Water Still Flowing into Bug Land and at Swale

December 2, 2010.  Thursday.

Situation:  I worked last night, and I have to work tonight.  Moi has gone hunting again.  I wake up a little later than I have been recently.  Mway went to the door to be let out, so she’s waiting outside for me to join her.  Last night after work I stopped in at Dan’s house by the river; the river was creeping up his back deck and could crest, he said, at the floor of his house, though he thought that unlikely.  There’s blues skies and sunshine out my window.  I can see the berry cones of the sumacs.

State of the Path:  When I step outside, Mway dashes off the porch, starts running down the chickens; I have to yell.  The plank and cement slabs in the path at the garden pond are still underwater; beyond, the path is soggy, with puddles around.  Flecks of frost here and there – maybe earlier this morning there was frost all over the ground.  The leaves are almost totally gone from the honeysuckles – only a shrub every now and then has scant leaves on it.  (Back in the back yard, I noticed that the willow still has some green leaves on it.)  I haven’t seen any deer in a couple days and no hunters, so I’m not thinking too much about that.  Round the hedgerow; a rabbit runs across the path; Mway doesn’t see it.  Through the patch of goldenrod, water is trickling, and when I get to the maples, there’s water trickling down the path here too.  The side stream is still flowing, and the water is collecting, though not nearly as much as yesterday, at the ridge and still spilling into bug land.

State of the Creek:  The creek is back in its banks, flowing brown and gently, gurgling at the cascades.  I see where grasses have been swept down, leaves and branches shoved about, dead leaves lifted up leaving behind bare spots of ground.  This is the case with the path, which is now nearly one long trail of bare ground winding along the creek.  I note that Moi’s water plants survived the high water; I see them sticking up at the same place in the cascade before the two big logs, which look like they’ve been pushed in tighter against the creek bank.  A couple dead branches have been caught in the little willow tree (if that’s what it is) that leans across the creek; the branches are matted with leaves.  I suddenly hear Mway barking; I look up and see her along the ridge, looking over at me; why the hell is she barking at me over there? I wonder.  A briar suddenly swipes me across my thighs, scratching through my pants (probably at a threadbare spot in them), and, wincing, I fling it aside.  Mway barks a few more times.  I note the swept-down grasses of bugland.  At the swale, a little water is still flowing into the creek; I pick up the plank behind the “chokeberry” and toss it across the swale so I can step across it.  I cross the feed channel, which still has water in it, though it’s not flowing.  The water in the skating pond has gone down.  When I duck under the pin oak, one of its branches lifts off my wool cap, and I have to retrieve it and scrunch it back down on my head.  I now see Mwayla: she’s backtracked from the ridge and is pushing her way through the goldenrod, which here is so bent over the path is nearly obliterated.

The Fetch:  Though the water’s down in the skating pond, there’s still water visible in the marshy area between the ridges.  And the path on the other side of the ridge is very soggy.  I note that, like the honeysuckles, the leaves on the Russian olives are gone.  I see the fairly recently shed leaves of one shrub strewn across the path just before the strawberry patch.  The goldenrod along one side of the path on the way to the clearing is now trampled down a lot, but on the other side the goldenrod is still sticking up.  I’d like to toss the stick there, but I see two white posts where Moi has planted evergreen trees, and I’m afraid Mway might trample those down too.  Up at the clearing, on one side of it the goldenrod is pretty well smashed down, and I end up tossing the stick sometimes into a honeysuckle or multiflora shrub, where it’s a little hard for Mway to get it.  I toss the stick down the path a lot, but I also start tossing it a few times on the side of the clearing toward the house, where there’s a lot more goldenrod for Mway to smash down.  As soon as Mway starts bringing the stick back without dropping it, I tell her “that’s enough.”