March is coming head on with cold winds and icy days! The past few weeks have been extremely frigid, yet this does not stop trees and animals from pushing forward with their lives and surviving until the warmth of spring and summer. Burlington offers unique spaces for animals to thrive in the city, with Church street filled with trees on up and down its length and parks and greens covering the land near the waterfront. The lake still has ice forming at the shore and tree buds are fully present. Some of the bird species I saw while walking around Burlington were crows and common songbirds like chickadees and sparrows. In some swaths of clean snow I saw some squirrel tracks, likely because squirrels thrive in city environments and they have an established presence in Burlington. Human activity hasn’t changed too much, but as the snow continues to melt and the weather warms, activity will continue to heavily increase in the city and on campus.
I also had the opportunity to travel home to Southern Vermont for part of the week and was able to capture more tracks and winter scenes from my hometown! The integration of nature into Burlington contrasted with the agricultural themes of Southern Vermont demonstrates the volatility of Vermont’s natural landscape during the month of March!
