11/1/07 – I took a walk this morning to snap a few pictures of this gorgeous November morning. Before I got more than a few steps, I noticed that the dogs were interested in one of the dumpsters in the parking lot. In August, a bear did some slight damage to one of the dumpster lids. It created a hole big enough for a pine marten to crawl in. Once in, the marten wasn’t able to jump high enough to reach the entrance hole and was effectively trapped.
I opened the lid and the marten immediately ran up the front slope of the dumpster and started jumping from dumpster to dumpster. I assumed it would jump into a nearby tree and escape, but no, it chose to jump down onto the ground. Instantly, there was a tornado of dogs and marten around the dumpsters. Homer, the golden retriever, was quite a bit behind the action and was slightly confused by all the activity. Phoebe, the terrier, was about six inches behind the marten with teeth snapping like castanets. Lucky for her, martens are slightly faster than terriers. Phoebe’s heartfelt desire to fight with the marten falls squarely in the category of “be careful what you wish for.”
I rigged the dumpster to prevent further marten trapping and we continued our walk. – Bill
Although this looks like the perfect day for a canoe trip, the ice forming around the edges presages the end of the canoeing season.
Homer inspects the ice forming on the Sawbill Lake canoe landing.