We've been enjoying a lovely spate of early fall weather this past week. The temperature has hovered in the low 20s, it has been sunny with occasional cloudy intervals, and the humidity has lifted. A light breeze has complemented the moderate temperature and the sunshine, so what more could anyone possibly wish for to make for perfect weather to trek about in the woods?

On the first official day of autumn's arrival we decided to lengthen our usual hour-or-so hike in the ravine. When we first moved to our present home a quarter-century ago, we were utterly delighted to find ourselves next door to an extended green ravine, forested with a running creek and littered with old pines, and a wide assortment of deciduous and conifer trees. The location offered us immediate access to an area where we could walk about enclosed in living green with no sight in any direction of the streets and homes that bordered it.

Within the forest there were always surprises of one kind or another, from wildlife to wildflowers in their seasons. Over the years we've seen a wide assortment of birds, some passing through, some making their homes in the ravine; birds like pileated woodpeckers, the giant of the species. We've seen ducks temporarily housing themselves in the creek, and once a large snapping turtle. We've seen great blue herons, barred owls, generations of hawks, rooks on occasion, and a wide variety of songbirds.

We've had the friendly acquaintances of squirrels who came to recognize us. some of whom would approach us directly for peanut handouts. We've come across families of raccoons perched in the boughs of old pines. And at one time, before the woodland corridors were disrupted we would often come across unafraid red foxes; now their sightings are far rarer for us, though they still live in the ravine.

And in those early years here while we were both still employed, we would come out for daily walks after work, in the evenings, and when we did that in winter, the sky would be brightly illuminated, reflecting back the lights of the city, particularly on cloudy days, to give us clear, peach-coloured light in the ravine. And in those earlier years we had a tendency to go much further than the circuit we now perambulate.

Several days ago we decided to return to our old familiar haunts, further along in the ravine. And we did that again yesterday. There are a lot of open areas there, of meadow beside the forested areas and we don't find that particularly attractive, but there are compensations. There are very old wild grapevines growing in some areas over there, and at this time of year the grapes, in small dark clusters (vitis labrusca) hang, inviting plucking, but they are of course, sour. Also over there the Hawthorns are different; there they produce large round bright red haws, whereas on our side of the ravine haws if they can be found, are mean and unattractive.

When we had the daily care of our granddaughter, and took her each day along with us to the ravine, she learned swiftly to identify edible fruits, hers for the picking, from wild strawberries, to thimbleberries and raspberries and the occasional blackberry bush.


Englemans ivy grows over understory shrubbery and trees; there are far fewer ferns growing there and a lot more of the red-stemmed dogwood. There are also, over there, if one ventures down little-used-now trails, fairly large copses of mature cedar trees. It is a nice alternative to our side of the ravine, nowhere near as extensive, but interesting.