A Cold Walk in the Woods

We decided to go for a walk in the woods this afternoon. It was a good thing to do to get out of the house.

The development we live in is basically a road in the middle of nowhere. It’s one road with a cul-de-sac at the end. Behind all the houses on one side of the street is a one mile long nature trail that leads to a main road. We have only ventured all the way to the main road once…a trip we aren’t likely to take again. Towards the end, the trail disappeared and we were left fighting underbrush just to get through.

Today was different. We weren’t planning on going all that far. Just far enough to check out the wetlands beyond the trail. It’s a happening spot, from what it sounds like at certain times. I have heard water rushing into the wetlands after a strong rain, I have seen and heard deer near the water and I have also heard coyotes back there howling away. What we haven’t experienced yet was an up close view of the water and marshy spots.

Today was pretty chilly. We got all layered up and started our hike by making our way down and through the woods in the back yard. That leads to the nature trail which leads to the wetlands. Don’t worry, I am going to show you all sorts of cool pictures of this.

Anyway, we got dressed and went down there. I brought my camera with me just in case I found anything worthy of being photographed. Good thing I brought it because…well, you’ll see below.

The water was neat. The woods were neat, but what was really neat was the damage the beavers were doing to the big trees back there. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Let me tell you, a beaver can take down some pretty huge trees.

As we were walking along the marshy areas, I noticed some small (3″-4″) trees laying on their sides. I noticed that the area that caused the tree to fall had some chop marks in it. It looked like someone had taken an ax down in the woods and chopped down a bunch of small trees. Then, I looked a bit further and saw that there were dozens of much larger trees that had fresh marks at their bases. I couldn’t believe it. I kept thinking that someone was chopping these things down. But why would they chop them half way and then leave? I came to the conclusion that beavers had done the damage.

I really don’t know what it’s going to look like back there in a few days because from what I gather, beavers can take a nice size tree down in no time. It’s going to be a mess and it’s going to be loud when these things come down. Even as we were walking through the trees, we heard creaking when the wind blew. Needless to say, we didn’t hang around very long.

Here are some pictures of what I described above along with some other stuff. Enjoy.