Finally - Some Rain

The last 4 weeks have been very dry in our area with the only moisture being dew coating everything in the mornings. It’s unusual to go this long without rain although it has made the fall field trips easier for the students (into the streams/rivers or BioBlitz). It finally rained yesterday and I’m sure all the vegetation is soaking up the moisture.

It might be too late for the fall foliage to recover enough to show vivid colors. Some trees have already lost their leaves…a very brief and muted color change then leaves swirling. I’m still hopeful that the trees behind our house will show their typical colors since the leaves are still on the trees and green. The color in our backyard usually peaks just before Halloween.

The status of our trees before the rain: cherry (leaves already on the ground), plum and oak (about half the leaves already on the ground), tulip poplar (about 1/3 leaves yellow and the rest are still green), maple (leaves green), sycamore (some curling brown leaves on the tree and ground, still about half the leaves are green and still on the tree).

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After a few days of rain – we’ll see what happens.

Soldiers Delight Natural Environment Area

My husband and I visited Soldiers Delight Natural Environment Area yesterday – taking advantage of the dry fall day before a few days of forecasted rain. It’s located less than 45 minutes from our house and I’ve had it on my list of places to visit since I was in Master Naturalist training a few years ago; I’m a little surprised that we haven’t found the time before now.

The visitor center is open on Saturdays and sporadically on other days. We got there shortly after 11 and there was already quite a lot of activity. We got a map and headed out to hike. Rather than hiking from the visitor center, we drove a short distance to an overlook that doubles as parking from some of the trails. The overlook shows the area back toward the visitor center.

The loop trail we took started across the road – following red blazes then orange and rejoining the red to get back to the overlook. It past some remains of one of the mines – fenced off to prevent accidents.

There were leaves beginning to fall. Some of the oaks had a very large crop of acorns this year judging by the piles on the path. My favorite leaf was a red sassafras. There were some areas of invasive plants but not as many as places that have richer soils. There were swaths of ferns in a few areas. We walked down to a little stream. The water runs over bedrock in most places.

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The critter-find for the hike as a fuzzy yellow caterpillar with some black tufts. I looked it up after I got home – an American Dagger Moth Caterpillar. It eats oak leaves – among other things.

More than half the path was over rocky areas; Soldiers Delight is – after all – a serpentine barren.

Gleanings of the Week Ending October 7, 2017

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.

Ancient Roman Mosaic in England Discovered by Amateur Archaeologists – A 4th CE Roman mosaic near the village of Boxford in Berkshire….discovered and then covered up to protect the mosaic until decisions are made about what to do next.

Fall Color In-Depth: Maple Trees Offer New Answers to Diabetes, Alzheimer’s – National Geographic Society  - I like maple syrup and often us it in cooking….it adds more than sweetness and – evidently – is better for you because of those other elements!

Electric Car S-Curve Adoption by Country (Fun Chart!) | CleanTechnica – Norway followed by Iceland and Sweden lead…The US is behind China.

Question: Can People Use Rooftop Solar Power During an Emergency? Answer: It Depends | CleanTechnica – As more battery storage becomes available…the problem of having solar panels but not being able to utilize them if the power grid is down may go away.

Spectacular Shots of Summer Fireworks Festivals in Japan - Hanabi Taikai – Wow! What a huge display.

Infographic: Brain Infection and Alzheimer’s Disease Pathology | The Scientist Magazine® - Evidence of infection (biofilms) in the hippocampus and temporal lobe in brains from people that have died with Alzheimer’s neurodegeneration….several theories about their relationship to Alzheimer’s.

These Breathtaking Natural Wonders No Longer Exist – 18 landscapes that no longer exist…including a beach in Hawaii…some sights in US National Parks.

Free Technology for Teachers: Historical Patterns Animated – A site from the University of Oregon…worth browsing even if you aren’t a teacher.

Interactives from NASA…Exoplanet Exploration – Create your own Earth-like planet….or a hostile world.

LED Lights, All-Electric School Buses, Hydroponic Gardens ... (Cleantech in Action Series) | CleanTechnica – A roundup of cleantech press releases that came out in September.

Raking Oak Leaves

I’ve raked the leaves falling from our oak tree twice already this year. My typical tools are the rake for the leaves and then a broom for the crushed acorns in the driveway and street gutter.  Today I remembered to take before and after pictures.

I had cleared 4 trash cans full of leaves from the gutter and grass closest to the street just a few days ago and was surprised that were so many leaves to be raked.

5 trash cans full of leaves and a half trash can of acorn debris later – the yard looks better but I realized that the tree still looks like it has a lot of leaves! This is not the last raking of the fall for this tree.

I also noticed that the acorn debris seemed to be more ‘hats’ that the nut itself. Maybe the neighborhood squirrels have been retrieving more of the acorns that fall on the driveway!

Spaghetti Squash

The Gorman Farms CSA shares in recent weeks have included winter squash; the first one was a spaghetti squash and I have thoroughly enjoyed it.

I cooked it first – whole, skin pricked with a fork, for an hour at 350 degrees. At the end of the hour I took it out cut off the top and then cut it in half to let it cool a bit. I had decided the first meal from it would be ‘spaghetti’ so I started the sauce: spicy tomato sauce from a jar poured over eggplant cubes that needed to simmer a bit. Back to the squash: I used a spoon to life out the mass of seeds and pulp in the center then teased out the ‘spaghetti’ that I wanted into a small non-stick skillet; I added a little oil and stir fried the squash a little to drive off excess water. I cut up some arugula for the topping while the sauce continued to bubble and I added some shelled edamame for protein. When the squash we ready I poured it into a bowl…the added the sauce and the generous handful of arugula. Yummy!

I used about 1/4th the squash for the ‘spaghetti’ dinner. The next fourth was used for a dessert! I soaked raisins in apricot brandy for a few hours. I started the dish by sautéing the squash with a little butter in a non-stick skillet, adding cinnamon + maple syrup + raisins with brandy as it cooked. I let the liquid cook down almost completely. It smelled wonderful and tasted yummy – eaten warm. The squash is naturally sweet so no much syrup was needed. This is something I will make again.

I still have more spaghetti squash in the refrigerator…planning to make a frittata since I will be out and about a lot over the next few days and that is easy to make ahead for a quick meal when I get home.

Next up – acorn squash.

Zooming – September 2017

I spent a lot of time outdoors this month; it’s fall and the weather has been near perfect. The moon was visible in the morning of one of the clear days and I took pictures through frames of leaves. This one is my favorite.

In the first half of the month the butterfly exhibit at Brookside Gardens was still open and I have lots of zoomed pictures for that but picked two of the blue morpho for this post. Toward the end it was hard to find one with wings that were not battered and palpi intact. These two are in reasonable shape.

Then there were butterflies out in the gardens. The Mexican sunflowers and cone flowers were popular. Do you see the tree skippers (butterflies) on the yellow cone flowers? Click on the image to get a larger view.

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The streams are beginning to be colorful with newly fallen leaves. The macroinvertebrates we search for to assess stream quality love matted, rotting leaves! I like the zoom on my camera that helps me get pictures without putting on my tall boots and wading into the river.

A large silver maple was cut down this month at Mt. Pleasant (Howard County Conservancy) and I working to count the rings and create material we could use with hikes we do for elementary school children. The saw marks were so deep that it had to be sanded before we count the rings…but insect damage was evident. More on this project as it progresses…

Of course, there are plants that area always a favorite – a graceful curve of a leave with water droplets, a flower turned to face the sun, a rose on a rainy day, a beechnut husk (the goody already eaten by a squirrel), birds hunting the bounty of seeds, and a tangle of succulent.

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Birding through a window – September 2017

The goldfinches are enjoying the sunflowers on the deck…making them easier to photograph. The look about after each acrobatic move to pluck a seed.

A fledgling was making quite a fuss on the deck roof outside my office. I looked around to see what else was going on and discovered the parent in the gutter --- ignoring the noise from the fledgling and enjoying a bath!

A few days later our resident Carolina Wren was out early and singing. There was still water in gutter and it soon took a bath and emerged very wet and bedraggled looking.

Gleanings of the Week Ending September 23, 2017

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.

Celebrate Cassini’s Historic Voyage in Eight Incredible Images | Smart News | Smithsonian – Cassini has crashed into Saturn’s atmosphere (intentionally) and there have been quite a few retrospective articles about its long mission. I liked this one…so am including in the gleanings for this week.

Eighteenth century nautical charts reveal coral loss -- ScienceDaily – The study compared the coral documented in the Florida Keys in nautical charts from the 1770s to satellite data. More than half the coral reef has disappeared completely. Nearer to land, the loss is closer to 90%.

What We Still Don’t Know about the Health Benefits of Nature – THE DIRT – I noticed this article first because the picture under the heading is of Klyde Warren Park in Dallas (I visited there several years ago and enjoyed it) but thin the article was worth looking at too. It defines some priorities for research to understand the health benefits of nature better although most people already agree that is it beneficial…but how exactly does it happen. Some doctors are already prescribing time in the park!

North American Ash on Brink of Extinction | The Scientist Magazine® - In Maryland many of the Ash Trees are already dead or dying. Very sad.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #105 – National Geographic Society – There’s an Eastern Bluebird toward the middle of this collection….perched a little differently than I usually see them.

A Monumental Road Trip in Northern Arizona - National Parks Traveler – I’ve been to most of these places…..and enjoyed them all.

BBC - Future - How we’re creating ‘super plants’ to help humanity – The article highlights 4 ideas: cross-breeding super plants, using plants as medicine, bananas on steroids, and fire-fighting plants.

Learn How to Create Zentangle Art, a Meditative Form of Drawing – This article is about doing Zentangles (drawing patterns) rather than buying an adult coloring book. I started doing doodles and graduated to Zentangles and never was tempted by the ‘coloring book’ craze.

Ruins of a Roman City Found Off the Coast of Tunisia | Smart News | Smithsonian – The area of ancient Neapolis is off the coast of Tunisia. It was destroyed by a tsunami in 365 AD.

Why are fossilized hairs so rare? -- ScienceDaily – Evidently, fossilized hair is 5 times rarer than feathers.  Chemistry? Environmental conditions? The research includes statistical analysis of where hair and feathers have been found in the fossil record and make some predictions about where and how to look for them going forward.

Wings of Fancy Volunteering Retrospective

I enjoyed volunteering at Brookside Gardens’ Wings of Fancy exhibit. The seasonal exhibit ended on September 17th and I’m missing it this week; I’m already keen on volunteering when the 2018 exhibit starts next April. I started later this year because I only decided to volunteer for in in May…but even so – I managed 26 shifts during the summer months and the first weeks of September. I’ve posted about the earlier shift previously…but am including the last 7 (all in September) in this post.

Shift XX was a sunny day and I enjoyed a walk in the gardens – flowers and butterflies.

Shift XXI was wet and there were times that the only people in the conservatory were volunteers! I took some pictures inside the conservatory with my cell phone.

I parked near the Brookside Gardens Visitor Center rather than near the conservatory for Shift XXII. I hadn’t noticed the horsetail and gingko planting in the bed around the conservatory before…and the brightly colored bench. As I walked down on to the conservatory, I noticed a rotting stump with bright yellow function growing on it.

The moon was still out when I got to Brookside prior to Shift XXIII. Along the butterfly walk (the path to the ticket taker for the exhibit) the gold finches were enjoying seeds and there was still a Monarch caterpillar on one of the milkweed plants.

Shift XXIV was rainy – again. I manage a picture of a spider web that held big drops of water. Attendance was light enough that I took pictures inside the conservatory.

It was a sunny day again for Shift XXV…but attendance was light again. I took a series of Monarch pictures: caterpillars and two mating pairs.

For the final shift, I was fixated on palpi (structures that start on either side of the proboscis and then lay between the eyes) again because I had seen so many blue morphos that appear to not have any. Evidently the blue morpho frequently breaks its palpi while the owl butterfly (second picture) does not!

And so – a fond farewell to Wings of Fancy…until 2018.

Training for Fall Field Trips

Early September is training time for Howard County Conservancy’s fall field trips for Howard County Schools. The content of the field trips had not changed this year; that meant I could take pictures rather than focusing totally on learning the material as we took the example hikes.

Montjoy Barn

The barn is one of my favorite places. It dates from the 1700s and was moved to Mt. Pleasant in 2003. It has doors on two sides that make a great frame for pictures…and the pegs used in its construction surprise children and chaperones alike during the elementary school hikes.

Stream Assessment

We used the Davis Branch at Mt. Pleasant for the stream assessment training. We’ll be doing the student science activity with 9th graders in many streams and rivers around the county this fall. There is an abiotic component (testing the water) and then wading into the stream to look for macroinvertebrates.

Meadow

The hikes through the fall meadow are a joy with second graders studying insects or soil….or sometimes taking a tangent from the assigned topic to observe vultures soaring or small flocks of gold finches enjoying the seeds of meadow plants.

The volunteers are trained…primed for the fieldtrips to begin!

Hiking to the Patapsco

Last Saturday, I led a group from Belmont Manor and Historic Park to the Avalon area of Patapsco Valley State Park. It was a beautiful day for a hike – sunny and not too hot. I didn’t take any pictures going downhill since I needed to be in the front. I did stop to check some spicebush (understory trees) for caterpillars since I am more aware of spicebush swallowtail caterpillar behavior from the Brookside Gardens’ Wings of Fancy caterpillar house (see my post about them here) while we made a short stop to allow the group to come together.

Once we got down near the river, a volunteer ranger met us to provide some park history. One stop was concrete Avalon Dam and I took a picture of it through the tangle of vegetation trees. The river bypasses the dam now! Looking down I noticed some self-fungus and very green moss among the accumulating leaves.

We stopped at the sign about Elkridge Landing. There is some controversy about exactly where the Landing was but it probably was not exactly where the sign I located. Another bit of history: the sign was made as an Eagle Scout project; it was very nice at the beginning - but has not weathered well. Maintenance in the park is always a challenge.

This is a wall that remains near what was the mill race in colonial times for the Avalon Nail and Iron Works – mended many times. It could be used for a geology talk as easily as for history.

While we were in the park we saw an ambulance come by with flashing lights and then leave again – lights still flashing. We heard that a hiker had gotten bitten by something. Later we learned the bit was from a copperhead and was on the ankle. It was a warm enough day that many people were in hiking sandals and shorts….scary that there was at least one snake not that far from where were hiking.

We started our hike back up the trail and noted the shelter along the trail that we hadn’t noticed on the way down because we stayed on the fire road rather than taking the trail.

The trail through the forest was up hill but shady and scenic.

I stopped to enjoy the stand of bigleaf magnolia. I didn’t hike to see them in the spring this year…maybe something to plan to do in 2018. That’s when they would be blooming.

The path is at the edge of the meadow for some distance and took pictures of a spider and meadow plants going to seed.

The hike was over 4 miles --- a good prelude-to-fall hike.

Red Soup

I have become a fan of beets. I love the color and flavor they add to soups and salads. Beets were a major ingredient in a soup I made on one of the first cool mornings of our fall.

The ingredients were:

Bullion

Beet

Tomato

Rosemary, thyme, parsley…whatever seasons you like

Mushrooms

Sunflower seeds

I started by letting the fresh beet cook in the bullion while I got all the other ingredients ready. I added the tomato and seasonings after the beet began to soften then used the masher while the soup continued to bubble. I added the mushrooms and continued cooking until the mushrooms reduced in size.

The sunflower seeds were sprinkled on top after it was in the bowl.

Yummy!

Tree Cookies

I was in a class recently that included looking at some labelled tree cookies – for trees that are relatively common in our area. Each one is about a foot across. I photographed them to study on my large computer monitor.

Some of them have split as they dried and the saw marks are still visible…but the rings show through reasonably well. They would probably show up better if the cookies were sanded a little. There is something unique about each one: the sugar maple looks light colored throughout; the dogwood has wider dark marks (reddish in color) and they don’t appear to be concentric further away from the center); the cherry has a dark center; the white pine shows come places where branches come off and this cookie has the most clearly visible rings all the way out. It is possible to count the rings out from the center to determine the age of the tree when it was cut done.

Celebrating Labor Day

We’re staying home for Labor Day – celebrating the end of summer with a ‘splurge’ meal of hotdogs and corn-on-the-cob cooked on the grill,

Snacking on cherry tomatoes while we cook…and

Watermelon afterward (maybe as mid-afternoon snack).

The forecast is for sun after a weekend of clouds (and rain) – a warmer day that we’ve had recently as a finale for the summer. The opening of schools in Maryland has changed from late August to the Tuesday after Labor Day this year which emphasizes the feeling that Labor Day marks the end of summer.

This year with the flooding from Hurricane Harvey just beginning to recede – there is a sobering aspect to this holiday. Modern communication brings it to us; the loss of ‘home’ for so many people is painful to us as well.  We should all be thinking about how we can help....and find out more about disaster mitigation strategies where we live.

Volunteering at Wings of Fancy at Brookside Gardens XV-XIX

The 5 most recent shifts at Brookside Gardens’ Wings of Fancy have not been overly hot – unusual for August here in Maryland. Before the 15th shift, it was damp. I took some pictures under a bald cypress of a Cypress Gall (Midge) that had not matured enough to kill the small branch and some developing cones. When I walked over to the boardwalk toward the nature center I walked through a spider web that has been built overnight; not the best way to start the morning. I brushed myself off and headed into the conservatory. The shift was a special one for photographers – so not crowded at all and calmer than the public shifts.

It was raining for the entire 16th shift. I managed to find some dry spots under trees along the stream when I got there for my walk around the gardens prior to the shift. Some big rocks have been added to the stream bed to stabilize the banks. There is one area that eroded perilously close the fence and the road just beyond.

The slide show below is the rest of my walk. I moved fast when I was being rained on but took pictures when I found a sheltered place: 1) of a curve in the stream, 2) in the rose garden under the crepe myrtle trees, 3) a waterlily (note the ripples from the raindrops into the pool), and 4) under the cypress trees that kept the butterfly bench mostly dry. Wings of Fancy got off to a slow start that day because the ticket seller was late…and it was raining harder. The conservatory leaks! The tiny space between the ticket taker awning and the caterpillar house becomes a little waterfall when it is raining hard! But the exhibit was a good rainy day activity for people once they got into the conservatory.

The 17^th shift was not rainy. It was an early shift for photographers again and I relaxed before hand with a good walk around the gardens noting blooms (sumac, joe pye weed, sunflowers) and then some oddities on the bald cypress (something that looks like tiny yellow ‘flowers’, and a fuzzy caterpillar with horns), jewelweed growing near the boardwalk on the way to Brookside Nature Center (the plant is supposed to be good for treating poison ivy…but it often grows in locations the poison ivy does), and a cocoa tree in the part of the conservancy not used for the butterfly exhibit.

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The 18th shift was sunny – but not too hot. I’m paying more attention to the tiny yellow blobs on the bald cypress; one of them had red filaments. The rose garden is beginning to bloom more now that the high heat of summer is over.

The rest of the garden has benefited from the rain too and looks lush. I enjoyed trying to photograph the skipper butterflies on the Mexican sunflowers.

The 19th shift was sunny and cooler than I excepted; as I was walking around I was glad I was going to be in the conservatory once my shift started where it would be warmer. I talked to one of the Brookside staff about the tiny yellow blobs on the cypress; it’s not something they have seen before.

I headed up toward the scent garden and saw a dragonfly in the air. It landed on one of the maples…and sat while I managed to find him in the foliage for a zoomed image. The maple leaves are beginning to change color for fall.

Another sign of fall in the gardens – a cardinal molting and getting new feathers on its head. This is not bald…but all the new feather shave not come in so the crest looks scruffy and around the eye still needs additional feathers to look ‘normal.’

I walked over to the boardwalk to photograph the jewel weed again and got side tracked when I noticed a spider near one of the flowers. It took long enough to get the photograph I wanted that i hurried to the volunteer entrance to get into 'flight attendent' gear and ready for the shift. It was a busy morning in the exhibit.

The Wings of Fancy is over for 2017 on September 17….I’ll most about the last of my shifts just after ‘the end.’ It’s been a great volunteer experience!

Previous posts re Volunteering at Wings of Fancy: prep, I, II-IV, V-X, XI-XIV.

Gleanings of the Week Ending September 2, 2017

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.

Yoga and meditation improve mind-body health and stress resilience – A study that went beyond anecdotal reports of positive effects. They looked at brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and activity in the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal (HPA) and inflammation markers.

20+ Spectacular Photos From the…Solar Eclipse and NASA’s Best Photos of the 2017 Total Solar Eclipse – Photo series from the web of the 8/21/2017 solar eclipse.

Dancing can reverse the signs of aging in the brain – Dancing is more effective than endurance training! Both dancing and endurance training increase the area of the brain that declines with age but dancing improves balance too!

The big idea: 5 ways to be a more thoughtful traveler – The articles ‘5’ are: know some history, think about how you’ll document your trip, read a book set wherever you’re going, learn some of the language, and understand where you come from. Good ideas!

10 Really Weird Animals of the Anthropocene  and Tongue Orchids & Corpseflowers: 7 insanely weird plant species – There is so much to learn about plants and animals…sometimes because they are changing and sometimes because they are hard to find/rare.

Trying to Create Something Different in the Nebraska Sandhills – I couldn’t resist this one…since I just visit Nebraska for the first time recently.

Image of the Day: Flying Blood Bag – The entwined network of blood vessels in a pigeon’s CT scan.

Our brains to change from early to mid-adulthood – The changes observed were so highly correlated to age that the researchers could estimate the ages of an individual simply by looking at the brain scan. 111 scans were analyzed from volunteers 18-55 years old.

On Education in the 21st Century – A paper by Richard Watson (futurist) for the Australia’s Department of Education. It talks about Slow Education (people centric, reflective, and aim to ensure that individual appreciate where the things they consume come from…emphasizes the importance of local difference, craft and quality over standardized production and cheap ingredients).

Interactive Infographic: The Global Business of Dying – The laws governing how terminally ill patients can choose to die vary widely – around the world and in the US (link to the US map is at the bottom of the global post).

Owl Butterfly Eggs

Last weekend, I took a few minutes to photograph the eggs of the owl butterfly in Brookside Gardens’ Wings of Fancy exhibit. I got as close as I could to the canna leaf where they were located and then clipped out the part of the picture to see them even better. The eggs quite small – about the size of the head of a straight pin – and look smooth to the eye. With the magnification of the enlarged picture it is easy to see that they:

• Are ribbed
• That they change as they develop with the white one being one that is probably not going develop. The others probably have a tiny caterpillar developing. Do you see the light brown C shape in the third egg from the left? Looks like a developing caterpillar!

One of the joys of volunteering at the Wings of Fancy exhibit is being there frequently enough to see the progression of butterfly development…and occasionally capturing some of it with my camera.

Road Trip Home from Nebraska

We retraced our road trip to get home from Nebraska – taking two days (again) to make the drive.

I took some last pictures around the hotel the afternoon before we left: the art in front of the gas station when we were filling the tank, the sunny parking lot, and the curtains in the room (they are a good prompt for a Zentangle!). This trip was the first time I had ever been in Nebraska and I was surprised that it was hilly; somehow, I expected it to be very flat like the panhandle of Texas. As we headed east the next morning we made one stop while still in Nebraska. There were a few people that were making an early start like we were – but not the crowd at the rest stop on eclipse day! The rest stop included some signage about the Native American use of the area.

We crossed the Missouri River, leaving Nebraska and entering Iowa. The rest stop at Council Bluffs has good signage about the history of the place and the fossil record; artistic ‘bluffs’ near the entrance, a floral mosaic inside, and low dividers around some of the picnicking areas; and a reddish colored walkway that might have been patterned after the river we’d just crossed.

We stopped at mid-morning to eat watermelon another Iowa rest stop. There were plenty of tables in the shade but it was cool enough that we picked one in the sunshine. There was a cicada that was very slow moving – too cold to make noise or fly away when I got close to take a picture! We stopped in Iowa City for lunch at a McDonalds and part of the decoration had physics and chemistry formulas! Right before we entered Illinois, we made one last stop and I took pictures of sun flowers. I like to see plants that are good for pollinators and birds in the rest stop gardens.

The Mississippi River is the boundary between Iowa and Illinois and I took a picture as we drove over the bridge. This is before the river joins with the Missouri…so it’s not as muddy looking. The only rest stop we used in Illinois had planted their formal beds with things good for last summer and fall insects and birds…good for them! It seems to be the trend in rest stop maintenance!

We hit a lot of traffic as we drove to the south of Chicago and into Indiana. I took a picture as we entered the state. We made a stop at a gas station before we got to the hotel in Elkhart, Indiana….tired after a long drive. There was a restaurant within walking distance from our hotel and it felt good to get the exercise after sitting for so much of the day.

The second day we had a shorter drive. The Ohio rest stops are more formal grass and trimmed bushes. There are some margins that might provide plants for insects. There are lots of travel brochures and I picked up several – thinking that north east Ohio could be a good destination for a fall or spring road trip. The rest stops have either barrel or dome sections over their food courts. I realized in the last one we stopped at that there was a Ohio map on the floor!

I took picture through the car window as we went into Pennsylvania. The Alleghenies make for a lot more elevation change and winding in the highway. The clouds were fluffy that day too. The skyline of Pittsburgh…the Heinz sign…the Squirrel Hill tunnel (my son-in-law’s apartment is on top of the tunnel!). After we left my daughter in Pittsburgh, we made a stop at one of the service plazas on the Pennsylvania Turnpike…and then it was through the Allegheny Mountain tunnel.

Our only stop in Maryland before we got home was at the South Mountain rest stop. By that time the fluffy clouds were mostly gone. The stop has mowed grass around the picnic tables…but the beds are planted with meadow type grasses and small flowers rather than exotic flowers. Those plants probably are easier to maintain and give the butterflies/bees a boost!

An hour later – it was good to get home.

Previous posts about our Solar Eclipse trek: Road Trip to Nebraska for the Eclipse, Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore, Solar Eclipse – August 2017, Nebraska Sunrise.

Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore

As mentioned in last Friday’s post, we stopped at the Indian Dunes National Lakeshore on our way to see the solar eclipse in Nebraska. After stopping at the visitor center (bison sculpture in front) to get a map, we drove to the Dunes Succession Trail which is part of the West Beach Trail System.

The first part of the hike was along a pave path to the beach. We crossed the dune field.

The beach is relatively narrow but it was a sunny warm day and people were enjoying the water. We followed the signs to the trail. The beach got very narrow and the sand was difficult to walk through.

Finally, we got to the trail that headed back into the dunes. Low grass and trees stabilized the sand.

It was still difficult to walk in the sand and it was obvious that sometimes the trail caused erosion of the slopes to the side of it.

There were low areas that looked like meadows and sometimes had wet areas.

The areas of succession (grasses, pines and low shrubs, deciduous trees) would happen again and again on the walk – which got easier after we came to the boardwalk.

Going up stairs is easier than walking in loose sand!

We thought we were at the top of the stairs and turned to take a picture of the Chicago skyline. It was a hazy afternoon….would have been better on a clear morning, I’m sure.

Looking back from the way we came, the variety of vegetation is easily seen. Sometimes the vegetation does not hold the sand well enough and exposed/loose sand results.

The cotton woods seem to be a hardy deciduous species here.

Even in the areas of hardwoods, there are sand slides where the vegetation failed to hold the sand. Note that the trees are no very big around either – probably not very old…and stressed.

The hike was a good contrast from the long drive in the car. We stopped for the night after a short drive into Illinois, more than half way to our Nebraska destination.

Gleanings of the Week Ending August 26, 2017

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.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #101 and #102 – 50 bird pictures this week! My favorite in the first group is the barn owl (and the other owls in this group). My favorite in the second group are the two pictures of spotted owlets! --- I am drawn to owls this week for some reason.

Voyager: Inside the world’s greatest space mission – The two Voyager space craft were launched in 1977…and are both sending back messages to earth.

Trees with ‘crown shyness’ mysteriously avoid touching each other – I haven’t observed this phenomenon in our Maryland forests…but now when I am in a forest, I’ll always look for it!

Time Spent – Who Americans spend their time with (from Richard Watson’s blog). It changes with age. The last chart shows that as we get older we spend more and more time alone.

Air pollutions ranking in 32 cities –  LA ranks 24; Washington DC, San Francisco and New York are 26-28; Boston is 31. Delhi, Beijing, and Cairo are the top three.

Trees and shrubs offer new food crops to diversity the farm – Ongoing research from the University of Illinois trying to mimic the habitat features, carbon storage, and nutrient-holding capacities of a natural system with a farming method that incorporates berry and nut bearing shrubs/trees with alley cropping (hay or row crops)….to be economically and environmentally sound.

AWEA releases map of every wind farm and factory in America – There is a link to the interactive map. The red diamonds are manufactures and the blue dots are the wind farms themselves. It’s easy to see that manufactures happens a lot in areas other than where the wind farms are located….that the center of the country has a lot of installed wind turbines! We saw some of them in Iowa on our way to and from the solar eclipse last Monday.

Diversity Lacking in US Academia: Study – Under-representation of African Americans, Hispanics, and women in STEM faculties at public universities. There is a similar lack of diversity in PhD programs. On a positive note: the assistant professor is more diverse (more Asians, Hispanics and women) that the associate or full professor rank.  Unfortunately, this positive finding is not true for African Americans. Overall – still a challenge….and it impacts the broader labor market as well.

More than 300,000 Atlantic Salmon Spill into Pacific – Oh no! Hopefully this is not catastrophic in the long run. But – Why are they growing Atlantic salmon in pens in Puget Sound anyway?

Thanks to Co-op, Small Iowa Town Goes Big on Solar – Kalona, Iowa – not far from our route to the eclipse! It comes down to local self-reliance and economic development that made sense for this small town. Somehow a pointer to this article (from last February) was in a blog post I looked at when I returned home and I noticed where the town was…small world.