A Quiet Walk in the Woods

Spring has sprung! Warm and sunny it was, so H and I decided to take a bicycle ride on the rail-trail. Since it was our first ride of the year we didn’t go as far as usual before turning around and heading back. We were about two miles from the car and stopped to look at a bird; we had just started up again when a combination of inattention and carelessness caused me to tip over and crash to the ground. The end result was a cracked helmet, a minor concussion, and possibly a broken rib or two.

If you ride a bicycle wear a helmet!

So, for several days I didn’t venture far from the house; cabin fever soon set in and the forest called. A short, slow walk was in order, so to the woods I went. There’s always something interesting to see in the woods, even on a short walk of only a bit more than two miles:

The scat of an eastern coyote –

Ground pine –

An old stump that resembled the bison skulls seen in antique photographs –

A variety of lichens –

 

Turkey-tail fungus on a decaying log –

Christmas fern –

Bright green moss covering the rocks in a stream –

The tunnel created by a sugar maple borer many years ago –

A deer skull that someone had hung in a small tree –

Beneath an abandoned chunk of firewood, a red-backed salamander – the most abundant vertebrate in our forests –

See, there's always something interesting to see in the woods.

By the time this was written I had ordered a new helmet, the ribs had healed and the signs of the concussion were fading away (no wisecracks).

If you ride a bicycle please wear a helmet!