Dusk to Darkness

The Program

This Woodlands of Bedford program was one week ago, on January 14.  The program started at the end of the day and transitioned into the darkness of nighttime.  The conditions were warm, but not as muddy as one would expect for our 3.5 miles of walking.  The two inches of rain from two days previous didn't impact our footing.  However, Tinker's Creek was running very high, at around 800 cubic feet/second.  Our stop down to the floodplain revealed several brave kayakers navigating high water with very fast flow.

The uplands of Circle Emerald were beautiful.  A Great Horned Owl was perched in plain view and presented us with a quick moment to enjoy before it silently flew off.  The walk to Indian Point was in darkness but no astronomy was possible due to the cloud cover.  We ended by walking to the highpoint of the field passing through weathered Little Bluestem, Schizachyrium scoparium.

Thanks to Frank Comodeca for talking these excellent photos.

Scouting in Advance

Scouting for this program the week before was a very different experience.  The several inches of snow cover was perfect and the temperatures were under 20 degrees.  Nighttime didn't come close to darkness and walking after dark seemed almost as bright as an overcast day.

My photo collage below is a good summary of the evening.