Unsettled Bones

 

With the gray doldrums of winter and a pandemic weighing squarely upon me, this week I started taking my lunch outside. By the time the sub zero weekend rolled around and knowing that we were in for a bit of weather on Martin Luther King Jr's Birthday, I was beginning to feel panicked that I would never see the open trail again! Ok, so that may have been a momentary loss of my senses. Call it cabin fever, call it whatever you want, Wayne was on the receiving end of it. 

A bit of a warning is in order here for those who aren't quite as fascinated by bones as I am. There are pictures of bones in this blog, not Wayne's mind you, but interesting none the less.

Wayne had barely gotten the milk on his cereal when I asked him where we were hiking today. His enthusiasm was palatable in his remark about something of it still being in the single digits. 

"Do you want to drive over to see if we can find the trail from the road?" Wayne asked after agreeing to a scouting expedition. We had both gotten into the Jeep when it dawned on us that we were headed towards another error in judgment. "Do you want to get on our gear in case we decide to start hiking?" I looked down at my day hikers and knowingly agreed. The thing about Wayne, is that I can wait forever for him only to have him in the end ready before I am. 

The plan was to hike the VAST secondary orange trail between green trail marker six and Newton road. We had previously hiked the green trail from the Vernon Rec to the Dam but had skipped this extension on that hike. 

This trail skirts state land shown near the top of the below image. Note "Blodgett" on both maps for refence. The areas shaded in blue are state lands. We decided to access the trail from Mary Drive off of 142 and parked at the now closed School House Grocery. 

Don and his crew, Vernon Trail Breakers Snowmobile Club  maintain these trails. Private land owners generously allow these trails to cross their land. 

State lands posted in yellow, are to the left of the trail as we enter from Mary Drive.

As we neared the tracks, we had state land diamonds on our immediate left, multiple newly posted no trespassing signs to our right, with green trail markers and RR signs directly ahead. This is a major intersection for a town of our size.

And by the looks of things, traffic has been heavy this winter. 

We've only taken one animal tracks class with Bonnyvale and this hike challenged every bit of our novice knowledge. Above are turkey tracks. Below are feline, K-9 and deer. There were more  than these to investigate, but I wanted to try and show all three kinds together.

Across the tracks and straight across the field is the green trail. The orange trail is to the left. Never ones to be satisfied with the obvious, we decided to walk the circumference of the field. 

When attempting to identify tracks, distance between prints and stride patterns are as important as the individual print. Here I use my glove to show relative size. These tracks show four toes with retracted claws. I asked Helen how to tell the difference between these cat prints and the weasel family. Helen said that mustelids have five toes.

I took another unexpected trip to the ground. As I rested in the prone position trying to collect myself, Wayne thinking that I had simply failed to sufficiently lift my feet while walking, asked me if I had fallen over my own feet again. I rolled over and looked in disbelief at a clump of grass that had apparently led to my undoing. 

Cut bone and deer hide. We couldn't find the skull or legs.

Rodents had gnawed at the ribs. Ferns and grasses had grown up through them. This find was worth the headache I suffered for the rest of the day from my fall.

On the bank of the Island Meadow Brook, we found a hole.

The brook was frozen enough for us to walk on. We weren't the first to walk on the ice.

With freezing and thawing, it's difficult to know the initial shape and size of a track.

The bend is a particularly beautiful area

We decided to check out the green trail bridge over the Island Meadow Brook as Don had shown me pictures of it being flooded. Don thinks that the issue is an undersized culvert. I wondered if the issue was beaver; but the only signs of beaver we found were two felled tree stumps that weren't fresh. 

From here we backtracked to the orange trail.

The light being let into this area is due to recent logging adjacent to the trail.

Wayne finally located an orange blaze.

Blodgett's field

We spent some time alternating through fields and woods

Wayne walks next to a posted area that has recently been logged.

At the edge of a Dunklee's field, we found seed filled deer tracks

The last leg of the orange trail crosses this field.

However, twenty feet from where we entered the field, Wayne noticed a sign that ended our hike short of Newton road.

Wayne checked his app to see if we had somehow missed the trail, but with no trespassing signs posted to the right of us and this sign to the left, we turned back.

Our shortened hike wasn't a total loss however, we stopped to check out a flooded area on the way back and found these cool tracks. After bugging Helen and Kirk all morning for identifications, they pointed out that most of my exciting track sightings on this hike were domestic dog and cat. I won't let that minor detail ruin my fun. -Norma Manning

When Small Brooks Turn into Little Rivers

 

Sunday morning, after a Saturday night of rain, after a week of rain and with more rain in the forecast, I informed Wayne that we were holding off on breakfast in favor of touring Vernon's brooks. Did anyone even realize that we have a Vernon brook tour? I'd  blame / credit Martin for this; but then I'd be getting off point. 

Our first stop was where Town Brook flows through the village at Allison Ln. Scoping out both sides of the road, I realized that Vernon's investment in updating culverts was money well spent. This area of the neighborhood washed out a number of years ago during heavy rains; but oddly enough had not done so prior to that during Tropical Storm Irene. This morning there was a hearty water flow when typically this time of year the brook is dry here.

Our next brook is Newton where the fire pond is as high as I have seen. This is on Scott Rd on the southern end of Lily pond where the fire pond is. For the first time, I saw a small amount of water flowing from the pond underneath Scott Rd and into the typically dry streambed there. 

The fire pond is fed from both the stream to the left and from the pond to the right.

I'm taking some space here to document this as there has been some discussion in town as to the headwaters of Newton brook and if an early dam on the southern end or an attempt to drain the pond altered the natural tributary and trajectory of  the brook.

The stream to the left looking north from Scott Rd. 

Directly across from the fire pond the culvert is emptying into a typically dry bed of Newton brook and continues behind the Morrison's place

Once again facing the pond, the small seasonal stream flows down the hill off of Scott Road, over a driveway and into the fire pond.

I'm almost done geeking out at this location. Here is the stream flowing along Scott Rd. I promise you that we will get to bigger flows later.

This is again Newton brook, but further south where it flows under Pond Rd. Newton brook is on the left and flood waters to the right.

Looking north from the Newton brook fire pond on 142

Newton brook on the East side of 142 near the Mass border

 

We headed north on 142 to Stebbins road and stopped on the way when we saw ducks swimming amongst the corn stalks in a field that typically floods in the spring. I wasn't quick enough to get their picture however.

We found Island Meadow brook bypassing the dam just before it flows under Stebbins road. The brook is brown with silt.

Town brook from the driveway at the mill and post office with 142 in the background.

The big beautiful culvert where Town brook flows under 142

We headed towards Cold brook where it meets the CT River below the dam. I had anticipated seeing the flood gates open at the dam; but not a one was. I saw Gordon's video on the Vernon, VT Facebook group showing that this brook had given the resident's on West road a time of it this morning. We did drive up West road but couldn't see any flooding from the road. The drive did give me pause however when I considered what might happen if one day the multiple beaver dams on Cold brook were to give way releasing the water in large pond down the brook all at once.  

Remember that meandering little brook Wayne and I walked in on the way to Miller's Cove to go fishing? I fell into Jacks Brook that Sunday when descending the bank and got quite banged up. Jacks brook looked more substantial this morning and had me thinking that an innertube ride might be fun!

Here is what I promised to you in the beginning. This is where we discovered (possibly) one reason why the indigenous people called the Broad brook, "Little River." 

A clean water project has been in progress on Broad Brook Road with ditches being dug on the side opposite of the brook and culverts under the road to the brook.

One of two waterfalls. this is a first sighting for Wayne and I! We will pay better attention to the opposite side of the road from the brook this spring.

The second waterfall enters a culvert under the road and empties into the Broad brook.

The swimming hole under this side of the narrows has vanished under high waters!

My first surprise was seeing that the Vernon Hydro Station's flood gates were shut. My second surprise was seeing that the Broad Brook falls were consumed with flood waters giving the illusion of a significantly shorter drop.

It's really difficult for me to capture the power of waterfalls, I think this picture is as close as I could come.

We drove into Guilford and then took Franklin road back to 142. We stopped at Central Park Rd which is near the north end of Pond road to see the new culvert there. That beautiful culvert prevented flooding in what once was an area that routinely flooded into a field across the street. 

On our way up  Huckle Hill, we found that  Town Brook had washed over Hickory Hollow road. 

Unfortunately, this structure was on the receiving end of the flood.

Is seems unfathomable that in July of 2020, Vernon was suffering from a prolonged drought and Lily Pond was as low as I have ever seen it in our eighteen years here. Wayne reports that our neighbors in western Mass are nearing record rainfall for the month of July. With rain in tonight's forecast, we may see our brooks rise further still as our ground is already saturated. 

When our brooks run brown, we are seeing the effects of soil erosion. Silt in our water is reason for concern not only for those who are losing valuable topsoil, but because silt is a form of water pollution that negatively impacts aquatic life. In addition to silt though not readily visible in my pictures are other forms of pollution washing off of roads and even lawns.  

For the reasons I listed above, and for the preservation of infrastructure and even our homes, it is vital that we continue our progress in creating setback buffers from wetlands, that we reestablish native plants in our watersheds, recreate historical connections between surface waters and wetlands and yes, even in rural Vernon's landscape, that we limit our hardscape, indeed work to decrease our hardscapes in order to allow our natural areas to capture and filter water runoff. 

Nature's vegetative wetland sponges have historically all too often been discarded in the name of development which is seen by some as "progress." With climate change creating more frequent extremes in weather, it's more important than ever to adjust our mindset about what true progress is. I'm all for better roads, better bridges, better culverts, better buildings; but if we can only bring ourselves replace the term "better" with "thoughtful," we may find ourselves with more options than driving down a straight road towards climate change.  

Sometimes the big things seem all too big for people like us to contribute towards meaningful solutions. We've thrown up our hands and think what's the use? We point fingers at cities and other countries and chime, "What about them?".  But I'm telling you that you can create real progress right here and right now! Choose something, (one thing) anything that you are passionate about with an eye towards mitigating greenhouse gases. Champion one body of water, one brook, a river, a vernal pool or if you are able, an entire watershed!  Choose to prevent runoff and dust storms from lawns and fields by planting cover crops and replanting native plants, shrubs and trees. Look to our hills, peer into our valleys, examine your hearts, find something! Before it's too late -Norma Manning

Addendum: 

I did not include two brooks in this blog of which Martin wrote about previously in The Brooks of Vernon, they are Roaring Brook and Witch Gulch. Roaring Brook required a hike in soggy conditions and Witch Gulch was obstructed from view by plant growth. 

Jeff Nugent just prior to this flooding event, ventured to Roaring Brook with fellow hikers and granted me permission to post his email describing their high falls on Roaring Brook adventure.

"Lead by the intrepid Bob Spencer, three of us adventured off in search of Roaring Brook Falls earlier this week. After a brief detour ("Um, Bob? I think we're in.... Massachusetts?"), numerous puddle bypasses, three harrowing stream crossings, a challenging descent into the gorge, and miles of forests that looked magical in the evening mist, we finally made it.  Roaring Brook Falls in all its truly roaring glory! The ferns on the rocks near the base of the "middle" falls were actually waving in the turbulent air generated by the falls.  The last time I was there was with much les flow in the late 90's. It was nice to return."

Photograph (middle) by Jeff Nugent

Photograph (upper) by Jeff Nugent

Further information:

Climate change: Resilience and Adaptation in New England (RAINE)

Watershed Maps For Southeastern Vermont