Welcome to My Home!
Here is a quick tour of our property. It has many interesting aspects that I never honed in on before NR-1.
Trees!
Our property is located in a Northern Hardwood Forest comprised of lots of red and sugar maple, beech, eastern white pine, white oak, and various birch trees.
Maple Sugaring
A few sap buckets left out by the previous owner of the property. Throughout the woods here gravity fed sap lines meander their way down the gradient to the old sugaring house.
Old Stone Walls
A prime example of the stonewalls that used to divide the farms that occupied this area. Looking at our property and neighboring properties these systems of stone walls combined with the successional patterns support that the less rocky areas used to be clear cut grazing fields.
Evidence of Glaciation
A glacial erratic in our backyard shows the geologic history of the area.
Bedrock
A large section of ledge poking through the surface epitomizes our property. There is surface bedrock showing through across the property which becomes increasingly evident when trying to put in a garden.
Human Created Habitats
In the winter we burn a large amount of wood to supplement heating with just oil. The pallets that we use to dry out the wood are prime territory for lots of smaller creatures like mice and squirrels. However, as anyone who has uncovered a wood pile after seasoning a common site are the large number of snake skins.
The phenology here is in a similar stage to that of the Burlington area. Our property is in full on stick season with the remaining leaves having fell over the past storm cycle. The shorter of the beech trees, protected from the wind, are still holding a majority of their leaves but their taller counterparts are bare. There are few birds in the area apart from chickadees and the occasional blue jay from what I have seen.
The phenology is likely so similar due to the congruence of ecologic characteristics from here in Northern NewHampshire to Burlington. This area shares many of the same plant species as Centennial Woods. There is an abundance of Eastern White Pines that are likely a result of the past history of the area. In the past this area was clearcut for pasture lands as a part of a farm as we have found dumping grounds and old farm equipment in the woods on our property. Also, this is evident from the distribution of the types of trees across the landscape. In areas that have greater amounts of surficial ledge there are fewer Eastern Whites as those areas would have made for poor pastures.
Our state is known as The Granite State for a reason and that is exemplified across the property. Similar to what we observed at Rock Point in many areas trees have rooted themselves in very shallow soils on top of large bedrock formations. In areas with shallow soils the species differ greatly from terrain that allows for extensive root systems. Through observing the surface ecology it is easy to predict if there is ledge close to the surface because the area will lack large hard woods like Oak and Maple but will be covered in smaller trees with the occasional mid sized pine.
The land here is similar phenologically and ecologically to that of Centennial woods as a result of the similar past both landscapes have experienced. The differences lie in the geology of the area. Centennial is based in sands similar to the newly succeeded areas in our area. But, the shallowness of our soils in some areas creates an interesting difference in ecology.
– Citations –
Marks, H. (2020) Oak Tree [Picture] Littleton NH, United States
Marks, H. (2020) Sap Buckets [Picture] Littleton NH, United States
Marks, H. (2020) Sugar House [Picture] Littleton NH, United States
Marks, H. (2020) Old Stone Walls [Picture] Littleton NH, United States
Marks, H. (2020) Bed Rock [Picture] Littleton NH, United States
Marks, H. (2020) Gravity Fed Lines [Picture] Littleton NH, United States
Marks, H. (2020) Wood Piles [Picture] Littleton NH, United States
Marks, H. (2020) Sugar House 2 [Picture] Littleton NH, United States
Google Images. (2020) Mapping of Property [Screen Shot] Littleton NH, United States