8 April 2018 Hudson Springs Lake

April snow never lasts very long. It's often replaced by a surge of spring. This afternoon spring was in full force at Hudson Springs Park. The lake was home today to a fleet of mergansers joined by a few blue-winged teals.

4 April 2018 April Snow

The only good part of April snow is it can't last too long. The view from my office window was gloomy.

2 April 2018 Short Trip

I was headed to Indiana for business when I received a call to hold off the trip for a later date. I was already in Toledo when I was notified so I decided to make my return trip along Lake Erie. I stopped for a few cache finds along the way. Two of them were at locations with a couple weird tourism items that are common in so many areas. My first stop included a large shark outside a taxidermy business. I found the cache.

My second visit was at a very familiar place to see Jacques the Muffler Man. Handless Jacques has been roadside in Marblehead for a very long time. He was a frequent site during the summers of my youth when I spent as many days as possible near Lake Erie at nearby Headlands Park and the lighthouse down the road. Jacques is a happy piece of the past, but has never revealed to me the location of the cache hidden here as I once again missed the find.

1 April 2018 Moving Around

I was traveling for business the next day so we needed to head back to Ohio. Before leaving home we had a quick walk around to see what spring flowers were out.

Dwarf iris and crocus were blooming near our house.

We walked our favorite trail on our property hoping to spot hepatica leaves for upcoming blossoms. We weren't disappointed.

We hid a cache last summer that had one find before it was muggled. We hid the cache in a wood pile in the ANF without thinking the locals would come to take wood. After surveying the scene we decided to look for a different hiding location before enjoying the views on Brokenstraw Creek as well as some passing mergansers.

Our last stop of the day was a muddy walk on a gamelands road to search for more caches in the state series.

We spent our time walking the road with side trips into the woods. One of the caches took us near the gamelands property line. The nearby landowner was storing old vehicles in the woods. The truck looks like an old cabover Dodge.

The old Karmann Giha looks beyond saving, but it is still interesting to see.

Our last stop of the evening was at a cache near this vernal pool. The frog sounds were wonderful. Spring :)

31 March 2018 Collins Pine

Collins Pine is a geocache friendly timber company that shares it holdings with the public for outdoor activities like geocaching. and hunting. We have visited their holdings for fun hikes in the past. This afternoon we were stopping at a holding we had not visited before. We had stopped here once before, but had no idea where to park to not interfere with the private property nearby. This afternoon we had better information for parking.

It was a good day for fungus

and Turkey prints.

27 March 2018 Killdeer

Killdeer always seem to be incredibly territorial and jumpy. It makes for tough photography. This evening a couple killdeer were on the lawn in front of my office when I left. For once, capturing images was easy.

25 March 2018 Erie National Wildlife Refuge

Our destination today was Erie National Wildlife Refuge for a clean-up day. We were here for the 2017 spring and happy to return to the site for this spring's clean-up. Last year a significant number of cachers showed up. This year, there were only four of us. Thankfully a couple local scout troops and their families were here to fill the void. Since we were without kids, we were given a state route along a property line.

A section of the area we cleaned was bordered by a one of the refuge's wetland areas.

Lots of colts foot today

We picked about five bags of garbage and a few tires from the side of the road.

These clean-ups are interesting for what shows up on the side of the road. Last year it was a discarded boyfriend cd. This year, Christmas treee ornaments.

The roadside also had things that were supposed to be there like skunk cabbage.

Once we were done with our section of the road and the trash was loaded, we headed off to a section of the refuge with a few geocaches we hadn't found. There was significantly more snow cover on the wooded trail. We missed the first find after searching this snowy bridge.

We were more successful at this old stone bridge. A quick wade in a very cold stream gave us an easy find.

24 March 2018 Western Reserve Bike Trail

It was a little cold to be on the trail with a bike, but we were happy to walk the trail today. The snow was mostly gone from the pavement, but a coating of ice was treacherous in areas.

Despite walking here before, I had forgotten this 1897 bridge is still serving on the trail.

There is always some piece of the past to discover along this old railroad grade. This pump house is hidden down a small incline and easy to miss when vegetation is present.

This nice downy was one of a few we spotted today.

This tree stand was really close to the trail. I wouldn't be comfortable on the trail during hunting season.

17 March 2018 Pennsylvania Bird Watching

We stopped at the gamelands near Conneautville. We had gotten used to spotting an eagle here each winter and had not yet been successful. This afternoon our luck was good. The eagle was too far to capture a good image, but we were happy for the sighting. We were able to also spot a nice red-tailed hawk in a tree at the edge of a field.

Our second stop was a walk along the Allegheny River. We enjoyed spotting hooded and common mergansers.