Category: Warm December

Ice

This past December fooled me. It was so warm. Not at all the way December is supposed to be in the Blue Ridge Mountains or in the Mid-Atlantic states. The whole month was that way. The warmth had me worried about how the rest of the winter would be.

But January came through for me. It’s been a nice frigid cold. Perfect. So far my cabin has been decorated by 17″ of beautiful snow. The first came on January 3rd. Those 9″ were the best, wet, clinging, heavy snow that stayed on the trees for several days. A perfect fairyland. These pictures are not of those snows but what winter also brings, the frosty cold, and with it, ICE.

The first image at the top of this post is of ice on the vernal pool at my yoga studio. The second is also at the yoga studio, and is of frost. And the photo just above this text is ice covered Blueberry buds. And no need to worry, the Blueberry flowers and the berries themselves were just fine, not damaged at all by the ice.

These buds are of Flowering Dogwood (Cornus florida). And again Mother Nature is a gentle artist, creating beautiful landscapes covered in ice and still those buds were not harmed. Going on to bloom, creating another gorgeous landscape of flowers a couple months later.

More ice and another Dogwood. This one Gray Dogwood (Cornus racemosa) with its fruit stalks, or pedicels encrusted in ice.

And here, one of my favorite Pine trees. Pitch Pine (Pinus rigida). Plastered in ice. All this icy elegance, just one part of why winter is my favorite season.

Snow in the Forecast

A Dark-eyed Junco (Junco hyemalis) enjoying the seeds of Black-eyed Susans buried in deep snow. Snow that fell in 2016.

December of 2021 was incredibly warm. Now the first two days of this new year of 2022 have followed that example with precision. Not like winter at all. Tonight as I write this it is 50°. Hardly a temperature that would make one think snow is in the forecast but sure enough it is. I’m hoping the forecasts are correct.

Dark-eyed Juncos are also known as Snowbirds and appropriately show up here as winter approaches. A few hardy little ones stay year round further up in the mountains but at this elevation they are only here during the usually coldest part of the year. I’m hoping they’ll get some snow to play in, in the early hours tomorrow morning. And some snow for me to play in too!

Eastern Phoebe In Winter

Eastern Phoebe (Sayornis phoebe). An amiable little bird that I love to see around as it flicks its tail feathers as a signal to me. A sign of identification. Being that it is an insectavore makes me welcome it well beyond my being enthralled by its charm. An event of just a couple days ago makes me appreciate that they eat ticks! This year those ticks are out there still, even at the end of December. It’s been much too warm to send the ticks, depending on their species, into hiding in leaf litter or going into underground burrows. Waiting for warm weather to return. They don’t need to escape. The warm weather hasn’t gone away. In a normal winter the Phoebe will eat what insects it can find but can and will resort to eating berries and other fruit that it can find. I love that they are here returning to the same nest year after year to raise their young. And are eating the ticks.