This week David Thomas-Train and I had the pleasure of teaching an Introduction to Animal Tracking class for Keene’s Community Education Program. This morning we enjoyed a field trip to the pond near the Keene Central School. I learned that the pond used to be called Lake Winifred after Winifred Notman. The Notman family donated the land where the school was built. What is now the beaver pond was once the pond created by the family to freeze in winter for ice that they stored in an ice house. The north-facing slope and stone walls helped shade what was probably a deep cellar-like hole. The ice would be insulated with sawdust and would remain quite cool until summer. The remains of the ice house still sit at the edge of the pond on the Rooster Comb trail.
In this photo Audrey Hyson checks out a nearby robin’s nest in a big white pine tip-up. There were two nests both full of dried grasses from the surrounding wetland.
Audrey Hyson and nest in white pine tip-up