Except when they’re munching on our hemlocks and arborvitae. I understand their need—when snow blankets the ground, our area’s abundant acorns are buried. I don’t really welcome the two-a.m. snackers. But I do admire their winter-survival tenacity.
Continue reading Welcome to the All-Night Deer Diner
Image Credits: Carol Doeringer.
Deer cross our lake in all seasons, moving back and forth from an island opposite our home. They swim until ice covers the water, and then they travel on foot. I often see them at dusk, lined up like kids headed for recess. But on this day, it was one p.m., an odd time to see deer in the open.
Two deer started the crossing. They walked for ten or fifteen seconds and then switched to a sprint. Another deer followed suit. My spotting scope was trained on that third deer when he abruptly halted. He slipped and skidded before coming to a full stop. I looked up from the scope for a wider view and saw what had spooked him.
The leaders had fallen through the ice.
Continue reading Deer Crossings
Image Credits: Carol Doeringer.
That’s an apt cliché for watching Great Blue Herons. If you’re the patient sort, you might be entertained watching them fish.
Tip-toe… tip-toe… (stand motionless for a full minute) … tip-toe… (don’t budge for another two minutes) … tip-toe… snatch!
Hardly the stuff of an action movie, so I don’t often show herons on my blog.
I don’t recall why I was filming one of these tall birds a few weeks ago. It was early-evening feeding time, and the creature was engaged in the usual slow-mo fishing expedition. Bored, perhaps, I turned on the camera.
I couldn’t have predicted the arrival that would catch both of us by surprise.
Last weekend, when Bert and I took one of our kayaks out, I left all things electronic in the house. That turned out to be a mistake. We did an hour of uneventful pedaling. (That’s not a typo; this two-person kayak is foot-powered.) Hugging the south shore of Lake Allegan, we enjoyed the usual flora and fauna, the latter limited to a few turtles warming themselves in the afternoon sun. Then fauna became fawna, as a young deer hopped out of the woods and into the water. He (or she? I could not tell) was not more than twenty yards in front of our boat.
I thought the fawn might reverse course on seeing us. Instead, he put his skinny legs in gear and swam.
