Flowers! Finally!

March is still roaring

The wind nearly blew me off the bike trail several times today. But the buzzards are back. That should mean spring is on the way, though this tree was right next to our house. I hope that is not a bad sign! Thanks to Tori for taking this picture for me.

The gunner left an Easter offering at the Wilson Road trail head. I found another dead coyote there Sunday evening. This one was shot in the gut with a high powered rifle. A terrible way to die. It also made it harder for me to haul it across the road. I had hoped this idiot had made his point. Against my teachings, I am making an assumption. But I think the odds are overwhelming this is a guy... sigh!

300 miles

I just reached 300 miles on the bicycle for the year today. A nice milestone, but far behing the local leader! But it is not a race. With spring here, I hope to ride more frequently and more comfortably. A guy can hope, anyway.

Deer Creek is back down to bank full. All that rain with the ground saturated by snow melt produced a lot of flooding here. And we still have some leftover snow drifts, but they are so brown you sometimes mistake them for mud!

After hiding for the last hour, the sun is out and I must be away on the bicycle!

undefeated team

The 1933 London High School football team. Captain was Jerry Beery (of the annual walk fame) is second from the left in the back row. My father is 5th from the left in the front row. This was London's second undefeated football team. Jerry's father, Brooks Fowler Beery was the captain of the first undefeated team. Brooks went on to play football at OSU his freshman year.

My Wonderful Neighbor

Dick Minner and his wonderful tractor came over about 10 this morning and made short work of last night's foot of snow. Thank you, Dick!

I do not know what the definition of a blizzard is, but mine is seeing a small 4" drift of snow that blew under the closed garage door last night. All that snow that melted last weekend has returned in spades! Too much white stuff! Madison County is under a Level 3 alert, so we can't go anywhere. And frankly I don't want to go anywhere anyway. But if I needed to, I could. This storm is only 150 miles wide, but it will be parked over us for about 30 hours. When is spring going to arrive?

Annual Jerry Beery Creek Walk

The snow started melting on Friday and the high water you see is strictly from snow melt. This is taken from the ford on the Beery farm where the creek makes a u-turn. There were no skunk cabbage as that area is under 1 to 2 feet of water right now. There is good news for mushroom hunters as one of the prime areas is under water as well. Deer Creek has been over banks several times this winter and there is a lot of debris deposited. The grass is greening under the trees to the left. The geese were scolding us as we upset their gathering. Jerry the boxer (named for THE Jerry Beery who is no longer with us) flushed a deer and Brookes has seen 11 or 12 wild turkeys in the cornfield near the creek. We are all hoping for an end to the snow and freezing temperatures. Today was a good start!

The annual creek walk started in 1993, soon after I returned to Madison County. Jerry and I started walking the creek the first warm weekend in February to see what had changed over the winter when neither of us was fishing. Jerry was a life-long steward of this land and would scrutinize each of the many trees he planted to control erosion . The newly returned beavers loved his ash trees even more than he did. After Jerry's death we have continued this tradition and tell stories to remember and keep alive all the stories from this special place.

In one such story, Jerry went to feed his cattle about a quarter mile from his house during the blizzard of 1977. As he was walking back, a white-out cut the visibility to zero. He blindly stumbled around until he walked into a tree. He knew which tree it was and easily found his way home. Not very many of us know any place that well!

March! Finally!

February was not a nice month in Ohio. Only 60 miles on the bicycle, though I was away for the two best (warmest) days of the month. Many days the high temperature did not even get to the average low for that day. How bad is that? But this morning the sky did show some promise of better days ahead. I can only hope.

There has been so much snow this year that the county had to move $75K into the salt fund to keep salting the roads. That probably came out of the repair fund and last year would have paved nearly 2 miles of county roads. This year it will not even pave one mile of road. And, of course, all the roads are a mess from the combination of salt and the freezing and thawing. Seems like a vicious cycle to me!

A hawk injured itself pursuing birds in my cousin's in-law's yard. It died before we could get it to the Raptor Center at Glen Helen in Yellow Springs. This has been a tough winter on everyone.