the Way of the Turtle

Critters, Critters, Everywhere
7 Mile Run in the Albany Pine Bush
Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Took me a while to decide where I wanted to run today... and then at the last minute I changed my mind and headed over to the Madison Ave Ext trailhead, only to disocver that there's still logging going on at the Great Dune. So I hopped back in the car and went with my original inclination - the Blueberry Hills and Kaikout Kill Barrens.

Weather today was perfect for running - warm but not hot, breezy, and sunny... if it stayed like this all summer long I'd be in heaven. I haven't run since last Thursday - my legs felt sufficiently beat up all last week that I decide a break was in order to give them some rest - and it seems to have worked, because they felt decent during today's run. It felt good to be out on the trails again, even if a huge portion of the Blueberry Hills are currently bare sand dunes from last fall's "habitat resotration."

Saw very few other people while I was there, but lots of critters... several turkey, lots of smaller birds (including a couple of blue jays and a very vocal titmouse), and a large flock of turkey vultures that periodically seemed to be landing and hanging out on the top of one of the sandy hilltops. There were a couple of wet spots (presumably leftovers from last night's storms) and the toads seemed to be having a grand time working on continuing the toad species... couldn't tell if they were some of the endangered Eastern Spadefoot toads or not, though the couple I saw up close seemed more likely to be Fowler's or American toads. I also saw two snakes - a small Brown snake and a wonderful example of an Eastern Hognosed snake.

Running along the trails through the Kaikout Kill Barrens reminded me that I probably won't be back there to run until later in the season... just as Vischer Ferry has loads of bugs that tend to keep me away in the summer, the trails here tend to get overgrown with brambles until they get cleared again, usually late in the summer or early in the fall. At one point I just ran through them and endured all the scratches on my legs for several days, but I like to think I've gotten smarter since then... and there are lots of other places I can go to run in the summertime.

JMH