Winter arrived early this year. Snow boots, shovels, rock salt, and other trappings of winter have already made their way out of storage. I found my ice cleats in the back of the closet so could walk down to get the newspaper without ending up on my backside. The Driftless Wisconsin landscape tends to puts a slant on anything you do during the winter.
But the winter backdrop makes up for the cold and inconvenience. Against this white canvas, every landscape takes on a new look.
I live in a coulee of the Mississippi Valley, a smaller valley extending from the larger. During the wet spring, the ditch in the middle of our ravine feeds the Mississippi with its contribution of water run-off from the top of the bluff. In the winter, the ditch sits dry, a mere wrinkle separating the steep hillsides to either side.
During winter, the hillside come alive. Looking out my window, a lone buck walks a trail about half way up the hill, his nose to the wind in search of a mate during this annual ritual. Otherwise hidden during the three seasons of foliage, his sleek body moves in contrast to the freshly fallen snow.
My eight-year-old grandson may have spotted this buck earlier in the season while deer hunting with grandpa. Facing opposite directions in our deer stand, he whispered, “Grandpa, I see a deer. He’s a ten pointer!” By the time I slowly turned around to look, this ten pointer had morphed into a two point spike buck. But the excitement never lessened. He still claims we saw two different deer – one ten pointer and one spike buck – and who am I to argue with an eight-year-old with eyesight eight times better than mine.
Each morning when I wake I’m treated to high-wire acrobatics outside our window. Two squirrels race across leafless tree branches suspended thirty feet above the dry wash. Like circus daredevils, they work without a net. Watching them scamper across branches and jump to adjacent trees, I’m reminded of a Cirque du Soleil performance I saw a couple of years ago, with acrobats and gymnasts performing feats that seemed to defy gravity.
My wife and one-year-old grandson saw ten turkeys cross the ravine just the other day. What one-year-olds lack in words, they make up with sheer amazement written in their eyes. Turkeys can often be seen strutting across farm fields or navigating open stretches of woodlots during the winter. I did not see this rafter of turkeys, but the three-pronged tracks in the snow across our lawn told the story.
Another treasure of the winter landscape, eagles can be seen soaring hundreds of feet above the river valleys. Eagles are year-round residents of Driftless Wisconsin, but they congregate around open water during the winter and can be more easily seen perched in barren trees. Pick an overlook of either the Mississippi or Kickapoo River valleys, and spend a few minutes watching one of nature’s most graceful creatures.
We are lucky to have such inspirational landscapes and wildlife to view the year round in Driftless Wisconsin; especially in winter when short days and cold weather get you to thinking about spring. Then you see an eagle silhouetted against a blue sky or a deer bounding across an open field, and you realize we don’t have it so bad.
You don’t have to live in Driftless Wisconsin to experience an inspirational winter moment. Send for a Driftless Wisconsin Map to find your way here. Plenty of time left to find that perfect photo of a Driftless Wisconsin winter landscape.