New York Forest

Ice Climbing

2008-02-07T20:43:00.000-08:00

Many of the secluded gullies of New York become winter playgrounds for ice climbers. Waterfalls turn into majestic sculptures that can be climbed with the proper equipment. It's amazing that each year all of the ice will disappear with rising temperatures, and then reform the next winter.

Mystery Bird

2008-01-16T13:56:00.000-08:00

Can any of you nature enthusiasts tell me what kind of bird this is? I mean other than a dead one?

Meleagris gallopavo

2008-01-16T13:16:00.000-08:00

A wild turkey almost gave me a heart attack last summer. It was early August, and I was standing in a sunny spot in the woods with thick undergrowth. It was completely silent, until a big turkey flew up from a spot inches from where I was standing. I looked down, and saw a nest with eggs! Hopefully she came back to her brood.

Ambystoma maculatum

2008-01-15T13:48:00.000-08:00

The Ambystoma maculatum, or spotted salamander, is seldom seen most of the year. It's reclusive lifestyle is broken for a brief time in the spring, however, when adults will migrate to breed in vernal pools or other bodies of water that lack predatory fish. During this time of unusual activity, spotted salamanders can be seen crossing roads in large numbers. The rest of the year you will have to do some searching if you are to meet one of these beautiful animals. I found this one under a rock near a secluded gully in July.

Megalania prisca

2008-01-13T22:01:00.000-08:00

What would it be like to encounter a two-ton lizard in the wild? How about just finding the fossilized bones of such a monster? I would be happy with either.

Old Trail, New Hike

2008-01-11T10:59:00.000-08:00

How many of us have a favorite hiking spot that we visit more than any other? I would bet most do. It's a combination of proximity, beauty, and perhaps low traffic from other hikers that draws us to these areas. My favorite place to hike is just six miles from home. I try to hike that trail at least once a week during the milder months. Although it's the same trail every time, it's never the same hike. The changing seasons always add a new element to the experience. In July, I feel like I am walking through a jungle. The woods are filled with foliage, insects, and other living things, and each hike involves an encounter with a seldom seen plant or animal. In the fall, change is everywhere. Secluded stands of sugar maples filter the sunlight to create a colorful new world below the canopy. Each day in the spring seems to offer a gift, whether it's a colony of emerging may apples or the sudden green haze of expanding buds on deciduous trees. The winter is its own world, clean and silent, and the tracks of wildlife serve as telling signs of winter activities. The seasons, however, are still just one source of novelty.
If your favorite hike follows an established trail, and you want to add some freshness to the experience, try leaving the trail for a moment, and making a C-shaped path off into the woods that will bring you back to the main trail. This method provides some of the excitement of bushwhacking, without the danger of getting lost. You will find some of the most interesting plant life just a few feet off the beaten path.

Lizards in New York?

2008-01-09T08:53:00.000-08:00

As a child who loved reptiles, I often wished I lived further south. The occasional garter snake or snapping turtle was always an exciting find, but during trips to South Carolina or Florida I was amazed by the abundance of lizards and other fascinating reptiles. Imagine my suprise when, after over twenty years of exploring the woodlands of New York, I found my first lizard: a Coal skink. The habitat was unusual as well - a very desert-like rocky slope on the north side of a stream. I have since returned to the exact site many times, and have found nothing.

Heightened Awareness

2008-01-08T11:53:00.000-08:00

Those of us who love to venture out into semi-wild areas to wander for hours know there is more to the experience than most realize. There are the obvious health benefits that come along with moderate, low-impact exercise, fresh air, and mental relaxation. But there is another beneficial effect of hiking that is fortunately much more immediate: the combination of calmness and alertness. This is likely partially a more spread out version of the well known "runner's high." Fellow hikers will know what I am referring to. Spend a half hour walking, and your thoughts will become noticeably more positive. You will be more motivated after the walk than you were before. Spend four hours walking, and your body will have reached a fluidity of motion that complements your new mental acuity. Meanwhile, your mind will be both energetic and at ease. In this heightened state of being, you no longer have the problem of getting yourself going, as you would if you were trying to get off the couch to walk the dog. At the end of a long hike, what you have really achieved is a harmony between mind and body.
Where does this elevated state come from? I don't know if this question has ever been answered. Exercise clearly plays a role, however. The brain no doubt gets more oxygen during hiking, as the rates of circulation and respiration increase. I would argue that in contrast to vigorous aerobic exercise, more prolonged and moderate exercise has a greater effect on the brain. Not only is the the brain receiving more nutrients during a long session of moderate exercise, but you have more time to think during a long walk than you would during a shorter run. When we hike, we are free to think. Ours minds wander and we end up working through problems and coming up with creative ideas, without ever intending to do so. New ideas and life solutions can have impacts on our lives that last much longer than the post-hike euphoria.
Exercise alone cannot account for the benefits of hiking though, as simply immersing ones self in a natural, beautiful area can alter the mind as well. Most of us spend the large majority of our time in buildings, always facing a flat wall. Our usual surroundings have a geometric simplicity that can dampen the imagination. The next time you are in the woods, look around and compare what you see to the inside of a building. The woods are infinitely more complex, and as primates, our minds evolved to process visual information not from the inside of a square building, but from the forests and other natural areas of our origin. The more time we spend indoors, looking at flat walls, flat computer and television screens, and flat floors and ceilings, the more we may be caging a component of the human brain that developed in a completely different environment.
What can be lost if we don't use our brains to the fullest extent? Hiking is not simply enjoying nature as a hobby or a nice diversion. It is a lifestyle. To be a hiker means more than to appreciate the natural beauty all around us. It means choosing to address a part of ourselves that is too often ignored. We are beings that spent millions of years evolving in an environment completely different from the one we live in today, and the hiker knows that the remnants of that evolution are alive and well in the human brain, waiting to be awoken with a gaze upon a forested trail.