When you have a snake-infested woodland area, you stay out of it during snake season.

Today's cool frosty morning was an ideal time to traipse through the woods to see what is 'new' since snake season arrived in the spring. To clarify, though, it wasn't really a "hike". It was a search for the neighbor's escaped yellow cow, last seen crashing through the woods south of our house after dark last night. Along the way, though, we got to check out a lot of the native plants and wildlife.

As we made our way through the woods, I saw lots of the pale sky-blue wild asters blooming wherever a little sunlight makes it through the canopy of the trees. The American Beautyberry Shrubs have gorgeous clusters of bright violet berries in spite of a very dry summer. The Gregg's Mist (wild ageratum) was blooming in profusion on the creek banks. The lack of moisture (our rainfall is now 10" below our annual average through the end of October) didn't stop or even slow down the growth of the vicious greenbrier and poison ivy vines. Still, they do provide berries for the birds.

The native blue autumn sage blooms in sunny spots on the edges of the woods. All the native grasses have seedheads, and the inland sea oats and brushy bluestem are especially lovely right now.

The coyote-dog hybrid that pops up too often in broad daylight and scares me and the dogs (because he doesn't turn and slink away like a 'normal' coyote) is lying on the neighbor's creekbank when the neighbor-rancher, on horseback, spots him. Unfortunately, the neighbor with the rifle is currently elsewhere on the 4-wheeler, also searching for the AWOL cow. So, the big hybrid coyote lives another day although it is the smaller creatures, like rabbits, cats and calves that should fear him most.

The deer trail at the back of our property, about 1000' from the house, has been heavily traveled and the neighbor-rancher on horseback spotted a lot of deer earlier this morning. Now, we see only one. It is a large, majestic whitetail and it stands in a clump of trees watching us search for the cow along Dry Hollow Creek where it runs through the property west of our place. No cow. I do wonder how that particular deer has escaped the bow hunter who has hunted this piece of property every night during bow season.

Heading south, I see the neighbor's pond is like ours....so low that the fish are barely surviving. We need rain.

As we walked through a couple of pastures that have not been grazed or hayed this year, I am surprised at how well they've grown, given this year's lack of moisture. The cracks in the ground are widespread and obvious in clay soil areas, but nonexistent in adjoining property with sandy soil. As we emerge from the ranch behind our own place, having already searched north, west and south of our property, and walk along the nearby section road, we see the last golden leaves clinging to the trees in a clump of native persimmons that have a heavy crop of coral-colored fruit. Unfortunately, it is mostly the coyotes who eat the persimmons, which are too sour for human consumption until they've been hit hard by frost, which sweetens them up slightly and turns their skin almost black.

The neighbor-rancher and I part ways at the road, and I head back home, sorry we didn't find the cow although she'll probably show up sooner or later. His last escapee was on the lam for weeks and finally turned up "hanging out" with a herd a mile or so away.

At home, the veggie garden's cottage border is awash in blooms. Butterflies of all types--monarchs, sulphurs, swallowtails, checkerspots and others--flit around the hummingbird sage, zinnias, marigolds, celosias, petunias, daturas, black-eyed susan vines, hyacinth bean vines,cypress vines, and other flowers and herbs that survived the summer. The ornamental peppers, and the remaining tomato and pepper plants, bearing loads of ripening fruit, sit there sunning themselves, happy to have survived this morning's frost.

Up by the barn, the daturas and brugmansias in pots soak up the rays of the sunlight and do what they do best.....look stunningly gorgeous. They remain in full blooms, with new blossoms opening almost daily.

I spent an hour or two this morning traipsing through the unpaved "neighborhood", battling thick forest undergrowth but not worrying, for once, about the snakes. I roamed through pastures, where cottontail rabbits hopped madly about and through woodlands where squirrels chattered from the trees. It is too cold for the slithering serpents to be out so early on a frosty morn, but the crows are relentlessly dogging an owl. The vultures circle overhead, drifting in circles and hoping to find something....anything to eat. The hawks fly over our heads, screaming their little cries, which alert the guineas and send them running for cover under the trees.


The cow was not found this morning, surprising everyone who thought she'd be 'trapped' within the fenced property that they know she was on last night. (Since she originally escaped by jumping one fence, I assume she maintained her freedom today by jumping another fence or two.)


It was a lovely morning for a bovine search, albeit an unsuccessful one. If you asked me what I did find, all I could say was that I found nature....and it was a beautiful morning in southern Oklahoma indeed. I could have been at home pulling weeds from the garden, but look at all that I would have missed.

I don't know how much this relates to gardening, but walking through the pastures and woods reminds me why I like to garden.....in the garden, I can have a tamer form of the beauty I see around me in the wild. Sometimes, I guess it takes an errant cow to force us to abandon our routine, forget the 'to do' list and experience something else instead. Remind me to thank that cow the next time I see her.

Dawn