thick reddish brown coat and bushy tale down in the dingle. I hope to take it's picture but its very shy.
Walking in the woods by what Greg calls "the tall grass" I found several wild turkey. And one evening I saw a deer while walking Morris.