Phoebe's Nable Mt. 6/28/11

"Always Something New at Moose Mountains!" (pictures)

After Scott and I spent time at the Burrows Cemetery Monday I hoped to get back on Tuesday to do a small hike and take more pictures of the flowers along the way. It was another beautiful day so I headed out, bringing my Clippers with me. I also brought some metal moose decorations to mark certain points of interest to see how they would look.

I arrived at the parking lot at 12:45 and began on my way. Horse Fly's were awful today and were driving me crazy as I stopped to take pictures of flowers along the road. I really wasn't paying attention to the daisy's, I mean, you see them all the time pretty much anywhere. But I was on the look out for the Goldenrod Spiders which I call crab spiders. I got lucky and spotted a very large male Goldenrod. You really have to go slow with these guys, they scare very easy. This is easily the largest of these spiders I've ever seen!

Continuing on, I stopped at the cemetery that we cleaned up the day before. I took pictures of all the head stones, something I hadn't done yet. Then I nailed a moose to the tree and continued on up to the top of the field. There was a very pleasant smell filling the air, almost of homemade pie or something. I was trying to figure out what it was, then realized all the wild strawberries were out. A field of strawberries, and boy did it smell wonderful!!

I moved on back into the trees and was startled by a pair of Ruffed Grouse that took off into the woods with their chicks, all the while making their noisy complaint of being disturbed! As I turned onto Phoebes Nable Spur trail I clipped a few branches here and there that were poking out into the trail. It was very warm out and this climb with all the stuff I was carrying was really giving me a work out as it always does!

I arrived at the summit, threw my pack down and had a snack. I nailed a moose to the pine tree and determined I would have to paint these moose's so they show up better. I'll probably go for a bright "SPNHF" green or blue. As I looked around at the overgrown view and around on the summit I suddenly realized all the flowers that graced the summit area. They turned out to be Tall Corydalis or Rock Harlequin. My first time seeing these so I was very excited!

Rested and re-hydrated I made my way back down to the field. Picked 2 ticks off me and headed back down to New Portsmouth Road. I then heard a truck coming up the road. Turned out to be the Forest Society truck with Forester Wendy and her two interns. Great timing. This was the first time I really got to talk about the property with Wendy, who knows the property really well. After about a 15 minute talk they continued on to check things out and I headed back to my truck to head home. The end time was 2:45pm.