Nature Notes

Yesterday I took services at Trinity, Alpena.  One of the parishioners arriving for the 8:00 Eucharist reported that the temperature was either -3 degrees, or -11, or -13, depending on which bank's sign you wished to trust.  In any case, it has been wicked cold around here — not as chilly as in the UP, which can be 5-10 degrees colder than Alpena/Presque Isle, but still decidedly nippy.  Dave reports we may have a heat wave this week, with temperatures rising into the teens and twenties!  Get out the lawn chairs!

Photo: George Harrison

Then yesterday afternoon, as I was returning to Alpena after my visit to the house, a coyote ran across the road in front of my car.  I was on East Grand Lake Rd., just a little south of the intersection with Kauffman.  The coyote came running out of the woods, saw my car bearing down, and bounded into the trees on the other side of the street.  At first glance he (or she) looked like a wolf, but was smaller and lighter-boned, rather like a German Shepherd.  His shaggy coat was a gray-white mix.  This is the first time I've seen one of the local coyote population.  They are undoubtedly here in numbers.  Unlike the wolf, the coyote has prospered in the wake of human development, and even reproduces happily in suburban areas.  Coyotes will sometimes hunt deer, often running their prey to exhaustion.  However, they typically live on small mammals, and might make a quick snack of someone's small pet dog if given the chance.

We also have bear in Presque Isle.  I saw one several years ago, as I was driving north on US-23 past Thompson's Harbor State Park, which is located just north of Grand Lake.  At first I thought it was a deer — that's the animal you expect to see crossing the highway.  But as more of the animal came into view, this pedestrian was clearly larger and heavier, and kept his nose toward the ground.  When the bear saw my car coming, he loped across the road and disappeared into the woods.  On the road, he seemed to fill both lanes, but that is probably a distortion in the service of storytelling.  In any case, he was very large, yet also quick and graceful. •••