Saturday morning at 8:00.....it's snowing hard. The B block final exam is starting. Blair and Paulina prep for Pre-calc:

Not everyone has an early morning exam. Wildlife Science students have already completed their work, and are setting out to install bird houses for wood ducks up at Mud Pond.

Dave Pilla explains that wood ducks are cavity dwellers, and while Mud Pond features snags (dead trees that drowned when beaver dammed the stream) for habitat, a healthy population of wood ducks wants five or six per acre. Dave and his students have already made the boxes (out of Proctor pine) and delivered them to the campsite by the pond. So, we don snowshoes and climb a mile north.

Dave advises us to take our time, but we get overheated quickly. At the juncture of Mud Pond Trail and the Cistern Trail, Dave takes a group photo:

We may be wet and sweaty, but the snow is falling hard enough to freeze on hats and hair. The boxes are located; nails and hammers are distributed, and five couples set off across the bleak pond surface.

Wood ducks prefer boxes away from the shoreline. Dave points in the direction of some remote snags.

The boxes are heavy. Connor positions one on the west side of a snag near the south end of Mud Pond.

Jack holds it in place while Connor drives a 16-penny nail through the top of the box into deadwood.

One hundred yards to the west, Sam and Sam are doing the same.

Back at the first site, Connor, Jack and Ethan question how a wood duck can fit through the entry.

A couple of teams placed boxes on snags at the north end of the pond. Their work done, they march back single file through deep snow.

Two hours after we started, we're back at the Forestry Shed. Job done!