dkilcaw's Journal

Yesterday I went for a hike up Mount Ninham in my hometown of Carmel (Kent), New York. Ninham is probably my favorite place to hike, mostly because there is a firetower at the top of the trail, the highest point in the county, with amazing views from the top. You can even see the NYC skyline on a clear day. It is the perfect place to watch a sunset, which is exactly what I did yesterday! I went at around 6 p.m. and it was the perfect temperature, probably about 65ºF. The top of the firetower is usually extremely windy, but yesterday it was comfortable. While walking up I kept spotting chipmunks and wanted to take pictures, but they move so fast I never ended up getting a good picture. The changing colors of the leaves looked so beautiful, and the bright yellow and orange leaves that had already fallen, covered the trail entirely. It looked magical. I thought it was so cool to take observations and realize how different each type of plant is, even if they look relatively similar. If you notice in my observations, I had to turn my camera's flash on for my last observation, because it was too dark without flash. The sun set so quickly, it was amazing to watch it physically descend into the horizon of trees. Though I started walking down soon after, it still managed to get dark fast; a good reminder that winter is soon approaching. I thought it was interesting that I was able to observe some berries. I never noticed any berries before while hiking that trail. By taking iNaturalist observations, I felt more connected to a place that I thought I knew so well. The observations reminded me that there's still so much to learn.

Yesterday I went on a nature walk around the Chestnut Hill Reservoir. It was a perfect temperature, very comfortable, probably because the sun was covered. We got caught in the rain walking back through campus, but for the nature walk itself we were safe! I went in the late afternoon, around 3:30 and there were lots of runners and people walking their dogs. The very first things I saw were groups of ducks and two beautiful swans. I saw one single duckling, so precious but a little strange to have only seen one. Towards the end of the walk, I found bunches of different berries. They were various pastel colors, like light blue, light purple and light green. They reminded me a lot of dyed Easter eggs. INaturalist was able to identify them as "porcelain berries", I've never seen these berries before, and after looking at the map I noticed that they haven't been seen in very many spots in New York, where I'm from. Overall, I think the reservoir is one of my new favorite spots, and I'm definitely going to be taking more walks around there in the future!

Today I went for a walk around Hammond Pond, following a trail through Houghton Gardens. It was such a beautiful day outside, it hit 80ºF here but the nature walk I took was mostly shaded which was a nice reprieve from the heat. Throughout the walk I noticed several chipmunks and squirrels. I caught a glimpse of a few birds but I mostly just heard them in the distance. I sat at an interesting bench made out of rock and observed the many different flowers around me. When we reached the water, it was so calm and serene and there was some sort of green algae on top of the water that I tried to have iNaturalist identify for me, but couldn't. There were also some water bugs flying around. I've never seen bugs that looked like that before and I was extremely intrigued. They had very thin "legs" and looked almost as if they were drones. They were difficult to see due to the thinness and lightness of their figure, but they were fun to observe nonetheless. Also, there were certain spots on the trail that were super muddy but others were completely dry. It was great to be back out in nature again. I even got to see a few dogs! Definitely will be coming back to this spot!