November 19th. Two distant Red-tailed Hawks (Buteo jamaicensis).

 

 

 

 

 

Beavers have taken down several small trees, carting off the branches for building or a submerged food cache.

 

 

 

November 20th.  Looking small to find color on a cloudy, damp afternoon.  Crowded Parchment mushrooms (Stereum complicatum) with pale grey foliose lichen.

 

 

 

 

 

Lush moss in this weather.

 

 

 

I won't guess this mushroom species.

 

 

 

Clubmoss (Lycopodium sp.).

 

Ravenel's Stinkhorn (Phallus ravenelii).  Several of them under the Colchester Spur sign.

 

Gypsy Moth (Lymantria dispar) egg masses on trees near Route 85.

 

November 23rd.  15 degrees.  (It was 7 at dawn.)  East of Route 207.  Bleak, and Winter is still a month away.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Red berries of Winterberry (Ilex verticillata), in the holly family.

 

After several hard frosts, they'll be eaten by Robins and other birds.

 

 

 

Still some green if you look for it.  Christmas Fern (Polystichum acrostichoides).

 

Ground Pine (Lycopodium obscurum).  In the early days of photography, Lycopodium spores were collected and used as flash powder: spread out in a shallow tray, ignited to produce a burst of white light. 
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lycopodium_powder

 

A short afternoon walk east from River Road.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Massive beaver lodge and winter food cache (the partly submerged branches and twigs to the left of the lodge).

 

 

 

An atypical beaver dam, surrounding the man-made overflow dam of the pond.

 

Lily pads trapped in the ice.

 

 

 

Oak leaves too.

 

Walking west from Bull Hill Road.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looking east from the Lyman Viaduct.

 

Looking north, the view from the Lyman Viaduct is almost entirely obscured by trees.  Very different from when I started walking the trail in 2001.