This holiday season, Christmas trees laden with cherished ornaments and twinkly lights evoking a sense of wonder, peace and warmth. will adorn our homes. When the festivities conclude, this cozy haven disappears as we relinquish our trees to the trash. For many, this sharp change in scenery,…
Who could use some good news right about now? Here is a story that will raise your spirits.
November is Diabetes Awareness Month. Seven in 10 Vermont adults are likely to have prediabetes, but more than half are unaware of this diagnosis. While diabetes may run in the family, you do have control over your health.
Winter is near, and for most of us, so are the deer. They need extra food now to get ready for winter, and some of what they eat – green leaves and grasses – are not readily available. So they are eating evergreen plants like yew, arborvitae and rhododendrons in our yards. There are steps yo…
Amaryllis, a popular holiday plant, is cherished for its showy flowers in hues ranging from stark white to dazzling red.
Thanksgiving is next week, and the management and staff at Central Vermont Home Health & Hospice (CVHHH) would like to offer our sincere thanks to our donors and community. When the coronavirus turned life as we knew it upside down, you stood by our side. Since March, individuals and loc…
What is it about the antlers of a whitetail deer? When I see a deer, any deer, during a day in the woods, a level of excitement rises along with, I am certain, my blood pressure. But if the deer is carrying antlers, that level of heightened awareness goes up even more.
I’m getting to be old enough that several woodstoves have left their cast-iron impressions on me. They are a utilitarian piece of the home, for sure, and there is also a certain romance to them. Every home of mine has had one or two, each with their own quirks, and all of them taking the cen…
Bent down in an apple field searching for a lost earring, I found a different treasure: a stout mouse-like animal, with a short tail and stubby ears. It gave me one quick look, then disappeared through a maze of tunnels in the thick autumn grass. I would have loved to follow this meadow vole…
Bladder issues affect many men, women and children, but people often feel uncomfortable talking about it. Common bladder issues include blood in the urine, urine leakage (incontinence) or simply getting up too many times at night to urinate, yet, none of these things are “normal.” November i…
I think it’s important to take time to count my blessings. I try to take time each day to reflect on how grateful I am for living the life I do. And on a sunny afternoon near Thanksgiving, I like to sit outside and reflect on everything I have to be grateful for. Here are some thoughts about…
For nearly a decade, I’ve been adding to a brush pile in the woods behind my home. A depository of pruned branches, dead flowers, discarded logs, old leaves and an occasional Christmas tree, the pile is a decaying testament to seasons and chores long past. Over the years, the pile has settle…
Stick season is here. It’s that quiet, gray and blue moment between autumn’s brilliant colors and winter’s deep snow, when the trees are bare — save for the golden hues of a few beech and tamarack holdouts. And its arrival means a few things: the start of deer season, better long-range views…
My weekly deadline decrees I write this the evening before the most interesting presidential election day in my lifetime, and you will be reading it after that big day — although, to judge from many warnings, the vote count may not yet be over by then, and there may be other complications to…
November is the gloomiest month of all. It’s cold and raw, but usually without enough snow to XC-ski on. It rains nearly every day, or seems like it does. The garden is put to bed, or if I‘ve neglected to do something, it probably won’t happen until spring. But this is a good time to force b…
In fall 1621, the colonists joined the Wampanoags to partake in a thanksgiving celebration of the harvest. Historians believe they shared cabbage, carrots and parsnips from their home gardens and native plants such as walnuts, chestnuts, Concord grapes, cranberries, garlic and an unsung hero…
Pine barrens are certainly piney — but they’re not the least bit barren. They were so named not because they lack life, but because colonists found them unsuitable for raising cattle or growing vegetable and grain crops. Left behind by the glaciers more than 10,000 years ago, pine barrens ar…
It is hard to believe eight months have passed in the COVID-19 global pandemic. Vermont continues to be proactive and vigilant in our approach to reducing transmission of the coronavirus and this has reduced the prevalence of COVID-19 in our community, resulting in lower infection and death …
How many times does firewood warm you? According to the old saying, it’s three times: It warms you once when you cut it, another time when you stack it and a third time when you finally burn it.
So it comes down to visualizing what you believe will happen. I am certainly not alone in this. You think about the opening day of the firearms season and what you must do to succeed. You are confident about your prospects but must follow that up with results.
Granted, I have a vegetable garden mainly so I can have fresh, succulent tomatoes from July until sometime in October. But I also have grown, I think, all vegetables that will grow in our climate. Right now, in late October, my saved tomatoes are all eaten, but I am enjoying plenty of other …
Although the Rutland Free Library has been reopened to the public since June 2 after closing for more than two months as consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s not necessarily back to business as usual — but you can still borrow a book.
A walk in the woods during fall is likely to reveal an array of forest fungi. Ranging from delicate, tan mini-umbrellas to fleshy, white softballs to foot-long, orange-yellow shelves growing out of rotten logs, they come in a variety of colors, shapes and sizes. Fungi are critical to the hea…
Diseases that chip away at the ability to think, like Alzheimer’s or other types of dementia, cause people to lose the ability to decide what they do and don’t want done long before the end of life is near. Unfortunately, most advance directive forms do not clearly address the kinds of decis…
Even Now
When I was growing up, my mom served meat and potatoes nearly every night. Our vegetable was peas or cooked carrots, and once a week or so we had an iceberg lettuce salad with cucumbers, tomatoes and carrots with dressing from a bottle. So I don’t really know how I developed a taste for comp…
Rutland loves Halloween. This year, Halloween falls on a Saturday with a full blue moon. While some traditions have been put on hold for 2020, as long as health precautions are followed, Vermonters can still look forward to Halloween.
It was late morning, and we were climbing the third big ridge of the day.
Last October, a young student in one of my nature-journaling workshops pointed out a fuzzy yellow caterpillar with long black tufts. “Those kind sting!” he declared. He was the third student that month to point out the same kind of caterpillar as stinging. I remembered being warned away from…
Is it even fall in Vermont without a squash baking in the oven?
Cooler weather is here and with it comes a change to eating warming fall foods. Not only is soup easy to prepare, but it is also incredibly nourishing and full of health benefits.
As the gardening season comes to a close, gardeners will soon be busy preparing for winter. Of all the chores involved, soil testing is often overlooked.
Summer has faded and gone. Autumn’s bright foliage does compensate, somewhat, for the dearth of flowers, but a few of my trees and shrubs (and several perennials) bloom in October, and I treasure them. Let’s take a look.
As I waded in Lake Champlain one summer, a fellow bather explained that just a little farther out, refreshing spring water would cool my feet. I have heard that old wives’ tale repeated at Lake Arrowhead in the Pennsylvania Poconos, and in Lough Ree in the Irish midlands. The explanation of …
To the uninitiated, latitude and longitude coordinates can look like a nonsensical jumble of numbers and symbols. But to geocachers, letterboxes and orienteers, they’re so much more. In part, they’re a recipe for adventure, and they lead to the precise location of little treasures hidden aro…
During this flu season, it is more important than ever to do your part to help protect you and those around you from this deadly illness. The flu season in our region typically begins at the end of October and lasts through April. The sooner you get your flu shot, the better you will be prep…
So, the magic month will soon be here. Sure, it’s a little early but, when it comes to deer hunting, it’s never too early to talk about deer. The November buck season will soon be upon us.
Sitting in a grassy field at Townshend State Park on a late summer day, I watched dozens of dragonflies roaming the sky. Their slender bodies drifted in and out of view as they rode the air currents. I thought of the cool autumn days to come and wondered where these dragonflies would go.
A few weeks ago, I traveled to Shin Boku Nursery in Wentworth, New Hampshire, to attend an all-day workshop on Japanese pruning techniques. Many of the techniques are useful to any gardener.
What’s in a picture? For artist Rob Mullen, who has spent years exploring and painting uninhabited regions of the world, his oil depictions of landscapes and wildlife include a message to protect the natural world that sustains us.
It’s not like long-distance runner April Rogers Farnham, of Plainfield, needs an excuse to get up and run. She regularly sets out, often with friends in tow, for pre-dawn runs on the trails and hilly, dirt roads around her northern-central Vermont home. She even inspires many others through …
New England is home to dozens of species of mammals, hundreds of varieties of birds and tens of thousands of different insects, but only one lizard: the five-lined skink. Though I am fond of reptiles and often seek them out, I have never seen a skink. Unless you’re lucky, determined or a roc…
I’m just tearing off September’s desk calendar and filling out the month of October, and I’m struck by the lack of appointments and things to do. The blank days stretch out like a road through a desert in the American West, with a filling station oasis every few hours. I can’t leave the stat…
