Friday, 3 July 2020
Soooo humid. And warm warm hot. So, out early, ahead of the full sun.
Me and this cottontail. Haven’t seen one in a while here in the city.
Strange world, under this mushroom. This space is about a centimeter and a half high.
Wednesday, 1 July 2020
The topography in this immediate area is that at dawn midtown is behind a bit of a ridge, then the sun gets high enough that it blasts he heights of the buildings in midtown. Like this. In this case: a view across the roof of a welding?? warehouse.
I’m amazed by this house…no parking signs on a public street with open parking. And threats of video surveillance. With cameras down the whole block, I assume funded by this resident. Hypothesis.
Sunday, 28 June 2020
Recently I’ve been trying to get out before the sun starts lighting the neighborhood. I may leave before the sun, but it’s usually blazing away by the time I return.
Folks who did yardwork on Saturday and put their bags of organic matter by the curb before heading indoors for a well-deserved cold one, got to enjoy nature’s art this morning…as the overnight rainfall re-sorted objects via curb-river.
The magnitude of the situation: worth no more—or less—than a cat nap.
About fifteen minutes ago we got the all clear on our city water—never was contaminated. Means I can make coffee in the morning…instead of limping along with a mokapot bracer. Lovely, but not the same.
Monday, 22 June 2020
We had a heavy-dew morning.
Then it was just plain humid. And hot.
And storms came through early this evening.
Sunday, 14 June 2020
Good vibes morning sky.
Don’t recognize this tree (shrub?).
Just a bit of mystery to this fence-shadow.
Rain cells came through afternoon and evening, so it’s a good thing I got a nice morning sky photo—evening would have been…drizzle.
Wednesday, 10 June 2020
I left early, as in I’ll walk for an hour and a bit, and be home by eight—another overcast morning (whew), yet humid humid humid. That’s a prescription for early outdoor exercising, if at all possible. Rumor is overnight the weather will change. I won’t be ready for the hot-sunny real thing.
So there I was one foot in front of the other, no coffee yet, trudging at a good pace (is that still trudging?), when I realized that pink and white feathery plant bits were smashed into the blacktop beneath my feet. I looked up: mimosa-in-bloom.
Later, nose down once again, I spotted stump transformation underway. Go fungi!
Friday, 5 June 2020
Perhaps a dozen times I’ve driven this route across the field…the first time there was no path—it was “virgin” grass. Each day, I’d drive it twice, over perhaps ten days. The grass height between the tires, where the tops are brushed by the underside of the pickup, is shorter than to the sides where it was untouched. Grass learns fast, it appears.
I hadn’t ever shot straight down on a lupine. [Got that out of my system, ¿no?]
I got this one right: it’s false Solomon’s seal (Maianthemum racemosum). Edible; didn’t know that.
Dined outdoors at proper social distance with the neighbors. Great sky. We got a special invite because the hunter-fisher-gatherer-gardener had success out on the lake this morning, and they shared. 🧡 A walleye, sometimes called yellow pike. In Canada, it’s a pickerel—although it’s not taxonomically a pickerel.
Thursday, 4 June 2020
I do enjoy these dewy mornings. Conditions weren’t quite right to foster a fog layer in the field…. Love the long shadows.
Of course, it meant that I got darned damp even with knee-high boots during my Eradication and Weight-Loss Spading Fun. It was clear yesterday, although I didn’t acknowledge it, and unavoidable today, that I will not finish removing the infestation. I did a good hour-and-a-half yesterday and today…hard push…just too many invaders. Ah, well, that’s often the way of invasive species removal programs; if I went for burdock and milkweed, too, I’d be…well, let’s just not go there.
Found this busy, noisy bee doing bee-business. On a pink-shaded lupine. Mid-afternoon.
I assume the feather is for luck, good winds, continued health, all that fine sentiment. And for safe travels. Our numbers here at the end of the road have dropped a notch again (safe travels!). Uptick expected Saturday—yay!
Wednesday, 3 June 2020
See those broadleaves among the skinny vertical grass blades. My quarry. Hours of digging remain. This is what weed control can look like.
Enough work. Off to Gitche Gumee on this blue-sky day.
For I don’t know how many years, the mouth of Hurricane Creek has taken a hard bend (sometimes east, sometimes west) before flowing into the Big Lake. This year it’s just a straight descent over the dark rust-red sandstone.
We also ducked (haha) in to check the Refuge, although it was “the heat of the day,” not considered the best for critter-watching. We saw the usual assortment…swans, geese, ducks, and a few other feathered critters we/I didn’t recognize. Several turtles. Two work trucks, yet no tourists whatsoever!
Most swans were bottom-up feeding, although we did see two sleeping (head under wing), and managed to catch this pair heads-up.
Thursday, 28 May 2020
We ventured farther afield…took US2 along the north shore of Lake Michigan. The lake is HIGH, backed up into the rivers that normally flow into it. Of course, until just recently it was very low, and many people are not old enough (raint-raint-bwaaah) to remember normal levels. Such is life in the time of climate change.
One chore was to stop at this hardware. One small tank truck, one SUV, and otherwise a line of pickups. And more pickups on the other side of the parking lot. An unconscious social statement? Probably pretty clogged inside (narrow aisles), but I didn’t go in.
We drove into rain after the hardware, and it is still with us. After everything was unpacked, I finally got a bit antsy and put on boots and headed out for a walk…and found the first lupine in bloom. White! And not a single other plant that I saw even has a bud!
Some kind of pussytoes, the flowerheads weighted down by the rain. I just read in the cyber-land of miscellany that pussytoes (Antennaria sp.) are in the daisy family (Asteraceae), and these plants are connected underground, and so are one, or clones, however you want to describe it. Plants are not animals.
Speaking of plants and seasonal progression…I nabbed a handful of chive-tops to put in tonight’s salad, and discovered they’re already sending up buds. I almost missed that transition, too!
Two because: one to town, one around the property….