Warm winter mornings

We have the sort of midwinter days that allow us to stay out long enough for plenty of exercise, but everything looks wintry. Foster Island is still snow covered, but the Chemung is flowing. For Ellie it is a time to check out tracks and scent something in the air.

Funny dog! She like the doggies' tracks as much as if they were deer's. These two shot were from the mouth of Hoffman Creek, completely bereft of all animal wildlife.
The river isn't ice-clogged, but many of the "bergs" are still extant. Double click the picture and check out the river in the upper left.

Those yellow things signal intakes for our local drinking water, and I suspect the attached tree isn't doing any good. Something that size could conceivably cost a fortune to remove.

If it were not for Ellie's pink outfit, every picture would be brown and white...

Little Pond

Our Playground was covered in ice--again!

This is the Grove Street Fishing Access Site on the Chemung River, February 21, 2009.

This is a feeder creek, with the huge ice floes positively back up into it. No way are these from the feeder creek itself, I don't think.

These two gulls are visiting right on the river channel itself. I was very tempted to walk out on the river with Ellie, but, because there is so much flowing water, decided against it.

Just downriver from Elmira the water is completely free. The birds are congregating there, these days. We saw ducks, geese, crows, hawks, and even a harrier. Never saw one of those before, so it will be weeks and maybe months before I ever get a shot of those speed demons.

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Little Pond

Nothing shy of scary

No human or heavy equipment piled all this ice...

Some of it is dirty and in nasty, gritty slabs along the river front, while other chunks glow an ethereal blue. Double click and get a closeup.

Ellie is just tiny next to these stranded floes. She easily walks out on them, coming back to my whistle. I can hardly walk on land right now; Foster Island is slowly flooding over.

Right in downtown are some new pieces of driftwood, making lovely patterns and colors. Too bad this trunk is attacked to a huge, stripped log.

They all are, and are huge just in themselves. Wish I could drive the Tracker down there to haul a few out for the property.

The river is really dangerous right now. Very powerful and full of floes and driftwood.

Add the howling winds of late, and our whole visit was a little eerie.

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Little Pond

February Thaw

Oky, so the groundhog saw his shadow and we are going to have a long winter. Big deal. Why, if Ellie could get her teeth into the little bugger, she'd see to it that there would be no more prognostication, fair weather or no.
Anyway, the HuggaMutt and I took advantage of the lovely temperatures and went to West Elmira to see if the Chemung was thawing. And it was. Strange to hear the river on the move once again. Especially unusual for winter was the sound of gurgling. The water is very high and pushing against the shore plants. Makes the river sound very much like a living, breathing entity. A rare view of the buildings at Roricks Glen. Too bad we can't have her back in her old glory. But not only did time move on, but so did the Chemung. The structure rising out of the water used to support the bridge that took merrymakers to the old park.

If you google Roricks Glen there are even some sites that offer diaries and other stories about the old place. I'm not native to Elmira, so I don't miss it.

I arrived just days after the Great Flood of 1972, and the damage was already done.

Let me tell you, I respect the power of the Chemung River.

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Little Pond

OOOOPS

Misplaced blog entry messing up my linkage.

Just this once, go back to RiverDog2008 to have a current visit with Ellie.

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Little Pond