Welcome Back!!

Welcome Back!

September 17, 2018

Welcome Back!

That is a Welcome Back for you, dear readers of Cottonwood Pond.

But, this is also a Welcome Back to myself after a hiatus away from this blog, as well as Cottonwood Pond, the place.

So many things have intervened:

• a living room renovation project
• the intense season of gardening, harvest, and food preservation
• the gradual, yet sharp, scaling-back of involvement in away-from-home projects for other people or organizations that require planning and preparation on my part
• HEAT
• a need to step back from all blogs (I have three) for awhile and reassess them

Over the summer I have peeked down there, even taken photos sometimes from above.

June 21

August 20

I wanted to stay connected with it, if even from afar, and take note of major events that could have strong effects on it, such as dry periods and heavy rains.

And there was one late evening during a full moon that I looked down into the woods to see one large beam of moonlight breaking through a section of canopy. The light illuminated Cottonwood Pond and nothing else. Some would take that as a “sign”. I took it as a reminder of how special the spot is to me, and I wondered if that small area of glowing moonlight would attract nocturnal animals.

I finally went down during the late morning of September 17. The atmosphere was typical for the first half of September in our area, when summer intensifies for its last hurrah. The air was already quickly heating and had that intense mugginess that defines this time of year. The sunlight was all-over piercing and relentless.

During the previous few weeks, we had a three-day period of non-stop pounding rain, followed by a dry stretch. I knew one thing for sure: all of that power of water would have carved out more paths, more holes, more gouges. It would have widened some places and deepened others. The wild, windy, watery storms would have littered the area with more twigs, branches, nuts and seeds, maybe some tree limbs, and maybe even a fallen tree.

Over recent weeks, as I spent time in the garden, walked down the driveway between woods and gardens, or just sat on the screened porch, I witnessed the distinct shift from full summer to almost-autumn, both visually and aurally. At some point, I realized that I had not heard the flute-like song of the Wood Thrush emanating from the woods in a long time. Then I realized I had heard the odd call of the Yellow-Billed Cuckoo for the last time this that year. Likewise, I had heard the last of the complaining call of the Summer Tanager. They had started winging their way to places south.

The year-round resident birds became more obvious, their calls and songs no longer buried in the crazy cacophony of summer bird sounds. Mourning Doves, Blue Jays, Crows, Red-Bellied Woodpeckers, Pileated Woodpeckers, White-Breasted Nuthatches – the sounds of those and others had become sparse, and more clear. It became easy to see Carolina Chickadees, Carolina Wrens, Goldfinches, Tufted Titmice and other small birds flitting around from tree-to-tree, or gathering sunflower seeds from the old brown heads, or finding insects from other plants. Cardinals, of course, are obvious during all seasons.

I came to realize that I no longer heard Cicadas in the trees during the hot day, or Katydids at night. Those summer sounds were gone. Crickets filled in both day and night, seemingly louder, and constant. The calls of frogs and toads had ended, though I still came across both, visually.

So it was on September 17, when I went down to Cottonwood Pond.

Looking down the slope on the approach to Cottonwood Pond

Looking up the same slope from Cottonwood Pond

On the woodland slopes, the intensity of spring and early summer had long passed. The show of plant density covering the shady slope floors was replaced by an almost bare surface, with roots, bulbs, corms and new seeds buried beneath, waiting until next year.

In the heart of summer, the real show is all in the sunny, open areas – in this case the wet bottom land, including Cottonwood Pond. The bottoms were thick with tall Wood Nettle, Poison Ivy, and Jewelweed. It was sprinkled with the orange of Jewelweed blossoms, the cornflower blue of Great Blue Lobelia flowers, the creamy, lacy sprays of Wood Nettle blooms, the white buds of White Snakeroot, and tiny dots of white-green fruits along the gracefully arched stems of Virginia Smartweed.

Wood Nettle in bloom

Blossoms of Spotted Jewelweed

Great Blue Lobelia

Standing unobstrusively among it all were sprays of dry, almost-black Honewort seeds held above the drying plants.

Elderberry plants were not as tall as I had expected. They had been pushed down under the weight of other plants, and lacked any sign of the previous heads of berries.

The “Goblin” of the Root Ball Bottom, which had previously developed a benign but humorous face, had changed to something different, almost hidden in deepness. This time it had more of a wise, mysterious face, like Green Man, but dark brown, perhaps reflecting wisdom of the area developed through age and experience.

Upstream from Cottonwood Pond

Patterns of water and other life in the Creek mud

As expected, the evidence of recent rushing water was strong. The Creek near Cottonwood Pond had strayed over its banks and wandered, and returned, braiding the area with newly-formed flow lines. Debris was piled up forcefully against the upstream side of the Barkless Log, and just to the downstream side, against the gradually forming “island”.

This included some man-made debris that had been pushed, over time, all the way from the roadside, through the winding woods' bottom, to this point.

Also among the debris were nutshells, paddle-like Ash seeds, and and center remnants of Sycamore seed balls. The distribution of this year's progeny was being accomplished.

In some Creek spots, more gravelly sediment had landed, heavier than the very fine silt that is prominent. This, also, told the story of water flow – the direction, where it was strongest, where it was the most calm. Sandy-looking deposits appeared in the centers of rivulets that connected new flows with the main Creek.

The most significant change of all took place at the Creek just below Cottonwood Pond.

The whole section of the Very Rotten Log that spanned the Creek had broken off, and had been swept a little downstream to be piled up with the other collection of fallen limbs, just like any other piece of debris.

The broken-off segment of the Very Rotten Log, with its white shelf mushrooms

I found the Bark Ledge, were the Seep (Cottonwood Pond overflow) trickles into the Creek.

The Very Rotten Log used to stretch over the spot, where the Seep enters the Creek

That water used to enter the Creek right below the Very Rotten Log. But, the spot had become wide open.

The jagged end of the Very Rotten Log, near the Seep, hanging over a Crawdad hole

Looking from the Seep down to the Creek, to the space where the Very Rotten Log once spanned the Creek

Some white shelf mushrooms were growing along the leftover sections of the Very Rotten Log, on either side of the Creek. One was perched just at the tip of a broken remnant, held above the Creek's edge.

And, so, another part of the history of Cottonwood Pond completely changed its existence. I used to use the Very Rotten Log to cross the Creek to Cottonwood Pond, but quit doing so after the wood became so rotten that it acted as a sponge, and water squished out around the soles of my shoes with each step.

The bed of Cottonwood Pond, the bowl sometimes filled with water, was holding no water – only mud. There were Raccoon tracks of various sizes in the beds of both Creek and Pond. I could easily imagine a mother Raccoon leading her kits on a learning-to-hunt-and-forage expedition.

Creek bed

Bottom of Cottonwood Pond

In the mud of the Cottonwood Pond bottom there was evidence of tunneling by some very small animal, barely below the surface. The sinuous lines of cracked mud started at the edge near the Young White Ash and wound across the pond bottom in a “drunkard's path”, ending at the base of the Mud Pile near the north corner.

My first thought was “Vole”, as I had seen their tunnels in dryer ground, under thatch, and in the snow, and this mud tunnel resembled those. It was too small to have been a Mole. So, I can, tentatively, list Voles as a species found at Cottonwood Pond.

Another sign of recent rushing water was the pile of root chunks near the north end. Over time they had broken off the Root Ball Bottom as they became exposed and then deteriorated just enough, and they had been scattered across the Mud Pile base. During recent times they had become piled together at the far end, maybe creating some interesting future habitat.

The muddy bottom of Cottonwood Pond was clear of plants, except for a lone white-flowered Smartweed, telling me there had been time for it to hang on and flourish without too much disturbance. But, the other side of the Inlet, in sharp contrast, was thick with vegetation.

Pond bottom and Inlet (where water enters pond)

The Inlet seen from the outside of the pond

If rushing water was strong and consistent enough to deter almost all vegetation in the “bowl” of Cottonwood Pond, why wasn't the area just outside, where water rushed in, likewise affected? Had water remained in the bowl for a long enough time to discourage growth?

Another thing I noticed was a difference in the size of Crawdad holes and chimneys, depending on location. At the bottom of the slope, and in the low, flat area, and near the edges of both Cottonwood Pond and the Creek, holes were large, and chimneys were wide, with pea- to marble-sided mud balls in the construction.

But, in the bottom of the Cottonwood Pond bowl the holes were small, and chimneys were tiny, with small diameters and mud balls the size of lentils, at most. However, some of the small chimneys were relatively tall, looking as if they would topple over.

Why were tiny ones in the pond bed, and larger ones outside of it? And, were some of the holes made by Voles?

Around the other side of the Root Ball, “little pond” looked like a smaller version of the main pond.

The lower half of the Root Ball Top contained more large holes (Crawdad, or Vole?).

Spider webs draped across roots like hammocks that could only hold the weight of spiders, or tiny fairies.

In the upper area, above the Trunk, one white, unopened mushroom stood in a dark pocket, looking like a wise hermit meditating at the mouth of a cave.

The canopy of sapling trees growing from the Root Ball was dense, and had grown exponentially in height, it seemed. I thought it would soon be difficult to distinguish it from surrounding trees and canopy.

How long it would be before the saplings would be firmly rooted in the ground below, instead of in the dirt of the Root Ball?

Another significant change was the Cottonwood Trunk. Since the last time I had seen it, almost every bit of the old bark had fallen off (previously, there was still plenty clinging to the lower section). On September 17, the Trunk was completely bare, but for a few small pieces that stubbornly clung to the old Trunk.

All of the old plant roots and fungal strands that had grown between bark and cambium (and that had helped in the sloughing process) were exposed to the elements. How long would it be before the whole Trunk rotted enough to break, as the Very Rotten Log had done?

I noticed that I had to bend further down than before to go under the prone Trunk. Was this due to the Trunk itself settling more? Or to a deeper build-up of soil that had been pushed under the Trunk? Or, was it just because I had gotten stiff over the hot summer and so it felt like a smaller space to get through?

During the time I was away from this blog and Cottonwood Pond, I allowed my mind to wander, and to be open to any ideas that would float by. I was aware of anything that seemed to gel or to coalesce toward a whole idea of what my approach could be, or would be, to the blog, and to what was happening at Cottonwood Pond.

My visit, finally, on September 17, helped the process.

To that end, it seems best to make bona fide observation visits once a month, on or near the 17^th. A more regular timing can yield more consistent observation, and the length of time may yield more significant differences to observe.

I may stick some other entries in between those monthly ones. I may want to muse about the whole “What IS Cottonwood Pond” idea again. Or on all of the species that I have found there. Or on the changes, over time, of one certain aspect. Or, I may make a special visit during dawn or dusk. Or, I might set up a “trail cam” and see what happens.

But, those will be occasional and sporadic. The most important factor, overall, will be the regularity of observing Cottonwood Pond on a monthly basis, and sharing those with you, dear readers, in the continuing saga of Cottonwood Pond.

Looking over the top of the Root Ball, toward the slope

And, in case anyone has been wondering, the “Elf's Walking Stick” was still there on September 17, leaning against the upturned roots of the Barkless Log.