Coming through the woods at about 8:15 a.m. today, I spotted what I think is a barred owl in a shagbark hickory tree. It was surveying the white crownbeard wildflower patch, before heading off to a higher viewpoint. Here’s the YouTube video. I also joined eBird, run by Cornell University’s Lab of Ornithology. Looks to…
Identifying plants — especially native ones — can be a somewhat difficult process, especially if you’ve moved (as I have) to a bio-zone different from where you’ve lived before. I was talking about this issue with my brother Gene, out in Washington State. He’s gotten very good at identifying native plants on Vashon Island, where…
You might think you’re on Nature’s treasure heap. You might be weeping for the beauty of it all. You might want to share it with the entire world. Certainly, you want to share it with family and friends, the people who matter the most to you. Why? Because you think, hope, wish and pray they’ll…
It’s a dream to find edible wild food, but you have to really look for mushrooms. Gene and Jan are interested in putting up tree houses on their acreage on Vashon Island, WA, and running a bed and breakfast. They also enjoy foraging for wild food (and creating their own, where possible). Dreaming of oyster…
I sit deep in my deciduous and cedar woods, shaded, sweltering in the hot afternoon Georgia heat. The still air, like an open oven, stifles me. I must escape. But just as I start to rise, a cool breeze starts from the creek bottom below, racing across the newly-mown fields. Wind rushes like a cresting…
Rather than throwing old pink shag into the landfill, I decided to use carpet as a weedkiller and a mulch. As my dad said: Deprive weeds of light, and they will die. Four months ago, when I ripped out some old pink carpet from my house, I put it over a large rectangle of my…