Winter Story

March 15, 1917 / Ft. Pierre, So. Dak.

To Mrs. M. M. Corey

It's great weather we’re having. Some days like the good old summer time and some like Greenland’s icy mountains. Most every one around here is “fighting a cold.” A small lad of my acquaintance seems to be suffering with a cold in the head and as a matter of course his friends suffer with him. I asked him once if he hadn’t a handkerchief. He felt in his pocket and replied “No, but I got a cork.” He was so amazed at my amusement that I didn’t even suggest him using the cork.

Bachelor Bess: The Homesteading Letters of Elizabeth Corey, 1909-1919, edited by Philip Gerber

Tree of the Week

Black Cherry, Prunus serotina  Ehrh.

DISTINGUISHING CHARACTERISTICS: Leaves simple, alternate, oblong-lanceolate, 2 to 6 inches long with petioles ½ to ¾ inch long; margins finely toothed, the tips of the teeth curving inward; 1 or 2 glands normally present on the upper portion of the petiole near the base of the blade. Winter twigs slender, red-brown, glabrous; leaf scars small, half-round, with 3 bundle scars. Buds ovoid, 1/8 to ¼ inch long (occasionally larger), with about 6 glabrous, dark red-brown scales; the terminal bud equal to or only slightly larger than the laterals. Flowers perfect, regular, in showy racemes, appearing shortly after the leaves in mid to late spring; petals 5, white, broadly obovate. Fruit a drupe about 1/3 inch in diameter, purple-black when ripe, with a persistent calyx. Bark smooth with prominent lenticels, eventually separating into thin, light gray to black scales with upturned edges.

SIMILAR TREES: Chokecherry and wild plum are much smaller trees; their leaves have sharp-pointed, outward-directed teeth and are broader relative to their length. In winter, bud scales of chokecherry are brown with tan margins; other trees with similar twigs have false terminal buds.

IOWA DISTRIBUTION: Native as far west as the natural lakes area in northwestern Iowa and the Missouri River in southwestern Iowa.

Forest and Shade Trees of Iowa by Peter J. van der Linden and Donald R. Farrar

Winter Sport

Things along the Upper River slow down in the winter, but never come to a standstill. With the first hard freeze of the backwater lakes and sloughs, as the window-pane ice thickens into plate glass just strong enough to bear a man's weight, some rivermen go turtle-hunting. Easing over this thin ice and winter-clear water that is only a couple of feet deep, the hunters watch for snapping turtles that haven't completely buried themselves in the mud. A heavy iron rod sharpened at one end with the other bent into a hook is driven through the ice, turtle, and all. The turtles are at their yearly prime, heavy with winter fat, and will bring top dollar at the fish markets. As the ice thickens on deeper bays and backwaters, there are panfish and pike to be hand-lined through holes cut with auger or ice spud. This can produce quantities of the sweetest panfish fillets of the year.

Up on the River by John Madson

Comfort Food From Iowa

Stormy Weather Chili

2 medium onions, diced

1 cup diced celery

2 tablespoons cooking oil

1 1/2 pounds ground beef

4 cups canned tomatoes

1 15 1/2-ounce can chili beans

1 to 2 15-ounce cans red kidney beans

salt and pepper to taste

1 tablespoon sugar

1 bay leaf

2 to 3 teaspoons chili powder

Sauté onions and celery in cooking oil in large kettle or pressure pan. When golden, stir in ground beef and brown until red is gone. Stir in remaining ingredients and simmer, covered, for 1 hour. A pressure pan will lower cooking time. Cook for about 20 minutes at 10 pounds pressure. Put pan under cold running water until pressure is down before trying to open the lid. Remove bay leaf before serving.

Up a Country Lane Cookbook, by Evelyn Birkby

Tree of the Week

Downy Serviceberry, Amelanchier arborea (Michx.) Fern.

DISTINGUISHING CHARACTERISTICS: Leaves simple, alternate, ovate to slightly obovate, 2 to 4 inches long with petioles 1/2 to 1 1/2 inches long, toothed, slightly heart-shaped at base; surfaces densely white-hairy when unfolding in spring but eventually glabrous or only slightly hairy beneath; veins branching freely and forming a network near the margin. Winter twigs slender, glabrous, red-brown to gray; leaf scars linear or crescent-shaped, very small, with 3 bundle scars. Buds elongate, the terminal 1/4 to 1/2 inch long and the laterals often nearly equal in size; scales commonly 4 to 6 in number, either red or yellow-green tinged with red. Flowers perfect, regular, in showy racemes, appearing when the leaves are beginning to expand in early spring; petals 5, white, linear to narrowly oblong. Fruit a reddish purple pome about 1/4 inch in diameter, ripening in early to midsummer. Bark light gray and very smooth, becoming darker and shallowly furrowed at the base of older stems.

SIMILAR TREES: Easily distinguished from other small flowering trees by its narrow petals and in summer by its small, early-ripening fruits and elongated buds. In winter, hornbeam has much shorter buds and muscled trunks.

IOWA DISTRIBUTION: Native throughout eastern, southern, and central Iowa, also occurring though uncommon in the natural lakes area and the Des Moines River valley in northwestern Iowa.


Forest and Shade Trees of Iowa: Third Edition, by Peter J. van der Linden and Donald R. Farrar

Winter Bird

Ruby-crowned Kinglet

Regulus calendula

Kinglets return to my area in early to mid September. By early November, the last bird has flown south. In fall, I hear mostly the chattering calls, but once in awhile a partial song, as though from a youngster trying out its voice, rings through the woods. At this time of year, both the ruby-crown and its cousin, the golden-crowned kinglet, often forage with other small birds, such as chickadees, titmice, nuthatches, vireos, and warblers.

Fifty Common Birds of the Upper Midwest, watercolors by Dana Gardner, text by Nancy Overcott

Winter Sport

The ring-necked pheasant is a very tough bird, in body and spirit. It adapts better to man and his doings than do any of the native prairie grouse, and is more tolerant of cultivation and heavy land use—up to a point. But the pheasant cannot make use of deep, soft snow as do native grouse that burrow into drifts where the temperature may be forty degrees warmer than the outer air. The pheasant takes potluck and simply roosts or huddles in what grassy cover it can find, and such prairie cover is a snowtrap, a drift-builder. Often, in the wake of a blizzard, food is not the pheasant's greatest problem. The scouring winds may blow fields free of snow and expose wet grain—but those same winds may bury roosting cover beneath towering drifts. And when the blizzard brings heavy snow that blankets the feeder fields as well, the hardy ringneck is forced into desperate actions.

Such evicted pheasants may move into feedlots with cattle, or into barnyards with chickens. Or they may just strike out cross-country, moving as far as ten miles to better cover. This is a fantastic journey for a ring-necked pheasant that may normally live out its sedentary life on one section of land, and reflects the desperation of these birds. In a few cases, the moving pheasants do find cover. In most cases they do not, and they die, as 90 percent of the pheasants in southern Minnesota died in the winter of 1968-69.


Out Home by John Madson