Monthly Archives: February 2020

Forest Bathing

Story and photo by Inga Hinnerichsen Forest bathing . . . Forest what? Though the pairing of those two words may seem strange at first, forest bathing is a term used for the intentional practice of connecting with nature and surrounding yourself with the energy of the natural world. It is the Japanese concept of shinrin-yoku, or taking a slow walk in the woods and absorbing the forest atmosphere with all your senses. The Japanese word shinrin means forest and yoku means bath. Never have we humans been so far from merging with the natural world and so divorced from nature. According to a study sponsored by the Environmental Protection Agency (USA), the average American spends 93% of his/her time indoors. Canadians are not far behind. The good news is that even a small amount of time in nature can…
continue reading

Fisherville Christmas Bird Count (December 2019)

Report by Linda Thrower, Compiler December 28th, 2019 certainly didn’t bring the weather of 2017, but who needs wind chills of -30 C while trying to count birds? Instead it was on the plus side with the temperature of +2 C at midnight and no winds to speak of until later in the day. And who could complain about having open water—not the waterfowl. But even with the weather co-operating, the birds were well hidden. Did they know all of us were looking for them? Thankfully, there were a bunch of keen eyes out there and some really good species popped out here and there. So, the new high and low numbers look like this: Horned Grebes were found in their lowest numbers since 2001 when 197 were counted. This year, 76 were seen. American Wigeons are back on the…
continue reading

Woodhouse Christmas Bird Count (December 2019)

Report by Adam Timpf   These are the results of the 33rd Woodhouse CBC held on Sunday, December 15th, 2019. The Woodhouse CBC is centred seven kilometres east of Simcoe, at the crossroads of Highway 3 and Cockshutt Road at Renton in Norfolk County and roughly covers from Port Dover to Waterford and just west of Simcoe to east of Jarvis. First of all, let me thank all 45 participants for spending their time and energy and contributing important data to this count. It wouldn’t be possible without you and I hope I can count on you all again next December. Also, let me thank the NFN for sponsoring the count and to my mom Tresa for putting on a delicious wrap-up dinner at her house. Nourishment is always needed after a full day in the field! Weather: The weather…
continue reading