eBotanicalPrints – June 2017

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As I am writing this post is it wet and dreary. It’s just the sort of day to appreciate books of botanical prints.

June 2017 was a big month for botanical books – 27 of them in all. Who knew that geraniums were so popular in the early 1800s. The Botanical Cabinet series had my favorite images – with the top of the list being the magnolia (near the bottom of the images).

  1. Geraniaceae : the natural order of gerania V4 * Sweet, Robert * sample image
  2. Geraniaceae : the natural order of gerania V5 * Sweet, Robert * sample image
  3. The language of flowers * Ildrewe, Miss (editor) * sample image
  4. Mushirui gafu * Kitagawa, Utamaro;Ishikawa, Masamochi * sample image
  5. Ransai gafu * Mori, Bunsho * sample image
  6. Flower Arrangement in Color * Rockwell, F. F.; Grayson, Ester, C. * sample image
  7. The ladies' flower-garden of ornamental perennials V1 * Loudon, Mrs.  * sample image
  8. The ladies' flower-garden of ornamental perennials V2 * Loudon, Mrs.  * sample image
  9. A wreath from the woods of Carolina, illustrated with colored engravings of native wild flowers * Mason, Mary Ann Bryan * sample image
  10. Flora britannica indigena; or, Plates of the indigenous plants of Great Britain * Walcott, John * sample image
  11. Popular garden botany * Catlow, Agnes * sample image
  12. The Botanical Cabinet V1 1818 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  13. The Botanical Cabinet V2 1821 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  14. The Botanical Cabinet V3 1818 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  15. The Botanical Cabinet V4 1819 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  16. The Botanical Cabinet V5 1820 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  17. A year in the garden * Mustard, Norah Elizabeth * sample image
  18. Futatsubo yori hyakutsubo made Nihon teizō shingyōsō santai zuan shinsho : tsuketari, Chikuteihō kokoroe oyobi shiyōsho to kōji yosansho * Sugimoto, Fumitaro * sample image
  19. The Botanical Cabinet V6 1821 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  20. My villa garden * Graveson,S. * sample image
  21. The Botanical Cabinet V7 1822 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  22. The Botanical Cabinet V8 1823 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  23. Every woman's flower garden : how to make and keep it beautiful * Hamden, Mary; Reeve, Mary S. * sample image
  24. The Botanical Cabinet V9 1824 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  25. Saxifrages, or rockfoils * Irving, Walter; Malby, Reginald A. * sample image
  26. Our Sentimental Garden * Castle, Agnes Sweetman And Egerton; Robinson, Charles * sample image
  27. The Botanical Cabinet V10 1824 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image

 

Previous eBotanicalPrints posts:

Gleanings of the Week Ending December 23, 2017

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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.

Search for Microbial Life on Mars | The Scientist Magazine® - Life on Mars…challenges abound.

Using Data to Inspire: Share Science and Find Truth in the Stories - The Bridge: Connecting Science and Policy - AGU Blogosphere – Maria Merian studied butterflies…and discovered that instead of being ‘born of mud’ spontaneously, they grew as caterpillars that metamorphosed into butterflies. That was back in the 1600s. Communication of data can be very inspiring!

Will Squid Soon Rule the Oceans? | Zócalo Public Square – These creatures thrive on disruption in our oceans…benefiting from climate change, overfishing and pollution.

Suburban ponds are a septic buffet -- ScienceDaily – Suburban animals behave, look and function differently because of the fundamentally unique ecosystems of suburbia.

Cancer imaging aid developed from horse chestnuts -- ScienceDaily – Horse chestnuts are trees I recognize in our local gardens….so I took a second look at this article. Evidently an extract from the tree may have a medical use!

What is the Bauhaus Movement? The History of Bauhaus Art – A short history of  Bauhaus art, architecture and design….how it all comes together and its legacy.

Free Technology for Teachers: The Science of Snowflakes – Two short videos about snowflakes.

100,000 Digitized Art History Books Are Now Freely Available to Any Art Lover and the Getty Research Portal – Another source of eBooks…it is easy to spend a lot of time browsing this one.

Photographer Takes Stunning Portraits of Endangered Animals: Goats and Soda: NPR – Photography with a message.

Dinosaurs Were Around Before Saturn Had Rings | Smart News | Smithsonian – There are timelines relating events around the world. This is a link between our planet and the rings of Saturn.

eBotanicalPrints –July – October 2017

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I am still working on creating a new section of my site. It should be ready by early 2018; my plan to include all the botanical prints books I perused in 2017 to get is started. This month I am getting the material formatted….working out the details for the new section.

Today I am highlighting the books I read from July – October. There were not as many botanical print books because I shifted to butterflies (prompted by my volunteering at Brookside Gardens Wings of Fancy).

July

Most of the books in July were The Botanical Cabinet volumes. There are 20 in all published in the early 1800s. Note that not all the books I am including in the collection are formal botanical prints; sometimes, they are art or catalogs or garden pictures….that are dominated by plants. They are not meant to be scientific documentation of the plant; I enjoy them too much to leave them out.

  1. The Botanical Cabinet V11 1825 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  2. The Botanical Cabinet V12 1826 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  3. The Botanical Cabinet V13 1827 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  4. Hours of gladness * Maeterlinck, Maurice; Teixeira de Mattos, Alexander * sample image
  5. The Botanical Cabinet V14 1828 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  6. The Botanical Cabinet V15 1828 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  7. The Botanical Cabinet V16 1829 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image

August

The last book listed for August is relatively recent. It was published in the mid-1950s and includes color photographs of cactus…the modern ‘botanical print.’

  1. The Botanical Cabinet V17 1830 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  2. The Botanical Cabinet V18 1831 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  3. The Botanical Cabinet V19 1832 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  4. The Botanical Cabinet V20 1833 * Loddiges, Conrad, & Sons; Cooke; George * sample image
  5. Among the flowers; selections from the standard poets illustrated in colors.  * misc * sample image
  6. The flowering cactus; an informative guide, illustrated in full-color photography, to one of the miracles of America's Southwest * Carlson, Raymond; Proctor, Claire Meyer; Proctor, Ralph C. * sample image

September

Botanical prints are also for children’s books; The books by Janet Kelman were published in the early 1900s.

  1. The botanical works of the late George Engelmann * Shaw, Henry; Trelease, William; Gray, Asa * sample image
  2. Gardens shown to the children * Kelman, Janet Harvey; Allen, Olive; Henderson, J.A. * sample image
  3. Trees, shown to children * Kelman, Janet Harvey; Smith, C.E. * sample image

October

Botanical prints were produced in different cultures. The two from October are from Japan in the early 1900s.

  1. Bairei gafu V3 * Yamado Unsodo (publisher) * sample image
  2. Icones plantarum Indiae Orientalis - or figures of Indian plants V1 * Wight, Robert * sample image
  3. Banshō zukan v. 2 * Kobayashi, Bunshichi * sample image
  4. Icones plantarum Indiae Orientalis - or figures of Indian plants V2 * Wight, Robert * sample image
  5. Garden Photography * Fitch, Charles Marden  

Previous eBotanicalPrints posts:

November 2017

3 Free eBooks – December 2017

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This month I picked books with an Asian theme:

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Bing, Siegfried. Artistic Japan: illustrations and essays. London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co. Six volumes available from the Internet Archive here; published in the late 1800s. Most of the illustrations are in color…and represent a broad range of Japanese art from the time. I picked an image of a textile but there is a lot of other types of art in these volumes.

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Ando, Hiroshige. Ehon Edo miyage. Kikuya Kozaburo han. 1850 or after and before 1868. Six volumes available from Smithsonian Libraries here. Images in soft colors depicting Japan in the mid 1800s. I picked one from the fourth volume that looked like a road lined with cherry trees blooming in the spring. There were some other images of landscapes with snow that I liked almost as well.

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Oriental Textile Samples. 1700. Available from the Internet Archive here. This book is a reminder of how rich the textile tradition is – particularly from China. I clipped a part of the cover – which must have also been textile. There is a note that the book is ‘fabric samples mounted in accordion-style, silk covered, volumes in brown cloth-covered folios’.

Gleanings of the Week Ending December 16, 2017

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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.

Switching Jobs | FlowingData – How often do people change jobs and what kind of job to they move to. In the field I was in (computer mathematical), almost 70% stay in the field. I certainly did for the duration of my 40 year career.

You’ve Seen the Washington Monument. Now See the Other Washington Monuments | Smart News | Smithsonian – A little history.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #117 – National Geographic Society – I always enjoy the weekly collection of bird pictures.

Autonomous Driving Levels 0–5 + Implications | CleanTechnica – A good reference re autonomous cars. Right now, I have a level 1 car (it has adaptive cruise control). I am hoping that by the time I am very old and want to stop driving that level 5 cars are easily available.

Cataloging Fungal Life in Antarctic Seas | The Scientist Magazine® - Fungi that thrive in extreme conditions…some surprises.

Water-loving cats: Unique Tiger facts – National Geographic Society – I like the last image the best: tigers in the snow.

3 Reasons Why California’s Fire Risk Won’t Dampen Anytime Soon - NPR – I was interested in this article but it didn’t answer the question that I thought it would: In areas where fires are burning now – are they reducing the ‘fuel’ enough that fires will not burn again for a long time…and could we develop techniques to maintain that reduction in ‘fuel’ (i.e. dead wood, brush) without damaging the ecosystem.

In Luxor, Two Tombs Dating Back 3,500 Years Unveil Their Secrets | Smart News | Smithsonian – There seem to be more finds in Egypt recently – but will they be enough to draw tourists back to the region?

The Secret in the Sand Dunes – Cool Green Science – Midway Beach survived Sandy…because they pay a lot of attention to maintaining their dunes --- including after-season Christmas trees to provide structure to dunes…catching sand.

Common psychological traits in group of Italians aged 90 to 101 -- ScienceDaily - Study finds group displays distinct optimism, stubbornness and bond with family, religion and land

Monitoring Conservation Easements

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This December is my first experience volunteering to do the annual monitoring of conservation easements for the Howard County Conservancy. I went to a training back in September and then ‘shadowed’ an experienced monitor visiting 2 easements in November. In December, I was ready to monitor 2 easements with a cohort that was doing it for the first time as well.  The owners were notified by Howard County Conservancy that we would be monitoring on a particular day and the weather cooperated for both days – dry and not overly cold. The first property was mostly forest and the hike around the property was different than my usual hike since there were no well-defined trails; deer trails or picking a path through the briars (glad we were doing this in December when it was cold enough to wear heavy pants to protect my legs from thorns). It was a wonderful early winter ‘walk in the woods.’

The land was crossed by a stream that feeds into the Patuxent River. We had one stream crossing over a culvert but made another stepping on rocks; it was good that it had not rained recently. Most of the trees were native…but there was a substantial clump of bamboo growing on one streambank.

The land was easier to see with the leaves on the ground. As usual, I noticed fungi.

There was an odd holly-like plant as part of the understory. The leaves looked like holly but the top did not.

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At the end of the walk, I rejoiced that the property owner had made the effort to make it a conservation easement and that it was about that same as it had been in previous years.

The second easement was entirely different: surrounded by housing developments and an active farm/golf related business rather than forest. The business was about the same as it had been in the previous year…but there was a change at the farm: a guard dog. The dog did not appear immediately, but no one was home. We could tell that there had been some earth moving going on upslope from the stream that starts on the farm and eventually flows into the Patuxent River. If a heavy rain came – a lot of soil would slump down into the stream. The dog appeared…and we decided to gracefully retreat without completing our check of the easement. The monitoring will have to be done when the owner or their representative can be there. It was a rattling experience, but we enjoyed a hefty morning snack with hot tea/latte to recover!

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Maryland Water Monitoring Council 23rd Annual Conference

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Last Friday, I attended Maryland Water Monitoring Council conference. The theme was “Managing Water Quality in a Changing World.” This was the 23rd conference held by the council…but the first one for me. I’d signed up as soon as I found out about it – months ago – and looked at the agenda ahead of time. The agenda was packed with interesting topics from 8:30 -4:30. Except for the two keynote talks there were 7 concurrent talks for the rest of the day plus poster presentations and vendor booths. Based on my experience with the symposium I went to back in October about the War of 1812, I hoped that I would make it through the whole day.

It turned out to be an invigorating day all the way through to the last talk! It helped that the food was fabulous and easily available, the chairs were comfortable, and the venue was large enough to provide easy transitions between sessions for the 600 attendees. Those things provided the infrastructure for the high-quality talks.

I’d printed off the agenda before the conference and highlighted the ones I thought I would be most interested in attending. Of the 12 talks I’d selected, only 1 did not live up to my expectations. At the end of the day I was very glad that I’d attended and plan to go again next year.

Brookside Gardens Model Trains

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I am volunteering at the Brookside Gardens G-Scale Model Trains exhibit in the conservatory this season. The exhibit is active during the day when the conservatory is open and in the evening during the Garden of Lights display. I like the trains better during the day when there is a more light – the better to see them – and have signed up for my shifts accordingly. There have been 4 shifts so far: 3 in the morning and one in the afternoon. I try to take a few pictures every time I am at Brookside, just as I did during the Wings of Fancy butterfly exhibit last some. There is always something new to notice. During the first shift, I was familiarizing myself with the layout of the display. The central display always has two trains in motion; usually one of them is Thomas….or another engine from the series. I also learned that this size of model trains is often used in gardens. Evidently the tracks are durable enough to be outdoors in a garden! I also began the hunt for all the figures on the scavenger hunt lists; Winnie-the-Pooh, Piglet, and Tiger were one of my first ‘finds.’ There is a model of the Brookside Gardens Conservatory too.

The second shift I worked was a few days later and I discovered that the volunteers that put the exhibit together and are there all during the open hours sometimes bring their own trains. On this day there was a very long train with the exact number of cars to fill the loop; the caboose cleared just as the engine got back around to where the track crossed.

To the side of the conservatory there is another kind of model train display – one that models historical places in Montgomery County! The Ferris Wheel moves just as the trolley does.

Before I started my third shift I took some pictures outside: the bald cypress still have some of their needles – rust colored against the blue sky with gathering clouds – and the small gingko near the door to the gift shop end of the conservatory still had yellow leaves at its base.

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Inside, Thomas was making rounds. So many of the children recognize Thomas and want to take in everything about the exhibit. The height of the central exhibit was lowered a few years ago so even children as young as 2 years old can see almost everything standing on their own. Sometimes I think they have a better perspective than the adults since the trains are almost exactly at their eye level.

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Last weekend was my fourth shift and my first in the afternoon…and there was still snow on the ground. I’d never been to Brookside in the snow, so I snapped a few pictures before I went into the conservatory. I made quick work of it because it was so cold.

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nside – I finally managed to get some pictures of my favorite poinsettias this year – in the conservatory with the trains – along one of the walls where the trains are not.

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Emily was moving about the track rather than Thomas. Many of the children know all the characters in the series so I always let them tell me.

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I have signed up for 5 more shifts and may do more if there are not enough volunteers during the crescendo week between Christmas and New Years when schools are out.

First Snow of the Season

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We had our first snow of the season on Saturday and I got up early enough yesterday to catch some color from the sunrise.

It was the non-disruptive kind of snow: melted quickly on the streets and sidewalks but stuck to the trees and grass. On our asphalt driveway, there were clumps of snow on Sunday morning and they all were associated with a leaf!

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It was very cold on Sunday morning, so I took pictures through my office window of the backyard – the sun making the forest look rosy in the background, the pines and tulip poplars holding clumps of snow, a junco comfortably sitting on the snow-covered deck railing waiting for a turn at the bird feeder.

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A few minutes later – I took a few pictures through a picture from another room. The color of the morning light was fading but the pines and forest were still a pleasant scene.

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I opened the garage door and leaned out to take a picture of the milkweed that are still standing in our garden. In past years the plants have lost their leaves before the frost but this year the leaves are still there, and their curls catch the snow.

Some last images of South Texas

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As I finished up the post yesterday about the San Antonio Botanical Garden – I realized there were a few more miscellaneous pictures I wanted to share from our South Texas adventure. Every day near sunset hundreds, maybe thousands of birds gathered on the roofs and electrical lines around our hotel in Harlingen. The last night I managed photograph some with some sunset color behind them. Many of them are grackles.

The next morning we headed to the National Butterfly Center first but decided it was too cold and wet for butterflies to be out and about when we got there. I photographed a male and female Boat-tailed grackle on the lawn and

The water lily in the little pool.

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Then I noticed a red-eared slider in the water too. It is native in southern Texas…but invasive in Maryland. It’s included in the list of the world’s most invasive species!

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We headed out for a state park in lieu of the Butterfly Center and then heading toward San Antonio. The one rest stop we made along the way had this forest mosaic.

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As we drove into San Antonio, I managed a picture of the Tower of the Americas through the car window. It was built for the HemisFair in 1968 and I remember making the trip to the event with my Camp Fire Girls group; I was in the 8th grade.

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One last bird picture: a cold White-winged Dove taken from our hotel window.

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San Antonio Botanical Garden – Part 2

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Like most botanical gardens, the San Antonio Botanical Garden is segmented. The Kumamoto En Japanese Garden was probably my favorite: the water feature surrounded by plants and rocks, a mockingbird scolding us (wanting the garden to himself), a sun and moon ‘lantern,’ and stepping stones for going off the trails.

The Sensory Garden was colorful and included sculptures (like the armadillo below) that were positioned to be touched.

The Fountain Garden included ‘Christmas balls’ floating in the water and a metal flower sculpture surrounded my greenery.

We came a garden that attracted butterflies. I managed to photograph Gulf Fritillary and

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I’ve always wanted to get some close-up Datura flowers and seeds…and there was a plant that was well positioned for that!

Two little surprises in the gardens: a design made with pumpkins under some trees and

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A chess set in the well of the amphitheater.

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There was a special display of scarecrows while we were there – created my local organizations.

The garden has several areas that talk about the various water situations in Texas: Hill country, East Texas, and South Texas.  It was more rustic than other areas of the Botanic Garden.

We didn’t see very many birds – but I did manage to photograph a hermit thrush in a tree (right off the trail in the East Texas part of the garden). I was pleased since I am rarely fast enough to get a good image of forest birds.

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San Antonio Botanical Garden – Part 1

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We took advantage of having a morning in San Antonio, Texas before our late afternoon flight home to walk around the San Antonio Botanical Garden. The first thing we noticed is that the garden is still being actively developed with some areas barricaded either for updating or new building. We headed to the conservatories forest. These are very different structures than the glass houses of the 1800s/early 1900s. They rise from concrete peers – high shards into the sky surrounding a courtyard. The climate in San Antonio is mild enough that even the courtyard looked lush and green at the beginning of winter!

There were sculptures in the gardens within the conservatories and the courtyard. My favorite was the ‘owl.’

The conservatories were divided by climate types: desert,

Primitive plants like cycads (l loved the color of the fresh cones)

And Screw pines (I saw the mature fruit in Hawaii and got a better look at the Phipps Conservatory, but this is the first time I saw the fruit at this stage of development).

I can’t resist the unfurling of ferns

Or the tropical flowering plants and trees.

And that was just the first part of our walk around the San Antonio Botanical Garden. There’ll be another post about the place tomorrow.

Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park

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The day after the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival ended and before we headed back to San Antonio for our flight home, we visited the Bentsen Rio Grande Valley State Park. Our original plan had been to spend the morning at the National Butterfly Center in Mission, Texas but the morning was cold and wet…not conducive to butterfly activity. So we changed our plans. It was still cold and wet but some birds in the park didn’t care. This Northern Mockingbird called attention to itself with is song(s).

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There was an area near the nature center with paved walkways – some of them intermittently covered. We walked around the area – everything was very wet.

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We took the tram into the park and got off at the first stop. There was a small butterfly garden near the bird blind (where there was no action) and the rain held off for long enough for there to be a little activity. I spotted a Painted Lady,

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A Skipper (not sure what kind),

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Queens in abundance, and

We hiked a little further and came to another bird blind…and there was plenty going on there. A Golden Fronted Woodpecker enjoyed the suet.

The Plain Chachalacas were also coming in to the feeders for a snack.

Green Jays were around as well.

It started raining harder do we found a dry place to stand until the tram came bay again. There were more people on the tram for the return visit, so we got the seat on the back of tram…riding backwards. It was a good way to end our visit. I want to go back again on a day when the weather is better!

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The Inn at Chachalaca Bend

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Our main activity for the last day of the Rio Grande Valley Birding festival was breakfast (sumptuous) as the The Inn at Chachalaca Bend followed my a walk around the grounds looking at birds. We started near the Inn’s deck on the bank of La Resaca de las Antonias. We saw a Belted Kingfisher on the electrical wires crossing the Resaca almost immediately!

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A Great Blue Heron and Great Egret had a little conference in the distance.

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There was a broken tree trunk (or old telephone pole) near the water….a perch for an Altamira Oriole.

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Directly across from the Inn an Anhinga dropped down into the water to capture a fish then walked back up a palm that was slanting over the water.

Nearby on a snag, a Golden Fronted Woodpecker searched for breakfast.

There was a ruckus and then a larger bird flew toward us over the water and sat on the electrical wire nearest us: a Ringed Kingfisher.

There was Great Kiskadee on the wire further away

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And a Black-crowned Night-Heron in the vegetation across from where were standing.

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The kiskadee flew away and we notice a kite (probably white tailed…but hard to tell for sure).

We left the Resaca to hike around some open field areas. We saw an American Kestrel looking at the meadow.

As we headed back almost to the edge of the path through a forested area, we looked up and saw masses of migrating American White Pelicans! There were several groups…maybe as many as 1,000 birds.

The path branched off to the edge of the Resaca again and we saw a Snowy Egret (note the yellow feet which is a distinctive feature for this bird even if the focus is not very good for the picture).

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As we got ready to leave, we gathered back at the Inn and saw a hummingbird at the feeder (probably Ruby-throated).

There were a few plants I took pictures of…but they were secondary to the birds!

Ten Little Celebrations – November 2017

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More than half the ‘little celebrations’ I’ve picked to showcase in this post are from the first two weeks of the month – spent in Texas.

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During the first week there was a big birthday celebration for my Mother (with three kinds of cake!) and visiting Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge for the first time.

In the second week, the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival was one long celebration that include seeing two kinds of Kingfishers on one field trip!

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I still am working on a post about the San Antonio Botanical Garden – it was the first time I’d been there and a place to celebrate.

I got to eat excellent Texas barbecue in three different restaurants during the trip too.

After every long trip – I celebrate getting home again; that was true for the November travel too.

We had company for Thanksgiving this year (daughter and son-in-law) so it was a shared celebration –something to savor.

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And then there was the pre-staging of December activities that actually started in November: volunteering at the model train exhibit and

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Garden of Lights at Brookside Gardens. I celebrate the season with every child that looks with awe at the trains or giggles with delight at Nessie blowing steam.

South Padre Island and Bay Cruise – Part 1

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Back to the posts about our experiences at the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival…Our fourth day field trip was to South Padre Island and included a bay cruise. The first stop for our bus was at The South Padre Island Migratory Bird Sanctuary. The place is two woodlots across the street from each other and surrounded by hotels and condos on South Padre Island. There are bird feeders and baths…plantings... a ‘rest stop’ for birds. It was very quiet when we first arrived; a Cooper’s Hawk had just caught breakfast and was feasting near the back. The Monarch butterflies were still active.

Eventually the birds became active – since the hawk was busy with its prey. There was a Couch’s Kingbird eating monarch butterflies: posing on the wire for photos. One of the guides had seen the birds eating Monarch’s the previous day as well. Was it the same bird? Supposedly Monarch’s taste bad and make birds sick (chemicals they absorb from the milkweed they eat at caterpillars); something is different about the butterflies or the birds.

Orange crowned warblers shared the space in the bushes and water with the Couch’s Kingbird. These are smaller birds but share the yellow color.

There was a Great Kiskadee as well…more yellow.

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One has to look hard to see the Yellow-rumped warbler.

A Ladder-backed woodpecker posed on a telephone pole.

There was a Hummingbird on an agave…too far way for an excellent image but the bill is dark so probably not a buff-bellied hummingbird. Maybe a Ruby-throated hummingbird female?

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Last but not least – a butterfly. Maybe Great Southern White?

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I have two more posts from this field trip…coming out tomorrow and the next day.

Zooming – November 2017

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In October, most pictures were plants…this month there is a mix but 10 of the 16 are birds! It was hard to not give up and just go with all birds since there were so many in my trek through Texas. Still – I like variety. The locations of the last 6 in the series below will have detailed posts in the next week or so. Enjoy the slide show.

Gleanings of the Week Ending November 25, 2017

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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.

Millions of Free Botanical Illustrations from the Biodiversity Heritage Library – I look at a lot of books digitized by the Biodiversity Heritage Library via Internet Archive – but their Flickr Account is a good way to see images – lots of them. And it isn’t just botanical. There are birds and insects and mammals and people that study them!

Gorging on Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #112, #113, #114 - Three of them!

The Ultimate Guide to the Wild Turkey and The Fascinating Behavior of Wild Turkeys and Tracing the Wild Origins of the Domestic Turkey – Lots of articles about wild turkeys came out before Thanksgiving. These were my favorites.

BBC - Future - How popcorn became a much-loved snack – Learn a little fun history. Who doesn’t like popcorn?

A Short History of the Crosswalk | Smart News | Smithsonian – Another little history of something that is now quite common. Crosswalks didn’t exist until 1951!

Best National Parks – There are a lot of preferences! How many of the 10 ‘most visited’ have you seen. I’ve been to 7 of them. I’ve only been to 1 of the ‘least visited.’

Urban Refuge: How Cities Can Help Rebuild Declining Bee Populations - Yale E360 – Some examples of how urban gardens impact bee populations; it turns out they are measurably positive! 13% of New York State’s bees were found in New York City community gardens.

Paper Engineer Creates Magnificent Pop-Up Cards – Beautiful and fun to watch opening (i.e. the video).

Stunning 100-Megapixel Moon Photograph Created from NASA Images – From the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter…my daughter helped do the initial image calibration on LRO bak in 2009

See a Brilliant Blue Butterfly Take Flight for the First Time – A video of a blue morpho butterfly emerging from its chrysalis and tumbling to its first flight (it may take time to start…but it’s worth the wait!

Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge

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Our third day at the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival did not start out well: our bus has a mechanical problem and our departure was delayed by about 3 hours. Fortunately, the replan included a lengthening of the trip by three hours and provisions (picnic lunch). On the plus side – we avoided some rain showers that moved through while we were waiting; on the negative side – we could have slept later (getting up at 4 AM is common at birding festivals!).  Our destination was the Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge. We didn’t seen any ocelots that the refuge is trying to protect…but we did see plenty of birds. The days was very cloudy and misty – not good for photographing. I picked a few that were good enjoy enough for identification.

There were snow geese coming and going. I liked this line because of the different morphs visible.

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There was a Little Blue Heron fishing in the shallows

And a Great Blue Heron standing on one leg surveying the shore.

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A group of Forster’s terns, with the black feathers around and back from their eyes) were grouped along the shore (looks like the birds behind them were snoozing).

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The Forster’s tern is in the middle of this image. The largest bird is a Caspian Tern and the one in front is a Royal Tern. The Royal Terns I’d seen in Maryland always looked like they were wearing a black cap but that is only during the breeding season…not this time of year in South Texas.

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A brown pelican flew above – following the shoreline.

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White Ibis wandered through the other shore birds.

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The Crested Caracara were new to me. Since the ones I saw on the field trip were a little far away – I took a picture of a captive bird as the Expo.

I took a close up of a prickly pear tuna (fruit)…note the spines.

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Side by side – a Lesser and Greater Yellowlegs.

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We were all on the bus when a male Northern Harrier swooped down into the field beside the road and hovered over prey. I did pretty well taking this series through the bus window since there was no time to do anything better.

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There is a platform where aplomado falcons are nesting. This is an exciting recovery story since this bird was gone from the area for years and has only recently been reintroduced and is breeding again in south Texas. I took a picture of the captive falcon at the Expo just as I had the Crested Caracara.

We stopped at the visitor’s center and walked around the cards there. Red-winged blackbirds are all over North America!

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The white winged doves are summer birds in south Texas according to allaboutbirds but there were still a lot of them around in mid-November; I wonder if they are really year round in the Rio Grande Valley.

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 It was a longer day that we’d anticipated but better than we thought might happen in the hour or so after we initially learned of the bus problem. In the end we decided that the Laguna Atascosa trip was well worth it.

Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge

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The second day of the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival, we did not have any formal field trips scheduled. It was cool and cloudy – not a good day for butterflies, so we shifted our plans back to a focus on birds and headed for the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge.Some of the first things we saw on our hike was insects – still with the cold: two dragonflies

Two caterpillars, and

A queen butterfly…not fluttering about.

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I was pleased to see a land snail on one of the small trees. We’d seen a lot of shells on the ground (i.e. dead) at both Las Estrellas and Rancho Lomitas. We were told that sometimes roadrunners get hungry enough to crack the shells against a rock to get to the tasty morsel inside.

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Ball Moss is something I had never seen. It is like Spanish Moss – also abundant on trees in the refuge.

Then we saw some duck: Northern Shovelers and Blue winged teal.

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A group of chachalaca were in the trees beside the trail. It was hard to get pictures through the foliage and branches…we’d get better pictures on another day.

As we walked across an empty parking lot, we spotted a kiskadee on an electrical line

And then a flash of orange in the trees – an Altamira Oriole was on the move. It eventually made it way to the electrical pole as well.

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The refuge has a swinging bridge through tree tops. On the day we were there, the birds were hunkered down but it was still work the climb and the look down into foliage.

At a bird blind, I finally got some good pictures of the green jay.

We made our way back to the visitor center and had a snack on our way to nearby Estero Llano State Park (topic of tomorrow's post). In this area of Texas there are a series of state and federal lands that make a wild life corridor…more meaningful than each standalone park or refuge.