every morning at dawn or even earlier marty and our australian shepherd francie go trotting out the front door and down the road to greet the day. an important part of this ritual takes place hours later with marty telling me in great detail about that day's walk, as i am just waking up and sipping a steaming cafe au lait from a tiny ceramic cup banded with a parade of geese. his report today was so especially special i asked if he would write it up and he graciously obliged.
This morning Francie and I went down the road, framed by two celestial events. Over the blazing east hills, the sun was just about to come up. To the southwest, a huge full moon was starting to go down. It was quite chilly but crystal clear with nice high pressure and lower humidity than we've had in weeks. As we neared the fox house, Francie began a continual nose-down snuffling that could mean only one thing: foxes are close by.
No sign of them at the fox house, though, so we turned onto South Dyer Neck Road to go over the short bridge and partway up the hill on the other side. As we neared the bridge two crows started shrieking alarm calls from the big old oak along the road beyond the bridge. Sure enough, sitting in the road under the oak like he owned the place, was Mr. Fox, staring at us. As we kept heading directly towards him, he sauntered across the road towards the Sheepscot River, and when he went out of sight in the trees, we could track him by the hysterical hovering of the two crows. Francie, of course, never looked up from her sniffing of the dry dirt on the road shoulders.
The fox trotted across the bottom of the open pasture where the geese often hang out and disappeared into the trees on the other side. Once we reached the big oak, I looked across the pasture and sure enough, there was friend fox, just at the edge of the tree line, watching us intently.
This afternoon, I decided to return to the same spot, even though there was no chance of a fox staying in one area nearly that long. Just where the fox had been in the pasture this morning, were the geese, standing still with their heads pointed up. Knowing the culinary predispositions of foxes, I thought it would be a good time for a beak count. It came out at 11. How could that be, since there used to be 13 and 3 got eaten? I counted again, and as I came again to 11, I noticed, standing in the middle of the flock with his neck straight up like a vigilant goose, was Ronny Foxy Baby! Now a bachelor, our fave duck seems to have found a new gang to hang out with, and although the geese never seem particularly happy to be in each other's company, nobody was bothering Ronny.
No sign of them at the fox house, though, so we turned onto South Dyer Neck Road to go over the short bridge and partway up the hill on the other side. As we neared the bridge two crows started shrieking alarm calls from the big old oak along the road beyond the bridge. Sure enough, sitting in the road under the oak like he owned the place, was Mr. Fox, staring at us. As we kept heading directly towards him, he sauntered across the road towards the Sheepscot River, and when he went out of sight in the trees, we could track him by the hysterical hovering of the two crows. Francie, of course, never looked up from her sniffing of the dry dirt on the road shoulders.
The fox trotted across the bottom of the open pasture where the geese often hang out and disappeared into the trees on the other side. Once we reached the big oak, I looked across the pasture and sure enough, there was friend fox, just at the edge of the tree line, watching us intently.
This afternoon, I decided to return to the same spot, even though there was no chance of a fox staying in one area nearly that long. Just where the fox had been in the pasture this morning, were the geese, standing still with their heads pointed up. Knowing the culinary predispositions of foxes, I thought it would be a good time for a beak count. It came out at 11. How could that be, since there used to be 13 and 3 got eaten? I counted again, and as I came again to 11, I noticed, standing in the middle of the flock with his neck straight up like a vigilant goose, was Ronny Foxy Baby! Now a bachelor, our fave duck seems to have found a new gang to hang out with, and although the geese never seem particularly happy to be in each other's company, nobody was bothering Ronny.
