Ice Fishing? + Sunset

[yourlibrarian]

Spotted something last week with a sunset, it looked like a beam of light was coming up from the ground. Tried to zoom in on it to make it a little clearer but I think it was more noticeable in person.





There was a strange sight out on our lake. As you can see in the next photo, regardless of temperature the aerators always maintain a gap in the ice. However for the first time we saw a smaller gap in the ice some distance from it.



We were speculating whether the muskrat, which we have seen swimming recently, might have created it to help its underwater food hunts, since it might spread out the area where it could surface.



Just as I was about to come back indoors from taking the photos, I noticed that our smaller birds were using it to drink, whereas usually I just see bigger birds like crows and ducks around the aerator.