Lyme – David Kotz

Familiar terrain

Back to my home stomping grounds.

My calves strained as I hiked up the steep, forested hillside, following a familiar route that has no trail and rarely feels the pressure of human soles. Except mine. For this weekend’s hike I decided to stay close to home and visit a patch of forest that I know very, very well. I have traversed this hillside dozens, nay, hundreds of times, following my whim instead of any formal trails. My senses perk up as I move slowly through the underbrush, looking and listening and sometimes even feeling for animal sign, trying to read the land and determine where I might place my motion-sensor cameras to capture interesting videos of the local wildlife.

Sale, Prestbury, and Lyme Park

A visit to my birthplace.

Fun fact: a bit more than six decades ago, I was born in England. I departed for the United States only three months later… so I have no memory of my birth country. Thus, the opportunity to spend a year living in London, and exploring England, has been especially meaningful. This week we took a roadtrip to the Manchester area to find my birthplace and to visit some of my parents’ friends.

My birthplace (then a maternity hospital) – Sale, Cheshire, England.

2025 Favorites

Favorite photos and videos.

Wow, 2025 was quite the year. With a dozen or more hikes in New Hampshire, and travels to Australia, England, Greenland, Iceland, New Zealand, Colorado, New Hampshire, North Carolina, and South Carolina, I had many opportunities for photography. Check out some of my favorite photos!

Sunrise view from Fryingpan Firetower, in the Blue Ridge of NC.

Lyme wildlife – July (part 2)

The second installment in a two-part post of July/August wildlife videos.

Over the past two years, most of my wildlife videos have been captured by cameras placed on a hill near my home. In this post – my final post of wildlife-camera video until next year – I have some pretty neat stuff to share. Lots of bobcats and black bears! Read on to watch both videos.

bear cub crossing a log right in front of the camera…

Lyme wildlife – July (part 1)

The first of two installments of video from my wildlife cameras.

It felt like we had a slow start to summer here in Lyme, but my wildlife cameras nonetheless captured bears, bobcats, and more. In this post, I’ll share two videos spanning July 1 through August 5.

A yellow carpet

An endless field of black-eyed susans.

Not far down the road from my home is a luscious meadow, a former farm pasture that the owner has preserved via a conservation easement to the Upper Valley Land Trust. This meadow is popular with local deer, turkeys, and other wildlife. In recent years, the conservators have planted the roadside with wildflowers, allowing me a brilliant commute on summer mornings. Last year, I shared photos of the multicolor feast of wildflowers. This year, the field is carpeted with the yellow and orange tones of Black-Eyed Susan flowers. Today, a mildly foggy morning provide just the right atmosphere for photographs. Click through the gallery!

Firewood time

Huge branches = lots of firewood.

Earlier this year, a large branch snapped off one of our silver maple trees. We sawed, split, and stacked it – firewood for a future winter! Yesterday, I climbed a ladder and sawed off the rest of the branch, which was 10-15′ long. It took an hour or more just to saw it into stove lengths, in part because this branch – just a branch, mind you – was thicker than our chainsaw bar. At one point I decided my Greenworks Pro electric saw (which is awesome, by the way) was just not cutting it. (Sorry, bad pun.) So I pulled out my trusty Stihl 026, our only remaining gas-powered tool. It is more than thirty years old, but still going strong!

Lyme wildlife – June 2025

Animal babies!

The month of June brings the onset of summer – and the emergence of wildlife babies. In this month’s episode of clips from my wildlife cameras, you’ll see young’uns from two or three species, and some really interesting behavior from a raccoon, deer, porcupine, barred owl, and black bear. Sit back, relax, and enjoy!

Lyme wildlife – May 2025

Bears, bobcats, groundhogs, and more.

The month of May was surprisingly quiet, as if the animals of Lyme were on the move – not settled in any given location, not often reappearing in the video captures from my wildlife cameras posted in two forests and my own backyard. Some locations that had previously provided multiple daily videos of a busy porcupine couple, for example, became dormant, causing me to explore new locations that may be more lively. One of those turned out to be exceptionally lively, attacked by a bear within days of its deployment! Read on…

Wandering the spring forest

When you really pay attention, you notice the small beauties of the forest.

I try to get out at least once a week into the forests of Lyme, NH, where I live. Regular readers see my videos from wildlife cameras placed at undisclosed locations in the woods. Although I enjoy witnessing the secret life of Lyme wildlife, and sharing it with you all, I mostly enjoy the opportunity to wander, off trail, with no particular destination in mind. The month of May adds the opportunity to enjoy small wonders along the way.