These entries are the log of my often daily trips into my woods.  My wife and I own 10 wooded acres, complete with a stream bed that is 120 feet lower than the top of the ridge.  I wander these woods often daily.  The deer and I have an extensive network of paths.  Once I cleared the paths the deer began to use them daily and help keep them open, especially during winter.

I love to collect and study mushrooms, but am also interested in all the other things I find.  Many animals live in my woods: deer, squirrels, opossums, raccoons, foxes, turkeys, snakes, and many others.  All manner of birds populate the trees.  The forest is mainly native hardwoods, with a few wpa pines.  It was probably logged 15 years ago.  We have black aspen, oaks, maples, hickory, walnut, beech, tulip popular, as well as all variety of scrub trees on the edges.  On the back of the property is a deep gully with a stream running through it.  Next to the stream bed is a large grove of paw paw trees.

I have found a multitude different varieties of mushrooms.  From poisonous Amanita to oyster and chanterelle.  I probably harvest a hundred pounds of edible mushrooms a year in the forest.

Luckily my house is in the middle of this forest.  We only cleared enough trees to build.  You can set on the back or front porches and see deer, foxes, squirrels, raccoons, turkeys and other wildlife.  I have seen foxes on the front porch and witnessed them trying to get my cats to play with them.