Sunday, December 28, 2008

A Walk in the Woods - Dec. 28th

When I went out to the barn today I was surprised to find a woolly bear caterpillar curled up on the ground in the snow. I wasn't sure if he was alive, but when I held him in my warm hand he began moving. Perhaps he fell off the barn when I opened the door or maybe he had just revived in the sunshine (It was about 30 degrees F today.) I set him down next to the barn in some dried leaves and he began crawling in very slow motion, presumably to a warmer slumbering spot.
Then, when Rog, Cadence and I went on an exploratory tromp through the woods we scared up a deer. I wasn't fast enough with my camera to capture him, but I got his tracks. There were deer tracks and trails and trampled places where they had bedded down all over the place.
A well-constructed little nest has survived the winter so far in the sumac patch.
A decrepit old chicken coop stands in the woods, surrounded by raspberry brambles--kind of cute, but probably not salvageable for housing chickens.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

That's my favorite kind of caterpillar! So cute. Thanks for saving him/her/it. That chicken coop is kinda spooky, very Blair Witch. Are you getting chickens? I'm jealous!

Corner Gardener Sue said...

I enjoyed going on that walk, and didn't even get cold!

Nice pics!

Susan said...

Yes, I AM getting chickens! But not until it warms up a bit. I can hardly wait! Rog and I are still in negotiations over how many chickens to get. And I still have some chicken-rearing research to do and preparations on the real chicken coop, which is in much, much better shape and closer and more convenient to the house than the Blair Witch chicken coop.