The nearly full moon hung beautifully above the western horizon as the meathead and I set out.

It was a morning when I savored the pull of the moon.

A small strip of skim ice hung on, but on fast fade, by the east shoreline of the north old clay pit as dawn came.

Another spectacular red-ball dawn with the line of clouds on the horizon. A fall morning that felt almost balmy with temperatures in the mid-30s.

But a remarkable lack of wildlife.

The lone natural jolt for the morning was a insistent rattling call of a belted kingfisher on the south pit.

Not sure what had him so wound up, but I could hear him a hundred yards before the meathead and I reached the town pond. Then I could see him flitting--I believe that is the apt word for the flight of a kingfisher--all around the south pit.

The last couple weeks he has been concentrating on the north pit. I wonder if his switch to the south pit, the deeper one of the two, means that the water temperatures or conditions are better for fish there.

That's about as heavy of thinking as I wanted to do today.

Maybe it was pulling together a Sunday column last night on the passage of the DNR Sustainability Bill, but this morning mind just feels like mush.

Back in town, not even a squirrel skittered about.