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During this mating/cleansing season (mid-February to mid-March) it’s easy and fun to communicate with the coyotes after dark.  Simply go outside and howl simulating a coyote and they will howl/yap back.  It’s great fun when you engage children to join in.

Twice, in the past, I’ve heard what sounded like a group of coyotes late at night, barking and yipping . On one occasion the frequency and intensity of it rose, then abruptly stopped. I imagined a “pack” chasing prey, then going silent as they made the kill. Mitchell’s study, however, brings out other possible scenarios.

Greetings Dave - despite nearly perfect sap flow conditions yesterday (03/08/14) we got very little sap from our 1200 +/- taps. Across the board - vacuum tubing, gravity runs and buckets - not much happening.  Nervous here as well about the season…My fear is the third week of March rolls around and it is 50 degrees and raining.  Time will tell…

I stopped to notice Gingko tree buds with my son just yesterday. Funny—how one can go further and further, diving deeper into various levels of intricacy, through closer looks at the familiar. Thank you for exposing me more fully to the wonders of buds, and giving me some new language for it, Michael. Especially ptyxix—a word that itself looks as though it has been folded in on itself several times.

Good article Brian.  Thanks.  As for long hunting and trapping seasons being shortsighted (see comment above), I beg to differ.  Research indicates that any void in coyote populations are filled with increased reproduction. Indeed, coyotes have suffered bounties, poisoning campaigns, shooting from aircraft, and legal hunting, yet continue to thrive.  I always enjoy seeing a track, catching a rare glimpse of one, and hearing them crank up their song, and now more fully understand what they might be saying.

For people like me that believe that the climate is changing, and will always change at a rate slower that those that will be dead before they know the change was in fact slower than expected. For the climate changes very, very slowly and sounding the alarm of impending catastrophe by making statements, for example, that “Boston’s climate will be similar to Atlanta’s” is ridiculous and only serves to anger those of us that simply believe for good, rational reasons that the variations we are seeing in the weather over the past one to two-hundred years is simply noise and means nothing in the scope of actual climate change which is occurring slowly over periods of thousands of years. What’s the big deal that mean temperatures have increased by 3.8 degrees since 1835 and that 70% of that increase happened since 1970. I mean, that’s weather folks. 1970 is about half of the 88-year normal solar activity cycle. We all know that the Earth has been getting warmer since the last ice age. It’s going to get “permanently” warmer but it’s going to take thousands of years more for that to happen.

Please just stop discussing the weather as if it were climate change. Climate change occurs over thousands of years and anything that happens in less time than that is the weather. If the weather is changing Mother Nature will fix it (and anything that’s messing with her) in the next hundred years or so. We have nothing to worry about and there is nothing we can do about it, nothing, and articles like this are what you can read in any end-of-the-world environmentalist rag. I thought Northern Woodlands was above that noise.

According to the Malenkovich Theory, the Glacial Phenomenons are explained. It is believed by some scientists, that there have been ten Glacial Periods since the formation of Earth.

Great blog and photos Dave. Hopefully the sap will start running again soon.

I saw a possum on the ground near the bird feeder. After a while it started to walk away then turned around and entered my shed, where I saw it disappear through a space in the floor. This was sighted around noon.

March 4th, I saw a catamount today. It was about 30 to 40 lbs I would guess,completely black and the tail was almost as long as the cat. I have seen them a number of times before, but never black and in the winter, it was a joyful sight.

It’s wonderful, just to dig in dirt. The very activity invites curiosity and openness. The other day I was at a nursery school and one kid found a bone (probably from a chicken) in the sand box; the place erupted.
I like to imagine what Katherine is thinking when she penetrates the muck.

Great article. I have tapped both silver maple and box elder for years. The syrup is a divine vanilla cream, very light colored and sweet.
Never a problem.
This year, it will be red maples since I moved.
Be well.

The need for a period of dormancy is not limited to “certain plants.” This biped mammal couldn’t function without it!

I have a nice picture of a paw print that is close to the size of my hand. I followed the tracks and I have pics of how far apart they are from the ones before. At least 6 foot distance strides. I am on the border near Bennington near the Hoosick River.

Your point is well taken, Mark. And no, I wasn’t trying to downplay or trivialize. Just having a little fun with the hyperbole. I’m simultaneously concerned about climate change and weary of how every weather event these days brings out the pundits and their tea leaves. Couldn’t resist poking that a little. Anyway, enjoy that snow.

This fungi is absolutely VILE when made as a tea. When thinly sliced it looks like chicken and when fried is shockingly repellant. The only way to get this into you is either make capsules or alcoholic tincture.

Brian Mitchell’s coyote article discribes graphically what is taking place at my back door.
I live off the grid at the end of an old logging trail. During mating season in the deep of winter I often observe coyote traveling across the frozen lake to and fro the reed islands, or positioned patiently by one of the many musk rat holes in the ice, hoping for dinner. At night their yip, yips and howls in sterio are music to my ears. Once the pups are born in early spring the excited high squeels of the young ones ad yet another note to the concert. My three dogs respond by vocally defending their own territory. Never a dull moment!

Love it. Seen all the Proenekke films and skimmed his dairies, and I was immediately reminded of him through your narration.

Informative articles; most people think they’re inundated with coyotes when there are just usually a small group. Too bad these amazing predators are so unfairly maligned. Killing them in unlimited numbers in “contests” and extraordinarily long hunting/trapping seasons seems so short-sighted.

Great! I particularly like thinking of a Marlon Brando coyote…