Warren Brook in Winter

Weather changes here in NH (well, yes) and sometime conditions make for great days on skis. Such was the case for a ski up Warren Brook. While it may always have been possible to break through the ice, the depth is not generally great enough to cause drowning, just cold wetness.

After skiing to the Warren Sands beach, the outlet  showed signs of water flow so skiing had to be done judiciously in places.

At the same time, the ice was thick enough for skiing and it was rather easy to ski around the open water and up onto the swampy areas that were well frozen. This watershed has recently had some protection afforded to it by generous donations to purchase easements. They protect Warren Brook but, because it flows into Lake Wentworth and then through Crescent Lake, it helps protect the watershed. Looking up the swampy area, it is possible to see a beaver dam which looks like a row of brown in the picture. The land preserved by the easement includes the trees in the center of the picture. The skiing was easy because there was just a thin crust, enough to get your ski edges into but not enough to slow you down.

In the swamp, there were tracks of coyotes. They are dogs and do “dog” things, sniffing here and there. At the same time, these “dogs” don’t get a nice kibble meal served to them every day so it pays to check any possible meal sight out. The tracks were old and basically were just icy prints instead of the half inch of crusty snow.

I guess that the stump was interesting or it may have just been the equivalent of a fire hydrant. You have to leave your mark.

Leaving the swampy area that is Warren Brook, coming back to the lake, the row of trees bordering the lake stand out.

The broad section near the entrance to Warren Brook has herons and ducks in the warmer months, now, it is just snow covered ice.

One other set of tracks that I enjoyed seeing were some XC ski tracks on the lake near the beach. It seems as if three people had stopped and talked for awhile. If you look, you can see many “dots” that were ski pole marks and it takes awhile to make that many dots with a ski pole. Then, the three skiers skated off across the lake. The report I got from one of the skiers indicated that a bald eagle flew over them for awhile and they were happy that they didn’t look like fish.

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