Kanape Brook Trail to Ashokan High Point

I've been cooped up in a lab a lot lately, and I've been really itching to get out on a nice winter hike.

I have wanted to check out the rest of the Kanape Brook trail, to the Ashokan High Point for a while. We have some red oak research plots about a mile up the trail, but I had never been any further. (To the right is Kanape Brook, as seen in the afternoon on the walk back down. )

A friend I met during the Hubbard Brook REU program in 2009 drove up from Long Island Saturday morning. We got to the trail head around 9:30am, signed in at the registry box and started up the trail. It snowed the night before, along with some sleet, and we were the first ones on the trail! The snow was still very packed so snow shoes weren't needed, although if we wanted to do any serious bushwhacking they would be essential.

The Kanape Brook trail is an old abandoned carriage road. The forest along the road had been burned periodically for blueberries, which were picked by the locals during the Great Depression and sold to NYC markets. The trail follows a very gradual incline up and has flat stretches passing through some thick mountain laurel patches and a small (and very beautiful but odd/out-of-place) planted norway spruce grove. The trail for the most part is pretty rocky, but it is not noticeable with the winter snow pack, and it seems to be a popular cross country ski route.
As we gained elevation the forest gradually became blanketed in a thick sheet of ice. Every branch of every tree and shrub was encased in a layer of glistening ice.

I was checking out some ice damage.

Towards the high point the trail begins to get steep, then flat, and then several short steep sections before arriving at an opening in the trail providing a beautiful view (below).


Despite the cloudy day there was still a beautiful view from the summit (below), which is covered in stunted oaks and mountain laurel.

While at the top I noticed movement in the corner of my eye from up in a tree, and I discovered we were actually intruding upon someone else who was already there enjoying a meal and the great view.

Around the lab

Stissing Mtn

I needed a break from everything and I was getting a bit antsy from being inside so much lately, so last Saturday morning I finally made it over to Stissing Mountain in Pine Plains (NY). It is a short and easy drive from Millbrook up 82.

Stissing Mtn is part of a 500-acre preserve run by the Nature Conservancy, their blurb about it is available here.

The hike up is short and a bit steep. The trail starts across the street from a small parking area and leads through an old fence and up an incline and gradually levels out a little bit before it comes to a fork. The trail on the left, according to two different people I spoke to, is shorter but steeper, but they both lead to the fire tower. I was already in a t-shirt and I wanted something more challenging so I continued up the left trail.

Although the snow was up to my knees, the trail was very packed and I didn't need the snowshoes I brought.

Not the best panoramic image, but it gives you an idea of the wonderful view from the fire tower. All of the Hudson Valley that I have seen is a patchwork of forest and fields, it is a perfect example of forest fragmentation.

Before I left I made a little snowman!

On my way out I found a Nikon lens cap in the snow. . Maybe the owner will read this? Unlikely, but I put it on the fence post at the beginning of the trail, below the snowman.

Portsmouth, NH

I have a huge backlog of posts to finish and put up. Most of my free time as of late has been consumed by other things (such as applying to graduate school) But I hope to get back on track this month.

On new year's day, me and Jacqui went to one of our favorite places on the seacoast, Portsmouth.

two views of the the Veteran Memorial Bridge

You can take a look at some of Jacqui's photos from the day here- Wreaths and Pigeons

Paradise below zero

I have not given up on the blog, it's just been on a bit of a hiatus as I've been very busy lately. I have a significant backlog of photos to post though, so check back again soon!

The title of this entry actually comes from the famous outdoors-man, Calvin Rustrum's book, Paradise Below Zero. From around Christmas time to New Years, I was in NH visiting family and friends. While I was home I had some time to get out with my snowshoes (above). The temperature was hovering around 0, but with the windchill it was around -9 F. I actually find it easier to dress for this weather, because the temperature is low enough and I don't need to constantly remove or add layers. Although it can make photography a challenging process.


Jake, our adventurous and tough little westie ventured out with me, despite the combination of the low temperatures, his small stature, and the depth of the snow. When the snow is this deep (in this case it was just over my knees without snowshoes) he stays right in my snowshoe tracks, jumping from track to track.




At the end of my walk, back home in Springfield NH (above).


The silhouette shot of my snowshoe (which I weaved!) was the last photo I was able to take before my camera batteries succumbed to the cold and died.

Purgatory Falls

I was in NH for the weekend, and I visited Purgatory Falls in Mont Vernon [correction: this section is actually located in the adjacent town of Lyndeborough-thanks George!]. A short walk down a trail leads to the gorge that Purgatory brook cuts through, descending down a beautiful little waterfall surrounded by hemlocks and birch. There are great little conservation areas such as this one, scattered all around the state, waiting to be explored!

An autumn walk

Here are a few shots I took today wandering around the woods, foliage is a bit past peak, but it's the first time I have been able to get out in the last few weeks with my camera.

Deer tracks in the mud


Invasive species above (burning bush) and below (barberry)

R

A few shots from field work in the catskills

Below are a few shots from some of the field work I've been doing in the Catskills since May. I don't typically have much time to take photos, but I sometimes try to carry my small "field" camera with me, an old nikon coolpix camera. So the quality is not too great, but it is nice to document some of the places we go to, and the things we do.

A view of from the Ashokan Reservoir.

The canopy of a maple plot at Diamond Notch.
A soil core. The O, A, and B horizons are visible.


Collecting canopy foliage samples, using a shotgun.







My arms after a day in the field, in June I believe. It may look bad, but really, the biting insects are not too bad at all compared to the White Mountains.
My favorite field location by far- the rondout creek. It is a beautiful place, I feel fortunate to be able work in such a beautiful spot. We did find time after work to jump in the creek twice, it was always very cold. John Burroughs, the famous writer and naturalist said of the creek,

"My eyes had never before beheld such beauty in a mountain stream. The water was almost as transparent as the air — was, indeed, like liquid air; and as it lay in these wells and pits enveloped in shadow, or lit up by a chance ray of the vertical sun, it was a perpetual feast to the eye — so cool, so deep, so pure; every reach and pool like a vast spring. You lay down and drank or dipped the water up in your cup, and found it just the right degree of refreshing coldness. One is never prepared for the clearness of the water in these streams. It is always a surprise. See them every year for a dozen years, and yet, when you first come upon one, you will utter an exclamation. I saw nothing like it in the Adirondacks, nor in Canada. Absolutely without stain or hint of impurity, it seems to magnify like a lens, so that the bed of the stream and the fish in it appear deceptively near. It is rare to find even a trout stream that is not a little "off color," as they say of diamonds, but the waters in the section of which I am writing have the genuine ray; it is the undimmed and untarnished diamond. If I were a trout, I should ascend every stream till I found the Rondout. It is the ideal brook"

Above is a typical trail in the catskills, I think this is at Diamond Notch again.

Above: Bear sign on the beech tree, claw marks from a black bear climbing up to retrieve beech nuts, a favorite food of black bears. It is a sad sight to see nearly all the beech trees infected with BBD, I wonder what, if any, impact that has on the bear.
Below: bear scat.
Sun through a thick beech canopy, one of my favorite views in the forest. Just another great day at the 'office'!Trailhead sign at Batavia Kill, where we have four oak plots.Above: A shot from the oak forest at Kanape Brook, where we have some beautiful red oak plots. Last time I was there it was painful, acorns were falling all over the place.