Of Bounds and Impounds

Ok, so dig this...

We get a call this a.m. from a woman who is sure that the pond is still draining.
We promise to go and look for ourselves as I saw the guys close the valve, and saw the flow stop days ago (Saturday).
(In the back of my mind I wondered if the release pipe had gotten undermined somehow, if her story pans out.)

This afternoon I go out to the Olean Street frontage and the water looks more or less the same, and then I turn my head and look north and it looks drier.
Drier?
I go up to the north end of the pond and it sure does look drier.

After making a call another person goes out, but this time to the south end of the pond by the dam.
There is no outflow (good), and the water level seems to him to be rising.
Rising?
Huh, how's that?

I go out to the dam myself, and sure enough, no outflow (good) and the water level is rising (also good). Heck the fish are jumping all over at the dusk light for insects!

So what gives?

Here is my guess:

Pools were left behind to the north on Saturday, which is the shallower end of the pond and the part of the pond that was clearly flooded by the dam to make the pond as big as it is.
The pond had only recently gone down and everything was still wet.
While the flow did stop, the pools were nevertheless on higher ground, even if they were cut off, and over time water sought its own level.
Thus, drier to the north, but overall the pond is reflooding.
Or I am just plain crazy.

Weirdest dang situation.


And then there is the continuing land clearing on our southern flank here at the Lodge.
To date the guy in the forwarder has been great about leaving a buffer on the conservation land of some 8-10 feet. Nevertheless, step away to grab some groceries, come back and decades of tree and understory growth can disappear. So we posted the bound line on the southern and western flank with Greater Worcester Land Trust Property Boundary tags.
Theoretically this, in addition to the operator's caution, as well as the project's own site flagging, should ensure that the project doesn't creep over and accidentally undo what nature has been hard at work at.
This was also a great chance to look carefully at the trunks of numbers of trees, and to look for yard waste dumping (yeah there was some), and trash (not so much thankfully.)

And so ends another busy day here at the Lodge.

Presently it is 8:38 p.m.:
the temperature is 66.0 degrees F and falling,
the humidity is 82% and steady,
the pressure is 29.80" of Hg and steady,
and the USFS Fire Danger Class is LOW.

By the way, unfortunately those rain storms never materialized, so the refill continues in slow trickle mode.