As I write, it is early Monday morning. The sun has been up for about forty minutes, but you cannot see it yet. Low clouds and I guess a fog filter its shine. The temperature is already seventy and the humidity is in the high eighties. The lazy, hazy days of summer are upon us and I think too soon. For some it will be a run the air-conditioner day. Mid week, we could be talking power grid issues. Maybe not with all of us concerned about where the family funds are headed and opening our utility bills with fear and trepidation. Some us will slow our pace and close the shades on the sunny side of the house and wait for the afternoon thunder storm to cool the day and evening.

It is only early July. Who knows what the “dog days” of August will bring to the neighborhood?

I can attest that the wildlife population is up in my backyard. I was walking our puppy yesterday many times. You get to do that if you are training a new puppy. When we are both home, my spouse and I will try to walk the three of us together husband, wife and puppy. Sometimes one of us will take a turn and walk the pup alone.

JIM HANLEY

Publisher

An afternoon last week, my wife returned slightly shaken to report a menacing hawk or falcon had swept low overhead when she was walking the pup along the edge of the brush line in the field behind our house.

Her first notice of the bird of prey was its shadow on the field of grass. Its screech and low swooping flight unnerved her. So we took another walk altogether and spied a matched pair of Peregrine falcons working the tree line. We note them now perched on the tallest object available most times we take a walk. We assume they are nesting. They are a menace to tweety birds on the wing and moles and mice in the field. They are not a menace to us as they have decided we are not a menace to them. I have never seen resident falcons in our neighborhood before this encounter.

Last evening on what I hoped would be the next to the last walk of the day the pup and I strolled down the street past Nana’s and down the driveway at my mom and dad’s house to cut through their side yard gate and into the small stand of maples and scrub oak behind their garage on our circuit toward home. Except for the open gate to the stand of trees, mom and dad’s side yard is fenced.

As we turned to walk down the little hill to the side yard, the pup sat. Twenty feet away was a doe. She was four foot to the shoulder and five feet to the top of her head. She looked fit and maybe one hundred and fifty pounds. All of us were surprised. None of us was panicked. She trotted away a bit and stopped and studied us. We studied her. She grazed and paused and looked and stopped again. This went on for three to five minutes. I never wear a watch on a walk. I seldom wear a watch at all.

The pup and I shifted a bit to clear a path to the back gate. She trotted through the gate and into the evening and disappeared. I love how wild things can disappear. The pup and I trotted home to tell our tale.

Until next time.