Winter solstice at Sharingwood
From: Rob Sandelin (floriferousmsn.com)
Date: Mon, 23 Dec 2002 10:16:01 -0700 (MST)
It is the season of shadows, the lowest sun of the year, the shortest day.
All is quiet in the woods, as if the place were asleep for the winter. But
life still stirs. Under the drifts of fallen alder and maple leaves the tiny
cobwebs of mycelia, the main part of the mushroom, expand each day, the many
white branches secreting enzymes that will dissolve nitrogen and other
nutrients, and pull them into the surrounding trees.  The trees trade
photosynthetic sugar to the mushrooms wrapped around their root tips and in
exchange, the mushrooms send nutrients, freshly decomposed, back to the
tree.

A lone deer wanders through our woods nibbling on the dainty lichens that
the wind storms of winter have dropped.  This time of year is the only time
the upper branch lichen gardens are available. Lichens seem to be a favorite
winter food of the deer, the forest trails are fresh with tracks.

This is the time of elfish gardens, tiny mosses  send out miniature palm
tree like caps to shed spores into a raindrop. At the base of trees you
might find  tiny bright orange mushrooms, Hygrocybe most likely, that are
like tiny ornaments against the fuzzy moss. On a stump you can find witches
butter, an odd gelatinous squiggle of orange. In the darkest part of the
forest, where the trees are close and nothing green grows, look for dead
mans fingers, tiny black fingers with white tips reaching out of the ground.

The winter stillness is complete, the wind sighs through the trees and a few
needles rain down, followed by the twirling helicopters of the hemlock
seeds, the final few remnants shaken out of their cones. Then the stillness
is broken by the DEE DEE DEE of a merry band of chickadees, who enliven the
forest with their acrobatics. They are part of a wave of birds that passes
by, joined in this avian clean up crew by tiny tinkly voiced kinglets and a
brown creeper. Over in the distance, a resident Pileated woodpecker, the
largest of its kind in North America proclaims its connection to this
forest, and the clear Kewwww of the flicker adds to the thin winter chorus.
A Douglas squirrel  scampers out to see what all the noise is about, then
drops down to a lower branch, carefully scouts the forest, before hopping
over a fallen log or two to grab a cone from its fall harvest stash.

The quiet world of the winter forest resumes its slow, sleepy  pace,
drifting languidly in and out  of activity. As darkness descends, a small
group of humans, with candles enter the darkness, and start a small fire.
They mumble strange tones, laugh, sing a tune, then depart. The flying
squirrels cock their heads at the odd smell of candle and fire smoke, then
go back to their night time business. The world of nature, so alive and
vibrant, even in these dark, wet and cold days, remains unknown by the
humans who claim ownership.

Rob Sandelin
Sky Valley Environments  <http://www.nonprofitpages.com/nica/SVE.htm>
Field skills training for student naturalists
Floriferous [at] msn.com


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