Rivers in Leaves

 

I took this picture yesterday in the early afternoon.  Both then and today, the river remains clear as crystal.  Looking down from the bridge, I see leaves moving, although for these two days, no maple among them.  As if someone was dropping oak leaves upstream, one lonely specimen after another flowed along.  Most rode the current a foot or so below the surface, some parallel to the bottom, other at right angles, and still others describing a slow spiral which, from time to time, brought them to the surface and then pulled them down again before disappearing.  Although a few maples in the village retain their leaves, it is mostly the oaks which persist in keeping them.  

Michael Snyder, a Vermont forester, tells us that oaks may keep their leaves longer because they discourage moose and deer from eating shoots in the spring.  Last year's leaves, not very tasty, I suppose, get in the way of succulent new growth.  Another theory is that oaks and their cousins, the beeches, are simply a little lower on the evolutionary ladder, a link between the more ancient evergreens and the radically deciduous.  In a few million years, they may get to be as grown up as a maple, cheerfully dropping their foliage just in time for whatever generation of leaf peepers may still be on this Earth.

Today in the late morning, before the sun broke through to create a mild and welcoming November afternoon, I took the picture above.  I noticed a different leaf shape on the Ottauquechee, something like a spearhead, very yellow.  They mostly rode the surface.  I don't know leaves as well as I would like.  They could have been from elms, which I would like to believe are making a comeback in Vermont.

In the flow of the river, each leaf carries, as its veins, that riverine, dendritic pattern, echoing, as it flows, the watershed which gave it life.

Arborescent Rivers, Within and Without

 

Today's blue sky belies the gloomy opening to yesterday's post.  

My trip up Barnard Brook, and the description of the Ottauquechee-Black Watershed in the book cited earlier, got me thinking about river patterns.  They are sometimes described as dendritic, meaning "of a branching form; arborescent." The latter word means "treelike in size and form." The tributaries of a river flow into the "main stem" of the watershed like branches attached to a tree.  The main stem of the Ottauquechee grows for about 31 miles, the Connecticut for 407.

This dendritic form seems woven into creation, as it can be found in crystals and in leaves.  It also describes much of what makes the human body live and breathe.  Blood vessels and nerves follow these arborescent paths. We are each a kind of self-contained watershed, with living rivers of fluid and branching electrical impulses.  

Ralph Brown, a British sculptor, created a bust suggesting this identity of human with river.  It is called The River.

Up the Brook

 

We have arrived at the typical November dreariness.  Grey skies, chilly temps, early sunsets, with only a promise of more to come.  Driving up to Barnard today, I followed a tributary to the Ottauquechee for its entire length, Barnard Brook, I saw my first falling snow.  The rain switched over to the white stuff as I climbed into the hills.

Experts divide up the NH-VT track of the Connecticut into bite-sized chunks, north to south. The Barnard Brook is part of the local swath of watershed called by the United States Geological Survey the Black-Ottauquechee watershed. The USGS preferences Vermont's streams over New Hampshire's in this shorthand for a section of both states which together contribute five major tributaries. In Vermont, starting south of White River Junction, are the Ottauquechee, Mill Brook, the Black, and the Williams, while from New Hampshire flows the Mascoma.  On that eastern side, the Sugar River and Lakes Sunapee and Mascoma are also part of the mix.

They all are a little higher today, if the view from the bridge here holds true for all the watery Black-Ottauquechee territory.

Water and Geese Above and Below

I took this picture yesterday around 2 p.m.  With Daylight Savings over, the mid-afternoon shadow of the bridge lengthens downstream. 

Less than a mile eastward, the ground floor windows of the Ottauquechee Health Center look out at a stretch of the river so straight it could be a canal.  Scores of Canada Geese dominated the scene yesterday morning. One or two would start to fly, leaving wakes as their feet trailed in the water just before taking off, and scoring the water again as they quickly landed.  Others dove under like cormorants, coming up in unexpected places. Still others, facing upstream, seemed to simply float, but as they appeared stationary, so they must have been paddling just to stay where they were.  Geese in every mode of action and inaction.  Were they just having fun?

We think of these geese as migratory, and they mostly are, but some stay around all year in our north country.  These birds may be right at home, or just taking a break on a southern trip from the Arctic.

Back on the bridge later on, I peered over and saw the river bottom lit up by the sun, as the bridge's shadow began some yards downstream.  The shadow obscured the depths, while the slanting afternoon light cut right through, revealing the bed of stones and sand, as I described in my post two days ago.  Gripping my iPhone over the edge, I took the picture below: the depths revealed, distorted by the lens of the surface ripples.

The under bridge scaffolding for repairing cables threw the H-shaped shadow.

The Bottom

 

Fewer leaves moved over the water today.  Maple predominated again.

I have spent a month posting about the Ottauquechee.  I realized today that I have not described riverbed below the bridge.  I took a closer look at what today's clear water passes over.  At the deepest and swiftest point, off center, toward the left, there lies a tongue of sand stretching into darkness downstream.  Here and there on both sides, double-fisted-sized stones flank that strip of bottom sand.  For a stretch on the left, a narrow slice of smooth ledge lies alongside.   On both sides toward the shores lie washing machine- and refrigerator-sized boulders.  Some of these larger rocks break the surface.  Others cause the very slow boiling effect closer to the right bank just downstream.  Out of the water, at least today, the rocky right bank rises steeply, with retaining walls escalating the height.  The left bank shelves gently away from the river.

I discovered a book yesterday whose riches I will share along with sights and thoughts about the river, Where the Great River Rises: An Atlas of the Connecticut River Watershed in Vermont and New Hampshire.  It lists the Ottauquechee as one of four larger tributaries to the Connecticut in the north country, which "from the air...sparkle in the sun."

A Murder of Crows

 

With the Ottauquechee down a bit, four crows, cawing loudly, strolled along the river's edge.  One or two stood in the shallows and leaned over to drink, a new sight for me for a crow.  A few weeks ago when again the water was quiet and lower, robins did the same thing, although they also bathed.  The crows moved up and along the left bank, as if patrolling, and one then flew to a nearby maple, his sharp black form contrasting with the faded red, yellow and blue Tibetan prayer flags fluttering in the morning's fresh breeze. 

Last year, robins had made a nest under the rear eave of the Rectory shed.  We enjoyed watching the nestlings grow larger, poking their open beaks upward.  One morning we heard robins squawking and saw crows flying out of the yard, and the nest was empty.

Wind Against Water

  

Gusts of cold east wind pushed against the river flow at mid-day.  Leaves of all types, in great numbers, moved on or through the water below the bridge, just blown from trees or swirled up from the earth.  Many found eddies near the shore, briefly shoaling before joining the seaward cavalcade of oak, maple and more.  The river is down some, but full enough right here to make room for the gusted swells.

Today's wind and cold signal a move toward winter.  A snow-covered pickup truck drove by this morning, though I have yet to see flakes in the air here in the village.