Notes From Zone 4

It was such a gorgeous day here yesterday. Big blue skies, and quite warm, in the mid-40s I think. The ground was still snow covered, and Frank drug us out for a walk in the woods. It’s amazing the number of animal tracks we saw out there — deer and moose for sure, and many small critters popping out of their winter holes for a warm day. We even saw bugs, which I found surprising. Mosquitoes in the snow? Strange. The beaver ponds out there are just beautiful.

It’s not unusual to have a white turkey day, and this year, the weather for it was beautiful. Big blue skies after the storm cleared, dropping four inches on us overnight. I had time to get the decks cleared and such before the guests started to arrive for the holiday meal, which was nice. I don’t know how long I’ll keep trying to do that back deck, but I did it today, anyway. We haven’t yet had enough to be plowed. This year Frank got some orange metal stakes/pole thingies, and outlined around the driveway where we want the plow guy to plow, in the hope of saving a few of our plants that usually get beat up pretty bad. We’re pretty sure he’ll just plow right over those, though, unfortunately. But it is worth a try!

Yet more snow, and it’s sticking. I’m not sure we’re going to have another thaw this winter, which is a bit early for us. It’s not unusual for us to have the first sticking snow around Thanksgiving day, but we’ve had three or four already this month, and with these last several, there’s been no melting in between. We did some more stacking of the firewood, having to brush off the snow. We (and the kids) have stacked quite a bit of it on the back deck, right by our bedroom door. We are hoping the deck is strong enough to hold the load! But it will sure beat hauling it up from outside the basement door. We have a fairly decent size stash under the deck, but we know it’s no where near enough. Oh well. The view of the swamp is just gorgeous after a snow storm.

The snow and ice storm is gorgeous, but better viewed from inside than out. Um, I think it’s time to take down the fall flag! The bird feeders are starting to get attention, especially the suet, which has been largely ignored all summer and fall. We haven’t seen the wild turkey flocks yet this year. I wonder where they are? I love the way the pergola looks with the ice all over it. The pond is now frozen solid.

I was in Chicago earlier in the week, and I seen to have brought back all snow here. It’s supposed to turn to rain tomorrow, but right now, it’s pretty. I got the front deck shoveled, at least, before getting tired. There’s not much else I can do out in the garden at this point, but I’m really reluctant to give it up. We are keeping an eye on our compost pile, as this will really be our first year heading in with all of the bins full to capacity. How long will they stay hot? I want to remember to get a thermometer. We were noticing today that the newest pile seems to be melting its snow off much faster than the others.

With everyone off because of the holiday, it was grand central station here today. The snow mobile club (Hidden-Valley Snowmobile Club) is fixing the trails all through our woods. We felt sorry for them this afternoon when the skies just opened up and poured with little warning. There must have been ten guys out there with either a tractor or a four-wheeler, hauling a cart. It was very bizarre to hear the noises all day long, because it’s usually completely silent. We really like our local club. They are mostly people that we know. They tell us what they are doing. They respect our land. They’ve built several bridges over streams out on our trails. They keep the trails open for us so that we can enjoy our land even better.

We had a pretty productive, busy and fun weekend, actually, for two people who still aren’t back to normal and who were homebodies the whole time. The weather did the promised warmness, and the rain held off until last night, long after we’d quit working outside. And work out in the garden we did. Lots of fall clean up, cutting off the green foliage that’d been zapped by the early freezes and snow. We got a bunch of leaves off the grass, except where the snow still covered it. I absolutely wore myself out with the rake, but just from lack of stamina, which I’m hoping lots of exercise will cure. Many of the critters are very confused by the quick change in weather as well. Frank found this snake, and many frogs.

Pretty, but it has convinced me to put away the fall jackets and wear boots to town this morning. Then I got there to find them with rain only, me overdressed for the cold. I forget how high up we are, and what a difference that makes.

We could only work out there for a couple of hours in these temps, and with the low stamina that we both have, post-surgery. We’ve waited too long to put the garden to bed, of course. Pulling glads while there is snow on the ground? I haven’t a clue if they’ll come back for me

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