Macro Photography in Bosque del Apache Desert Arboretum

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The Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge’s Desert Arboretum is near the visitor center…and was the location of our first formal activity of the Festival of the Cranes last week: macro photography.

I started out with my bridge camera (Canon Powershot SX70 HS) and a tripod. I learned very quickly that the tripod was too heavy and unwieldy for me. I struggled to get myself positioned without stepping into the beds to get close enough to the plants. The macro lens that I’d added to the camera did not work well enough for me either,  so I reverted to hand held and using the zoom from just far enough away to allow the camera to focus. I photographed cactus spines, screwbean mesquite…white crowned sparrows.

I had the best results with my phone (iPhone 15 Pro Max). Cactus fruits and spines dominated but I also managed to photograph some creosote bush seed pods and some bark. I challenged myself to pay closer attention to focus and background along with overall composition.

The session would have been more enjoyable had a opted to bring my collapsible stool so I would not have been standing the whole time (my back was painful by the end)….a lesson learned that I will (hopefully) remember for next time.  

Previous Festival of the Cranes posts

Identifying Woody Plants – Month 3

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The Identifying Woody Plants field class I am taking at Missouri State University is winding down. The field trips are done, and we’ve had a class looking at twigs and fruit in the lab. The fruit is not too hard…but twigs are a challenge. I did some photographs of fruit.

Hickory nuts/husks, pods (trumpet creeper, catalpa, honey locust)

Colorful bittersweet (I hope the native), acorns, chestnut burs, magnolia (the grouping looked very artsy to me), rose hips, tree of heaven winged seeds, pods of Rose of Sharon.

The ginkgo outside the building our classroom is in finally turned yellow. There were others on campus that had already turned yellow and dropped their leaves. This one was delayed.

In another class, we looked at pressed specimens from prior classes (some of them more than 10 years old) with the assignment to be able to ID them in the next class! I realized how much I look at many aspects of the tree and only having the small part that can fit on a page is sometimes very challenging.  The Nyssa sylvatica specimen has no fruit – just leaves and twig.

There is one more class after Thanksgiving that includes the mounting of our own pressed specimens. Then I will be done since I am auditing the class and can forego the final!

Previous posts about Identifying Woody Plants field class

Ten Little Celebrations – October 2024

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The temperatures were more pleasant in October….I enjoyed the outdoor field trips and classes a lot more.

Pleasant temperature to walk around the Missouri campus during class. We were outdoors longer but it was easy compared to short hikes around campus in August and September!

Field trip to a healthy stream and woodland. Celebrating the water quality and the native species (not overcome by invasives)!

Cut down a Japanese barberry and burned most of it. Celebrated one more non-native (that is sometimes invasive) being gone from my yard.

Geology field trip plans. I celebrated that enough of my Missouri Master Naturalist classmates and chapter are interested in geology field trips to make them a likely late fall/early winter activity.

Getting seeds planted. I got buckeye, Hopi sunflower, common milkweed, and persimmon seeds during the second week of October….and celebrated when I got them planted. Some must go through the cold temps of winter to sprout in the spring.

Volunteering at a fair for homeschoolers…talking about Monarch butterflies. I celebrated by first gig as a Missouri Master Naturalist…and that my iPad-based slideshow of Monarch butterfly pictures was well received.

Owl Pellet. I vaguely remember that I had dissected an owl pellet in some previous training…but I celebrated that I did a more thorough job this time… and found a complete rodent skull…and the backbone…lots of ribs.

First solo Missouri Master Naturalist volunteer gig. I celebrated that the two days spent doing an after-school program with a local school for gift students was positive for them…and for me!

Whataburger. Sometimes I just want to splurge. On the way back from my Dallas trip, I stopped for a Whataburger…celebrated that it tasted just as I remembered - although I won’t do it very often.

Successfully completed my Missouri Master Naturalist training. Hurray! I am celebrating what I learned and that I now have more time to volunteer!

Ten Little Celebrations – March 2024

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Picking 10 little celebrations is only challenging because there are so many of them to choose from! I help myself by only noting one each day, but I realize when I look at the list at the end of the month that there are even more, in retrospect, worthy of celebration. Here are the top 10 for March 2024.

My mother’s life. The phrase ‘celebration of life’ is more like a savoring because there is an overlay of grief that is part of every gathering after a death. I stayed focused on making sure that someone was with my dad for the duration and providing narration of the images in the slideshow for him…varying what I said a bit each time it repeated and realizing that she had a very full 92 years!

Getting the check deposited after the sale of my parents’ house. What a relief to not be carrying around a big check!

Home again. I made multiple short trips to Dallas for various reasons and was always very glad to be home again. Even though the time away is only a couple of days, the stress of driving, my task while in Dallas, and staying in a hotel takes a toll. I don’t really relax until I am at home. Hopefully, when I am only going down to see my dad, it will not be as stressful.

Sequiota Cave Boat tour. What a great tour. I liked the non-commercial nature the tour…seeing the tiny bats roosting.

Springfield Botanical Gardens. Full of spring blooming trees.

Dickerson Park Zoo. My daughter gave us a membership for Christmas, so we’ll be enjoying the zoo often over the next year. I liked the roaming peacocks (and other things too). The post about this visit is coming day after tomorrow.

Feeling better. I got sick with something that caused sinus and throat problems. I tested for COVID for 3 days…and was negative for that. And then I recovered rapidly and I celebrated. Also celebrated that my husband did get whatever it was.

Creating more hosta locations. I divided some of my hosta plants as they first began to come up and was pleased that the new plants adjusted very quickly to their new space. I am looking forward to their lush growth this summer…and will divide more plants next spring!

Burning sticks. I enjoyed the fire in my chiminea after cleaning up the small branches and pine cones around my yard….celebrating with some pictures of the fire!

Butterfly and pollinator seeds planted. I celebrated getting the beds prepared and the seeds planted…right at the mid-March suggested planting deadline.

Springfield Yard – March 2024

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My daughter’s yard in Springfield MO is full of springtime. I visited to help get pollinator/butterfly garden seeds planted. After we got that done – I enjoyed the beauty of the yard which has been a work in progress since the house was built in the 1950s…and my daughter’s since 2021.

The oakleaf hydrangea is leaving out; the plant gets more sun this time of year before the big trees get their leaves. I noticed it as we were picking up sticks around the base of her river birch and oak tree.

The vinca, growing in a bed thick with leaves from last fall, is blooming.

Her wood hydrangea still has flowers dried from last fall…not leafing out yet in its shady location.

A Japanese quince was blooming. I hadn’t noticed this in her yard before, but I must have just missed being there at the right time.s. Would birds get ‘drunk’ from the (probably fermented) fruit?

The crabapple tree was full of buds – and some crabapples left from last season. Most of the fruits had been eaten and I wondered why there are still some on the trees. Would birds get ‘drunk’ from the (probably fermented) fruit?

There is a young cherry tree near the corner of her front yard. The blooms were everywhere.

A red bud is in the other corner also full of blooms. My daughter commented that it really is misnamed since it isn’t red.

We also observed that most of the plants damaged from a too zealous application of herbicide by a yard crew last year seem to be recovering with the new season.

What a great time to get outdoors and into a garden….

Hydrangea Flowers and Magnolia Pods

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It won’t be long before we have afternoons blowing/raking/mulching leaves in my daughter’s yard…but until then I am enjoying the end of her summer yard when I visit there. The seed pods of the Southern Magnolia are full of red seeds right now. They always remind me of red M&Ms! The pods will eventually become a nuisance on the ground…but on the tree they are interesting – colorful, splitting to allow the seeds to escape- these are prehistoric flowering trees with seed pods that look very much like cones.

She encouraged me to cut the flowers from her Asian hydrangea since temperatures into the 30s were being forecast. There were 3 flower clusters (others too…but they were not mature enough to open if cut). I trimmed the lower leaves off right after I cut them and put the flowers in a large vase as soon as I got home. They’ve been on my office windowsill within line of sight from where I sit at my computer since then.

The flowers last for a long time – which gave me several opportunities to do some artsy photography with them over the past few days. What’s not to like with the gentle pink and blue…bright green! I managed some almost high key images….with smudges of color and screen grid in the background.  It was a good ‘rainy day’ activity.

Gleanings of the Week Ending October 14, 2023

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Abandoned Lands: A Hidden Resource for Restoring Biodiversity – Nature colonizing abandoned land…maybe we need to learn to help it along. The amount of land under agriculture globally has been in decline since 2001. Sometimes the abandonment is not driven by economic, demographic, or social factors, but by pollution or industrial disasters. Hundreds of square miles of radioactive former farmland around the stricken nuclear reactors at Chernobyl in Ukraine and Fukushima in Japan are now within exclusion zones and could be without human occupation for centuries to come.

How to build for aging in place - Aging-ready homes address two core needs—single-floor living and bathroom accessibility—by providing a zero-step entry, a first-floor bedroom, and a full first-floor bathroom with at least one accessibility feature. Today only 10% of American homes are ‘age ready.’ When my husband and I bought our current home, we were conscious of buying something that would help us age-in-place. Everything is on one floor except for the laundry room….so we might have to eventually add an elevator to the house.

The Mississippi is Mighty Parched – The river south of Memphis has narrowed considerably in the past 2 years. Barge companies reduced the weight carried in many shipments in September because the river was not deep enough to accommodate their normal weight. Much of U.S. grain exports are transported down the Mississippi; the cost of these shipments from St. Louis southward has risen 77% above the three-year average. The lack of freshwater flowing into the Gulf of Mexico has also allowed saltwater to make its way up the river and into some water treatment plants in southern Louisiana.

Electric Cars Are Transforming America’s Truck Stops – I’ve been noticing the changes described in this article as I travel. More of truck stops have banks of chargers…and the Pilot just north of Denison has better food and a larger shopping/eating area… Adding charging equipment for electric cars is a major transformation for truck stops and travel centers but represents a new business opportunity.

The seed guardians in the Andes trying to save the potato – Climate change/disease are risks that all species are facing. There are 1,300 varieties of potato growing in the Andes. Potato Park, located near the Peruvian town of Pisac, was founded by six indigenous communities in 2002 to preserve the genetic diversity of potatoes grown in the region, as well as the cultural heritage of the people that grow them.

Chemical Analysis of Viking Combs Hints at Long-Distance Trade – 85-90% of the combs found in a Viking settlement in Germany, came from northern Scandinavia – made of the antlers of reindeer. So large scale trading between the two sites was happening as early as AD 800.

See Ten Stunning Images from the Bird Photographer of the Year Awards – Birds and photography…images to enjoy.

Japanese Scientists Find Microplastics in the Clouds Above Mount Fuji – Maybe we should be more surprised if we looked and didn’t find microplastics!

Why Flamingos are Showing Up in the U.S. this Fall – The short answer is hurricanes…specifically Hurricane Idalia. Flamingos are strong fliers and will simply return south eventually.

A Sample of Ancient Asteroid Dust Has Landed Safely on Earth – We were at the launch of OSIRIS Rex in September 2016…so I continue to follow news about the mission.

Gleanings of the Week Ending July 22, 2023

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

The ground is deforming, and buildings aren’t ready – Underground climate change in urban areas where heat islands underground cause enough expansions and contractions to damage building foundations…particularly in older buildings.

How noise pollution impacts nature – A study out of Vail, Colorado, showed that increased trail use by hikers and mountain bikers disturbed elk so much the cows birthed fewer calves. Another out of Grand Teton National Park showed that backcountry skiers scared bighorn sheep during winter when food was scarce, with potentially lethal consequences.

Hospital understaffing and poor work conditions associated with physician and nurse burnout and intent to leave - The study from the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing found that physicians and nurses, even at hospitals known to be good places to work, experienced adverse outcomes during the pandemic and want hospital management to make significant improvements in their work environments and in patient safety. The solutions to high hospital clinician burnout and turnover, they say, are organizational improvements that provide safe workloads and better work-life balance NOT resilience training for clinicians to better cope with adverse working conditions.

The simple ways cities can adapt to heatwaves – Heat monitoring and planning is become more important for cities…the climate emergency in cities is a health emergency.

New biodegradable plastics are compostable in your backyard – New plastic made from blue-green cyanobacteria that isstronger and stiffer than previous plastics from the same raw ingredient. They can be recycled…but also degrade rapidly in the environment.

Giant Hand Axes Discovered in England Point to Prehistoric Humans’ ‘Strength and Skill’ – More than 300,000 years old perhaps from an interglacial period. Early Neanderthal people inhabited Britain then…and maybe other archaic human species too.

Germs, genes and soil: tales of pathogens past – DNA sequencers and powerful computational tools…applied to ancient microbes…probing their role in human history. This article describes how the work is done, ethical considerations…using examples of what has been accomplished so far. The field of archaeogenetics is just beginning.

Back from the Dead: New Hope for Resurrecting Extinct Plants – There is a global effort to digitize herbaria specimens which had helped identify holdings of extinct plants…sometimes finding seeds. And then the challenge is how to best attempt to grow old seeds.

Pain risk varies significantly across states – Pain due to arthritis varies geographically in the US – with the moderate to severe pain being 23% in West Virginia vs 7% in Minnesota.  There is also a difference between people that did not complete high school…and those who obtained at least a bachelor’s degree – with the delta being greatest in West Virginia, Arkansas, and Alabama. There is a need to focus on the macro-level policies (i.e. generally at the state level) while continuing current individual interventions.

The Acropolis Adopts Crowd Control Measures for the First Time – The post-pandemic travel surge is overwhelming at some places – including the Acropolis!

Carrollton Yard – March 2023 (1)

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The next few months, until the heat of summer becomes oppressive, should be the prettiest months of year in Carrollton, TX yards… including my parents’ yard. There were so many things to see when I was there in late March, that I am writing about them in two posts (today and tomorrow).

Seeds from a neighbor’s tree were all shades of green to brown….blowing over the back yard (will any of them sprout?).

The usual early spring flowers were up. My mother cut some of them to bring indoors; the garden still held plenty more.

The fiddleheads in the front flowerbed were healthy looking. They survived the prolonged period of 100 degree + days last summer better than the blue rug juniper ground cover (more than half of it died). Being in the shade most of the time must have helped although some of last year’s fronds looked burnt in August.

I was surprised to see several clumps of mushrooms around the base of one of the old mulberry trees. The tree itself was leafing out…so it’s unclear why that grassy area was so hospitable for mushrooms. I took the opportunity to do some macro photography….of course.

I enjoyed two servings of edamame pods and composted the empty pods afterward in one of the flowerbeds. It is surprising how much happened to them in 2-3 days! I’ll check them again in late April!

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 8, 2023

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Avi Kwa Ame, Sacred Land in Nevada, to Be Preserved as a National Monument – Good! Another place to see when we make a trip in the west.

Volvo Delivers Its 1st Electric Heavy-Duty Truck in Africa – The truck is being used for collecting waste in Rabat, Morocco. Morocco is also home to the world’s biggest concentrated solar power facility.

A 90-year-old tortoise named Mr. Pickles just became a father of 3. It's a big 'dill' – Radiated tortoise native to Madagascar and critically endangered…at the Houston Zoo.

One of Europe’s last free-flowing rivers declared a National Park – Albania’s Vjosa River. Europe is also removing dams along other river just as we are in the US…but rivers that have been controlled by barriers will never be the way they were before the dam.

Clinics on wheels bring doctors and dentists to health care deserts – It’s a step forward and might work well for preventative or chronic care…but what happens in cases where the need is more urgent…like broken bones, having a baby, the aftermath of a car accident?

Technology over the long run: zoom out to see how dramatically the world can change within a lifetime – A graphic from ‘Our World in Data’ – worth the look. See the big developments they selected occuring during your lifetime….and when technologies we take for granted came along.

Take a Virtual Tour of the ‘Doomsday’ Seed Vault – Its doors are only opened a few times each year for new seed entries. The seeds come from countries from all over the world and are kept at -18 degrees Celsius. The most recent withdrawal was to re-establish a seedbank that had been destroyed in Aleppo during the Syrian Civil War.

Urban Trees Could Cut Summer Heat Deaths by a Third – Increasing tree cover to 30% could reduce premature deaths from urban heat islands by 40%. Sounds like a good idea of heath…and makes the cities more appealing too. Other actions can help too: green roofs/walls, light colored roofs/walls/landscape pavers, and replacing impervious surfaces with plants and soils.

Fresh produce contaminated with toxic BPA-like chemicals found in food labels – A Canadian study found that the chemicals migrate from labels in packaging materials into the food!

Common sweetener suppresses mouse immune system — in high doses – An artificial sweetener (sucralose) that might become a drug to reduce or replace immunosuppressive drugs that often have a lot of unpleasant side effects (if humans react to it the same as mice).

Spring Yard Dreaming

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Moving to a new area of the country….a new house…I am full of dreams for the yard.

I’ve already bought way too many seeds for the existing flowerbeds. Most of the beds contain landscaping cloth covered by river rock. Maybe I could plant mini-pumpkins in those beds by poking a hole in the fabric. I’d like to grow enough plants to have a good harvest in the fall. I’ve already identified some beds in the back of the house that will be changed dramatically. And there are areas between trees that I will turn into flower beds because I don’t want to mow there. One plant I want to grow…and harvest…is stevia; my CSA in Maryland had hardy plants that withstood harvesting of their leaves/small branches all during the growing season; putting a few leaves to steep with tea gives just a hint of sweetness that I enjoy; I will order organic seeds.

I have chives seeds gleaned from my parents’ Carrollton yard that I will plant to grow as ‘edges’ of flower beds. Since I purchased seeds as well (that have pink flowers) I will probably mix those seeds with the ones I gleaned to add splashes of color/texture variety.

My larger plan it to plant some native bushes in the back yard to reduce the amount of yard that is mowed and have some deeper rooted plants on the slopes at the side of the house. I need to go to a nursery to hone my list of natives that are hardy in this area. I’ll ask about some of my favorites: oak leaf hydrangea, beautyberry, and ninebark. I’d like to plant something that would provide winter food for birds; maybe the nursery will have some recommendations. I need to check the guidelines from our Home Owner Association to see if I need to get permission; if I do, hopefully it will be an easy process.

February is the ‘yard dreaming’ month….I’ll need to act soon to make it happen…but maybe it won’t all get done in 2023!

Cosmos and chives

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At my home in Missouri, we had some overnight frosts. That was not the case in Carrollton, Texas where I spent the last week of October. The cosmos flowers were still blooming!

There were still buds and insects too!

Before I left to come home, I decided to collect seeds from the chives to plant around the edges of some flower beds in my Missouri home next spring.

The plants had formed, and the capsules had popped open. The rain had knocked the seed heads over and into the still-green leaves and steppingstones.

The plants had formed, and the capsules had popped open. The rain had knocked the seed heads over and into the still-green leaves and steppingstones.

I picked up the heads carefully and used scissors to cut the stem…collected a bin full of them. They were still wet from the rain, so I opted to cut more of the stem part of the head away and spread the seeds/capsules on a paper towel to dry. I brought them home in a recycled envelope. They are now emptied into a box in my office – keeping dry – ready for planted after the last frost next spring!

Carrollton Yard (2) – September 2022

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A quick whirl around the front and side garden in Carrollton TX…

Then to focus on plants I looked at more closely:

Red yucca. This time of year the seed pods are always interested. As the seed pods dry, they tend to look burnt and black…the seeds inside are black as well.

After the sprinklers finished one morning, I took macro pictures of the Tradescantia pallida (purple heart or Wandering Jew) flowers.   The flowers act as small cups holding the water droplets.

Overall - most of the plants survived the severe weather earlier in the summer; it will be interesting to see how the fall progresses.  

Gleanings of the Week Ending November 27, 2021

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Lots of wonderful photography posts to enjoy this week: Winners of the Weather Photographer of the Year Contest Celebrate the Beauty of Nature, West Coast Landscape Photographer Perfectly Captures the Region’s Magical Vistas, Awe-Inspiring Winners of the 2021 Natural Landscape Photography Awards, and Photographer Zooms in on the “Hidden Beauty” of Small Seeds and Fruits – Not sure why there seemed to be so many of these in my feeds this week….

What is Play-Doh made of? – Thinking of toys this time of year….play-doh is something that has been around a long time. We don’t have any young children in our immediate family and I’m missing the joy of watching a child at play.

How your house will go carbon free – Efficiency and renewable energy. At least some of the technologies already exist and many can be retrofitted into existing houses.

Armadillos advance northward as temperature rises – I remember seeing armadillos years ago in Texas when we were camping….maybe we’ll be seeing them closer to Missouri and Maryland in the near future – although hopefully not digging up my yard.

Catching up on Top 25 birds of the week: Breeding and November 2021 – I am ready to do some birding…my husband registered us for a birding hike in a Baltimore hike in December and I hope the pandemic will wane enough that the birding festivals will be back in 2022.

Red, White and Green: Winter Colors in Arches are Awaiting You – My husband and I visited some of the Utah parks in October several years ago…and there was already a dusting of snow on some of the mornings and in the mountains. Maybe we’ll go in November next time.

California Condors Surprise Scientists With Two ‘Virgin Births’ – Maybe this happens in other species too. There was no way to verify the phenomenon before genetic testing became available.  

Seeing Red: What the Color of House Finches Can Tell Us – House Finches are frequent visitors to our bird feeders. It was good to learn more about them from this blog post.

For women, greater exposure to estrogen in life may protect brain regions that are vulnerable to Alzheimer’s – This post left me wondering if estrogen mimics in our environment (i.e. pollution) might be protective as well…and, if so, will younger women be less likely to experience brain shrinkage after menopause than the older generations of women are experiencing.  

Why mandatory vaccination is nothing new – A little history of vaccine mandates. I didn’t know that George Washington required all troops to be inoculated against smallpox in 1777!

Macros – September 2021

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My smartphone, a clip on macro lens, and Bluetooth shutter control were the gear I used for the macro photos feathered in this month’s post. They are all from a short walk in Howard County Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant from the parking area and into the Honors Garden. The set up works very much like the bridge camera (with lens, diffuser, manual focus) in that I must get close to the subject and move the phone to get the focus perfect. It has the advantage of being a lot more compact than the other set up!

The rain from the night before had left everything with a sheen or droplets of water. Often the wet increased the richness of the colors…and the shine. The thin clouds provided good, diffuse light – a good day for smartphone macro photography. The cedar was on my way to honors garden.

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The seed pods on the magnolia were not flat enough to be an easy shot! The depth of field is very narrow with magnification.

I experimented with different perspectives of cone flowers

And asters. In the last picture, the depth of field gave me the blurring around the edges than I wanted.

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The birds nest fungus was in a mulched area near the parking lot. Some of the cups seem to hold water!

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Even grass seeds take on a different perspective in a zoomed image.

…And these are the best of the rest (note the insect hiding inside a flower)!

Gleanings of the Week Ending August 7, 2021

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

A roadrunner taking a dust bath wins the 2021 Audubon photography awards – This gleaning list is big on bird photos! This is the first one.

Top 25 birds of the week: Conservation – This is the second. These posts encourage me to get outdoors in areas near my home to photograph birds!

How giraffes deal with sky-high blood pressure – Multiple differences between giraffes and humans when it comes to blood pressure!

Permafrost Thaw in Siberia Creates a Ticking ‘Methane Bomb’ of Greenhouse Gases – The article is about what happened in summer 2020…made me wonder about what is happening this summer in Siberia. This along with the fires that seem to be worse each season are signs that climate change is happening faster than anticipated…that the models might be optimistic rather than realistic.

Plastic, the Trojan Horse – A study that found plastic accumulation in foods may be underestimated. Not good.

Smoke Across North America – Lots of fires this summer. My husband told me that the local astronomy club has cancelled several nights they’d planned for observing because no stars were visible through the haze here in Maryland.

How the sun affects our skin – An infographic about vitamin D, sunburn and skin cancer.

This catfish doesn’t just move on land, it reffles – Plecos – from the aquarium trade – are now invasive in warmer waters in the US. They do have an interesting way of moving on land (videos of their reffle)…..this means if found/caught they shouldn’t be left on the bank to die (since they will easily move back to the nearest water). The article didn’t say what to do with them (presumable kill them).

Drought, Heat Taking a Toll on National Parks in Southwest – I’ve enjoyed so many of the parks mentioned in this article – Saguaro, Grand Canyon, White Sands, Petrified Forest. It has always been dry there…but now it is getting drier and hotter.

Take a Virtual Tour of Artworks Inspired by Efforts to Preserve Plant Biodiversity – A virtual site of an exhibit not at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery in Exeter, England. Watch the 5 minute video about the site….then enjoy the exhibit here.

Browsing Natural History Magazines – March 2021

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I browsed the 1966 to 1984 volumes of The American Museum of Natural History’s magazine available on Internet Archive in March 2021. There will be more browsed in April. I collected a few images from each volume ... all the volumes are well worth looking through.

In 1966, the infographic (I’m sure they didn’t call it that in 1966) about spider webs was well done

And I enjoyed the bird pictures by Basil Ede.

Then there were images if flowers and mushrooms and Persian artifacts…carnivorous plants, flamingoes… that I picked from the 1967 to 1972 volumes (this was the time period I was in grade 7-12).

In 1973 there were seed pods (lotus, magnolia, London Plane)), a small racoon, fall leaves, and a turkey…marking the seasons.

In 1974 to 1977 my image picks are hermit crabs, volvox, Mesa Verde (which my husband I visited during this time), and a frog. My husband got his undergraduate degree and I was working full time/going to college part time.

In 1978 there were some beautiful images of seeds in flight.

1979 included many articles that were interesting to me: skunk cabbage, Pompeii, and the 17-year cicadas.

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In 1980 there was an article about how snakes shed their skin.

The 1981 volume is missing from the Internet Archive collection. In 1982 there were a lot of articles that interested me – about Jack-in-the-Pulpits and lichens…jewel weed and nautiluses….

And then endemic Hawaiian plants and birds. 1982 was the year my husband and I finished our formal schooling…he had a PhD in Physics and I had a MS in Math.

1983 included a great picture of an Egret in Florida…1984 some parasitized caterpillars. 1983 was a pivot year for us because we move away from Texas and to Virginia/Maryland pursuing our careers.

Overall – I enjoy browsing through the annual volumes of this magazine….thinking about what I was doing at the time they were originally published.

Maple Seedling

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A maple seedling has been added to the row of Kombucha bottles on the windowsill in my office. I did this several years ago with a smaller seedling and it lasted for a long time – the leaves eventually turning red (long after the leaves fell from the red maple tree in our yard). This one will have a place with the cut flowers for the next few months.

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I pulled the seedling while I was working in the front flower bed. It must have missed my attention previously. My husband filled the bottle with water for me to put it in since my boots were muddy.

It was one of four red maple seedlings I found.

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There were 5 tulip poplars!

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I filled the wheelbarrow with bush trimmings and milkweed (without caterpillars) – once again using that as the metric for my morning round of yard work.

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When I took the wheelbarrow back to the brush pile to empty, I noticed that the small puffball I had seen over a week ago was done with its development – had puffed its spores away.

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Unique Activities for Yesterday:

Miniclover. My husband mowed at the lowest setting (i.e. scalped) the areas of our yard that tend to have problems keeping their turf…we raked over the areas…and planted miniclover. In the past we’ve tried over-seeding with grass seed and it hasn’t worked very well so we decided to try something different. Now we are watering every morning (if it didn’t rain overnight) for the next week or so….and we’ll see what happens.

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 13, 2019

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Coconut Spice Cake Recipe | Magnolia Days – The cake I made for my husband’s birthday. It tasted great even without icing!

Photographer Captures Stunning Images of Ice Shards Along Lake Michigan | Smart News | Smithsonian – Spectacular ice forms – made during the breaking up on Lake Michigan a few weeks ago.

Ancient Caribbean children helped with grocery shopping in AD 400 -- ScienceDaily – Snail and clam shells (small ones) might be from child, rather than adult, foragers!

Thousands of Invasive Cane Toads Overtake Florida Community | Smart News | Smithsonian – Ugh! Not something people want in their yards and pools and driveways. These toads have a toxin strong enough to kill cats and dogs that munch on toads and can cause burning eyes or skin irritation in humans.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week: March – National Geographic Society – Beautiful birds….changing environments and habitats.

Where Have All the House Sparrows Gone? – Cool Green Science – House sparrow numbers have been declining since 1966 – all around the world!

66-million-year-old deathbed linked to dinosaur-killing meteor -- ScienceDaily – Fossils of animals killed and buried within an hour of the meteor impact!

Pairing Geothermal Plus Rooftop Solar For A Truly Renewable Home | CleanTechnica – At what point will the idea of geothermal heating and cooling catch up with rooftop solar for our homes? Will Dandelion – or comparable companies - become nationwide?

Five new frog species from Madagascar -- ScienceDaily – Some tiny new frogs. The smallest is only a little larger than a grain of rice.

These pictures of seed bank samples turn biology into art – The beauty of seeds. The first photograph (of Australian windflower flower heads is my favorite. The x-ray of a red yucca seed head is also interesting….showing the 3D of the pod in the image.

Gleanings of the Week Ending November 10, 2018

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Uncapped Wells Have Been Leaking Oil into the Gulf of Mexico for 14 Years - Yale E360 – Why can’t the oil companies do a better job of preventing leaks…or, at least, stopping leaks if they occur? Don’t they have the technology to address this issue?

With Shorter Winters, Plants Bloom Early and Die Young – National Geographic – Green springs…but the plants don’t sustain the green through the drier summers. Not good for our yards and our farms…and us.

Photo of the Week – October 19, 2018 – The Prairie Ecologist – Fluffy seeds from the prairie…including common milkweed,

Image of the Day: Clubbing | The Scientist Magazine® - Peacock Mantis Shrimp have a spring-like structure that enables them to beat the life out of their prey.

Beautifully Painted Shrine Emerges from the Ashes of Pompeii | Smart News | Smithsonian – Much of Pompeii that we know from tourist books was excavated before modern methods…and sometimes ‘restored’ in a way that we don’t know exactly what it looked like when originally uncovered. New excavation can provide clues about older excavations as well as the particulars of the newly uncovered walls.

Substantial changes in air pollution across China during 2015 to 2017 -- ScienceDaily – Particulates are down but ozone is up….so good and bad trends.

BBC - Future - The flu that transformed the 20th Century – The 1918 flu epidemic…100 years ago this year. There is still research on the virus and what happened…some surprises in the findings.

This Humongous Fungus Is as Massive as Three Blue Whales | Smart News | Smithsonian – 91 acres, 110 tons, and about 1,500 years old. And this is not the biggest one discovered…it was the first that was well documented.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week: Black plumage – National Geographic – I always like to include birds in my gleanings. I was surprised that there were no crows or ravens or starlings in this collection of birds with black plumage.

The Winners of the 2018 Astronomy Photographer of the Year Contest Are Out of This World – Three are some pictures from the 2017 solar eclipse in this collection.