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January-February Nature Review
Date: January 1, 2007 Author: Phil Burke
As the days lengthen imperceptibly, we find ourselves locked in the dead of winter, a long way from the rebirth that begins in April on a good year and during some fortuitous years, as early as March. What will January and February hold this year? To answer this we have to look back to previous years and for this we turn to the journals, and in particular to the observations made last year.
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A Holiday Nature Quiz
Date: December 25, 2006 Author: Phil Burke
As the old year disappears like morning mist on a winter river, and the year sweeps in like an eagle over a heron colony, let us once again test ourselves with a little nature trivia. This test is best done in pairs with a reward for she or he who gains the best score.
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The Pine Tree - Part 2
Date: December 18, 2006 Author: Phil Burke
As a result of red squirrel feeding on a white pine cone, a seed was loosened and drifted to the ground far from the parent tree. It germinated in a fertile area shared by a quaking aspen, a balsam fir and a white spruce. A deer destroyed the aspen during the rut early one winter.....
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The Pine Tree
Date: December 11, 2006 Author: Phil Burke
Many decades earlier in the early fall a red squirrel, scampering across a pine bough more than two hundred metres away had carried a pine cone to its cache. It stopped on the branch and gnawed at the cone, taking an afternoon snack. A seed loosened and fluttered from between the cone scales, spinning in the wind to the ground in its dizzying flight.
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The Christmas Bird Count
Date: December 4, 2006 Author: Phil Burke
This year the bird count will take place in Kenora on Saturday, December 16. There is a two-week window during which the bird count may take place, but only one 24-hour period may be selected during that fourteen day period. The event is going to be a big day for birds and those who call themselves birders, birdwatchers, nature lovers and interested observers. This is the day volunteers with a vast range of experience and skill are being asked to spend a few hours counting birds.
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November Walks - Week 4
Date: November 27, 2006 Author: Phil Burke
The millions of tiny mammals that skitter among the dead grasses and under leaf litter welcome the snow for two reasons; first, it insulates them from severe cold and it also affords them protection from the many predators that rely on mice, voles and shrews to carry them through the winter.
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November Walks - Week 3
Date: November 20, 2006 Author: Phil Burke
Our treks through November continue with a walk through the surrounding bush or snow that was dumped by a mid-month storm in 1996 giving us 40 cm. (16 in.) over a period of 36 hours. The temperature ranged between -.3C and –4.1C. contributing to a very heavy wet snowfall.
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November Walks - Week 2
Date: November 13, 2006 Author: Phil Burke
It is the second week in November and as we review the journals for past Novembers we realize that this month, like most, is prone to wide variations in climate. However, there are some constants; one being the shortening of the photoperiod (hours of daylight) and the dropping of the mean daily temperature viewed best from a graph read at the end of the month when the trend is readily noticeable.
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A November Walk - Week 1
Date: November 6, 2006 Author: Phil Burke
November, while it may have many faces, provides us with the security of certain constants. We can be sure that all our greenery would have been stripped from the deciduous trees and shrubs by the time the eleventh month is upon us. We can count on a dearth of wildlife from insects up to birds. And we can count on the sun dropping lower in the sky on each successive day.
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Fall - Part 2
Date: October 30, 2006 Author: Phil Burke
Our fall walk has taken Norm, my dog, and I deep into the bush where we count our losses as fall erases the last vestiges of spring and summer. It is a sad time knowing that what was can never be again but next spring another world will appear, similar but not identical.
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