The Chippewa Watershed Conservancy currently own twenty-two preserves scattered across four counties. Yesterday (29 October 2017) I visited the four "flagships" of the CWC's preserve system -
Sylvan Solace Preserve,
Bundy Hill Preserve,
Hall's Lake Natural Area, and
Audubon Woods Preserve. The close nature of three out of these four preserves made it easy to link my visits together. My goal was simply to visit each of the four preserves, walk on and off trail, and photograph whatever grabbed my attention. Because I took so many photos I am going to split this into two posts. This post will deal with my visits to Sylvan Solace Preserve and Bundy Hill Preserve.
Sylvan Solace Preserve
Sylvan Solace Preserve was my first stop. This preserve is located on Pickard Road, between Gilmore and Littlefield Roads, approximately 7 1/2 miles west of Mt. Pleasant. I arrived at Sylvan Solace just a few minutes after 9:00AM and spent about approximately 1.5 hours on site.
Here are a few of the many photos that I took during that time.
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| A deer trail through a grove of Black Locust trees. |
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| A dead pine slowly succumbs to rot, insects, and woodpeckers. |
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| Ferns change into their subtle shades of red, orange, and brown. |
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| Small metal arrows mark the location and direction of trails throughout the preserve |
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| Looking up at the overcast sky through Bigtooth Aspen trees. |
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| Bigtooth Aspen leaves turn yellow then brown as they dry out. |
Along the east trail at Sylvan Solace, I noticed several scrapes made by White-tailed Deer. Scrapes are one of the ways White-tailed bucks leave scent to mark their territory. Located above the scrape is typically a low-hanging branch that the buck will lick and rub with the scent glands located on his head. The buck scrapes the ground with its hooves to draw attention to the scent marker and typically urinates on the scrape to add even more scent. Both bucks and does will check out scrapes. Although bucks create scrapes year-round, this behavior intensifies in the weeks before mating season. I found several fresh scrapes at Sylvan Solace and would go on to find scrapes at each of the other three preserves I visited.
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| A fresh deer scrape is used to leave a scent "calling card" to announce a buck's presence in the area. |
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| A mushroom pokes up from the leaf litter. |
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| Looking upstream at Sylvan Solace Preserve. |
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| Spreading oak trees grew up in the open before being surrounded by forest. |
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| American Beech trees will be among the last to lose their leaves - often holding them through mid-winter. |
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| Nest boxes provide artificial cavities used by many bird species. |
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| A fern, grasses, and Bigtooth Aspen leaves create a colorful mosaic. |
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| Rain and dewdrops bead up on the waxy coating of freshly-fallen Aspen leaves. |
The pictures of my second preserve visit can be seen below.
