There’s little more enjoyable than a walk in the New England woods in Autumn. Waveny Park in New Canaan is a great place to capture the beauty of Nature.
Here are two photographs of the Sunrise in November, 2011.

[They're 1280 x 960. If you click 'em and download the large image you can set one as your desktop or your phone's lock screen.]

Enjoy.
-

There, you will even find quaint streams bubbling with life. There are pristine examples of local flora along the paths and many signs of fauna calling it home. A healthy Red-Tail Hawk swooped down just in front of me as I wandered a long straight section of path. It flew close to the ground and sped through the trees to a perch just out of sight.

Sometimes when I am walking in Nature with my camera, enjoying a startling moment of magnificence precludes my reaching for the camera. Trying to focus and snap a shot, I’m missing the moment on a personal level.

I stopped to take a picture of a red squirrel and just as I focused he leaped. My digital point and shoot captured it sailing 20′ above the ground to a neighboring tree! The hawk, however, flew down quickly and I watched in amazement as it powerfully navigated the thick foliage, not bothering for a blurry snapshot but prefering to absorb every split-second my senses could take in.

The less we do to alter Waveny Park while it is in our care, the more positive experiences with Nature future generations are offered. If we build driveways and drainage systems, sports facilities and recreation buildings, residences or offices, even a tool shed, we are making a costly trade.

Remember, the thick woods where Spencer’s Run is was one of the most fascinating places of my youth. A woods filled with wildlife and so Naturally overgrown it was virtually impassible on foot. So many animals used to live in there! My dog, at the time, would often spot a deer and beg to run in and chase. I watched bats fly around those trees every summer.

[Show as slideshow]

Please don’t sell our Park. Please don’t cut down any more trees. Please stop encroaching on the fraction of remaining habitat. Nothing is more important than the air you breath, for without it none of this matters.

A public-private group formed recently with the intention of restoring the Waveny Park cornfields.

Is public-private a word? Or is it two antonyms, such as good-bad, put together?

The cornfields, some 18 acres located in the southeast corner of the park, have been neglected for years, leaving it overgrown with invasive plants and vines that are choking native species of trees and bushes, many of which were planted 50 years ago or more.

I know newspaper journalists like to ‘editorialize’ but to say the fields have been neglected is an outright falsehood.

The truth is, the cornfields have not been neglected. The cornfields have received constant attention for years, purposeful destructive attention by the town of New Canaan and it’s contractors who have deposited hundreds of cubic yards of toxic crude oil product and thousands of cubic yards of dredged waste.

The fields have, under the care of The Town of New Canaan, been systematically destroyed according to their plan and the residents of New Canaan paid for that deleterious process. To call it neglect is just not true. Neglect is defined as “Fail to look after, pay no attention”

On the contrary, the Waveny cornfields have received constant attention and there are more than 100 photographs on Waveny.net showing “years” of ruinous attention.

Judging from the statement the cornfields are “overgrown”, the journalist who wrote the Advertiser article obviously hasn’t visited the cornfields which have been devoid of life for quite some time.

Does it not seem odd to anyone that persons responsible for the deplorable condition of the cornfields should be appointed to the Restoration Project’s Steering Committee?

Waveny.net has been concerned by the destructive behavior of a Town bent on selling off and irrepairably altering the natural landscape of Waveny Park for years.

Most of all, the question remains; How have we come to the point where a few residents are forming a committee to clean up for the Town of New Canaan? Why do citizens have to call on the Attorney General to protect us from our town governement? Why do we elect and support with our tax dollars men and women who don’t hold righteous values? Why do we as residents of New Canaan allow our elected officials to treat our precious resources with such injust disdain?

The article should have said: “We, as a town, have been using the Waveny Park cornfields as a dumping grounds for several years. The abuses have taken a serious toll on the environment, forcing out wildlife and completely obliterating native and planted flora. Despite our decision to use the grounds for debris storage, we have come to the conclusion that a Natural setting is preferable to the continued use of our Public Park as a dump and therefore have decided to reverse our decision despite the millions of dollars aready invested in destroying the area.

We, as a town, have decided to remove the tires, scrap metal, plastic and asphalt in order to reestablish the Natural environment to the best of our ability. Though it will take years for such a reversal of behavior, it is in the best interest of future generations to keep Waveny Park the wonderful natural landscape it has been for hundreds of years.

Cold wind blowing, the crunching snow, the swishing sounds of so many layers of clothes, the hat and scarf around the ears; the heightened alertness from the quieting layer of white: increased line of sight, an echoing stillness out of the wind.

Being warm under all these clothes, plopping down in the snow for a rest. How could this make me feel so good? Taking off one glove and setting it down, careful not to get snow inside, reaching into a pocket to retrieve a chocolate, mmmm and getting that glove back on quickly, then rolling over on my stomach in the snow over the grass on the cold earth…. for some reason… because I can; because I’m warm inside, because I’m happy, because I’m not afraid to lie on the ground – outside.

I’d rather a path than a road, a field than a lot, a meadow than a lawn even a cabin to a castle. It’s a new year for this world and my weekend walk in Waveny Park reminded me that I am glad to be alive. I am hopeful for the world and for our Nation in the years to come.

A wish for a prosperous and healthy 2009.

–
Monday, the weather was perfect for a walk in Waveny Park in New Canaan, Ct.

[Show as slideshow]