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Daily short takes from an Appalachian hollow

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mink

December 2, 2017 by Dave Bonta

Heavy frost. When the sun strikes it, a faint mist rises from the yard. My father stops the car in the road to say he’s just seen a mink.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags frost, mink, mist
November 19, 2013 by Dave Bonta

A mink hunts in the creek-side meadow, weaving through currant bushes where juncos bathe and groom, neither paying attention to the other.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags black currants, juncos, mink 1 Comment
November 12, 2013 by Dave Bonta

The first half-inch of snow. A mink appears along the creek, looping over and under the snow-laden grass like a dark needle and thread.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags mink, snow, stream 1 Comment
October 11, 2012 by Dave Bonta

A large, dark weasel flushes a rabbit from cover and stops, rearing up on its hind legs: mink! We stare at each other with mutual disbelief.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags cottontail, mink 1 Comment

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On This Day

  • August 22, 2025
    Cool and clearing. Dew drips from the porch roof onto the orange jewelweed, which this morning for the first time receives no visits from a hummingbird.
  • August 22, 2024
    Clear, cold, and still. A hummingbird finds the one wild bergamot blossom hiding next to the porch and circles its purple mop-head, tonguing a dozen tubes.
  • August 22, 2023
    A gray squirrel with a nearly white tail scampering up the road draws my attention to the white snakeroot—banks of it just coming into bloom.
  • August 22, 2022
    Overcast with a shimmer of light rain. A red-eyed vireo still calls at the woods’ edge. The thud of a black walnut onto a roof.
  • August 22, 2021
    A few minutes after moonset, and the ground fog is still aglow. A screech owl’s monotone trill.

See all...

Related book

Cover of Ice Mountain with a linocut of a big ridgetop tree.

What I do after I sit on the porch. One winter and spring's daily walks distilled into short poems with linocut illustrations by Beth Adams.

Header image: detail from Paper Garden by Clive Hicks-Jenkins (used by permission)

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