Ramble with Storm: First ice & goodbye belted kingfisher

Mulling things on my morning ramble with Storm, our family’s mixed Lab.

Something new for the meathead to paw at on the edge of the north old clay pit: Ice.

Type that and I hear the growl of Bulls coach Tom “Thibs” Thibodeau, “Ice.”

Funny how things stick in your head.

I could hear a lone belted kingfisher chattering an admonition on the south old clay pit. (Thank you Cathie Healy Kramer for that verb for the call of kingfishers.)

That surprised me. With the cold, the north pit was nearly completely iced over. The south pit was largely open, other than the kingfisher’s favorite end on the south, which was iced.

The north pit, unless it is extremely windy, freezes first because it is much shallower than the south pit, which is smaller and more protected.

By tomorrow, I think both pits will be iced. And by the looks of the forecast, that will be it for the kingfisher until spring or summer.

Only heard a few Canada geese on the lake to the west. On that lake, geese tend to swim a whole open, sometimes nearly the whole winter.

That was it for wildlife.

Coming out of the old rail bed, now a trail, above the south pit, the predawn sight of the grain elevator on the edge of town caught my eye.

I still think the next project for Larry Green, author and photographer behind Water Tanks of Chicago: A Vanishing Urban Legacy, should be Grain Elevators of Kankakee County. It would be a natural for him on his way to fishing his favorite river.

Back in town, I read 14 degrees on the bank sign. It was colder than that. Back home, I had 7 on my thermometer behind the garage. The local reporting site for the National Weather Service had 10 degrees.

All I know it has been more than 20 years since it was so cold this early in November.