It's All Downhill from Here

by Meg Downey Hardy, UNH Cooperative Extension Master Gardener volunteer

Today I witnessed a five-second sight of two boys at the top of a hill in their yard ready to launch down the hill using their scooters as sleds. Their inventiveness, purity, power, and childhood bliss caused an eruption of emotions and memories for me.

First, my mind filtered back to my own three children and the sledding adventures we had as a family. I thought of the dangers our kids had faced, just like the two boys on scooters with no helmets.

Then I was pulled to older memories that came from my young self. Memories of the good winters filled with snow, when no January thaw eroded our fun, our sled courses, and our wondrous outdoor universe.

My family lived on one acre in a neighborhood. Our yard had a hill, the best yard in the neighborhood when winter arrived. We wanted lots of snow, cold, and days off from school.

On that snowy hill, we were engineers, race-car drivers, and daredevils, independent of our parents, in our own world for as many hours as we could eke out of each winter day. We hoped for the rare nights when our parents would allow us to stay out to sled in the dark with just spotlights to illuminate our special world.

We created games and challenges endlessly, many which I don't remember. We purposely created "courses," pouring water on them to make them slick and fast. We tested each other. Who could make it to the end? Who could go even farther and launch over the snowbank into the road?

When we became bored with that adventure, we made other courses. One went straight towards trees, negotiating a swerving curve just before hitting the tree. If you couldn't steer, you had to bail out and give up on being one of the successful ones.

Sometimes for a change, we went over to Joan's hill across the street. But that one was boring, just long and straight and gradual.

I remember the endless wait to get the best sleds. Our flying saucers were duds; they went nowhere slowly. The wooden toboggan was only fun when everyone jumped on one by one in sequence, with the last person responsible for the final push and a running leap to fit onto that last spot in the back. The newest addition, those rolled-up rectangles of plastic, were a struggle and could only be steered by the hands or feet, like the saucers, but worse because you slipped off them so easily.

The classic wooden sleds, Flexible Flyers, were the best. We didn't want to seem too eager to take the old-fashioned sleds. Each family only had one. The oldest ones, the sleds our parents had used, were the best.

Peer justice was at work. Everyone took turns with the slow, spinning pieces of plastic that couldn't make it down the sleek courses we built. No one dared to take two runs in a row on the best sleds. Those had to be shared and everyone knew it.

On the Flexible Flyers we had to choose between sitting up and steering with our feet or running with the sled in our hands, throwing it down, and jumping on stomach-down, hands on the steering wood, feet useless to help once they were on the sled. My husband still talks about launching sleds on his stomach. I still think of how much I preferred sitting up. Something about going head first, face next to the snow as I sped along, made me choose the slightly slower technique.

Sometimes we'd try fitting two to a sled, either both sitting up or (sometimes) both lying down, one on top of the other, knowing that the journey would be short and filled with laughter, as we gained little speed and almost no distance.

As a shy little girl in a family of boisterous sisters, these outdoor adventures affected me the most. The camaraderie of kids against the elements in that self-organized universe of peer justice, childhood power, and autonomy created a magic that still persists.

My sisters don't share my idyllic winter memories and are surprised at my continued enthusiasm for snow and cold. But I feel lucky. Living in New Hampshire I got to sled, my children got to sled, and my grandchildren will get to sled. Memories of my childhood winters dissolve the drudgery of bundling up, plowing the driveway, shoveling the walks, and braving brutal temperatures as I head for the hill.

Photo by kjarrett. Some rights reserved.

Returning the Pony

At the age of 40, I thought my childhood dream of having my own pony had finally come true.

The truth is, I'd had horses in my life before, but they were never mine.

Before I was born, my parents left New York City and bought a 55-acre farm in Vermont where I spent my first five years. It was an ideal setting in my child’s mind; fields to roam, a pond for skating parties and swimming, and lots of animals for playmates.

I loved the horses best, but as the youngest I wasn’t allowed to ride them unless it was with someone older. That’s why I wanted a pony all my own. Forward 35 years.

On a cool summer morning I stood by a row of windows in my second-floor bedroom and looked out onto the back lawn toward the woods that led to a golf course. With coffee in hand I luxuriated in the feeling that comes when a soft dawn breeze, pungent with sweet pine, wafts through the screens and promises another beautiful day. The mist on the grass was thigh-high and rising. The only sounds were the birds chirping their morning calls.

As I turned to head downstairs, something by the edge of the lawn caught my eye. Having the eyesight of a mole I never trust my un-spectacled eyes, so I raced frantically to the bedside table, jammed on my glasses and checked the spot again.

A pony! A lovely brown filly, grazing on the tall grass no more than 60 feet away. All logic left my brain. It seemed my dream had come true; my prayers had finally been answered.

Not wanting to frighten the pony, I flew silently down the stairs to enlist my husband’s help in corralling her. Looking like a player in a game of charades I began gesturing madly and mouthing “There’s a pony out there.”

“WHAT?” he replied in full voice.

“Shhhhhhh. A pony! A pony! Over by the woods. Help me get hold of her.”

We stepped outside and simultaneously assumed a stealthy crouch­­as if that would work. The pony nonchalantly lifted her head, continuing her munching as we moved slowly toward her. Making no attempt to run, she allowed my husband to clip our dog leash to her bridle.

For one brief moment I allowed time to slip away. I was a kid again and it felt like Christmas. While I held the lead, Jay called the police to see if anyone had reported a missing pony. No one had.

“Can we keep her?” I asked, half joking, half serious.

“Ya, right,” came the reply. “Let’s think about this for minute,” he said assuming his scholarly voice. “If we can retrace her hoof prints we can probably figure out where she came from.”

Although the prints led to a small stream and disappeared, that was enough evidence to give Jay the brilliant idea that she must have come from the estate on the other side of the golf course. So sure was he of this that after letting me play a while with the pony, he set off to return her to her rightful owner.

Down the cart path they went, the pony making no objections until they came to the barn. She wasn’t the least bit interested in going inside, but the horses in the stalls seemed delighted to have her back. It took some doing, but eventually with persuasive pushing, pulling and cajoling she was safely “installed.”

Since Amy, the woman who took care of the property, wasn’t home, Jay left with a satisfied feeling that he’d done his good deed for the day. I hung back, a bit sad at having to give “my” pony back.

A week later Jay ran into Amy in town and told her about returning the pony.

“Oh my gosh!” Amy laughed. “I wondered who had put her in the barn - I came in after work and almost died when I saw her there. She belongs to the Gordons on the other side of town.”

“Really?” Jay said, “But the other horses seemed so happy to see her.”

“That’s because she’s in season and they’re all stallions!”

By Susan Ferber, Master Gardener

Snow, Water, Ice

Remember those soft little snowflakes falling from the sky, attaching to your eyelashes, mittens, and tongue during those snowy days when you were growing up? Oh, how my friends and I loved to get up and out when the announcement came, SNOW DAY. NO SCHOOL!

Remember sitting outside by yourself and listening to the snow fall, how quiet and secure it made you feel?

Growing up in the fifties and sixties, I never really understood why snowflakes were so wonderful or why the water they’re made from is so powerful. How could the substance in those delicate little flakes from my childhood float on the top of a pond, move mountains, and kill living plant tissue?

I never really made the connection between liquid water and ice until I was studying to teach Advanced Placement biology. I had a wonderful instructor whose job it was to bring all of us pre-1963 high school science teachers up to date.

This class brought me one of those “aha” moments when things suddenly come together and begin to make sense. My moment of enlightenment came when our instructor explained water and all its properties.

We began with the structure of the simple H2O molecule everyone knows by its chemical formula: two hydrogen atoms (H) and one oxygen atom (O). The way in which the hydrogen and oxygen atoms bond and by which the molecules attach to each other causes liquid water molecules to attach and break apart constantly, giving water its familiar fluid appearance. But what about ice? How does water become ice and float?

The unique bonding properties of the water molecule also account for ice. As liquid water begins to lose its heat and freeze, the molecules attach to one another in such a way as to keep each molecule at arm’s length from its neighbors, creating the rigid lattice structure we know as ice. This ice lattice creates space between the molecules, making ice less dense than water and causing it to expand and float.

Also due to this shape, when liquid water flows between rocks and down into cracks in rocks and freezes, the ice lattice expands to nine percent more than the water’s liquid shape and exerts a tremendous force on the surrounding rock. This expansion causes fractures along the rocks’ natural weak points. Adding gravity explains why the Old Man in the Mountain was doomed to fall in spite of the valiant attempts to hold it in place.

Now as fall fades and the woods turn white with snow, what caused those maple leaves to shrivel and fall and your geraniums to turn to brown mush and begin to rot, but doesn’t damage evergreen shrubs and trees? It seems water and freezing temperatures again are the culprits. Leaves on deciduous trees die as part of a plan.

As sunlight and temperatures decrease, photosynthesis slows and the tree begins to use more energy than its leaves produce. These are the clues for the tree to reduce its energy budget and remove all those things causing a negative draw on its energy stores. Trees drop their leaves and take a long winter’s nap.

But many of our cold-tolerant evergreen trees and shrubs have adapted to freezing temperatures by moving water out of their cells to spaces between the cells, allowing the cells to survive by lowering their freezing points. When the temperature rises, melting occurs, water moves back into the cells, and the plant resumes its growth activities, though there may be some cell damage. But not all trees survive, as the drying winds so common here in winter can kill a tree by drying out the water between its cells.

That explains how trees may (or may not) survive, but what about geraniums? Geraniums and other summer-flowering annuals, due to their genetics, don't transport water out of their cells, so ice forms in their cells and kills the plants.

So, as daylight decreases and gardens are put to sleep, I look out my window at the frozen pond, the surrounding trees and shrubs, and the deflated, brown vegetation of the flower garden, and I think: I now understand why ice floats, snowflakes form, leaves die, and The Old Man in the Mountain fell. It’s all because of the simple structure of ice-crystal lattices created as liquid water freezes.

And, as winter advances, snowflakes fly, and the woods look dead, I know that even in winter, plant cells in my trees and shrubs are performing tiny miracles, preparing for spring.

By Suzy Martin, Master Gardener,Community Tree Steward

Just Beyond the Hemlocks

Half a century ago, my father took me walking in the woods. Not a huge wood by New England standards, but from a six-year-old’s viewpoint, three feet above ground, it seemed to go on forever.

We worked our way along a deer path, through laurel and spindly undergrowth until we came to where the ground grew green again, all the brighter for our having last passed beneath a covert of hemlocks, where dirt, dry leaves, and shade mixed with dappled sun to make a deep, yet bright and shimmering brown. It hypnotized and held me captive until my father, calling my name, broke the spell.

Here the woods surrounded and kept secret another world. The long, splayed roots of fallen trees stood tall, forming castles and villages for (I hoped) gnomes and fairies. Pedestals of mud and grass rose among them, and thin bands of water ran between them. Atop the pedestals grew sculptured vases of mottled purple and green (which would later become recognizable as ordinary skunk cabbage). Wood ferns, preened and plumed, formed circles­graceful green dancers, holding hands, backs arched, waiting for the music to begin, their dainty toes hidden in the earth-tone carpet of the forest floor.

“Now sit and be still.” Dad squatted down and led me by example looking from ground to treetop, side to side, moving only his eyes. “If we don’t move or make noise, we might see something!”

I chose a nearby patch of moss growing close enough to the shell of an old oak to lean my back against. Dad stood and started to move away.

“Where are you going?” I whispered.

“There.” He indicated a direction with his chin. “Right behind you. I’ll pretend to be a rock, you pretend to be a stump.” I thought this was a fine idea. Maybe we’d see elves.

The memories of that six-year-old child are now encased in a 56-year-old body. Where I now sit is many miles and a lifetime away from that place, but much the same: a rivulet, just outside the shade of hemlocks, a stone's throw from a magic village made of plant and earth and fallen trees. I come here often, but now instead of sitting cross-legged, I hug my knees, thereby reassuring them that I have neither forgotten nor taken them for granted.

Here I always feel my father’s presence sitting quietly behind me. This place centers me. I come here knowing I will return home wet and muddy and bug-bitten, because the closer I can get to the earth, the more grounded and alive I feel.

A Blanding’s turtle joined me here once. I was sitting as still as possible considering the sign over my head, written in mosquitoese: “Free Food Here.” For whatever reasons, the turtle considered me harmless, settled in, and we sat in companionable silence. Too soon, sufficiently rested, he rose and strode forward until his front legs stood in the gently running water. He submerged his head and drank for so long I thought he’d drown. Once sated, he lifted his head from the water stretching his neck towards the sun, his beautiful golden-orange throat seeming to glow. He appeared to be considering the world around him, and smiling.

We both enjoyed the scenery for a while, neither of us in a rush. The pale white spots on his shell became clearer to me the longer I looked at him. It struck me that perhaps this was a descendant of the turtle in the Iroquois creation myth that once carried the earth upon his back, his carapace­high, rounded and elongated like the milky way­a map of the heavens, its throat the color of a sunrise or sunset. Perhaps he is still holding up the earth, keeping it in place as long as he is on it. Lose him, and we’ll all be lost.

The turtle made an almost imperceptible movement, and I knew he was ready to travel on. I closed my eyes because I didn’t want to see him go. The temptation to follow would have been too great.

By Lynn Quinlan, Volunteer

New Hampshire: End of the Nation's Tailpipe?

Swimming to Christmas Tree Island is a rite of passage at Bear Hill 4-H Camp, complete with certificate. It’s been a tradition there at least since I was a camper in the late 1970’s and probably since the camp started in 1936. Since 2001, I’ve worked at Bear Hill as a volunteer swimming instructor.

When the campers come back from the swim they carry themselves with renewed pride and self-confidence. Changes in self image can be phenomenal. I’ve seen campers with behavioral problems learn that they can set a goal and reach it with hard work and determination. Reaching Christmas Tree Island is physical proof.

It isn’t easy to jump into nine feet or more of water. You can’t see the bottom and the water has spots of pond weed. We swim among nature’s creatures: fish, snakes, turtles and frogs. A Polish counselor who had just finished the swim confided that it is scary because it involves “jumping into the unknown.” It takes a lot of courage to face your fears of the unknown and to believe you can make it across the pond and back on your own power.

We do everything possible to help our campers succeed, and we take every precaution to ensure their safety. We swim at a leisurely pace. Life guards and swimming instructors watch the swimmers closely for any sign of distress.

During swim classes throughout the week, swimmers have trained their muscles and cardiovascular systems, while improving their stroke technique by swimming laps of different strokes: crawl, elementary backstroke, sidestroke and back crawl.

During the week we watch and evaluate swimmers to make sure they can accomplish the final ritual swim to the island. The campers often don’t realize what they have learned and how much they have improved their fitness until they take on this slightly scary challenge.

Everyone feels good after a leisurely swim in the pond. We usually go on hot, clear, sunny days. To help the children enjoy the experience and overcome their fears, we point out the trees, the sky, the sunlight glinting off the water. We show them the bubbles from fish and other wildlife.

Gasping breaths are out of place in this place of peace and beauty. So I wondered why one young woman, a competent swimmer, was having such a difficult time with the swim to Christmas Island .

With wide, fearful eyes, she worked hard to draw her next breath. I offered her the red rescue tube I was trailing and she took it. Relieved I wasn’t going to have to rescue a panicked swimmer—a physically hard and dangerous situation—I asked if she was okay. She said she’d lost her breath. I towed her on the tube to the island so she could rest. That she wasn’t able to make it to the island surprised me. During class she had swum much further distances at a much faster pace.

After reaching Christmas Tree Island, the camper I’d towed told me she had a reduced lung capacity that day because an unusual amount of pollution had affected her asthma.

She knew this, she said, because she was involved in INHALE (Integrated Human Health and Air Quality Research), a study the University of New Hampshire was doing at the camp with children affected by asthma and allergies. Every morning at breakfast, a graduate student researcher measured campers’ lung capacity to study the consequences of bad air quality.

This particular day was one of the ten “bad air” days that New Hampshire has on average during the summer. On these “bad air” days, public health officials warn that even the average person should avoid outdoor physical activity, while young children and the elderly should remain indoors with air conditioning. I saw first-hand the effect it had on one of my swimming students.

According to Dr. John Spengler of the Harvard School of Public Health, air pollution causes 60,000 deaths nationwide each year. But the deaths are only the tip of the iceberg.

Air pollution causes increased visits to the hospital emergency rooms, more inpatient admissions, more use of medication, and losses in workplace productivity.

When we think of air pollution, we tend to think of smog clouds hanging over Los Angeles , not a forested camp in New Hampshire . Learning that New England is known as the “tailpipe of the nation” shocked me.

Dr. Jeff Salloway, a UNH professor of health management and policy, heads the INHALE project. Salloway says asthma rates in the United States have increased 1000 percent in the past 30 years. More than 11 percent of New Hampshire children have been diagnosed with asthma at some point in their lives.

Even though we may think we live in a pristine environment here in New Hampshire, two weather systems funnel pollution from the Midwest and the entire Atlantic seaboard over New England before it moves out to sea. Salloway says that toxins carried in the polluted air—ozone, sulfur dioxide, and oxides of nitrogen, and others—cause asthma and other

But the news isn’t all bad. By gathering this data from projects like INHALE, researchers and weather reporters can help us change the situation.

Dr. Greg Carmichael of the University of Iowa said in an interview with PBS’s Online News Hour that the weather person may soon begin reporting, “here’s the snap shot of what the air quality will be tomorrow. But here’s what the air quality would be if 50 percent of the people decided not to drive.”

We can have some control over our environment. In some New Hampshire communities, people can take free rides on public transit systems during “bad air” days. The rides are paid for by a grant from the Environmental Protection Agency called Ride Free Breathe Free.

We can choose to carpool. We can choose to drive smaller, more fuel-efficient cars. We can contribute less to overall air pollution by walking or bicycling to work or school on “good air” days.

Preventing illness, saving lives, and maintaining our quality of life means recognizing the problems, knowing what to do, and making choices to change our behaviors. We can’t get lulled into believing we have no air pollution because we live in a rural area. Appearances can be deceiving.

Editor’s note: Look for the INHALE Web site which should go live in a few weeks.

For more information

UNH graduate student Tom Lambert, who studies the effects of air quality on human health, offers these links for air quality forecasts and real time air quality data:

• New England air Quality Forecast
• Local Forecasts and Coditions
• National Weather Service Air Quality Forecast Guidance
• University of New Hampehire’s AIRMAP air quality forecast

By Bonnie Barlow, UNH Cooperative Extension Community Tree Steward and 4-H Volunteer