Something To Eat

We are accustomed to seeing bird tracks on the snow under sumac trees.  The red berry clusters are a generous cache of winter food.  Both the footprint and the dig in the snow point to a deer also feeding here.  The path that this deer took went directly in front of an arbutus patch.  We have never seen indications of deer feeding on  our arbutus.  Others have written that deer do feed on this plant.

Our treasured four transplants are under a wire cage designed to keep out both rabbits and woodchucks.  Both of those animals have in the past eaten arbutus here.  Today it looks like this cage may have prevented a hungry deer from feeding here.

These more recent transplants also grow under wire.  Their location behind the arbutus wall places them in afternoon winter sunshine despite being under a white pine tree.  Remaining snow is in the shadow of the wall.

This was a glorious day to be outside.  Clear skies and ever strengthening sunshine combined to provide our first January thaw.  If the forecast for the rest of the week holds, we will see a daytime temperature in the 40s.

Making Tracks In The New Year!

The first day of 2017 is a beauty!  We woke up to bright sunlight streaming in the windows.  When I took a look outside I could see that something spent the early hours of the new year making tracks in the garden.  I did see a pretty tufted titmouse in the trumpet vine, but the tracks I wanted to check out were not bird tracks. There was no melting snow except for a few drips off the roof of the house on the south facing side.   Ed and I dressed warmly and set out to make some tracks of our own.  Tracks like the ones on the right of the picture seemed to crisscross the garden. Blue shadows on the snow reflected the blue sky above us.  I love the curved shadow of Ed's tumbled down wall!

I'm no expert at reading the signs, but there is a real clue in this picture.  The animal who left these tracks spent some time eating or rubbing against the remains of a big catnip plant.  We have seen bobcats here before.  But they have big furry feet and these prints seem a bit small but a feline is a good bet .

Imagine walking along the edge of a stone wall and then leaping fifty-four inches  to the other side of the ramp into the basement.  If I tried that where would be much more of a disturbance than a few footprints when I landed.  From here the tracks went along the edge of another wall, under the ramp and then down the driveway.  Now I was almost positive exactly whom I was tracking.

Sure enough there were footprints leading to Rainbow's tree.  The only remaining question is "Who let the cat out?"