A Story About Mud

Now this hardly a scientific study, I'm no scientist, I have no proven data. This is strictly observational, theoretical. But as a frequent hiker, and sometime mountain biker, I am pretty familiar with Hartshorne woods. And mud, especially mud like this, deep and thick, high viscosity mud, the kind that could take a shoe off, is rare, and short lived.

Hartshorne is well known by mountain bikers as a track that will stay compact and tight, a good hard riding surface. Bikers know this, hikers know this, we all know this. Even in heavy rains water rolls off, doesn't penetrate, causes some erosion, maybe a puddle, but not mud, not like this. Rain will actually firm up some areas of the trails, the sandy spots, caused by the erosion, at least temporarily.

This mud however, was not caused by rain. At least not directly. But instead a string of changing weather patterns caused this unique to Hartshorne phenomana.

A couple weeks back, we here in the Monmouth County area enjoyed an early morning snow, 3 inches or so just before day break, which was then followed by a steady, day long rain. Not enough to wash all the snow off, but instead leaving a fairly thick slushy cover over the hard packed trails. Then it froze. A cold spell swept in, a good week or two of cold, well below freezing at night, at, or maybe slightly above freezing in the day. On southern, and even some western facing trails the sun melts the slushy snow fairly quickly, but on northern facing trails and some eastern trails, the ice remained.

During this time I imagine, or hypothesis if you will, the ground, warmed by the earth's core, now being insulated by the ice, melt's the ice from below, slightly at least, not enough to seriously decrease ice thickness, but allowing some water to seep, into itself, water seep's into the ground, it doesn't roll off. It doesn't dry out. It seeps.

Then there was the thaw, or a thaw, the first thaw in this string of somewhat unusual weather events. A beautiful spring Sunday in January. 60 degrees, sun out, birds chirping, squirrels gathering, red tail hawks watching em all. Hikers hiking, bikers biking, but we all should have brought our ice gear. The hard compact ice melts, becomes slippery ice, wet and watery, but not thoroughly. Tiny streams running through ice, flowing down the hilly trails, and presumabley into the ground below. The first major step in this unique mud making process.

But it's not mud yet, at least not on the surface. The surface is still ice, in most places. It's still melting. Melting, until the weather shifts again!

Cold sweeps back in, High on Monday is 40, and dropping. Tuesday? Snow! 5-6 inches! Finally snow, it's been years, I love snow, I love winter. Wednesay? Frigid. Where are the chirping birds? Where are the gathering squirrels? Thursday, more of the same. Cold, real cold.

And then another weekend thaw, more beautiful spring weather, but this time it's Febuary. Another 60 degree Sunday. More birds, more squirrels. The snow, which covers the ice, melts. More tiny streams running through the ice, down the hills, more presumed seepage into the ground below. But this time the thaw is hanging for more then a couple days. Monday? Not 60's, but high 40's, more melting. Tuesday, warm, near 50. Wednesday 60's, but no more melting. The snow and ice are gone.

Finally we have our mud. Gushy, sloppy, thick, red mud. Right there on the surface. Bike tires sink deep, bogging, this is slow mud. The riding which can be damaging on any day, can be vastly more damaging now, especially on hills. I find this out one minute into the ride. I have to make a repair, my back tire sliced a layer off the side of a dirt wall. But it repairs well, the mud has the consistency much like drywall spackle, which fittingly is also known as mud, so it repairs well. The repair looks good, one would hardly notice, I wonder if the integrity of the slope is ruined, I'll keep notice on this spot.

Thusday it's gone, most of it, some spots here and there remain soft, some wide soft trails, but the real mud, the good mud, the noteworthy mud is gone. Dried up. Back to dirt. Tire ruts and foot prints, remain, ridgid, evidence, but not mud. Maybe after a good snow it will be back. Maybe next year, who knows maybe this year, it's still febuary.