For my second semester phenology spot, I decided to return to where I had visited previously in Centennial Woods. Pictured below is the spot, which is at the bottom of a hill by the brook.
The most obvious and consistent sign of animal activity I observed during my visit to the Natural Area today were the tracks of a small rodent, most likely a squirrel, in the snow all through the woods.
I considered that these tracks might be from another animal, like a rabbit, but there were many instances of the tracks leading to trees, furthering my confidence that the tracks were from squirrels.
Additionally, I observed what I believe to be deer tracks. The tracks were not very clear so I was unable to discern any imprint of hooves, but the diagonal placement of the relatively small tracks in straight lines only seemed possible to have been left by a deer.
Towards the entrance to the natural area I was able to hear chickadees (a pretty common bird to see in the winter in our area) in the canopy of trees above me. Using Merlin’s bird call ID I was able to confirm my ID.
Finally, the biggest phenological change I noticed from my last visit was that the brook had almost completely frozen over, as well as the wetland into which the brook flows.
I was able to see some tracks, like those of the squirrels, in the snow over the ice, which implied an interesting behavioral difference in relation to the landscape of their ecosystem.