An Expression of the Season

On February 28 and March 1 we had another substantial snowstorm, and afterward brilliant blue skies and calm winds and dazzling celestial displays in the night. I bundle up and take my walks, frequently stopped in my tracks by the impact of my surroundings: awe and joy at the perfection of form and texture, light and shadow, snatches of birdsong and the silences in between.

The east garden, its row of asparagus and the sweet potato mounds:

Squeaky Tree:

Lobster Tail Trail:

Toward the north fence line and the draws with coyote dens:

Big Bucket Trail:

The ancient hickories at Turkey Holler:

The Gorge:

The Grand Traverse:

Approaching Tire Shrine:

The Ford:

Hidden Meadow:

Across the top of the Trap Range:

 

Below the dam:

Rabbits congregate beneath this maple near the burn barrel:

The bridge-to-be, and across the dam, the pond and the terraced observatory field:

It Gives One Paws

Charismatic megafauna. That's what ecologists call those wild creatures at the top of their food chains. (As biologist Lewis Thomas notes in The Lives of a Cell – highly recommended, by the way – life is a game of 'now I eat you'.) And it's a continual wonder that these turkeys and coyotes and bobcats and horned owls and deer and falcons and buzzards exist here, such large animals, so close and yet so seldom seen. And still more I wonder that they find enough to eat and thrive; and about so much else that must perish to nourish them.

Wild turkey:

Bobcat:

Bobcat spray:

Coyote:

The Wind Arose and Swept the Snow – Our Place in the Landscape

We occupy a rather unique geography here at American Nacre that has a large effect on how the elements treat us. Here is an aerial photograph that shows the farm last May as seen from an altitude of about 17,000 feet. Our 40 acres is the small square of land surrounding the pushpin – you can see the 1000 feet of lane running up the middle, paralleling Kincaid Creek. You can see all the dark green of wooded creeks running to the southeast, falling steeply off the bluff onto the Mississippi River floodplain. To the northwest, another series of creeks drains more gently into the Cedar River, another of Iowa's many large rivers, but which despite its nearness at this point doesn't have its confluence with the Mississippi for another fifty miles downstream. The grey-tan fields in between these two major drainages are an edge of a plateau scraped flat during the last ice age, and all these rivers and creeks were formed after the glaciers receded.

The upshot of all this is that American Nacre sits just below the plateau, enough that winter winds from the west and northwest tend to pass over much of the farm, rather than blowing across it. You can use the live map link to fly around the farm and see how steeply the land falls into the drainages.

View Larger Map

Which leads to the next set of photographs.

In the woods and the creek valley, the snow has fallen softly and evenly in relatively calm air. Snow several inches deep balances even on very slender branches. But along the west fence line it's a different matter. The neighbors' soybean and hay fields are swept by the wind, which sculpts the snow into beautiful drifts as it is released in the vortices produced by the fences and brush and terraces that separate our land from theirs.

Snow!

We have had several beautiful, substantial snowfalls this winter, only one of which could properly be called a blizzard. The rest have occurred in near calm winds, producing blankets and pillows of downy white. This storm occurred on January 30, and I took my walkabout the following day.

The coyote, rabbit, and deer are the early risers, always leaving their marks before I get out.

The shooting range, a very wet little field that I would like to plant to blueberries. Yes, we use steel shot, not lead, for trap shooting.

Hidden Meadow, one of my favorite views on the property. The juniper in the foreground is a favorite shelter from the weather for coyote and, in the absence of coyote, pheasant and rabbit.

The smaller burrowing creatures, voles and mice, mound the snow as they pass among the underlying grasses, sometimes leaving elaborate branched patterns as they move back and forth.

And down to the creek at the under-construction ford, just upstream of the road culvert and wier.

Stepping stones at the ford, looking upstream.

One of the woodland avatars. It probably has a name, but Donna has not revealed it.

  

Good old Eye Chair.

Adjacent to Squeaky Tree, near the upstream border of the property, with cattle pasture beyond.

The Grand Traverse between Joy Stone and Little Bucket, overlooking The Gorge.

Some House and Farm History

We're fortunate to have a neighbor across the road who grew up on the property that we now manage. Ron is descended from the family that established this farm in c.1868, and he and his brother were still on the place a hundred years later. He is a great storyteller and source of information about the farm and all the little quirks we identify as we get to know it better. When he and his siblings were growing up, the farm had a small dairy herd and a hog confinement shed, and they grew apples and tomatoes and strawberries among other crops.

Ron and his sister were generous enough to find us these old photos of the place, dating from when their parents took over here. As you can see, the house was pretty dilapidated, but has been beautifully restored and enlarged and updated.

Then.

Later.

Now.

Here are some additional treasures, showing the farm in the 1970s. So many changes even since then. What is now the pond was pasture. Between the shop and the corn crib was a hog confinement shed. Much of the woods had not grown up and was still used to run cattle.