Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens in June 2017 – Lotus

Our visit to Kenilworth Gardens last week was a little early for lotus flowers – which are the big summer show at Kenilworth. There were lots of big leaves and buds…a few more weeks and the flowers will be numerous.

I was surprised that there were quite a few seed ponds from last season visible in the ponds.

I took a series of bud pictures – surprised that none of the dragonflies were using them as perches as we’ve observed in previous visits (usually in July).

The leaves unfurl like a scroll rather than from the center like some water lily pads. They stand well above the water level as well.

Behind the visitor center and plant houses there was a demonstration pond that was full of blooms. Maybe they were started inside or the demonstration pond is somehow different than the main ponds. Enjoy the slide show from that small pond that is a few weeks ahead of the main ponds.

Previous posts about this visit: insects, water lilies, birds.

Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens in June 2017 – Birds

The dominate bird sighting on our visit to Kenilworth Gardens last week were Canadian geese. They were hard to ignore because of their size and the aggressiveness of the adults in protecting their goslings. They hiss if you are too close – and attack if you continue closer….so we gave them wide birth. We re-routed to other paths through the gardens several times!

When I saw a group on one of the ponds I thought I could get closer and they would just mill around in the water…but then I noticed that another pair with goslings were nearby. I used the zoom on my camera again.

I was disappointed that we didn’t see any herons on this visit. Previously I had photographed both Green and Great Blue Herons in the gardens. I did see a red wings black bird. It was so far away that I only was able to identify it via the zoom on my camera.

And there were cardinals that flitted about in the trees along the boardwalk toward the Anacostia River.

Previous posts about this visit: insects, water lilies.

Cat with a Lion Cut

Our cat (Boromir) has long hair with a thick undercoat. It got increasingly matted after he had jaw surgery several years ago. My husband tried to cut some of the mats but there were an increasing number that were so close to the cat’s skin that they could not be cut with scissors. My daughter suggested we take him to a groomer for a Lion Cut so when she visited us last week, that became one of the ‘to do’ items.  My husband was very anxious since the cat is older, less active, and might react badly to the adventure.

In the end, it was less traumatic for the cat than for my husband. At the groomers, it appeared that half the cat was left on the table! When they got home, he came right out of the carrier and sat on his scratching platform (and he does look a little like a lion with all the fur left on his head and the tuft on the end of his tail,

Got a snack (his lower legs and feet still have the long hair…so he looks like he is wearing boots), and

Watched some television.

We’ve noticed that he has become more active since he got the Lion Cut so the mats in his fur must have been uncomfortable when he moved around. He goes up and down the stairs much more frequently now. He seems to like his new look (and feel).

Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens in June 2017 – Water Lilies

The waterlilies at Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens were the best I’ve ever seen them when we visited the gardens last week. Usually we go for the lotus flowers; the water lilies are already declining their peak blooming by that time. I didn’t take any landscape shots (I realized when I reviewed my ‘take’ when I got home)…focusing instead on the veins in lily pads and the flowers.

The lily pads have a lot of red in them on the underside as they are unfurling. The jumble of plants in the pond often lifts them out of the water at least temporarily. The pads are rarely pristine. I’m not sure what nibbles on them but it is obvious that they are food plants for some (insects, turtles, geese?).

The flowers are always spectacular. I took several images zoomed past the optical range (i.e. into the realm of digital zoom) and that makes them look painterly.

Belmont – June 2017

I was asked to lead a hike yesterday at Belmont Manor and History Park – part of the ‘third Saturday’ program for June. There was a component for pre-schoolers that was done in the Nature Center. The day before the event, I decided to take the trail I’d planned for the hike (make sure things were as I expected). Unfortunately – a path that is usually mowed through one of the fields was not so I had to change my plans for hiking to the stand of Bigleaf Magnolias. I took a close-up picture of a mullein in bloom before walking back to the Carriage House to decide on a new plan.

I walked down the path and into the woods like we do for pre-schoolers. There were some interesting insects

But most of the plants along the way are invasives: multi-flora rose (below), autumn olive, and wine berries.

I decided to play it by ear and let the group that showed up to hike make some choices about what they wanted to do. The staff filled the bird feeders near the nature center so there were plenty of house finches around to observe…and mockingbirds and starlings and red winged blackbirds.

It turned out the group on Saturday included younger children and a couple were wearing flip flops. We decided on an easy hike down to the pond and saw bluebirds and trees swallows on the nest boxes. The bluebird babies were visible through the opening in the box! We also saw dragonflies and red winged blackbirds. The children found several black and white feathers during our hike as well. The younger children and parents went back to the nature center after the hike to the pond and the hike continued up to the Belmont Cemetery. We walked around talking about the research that has been done and spotted a box turtle! It was probably the high point of the hike (other than the birds).

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 17, 2017

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

Lost ecosystem found buried in mud of southern California coastal waters – An ecosystem that had existed for 4000 years died off in the early 1900s – destroyed by sedimentation from coastal land use practices from 1769 onward.

Gigantic Aztec Temple Unearthed in Mexico City – Built to look like a coiled snake. A hotel owns the site.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week # 91 – Do you have a favorite from the bird images this week? I liked the cormorant catching the fish.

Prairie Ecologist Photo of the Week – Poppy mallows and yarrow…and the bug drama on them (Hint: it involves a crab spiders and a fly)

The Chemistry Behind the Opioid Epidemic – It’s not just about heroin any more. Many people became addicts from drugs prescribed by their doctors for pain. I listen to stories on this topic trying to understand why the medical establishment in not doing more to keep people from becoming addicted.

Sounds of Nature in National Parks are being Trampled by Noise – Modern conveniences are noisy. Now that I have a car that operates as an EV most of the time, I am realizing how much car noise is almost everywhere. At least there are beginning to be EV options. In my neighborhood, lawn mowers and leave blowers are big nose emitters.

Art History: The evolution of landscape painting and how contemporary artists keep it alive – Eye candy….I like landscapes in general and appreciated the bit of history….also the artists producing landscapes today.

Climate change could make cities 8C hotter – Wow – the urban heat island effect already makes cities a little hotter than countryside….it gets worse as the countryside gets warmer.

Reading the Neandertal Smile – A study of the dental calculus (calcified dental plaque) of 5 European Neandertal specimens revealed that some were meat eaters, others vegetarians depending on whether they lived in a steppe or forest environment.

The Celiac Surge – This article discusses the rapid increase in celiac disease…and potential causes.

Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens in June 2017 – Insects

We made our first visit of the year to Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens yesterday. There are so many things I noticed in the gardens that I am doing multiple posts: insects, birds, waterlilies, magnolias, lotus, and turtles. There are three types of insects I’ll highlight: bees, butterflies, and dragonflies. The bumblebee I photographed was on a buttonbush. Most of the plants are not in bloom yet so the few lowers were very popular. I noticed that there was only one bee per flower! The pickerel weeds were in full bloom and they were attracting bees as well.

I photographed a tiger swallowtail on the pickerel weed. There were not very many butterflies around the garden yet. Perhaps there will be more as the summer progresses.

The main insect my husband and it try to photograph at the gardens is dragonflies. They seemed to be a lot of them flying around but not as many were sitting long enough to photography. I managed to get at 6 different kinds: greenish area around wing attachment with brownish ‘dash’ near tip of otherwise clear wings,

Could be a different perspective on the same kind…or not (the wing attachment area does not look green and the clear part of the wings has an amber tinge),

Brownish red coloring and smaller than the previous dragonflies,

Fuzzy at wing attachment and black markings across the wings (clear tips of wing) – maybe Common Whitetail male,

Brown body and black markings across the wings (dark tips of wings) – maybe a Common Whitetail female, and

Clear wings outlined in black around the tip.

I’m sure we’ll go to the gardens again this summer. I wonder if I’ll see the same or different dragonflies.

Volunteering at Wings of Fancy at Brookside Gardens I

My first experience volunteering at Brookside Gardens’ Wings of Fancy was earlier this week. It was a ‘trial by heat’ since it was a shift on a hot afternoon for 3+ hours. Before I left home, I collected things to take that would help be stay cool in the conservatory: water bottles with ice in the bottom, a mister, a hat, and a handkerchief. I took some peanuts for a snack. Everything went in a small bag with a penguin (a little psychology…thinking cool).

When I got there, I found a shady place to park (although it would not be shady there by the end of the shift) and took a short walk through the formal gardens. It was noticeably cooler in the shade…very hot in the sun and I was glad I had put sunscreen on before I left the car. I took some pictures quickly as I walked: a magnolia flower,

A pattern made of detritus on a pool of water,

The purple poppies past blooming,

An onion tangle,

A bit of blue in lots of green (and a shady place to stand),

And climbing roses.

Then the water came on. It brightened the colors of the rocks

And the plants in the rain garden area near the conservatory.

The butterfly sculptures marked the entrance to the exhibit.

I went in the staff/volunteer door, got my purple apron and other gear, and put my stuff in a locker. The shift started with a walk through of the stations and unique aspects of the day: slow because of the heat, a group had been due earlier but not arrived, etc. I started at the exit station and migrated to the discovery and caterpillar station (cecropia moth and Julia longwing). It was a slow afternoon with only about 15 people coming through the exhibit over 3 hours. There were times that there were no people at all in the exhibit….those times I wished we didn’t have a rule again cell phones and cameras while volunteering!

It was a good first experience although the next shifts I’ve signed up for are all in the morning. I now know that the two bottles with water frozen in the bottom (and can handlers to help them stay cool) which I fill at the water fountain just before going into the exhibit, will provide cool water for the entire shift and that the mister helps me handle the heat (misting around my neck and arms helps a lot). I also wet the handkerchief to cool ‘hot spots’ that I didn’t want to spray (like my face).

Prep for New Volunteer Gig – Wings of Fancy at Brookside Gardens

I’ve been preparing for a new volunteering experience for the past few weeks – to be a flight attendant or ticket taker for the Wings of Fancy (Butterfly exhibit) at Brookside Gardens. I’d noticed the call for volunteers as the first item on the Brookside web page back in May when I signed up for a photographers session in the exhibit; I talked to one of the volunteers during the session and decided that I would enjoy doing it too.

The process was not hard but more involved that I initially anticipated. The first part was online: signing up for training in the exhibit, filling out information to allow a background check (done now for volunteer jobs that interact with the public), and several e-learning modules about Brookside Gardens in general and then about the butterflies specifically. Last Thursday, I went to the training from 6:30-8:30 PM. It was an unusual time for me to be in the gardens and I got their early enough to take some pictures of the area near the conservatory (hence the pictures for this post). I'll probably take a few pictures before or after each shift - so will see a lot more of Brookside Gardens this summer.Horsetails

The two hours of onsite training were informative. Afterwards I felt like I do after most trainings before volunteering: knowing enough to be dangerous but not nearly as much as I will after I do it a few times. The gardens request 10 shifts (of 4 hours each) over the course of the season and told us that it may take as many as 8 shifts before volunteers truly feel ‘experienced’ in the role.

Stay tuned as I begin my journey as a Wings of Fancy Flight Attendant!

Hike from Mt. Pleasant to the Patapsco River – Part 2

Continuing from yesterday’s post….into the forest we go! The first stretch was down a tree covered slope with lots of leaf litter to a paved road that had a few houses at its end. We were just crossing the road. I paused long enough to take an upward picture of the canopy. We continued downhill to join a trail in Patapsco Valley State Park.

We saw two box turtles along the hike. The first one was in better shape than the second (note the elongated holes in the top of it). The growth rings on the scutes provide an estimate of the age of turtle; the first one is probably younger than the second one.

There were a lot of invasives carpeting the floor of the forest: wavy leaf basket grass with its crimped leaves and Japanese stiltgrass being the most numerous.

I celebrated when I saw native plants like jack-in-the-pulpits, mayapples or skunk cabbage…but there weren’t many of them. They are easily crowded out by the invasives.

We followed a stream down to the culvert under the railroad tracks that brings it to the Patapsco River.

Inside a small hollow log, a fishing spider waited patiently for its lunch.

There are many large sycamores. I took pictures of a leaf newly fallen into the stream and a new leaf on a low branch near the river. The trees are too large to try to photograph in their entirety!

We clamored up the railroad embankment and stood on two tracks to see the river below. There were horsetails (vascular plants that reproduce by spores) growing on the bank by the river.

We didn’t stay long at the river; the bank was too steep to climb down and no one wanted to stand on the active rail road track for long. We headed back uphill to Mt. Pleasant. The line of 30 people elongated as we all set our own pace – going silent in the steeper sections. The day had warmed. By the time I got up the hills, I’d finished the water I carried and headed into the nature center to get more!

Hiking from Mt. Pleasant to the Patapsco River – Part 1

Last weekend – before the higher temperatures came to our area – I joined a hike from Howard County Conservancy’s Mt. Pleasant Farm to the Patapsco River. I arrived early enough to take some pictures with my new camera…make sure the connection between the camera and phone was adding geotags. It worked! After the hike, I used Photoshop Elements to display my pictures on a map and thus the path of our hike (click on picture for larger image).

I took pictures of two places at Mt Pleasant prior to beginning the hike: the plants blooming in the garden near the blacksmith’s shop

And some bluet damselflies at the pool in the Honors Garden…and bright flowers nearby.

The first part of the hike was along a mowed path that eventually went through hay fields with high grasses on both sizes. I’d worn long pants tucked into my socks to avoid ticks but being on mowed paths is still a good idea.

There were signs of civilization in the distance – but it was surprising how quickly signs of civilization are blocked by other vegetation.

My favorite picture for the first half of the hike was this wild chive among the grasses.

There was a butterfly holding onto a swaying stalk – I only got the one angle so am not sure whether it is a spicebush butterfly or a black swallowtail. I like the way the light comes through the wing.

Just before we entered the forest – I turned back for a picture of the mowed grass trail we had just come down. The second half of the hike to the river would be through the forest…and shady. That will be the topic of tomorrow’s post.

New Camera at the Pond

I got a new camera last October before the Festival of the Cranes; Canon came out with a new version already and my husband ordered it immediately – and Cannon Powershot SX730 HS. It has all the features of my previous ones (the 40x optical zoom, for example) plus a screen that is hinged so that it can be angled out from the camera. It will make it easier to take pictures with the camera held lower which is often a better angle for composition. It makes it easier to look through the bottom of my glasses and actually see the screen rather than pushing the glasses down my nose and not used them at all for the screen!

The other new feature that the camera has is Bluetooth pairing with my smart phone to get geo-tagging data (from the phone) in real time to add to the images. I’m still experimenting with it but I think it’s going to work well. I had an older camera that had GPS in the camera itself; since I turn my camera off and on a lot, the time it took the GPS to geo-locate made it almost useless. My phone is on all the time so the location information from it – transmitted via a Bluetooth pairing to the camera – should work better.

My first foray outdoors with the new camera was a short walk down to the neighborhood pond. It is still an eyesore covered with green algae and some trash visible around the margins. As we walked toward it, a red-winged blackbird was making a ruckus perched on a stick in the middle of the pond…then a bigger bird took its place.

Zooming in…I discovered it was a green heron!

It perused the pond then took a hunting stance.

And caught a frog!

A few seconds after gobbling down that meal, it swooped down low over the water and caught something…flew to far bank.

Another frog! The pond may have a huge crop of frogs this year because it has few fish and turtles (to eat the tadpoles)….the heron feasted.

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 10, 2017

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

Is air pollution getting worse or better? – Overall, air quality has improved…but we’ve also learned more about the harm air pollution causes…and there is still a lot more that needs to be done both is improving air quality and understanding aspects that are the most problematic.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #89 and #90 – Two groups of bird pictures. Which ones are your favorites? The first group includes the mating display of the great egret. My favorites in the second group are two of birds in flight: a wood duck and a peacock.

Artist uses fire and smoke to create incredible paintings of birds – More birds....images made with fire, soot and acrylics.

Lavau Celtic Prince: 2,500-year-old royal tomb starts to reveal its secrets – A tomb in eastern France…I liked the pictures of the artifacts as they emerged during excavation.

Insects color our world – Beautiful images….and some tips on actions that can help insects in our environment.

The Kid’s Guide to How the Internet Works – When my daughter was in elementary school 20 years ago, they were beginning to teach children about how the internet works and internet safety. Now it seems like this instruction is even more needed – critical to our children’s wellbeing.

Did children build the ancient Egyptian city of Amarna? – An article about the excavation of a cemetery of children, teenagers, and young adults. Based on the analysis of the skeletons, many have traumatic injuries and degenerative conditions caused by frequent heavy labor.

The US Lags Behind in Meteorology – Europe has forged ahead at a time when the US has cut computing power, research budgets and the National Weather Service. The American weather models are increasingly being discounted for forecasts more than 3 days out.

Antarctica is turning green – Antarctica is warming at a faster rate than the global average…about 0.5 degrees Celsius each decade for the past 60 years. Instead of white, there is more and more green!

Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens – A photo guide to common damselflies and dragonflies – A two page quick reference. My husband and I will use it later this month and in July when we visit Kenilworth – attempting to photograph dragonflies.

Our Yard – June 2017

There were a lot of rainy days in May and June – so far – has been relatively cool here in Maryland. The plants seem to be thrilled. I’ve already trimmed the bush beside our garage and it already needs to be trimmed again. My husband parks his car on that side of the garage and is keen for me to do the job ASAP.

The milkweed in the front flowerbed looks great – and there don’t appear to be any more caterpillars on it. Pooh!

I might cut down the plants toward the front of the bed so that the ‘predator’ lights will be more visible to the deer. So far the gizmo has kept them from eating the day lily buds.

The trees are still getting a lot of new leaves. The new maple leaves start out tinged with red.

The tulip poplar leaves are miniature (somewhat streamlined) versions of the larger leaves. Most of the flowers are fading now and the seed mods are forming.

Our oak tree is trimmed up so high (it’s close to the street and the country trimmed it high enough that fire trucks would not be damaged if they needed to come down our street) that I decided to take a picture of a leave that had fallen. The tree has grown a lot since we moved into our house 20 years ago and I like the shade it provides to the front of the house on summer mornings.

Celebrating the CSA Season

The season for our local Community Supported Agriculture (Gorman Farms) has begun! I selected to pick up my share on the first day available each week and went during the first hour of opening. A lot of other people did the same. Cars were coming and going almost constantly while I was there – not crowded but a steady flow.

I cleaned out the crispers in my refrigerator before I went and was glad I did. There is a lot of green with a few hints of red: lettuce, chard, garlic scapes, tatsoi, pac choi, scallions, kale, and oregano. I chose an extra head of lettuce as my overage item this week since I decided to just enjoy big salads – maybe take off a pound or two while eating the bounty of early summer lettuce.

I saved bins from buying salad greens during winter so I have plenty to use for storing the cleaned lettuces from the CSA for at least a week.

The first meal was a big ‘garden’ salad.

The second meal will be scrambled eggs with garlic scapes – one of my favorite meals after the first CSA distribution of the season. This is my 4^th year for enjoying CSA produce and garlic scapes are one the favorite ‘new’ foods the CSA has provided.

Mt. Pleasant Nature Center Expansion

The construction is complete on the expansion of the Howard County Conservancy’s Mt. Pleasant Gudelsky Environmental Education Center. I was there last weekend for an event held on terrace (upper level in this picture). The Nature Center and offices is below.

The Nature Center can be partitioned or left as one larger area. The flow of the area will make handling school and summer camp groups so much easier.

There are several topic areas: honey bees,

Watersheds display and map with high schools and a few highways overlaid on the rivers of Howard County,

A forests corner,

And a display wall for critter tanks (and a column made from a tree trunk!).

The event on the terrace overlooked the Honors Garden – very green from the recent rain. I liked that the railings were made to contain even small children!

The areas around the building are recovering from the construction. The flower pot people are dressed for summer

And the plantings along the walks are blooming.

Road Trip from Tucson – Part 2

After a good night’s rest in Carrollton, Texas we headed out for two long days of driving to get to Laurel, Maryland. Our first stop was still in Texas: a Love’s in Mt. Vernon, Texas. We both got morning caffeine: coffee for my daughter and a soft drink for me.

The next stop was a McDonald’s in Hope, Arkansas. I remembered to send a text to my husband that we were on the road. We bought French Fries and Chicken Nuggets which I ate while driving. I eat the French fries first from the container on my lap. Then my daughter hands me my portion of the McNuggets.

The next stop was a McDonalds in Cotton Plant, Arkansas. We felt a little guilty because we didn’t buy anything; just used the facilities and continued our drive.

I was in the passenger seat when we were crossing the Mississippi River to Memphis so was able to take some pictures.

We stopped at a very understaffed Exxon travel station in Arlington Tennessee. I bought another soft drink to keep me going.

The only real rest stop of the day was in Benton County Tennessee.

We got to our stop for the night, an EconoLodge in Lebanon, Tennessee, and managed to park in the shade while we ate dinner (so the tarantula and spider stayed cool enough) and were back to the hotel about sunset.

We had a large breakfast so didn’t stop until lunch time (it came a little earlier because of the time zone change). It was a McDonalds but I got a salad this time. I drove while my daughter ate.

We made a stop at a Sheetz for gasoline…and another soft drink for me.

I started eating my lunch and then took some pictures of the greenery in eastern Tennessee throught the windshield.

The next stop was the only rest stop of the day – in Virginia. There was a dogwood near the building’s entrance with fading blooms.

We were close enough to home that we went for 3 hours without another stop. The car was power washed by some rain showers along the way. The road was drying by the time we got home. We staggered out of the car. The tarantula was out of it burrow and seemed glad the vibrations were finally stopping.

It was good to be home again!

Road Trip from Tucson – Part 1

I decided to take pictures at every stop we made along our four-day trek between Tucson, Arizona and Laurel, Maryland. The first one was at the Texas Canyon rest stop – still in Arizona – that we’ve stopped at every time we’ve made the long drive over the past 6 years. It’s the most scenic rest stop of the drive – rocks, blue sky, and

Desert plants.

We didn’t stop at all as we traversed New Mexico – holding out until we reached El Paso, Texas and a Love’s for gas, coffee for my daughter, and a soft drink for me. El Paso has the best highway art (overpasses and abutments) along the drive. The area is very dry – makes Tucson look lush.

The next stop was a rest stop near Van Horn, Texas. It is one of the old style in Texas: not air conditioned or completely enclosed….but beautiful with historical themed mosaics and colorful sandstone walls.

The area is still very dry.

The first day out was a long one so we had another stop at a Love’s in Odessa, Texas

Before heading on to Abilene where we stopped for the night. The sun was going down by the time we picked up our dinner. We parked in the shade and decided that the temperature was dropping enough that we didn’t unload the plants or tarantula that we had in the car.

The increasing amount of available water makes the eastward journey greener and greener. By Abilene there are even some trees!

As we headed out the next morning there were some clouds.

We stopped at a new rest stop. It opened in Spring 2016. It was museum like…air conditioned…no mosaic.

Shortly after the stop, it started sprinkling and then we got waves of heavier rain through Fort Worth. It was misting and then just cloudy for the rest of the day. We arrived in Carrollton…visited with family. I took another picture of the red yucca in bloom…and the sunset. We were glad that the drive between Abilene and Carrollton was a short driving day allowing us to rest up a bit for the next 2 long drive days….which I will post about tomorrow.

Leaving Tucson

After 6 years of graduate school (and completing PhDs), my daughter and son-in-law are leaving Tucson. I went to help them pack the apartment (see moving in containers part 1 and part 2) and then drive with my daughter cross country in a very full car (upcoming posts). I was too busy to do any touring but I did take a few pictures around their apartment and then as we left Tucson for the last time.

They contributed a plant to the landscaping of the apartments; a solanum plant on the ledge of their patio dropped seeds everywhere and one of them grew quickly enough to be large enough (and blooming) that the apartment grounds crew evidently think it is part of the landscaping!

The scenes around the apartment were familiar: The lantana was blooming,

The tall palms caught the morning sun before the rooftops,

The screen of tall evergreens acted as a screen,

The fountain made watery sounds that could be heard inside the apartment if everything else was quiet,

The pinks and oranges of lantana…the shaggy bark of eucalyptus…all part of the walk down to their parking space, and

Crepe myrtle blooming.

We thought we would leave just after sunrise, but Arizona is not on daylight savings time so that became too early. It was still early and the streets of Tucson were mostly vacant as we started our road trip.

We might go back to Tucson someday on a vacation, but it won’t be the same as these past 6 years.

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 3, 2017

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

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #88 – My favorite is the roadrunner with the lizard!

American Trees are Shifting West – Based on analysis of tree inventories done between 1980 and one finished in 2015 and included 86 species of trees.

New York Marine Life Revealed at Brooklyn Photo Exhibition – Underwater views by photographer Keith Ellenbogen….raising awareness of the conservation needs of local marine wildlife and their habitats.

An inside view of Hong Kong’s hidden rooftop farms – Born out of fear of contaminated food! Fresh, locally grown vegetables are a luxury in the big city that imports more than 90% of its food.

Monarch butterflies: the problem with herbicides – Research that looks at the many factors that contribute to the decline of this migratory insect. I know that in our areas of Maryland there are a lot fewer Monarch butterflies than 20 years ago.

It’s Not Easy Being a Hatchling – 3 osprey hatchlings…growing fast….the live cam feed is available here.

New Online Database Catalogues 20,000 Threatened Archaeological Sites – Armed conflict, looting, tourists, construction….there are a lot of sites at risk. The link is an introductory article; the site itself is here.

The future of employment – There are quite a few categories of jobs that will be done by computers rather than people in coming decades. Some – like registered nurses and teachers – will still be performed by people.

Extremely Detailed Macro Portraits of Colorfully Exotic Insects – Insects….done with one shot, not stacked images.

Vacation at Toadstool Geologic Park – Sometimes out of the way places hold a charm found no where else!