All sorts of life is overwintering in dead leaves this month. One insect beneath the leaves at your feet is the queen bumble bee. At the end of the summer, the original foundress queen, all the female worker bees, and all the male bees die.
Only those offspring queen bees that have been fertilized by male bees will survive the winter. They will stay above ground, under the leaves, or burrow just below the surface to wait out the winter, then emerge in the spring to find an already-existing cavity they can use for a nest.
Are you planting for bees? Some early spring flowers that will attract hungry queens are wild cherries, native plums, willows, prickly ash, bluebells, wild geraniums, and violets.