Cold Hike with 1st Graders

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Last week, I hiked with groups of 1st graders at the Howard County Conservancy’s Mt. Pleasant Farm. It was the coldest field trip of the fall season so far – with the temperature in the 40s. On the plus side – it was a sunny day so it looked warmer that it felt.  

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I arrived early to take some pictures before the buses and put on several layers before I left my car. The leaves are still mostly green.

It like the sunshine on the ferns and seed pods.

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There were still a few flowers late season flowers for the pollinators still around or coming through. Apparently, there are still a few hummingbirds although they are usually mostly further south by this time.

There were several other field trip groups at the Mt. Pleasant on the same day: high schoolers down at the stream and a group of babies/toddlers/pre-K children with parents. All three groups arrived in about 30 minutes: the high school bus then the young group in cars that seemed to fill up half the parking lot (a larger informal group that usual) and then the 2 bus loads of 1st graders, their teachers, and their chaperones.

The students were dressed for the weather and enjoyed hiking. We talked about what lives in trees and saw squirrels and their nests….some birds. We saw the domestic chickens and goats…talked about how they stayed warm and what they ate.

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The children found a snake skin on a stump…and the second group saw a very small rat snake sunning itself on an old stump.

Good hikes and activities…then hand washing and a picnic! What a great 1st grade morning!

Common Buckeye Butterfly

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Last Saturday, I was at Robinson Nature Center about noon enjoying the native plant garden near the front of the nature center. When I noticed a Common Bucky Butterfly enjoying some of the fall flowers.

I took pictures from several perspectives. The colors and markings are very distinctive. It has knobs on the end of the antennae and whitish palpi between its eyes. It’s reported to like flowers with yellow centers…and that it what this individual was enjoying.

The entrance of the nature center has a nice display of fall pumpkins and squash.

I had come to the nature center earlier to participate look at macroinvertebrates in this part of the Middle Patuxent – upstream from the location for the two assessment with high schoolers earlier this week. Two differences: 1) no clams at Robinson….lots of them further down the river and 2) we found a snail…didn’t find any downstream. We found more of everything but that could have been the difference between and adult group and high schoolers….and we had more time to do the project.

In the Middle Patuxent – Day 2

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Last Wednesday was the second day of the week that I volunteered through the Howard County Conservancy to help with a high school Stream Assessment in the Middle Patuxent River off the Kings Contrivance Loop trail; same location, different high school. The day still started out in near darkness…but then it was sunny!

We set up for the macroinvertebrate identification and quality assessment: collection bins and buckets and nets at the river level then tables with identification and analysis materials to the side of the trail.

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I took a river level picture…much better without the rain – although the temperature was in the 50s rather than the 60s like Monday.

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This time the white board worked very well to summarize the macroinvertebrates the students found and identified.

The students took pictures of the critters during the field trip. I let them borrow my clip-on macro lens. One girl had a very steady hand and took video of one showing gill movement. I took my pictures after the students headed back to school. Here are some my favorites.

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Two entwined netspinning caddisfly larvae and a dragonfly larvae

A lot of dragonfly larvae…different instars and species

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Another dragonfly larvae – one that seems to like this particular stretch of the Middle Patuxent. We’ll see if we find any upstream in day 3.

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Several different pictures of the same damselfly larvae. We use ice cube trays to separate the critters while we are identifying them…they are ‘macro’ but not very big!

Two different kinds of mayfly larvae.

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As I walked back up the hill to my car, I savored the sunny day and the near solitude of the walk.

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The feeder streams still had trickles of water. One neighborhood woman that came by before the students arrived told me that the river had gotten bigger in the 30 years she has lived in the area and walked the trail. The river has dug down through sediment enough that it becomes a roaring torrent when it rains hard and rarely connects to its floodplain.

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I couldn’t resist a fall leaf. Most of the forest is still green. We’re still waiting for fall color!

In the Middle Patuxent River – Day 1

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Last Monday, I volunteered through the Howard County Conservancy to help with a high school Stream Assessment in the Middle Patuxent River off the Kings Contrivance Loop trail. It was raining when I left the house before sunrise and continued through the assessment.

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It was starting to get lighter when I arrived at the site and helped to set up for the macroinvertebrate collection and identification.

We discovered very quickly that the white boards would not work in the rain – even if we wiped them off immediately before we tried to write.

Fortunately, the rain was gentle and water still relatively clear. This part of the river is silty…not a lot of cobbles.

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We found quite a few critters. There were at least 3 different kinds of dragonfly larvae; I had never seen the kind with a more rounded abdomen. All the other critters were the more typical ones.

Paper was quickly damaged in the rain. The students took pictures and (hopefully) enough data sheets will survive to make a good composite data set for the class. I took a picture of one of the sheets. The macroinvertebrate analysis done on site showed the river to be in the moderate range.

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The students finished and headed to their buses. As I made my way up the hill to my car, I stopped to look at some of the feeder rivulets along the way (there were bridges although I could have easily walked across these with my boots). There were some signs of erosion along the banks….it wasn’t as bad as I thought it might be after our recent downpours.

There were also some colorful fungi. Orange is seen frequently.

There was an area with a lot of shelf fungi on logs. It was so damp that some seemed to have something green growing on them.

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My favorite was nearby – bright red and orange with yellow on the edge.

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Gleanings of the Week Ending October 20, 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.

Tracking exploding ice cracks on Himalayan glaciers - GeoSpace - AGU Blogosphere – Research about the seismic noise of glaciers.

Researchers have discovered how to slow aging: Natural product found to reduce the level of damaged cells in the body, caused by aging -- ScienceDaily – I never know what to think of these early findings…but the logical take away from this one is eat fruits and veggies since that is the source for Fisetin. But – that’s been dietary guidance for a long time.

Belly Fat Has a Role to Play in Fighting Infections | The Scientist Magazine® - Research is yielding some functions of the omentum…but there is still a lot to discover about the role this organ plays in the body.

Recovery: Prairies Under the Sea – Cool Green Science – Eel grass recovery…a success story close to where I live. The success with sea grass restoration in Tampa Bay faced a setback with this year’s red-tide blooms.

Keep your salad greens safe | Berkeley Wellness – I agree with everything except the ‘bag them’ since I am trying not to get any plastic bags at all. I take a bin with me to the grocery store for wet items and use mesh or paper bags for the dry items. And make sure the meats are in a separate bag from my produce at the checkout.

Voyager 2 Detects Hints That Interstellar Space Is Nearby – Launched in 1977, Voyager 2 is getting closer and closer to leaving the solar system.

The Mystery of the Dying Mesquites – Cool Green Science – Unappreciated trees – dying away – and finally noticed. Too late to be saved?

Decades of Trash Burst Out of Yellowstone Geyser | Smart News | Smithsonian – Yuck! Hopefully we are better now at keeping trash out of the geysers.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week: Birds Feeding – National Geographic Blog – So much to like about birds….in every aspect of their lives.

Hurricane Michael Flooding Damage Assessment Images – From NOAA. Use the sliders on the images to look images before and after the Hurricane.

Ferns under the Deck

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Our deck is over a story off the ground and it always in deep shade. I planted some Christmas fern a few years ago and it is almost overwhelmed with the splash from between the decking above. I think this is the first place I will put compost (as mulch) when it is ‘done’.

I thought he shade would be ideal for the fern and that it would propagate itself. But the muddy mess is not good for anything growing there unless I can find a way to improve the situation. Having mulch instead of mud should be an improvement.

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On the other end of the space under the deck there is some moss growing and maybe some little ferns. I’m not sure. I’ll spread some around them when I disperse my compost. The deer don’t seem to be bothering them so far.

A Few Minutes Observing…a female cardinal

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Taking pictures through my office window with my new camera is a bit more challenging than it was with the old camera; getting the lens camp off takes too much time. But there was a female cardinal that stayed perched on the gutter long enough for me to get a portrait.

It was a cool breezy day and the bird’s feathers are fluffed…the crest is a little rumpled too (a bad crest day?).

I noticed some leaves in the gutter; it’s not clogged yet but it could get that way with more leaves flying in the next few weeks.

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Right now – most of the leaves visible from my window are still green…with a few patches of color. The tulip poplar leaves go to yellow and

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The maple will go to red. Eventually.

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And that was my few minutes observing through the window!

Spider Webs at Centennial Lake

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Spider webs stand out when they have water droplets on the silk – either from dew or fog (or water sprayed by a photographer keen to photograph them). Last week at Centennial Park the water droplets were from fog. I was surprised at how many spider webs I saw along the path…. realizing that there are a lot more spiders around than we usually notice.

Some of the webs had probably caught something since they had gaping holes.

Others were more intact or maybe partially repaired.

As I was getting ready to leave the park I notice a large funnel web near the trunk of a pine. It too was more visible because of the fog. I didn’t see the spider, but it was probably there somewhere. I was so focused on the webs in the trees that I wasn’t looking for the funnels on the ground!

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Mushrooms at Centennial Park

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On the foggy morning I spent at Centennial Park last week, I found some tiny mushrooms in the raised bed across the pathway from the boat rentals. They were growing in the mulch and were ‘fruiting’ because of the very wet conditions we’ve had recently. Some were very hard to spot because their color’s were not that different form the mulch – and they were small. I stood far enough back so that I could use the zoom to photograph them without climbing into the mulch.

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There were some birds nest fungi that were mostly empty nests although a  few of the ‘eggs’ were still nearby.

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My favorites were brightly colored like these very small red mushrooms (note there is a centipede just to the left of the mushrooms).

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My favorites were some tiny orange mushrooms with yellow stalks and edges. They seemed to be glowing – standing out in their drab surroundings.

I walked over to some pine trees near the parking lot while I waited for my husband to finish his brisk walk around the lake. There were some larger mushrooms coming up through the pine needles.

Gleanings of the Week Ending October 13, 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.

Free Technology for Teachers: Frostbite Theater - 87 Science Experiment Video Lessons – Short videos…fun for more than just students!

Sunflower pollen has medicinal, protective effects on bees -- ScienceDaily – Sunflowers – a nice addition to pollinator gardens.

Research forecasts US among top nations to suffer economic damage from climate change -- ScienceDaily – The study found that the top 3 countries with the most to lose from climate change are the US, India and Saudi Arabia. China is in the top 5.

Do MoCA and Other Cognitive Screening Tests Work? | Berkeley Wellness – A short article that introduces some terminology….but not very satisfying. This is not an area where medical intervention has made great strides – unfortunately for an aging population.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week: Birds in Flight – National Geographic Blog – Birds in motion…a photographic challenge.

BBC - Future - Do we really live longer than our ancestors? – Life expectancy has increased because more of our species are making it to old age; life span has not changed much at all through history. The emperor Augustus lived to be 75 in the 1st century (his wife live to 86 or 87 years) and Japan’s Empress Suiko lived to be 74 in the 6th century. Cicero’s wife lived to be 103.

Prehistoric art hints at lost Indian civilisation - BBC News and An Unknown Ancient Civilization in India Carved This Rock Art | Smart News | Smithsonian – The same story from two sources. The first one is more detailed.

The Seven Cs of Education | What's Next: Top Trends – 2 items: the 7 Cs and the nature of creative thinking.

Secondary forests have short lifespans: Most don't last long enough to provide habitat for many forest species -- ScienceDaily – Making large scale commitment on reforestation requires long-term vision….and that appears to be lacking. The study was done in Costa Rica.

Infographic: Light Pollution Threatens Species | The Scientist Magazine® - It not just birds and bats….light pollution impacts a lot of organisms…including us (not the last item on the list ‘desynchronization’).

CSA Share

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The Gorman Farms CSA season is about done but I am enjoying everything in the shares we are getting. A recent share filled the ceramic top of my stove. There are carrots with more top that carrot – but I like the tops in salads and soups; as soon as I got them home I cut the tops off, cleaned them and put them in a plastic bin with the parsley. I’ll eat the carrot tops first since they won’t last as long as the parsley. The carrots themselves will be eaten with hummus for snacks. They were very muddy. Heavy rain and mud has made harvesting more challenging than usual in our area.

I haven’t tried the watermelon radishes yet but I have enjoyed them in seasons past. We’re still getting a couple of onions every week which fits well with the way I cook. I’m a little behind on the winter squash; at some point I’ll cook them all and freeze the pulp to use like pumpkin. There were three tiny versions of butternut squash in this share; supposedly they are even sweeter and cook faster because they are small. The purple cabbages are small – struggling in the soggy fields probably. The peppers are holding strong; there were bell, banana, and roasting peppers in the share. And then there are sweet potatoes…several pounds every week; I’m saving the ones that are cured to eat after the CSA is over for the year. There was quite a selection at the overage table and I picked the fennel; I’ve developed a taste of it…since joining the CSA several years ago; I’d never tried it before that.

Good eating in October!

Foggy Morning at Centennial Park

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Earlier this week, I enjoyed doing some photography at Centennial Park on a foggy morning. The lake was a little high from the recent rains and the fog muted the colors of the trees (still mostly green).

I stopped at a dogwood tree to capture the buds for next season and the seeds from this year.

There were some colorful leaves that showed up better at close range.

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There were some fall flowers at the edge of the lake – somewhat protected from the water run off by a large rock.

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There were not very many birds around:  a few Canadian geese on the lake

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And a mockingbird. Note the small spider web in the picture with the mockingbird.

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The spider webs and small mushroom growing on rotting mulch were the photographic high points of the walk. I post more about them next week.

Shelf Fungus

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There were several tree trunks/branches thick with shelf fungus that I photographed last Friday during my muddy hike in the Middle Patuxent Environmental Area). The first was a tree standing by the river – exposed roots holding it right on the edge. There were at least three different kinds of fungus on the trunk.

Perhaps seeing that tree made me more observant as we hiked further along the along the loom of the South Wind Trail. I spotted some bright orange fungus on some fallen branches beside the path. The color jumped out – a contrast with the greens and browns on the forest floor.

With all the rain we’ve been getting – there are quite a few fungi around…and they are fresh enough to be brightly colored. They are fun to find and photograph. Exact identification is frustrating for most of them, so I am lumping these as ‘shelf fungus’!

Rain and the Middle Patuxent

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Last Friday, I had all my gear prepped and was almost walking out the door when I got the word that the field trip for high schoolers to assess stream health in the upper part of the Middle Patuxent River (in the Middle Patuxent Environmental Area) was cancelled. There was a line of heavy thunderstorms come through the night before and crossing the river on rocks was impossible. It’s been a rough fall for stream surveys with all the heavy rain we’ve gotten. I waited until mid-morning then headed out to see the high water myself – recruiting my husband to go along. It is about 15 minutes from our house.

Like a lot of forested areas in our county, there are scheduled deer management hunts posted on bright red signs. There is a similar one in our neighborhood for the forest behind many of our houses (and down to the Middle Patuxent River).

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The South Wind Trail started out as older asphalt then became grass with some muddy places.

I saw some Christmas ferns under a low growing tree just off the path.

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The closer we got to the river the muddier the trail got. The ground was clearly saturated. It would have become quite a quagmire with 60+ students, teachers, and volunteers hiking down to the river.

At the river the water was higher than I’d see it and foam was floating on the surface. The rocks we used to get across the river where we did most of the sampling were partially submerged…to dangerous to cross the river. The amount of sediment and rapid flow of the water would have made it had to find macroinvertebrates as well.

At first, I thought the gray areas of the rocks close to the river were lichen, but when I looked more closely, the areas looked more like they had been scoured and the lichen might be starting to grow again – very slowly.

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As we continued around the loop to get back to our car, a part of the trail looked like it was becoming a rivulet into the river. Since the water had not made a ditch yet, it might be something that has just happened this fall.

Mushrooms

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Mushrooms are coming up all over. The moisture we got in September evidently provided optimal conditions for the fungi to put up fruiting bodies.

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On the way home from Belmont last week, I stopped along the road to photograph an embankment with visible mushrooms.

As I got closer I discovered some that were not quite as visible. There were at least three different kinds. The largest ones, that were in all stages of development, were what I saw first. The started out as white then began to darken and crack like meringue. Finally, the cap splits. There were some that were still just pushing up – still almost concealed by pine needles.

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There was one that was almost the same color as pine needles.

And puffballs that were in all stages of development.

When I got home, I noticed a large one at the base of a neighbor’s tree. I put my macro lens beside it to show the size and then took a picture of the surface with the lens; it looked like a topography map with rifts between the brown patches!

Brookside Gardens at end of September – part II

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Yesterday I posted about plants…today is about birds and butterflies. We’d gone to Brookside Gardens to photograph hummingbirds – realizing that it was near the end of the season for them. The garden area full of salvias was still full of flowers.

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There were a few birds, but they did not stay long. The only image I managed was a hummingbird in a tree….using the zoom to advantage. The bird looked very rounded and in good shape to continue south.

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I also photographed a male and female monarch (the male has a black node on each hind wing). They too were probably heading south and stopping at the garden to refuel.

Brookside Gardens at end of September – part I

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The growing season is waning, but there is still plenty to see at Brookside Gardens when we went last weekend. Some plants have already produced their seeds – the sumac and sunflowers and castor beans among them.

The magnolia pods are as colorful as the seeds. Some of the seeds have already been eaten by birds or squirrels.

But there are still flowers to see too. I spent time photographing asters with tiny water droplets still coating them from the morning dew.

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But there are other things still blooming as well.

There were some lights that were turned on covering the trunks and lower branches of trees around one of the court yards – evidence that the crew putting up lights for the holiday light show has already started.

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Cooler Days – Little Fall Color

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Here it is the end of September and most of the leaves are still on the trees and green. The ones that have fallen are brown.

Our oak is a good example of that. Looking at the ground it looks like half the leaves have fall but the tree still looks like it has plenty more. (The ruler in the picture is me learning to take better documentary pictures for trees.)

In the back of our house, the red maple has no red leaves. Usually it starts out with a few that show up surrounded by green. But right now it’s still a wall of green although there are leaves on the ground that are brown.

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The tulip poplar usually has some yellow leaves surrounded by green. Some of the leaves look like they might be turning but even the zoomed image looks like a wall of green.

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There are some green tulip poplar leaves that have fallen in recent heavy rains…but overall the tree still has a lot of green leaves attached.

The sycamore has been dropping brown leaves but still has a lot of green ones on the tree. It’s usual the first to drop leaves. This year some are staying on the tree but there are still more green than brown ones.

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We’ve gotten a lot more rain than usual in September (almost 11 inches rather than the historical average of 4.6 inches) and the trees may be impacted by that. There is a lot of mud even in the grassy areas of our yard.

The end of October is generally the time the leaves fly from the trees, so I am still anticipating fall color. It just seems that there are too many brown leaves on the ground already.

Gleanings of the Week Ending September 29, 2018

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The Amazing Ancient Fishes of Africa – Cool Green Science – Lungfish, butterfly fish, bichir, bonytongue…most of them are air breathers!

Thinking beyond yourself can make you more open to healthy lifestyle choices -- ScienceDaily – Maybe we need to psyche ourselves to make better choices!

Japan's Hayabusa2 Spacecraft Successfully Deploys Landers to Asteroid Ryugu's Surface and Bouncing robots land on asteroid 180m miles away amid mission to fetch sample for Earth • The Register  – Exciting stuff from a rover on an asteroid! And the return mission in 2020 will be exciting too.

Molecule with anti-aging effects on vascular system identified -- ScienceDaily – A ketone body was identified that is produced during fasting or calorie restriction. It appears to delay vascular aging.

Free Technology for Teachers: A Good Resource for Learning About the Science of Food – 14 short videos about food research.

Scientists investigate how DEET confuses countless critters -- ScienceDaily – Evidently DEET interferes with organisms’ response to odors thus confusing the organism rather than repelling it!

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week: Birds with Yellow Plumage – National Geographic Blog – I always enjoy the bird photographs

BBC - Future - How to use seawater to grow food – in the desert - An experiment in Jordan to farm with solar powered desalination of Red Sea water for greenhouses cooled as part of the desalination process. Jordan currently imports a high percentage of its food…if this type of farming can be cost effective the country might be able to feed itself and even export some foods.

How leaves talk to roots -- ScienceDaily – When I was in college taking biology courses in the 1970s – micro RNA was not in our vocabulary!

Well-Preserved Roman Road Uncovered in the Netherlands - Archaeology Magazine (more details at https://www.dutchnews.nl/news/2018/09/roman-road-artifacts-found-during-digging-for-a-new-motorway/ ) – New finds like this are always a little surprising…things that were there for a very long time but covered over by a few feet of soil.

Zooming – September 2018

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The zoom on my new camera (60 vs 40 optical zoom…and then comes the digital zoom too) makes it even easier to stand well out of the flowerbed, get a good angle, not scare the butterfly or bee. It’s easier to hold myself steady using the viewfinder rather than the screen like I had to previously. Sometimes I use the monopod…but other times I find that I can simple hold myself steady enough that the camera image stabilization does the rest.

The images I selected this month are from several places: Longwood Gardens, home, Brookside Gardens, and Howard Count Conservancy’s Mt. Pleasant Farm. Some of my favorite places to be.

Enjoy my picks of zoomed images for September 2018!