January has mostly been very cold with almost no snow.   But last few days have been warm and the last two days it’s felt like spring.  There’s hardly any snow on the ground so we’ve been able to walk on the tops of our hills nearly every day.

Cold morning sky with contrails – the planes are probably heading to Chicago.

 

Frozen grasses in Buffalo Ridge Prairie

 

Hidden Oaks Savanna with ice coating the plants and trees

 

Sunrise over the creek with a gnarled willow

 

View from the Knife Edge Point with snow flurries in the air

 

We’re trying to figure out what’s been happening to the stream in the Glen – the small ravine where we sit to watch birds.  The water comes from a small spring just around the bend in the pictures.  Normally the stream is one to two feet wide and about an inch deep.

This is what it looked like in early October.

 

December 20.

 

On January 7th the ice had started to spread out.

 

Pretty soon our birding bench was surrounded by ice – January 17th.

 

The ice keeps spreading – now the whole floor of the ravine is ice – January 24th.   We never see any moving water – the ice just keeps spreading out.

 

Here’s another wet spot – in the wetland.  Normally this is a small slightly damp patch in an otherwise dry meadow.  Yesterday – with the warm temperatures – it had turned into a shallow pond.

 

The beavers have been building a new dam in the creek, just downstream from one of the older dams.  It looks a bit disorganized, but it does slow the water down on that side of the creek.  The dam doesn’t go all the way across – they’ve left a narrow channel on the left side where the water can flow around it.

 

Vole tunnels under the surface of the snow

 

The star-shaped footprints of an opossum.  These are next to the big brush pile where I think it has a den.

 

Now the snow is gone in most of the prairies…

 

and in the woods.

 

Buffalo Ridge had a little snow until the last few days.

 

Another sunrise…

 

Early morning sun on Indian Grass Point

 

The last few days have been so warm that I did some buckthorn clearing in a rediscovered prairie opening.  I had done some clearing there years ago, but then neglected it because there were so many other larger places to work on.  It still looks like prairie, but some big buckthorns have grown up, and the edges are starting to be overgrown with buckthorns and small trees.   I worked there this morning and got the biggest buckthorns cut.  Amazing to be able to work outside in January.

 

The sun coming up over the top of the hill…