“When Icicles Hang by the Wall, & Dick the Shepherd Blows His Nail” by Edward Robert Hughes
Soon shall the winter’s foil be here; Soon shall these icy ligatures unbind and melt — A little while, And air, soil, wave, suffused shall be in softness, bloom and growth — a thousand forms shall rise From these dead clods and chills as from low burial graves. Thine eyes, ears — all thy best attributes — all that takes cognizance of natural beauty, Shall wake and fill. Thou shalt perceive the simple shows, the delicate miracles of earth, Dandelions, clover, the emerald grass, the early scents and flowers, The arbutus under foot, the willow’s yellow-green, the blossoming plum and cherry; With these the robin, lark and thrush, singing their songs — the flitting bluebird; For such the scenes the annual play brings on. ~ Walt Whitman (Sands at Seventy)
1.28.25 ~ Sandy Creek Park, Durham, North Carolina
It’s been a very busy month! I had a great time at the reception for the Birds of North Carolina: A Community Photo Exhibit at the botanical garden. In addition to appreciating my family and friends showing up for support, I met another photographer. She had several pictures of great blue herons I was admiring. She recommended Sandy Creek Park as a place to find lots of waterbirds. And so, when Tim was clear to resume strenuous activity, off we went to find the park.
Tim was recovering from two cardiac catheterization procedures this month. The first one was looking for the source of his worsening shortness of breath symptoms, and the second one was to insert three stents in his right coronary artery, which supplies blood to the right ventricle of the heart, which pumps blood to the lungs. What a difference those three stents are making.
Some of my readers may remember that Tim had a heart attack in 2007 and was flown by a medical helicopter to Yale New Haven Hospital in Connecticut where he had emergency triple bypass surgery. Those three arteries are still doing well, but this one had been narrowing.
Our “walks” in recent months were becoming shorter and progressively more difficult for him. In fact, we hadn’t walked in the woods together since early November and that one was very short. We’ve been spending most of our time in the botanical garden where he could sit on a bench while I took pictures. But on this lovely day it was like old times again, trekking through the woods with my sidekick pointing out many of the things he spotted along the way.
the uneven terrain Tim’s back appreciates
a bird blind
Even though everything was dull and drab for winter and we only saw three Canada geese, it was still a beautiful day, and we’re looking forward to coming back here to see all the scenery (and hopefully more waterbirds!) in the changing seasons.
1.11.25 ~ red mulberry branches and twigs coated in ice
We experienced our first winter storm down south here last Friday night, getting just an inch of snow, followed by sleet. When I woke up Saturday morning I didn’t see any birds, but there were little icicles dangling from the red mulberry tree branches and the rhododendron leaves. My little indoor owl ornament looked pretty in the bay window and the whimsical mushrooms in the garden looked different surrounded by white stuff with their own tiny icicles.
On Sunday we were supposed to attend a reception at the botanical garden for the Birds of North Carolina: A Community Photo Exhibit, but it was postponed until January 26th due to the inclement weather. I’ve been pretty excited because they accepted all four of my submissions, which I’ve added below. They’ve been posted here on the blog before, but they look even better hanging up in the gallery, enlarged to 8″x10″ size from the original number of pixels.
American Robin 3.17.24 ~ Coker Arboretum
Carolina Wren 3.20.24 ~ North Carolina Botanical Garden
Yellow-rumped Warbler 3.29.24 ~ Bolin Forest
Hermit Thrush 3.30.24 ~ North Carolina Botanical Garden
I couldn’t help noticing that all the pictures I selected to submit were taken in March. Looking forward to another spring month for bird photography!
To celebrate New Year’s Day my friend Susan invited her friend Sarah and me to take a nice long walk on Pumpkin Loop in the Carolina North Forest. It was my first time on this trail in the dense pine forest. I remembered to wear my thermal leggings and enjoyed the brisk winter air, while the bright sunlight created sharp, dark winter shadows. We heard many birds and caught glimpses of a few of them.
long winter shadows
I have read that squirrels eat pine cones. They use their teeth to peel away the scales on the cone in order to extract the seeds inside. I’ve never seen one doing it, but on this walk I spotted some evidence of the process left behind on a stone.
remains of a squirrel’s pine cone seed feast
oak marcescence
post oak (thanks to Teri for the identification)
a tiny cairn on top of a post
sunlit end of cut red cedar (?) log, covered in moss and lichens, resting on a bed of pine needles, with some tiny mushrooms nearby
Leaving the loop trail, we then stopped to visit a labyrinth nestled into the woods.
Carolina North Forest has 750 acres of woodlands and countless trails. It would probably take a lifetime to explore all of them, but that means I will never run out of possibilities here!
Stop and listen to the ragged-edged beech leaves, pale specters of the winter forest. They are chattering ghosts, clattering amid the bare branches of the other hardwoods. Wan light pours through their evanescence and burnishes them to gleaming. Deep in the gray, sleeping forest, whole beech trees flare up into whispering creatures made of trembling gold. ~ Margaret Renkl (The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year)
12.20.24 ~ North Carolina Botanical Garden
A week ago I made a quick trip to the botanical garden to take a final picture for my four seasons photo hunt, and added it the post, which had become an eight season collection. It was a chilly, gray day but I was tempted to linger and see what other kinds of pictures could be taken in the very dim light of midwinter. One beech tree was full of marcescent leaves. A single leaf was dangling from another one.
white-throated sparrow
Finally, I got pictures of one of the white-throated sparrows foraging under the bird feeders, where there is a little less brush for them to hide under. There is stark beauty to be found in the winter garden, when seedheads are left naturally for the birds to eat.
a squirrel nest
oakleaf hydrangea
oakleaf hydrangea
Happy New Year!
a lingering aster
eastern gray squirrel
pansies
It still amazes me how pansies are winter flowers down south here! Imagine – pansies outside in December! Even though the temperature was in the low 50s that day, it felt cold and raw to me, in spite of my extra sweater, winter jacket, hat and gloves. I could have used my thermal underware but I didn’t think it would feel that cold out there.
One of the many things I do miss about being a young person is what was my tolerance for the cold. I used to love winter, being a January baby, and have many more fond childhood memories of playing outside in that season than in the others. (No bugs!) My sister and I spent countless hours ice skating in the frozen swamp in the woods behind our house. It was fun gliding across the (sometimes lumpy) icy hollows between the hummocks. A challenging obstacle course. And not a pansy in sight until April!
“Woodland Stream in a Winter Landscape” by John Henry Twachtman
I cannot tell you how the light comes. What I know is that it is more ancient than imagining. That it travels across an astounding expanse to reach us. That it loves searching out what is hidden what is lost what is forgotten or in peril or in pain. That it has a fondness for the body for finding its way toward flesh for tracing the edges of form for shining forth through the eye, the hand, the heart. I cannot tell you how the light comes, but that it does. That it will. That it works its way into the deepest dark that enfolds you, though it may seem long ages in coming or arrive in a shape you did not foresee. And so may we this day turn ourselves toward it. May we lift our faces to let it find us. May we bend our bodies to follow the arc it makes. May we open and open more and open still to the blessed light that comes. ~ Jan Richardson (How the Light Comes)
Yesterday we went to a winter craft market at the botanical garden and of course I couldn’t resist getting a few pictures outside. It finally feels like winter here, with low temperatures some mornings in the 20s. But it was a warm afternoon and it felt good strolling around, even if a host of white-throated sparrows foraging in the brush wouldn’t come out for a picture!
I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape — the loneliness of it — the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it — the whole story doesn’t show. ~ Andrew Wyeth (LIFE, May 14, 1965, “Andrew Wyeth: An Interview”)
Winter under cultivation Is as arable as Spring ~ Emily Dickinson (The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #1720)
The Winter, most commonly, is so mild, that it looks like an Autumn, being now and then attended with clear and thin North-West Winds, that are sharp enough to regulate English Constitutions. ~ John Lawson (A New Voyage to Carolina, 1709)
the warmth of the sun in winter
Carolina buckthorn
seasonal decor for the shrubs
Lots of folks are rushing around getting ready for the holidays, but I like to stay quiet this time of year, snuggling under my wool throw with a good book. I’ve started reading Clover Garden: A Carolinian’s Piedmont Memoir by Bland Simpson. The author lives not too far from us and I’m enjoying reading about the natural history of the local area.
