My late friend Flea used to have a theory about sickness. Whenever he was sick, he'd go work out, playing basketball and hustling and working up a sweat, essentially sweating the illness out. He swore by it. Since the ol' Covid has kept hanging on, I put myself into Flea mode and took a hike on Sunday morning. We'd taken a short walk on Saturday so I knew it could be done.
I was feeling pretty polluted but we got to our spot at about 9 AM and it was sunny, with temps in the mid-70s. We went slowly. I strayed over towards a stream that was nothing but a dustbowl. I'd never seen it dry before, but this drought has been lethal. Andrea was digging in the field so I went over to see what she was up to.
It seems she had found a nest of hatching Painted Turtles. They were very much in the way of foot traffic, so she played in the dirt for a while.
She took the fistful of five hatchlings over to the (very low) pond and we found a suitable place for them to have a chance to survive and thrive.
The last two stragglers eventually went in and got into the muck.
So, about that dried up stream? Yikes!
Along the pond, we saw a miracle... a second August snake! This Water Snake was enjoying a soak.
We went very slowly and I rested quite a lot. I fell asleep in the bird blind for a minute. Eventually, we got to a spot where a gorgeous Pickerel Frog hopped into view.
We slowly carried on. Andrea had a spot she wanted to look for more turtle nests so I laid down under a tree and enjoyed a cool breeze and the fresh air. Beat the heck out of the stale bedroom. She found no other nests but saw an amazing sight with deer drinking from the other side of a pond.
Heading back, we took a different path back, a new one to us. We might have decided against it had we known how long it was going to be, but we made plenty of rest stops. We were rewarded by a spot overlooking a couple of (very low) ponds. It was lovely. There were a few Green Herons poking around and they're always a treat.
We didn't see any more critters until that path hooked back up with the main path. There, we saw this beautiful young Garter with a meal in it's gullet.
Here's his face...
Well, the sweat was certainly coming. I was exhausted and sweaty but it's all good. We were getting fresh air and seeing some animals. We peeked back into the pond before leaving and saw a massive shell pushing through the lily pads... then this teeny face (attached to a behemoth noggin) broke the surface.
Andrea wanted to check the area we released the hatchlings before we headed to the car. They were all buried and safe. This Pickerel Frog said he'll keep an eye on them.
I was staggering back to the car and I commented to Andrea how odd it was that we saw turtle babies before snake babies! I mean, we usually see shoestring Garters a few weeks before turtles start poppin' out. No sooner had I said that than a wee shoestring squiggled across the path. Luckily, it was in front of us, wand we're always looking down. We whisked it out of danger and moved it to a safer place in Andrea's hat.
So, I survived. I'm not going to say that the Flea Method cured me but my fever didn't get above 99.5 in the day following the hike. And now it is gone. Was it Flea's Flu Formula? Or seeing some critters than has helped so much?
I'm not back to "normal" but I'm not as miserable as I was week ago. I'll take it.
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