The winter landscape can be fascinating, with or without snow.  After the leaves fall, the bark of oaks, maples, sycamores, and tulip poplars stands out in stark relief.  Crape myrtles, with their smooth intertwined trunks, are especially interesting without their colorful florets.  Ornamental grasses, withered without their green or purple plumes, have a certain drama before they are cut back for spring rebirth.  In the forest behind our house, oaks and beeches hang onto their brown leaves throughout the winter.  That’s called marcescence, a new word for me, but not a new phenomenon.  I watch the fluttery leaves in the winter, but by spring those crisp leaves quietly drop, almost unnoticed, to be replaced by soft green buds. 

Snow may conceal the familiar landscape, but that same snow reveals traces of a myriad of wildlife, even inside the Beltway.  The quiet solitude of the first measurable soft snowfall was punctuated by hoofprints of the many deer who traipse across our hill, the smaller paws of the red foxes that live below our house, even the tracks of the raccoons who rarely show themselves but I can hear them rustling our garbage cans without success.  There may have been an opossum in the bunch, too.  On the patio, the chipmunks and squirrels have hunkered down, probably subsisting on the autumn acorns they stowed on warmer days. One little wren shivered near the sliding glass door; few other birds showed themselves.

 The winter landscape includes the snowy mountains left by plows on roadways and in parking lots.  With sustained frigid temperatures, little melting and overnight refreezing means that those snow mountains may be with us for weeks.  I remember the blizzard in 1966, nearly 60 years ago, when snowplows piled the 20-inch snowfall into dump trucks, which then dumped the snow onto the frozen Potomac River from the old 14th Street bridge.  As the river thawed, mountains of snow floated majestically down the river.  That was before the 1972 Clean Water Act which, fortunately, banned such potential pollution into our waterways. 

Snowy and icy roads and walkways can make getting around more challenging, prompting some school systems to extend closures longer than many parents anticipated.  School buses can be unwieldy in good weather; traversing hilly neighborhood streets to collect students in winter tests the vehicle and the driver, not to mention the students waiting at an unplowed bus stop. With heavier snow totals forecast for 2025, drivers should ensure that gas tanks are full, washer fluid topped off, and that water, non-perishable food, blankets, and maybe a phone charger are available in the vehicle, just in case they get stuck. The Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) is the state agency that maintains and plows roads in Fairfax County (Falls Church City handles its own snow removal).  For many neighborhoods, VDOT appeared to perform well but some areas never saw a plow.  The Board of Supervisors has asked VDOT to explain the spotty service.  They did the same after the Blizzard of 1996, and several steps were taken then that improved response in later storms, including using technology (very new then) to track plow locations.  Snow removal seems to be a never-ending issue, whether two inches or ten have fallen. 

 As I write this, our steep hill appears to be clear but the Arctic “blast” will keep snow on the ground for several more days or weeks. Snow blanketing the landscape is lovely, especially in our parks.  A trip to Green Spring Horticultural Center (4603 Green Spring Road – enter from Braddock Road and Witch Hazel Drive in Lincolnia) on a sunny day reveals native plantings that will survive in the winter garden, and the icy ponds that aren’t ready for skating, but frozen enough that resident ducks and geese can waddle across them without getting wet!  On really cold days, you can “duck” into the greenhouse, enjoy cacti and succulents that thrive there, and warm up a bit. Then plan to come back in the spring and see the landscape re-awaken in warmer weather, including the stunning new moon gate near the historic house.