As we approach the longest night of the year, and the actual beginning of winter, we note that winter is already here. This past week has seen below zeros in temperatures and a couple days where the warmest part of the day was in the teens. The stream at left is still moving but if you look closely, one can see the broader areas are ice sheets several inches above the level of today’s flowing water.

We found a large debris field of black feathers along our walk today. It appears that a black crow crashed (somehow it must have been caught by a ground or air predator). The largest remnants are shown in the red circle in the second image. The black spots littering the ground are mostly feathers.