Close No Cigar

The light rain this morning made it perfect for walking through the woods quietly .Moving slowly along an oak ridge I spotted movement about fourty yards away. It was a six point buck moving away from me with his nose on the ground in pursuit of a  doe. I attempted to get a picture through the many trees.

You can see his front leg and neck  on the left hand side of the picture. He was moving along and out of sight no time.
Also , since the leaves have fallen I have seen more bee hives  . Just in my hike this morning I counted three.
Jim

Deer Activity This Morning

With the rut just about in full swing deer should be moving pretty good. That was the case this morning. The problem was, I spotted them just a little too early and  had to  quickly set the camera on ISO 6400 with barely got this picture

A little while after this picture I did spot a small spike horn and several does.
 Before calling it a day I took a second hike at a NW gate  in hopes of maybe catching a few more deer out and about.

No luck!

Jim

 

Jim

Cold & Windy Morning

What a difference a day makes. Bit of a snap in the air this morning. I ventured out to the the Shaft 12 Road  I hiked to the intersection of Fitzpatrick Road ,where I took a right down a short cart road to the reservoir. I questioned my shoreline decision when the sharp wind  convinced me to put my hood on. It was worth the discomfort when this eagle glided by,

Continuing on, moose , raccoon  , coyote and deer tracks where consistent in the mud. The call of a loon put a nice finish on the morning .
I took a ride over to Quabbin Park. The reservoir looked beautiful from Enfield Lookout with a touch of sun.

Jim

Hike To Dead Eagle Site

It's been just about a year since I found the remains of a young eagle on a shoreline hike. . I thought it might be an interesting morning to visit the area and see what if any activity is evident. I parked on Rte 32A  and hiked Carted Rd to Hell Huddle Rd then to the reservoir where I followed the shoreline east.  The reservoir is down but not as low as last year. Moose ,deer and raccoons have been visiting the waters edge frequently.

When I reached the area ,the pace slowed looking for any sign left by eagles. With the bones and shells that were found last year, one might conclude that an eagle visited regularly consuming it's catch.

 Rounding the next corner was a broken mussel. A little further lay a painted turtle shell.

 I found a similar  turtle shell last year in the same area.  One could conclude with the few parcels located this morning that eagles use the area regularly when feeding.

Jim

Fall Transition

The Quabbin woods were extremely quite this morning. Song  birds have moved south. Winter birds were also scarce. I did see a pileated woodpecker , several blue jays and handful of chickadees. I ventured down to a small  swamp as dawn set in. I did see  a buck scrape. Bear sign was no where to be found.

I hiked over to Rattlesnake Hill then back out to the truck. GPS read six miles for this hike.

Jim

Lots Of Tracks

Nice crisp morning for hiking. Today's hike took me to Gate 27 in the NW region of the reservoir.
Easy walking . The cart road runs parallel to the reservoir and will take you as far as Gate 22. After several  miles I took a cart road down to the reservoir and followed the shoreline back to the 26 road intersection.

The water level is down which made for easy walking. I did see several immature loons. A muddy area held the tracks of a variety of animals. Bear , raccoon , moose and coyote tracks were easy to identify. I sure have put a lot of miles on the last month with hopes of getting a picture of a moose.
Tomorrow I head back to my favorite east side gates hiking.

Jim

Drove over to gate 8 this morning. With the close of the fishing season last week made for a nice quiet hike this morning. Didn't take long with the gradual decent to lose the noise of Rte 202. Tracks of where a single moose walked the road gave anticipation of maybe seeing a moose this morning.

Not to be. The reservoir was fairly calm, I did see one mature bald eagle and several other raptors that I could not identify.




Been a while since driving by Pelham Lookout during the day. DCR has put up a nice sign

Jim