Snow curlicues - how elegant!
Thursday, April 3, 2025
Curlicues
Wednesday, April 2, 2025
Web Décor
I don't know whether to call this a window decoration or web décor, quite frankly. It's the remains of prey in a spiderweb that I can see through my window.
Tuesday, April 1, 2025
The Return of Monochromy
Just as I was gloating over a return to a varied color palette, I was greeted again by this vision. It was expected, so not too shocking, but dang, I want to see more green settle in.
We've had a crowd of wood ducks (or is it a lumberyard, Dale suggests) and ring-neck ducks enjoying the seclusion and habitat our cove and breakwater offers.
This is so picturesque!
Monday, March 31, 2025
Treasure Revealed
The close up pic from yesterday is a beautiful fringed rosette lichen (Physcia stellaris) - magnificent! The intricate beauty and varied surface is stunning.
Sunday, March 30, 2025
Treasure
Saturday, March 29, 2025
Dimples
I love the look of these dimples (or blotches) in the changing ice - it's the imperfections that make it interesting.
Friday, March 28, 2025
Picture Perfect
What a difference a day makes!
Thursday, March 27, 2025
Grapefern Joy
This unusual native plant, the cutleaf grapefern (Sceptridium obliquum form, I believe) is sometimes referred to as an fern ally, not a true fern though it is fern-like. It's related to the more widespread rattlesnake fern, and grows underground for 8 years, establishing a network with mycorrhizal fungi in the soil before producing a frond above ground, one each year.
It is extremely beneficial to plants like this that we not destroy soil structure by digging and turning. Having an underground developmental time of 8 years before coming to the surface puts these organisms at risk of being destroyed when we disturb soils. I have had 2 occur in my yard since living here! So pleasing! Look at the beautiful glossy leaves.
Like orchids, their growing conditions are highly dependent on specific mycorrhizal networks, and are well nigh impossible to propagate artificially - leave them where they are and enjoy them.
Wednesday, March 26, 2025
Tuesday, March 25, 2025
Spring's Sting
After my recent reveling in the snow melt, spring gave in to winter's pressure and presented us with this dramatic monochromatic lake scene (complete with a cruising loon).
Thankfully, we were expecting this event, so it seemed more acceptable - a last hurrah, possibly? This is how it looked most of the day.
It was about 4 inches, but it fell on clear ground and liquid water, so it shouldn't hang around too long.
Monday, March 24, 2025
Rutting Season
Ugh! Together the rain and snowmelt have turned our untarred road into a rutted mess, making traversing some areas rather adventurous and skiddy!

Potholes abound, and are not solitary either, but rather congregating in clusters or rows. Their depths "bend" the shadows.
It's funny to read that people are wondering when the Association will "grate" the roads, when they mean grade! They are already grated, IMO.
Sunday, March 23, 2025
Water's Flowing
Woo hoo! Our lake is liquid again, and the mergansers, loons and mallards are taking advantage.
Saturday, March 22, 2025
Lucky Ducks
"Our" resident wood ducks now have a new location for their assisted living home in our cove. We've had a duck box on a pole standing in the water, but it's been pushed sideways by ice and hasn't really been upright for a number of years now.
After much planning, Dale hatched a great plan to suspend the duck box over the cove, making sure to thread PVC pipe onto the wire to stop predators (squirrels, raccoons) reaching the box to eat their eggs. It has turned out beautifully - I sure hope the wood ducks approve and grace us with their presence very soon.
Friday, March 21, 2025
Larval Pathways
I was intrigued by these patterns on a few twigs lying on the lawn. They looked rather creative, like nature's version of scrimshaw.
Thursday, March 20, 2025
Orange Treasures
I was able to notice some really cool orange items in between the renovations and clean up in Orange, MA this week.
First up, a black bear's calling card on the lawn, with orange seeds embedded within
Next, an orange jelly fungus known as witch's butter
A neighbor's delightful (though non-native) crocuses with orange centers
Wednesday, March 19, 2025
Embedded in Ice
I love the fragility of these wispy looking leaves embedded in textured ice
Oak leaves frozen in time, looking mirage-like
Tuesday, March 18, 2025
Looking Good
Since taking this picture, a fair amount of snow has melted, and the edges of the lake are watery (not solid) as you can see in the next picture, taken 10 days later. It looks rather dreary without sunshine, but at least our yard is no longer 100% white.
Trudging through the snow to the lake edge is like walking through a slushie.
It looks so messy!
Monday, March 17, 2025
Scrumping: Thievery or Windfall?
When the word scrumping came up recently, it made me wonder whether what I do when I encounter roadside berries, fruits and timber is ethical. Hmm, am I stealing, as indicated by the Cambridge English dictionary definition of scrumping: "an old English word for stealing fruit such as apples from trees"?
It's not that I trespass on people's lands and fields to harvest fruit they would otherwise use. I don't climb over fences or cross boundary lines. Rather, I see it as an innocent way to use produce that would otherwise go to waste, of making use of public bounty along roadways and other non-privatized places. I don't like to believe I might be stealing - though I know it's not my land ... I usually only take things that appear to have been abandoned or forgotten, whose use or value to others is negligible.
But then I consider whether I'm merely seeing our resources from a capitalist viewpoint ... since nothing goes to waste in nature; if I don't "use" it, it will be recycled, composted and become transformed into a life form again. It's all part of the same network and cycle - it's not just a usability issue, and it won't ever go 'to waste,' for nature has none! But it's also my way of being thrifty, of making use of produce that I don't have to pay money for.
Sunday, March 16, 2025
Saturday, March 15, 2025
Entangled with Fungi
It's a revelatory and earth-shattering read, forcing us out of our preconceptions about the living world, and revealing how little we really do understand non-animate life. In addition, it's beautifully and poetically written, with outstanding, helpful metaphors.
Sheldrake describes the mycelial network of fungi as our planet's "ecological connective tissue", and a "living seam of sprawling, interlaced webs." He refers to fungi as ecosystem engineers, which "underwrite the regenerative capacity of the living world," and which contain "an ancient library of information" enabling fungi to re-model themselves as environments change.
As "chemical wizards", they are VITAL partners in helping solve the ecological disasters and climate disruptions from human activity. We owe it to ourselves not to destroy them further.