Spring-like weather and trails

This week the weather man says we will have highs in the 40's and 50's and sunny most of the time. The snow is melting and probably will be gone by this weekend. The trails have melting snow on them and in places ice. In places it is getting muddy.. These two pictures show a couple trails now.

Snow Patterns and beauty

We have had a rollercoaster of weather in February. We had a week that hardly got above zero to small snowstorms that added to the snowpack to the present warm weather to melt it all away. We will see if March and April give us more snow or if this is the end of snow for the winter. Since I did not do an update in February I thought it would be good to show some things I observed in the snow of February.

Snow often sticks to the trees, vines and everything it touches. I like to go for walks during the snow unless it is blowing so hard it makes for poor visibility driving to Fort Ridgely dangerous. Soft gentle snow is usually what sticks to the trees anyway and makes the woods a magical place to walk through. Below are pictures after a snowstorm in early February. Trees and trails were covered with a coating of snow

Notice the frost around a tunnel entrance for some kind of wildlife. This indicates that there is something breathing below. Many animals survive the harsh Minnesota winters by spending much of the time below the snow in tunnels (mice, voles, etc.) or lodges in lakes (beavers and muskrats). Sometimes you see snow mounded up over a tunnel that these subnivean (below the snow) creatures have made across a path. These tunnels collapse during melting and leave behind patterns like in the picture below. Often the tunnels go into and through the grass below the snow. Many springs I have seen tunnel patterns in the grass of my yard after the snow melts.

Deer leave interesting patterns in the snow too. The obvious is the trails of their hoof prints in the snow along groomed trails as well as many of their own trails. They also randomly walk wherever they want through the snow. One example is found in the picture below. I saw a group of deer near the trail in the valley below airplane hill. The picture shows the "Erosion Keep Off'' sign. They not only walked all around the sign, but passed much higher up on the hill where erosion is much more likely. Apparently they can't read or are rather rebellious.

Another interesting thing is that there was evidence of both types of excrement in the area of the indentations. I hope they waited until morning before going so it did not smell all night. Notice deer poop is lots of little turds like rabbits. They are bigger and not as spherical as rabbits'. Their pee is orange brown more than our usual yellow. It was interesting to note that I found a group sleeping spot beside the observation deck at Airplane Hill and another at the overlook grassy area just off the prairie on the other side of the park. They picked pretty places to sleep.

Eagles in the Minnesota River Valley

We often see eagles soaring over the valley as we drive to New Ulm or Mankato or as we hike at Fort Ridgely. I also know of an eagle nest near a lake on the way to Hutchinson. Our national bird is majestic and beautiful to watch and get in pictures. My son saw the eagle in the picture below as we drove on the bottom road (21) from New Ulm last week. It probably had some prey there and when we turned around to get a better look, it left the prey to get away from us. They are so majestic when they fly as you can see with it just taking off in the picture below.

Many eagles overwinter in Minnesota. Usually you only see one or two of these at a time. There are also large groups that migrate through on their way farther north. Several times at about this time of year I have seen such groups. Last year they were about halfway between Fort Ridgely and New Ulm in a tree and by some open water in a flooded area (see pictures below). I, as well as several others who stopped to observe, counted around 40 eagles that we could see.

Such a group is called a convocation. One year I saw a similar group at Mack Lake County Park. Then I spent more time watching and they were flying around and dive bombing each other. Lots of aerial acrobatics maybe to impress a mate or something. Have any of you seen any gathering of eagles this year? I asked a long time resident of the valley why we haven't seen large groups of eagles this year. He said there has not been any flooding yet this year so not as many fish for them to feed on.