Nudists

Yes! Last fall, when nudists came out of the woodwork in Brattleboro, the mayor replied to reporters that the problem would go away soon (with the weather). He was right - but now they're back! Horrors! And they could "strike anywhere"!

A contradance isn't a square dance

And I'm organizing a contradance as a fundraiser for EarthWalk Vermont! You can do-si-do your partner on June 8th at the Plainfield Town Hall in Plainfield Vermont from 7:00 til 10:30.

I've been doing an apprenticeship with EarthWalk this past year learning naturalist skills, games, songs and stories and trying to pass some of them along to children at the same time.

No matter what ends up happening during the day with the kids, at least every child there is spending time outdoors with us, which is a tradition that is so quickly getting lost from modern American culture. Video game, anyone?

So come dance your booty off in Vermont Friday June 8th (and support EarthWalk)!

I'm also asking for creative silent auction donations from the community so that I can find out what cool things people in the area know how to do, or are connected to, or like to make...etc...

Squirrel baby

I'm squirrel-sitting for a friend who rescued this tiny little creature from her front porch about a week ago. He eats puppy formula every three hours out of an eye dropper which he's learned to nurse from. Then he nestles back in to his little box nest (complete with heating pad) and curls up to sleep. Occasionally he jumps and makes cute little sounds in his sleep - what is he dreaming about? Does he remember his nest and his mama? The outdoors at all?

No more snow

Hooray! The snow has finally melted! The first flowers are popping out and the trees are almost in bloom. I'm spending my days outside as much as I can, studying birds, weaving baskets and generally geeking out on all the new plants and life that is returning to my yard. My newest plan for my Career is to try selling some writing in the form of a newspaper column on birds to some local papers, since all I want to do all the time anyway is birdwatch.... and yes, I am the only one without grey hair that goes birding on Friday mornings with the local nature center. And I love it!

Bears, oh my!

The bears have woken up from hibernation, and my mom woke me up with a phone call about a week ago: do you want to come up the street and track a bear? Of course! What else is there to do in Vermont? Up the road we ran, to look at the tracks in the last of the melting snow. The bear had come down from the woods, straight to our neighbors feeder (three houses up) and knocked it down to eat the seeds. From there, he (or she, I don't know) went to the next neighbors house and checked out their bird feeder which was a little too high to knock down. From there, we tracked him right across the street from our house where he was snuffling around on the ground for more birdseed...and then, he walked right across the road and into our yard! He paused under our birdfeeder, then walked right up to where we've been feeding birds outside our southeast windows all winter and stook two feet from the window! We tracked the bear right to our front yard! From there, he walked through the mud and left big muddy footprints next to Nick's car, which we'd walked right past hurrying on our way to see the bear tracks. Funny how that works!

More birds

Some of the more colorful inhabitants of the neighborhood:



(it's not a cardinal)

Tracking is cool

Reading the marks in the snow, I couldn't necessarily say which prints told me, but I felt the deer and the coyote running inside me. My heart pounded as I felt the stalk of the dogs and the surprise of the deer. The flight. Galloping bodies in tight bunched forms and long taught sillouhettes. Short chase. Hungry kill. Yote tracks lead me into, around and back out of the woods in a graceful dance through life and death. Hemlocks bearing witness to the hunger of the deer and the yote.










Deer or coyote?
How many?

PS - you can always make the picture bigger