Spring Break hiking- Beaver Dam Creek

 After visiting Panther Creek, we continued down the road and stopped at Beaver Dam Creek.This is a short established walking trail in Hillsville, VA.  It's really close and makes a nice afternoon family walk.  We typically spot a few wildflowers and the kids enjoy throwing rocks in the creek.  We usually pass a jogger or two, but it's never very busy here.

The trail follows the creek, and new raised bridges were put in where they had been partially washed away last year or the year before.  We spotted a little warbler here, although i was unable to identify it.

The trail is flat, so the kids love to run ahead and climb on the big rocks. It's really a pretty safe/ family friendly trail.

i was a bit disappointed by the lack of flowers. i thin we are just a couple weeks early, for the trillium and may-apples to arrive.  Skunk cabbage was popping up everywhere, although most of the flowers had dried up and the green shoots were beginning to open. 

i found some Shrub Yellowroot on the edge of the creek. Although the flowers are tiny and easily overlooked, if you take a second to really look at them they are quite lovely ad delicate. 

Every year we come to Beaver Dam looking for tadpoles.  The first year we visited we found both tadpoles and newtpoles.  i didn't have any luck raising the newtpoles, but we were able to raise and release the tadpoles.  We found egg mass in one of the swampy areas. i'm not sure what it is from. 

We found tadpoles in one of the puddles in the parking area.  There were tons of tadpoles in all sizes. i often wonder what happens if the puddle dries up, as it hasn't rained in days and there really wasn't much water in the puddle. :(

i just happened to have a bucket with me. ;) So we scooped up a few to bring home and raise. We'll release them once they grow into frogs.  We raise tadpoles almost every year, but didn't get to last year. So i was pretty excited to find them this year. :) 

i really like that Hillsville has this established walking trail that is well maintained by the town. i would love to see something like in Floyd.