Reasons to Love Spring

 

This is the best time of year to go for a walk in the woods.  Living in Franklin, MA, we are blessed to be in the middle of the best the world has to offer.

We are half an hour to an hour away from the city.  I don’t only mean Boston, but also Providence, RI, and Worcester.  All three cities have unique cultural and entertainment allurements.

But for this particular moment in time, I want to concentrate on the areas’ natural surroundings.

A few days a week, I am fortunate enough to get out and take a nature bath.  On Mondays, I walk with the Wrentham Seniors.  We meet at the Wrentham Senior Center at 9:30.  They walk year round in all kinds of weather, putting cleats on their boots to walk on ice in the winter. They carry umbrellas when walking in the rain.  The group also walks at a fast pace.  The first time I walked with them I could barely keep up and fell behind.

One reason I might have fallen behind, besides being out of shape, was because I was used to the walking pace of my Thursday hiking group.  This group is led by a 90 year-old lady.  We go everywhere, from Rhode Island to areas surrounding Boston.

Lastly, on Friday, after a TOPS meeting some of the members go walking.  TOPS is a nutrition conscious group, that meets on Fridays at 12:30 at the Franklin Senior Center.  The vast majority of the group are there to lose weight, but we’ve had a couple of people who are there to gain weight.  TOPS is good for everyone.  After our meeting we walk in surrounding towns’ woods for an hour.

What’s my favorite?  Honestly, I can’t pick my favorite walk, especially this time of year.  There’s just too much of everything.  No matter which group I’m with, no matter what day it is, no matter where I go, I never see everything there is to see.  But it’s all wonderful.

This Monday, on Knuck Up Hill, in Wrentham, the sky was so clear, we could see the Boston cityscape. Half an hour later, we walked by six turtles sunning themselves on a log.  Fifteen minutes later we stopped to talk to a lady who had just caught a large mouth bass in Trout Pond.  She threw it back in.  She explained that she catches and releases.

 No matter where we turn in spring, there’s something going on.

A favorite place this time of year is Wallamonapoag, in Wrentham, because of the herons nesting.  We counted 36 nests, that we could see. Wallamonapoag is a nature preserve.  The name is native-American for “Place of Shells.” It features several beaver dams, forests, some large eskers and the heron rookery. There are also a couple of swans who have taken up residents, among the noisy mallards.  The swans just had seven cygnets . It is such a delight to see the proud parents parading their family.

The eskers can be too steep for some people.  An esker is a remnant of a glacier.  Glaciers once covered all of New England.  As the glaciers melted, the water carried gravel and boulders that were laid down in steep ridges. Since an esker is mostly gravel, they are too often mined for solid fill.  Therefore, eskers are becoming scarce.

Besides the eskers, near the water are many salamanders, toads, box turtles, bugs, fungi, worms, and other small creatures.  This time of year is when we see lady slippers, too.  And yes, it is still against the law to pick them.

On Friday afternoons, after our TOPS meeting, some members walk with me.  Delcarte Conservation Area in Franklin is the perfect spot.  It is a natural gem. In one panoramic view of the pond one can see the fish jumping, some box turtles sunning themselves, and the swans and cygnets gliding silently and majestically along.  There are a couple of beaver lodges but I’ve never got a glimpse of the beavers, although there’s evidence of their handiwork, here and there among the fallen trees. No matter where we look, there’s life, living.

We never know what we’ll see when we head out for a walk.  Perhaps some Canadian geese will let us know that we’re unwelcome, or we’ll see tree swallows swoop around amusing themselves. We could come upon some mallards having a romantic conversation.

Life is happening, everywhere.

Sometimes you have to really listen and look, but there’s always the joy of revelation—the singing birds, the flowers of the woodland, the animals darting here and there, busy/busy nesting and gathering. 

It’s impossible to see everything.  But we try.

Spring is too short; life is too short; don’t miss any of it. Nature is the place where something incredibly interesting happens; you just have to be there to see it.