The weather has been a tad nippy for the last week, and it continues for another week with some snow predicted many of those days. We are getting a new coating of the white stuff each day, but a little more is needed on the cross-country ski trails to cover the rocks and some debris that are on the trails. I checked out part of the trails behind Limekiln campground, and I did not make it too far for all the stuff that had fallen from the windstorms in the trail.
There were four skiers who had gone around the trail before me, signing the register at the barrier dam and doing the Loop Trail, which is more than six miles, and it comes back into the campground on the back loop road. As I was clearing, I heard voices on the other side of the beaver flow. It was almost 4 and time for me to start out, so I thought I would see this party and ask them how the trail was where they had been.
I caught up with these four ladies on the road out of the campground, and they told me that they had gotten out to the old snowmobile trail and not seen any arrows or markers from there, so they had lunch and turned around. They said there were some blowdowns, but good until that point marker-wise. Some of the ladies were from Canada and normally ski in the High Peaks, but decided to try some more flat land skiing. They said they had no snow to ski on in Canada. Snow is still quite thin around here on the wood’s trails. The roads in Limekiln campground had been plowed as some operations work is going to be done there over winter. If you stay on the lower trail along the lake shore, you only hit some of the plowed road as you go to the leach field. Snowmobiles are using all the roads in the campground.
Two fishermen riding an all-terrain vehicle broke through the ice on Great Sacandaga Lake on Sunday. Ice fishermen got the two men out of the water, but one of the men — William Gifford from Gloversville — died from the accident. People should check the ice conditions before traveling out on a lake. Any inlet or bubbler along the shore of these lakes are not frozen and may stay open a long way from shore, so be careful traveling on any body of water.
There are still several birds at my feeders, and I just put up a block of suet and every kind of bird has been working on it. For two mornings in a row, just before 8, some predator bird has been coming through, but I haven’t seen it. I did find some bird feathers near the feeders so it must have gotten one of the little birds. When you look out on a wintry morning and no birds are feeding, there is a predator in the area, and everyone is in hiding. Sometimes it takes an hour before all the birds start feeding again. If I go out and put out feed, they will come back because I have scared away the predator, though not seen it.
This weekend is the Waterfowl Count here in New York state, and I will count the ducks on any open water around here in Hamilton and Herkimer counties. The Inlet channel is always open and a place to find every mallard and black duck in the area. I might even see a belted kingfisher, which for many winters has lived along the channel. I check the Moose River in Old Forge where it is open and normally find a couple of ducks. Sometimes, if the water is flowing, there will be ducks and geese spending time together in the channel from First Lake to Old Forge Pond. If we see eagles, we put those down also.
My grandson, Nathan, got some good northern lights photos last week, and we were in the clouds up this way. [Monday was] a full moon, but it does not look like we are going to see it. There are two total eclipses, one in March and one in September. There are three super moons, October, November, and December. Looking ahead, there are going to be many chances to see the northern lights again this year.
Many of my amaryllis are in bloom or are about to bloom. These are all saved from last year’s plants. I just let them grow their leaves all summer and then I cut them back and put them in the dark cellar for more than a month, then bring them back to life. So far, four out of six are putting out flowers and the other two are just greening up, so they may bloom as well.
Getting out on that new powder but being a little more careful this year, but that’s another story. See ya.
Top photo: Northern Lights. Photo by Nathan Lee.
Glad to hear your amaryllis are doing well!
Mine are in the garage, waiting til the end of January to be brought in the house. That way they will bloom in March, just when I am totally sick of winter!
Hope the Waterfowl Count goes well. Tons of Scaup (sp) around Ausable Point on Champlain right now. Even saw a few Canvasbacks last week.
Hi, I skied the perimeter trail from Fern park this past Thursday. And like the ladies you wrote about, I also missed the turn back to fern park and wound up on the snowmobile trail. I ended up skiing to south shore rd. then back to the park. I followed tracks all the way from Limekiln area to the snow mobile trail. There is blown down as you mentioned. The folks you spoke to are younger or shorter than me or both I think as they went under some stuff I was just not getting under! Thank you for breaking!
thank you for writing about the inlet area.
So glad you’re grandson is getting picturesof the northern lights! So many of us have never gotten the chance to see the lights, let alone take photos! I think you are a good influence.