Our Neighborhood – February 2026
/It was a sunny day in the mid-60s in our neighborhood. As I started my walk around our storm water ponds, I saw two robins – the first ones I’ve seen since last fall!
There seemed to be quite a few eastern white pine cones on the ground and in the trees. The tree in my yard is not old enough to produce cones yet.
There were turtles on the bank and in the water at the place I seem them most frequently.
There was ice on the second (smaller) pond. There were leaves stuck in the ice. One area has a circular center and then branches off that center. The ice would likely be gone by the end of the day.
Further around I noticed ice along the edge of the larger pond. The patterns there were changing…visible melting.
A recently ripped branch of a river birch was in the water, and some curly bark from the same kind of tree was on the shore nearby….both detached from the tree during the recent storm probably. One of the trees has exposed roots damaged by mowers.
A male and female mallard swam out into the pond. The female was eating and posed for a better picture that the male. I wondered if they were the same pair that has been at our pond for the last couple of years…hatching ducklings…and then losing them to the turtles.
Our area has been very dry since a very wet spring in 2025…and the snow earlier last month must have soaked in very close to where it melted. My yard is a little wet (would be muddy if there was vegetation everywhere). The intake channels for our stormwater ponds were dry and the water level in both ponds was low as well. Maybe we’ll have spring rains again soon.
