Hello nature lovers,

So I have a story to tell about my last-ditch attempt to see a groundhog for my descriptive narrative and my field journal (because it was also my last-minute final journal entry).

Last Wedneday, a beautiful warm spring evening, I decided to take a stroll down to Occum Pond to try to spot some groundhogs. It was just before sunset, and the light was beautiful. I immediately noticed how much more everything was in bloom than the last time I saw Occum, just a week earlier. 

The grass had grown like crazy – some of it was up to my knees! The flowers were all blooming, and the trees had lots of young green leaves on them. As delighted as I was to see the brand new lush-ness of the vegetation around Occum, I also realized this meant it wouldn’t be as easy to spot groundhogs and their burrows.

I trudged through the tall grass over to where I had seen groundhog burrows before, and noticed some new ones! Now, there were 5 or 6 that i could see, instead of only 2 on this side of the pond like i had originally found. 

There seemed to be two burrow networks, because I could see two main entrances, and the rest were spy-holes or alternate entrances. If you remember from my presentation, groundhog burrows are complex and have different chambers/entrances for different purposes. 
 

There is always a main entrance and a spy-hole/alternate entrance, and usually at least two or three various chambers. The main entrances are usually built up a lot more with a large dirt pile, leaves, and other debris around them, while the spy-holes are much less conspicuous, dug more into the ground and usually don’t have much debris or dirt spread around them. The different chambers are usually used for nesting, sleeping, and getting rid of waste.

As exciting as it was to see all these different and new groundhog burrows, what i really wanted to see were some actual groundhogs. I had no such luck at these new burrows, so I decided to trek across to the other bank of Occum to see if i could spot any of the rodent-like brown mammals. On my walk over, I looked down to my legs (I was wearing shorts) and feet (clad in flip flops) see lots of shiny three-leafed plants that looked much too similar to poison ivy. Fear immediately swept over me, and my flight instinct kicked in – I started to run/hop/jump my way over to the other side of the bank, I guess all the while thinking that going faster through the poison ivy would give me a better chance of avoiding the oils from the leaves? Either way, once i finally past it through the tall itchy grass and pesky poison ivy, hunching over and breathing hard, I hoped i might at least see some groundhogs as compensation for my possible contraction of itchy bumps all over my legs. But, of course, I didn’t see any there, either.

Dejected and frustrated at my lack of proper leg/footwear, I walked back to my dorm quickly to run cold water all over my legs and feet in the hopes of maybe avoiding having red itchy bumps all over my legs during finals week, and alas – I saved myself from the dreaded poison ivy.

Until next time,

Lauren

p.s. i hope everyone takes this as a strong word of advice to never wear flip flops and shorts on nature observations/walks if you know you’re going to be walking through a lot of plants and vegetation :-/