Time to ski?
December 31, 2015 - It's a slight dusting of snow—and certainly not enough to cross-country ski on—but as I bid an end to one of the most ch...
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Puzzling
December 30, 2015 - With weather that varied between light rain and a near-freezing mist, I wasn't able to spend much time on the trail, and...
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A touch of snow
December 29, 2015 - Finally! Just when I'd begun thinking that maybe, just maybe, the white stuff would steer clear of my locale this season...
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Nestlings
December 28, 2015 - With the recent rains and the ridiculous warmth, the natural world has yet to call a halt to the growing season. Much of...
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Jumping the season
December 27, 2015 - A stretch of several days of above-60 temperatures—definitely ones for the meteorological record books—coupled with abun...
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Reawakening
December 26, 2015 - With the Big Day behind us, my shadow and I needed to get in some serious hiking, and given a choice of a wide variety o...
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Very merry Christmas
December 25, 2015 - For years and years—now reaching 40—of my second mixed marriage, I, a rarely observant Reform Jew, not only didn't get C...
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Christmas Eve surprise
December 24, 2015 - The weather has gone from merely crazy to totally insane. The temperature today, Christmas Eve, is supposed to reach the...
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Trimming the tree
December 23, 2015 - We spent most of the day in the car: driving up to New Hampshire to pick up my granddaughter and daughter-in-law, the la...
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Running water
December 22, 2015 - An almost frighteningly dry year is ending on a very wet note—and, to judge by the intense color of the mosses, a very g...
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Blossoms end?
December 21, 2015 - There's a game that naturalists play when we put together our phenologies, our version of nature's "pilgrim's progress."...
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Frost's return
December 20, 2015 - Below-freezing temperatures returned for the briefest of moments overnight, and as I walked, I noticed the glint of ice...
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Awaiting a sign
December 19, 2015 - The warmth and the green-brown of a climate change pre-Christmas continue to haunt our ridge, and in the wetter area of...
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Almost a wrap
December 18, 2015 - The hardy cyclamens in our garden have certainly lived up to their name. While it's certainly been way warmer than norma...
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A splash of color
December 17, 2015 - If I can't get too far afield in the natural world these days, I'm eternally glad that I can still bring nature fairly c...
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A taste of untimely honey
December 16, 2015 - I've been feeling cooped up, but such is the way with the pre-holidays prep, so any opportunity to get outside and walk,...
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Grounded
December 15, 2015 - The mists thickened overnight and gave way to a steady, warm rain, and there was even the chance for a thunderstorm or t...
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Unclear
December 14, 2015 - The temperature, while not as insanely warm—for this time of year—as it has been, remains about 10 to 15 degrees above n...
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Drinking tea, still
December 13, 2015 - Another 60-plus degree day... another day during which the woodstove sat idle... another day to worry about tick bites..
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Last meadowhawk?
December 12, 2015 - When the temperature this afternoon soared into the 60s—a new high, I'm pretty sure—I knew that I had a mission: to visi...
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Haunted
December 11, 2015 - The last of the lock-sets and deadbolts went in today, and while I certainly wouldn't want to do any back-patting and pr...
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Not-so-still waters
December 10, 2015 - Working on indoor house projects—two lock-sets and deadbolts installed, one combination to go—instead of trekking outsid...
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Natural jelly
December 09, 2015 - I filed the last of my magazine articles today and this, in theory, means that I'm free to walk, explore, and document t...
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Reflections
December 08, 2015 - I had to spend most of the afternoon in New Haven today for an echo cardiogram, and since I was writing all morning, the...
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Smokin' spores
December 07, 2015 - The clubmosses have just about finished their reproductive show for the year, and the upright, yellow-green spore cases...
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Beginning to sound like Christmas
December 06, 2015 - Almost into the 60s today and still warm tonight—it's not beginning to look anything like Christmas. But fleece and ligh...
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Stitch in time
December 05, 2015 - This old oak shares something fundamental with Harry Potter. The "boy who lived" after miraculously surviving a Killing...
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Rare fern rediscovered
December 03, 2015 - I first found this plant, which is called a Mountain Spleenwort, in September 2014, when I was on a walk with a group of...
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Little man of the mountains
December 03, 2015 - The Old Man of the Mountains—the stern stone face that graced the side of Cannon Mountain in New Hampshire—may have coll...
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Autumn's end
December 02, 2015 - If money was no object, one thing I would purchase immediately is a camera-equipped drone that I could use to fly above...
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Still working
December 01, 2015 - On a twilight walk, I had company: my grandson. I had told him about the otters at the millpond, and together—two eyes b...
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