Musings

Walking around the orchard these days, there’s an uneven chorus of dull, rather quiet thuds. Apples falling.

I don’t remember Dad telling me about this tree, but since the deer are avoiding the drops, I’m guessing this is a pollinator—so: for the pollen and not the apples. I guess the pollinator trees are somewhat like the drones in an ant colony. Somewhat.

There’s a poetically named Lake of the Clouds west of here; this is Lake under the Clouds. There wasn’t much sunshine today, but we had constant cloud-cover (shown here), and even some rain.

Posted at 10:02 PM | Comments Off on Nearby

I’m not burying the lede. Our lede. We went to the Refuge, and saw swans. And a few other waterfowl. And a raptor-type something or other, I think.

The light was odd and not always helpful. And I forgot the binocs.

Pouring rain for this shot. Lasted about two big minutes, and this is near the beginning. The wind came up and the rain came in and I rolled the window up. Goodbye, cattails.

In WashDC, the lede this evening is something else entirely.

Posted at 7:51 PM | Comments Off on Refuge quietude

I just checked out GooMaps satellite view to see how far this channel goes, as this direction is toward the upper reaches of the catchment. Less than a quarter mile.

You probably can’t pick her out, but just at the last visible bend is a lady mallard paddling away. I think she’s the same one who surprises me most days when I walk this way by jumping into flight while loudly quacking. As she did today. She sure is hanging around this spot for quite a while.

Posted at 8:24 PM | Comments Off on Me and one lady mallard

Daylight began with piercing quiet and heavy ground-fog.

As the day progressed, overcast and intermittent precip alternated with streaks of sunshine—you can see one of the latter illuminating a sand dune in the distance.

Today’s big chore was heading to town for groceries and a raid of the hardware store. Instead of the direct road, 44 miles round trip, we took the long way, up to Lake Superior in a big loop—a detour that took us 111 miles. Well worth the miles of mud puddles and bumps on the unpaved stretch between Grand Marais (where I took the photo) and Deer Park. Great names, no?

I walked subsequently, toward the end of the daylight portion of the day, when it was windy and sunny and surprisingly pleasant, quite the opposite of the morning.

Now, as darkness closes in, it’s less windy and threatening rain. Soooo good to be indoors.

Posted at 6:21 PM | 1 Comment »

I found the sunrise foine, and the sky terrific. I find that channel through the left-of-center especially striking.

I kept hearing sandhills yesterday, and today I caught them cruising just above the trees (right of post), attracted by their calls, which resonate I swear for miles. Just a pair.

You can see only one raven in the dead elm (elm is ID hypothesis); actually, when it flew seconds later, I saw it had a companion.

No Canada geese, however.

Posted at 8:19 PM | Comments Off on Bird report (partial)

Today’s photo tour of my day begins with these tracks, fresh-made as it rained into the wee hours. There are a couple of shoe-wearing horse-tracks in the lower left, and continuing across. But the rest are deer. I cannot come up with a scenario in which the long drag “prints” were created.

Also on my walk, a slight detour onto a bridge, perhaps installed by a fisher-person or birdwatcher, that crosses the ditch in the swamp. I learned about duckweed when I had Biology I in HS, back in the Middle Ages. It’s the floating green.

Kinda looks like funky soybeans in this shot. One leaf per plant, I just read.

Much later, I walked down to the lake…. Offshore breeze today (after days and nights on onshore winds). That means we have a beach! Water’s still way too high, though, IMHO.

Quick stop to check out the low-ground plants on the bluff-top. Sphagnum moss. Always thought “sphagnum” was lovely to hear, almost melodic, and no fun to spell.

Posted at 5:43 PM | 2 Comments »

We have apple trees in the orchard that yield apples that make deep pink applesauce. Turns out that if you use the same apples to make tarte tatin, they become such a deep red that you might think the fruit was plums! Oh, so super tasty!

Posted at 9:28 PM | Comments Off on Yum in an iron skillet

Wishing to give the new fitness device (misleadingly called a watch, which is accurate in that it does tell time, yet has a fuzziness similar to a smartphone—which is far more smart than phone) a tryout, I got out pretty darned early, and paced myself, ending up with a mostly sunny three miles. One darned gorgeous fencerow maple.

And a tree skeleton—an elm, I’m guessing. Rain most of the overnight hours, hence intermittent puddles and mud.

I worked very hard to turn this into moose tracks, but the overwhelming evidence of an adjacent cattle pasture and a vague recollection that moose tracks look like giant deer tracks, and thus are much narrower…forced me to accept the domestic nature of this evidence.

Although clouds were coming in, we went over to the refuge to drive the loop. We did see a few ducks, geese, and swans at a distance, but this dirty great blue heron (?) was the most interesting specimen we spotted. A quiet day for critters.

Dramatic maroon leaves on this small tree.

And the autumn mushrooms are about…or at least they strike me as a different assortment of species from the springtime crop. Or my dataset is skewed and, most likely of all, my observations are based on ignorance.

Posted at 5:03 PM | Comments Off on Fall colors, shapes

It is Apple season, too. I/we splurged on the new 6 (the first AppleWatch in our household), and originally delivery was promised Oct 3–5. It came today. In fact, it went from Mt Pleasant to Rudyard this morning, then out for delivery. Just days ago it was in Alaska, Singapore, and China—in reverse order.

So far I can confirm that I have a heartbeat and that the device counts my steps, plus I have received and sent texts. You can “write” a text by bringing up this zone for you to finger spell in. My letter shapes were darned crude, yet it got every one correct immediately. Yup, Apple season.

Posted at 8:31 PM | Comments Off on Apple season

We got up and did our usual ablutions, breakfast, and getting on the road northbound. More, more! Found fall color…even shadows.

And closeup sumac at a rest area.

Then: the Big Bridge. With cloud cover and intermittent moisture.

Today’s mystery object…remains a mystery.

Traditional stop for lunch at Clyde’s, bison-burger with, wait for it, fries! Fresh, hot fries are a rare treat during this pandemic.

This is where we stop to get milk, the local paper, and necessities for our first overnight.

And the lake. One of many in the region, but for this locale, this is the lake.

Feels soooooo good to be here.

Posted at 9:04 PM | Comments Off on Photos!