Always something different

Always something different...

Today on our adventure we decided to check out a trail and investigate a swamp on the other side of a hill. Now is the perfect time to stroll around swamps. With temperatures in the teens and below zero at night for the past week or so, swamps are for the most part safe to hike around and most importantly, the ticks are dormant! You should know a little more about hiking around swamps, so just don't go out and hike around one because it been cold enough.
Although we couldn't follow the trail all the way around, we managed to bushwhack up and over the hill.


 Can you spot Gaige at the bottom of the Hill?

 

                  

Looking up the hill after hiking down.

As we continued we found a trail that led us up the outlet from the swamp, so we followed it. As we approached the swamp the first thing I notice is that there were no Great Blue Heron nests, or at least I thought!

I decided to walk around the swamp and look for animal sightings. As we approached a safe place to enter I noticed Gaige was air-scenting in a around a small embankment. I let him work it out and it led his nose up into the trees. That's when I noticed two fish skeletons hanging high in a tree.

We continued on and made our way around the swamp. On the other side, close to the edge and high up in a dead tree was yes! a Great Blue Heron's nest. It was a small one but just the same, there was one here.  Once we made our loop we ended up at a long beaver dam, this is where Hikah laid down some nice track for me to get a picture of.  

From here we headed back to the car. Hikah was at his limits so we found the trail and kept moving or at least I thought. Well you see Gaige... yes Gaige, he started air-scenting again so I asked him to work it out and once again it led his nose up into the trees. This is when I spotted animal legs (deer).   Someone threw out these parts along the side of the road after cleaning up their deer. This got me thinking back when I did roadside searches with Hikah looking for clues on searches. You just never know what's been thrown out on a roadside and what can get caught up in the trees.

Thinking today was going to be a non-eventful day, we left it all up to the trees and Gaige! Always something different...

Finding Our Way

Finding Our Way... 

It all started this morning with a forecast of sunny, 10 degrees with a wind chill below zero. I decided we were going to find an unnamed pond that I wanted to explore. We would be going off trail and doing some bushwhacking in-order to get there. On our way, we came across a couple of obstacles. One obstacle, which from a distance looked like a fuselage hanging in a tree, turned out to be a huge piece of material from an industrial building, part of the fall-out from a 2010 tornado in the area.  

 

After investigating the area, we moved on to find our unnamed pond (which I named Hikah-Gaige Pond). Once arriving at the pond, the wind was so constant and making it feel like 20 degrees below zero. I took a few pictures and quickly ducked back down the hillside and out of the wind, burr!

 

We then proceeded to transverse the hillside and eventually came across a trail. Upon exploring this trail we came across a RTH (Red-tailed Hawk) screeching at us. It then flew off and I was able to ID the bird. It landed once again and gave off another loud screech. It then flew off out of sight. I have never heard a RTH screeching live, that was pretty neat. I decided we needed to head back so we followed the tail back down the hillside to Dean Pond. While doing this, I though I heard a couple grunts and sticks breaking behind me so I picked up the pace.The dogs were also air-scenting  into the area. One day I would like to go back and check that out (signs of track). 

We crossed over the pond and returned safely.

 

Map of the area with my track in red.