LUCILLE

One Monday morning in late June, I saw what appeared to be a moss-covered dome-shaped boulder moving at the base of a hill just south of the main gates to my property.  I'm not saying that boulders never move on hilly terrain such as this; it's just that I've never seen one move uphill of its own accord. So I paid attention.

Quickly I realized this was no ordinary boulder.  I watched in fascination as a head, arms and legs and a tail came into view. I began to suspect this was a snapping turtle.

Is this the way to Mt. Everest?

There are lots of signs warning of TURTLE CROSSING in the neighbourhood, so I wasn't totally surprised, but I couldn't understand why it was trying to walk up a steep hill.  It could have come up the driveway if it wanted an easy route.  This was at the same time an enormous influx of people were trying to scale Mount Everest, so I was tempted to name the turtle Sir Edmund Hillary. I thought the better of it when my neighbours pointed out that this snapping turtle was digging a hole in which to lay her eggs.

Early the following Saturday morning, my neighbours emailed to say the turtle was now in the very middle of the entrance to my driveway.  They were watching it dig a hole.  They explained that snapping turtle eggs need to be protected from predators until they hatch.  They lent me a dog crate to tide me over until I had time to build a screened cage as recommended by Credit Valley Conservation.

Once the turtle had laid her eggs, I presume she headed up the driveway towards one of my ponds.  I didn't see her again, as I went to Toronto for the day, while my neighbours kept a close eye on events in my driveway.

I read up on snapping turtle eggs and learned that my driveway would be the site of a turtle maternity hospital for basically the entire summer.  I'm conflicted: half of me is proud to be the birthplace of an endangered species.  The other half of me is extremely irritated that I have to drive around the screened cage.  And this latter half of me is indignant that any parent would be so careless as to effectively dump her kids by the side of the road and leave them for someone else to raise.  I'm expecting the eggs to hatch any day now, and I'll be very eager to get rid of the turtle cage blocking the entrance to my driveway.

Who leaves their kids by the side of the road?

Now, every time I drive past that screened cage, I instinctively burst into song, and now the title of that song has become the name of the mother snapping turtle.  I call her You Picked A Fine Time To Leave Me, Lucille.

Canada Vignettes: Log Driver's Waltz (performed without hip waders)

SO HIP IT HURTS

All summer long, I've been telling myself that I need hip waders.

With three ponds, none of them too clean, I often find myself needing to climb into the water and retrieve a waterlogged tree trunk, or glide the Good Ship Louise through the particularly shallow narrows between Ponds Two and Three, or to saw off an overhanging branch.  You understand that none of the aforementioned was in my skill set when I moved here five months ago.

Even without hip waders, I often climbed into the pond, hoping to find the water level below the tops of my rubber boots.  Often it was, so I took another step, and found myself up to my thighs in pond water.  Once, my nephew Angus chivalrously offered to help me glide the boat between Pond Two and Pond One.  I stepped out, he promptly gave Louise one mighty shove in the right direction, and the flat bottom of the boat ended up on the tops of both my feet, throwing me (and my phone) off balance.  We fell backwards into the mud.   My language at that precise moment pretty much peeled the paint off the boat. Angus likely will not make that mistake again.   

But even hip waders would not have helped me in that situation.  Emptying frogs from my boots, a hot shower, a lot of soap, a cup of hot tea and a generous application of home made laundry detergent on my clothing restored my composure to a degree.  Angus still helps me whenever he's here, but I notice he gives the Good Ship Louise a wide berth.

Still, I've been pining for hip waders.  Two weeks ago, I was en route to my brother's place in Toronto when I realized I was close to Al Flaherty's Outdoor Store on Dufferin Street.  I had about fifteen minutes to spare, so I decided to pop in and look at hip waders.  Not only did they have hip waders, they had a pair in my size.  I didn't try them on, I just grabbed them, paid, and headed out the door.

Thirteen days later, I still haven't even tried them out once.  I don't know what the trouble is.  Perhaps there are so many other things to keep me busy at Five Acres this time of year, but somehow I've never gotten up the nerve to pull them on and attach them to my belt.  I think a bit of it may be that to get out of them is a hassle.  When I'm out working on the property, I can kick off my wellington boots at the screen door, come in for a drink of water, and be outside again in a minute.  Not so with hip waders.  You have to take off your belt, and pulling them off is probably an ordeal.  Maybe a smart move is to keep a large tub of clean water by the screen door so I can step in that, rinse off the foot part, and just come in with the hip waders on.

Be that as it may, today is the day I'm going out in my hip waders.  My work jeans are the right degree of grimy, it's not so hot outside that I'll need a drink of water every hour, and the water level on the ponds has never been so low as it is this week.

Stand by, readers.  I'm going in.

THE SNAPPER

This is my sanctuary.

I love waking up at first light, hearing only the sound of birds chirping, and going to sleep when it gets dark, hearing the sound of peeper frogs and the occasional encounter between a coyote and a goose or two.  I often get irritated with Canada Geese, who leave cigar-shaped  reminders of previous dinners all over my lawn, so I'm no longer unnerved by evening coyote visits. Coyotes are like my own personal mafia; if I have a score to settle, coyotes have my back.  I know there will eventually be a day of reckoning, but it hasn't happened yet.

So yes, this is my sanctuary. I just didn't realize that it's also a turtle sanctuary.

Twice now, I've seen a large snapping turtle out where my driveway meets the road.  The first time was a Monday; it was  trying to lay its eggs on a steep hill beside my gate.  It didn't seem like a brilliant location, but who am I to judge? I took some photos and left it to mind its own business.

The second time,  the following Saturday, I received an early morning email from my neighbours to say a snapping turtle was laying her eggs smack in the middle of the entrance to my driveway.  I ran out the door.  It was the same turtle.  I recognized her by a rectangular indentation on her moss-covered shell.  You could have put your business cards in it.

Once the eggs were laid and the turtle had left (because turtles' parenting skills are neglectful in the extreme), my neighbours put a wire crate over top of the eggs to protect them from predators.  A few days later, my nephew Angus and I built a proper screen to cover the nest, complete with an access door so the babies could escape as soon as they hatched. We're going to be looking at that screen for a long time. Snapping turtle eggs can take months to hatch.

Another snapping turtle appeared beside my vegetable garden a few days later. She seemed a bit younger, with less moss on her back. Coincidence?  I thought so.

Yesterday morning, I went to check the swimming pool and found a very large snapping turtle in the shallow end, coming up for air.  I didn't even run for a camera.  I just got my largest net and, with some difficulty, fished it out.  It took off, as fast as it could, the minute it was on dry land.

With some trepidation, I went down to the pool this morning, and there was yesterday's snapping turtle, coming up for air in the shallow end again.
This time, I ran back for a camera.  When I returned, it had wedged itself between the ladder and the wall of the pool.  I took a photo, then fished it out with my net.

This time,  it just sat in the net, making no effort to leave.  Eventually, I carried it down to one of the ponds and tried to coax it out of the net. A word to the wise: snapping turtles do not appear to enjoy being coaxed. They don't seem to like much of anything, actually.  Its claws were tearing my nice new net and it was hissing up a storm.  Meanwhile I was getting bitten by mosquitoes by the dozen.

It took some doing to dislodge The Snapper from my net.  As soon as it was free, it made a beeline for the pond. Frankly,  I hope it stays there. And now, if you will excuse me, I have to go and add a extra dose of disinfectant to my swimming pool.  A friend has sent me a photo of a wire shark, which is apparently a scarecrow for turtles.  I want one for the pool.

THE LOG DRIVERS' WALTZ

One of the best features of this magnificent property I'm responsible for (because I don't feel I own it, despite having paid for it; I have become its steward - a responsibility I take very seriously) is that there are three ponds.  The first is quite small, perhaps 50 feet across. I still call it Pond One, because I haven't come up with a better name for it yet.  The second pond, Pond Two, is about four times the size, and right now it is covered in lily pads but the water is surprisingly clear.

Ponds One and Two are connected by an underwater pipe made of corrugated metal, so that theoretically there is some flow of water.  Pond Three is the largest of all.  It is connected to Pond Two by a narrows.  If I am alone in the boat and it has been raining heavily, I can row through the narrows with some effort.  If I have a passenger in the boat, I climb out at the narrows, into the pond, (horrifying my passenger) and slide the boat through to Pond Three.

Pond Three has a name.  I've called it Group of Seven Pond, because it looks exactly like a painting by one of the Group of Seven.  My nephew, Ivor, who has a dry sense of humour, cautions me to be careful when I'm sailing on Pond Three, saying "remember what happened to Tom Thomson".

Pond One flooded its banks this spring, due to the very heavy rains, so it is in my estimation about 30% bigger than it was last year.  The screened-in porch of the boathouse next to it is also flooded, though the interior of the boathouse, which is slightly elevated, is reasonably dry.  But unless we have a long, hot, dry summer, I doubt Pond One is going to shrink to its regular size.

Now that I'm responsible for some beautiful land, I am doing my utmost to keep it, and the ponds, in good condition.  This means encouraging the flow of water from Pond One into Pond Two, and from there into  Group of Seven Pond.  I've observed that any branches which have fallen into the ponds impede the flow of water generally, but especially so at the narrows between the ponds.  Every time I remove a branch, there's a great deal of bubbling from the bottom of the pond and then a little rush of current in the right direction, so I know I'm doing the right thing.

If you want to feel incredibly strong, just pick up a gigantic log floating in water.  It's easy, because the water is supporting the part of the log that you're not lifting.  Thus, I've been able to pull out tree trunks nearly a foot in diameter and 12 feet long.  I pull them onto the shore as far as I'm able, let them dry out for a few days, and saw them up for the fire pit.  I will never run out of firewood if I live to be two hundred.

All this coaxing logs out of ponds can't be done from shore, so mostly I'm out in my trusty boat, the Good Ship Louise,  using a loose paddle to nudge the bigger branches toward the shore so they're easy to haul out.  Sometimes I'll move a large piece of tree trunk under the bridge leading to the island, intending to float it into  Group of Seven Pond, and find that the next day it has returned to the position it occupied before I moved it.  But as I remove more and more branches from the ponds, I can see the ponds are appearing healthier.  Progress is glacial, though, and I expect to be working on this for years.  Additionally, sometimes I'll see a branch fall off a tree while I'm out rearranging logs, so things are getting better and worse at the same time.

All of this reminds me of a Québecois song I love, entitled The Log Drivers' Waltz.  I often sing it to myself as I'm out on the Good Ship Louise, rearranging the flotsam on my ponds.  Here are some photos from Group of Seven Pond.

WILD LIFE

I knew before I moved here that I'd be encountering many creatures that I'd never seen up close in my life.  I'd heard tales of coyotes and rabbits, beavers and even deer.  I've always had a profound dislike for zoos, and I long ago made the decision never to visit one, so I've probably seen fewer species than the average 7 year old.  I knew I'd be on a steep learning curve.

The first animal I saw on my property was a muskrat.  At first I thought it was a beaver - until I realized how big a beaver actually is.  When you see something swimming in your pond, if you can see its head and back, and it's less than the size of a football, that's likely a muskrat.  A muskrat looks like a very small beaver with a rat-like tail.  By contrast, a beaver weighs about 50 pounds.

I've seen a few chipmunks, and twice I've seen rabbits.  So far my vegetable garden hasn't been raided by any rabbits but I've been told to expect that to happen if I don't put chicken wire around  it soon.

I've smelled a skunk once.  I went out to the carport one morning and found some of my beekeeping equipment scattered on the ground.  I went to pick up a bee brush and noticed it smelled strongly of skunk.  Not too sure how happy the bees will be about that.

About 10 days ago, I was taking my wheelbarrow down to the decommissioned playground to load it up with gravel, as I was regravelling the driveway.  It was still daylight, perhaps around dinnertime. I looked up and saw a mid-brown animal that looked a bit dog-like heading from my north property line to Pond One.  It stood there, looking at the pond, while I stood there wondering what it was and what it was doing.  It seemed to be surveilling the pond for something. I stood still, watching it.  Its face was not at all dog-like. Suddenly, it looked directly at me. We locked eyes and I realized:  that's not a dog, it's a coyote.

I knew that the way to avoid problems with coyotes is not to turn your back on them or run, so we basically had a staring contest.  I tried to look as big and imposing as I could.  Suddenly, the coyote wheeled around and ran for the trees along my north fence line.  I dropped the wheelbarrow and went into the house to Google "coyote" to confirm that's what I had seen.  It was.  I watched out the window for a while, surmised that it had come to scoop up a nice muskrat from the pond for dinner, and finally got my courage up enough to go and retrieve the wheelbarrow.

Since then, I've seen many muskrats coming out of the pond to forage in the lawn for a snack. I always warn them to be on the lookout for coyotes.

Twice recently, I've gone for a hike to my island and encountered a deer.  The first one looked quite small.  It jumped off the island into Pond Two and I lost sight of it.  The second sighting was the very next day.  Friends were visiting from Toronto.  Two of us decided to hike over to the island. Half way there, we heard a rustling among the trees and suddenly there was a  larger doe with white spots,  jumping off the island into the pond, heading for the fence line. We traversed the island, and I noticed something red and white on the ground, up against a clump of yew bushes.  It looked like a plastic toy of some kind.  I've been very diligent about cleaning up plastic and garbage from the property, and it was definitely not there before.  I went up to have a closer look.

I realized it was a small animal lying on its side, and it was clearly newly deceased.  The red and white was the bones of its rib cage and the tissue underneath, as a large patch of its fur was missing.  I was dumbstruck; was it shot by a hunter?  Or attacked by a coyote?  Had it been abandoned by its mother or been injured during birth?  We stood there for a few minutes.  I asked my friend if it was a fawn or a hare, perhaps, because it had long ears. She confirmed it was a fawn.

I had my phone with me so I took a few pictures.  Please don't look if you are squeamish.

We headed back to the bridge, but I felt deeply distressed.  Next day, I felt I should do something to mark its short life.  I went to the basket where I keep fabric remnants and cut a long strip of pure white linen.  Then I took a large bag of dried lavender flowers that my friend Crystal had given me for my last birthday and headed back to the island.  I walked the entire island very carefully but could not find the fawn.  I compared the photos on my phone to the places on the island where there were yew bushes and established where I believed the fawn had been.  I tied the strip of linen around a young tree, and sprinkled handfuls of dried lavender on the ground to mark where it had lain.  I felt like the only mourner at a funeral.

I suddenly heard a voice, singing, and was surprised to find that it was my voice, singing the Italian love song O Sole Mio in Neapolitan dialect.  Then I heard myself singing the Paul McCartney love song, I Will.  These are the songs I sing when I visit the cemetery where my beloved guys are buried.  I often bring dried lavender to their grave.  I sometimes bring pebbles from my travels, and I always bring fresh bread for the birds and squirrels.

I don't know what happened to the fawn - how it got there, how it died, where it is now - but I feel that though I could do so little in that moment, I could at least honour its short life with this brief, heartfelt ceremony.

AXE ME ANYTHING

It's seven weeks now since I moved out of Toronto and I can hardly begin to count the things I've learned.

When I look back, I can see signs as far back as two years ago that change was looming.  One day, I was lunching with friends at Colette Grand Cafe, very close to our old house on Portland Street. We were appropriately dressed for a genteel urban lunch.  Leaving the restaurant with one of my friends, I asked if she'd mind a detour to Lee Valley Tools, conveniently located five minutes away.

If there's anyone on earth who objects to a detour to Lee Valley Tools, I don't want to meet them because there's no way that person and I could ever be friends.   If you're a friend of mine and you want to break up with me in the cleanest, most surgical way, just say "I don't want to go to Lee Valley with you".  You'll never see or hear from me again.

But on this occasion two years ago, my particular reason for visiting Lee Valley was because I'd been wanting an axe of my own.  A splitting axe, in particular. Also known as a maul.  One of the things I wanted to learn was to become a proficient, nay, elegant splitter of wood.

And that's when I bought my Ochsenkopf.  It's a German word, meaning oxen head, and that's generally the shape of a maul.  Its purpose is to drive a thick wedge along the grain of dry wood so it splits in two for easy burning.  Strictly speaking, I don't have the arms for such a heavy axe.  I'm really strong, but my elbow joints and wrists are the weak links in the chain.  I should have bought a lighter weight axe, but I loathe things that are specifically designed for women's use.  And somehow that Ochsenkopf really spoke to me.

When I got it home, I immediately started looking for things to chop, which led to the discovery that my Ochsenkopf did not actually come pre-sharpened.  There was a hardware store across the street from Atelier Ivaan, so I went across to buy a sharpening stone.  

If you're female, you've probably been mansplained a few thousand times in your life.  Usually the predominantly male sales staff at New Canadians Lumber, the hardware store, know not to make assumptions about me, but this day I happened across a newer staff member who decided to give me a lecture on  sharpening axes. I'm pretty sure he'd never sharpened anything in his life, because when he got to the "No, no, no, you don't want that to be sharp.  That's dangerous, eh?" stage, my patience ran right out.  I looked at him hard, and shot back, "When it's not sharp, we call it a club....eh?"

Once the Ochsenkopf was good and sharp, there was no stopping me.  Last May - May 5, 2018 to be precise - there was a huge windstorm in Toronto which felled a gigantic old tree and the fence of a local schoolyard.  The minute news went out of a downed tree in the neighbourhood, the Ochsenkopf and I were on the scene, practising our moves.  You can't do this for too long, though, because even a grey-haired woman of a certain age looks mighty suspicious wielding an axe in downtown Toronto.  And let's face it:  splitting wood is more exhausting than watching YouTube videos of people splitting wood.

I learned some pretty good skills, the best among them being:  don't bother trying to split wood that is still damp.  You'll be resharpening the old Ochsenkopf every five minutes.  Plus you'll look like you don't know what you're doing.

But out here in the back of beyond, I have infinite scope for my need to chop things.  Just this morning, I felled two deceased cedar trees.  I was kind of hoping someone would come along and watch, but I chopped in solitude.  I'll throw those cedars on the fire pit once they've dried out a bit more.

Then people can come by and be impressed by my fire building skills, which are next on the agenda.