2025 Year End

The month of December and 2025 closed out on a cold and mostly cloudy winter day. Here's hoping that in 2026 we find more joy, compassion, community, and spiritual guidance in nature.

We are thankful for our home that brings in lots of light and offers many windows into our yard to observe wild things. During the growing season we share our garden bounty with rabbits, chipmunks, deer, and an occasional woodchuck. An opossum wanders through year-round, taking refuge under one of our sheds. The moles tunnel just below the surface of the grass, aerating the lawn, while skunks forage for grubs leaving small divots in the yard. 

I set out two wildlife cameras -- 20+ year-old so not the best imagery, but it documents the night-time visitors. Two deer, a mother and fawn, visited often, and a small buck a few times. 

Rabbits are the the most common night-time visitor -- at least three and sometimes a family, but 2025 did not seem to be successful as we saw few young bunnies. I was excited to capture a black bear, gray fox, opossum, and a very large raccoon. A Halloween pumpkin and sunflower seeds from the bird feeders attracted white-footed mice,and a flying squirrel.

The flock of ten turkeys visited once or twice a day since August or so, stopping twice today. The young ones have grown. Based on their breast feathers, it looks like 5 females (brown-tipped feathers) and 5 males (black-tipped feathers). Some of the males are starting to show a small bump on their legs that will grow into spurs as well as the hint of a snood and other head ornaments. 

The bird feeders went up around December 1st. A day too early as a bear or two found them. Thereafter the temperatures dropped and the bears, presumably, tucked into their dens for the winter. A female yellow-bellied sapsucker continued to visit the suet, staying later than usual. Others have reported the same. 

Our gardens survived and flourished despite cold rain in May and drought in late summer. But it has become hard to grow any Brassicas due to the abundance of cabbage white butterflies. The garlic crop was successful with a new crop of 197 bulbs planted on November 2nd. Soon, it will be time to peruse seed catalogs, plan the garden, and dream of warm soil and green shoots.