Gleanings of the Week Ending March 20, 2021

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

The greatest security threat of the post-truth age - BBC Future – The chilling observation that we might be in a period when “Although information is easily available, people cannot tell whether anything they see, read or hear is reliable or not.”

Top 25 birds of the week: Waterbirds! – From around the world…and the first one is a bird I’ve seen/photographed too in Texas, New Mexico, Delaware and Florida: the American White Pelican!

Diets high in fructose could cause immune system damage, study suggests -- ScienceDaily – Another reason to avoid processed foods….

Easy Nature Adventures to Enjoy Near You – Enjoying the place where you are…outdoors! This time of year, there is a lot of things to see close to where I live and I can choose the places/times to avoid any crowds (still a good thing in this pandemic time until the vaccination rates get much higher and infections begin to plummet).

Stealth Chemicals: A call to action on a threat to human fertility – Evidence has been accumulating…and there are a lot more observable problems at this point. I was glad that near the end of the article, there were recommendations for people trying to have children and/or for young children. And we need to move forward on top-down approaches if manufacturers don’t take near term action.

Helping Birds Adapt to Climate Change in the Nevada Desert – Replacing lost riparian areas after removal of invasive tamarisk.

Earth Matters - What in the World Are Moon Trees? – Trees grown from seeds that were taken into lunar orbit 50 years ago!

Climate Change, Deforestation Hurting Monarch Butterfly Migration : NPR – So many problems for the migrating populations of these butterflies. Soon we might only see this butterfly in areas where they don’t need to migrate to survive the winter.

Remnants of Iron Age Settlement, Roman Villa Found in England | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – 15 cone shaped roundhouses dating from 400 BC and 100 BC and then a Roman villa from the 3rd to early 4th century AD. It must have be a good place to call home over a long time period!

Ice Age Carolinas – Carolina Bays….indicators that permafrost extended for several hundred kilometers south of the ice sheet during the last ice age.

Hugh Thomson – Illustrator

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I noticed Hugh Thomson’s work when I was browsing the Stephen Lucious Gwynn books about Ireland and did a broad search for other books he illustrated. He was an Irish illustrator best know for pen-and-ink illustrations. I browsed 5 books with his illustrations back in February published between 1895 and 1913; I’ve selected at sample image from each one.

The Story of Rosina and other Verses (1895)

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Two historical reflections:

  • Do you prefer the pen-and-ink or the color illustrations? Today we are so bombarded with colorful illustrations/photographs that we tend to expect color…..but the pen-and- ink show a different kind of detail.

  • Based on the Wikipedia entry, Thomson died in 1920 at 59 years old. His career as an illustrator declined with World War I and he was forced to find other work during the last years of his life. I wonder how many people will find the COVID-19 pandemic as disruptive to their livelihood/life plan as previous generations found the World Wars.

As I was writing this blog post, I noticed that the Wikipedia entry for Thomson has a list of selected works that includes links to Internet Archive. Some of the books do not list Thomson in their metadata (i.e. the illustrator was not listed along with the text’s author) so I didn’t find them in my broad search. Hurray! I have some additional Thomson illustrated books to browse!

Reflections on the Mt Pleasant Farmhouse

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Last time I walked around Howard County Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant, I started thinking about the changes around the front of the farmhouse since I first saw it back in fall of 2013. The large tulip poplar in front of the house had already been cut down; over the years I noticed the increased weathering of the stump and its roots have decomposed too. It’s a favorite place to find snake skins and sometimes small snakes…spiders…ants!

The stump to the left was cut closer to the ground in the past few years after the tree started dropping branches and there was concern about potential damage to the farmhouse. I remember a hike with kindergarteners when the tree was still there – me standing about 6 feet away from the trunk of the tree…facing the children and their chaperones a little further from the tree…talking about what might live in the tree….they were talking about the birds and the squirrels…I turned around to gesture to the tree….and there at about eye level was a large black rat snake. What I great teaching moment! I pointed the snake out to the group. The chaperones took a few steps back; the children stayed put at rapt attention. We talked about why the snake might want to be in the tree as it slowly moved from its spot of sunshine on the trunk slithering underneath the loose bark until it was out of sight. Later, after the tree was cut down, some groups tried to count tree rings…others used the spot for a group picture.

The walk up to the front door was added in the year before the pandemic. The front porch is often used as a stop for the younger elementary school hikes and most groups were taking various routes over the grass to get there prior to the construction of the walk. The porch is particularly welcome on rainy days. On one such day before the walk was built, my group made it to the porch as the last stop before lunch; as we turned to go…it started raining even harder; we waited for a few minutes, but it didn’t let up and everyone was hungry. We eventually left the haven of the porch and splashed through puddles toward the nature center building – the revised picnic lunch location.

On the far right…across the gravel drive there is another stump. It was a silver maple that was planted in the later 1800s (based on the tree ring count). It was cut down a before the walk was built There was a ‘twin’ silver maple on the other side of the circular drive what was cut down at the same time (hidden by the cedars on the left in the pictures). The stump on the right was sanded and some steps cut into the side so that the kindergarteners could climb up to see (and count) the tree rings.

My history with the house is a few short years. The house has a longer history with the façade mostly from after the Civil War and there is a log cabin of even earlier vintage enclosed by the additions and modifications made to the house over the years. It’s interesting to think about the highs and lows of the family that lived there…the ways they used the spaces…made changes to fit their needs…the technology incorporated over the years (plumbing and electricity, for example). My few years are a short window into the house’s history!

Green Zentangle® Tiles for March 2021

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St. Patrick’s Day was my prompt for cutting some green cardstock tiles for a March Zentangle project; I cut the tiles to have no waste of the cardstock pages so they are 4.25 x 5.5 inches. I’d got the cardstock from my sister – left over from her teaching days when she retired. The color was dark enough that it required use of gel pens which I generally use only for highlighting - a change of pace (and challenge). The pink gel pen on the green paper was not very appealing to me. Later in the month I started using the black Ultra Fine Sharpie again.

The two favorite tiles from the project were the last ones I created! On one I made flower patterns with the white gel pen then added black auras and green poke leaves with Ultra Fine Sharpies. The other one was a grouping of 5 pattern clumps with connections made with circles, auras, and fills.  

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The Zentangle® Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. It was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. “Zentangle” is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Learn more at zentangle.com.

Mini Road Trip: Mt Pleasant – March 2021 (2)

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Continuing the sights of my mini road trip to Mt Pleasant….

I noticed 3 trees…for different reasons:

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The light on the curling bark of a river birch.

A hole that looked recent in a high branch of a large tree. I wondered if it might be a woodpecker preparing a nesting cavity although I didn’t hear or see the bird.

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The trunk of a red bud…with my regular camera

And then with my phone and a clip-on macro lens.

There were also some interesting vines around small trees and hanging from low branches…natures ropes and knots.

I always enjoy looking for shelf fungus as I walk on forest paths.

My favorite images are ones that capture the structure of the top and underside…the two pictures below are the same group…but different composition. I can’t decide which is my favorite. I didn’t realize that the tree rings were visible until I looked at the images on the bigger screen at home! The grouping was on the cut end of a tree trunk that had been cleared from the trail after it fell.

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As I headed back toward my car – I stopped to photograph the jasmine…the early bloomer near the picnic area and

Some seed pods (not sure what they are) from last season. The seeds have been dispersed but the pods catch the light…become flower-like again.

Overall – it was a very good walk around Mt Pleasant although I didn’t get down and around the meadow…. that is left for next time.   

Mini Road Trip: Mt Pleasant – March 2021 (1)

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I may do more than one mini road trip to Howard County Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant this month since the plants change so quickly this time of year. I also want to photograph the wood frogs in the small pond in the Honors Garden when they start their mating songs; the pond was still silent and empty this time. Everything was still skewed toward ‘winter’ although there were more signs of spring than when I went at the end of February.

The skunk cabbage bloom is fading…the golf-ball-like flowers are turning brownish…maybe seeds are forming.

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Last time I saw the skunk cabbage there was still snow on the ground along the trail. Some spathes that had black areas at the top during that visit now appeared smaller in size…and one spathe was almost totally black; maybe it had been too damaged to continue flowering.

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Overall, there seemed to be more visible clumps of skunk cabbage than the last time I visited the site. Next time I go, I expect there will be green leaves unfurling.

The witch hazel along the drive to the farmhouse is another plant I check this time of year. It’s an Asian variety that blooms in late winter.

The tree keeps some leaves from last season…that provide a more subtle color than the blooms.

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Other ‘sights’ from Mt Pleasant in tomorrow’s post….

Racoon at our Feeder

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Our squirrel-proof bird feeder has been mostly effective against squirrels and racoons. Recently we had our first bird feeder camera recording of a racoon that managed to get seed…for a max of 13 seconds! All the other the racoon visits the animal has gone away totally frustrated.  This time the racoon managed to support most of its weight on the frame of the deck rather than the feeder for those crucial seconds. As soon as the animal grabbed the feeder with both paws….the spring stretched enough to close the access to seed.

Clips of the whole sequence are below. Use the arrows to move back and forth and see the black metal leaf close down over the access hole for the seed as the racoon puts both paws onto the feeder.

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 13, 2021

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Spring is starting here in Maryland…we have a clump of crocus up and blooming in our front flower bed!

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 birds of the week: March 2021 – Starting off the gleanings for this with bird photographs. I found myself looking at eye color as I enjoyed this group of 25.

Satellite imagery shows northern California kelp forests have collapsed – I had read a story about this previously….but this article include visuals: satellite image and underwater images of what it look like before…and the urchin barrens that are there today.

Kauri trees mark magnetic flip 42,000 years ago | Science – Analysis of a tree preserved in a bog. It lived during the Laschamp Excursion (the last time the poles flipped) The climate instability lasted about 500 years.

Giving Wildlife Room to Roam in the Face of Climate Change – The importance on microhabitats in wildlife conservation particularly as climate changes.

Small Particulates From Burning Fossil Fuels Kills 8.7 Million People Each Year – And this is a form of pollution no one escapes….unless you choose to live in an enclosed and continuously filtered environment (like on an planet that does not support life as we know it). Right now, there are areas outside cities that have lower levels of the small particles in their air but eventually the continued increase in particles and circulation within the atmosphere will spread the ever increasing particles over the entire planet.

Even for Solitary Squirrels, It’s Better to Know the Neighbors – Red squirrels that have the same neighbors year after year…live longer! The study was done in a remote area of Canada over 22 years.

Thanks to Etsy, You Can Now Purchase a Gee's Bend Quilt Online for the First Time | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – Folk art…museums…and a modern outlet to improve the artists’ ability to sell their work.

There’s a Koala in the Backyard – A description of what it’s like to have a koala in a tree near homes – serenading.

Geologists Share Their Concerns With Drilling For Oil In Big Cypress – Hopefully the project will not move forward….a national preserve should prioritize the natural environment, not the degradation or destruction of it.  

Eight ways chemical pollutant harm the body – From Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health: oxidative stress and inflammation, genomic alterations and mutations, epigenetic alterations, mitochondrial dysfunction, endocrine disruption, altered intercellular communication, altered microbiome communities, and impaired nervous system function.

Newport Teahouse and Green Animals

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The issues of House & Garden from the second half of 1983 (available on Internet Archive) include pictures from two Newport RI places that I visited back in 2014…and I always like to find places I’ve visited in magazine pages:

Green Animals Topiary Garden (my blog post from October 2014 and the official site). It was one of my favorite places because it was outdoors…and so different from the ostentatious houses.

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Chinese Teahouse at Marble House

(the official site and my blog post with depictions of the Tea House published in the 1916 Architectural Record that includes some of my photos from 2014). I only saw the outside in 2014 so it was interesting to see the picture of inside from 1983 and the ‘Votes for Women’ cup from its association with the suffrage movement.

Another significance for these issues – my husband and I had just made our big move from Texas to the east coast (Virginia) in 1983. We had moved into our house at the end of June and within a couple of weeks, the air conditioner compressor stopped working! As I browsed through the 1214 pages of this volume, I remembered that I would have been way too busy to have noticed them at all in 1983 (unless they happened to be available to thumb through while I was waiting for an appointment). Here are some other images from the volume that I am enjoying so many years later!

A Year in COVID-19 Pandemic

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It’s been a year since the WHO declared the COVID-19 Pandemic. This time last year was chaotic with shortages in grocery stores and trying to figure out how to reduce our risk of getting the virus; in March 2020 even the medical professionals didn’t always have the equipment they needed to protect themselves and the public was not yet being encouraged/mandated to wear masks. Shutdowns were just starting.

A lot has happened since then. For some, the impacts of the pandemic year will continue for a long time. For me – I am more aware than ever of how fortunate my family has been to stay well and to now be getting vaccinated. My parents and nieces were the first to get vaccinated; my parents because they were over 75 and my nieces because they are medical professionals. Then my sisters and me.  My husband and I managed to make an appointment to get vaccinated the first time our county health department notified us that appointments were available to us (notified on a Sunday and appointments were available on Friday…we took the first available). We got the first shot of the Moderna vaccine last Friday and already have our appointments for the 2nd dose; we’ve been recording our side effects (minor) using the vsafe.cdc.gov tool. My daughter and son-in-law got the Johnson & Johnson vaccine last Saturday. They experienced a few more side effects – were glad they had the Sunday to rest – but were able to teach their classes at the university on Monday.

In our state (Maryland), the rollout of the vaccine seems a little chaotic, but it appears that a lot of people are anxious to be vaccinated and the supply is slowly increasing. The state has scaled up the capacity for getting shots in arms by increasing the number of sites providing vaccines. I was in the throes of trying to figure out when pharmacies got supplies of vaccine so I could make an appointment when we got the notice from our country health department. The site my husband and I went to was well organized and kept people moving through with plenty of distancing. We filled out a survey and made our second appointment via our phones while we were waiting the 15 minutes after the shot.

In the past month – I have started mini road trips to get used to driving again. It’s a great time of year to begin to get out and about more…choosing outdoor activities and locations where there are not many people around. Howard County Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant and Brookside Gardens have been my favorite destinations so far.

I have started wearing KF94 masks that fit me better than any of the cloth ones I have.

As soon as I am fully protected by the vaccine (in mid-April), I will be taking a road trip to Dallas to see my parents. The CDC’s recent guidance has helped me begin planning the trip. I will be wearing my KF94 mask during times I might encounter other people on the road trip down – to protect others…and to reduce the risk to myself from any variants that the vaccine might not handle effectively. I’ll get takeout or drive through food rather than going into a restaurant. And then I’ll stay in Texas for several weeks for a good visit and maybe get some projects done for my parents while I am there. My Dad will be reaching the 90 year milestone this month.

I enjoyed 3 birding festivals in one weekend during the past month: Laredo, Niagara, and Bosque del Apache. It was a very cold weekend…the webinars a welcome distraction. I am continuing some webinars but skewing toward more outdoor time in the coming weeks.

I am also preparing to resume my volunteer activities. The organizations have changed and are offering training for the programs they are doing now and anticipating the ramp up as more and more people are vaccinated and the infections continue to drop in our area.

The % positive from testing in Maryland is the one I am using to decide if I will resume going into the grocery store rather than doing curbside pickup. Right now, it is looking good so I might do my own shopping next week! I enjoy picking out my own items…automatically picking substitutes on the fly rather than interacting via texts with a shopper. And I like using my own reusable bags; we’ve been accumulating a lot of paper bags recently!

In the next week or so, the US will pass the 100M vaccines administered milestone (https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#vaccinations ) and the trends of infections/deaths are declining. Good news…and there is a lot of work being done to help it continue.

Macro Landscapes

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On my recent walks around the yard, I’ve been noticing the tiny landscapes on the ground….the greens of very early spring. The moss under our deck stays green all winter and now there are tiny plants (clovers and mock strawberry) coming up through it. They’ll stay low growing so we’ll never mow the area.

A patch of moss can also be found near our chaos garden. It appears to be more yellowish (maybe got too dry) with red seta…the  sporophyte that was at the top of the seta is already gone (i.e. the spores long dispersed). The grass is beginning to grow around the moss and it will eventually be in the path of the lawn mower.

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There are some weeds beginning to grow too…..coming up in the grass, tulips poplar seeds, and rolls of sycamore bark. The mowing will keep it short. I tend to leave weeds like this…hoping they have deeper roots than the turf grass…better at holding the soil on the slope.

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The soil a few feet away from the chaos garden must be rich in humus since there seems to be a puff ball or two every year. This one is from last fall. I remember finding it when I was mowing the leaves! It has collapsed but somehow managed to stay relatively intact through the winter. Underground the mycelium is growing and decomposing the humus further with the help of microbes….the makings of healthy soil.

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The daffodils are up in the oak leaves, old day lily leaves, and tulip poplar seeds in our front flower beds. Maybe I’ll cut a few of the flowers this season to bring their springtime indoors.

There are the usual ‘weeds’ in the same beds. I recognize the mock strawberry. There is a chance that some of the others could be black-eyed susans which I  want for the bees and butterflies during the summer.

There are a few crocuses coming up. There are fewer every year. One came up last year out in the yard…the bulb probably moved there by a squirrel.

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I looked closely at the joint between the driveway and our front walkway – lots of tulip poplar seeds there. They had made enough ‘soil’ for a small clover and some mock strawberry to grow. And there was a worm using the crack as a highway between the lawn and the flower bed; it was heading toward the flower bed….a much richer place for the worm!

Finally, I checked the bush at the corner of the garage. I’ve been nurturing a young holly to take over for the old bush. I discovered a plant growing in the stump of the old bush…a sure sign that it is rotting. I’ll be cutting it closer to the ground and let the holly take over completely.

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Overall – these macro landscapes look more springlike than our trees at this point. I’ll wait a few more weeks to photograph the large scale spring landscape.

Found Feather

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I was out in the yard picking up sticks and sweeping the deck on a sunny afternoon….and found a feather in a pile of tulip poplar seeds. There were no other feathers around so maybe this one fell out as part of a molt rather than a predator/prey interaction. The tip was in relatively good shape, so it probably had joined the pile of seeds sometimes after the last rain. I took it inside to photograph.

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The feather had a lot of down near the base.  Using my 65x magnifying lens with a light clipped to my phone – it is easy to see the structure of the fluff!

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The part of the feather near the tip had even more structure although there are already parts of the feather than have split apart…and small debris. If the feather were still attached, the bird would be preening to correct both imperfections. Once a feather falls out, it doesn’t last long in the natural world.

Mini Road Trip: Brookside Gardens – Part 2

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This time of year, I always check the witch hazels…small trees that are blooming along the path away from the visitor center toward the conservatory. They have unusual flowers with ‘streamers’ away from a deep red center. It was a little too cold when I was at Brookside to see any pollinators – but 10 degrees warmer and the early insects would be visiting the blooms.  

The color of the streamers varies from yellow to red. I think my favorites are the combination…the yellow orange. Evidently the flowers are very weather dependent and last longer if there are cold spells!

I tried an experiment with the high key technique…the sun behind the flowers and overexposing. The increased detail of the center of the flower was good but the background was too noisy and the compositions are not great; I got cold….rushed too much. Maybe the blooms will still be around next time I go to Brookside and I’ll try again.

Mini Road Trip: Brookside Gardens – Part 1

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The mini road trip to Brookside Gardens last week was my first time back to the gardens in over a year. It was in the low 50s, sunny and breezy – I typical early March day for our area of Maryland. The outing started out with a group of five robins looking for worms in our front yard as I drove away for the house – a great indicator of early spring. There were not as many people at Brookside as there had been at Centennial Park and almost everyone was masked and maintaining distance; it was a more comfortable situation…and I took so many pictures that there will be a second post about the mini road trip tomorrow.

On the walk from the parking lot toward the visitor’s center, there was a bird’s nest from last season in one of the young trees. I’ll see the spring action at Brookside this year that I completely missed in 2020!

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It’s still early in the season – but there are some flowers to photograph in the gardens already.

There are plants that stay green through the winter too. I always enjoy the profuse stand of horsetails planted in one of the beds at the visitor center.

The tall sycamore uphill from the conservatory has been cut to a tall stump. It had struggled in recent years with some the higher branches being leafless/dead. The stump has been fitted with a mask and googly eyes!

There was another tree I noticed had been cut down too! I’m glad they left the roots and short stump…wonder what will come up around it in the bed.

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The hydrangea flowers from last season were prevalent….and seem to always draw my attention;  their flowers are so large and they last, in dried form, through the winter. Maybe I’ll plant some native hydrangeas at my house…although the deer that come through our yard would gobble them up if they were not protected with fencing.

Tomorrow I’ll post about the witch hazels blooming at Brookside!

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 6, 2021

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

America’s First National Wildlife Refuge – Pelican Island National Wildlife Refuge….I’m including it in our plans for the next time we go to Florida; it’s about 1.5 hours to the south of Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge which is always one of the places we visit in Florida.

Highly functional membrane developed for producing freshwater from seawater: A desalination membrane laminated with nanosheets featuring 2D nanochannels -- ScienceDaily – Still in the research stage. Maybe this is one of the technologies that will enable low-energy desalination - something we will need to avoid water shortages in many areas of the world.

A mild way to upcycle plastics used in bottles into fuel and other high-value products -- ScienceDaily and How Paving with Plastic Could Make a Dent in the Global Waste Problem - Yale E360 – Two articles about uses for the plastic waste that is overwhelming the planet right now. There still needs to be significant testing on plastic for paving: will it withstanding heavy traffic…will it shed microplastic particles, etc.

Pompeii's Museum Reopens With Dazzling Display of Archaeological Treasures | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – I enjoyed the article…and the website for the new museum.

A large number of gray whales are starving and dying in the eastern North Pacific -- ScienceDaily – Ongoing research but one explanation being explored in a decline in prey (i.e. amphipods) availability in their Arctic feeding grounds – maybe caused by warming there due to climate change.

For the Birds: Why Designing for Birds is Good for Everyone - News | Planetizen – Fast Company interviewed Tim Beatley about his book; he was one of the speakers at the Birds on the Niagara conference.

Wombats Poop Cubes, and Scientists Finally Got to the Bottom of It | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – Over 40,000 contractions as the feces moves down the intestine to shape a very dry cube. Evidently the cube shape is an indicator of wombat health!

Water Warning: The Looming Threat of the World’s Aging Dams - Yale E360 – Lots of people live downstream from big dams. Yikes! Decommission of dams is not easy…arguably it could be harder than the building of the dam originally.

Thousands of Wild Bee Species Haven't Been Seen Since 1990 | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – Most of the data came from Europe and North America….with some from the rest of the world. All of it sums up to a grim picture when it comes to bees.

Yellowstone's Hotspot Has Been Simmering For About 17 Million Years – An example of how continued data collection and study…can shift our understanding of geologic history even in areas like Yellowstone that have been studied for a long time.

Mini Road Trip: Centennial Park

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On a recent sunny afternoon – I headed out on a mini road trip to Centennial Park. Others had the same idea; the first parking lot I went to was full; there were plenty of spots at the second lot I checked. There were more people than I expected; most – but no all – were masked. This mini road trip was the trial of wearing a KF94 mask with a second mask on top for me; I’d put the masks on before I left the house. I walked across the street after my pace was halted by a young woman stopped in the middle of the sidewalk to coax her reluctant dog to walk; I took a picture looking up the trunk of a gingko tree; the long buds with a rounded tip look like they’ll have tiny green leaves emerging soon.

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I went back to the sidewalk intending to take it to the main trail around the lake but that seemed like what everyone was doing and I was not keen to walk at the pace of the crowd to keep the distancing between groups. I was more interesting is finding at least one photographic opportunity which I saw almost immediately…under some pine trees near where I parked: pine cones in the grass and needles!

I found one that I photographed with my normal settings…then with special filters: art bold and water painting.

Before I turned back toward my car I took a picture of an empty picnic table. It was too cool for sitting around….people were out moving about and enjoying the sunshine.

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It was too crowded for me to spend more time at the park. I accomplished my goal for the mini road trip: get used to the mask configuration and re-familiarize myself with driving my car! I’ll be doing more of these short outtings over the next 6 weeks or so as one step toward a new normal I’ll  have post-vaccine.

eBotanical Prints – February 2021

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20 new books for the botanical prints list in January – all from Internet Archive. I started through the magazines of the Arnold Arboretum (Arnoldia) toward the end of January and all 20 of the ‘books’ for February are that magazine…and the browsing continues in March.

These volumes are from the past few decades rather than the past few centuries which is often the case with the eBotanical prints monthly posts. There is one image for each of the 20 new books; click an any sample images below to get an enlarged version. Enjoy the February eBotanical Prints! The whole list of 2,084 eBooks can be accessed here.

Arnoldia -  v.74:no.3 (2017) * Arnoldia -  v.74:no.3 (2017) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2017

Arnoldia -  v.74:no.4 (2017) * Arnoldia -  v.74:no.4 (2017) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2017

Arnoldia -  v.73:no.4 (2016) * Arnoldia -  v.73:no.4 (2016) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2016

Arnoldia -  v.73:no.3 (2016) * Arnoldia -  v.73:no.3 (2016) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2016

Arnoldia -  v.71:no.1 (2013) * Arnoldia -  v.71:no.1 (2013) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2013

Arnoldia -  v.71:no.2 (2013) * Arnoldia -  v.71:no.2 (2013) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2013

Arnoldia -  v.71:no.3 (2014) * Arnoldia -  v.71:no.3 (2014) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2014

Arnoldia -  v.73:no.1 (2015) * Arnoldia -  v.73:no.1 (2015) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2015

Arnoldia -  v.73:no.2 (2015) * Arnoldia -  v.73:no.2 (2015) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2015

Arnoldia -  v.74:no.1 (2016) * Arnoldia -  v.74:no.1 (2016) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2016

Arnoldia -  v.74:no.2 (2016) * Arnoldia -  v.74:no.2 (2016) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2016

Arnoldia -  v.71:no.4 (2014) * Arnoldia -  v.71:no.4 (2014) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2014

Arnoldia -  v.32 (1972) * Arnoldia -  v.32 (1972) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 1972

Arnoldia -  v.34 (1974) * Arnoldia -  v.34 (1974) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 1974

Arnoldia -  v.62:no.1 (2002) * Arnoldia -  v.62:no.1 (2002) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2002

Arnoldia -  v.62:no.2 (2003) * Arnoldia -  v.62:no.2 (2003) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2003

Arnoldia -  v.62:no.3 (2003) * Arnoldia -  v.62:no.3 (2003) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2003

Arnoldia -  v.63:no.1 (2004) * Arnoldia -  v.63:no.1 (2004) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2004

Arnoldia -  v.63:no.2 (2004) * Arnoldia -  v.63:no.2 (2004) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2004

Arnoldia -  v.63:no.3 (2005) * Arnoldia -  v.63:no.3 (2005) * Arnold Arboretum * sample image * 2005

Last Snow of February 2021

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It snowed for a short time on the 22nd – the last snow of the month. I was disappointed with my first foray out to photograph snowflakes.

They looked like pellets although not always sleet spheres like I had photographed earlier in the month. They were very white…and I could see that some were hexagonal even without magnification.

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When I used my clip-on magnifying lens with my phone – I saw that they were indeed heavily encrusted snowflakes. They were thick enough that the shallow depth of field with the magnification meant that parts were out of focus.

I tried again 30 minutes later and was surprised at how different the flakes looked. They were still encrusted but not as heavily. The temperature was warm enough that there were clumps of icy flakes --- pieces of structure.

My favorite image of the morning was taken during the second session. The lighting caused a little aberration, but I like the glitter of the ice…and the overall shapes.

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At dusk of the same day, the snow was still on the ground as the deer came through; they never stop for very long in our yard. This time they stopped for long enough for portraits. I’m quite sure the animal in the second image saw me in my window!

Overall – it was a winter’s day to enjoy…my routine pursuits with the added spice of snowflake photography and noticing deer staying a few minutes longer than usual in our back yard.

Mini Road Trips: Mt Pleasant – February 2021

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I visited Howard County Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant twice in February. The first attempt was a beautiful day – one of the warmest in February. It was a little traumatic because when I attempted to leave my house, my car’s battery was low; I decided not to hike – just make the round-trip drive to let the battery changed again.

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I took a picture of the river birch in the rain garden near the parking lot through the windshield.

The next day was colder but I was intent on hiking…seeing the skunk cabbage again about a month from when I’d hiked to see it back in January. The paths were often muddy and sometimes snow covered. I was glad my hiking boots were waterproof!

The approaches to the bridge over the stream near Hodge Podge Lodge were very muddy but I managed to step on and off onto vegetation. There seemed to be more sand than decaying leaves in the stream bed below the gentle ripples.

The area where the skunk cabbage grows is a low spot where a seep creates a muddy spot then forms the beginning of a stream that feeds into the Davis Branch. There are skunk cabbage plants in the muddy part and then along the tiny trickling stream. It takes a little hunting…watching your step to avoid stepping on plants emerging through last summer’s vegetation.

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There seemed to be about the same number of plants as in January. Some appeared to be damaged at the top by the recent very cold days. The plants create some heat chemical and pull themselves deeper in the muck to survive cold days…but the top part of the spathe would probably always be above the muck.

I did manage to zoom in on one plant that had a visible bloom! They look like a golf ball inside the spathe!

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I’ll make at least one more hike to see the skunk cabbage….try to photograph some of the first leaves unfurling.

Zentangle® – February 2021

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I created a lot of tiles in February – not counting the Valentines themed tiles I already posted. I am continuing my theme of utilizing tile material completely (modifying tile sizes that I cut to leave no small pieces of card stock/cardboard unused. I also started making two-sided tiles when the cardboard is ‘blank’ on both sides; these will lend themselves to hanging mobile type displays eventually. All the tiles were physical ones this month and I will probably continue that way until I use up the Ultra-Thin Sharpie set that I’ve had for a few years now; some of them have run out of ink already.

Most of the tiles were made without a plan in mind….I like to start with a pattern and then build a tile from the middle out – or start with a frame…with or without a string. Often I am surprised at various stages along the way – when I finish the drawing in black ink….when I finish ‘coloring’….when the highlighting as been added as a last pass. Sometimes the parts that remain as black lined patterns are a frame or simply the background. The white lines always draw my eye.

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The Zentangle® Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. It was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. “Zentangle” is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Learn more at zentangle.com.