80AcresOnline

We get snow so seldom (and enough to take pictures of, even more seldom) that I feel several posts of snow pictures are justified.

This is on the trail north from Fox Pavilion to the north fenceline.

From the View Corner,  here’s what it looked like looking south along the west side of the dry woods (a narrow strip of cedar elm and live oak with elbowbush below:

I walked to the end of this set of trees and started down Center Walk, one of our mowed maintenance paths:

I took this over halfway from dry woods to creek woods, close enough to easily see the opening to the Entrance Meadow, a pocket prairie that had preserved a number of native grasses and forbs we used as seed stock for the rest.  Deer and other wildlife use our mowed paths; Center Walk had deer tracks in the snow and one set of deer tracks crossing it.   Also seen were fox tracks.

This is only part of the Entrance Meadow, an irregular opening mostly fringed by Ashe juniper (“cedars.”)  We mow it yearly to keep down greenbriar and woody vegetation, so the little bluestem, Indiangrass, planted big bluestem,  and sideoats grama–as well as native prairie forbs–will continue to provide us site-specific seed.

Just starting the east-side Creek Woods trail from the Entrance Meadow–a sagging branch of juniper bars my way, and sun glows on the snow-and-ice spangled bushes ahead.  This trail runs just inside the woods.

Moving through the upper swamp-overflow channels north again toward the creek:

That isn’t the main creek, just water in one of the overflow channels.    Upstream (I walked to the creek, upstream through the north end of the creek woods) is Deer Ford, one of my favorite spots:

There are clumps of snow in the limbs of the cedar overhanging the creek.  And on one cedar elm limb at eye level, a linear cap of snow was melting into the lichens:

The yellowish one is growing on top of the greenish-gray one–the chocolate colored fruiting bodies (roundish dark bits) belong to the gray-green one.

Coming back through the entrance meadow from Deer Ford,  sunlight glittered on the mass of elbow bushes beside the trail…snow had partially melted and refrozen on the flower buds.

And now a few details to stand for many such:  snow on grass details, here snow caught on the remains of a grass seed head (minus seeds)–the snow partially melted and refroze over night:

And the remains of a tunnel through the snow made by something that started under a clump of grass maybe 10 yards from the south fenceline.   As the day warmed, the roof fell in:

The little trench it left was maybe as wide as my thumb or a bit wider,  so I’m guessing a mouse of some king.