May 02, 2020

2020 - Gleanings

May 02, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Downloading Woody Plants of the Northern Forest by Jerry Jenkins. The Northern Forest Atlas organization has 3 digital atlas guides: woody plants, mosses and sedges. They are available as free downloads (PDFs). The images are wonderful…the downside is that the guides are HUGE because of the high quality images. The woody plant guide is 630 MB. Put the download in a place you will remember to retain it as a reference (and avoid downloading it again).

Browsing the books illustrated by Frederick Richardson on Internet Archive. He illustrated books in the early 1900s. The samples below are from Edith Ogden Harrison’s The Enchanted House and Other Fairy Stories.

Walking laps. It’s been very wet here, so I’ve been indoors more. I’ve plotted various circuit paths through my house to get some exercise! I do laps for 5 or so minutes every hour…or that is the general goal.

**Receiving a new office chair**. My constant bouncing on the Swopper stool at my computer had recently started to bother my back rather than sustaining my back muscles….so I opted to move to a more traditional office chair. We had one that was over 30 years old that I thought might work but the height adjustment no longer functioned. My husband found a new chair from Staples…ordered it…and it came to our front porch within a day or so. It’s now assembled and will be the chair at my computer. The Swopper will still get used daily….but not as heavily as it has for the past 10 years!

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the weekly gleaning list….

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.

Deep Sea Squid Communicate with Glowing Skin: NPR – The video is a little over a minute…deep sea footage of Humboldt Squid taken by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Institute off the California coast.

To Cut Carbon Emissions, a Movement Grows to ‘Electrify Everything’ - Yale E360 – All-electric new construction…preparing the way for dramatic reduction of fossil fuel consumption.

Top 25 birds of the week: April 2020 - Wild Bird Revolution and Top 25 birds of the week: Blue Feathers - Wild Bird Revolution – A double dose of bird photographs this week!

Enjoy the Red-Winged Blackbird Show – I saw red-winging blackbirds on one of my walks in the neighborhood – at the storm water retention pond. There was a bit of drama I’ll share in a post next week.

The Hidden History in My Backyard – A history of a Florida backyard/neighborhood. I am content with the idea that my back yard was a forest….and that there is still a swath of forest down to the river.

Skulls from the Yucatan Peninsula a Clue to Early American Settlers | The Scientist Magazine® - Analysis of Quintana Roo skulls from people that lived 13,000-8,000 years ago…found in underwater caves that were above sea level at that time.

Pictures of Redwood National and State Park – Huge trees – always awesome.

Southwest Drought Rivals Those of Centuries Ago, Thanks to Climate Change - The New York Times – The last sentence is the bottom line: ‘We don’t have the whole story on Southwestern hydroclimate nailed down.’ The article talks about the analysis we have now….it probably means that the population growth in the Southwest happened at a time that was unusually wet, and that it won’t be supportable into the future.

Insect wings hold antimicrobial clues for improved medical implants -- ScienceDaily – Beginning to understand how nanopillar structures in cicada and dragonfly weeks kill bacteria on contact.

What chemical analyzes of human bones tell us about kitchen utensils in the Middle Ages - HeritageDaily - Archaeology News – Copper in bones….shows continuous exposure for cooper from AD 800 to AD 1800…consumed in daily diet prepared in copper cookware!

May 01, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing – 4/30/2020 - Zentangles

May 01, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Drama with irises. Day before yesterday I counted 5 stalks of iris buds in our flower beds…was thrilled with the prospect of having flowers this year.

When I came downstairs yesterday morning, one of them was gone! I wondered what would have eaten the whole upper part of the stalk and went outside for a closer inspection. I discovered that the stem had broken off and the upper part was hanging by a thin fiber down in the mint and daffodil leaves! Now the bud stalk is in a glass of water beside my computer monitor. It probably is not far enough along to continue its development…but I’ll enjoy the gentle curves of the bud for a few days. I checked the other 4 bud stalks and they are still intact.

Getting a grocery delivery on a rainy day. Usually we have the bags placed on our porch but yesterday was a blustery rainy day, so I changed the delivery instructions to have the shopper put then in the garage in the open hatch of my car. After they left, we retrieved the refrigerator items and then closed the hatch on the non-perishables to let them sit for few days to let any virus particles die.

Finding an article about starting an herb garden in the April 7, 1952 Life Magazine. Available from the Internet Archive here. Click on the images below to see them in a larger view. This is still a good list today although I use some more than others: basil, dill, chives, thyme, rosemary, oregano and mint. I have some mint coming up in my flowerbeds that I might start using in my morning smoothies!

Receiving an email from the grocery store about a new way to shop with them – once I start doing my own shopping again. It involves an app on the phone that allows scanning and bagging into your own bags while you shop then checking out at a self-checkout register. It will be another month at least before I start going to the grocery store again – but this app is another element of the strategy when the time comes along with a mask, disinfectant wipes and hand sanitizer/washing. Basically, this app enables ‘contactless’ shopping!

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

Now for the April 2020 collection of Zentangle tiles…

I picked 30 since there are 30 days in the month. Only 4 of them were done on the iPad (the ones with the black background). The other tiles were all from recycled materials – lightweight boxes, pocket folders (the yellow ones) or dividers between small cans of cat food (the rectangles). It was not a huge month for Zentangle tiles – which surprised me a little. I have been at home and thought there might be times I would do a lot of tiles in one day but somehow I’ve developed enough other activities to not lean on tangling to keep myself occupied.

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.

April 27, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/26/2020 – Through the Window

April 27, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Registering for virtual events. Just as I was beginning to miss birding festivals and the annual Master Naturalist training day – offerings of virtual alternatives appeared in my inbox! The registration was minimal, and I don’t have to be anxious about what the pandemic situation will be in late May and June. They are both on my calendar!

A birding festival. New Jersey Audubon has re-imaged their Cape May Spring Festival to a virtual event on May 23rd and 24th. My husband and I will enjoy the new (safer this year) form of the festival and hope to go back to Cape May next spring to enjoy the outdoors and birds like we did in 2019.
A climate change education conference. The Mid-Atlantic Climate Change Education Conference is also going virtual (June 29-30).

Surveying the yard. (Happened on the 25th…but I didn’t have time to write about it then). The weather was dry and in the 60s – a good day to get out and do some yard work. I used the electric hedge trimmers and worked on the bushes in front of the house for about an hour….and then walked around for some nature photography: there are 2 iris buds! Once they start opening, I plan to cut the stem to enjoy inside…avoid the trauma of having the deer eat them.

There was also a small weed blooming in the flower bed…which I left.

20200425_142530(0).jpg — There are so many tulip poplar seeds flying around – inevitably, some of them produce seedlings. Repeated mowing handles the ones in the yard but the ones in the flowerbeds must be pulled. They make awesome specimens for the tree module of pre-school field trips…which are not happening this year; they make the point very well about how much of the tree is underground! These ‘baby trees’ went back to the brush pile after I photographed them.

20200425_144040(0).jpg — Some reddish clover like plants are growing in the grass and moss on the shady hillside to the north of our house.

Near the steps down from our deck – some evidence of a bird’s demise. I hope it wasn’t the phoebe that was a frequent morning visitor to our sycamore.

Under the deck, the Christmas fern is full of fiddleheads – new spring growth.

I did an ‘intimate landscape’ picture of moss (dead and alive) and violet leaves.

The photography was a great finale for my yard work.

Watching a crew take down a dead pine tree in our neighbor’s yard. The tree was obviously ailing last summer and the few needles still on its branches were dry and brown. It’s good to have is down before it fell during wet and windy weather…maybe smashing into a house or fence or storage shed.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the monthly ‘through the office window’ post…I was at home for the whole month so there were a lot of photographs taken through my office window to choose from. Birds were the primary subjects: Carolina chickadee, brown-headed cowbird, dark-eyed junco, Carolina wren, common grackle, cardinal, American goldfinch, house sparrow, red-belled woodpecker, eastern phoebe, mourning dove, house finch, rose-breasted grosbeak, downy woodpecker, and chipping sparrow.

The red maple’s samaras ripened over the course of the month. Click on the middle picture below to ID the bird munching on the seeds.

And there was one sunset picture in the mix. Overall - it was a good month for photographs through the window!

April 26, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/25/2020

April 26, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Spotting a Rose-breasted Grosbeak. The bird was a on the gutter of our covered deck initially – then on the feeder. This is a first sighting for this species at our feeder. I managed to tell my husband in time for him to see it too. It was the most exciting event of the morning! The bird flew off to the maple tree then returned several more times during the morning. It was assertive enough to drive away the cowbirds!

Catching up on Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series:

Reflecting on my own wardrobe over the decades. After finishing the Fashion as Design Coursera course, I am doing some thinking about my wardrobe history. What was memorable about each decade (after I was old enough for clear memories).

1960s

I started school in 1960 so a lot of my growing up was done during the decade. I can remember learning to iron my clothes early on but being thrilled later with synthetics that did not need to be ironed. Underwear and socks were ordered from Sears as needed, but we shopped in local stores for clothes and shoes. I rarely had more clothes that I needed to last between the weekly laundry days although we did have seasonal clothes that we kept in heavy cardboard barrels during the off season. As I got older, my mother involved us in deciding the clothes we wanted with the budget she allocated for each of us. I learned to sew to stretch the dollars as I got older.

The schools I went to were not air conditioned until I was in high school so the beginning and ending of the school year (in Texas) was extremely hot. Maybe it was a positive thing that girls were expected to wear dresses to school!

I remember dresses getting shorter and shorter as the decade progressed. In 6th grade I had a drop waist dress that I liked a lot. High school colors were important.

The worst fashion of the decade from my perspective was corrective oxfords. I had flat feet. The oxfords were white leather with metal arch supports to hold the foot as it grew. They didn’t help at all since my foot already was the size it is now by the time I started wearing them. They were heavy and awkward; I seemed to always be catching the low, clunky heal on my ankle (frequently enough that scars formed).

1970s

My dresses and skirts reached their maximum shortness in the early 1970s. It seems that I transitioned to wearing slacks and jeans more during the decade.

I was making all my clothes except underwear and jeans…even making some dress and flannel shirts for my husband. I made my own wedding dress out of white brocade upholstery fabric (for a January wedding).

My clothes had to go from office to school because after I graduated from high school, I was working full then going to college classes in the evenings. I still didn’t have many clothes; they were all general purpose. There is a picture of me in a vest, puffed sleeve blouse, pants rolled up over my socks – carrying a camera bag on a geology field trip – not the most practical outfit (or shoes) for hiking!

Later in the decade I started dressing up a little more for work because I was moving up in the organization. I remember liking dirndl skirts and squarish jackets – scarves/jewel necklines or blouses with wide ties at the neck. I’d learned to tie square knots and good bows in the early years of the decade.

I did buy my first pair of hiking boot – heavy, leather that was so stiff that the tops made blisters on my ankles when I wore them to hike down to the plateau level of the Grand Canyon.

1980s

I started out the decade sewing everything then sewing blouses (I even made one with a several with crocheted sections around the neck). I took some classes to refine my tailoring skills. But by mid-decade, I was ordering by suits from Spiegel. By the end of the decade I stopped sewing completely; it wasn’t as economical as it had been previously and – with motherhood and working full time – there was no time.

I wore 2- or 3-piece suits to work from about 1984 to the later part of the 1990s. I was moving up in my career and the suits were part of the corporate culture for men and women. I liked skirts that had an actual pleat in the back rather than a slit and a small inner pocket in the jacket (I never used any external pockets). I wore blouses with lace or crochet or a bow at the neck….or a scarf. The suits were all solid colors – black, navy, gray, red jacket/dark skirt. One of my favorites was tan silk; I always got compliments on it. I wore it with a black blouse or with a scarf that was maroon and the exact tan of the suit.

My work shoes were generally black or navy pumps (often a sling strap because my heel was so narrow that the others didn’t fit well) with a 2-inch heel.

1990s

My husband, daughter and I wore look alike t-shirts/sweatshirts from places we visited on vacations for casual wear with jeans, shorts, or sweatpants.

2000s

Several tapestry jackets were also added to my wardrobe. I remembered having some bell bottom tapestry pants in the 1970s that I enjoyed until they wore out. I donated a couple of the jackets when I retired from my career but have kept one that I wear occasionally.

Some of my clothes came from thrift stores – particularly some of the black slacks and colorful blouses to pair with otherwise dark jackets. It was thrilling to find things appropriate for ‘business casual’ for so little.

One of my favorite jackets was a gift from my Mother….I usually wear it buttoned….over one of my many pairs of black slacks

2010s

By the 2010s, almost all my work shoes were clog type heels. The only pair I have left had soft leather uppers and are slightly lower heels that the ones from early in the decade. I liked square toes. Eventually my knees started hurting if I walked a lot in the shoes and I was glad to go to much flatter shoes by the time I retired.

For the last years of my career I wore a wig to work; it was my way to have ‘great hair’ every day that earlier generations of professional women – like my mother – got by having a weekly appointment with a hairdresser. The wig was less time consuming.

I also built up more casual clothes for outdoors. My daughter enjoyed being outdoors and most of the family vacation were to National Parks (or similar places). And then my volunteer gigs needed those same type of clothes.

Longer skirts are my favorite warm weather clothes. Most of them I find at thrift store and some of them are probably decades old!

Now

These days I like leggings (jean or cotton knit) with tunics. The tunics need to have something unique: asymmetric hem, embroidery, or color.

Overall - there are a lot of synthetic fabrics in my closet that will last a long time. I’ve gotten rid of the things I don’t wear via donation…and plan to keep what I have for the foreseeable future!

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

April 25, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/24/2020 - Gleanings

April 25, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Finishing Fashion as Design Coursera course. The theme for the last module was Expression. It was a good way to end the course. I have enjoyed both courses I’ve done from MoMA and will probably start a third one – What is Contemporary Art – early next week.

Hearing a piano practice. My husband opted to start up piano practice…not sure why he hadn’t thought to play it weeks ago. What’s not to like about a grand piano? It was tuned last winter just before the coronavirus pandemic, so it is in excellent condition. His playing didn’t last for long, because the cat demanded attention…and has decided that the best place to sleep is under the piano.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And then there are the gleanings for the past week:

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.

How Rain Evolved Its Distinct Scent—and Why Animals and Humans Love It | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – The chemical that is the scent of newly moistened soil, geosmin, has been known to scientists since the 1960s….but now we are figuring out its purpose. It is made by 120 of 122 species of bacteria in the genus Streptomyces that have been studied. The scent attracts springtails (tiny arthropods) that eat the bacteria and spread the bacteria’s spores via their excrement or the spores that attach to their body and then fall off. Many other insects, fungi and nematodes are killed by chemicals produced by the bacteria. So – the scent after rain is connected to the lifecycle of bacteria that are one of the most important sources of antibiotics known to science!

Top 25 birds of the week: Terrestrial Birds - Wild Bird Revolution – Enjoying images of birds from around the world.

Long-living tropical trees play outsized role in carbon storage -- ScienceDaily – They used ‘hindcasting’ to validate their model: seeded the model with forest composition data collected at their site in Panama during the 1980s and then ran the model forward to see that it adequately represents the changes that occurred from then until now. Once that was done…they can use the model to predict what will happen to the forest with climate change. Will the forest continue absorbing some of the excess carbon – or not?

Flamingos in Captivity Pick Favorite Friends Among the Flock | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – 2-4 birds…not limited to mated pairs. Some were together for the whole 5 years of the study! The study found no loners but some bounded between groups.

What do soap bubbles and butterflies have in common? Butterfly breeding gives insight into evolution of iridescence -- ScienceDaily – A 75% increase thickness in the chitin lamina of wing scales turned iridescent gold to shiny blue….the same way a soap bubble iridescence works! And now there is a whole new genetic approach to investigate structural color in butterflies – and may lead to new ways to produce photonic nanostructures for solar panels, paints, clothing, and cosmetics.

How to mine precious metals in your home - BBC Future – Theoretically - the “urban mine” is far richer in high value materials per ton than traditional metal ore mines….but we don’t quite have the way to collect the ‘ore’ or effectively extract the metals.

Springfield Plateau: Cowbird Eggs – Cowbirds….I’m trying not to be too judgmental. (I’ve included a picture of cowbirds at our bird feeder below. The female is a more frequent visitor than the male.)

Colorful Image Lights Up Microscopic Guts of 'Water Bear' | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – Enhancing our view of a tardigrade with fluorescent stain….and done close to where I live at University of Maryland Baltimore County!

Take a Free Virtual Tour of Five Egyptian Heritage Sites | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – These are best viewed on your largest monitor!

Common protein in skin can 'turn on' allergic itch -- ScienceDaily – Turning off the production of the protein periostin in the skin can reduce the itch from atopic dermatitis (in mice). More research needed to see if it works for humans too.

April 23, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/22/2020 – First Birds

April 23, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Looking at our birdfeeder camera videos and clipping a picture of the first bird recorded at the birdfeeder for each day of the month (so far). Can you identify each one? The clips from the video are not always clear. It’s easier to make IDs from watching the video – seeing how the bird moves. I put the list underneath the gallery.

Carolina Wren
Chipping sparrow
Dark-eyed junco
Tufted Titmouse (with a chipping sparrow flying in)
Red-bellied woodpecker (male)
Chipping sparrow with mourning doves below
House finch (male and female)
Northern Cardinal (female) and house finch (male)
Carolina wren
Northern Cardinal (female)
Carolina Wren
Brown-headed Cowbird (female)
In the rain – Brown headed Cowbird (female) with Northern Cardinal pair below
Red-bellied Woodpecker (male)
Red-bellied Woodpecker (male) and Brown-headed Cowbird (female) with Northern Cardinal (male) below. The cowbird left first leaving the woodpecker to enjoy breakfast.
Brown-headed Cowbirds (male and female)
Brown-headed Cowbird (female)
House finch (male) and Brown-headed Cowbird (female)
Carolina Wren
Carolina Wren
House Finch (male)
Carolina Wren with peanut

I noticed when I was listening to the first videos for each morning that there is often a phoebe in our yard greeting the day (they are insect eaters so don’t come to our deck).

The cowbirds are around a lot more this year, but they don’t seem to be deterring the other birds at the feeder. The woodpeckers and finches are aggressive enough to drive them away and the cardinals wait until they leave.

Refilling the birdfeeder and bath. I let the feeder be emptied by the birds. The little ones like the chickadees do a thorough job. The bigger birds like the woodpeckers are more interested in peanuts and sunflower seeds…very frustrated when the supply is low. The morning was so cold (in the low 40s) that I put my coat on for the chore.

Perfecting the grocery list. I have settled into a grocery delivery pattern: selecting a morning delivery time slot 3-4 days in advance then building up the list in the interim, marking my calendar for the 2-hour interaction with the shopper/delivery person. Thursday is the big day this week – and I got a morning time slot! There are 36 items on the list.

106z1 20 04.jpg — **Browsing Life Magazine from 1946.** The March 25th edition included an article about Bikini Atoll… a topical paradise before the atomic bomb testing started just a short time after the pictures for the article were taken.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

April 22, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/21/2020 - Macro Fabrics

April 22, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Looking at Life Magazine for May 1944 – I found some early work of Chesley Bonestell that launched his space art career…mixed in with the coverage of World War II.

Finished reading Bruntsfield Brook by Charles Cockell. I bought the Kindle version after hearing about it in one of the Life in the Universe Pandemic Series videos. It was a fun way to learn about microbial mats…wound into a story with lots of drama impacting the different kinds of microbes: phages, ice, pollution, and drought.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for a little project prompted by learning (from Charles Cockell in his Life in the Universe Pandemic Series) that Antonie van Leeuvenhoek first used macro lenses to assess the quality of fabric…then turned the lenses onto other things and became known as ‘the father of microbiology.’ For some reason I had never thought about what prompted him to be using glass lenses originally. So – I did a little project to look at different fabrics with the jeweler’s loupe…taking pictures with my phone through the loupe.

I started with the upholstery fabric on a couch. The colors are more vivid when they are magnified! I don’t know what the fiber content is…but it’s shiny…. that probably means it’s synthetic.

Clothes that I had that were labelled 100% cotton were all tops. 2 t-shirts (normal weight and thin) and a waffle shirt

I also had an older 100% cotton denim shirt. It is old enough to have some worn areas.

Then there were the cotton and polyester blends. The bandana didn’t have a label, but I lumped it with the blends because it was shiny. A pair of jeans and a t-shirt looked like cotton so I assume that the polyester part might be wrapped in cotton.

A quilted jacked had a looser weave and was shiny. A man’s shirt and my photovest were both a tight weave cotton/polyester.

I have a linen-look button front tunic that I have enjoyed wearing for years. I didn’t realize it was 100% polyester until I looked at the label. And it looks very much like plastic when magnified! I’d never thought of it as ‘shiny’ before.

I had two silk scarves which I included in my pile to photograph.

And then there was acrylic blended with polyester (for a cardigan), with cotton (for a ribbed turtleneck) and nylon for a lightweight unlined sweater jacket. The last one looks like the 100% polyester tunic – although the fiber in the tunic is woven and the sweater jacket is a knit.

Overall – it was an interesting project. I am always keen to apply what I am learning, and this project blended the astrobiology lectures and the Fashion as Design class!

April 20, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/19/2020

April 20, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

2020 04 IMG_5720 (4).jpg — **Looking for sunrise.** I am always up before sunrise, but I often get busy with other things in my office (which is on the west side of the house) and miss the sunrise. Yesterday was not a spectacular sunrise because it was clear….but I did like the bit of color and the silhouettes on the horizon.

Frost warning. We had a frost warning until 9 AM yesterday. Even with the heat keeping us warm enough, both my husband and I opted for a hot breakfast. I had oatmeal cooked with cinnamon and pecans…and then a bit of honey added for flavor and sweetness.

Being fast enough to photograph a pileated woodpecker and a phoebe. Birds are often very active in the morning. Yesterday I was fast enough to photograph 2 birds that are often elusive.

The pileated woodpecker flew in silently to the trunk of the black walnut – I just happened to see the bird as it flew in. By the time I got the camera turned on, it was searching the forest floor…almost out of the range of my camera.

I heard the eastern phoebe and went to the window to see if I could see it. Yes! It was in the sycamore – saying its name over and over.

Catching up on Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series:

Sycamore buds bursting (outside). The buds are beginning to open on the sycamore outside (following the pattern observed more than a week ago on the branch I brought inside to observe more closely). The buds on the tree are at varying stages right now…and there are some that look very round. Maybe those are going to be flowers rather than leaves?

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

April 17, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/17/2020 - Gleanings

April 17, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Browsing through some issues of Vogue. The Internet Archive has some issues of Vogue online. I particularly enjoyed the one labeled Vol 138: Vogue which includes issues from October - December 1961 (a bound reference volume); you’ll have to create a free-sign on to check it out – browse through. I was in 2nd grade when these issues were originally published and the designs appealing; maybe we all have a subconscious affinity for clothes that were worn as we were growing up. It was a time when natural fiber fabrics were being replaced with synthetic fibers. I can remember learning to iron my cotton shorts and tops during the summertime when I was in the later grades of elementary school!

Noticing filaments algae in the sycamore branch vase. How did it get here? Were there spores on the branch when I brought it in? The picture on the left below is looking down into the vase, the branch being the diagonal shape in the lower left corner. I pulled some algae out and put it on the top of my iPad (using the iPad as a light table) and took a picture through the jeweler’s loupe (picture on the right)…not enough magnification to see any internal detail, unfortunately.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

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.

These Colored Micrographs Show the Incredible Intricacies of Plants – A different botanical perspective.

Can fashion ever be sustainable? - BBC Future – This article fit right in with the Fashion as Design Coursera course I am working my way through right now. I already buy more than half my wardrobe from thrift stores and don’t buy very often. My closet is still too full; one indication is recently finding a pair of jeans I had forgotten about! This article has prompted me to think about how often I wash my clothes. Maybe I don’t need to launder some of them as frequently.

Why This Rare, Huge Ozone Hole Over the Arctic Is Troubling Scientists | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – It probably will close soon – but it’s an interesting phenomenon that probably would have gotten more press if coronavirus wasn’t overwhelming all other news.

Blood test detects over 50 types of cancer, some before symptoms appear -- ScienceDaily – This type of test has been a goal for years. Are we getting closer to reality?

Covid-19: The history of pandemics - BBC Future – The impact of coronavirus on our day to day lives is a unique experience for most of the world’s population. This article is a short history of other pandemics: Justinian plague (6th century…killed as many as 50 million which was half the global population), the Black Death (14th century…killed up to 200 million), smallpox killed as many as 300 million people in the 20th century alone even though there was an effective vaccine available since 1796, 1918 influenza (50-100 million died), and HIV (killed 32 million and infected 75 million with more added every day). Since 1980, the number of outbreaks of new infectious diseases per year has tripled.

19 Incredible Winning Photos from Nature Photography Contest – Lots of interesting nature photos.

Wearable device lets patients with type 2 diabetes safely use affordable insulin option -- ScienceDaily – Maybe technology can deliver less expensive drugs in news ways….making the drugs more effective.

Bioprospecting for Industrial Enzymes and Drug Compounds in an Ancient Submarine Forest: NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research: NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research - An unusually large, biodiverse, and temporally stable wood-associated marine habitat off the coast of Alabama. Within 100-200 prepared culture plates, the team identified approximately 100 strains of bacteria, many of which are novel and 12 of which are already undergoing DNA sequencing for further study of their identity and their biosynthetic potential to make new drugs.

Photographer Immortalizes the Ice Waves of Picturesque Lake in Colorado – It must have been cold work capturing these images!

6 Creative Ways Wildlife Find Shelter • The National Wildlife Federation - A fun article…with some great photographs too.

April 15, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/14/2020

April 15, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Hearing the Carolina Wren in the early morning. It’s generally too dark for pictures when I first hear the Carolina Wren. It was singing again around 9 AM and I managed to follow the sound and get a picture.

Catching up on a Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series:

When will humans explore Mars? (interview with Darlene Lim from NASA Ames)
Why are microbes so amazing?
What is the tree of life?
Is there life elsewhere in the solar system?
Do microbes fall in love? – A fun segment summarizing the novel about microbial mats by Charles Cockell: Brunsfield Brook. I liked it enough to buy a Kindle version!
Is there life in extraterrestrial oceans?

Noting that it’s 3 days past the COVID-19 model’s projected peak for resource use in Maryland! The peak for ‘deaths per day’ is still 4 days away. So far the downward trend has been bumpy….hopefully it will look more definitive over the next few days. I also read a thought provoking article “This is what it will take to get us back outside” from MIT Technology Review.

Cooking sweet potato custard. I baked a sweet potato for dinner recently and had half of it leftover so I made a small custard with it….using the same recipe as for pumpkin custard. I used 2 eggs, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon ginger, and 1/4 teaspoon cloves. After that was thoroughly mixed, I added the milk to make it the right consistency. I decided to add chopped pecans once I got it into the baking dish for ‘crust on top.’ Then baking: 425 degrees for 15 minutes and 350 degrees until it was done. My husband and I each ate half as an afternoon snack. It was a big success using a leftover!

Getting a 3rd grocery delivery. I scheduled the deliver for 3-4 in the afternoon so the shopping was done between 2 and 3…I made sure I was at my laptop so I could participate in the decisions when the item on my list was not in-stock. I am trying to go for a bit longer than a week between deliveries, so we had a porch full of stuff. We put the non-perishables in the back of my car for a few days and the refrigerator items were put away…followed by thorough hand washing and wipe down of surfaces. The unloaded plastic bags are bundled up in the back of my car to return for recycling next time I go to the grocery store – even though I have no idea when that will be.

Participating in a Zoom session with other volunteers. A little virtual socializing.

Getting a request to present in a Facebook Live session in May. When they asked if I was available on a date, I realized that my calendar was completely empty! I didn’t have to look. It’s good to have a milestone like this; it isn’t a ‘back to normal’ because we are still maintaining social distance….but coming out a little from the ‘stay at home as much as possible.’

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

April 11, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/11/2020 – Found Mirror

April 11, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

2020 04 IMG_5703 (6).jpg — **Noticing the big buds on the sycamore**. The buds outside on the tree are finally getting big Soon they will have small leaves…and those leaves will continue to grow all summer until some get to be as big as dinner plates.

Witnessing quite a bit of bird drama: Our backyard was an active place yesterday.

2020 04 IMG_5703 (2).jpg — Surprise! We have **juncos** again! There are at least 2 of them around still. In years past, they were gone by now. Maybe the very windy weather has caused them to not make it to their summer nesting areas so they came back to refuel.

2020 04 IMG_5703 (8).jpg — A **red-bellied woodpecker** drives away cowbirds from the bird feeder. The cowbirds generally seem aggressive, but the red-bellied woodpecker made short work of about 6 cowbirds on the deck around the feeder. It flew in the cowbirds scattered

A piliated woodpecker inspects our forest. We see a few every year but they don’t seem to stick around our area of the forest. I saw it fly into the tulip poplar at the edge of the forest. It was hidden by leaves at first then came out and was preening. I looked more rounded than usual with its feathers fluffed out.

2020 04 IMG_5703 (7).jpg — A **red-bellied woodpecker** found edibles in the sycamore. Usually they come to the feeder and ignore the nearby trees. Yesterday there was an exception. There was pecking going on!

Filling the bird bath. The wind and low humidity of the day before had caused it to dry out. I had a little surprise when I went out with the pitcher of water in the morning just after breakfast – there was a thin layer of ice in the bowl! It popped out easily, falling to the ground below the deck - and I filled the bird bath with the water from the pitcher – hurrying back inside to get warm. Yesterday was a low humidity day as well – but not quite as windy.

**Enjoying spaghetti sauce tomato soup.** I wasn’t hungry enough for pasta so I simply added some celery to the spice tomato meat sauce….added fried onions on top. It was a great light meal.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

In the early day of our ‘stay at home as much as possible,’ I cleaned out some boxes that had been in our basement since we moved to the house 25 years ago. One was a box of framed prints and other larger flat things that I’d boxed up after my mother-in-law died 4 years before that. I didn’t remember the mirror at all. It had been protected inside the frame of a larger picture, held in place by padding. There was a bit of tarnish along one side. Perhaps she bought it a few months before she died, and I hadn’t noticed it – I simply put it in the box with other things that it could be packed with. Once found - I hung it in the entry hall of our house.

Now I notice it every time I go downstairs – which I do many times a day on the way from the upstairs bedroom/my office and the kitchen/doors to outside. It’s probably not something I would have purchased but I like it more as the days go by. It’s part of our family history simply because she chose to buy it. And so – the mirror on the wall, hung by another generation as a reminder of the past and reflecting the present. Perhaps it becomes an heirloom in our future.

April 09, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/8/2020

April 09, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Hearing the phoebe first thing in the morning. I am hearing a phoebe outside my office window every morning as I begin my day. Maybe it’s in the sycamore. Maybe its nest is nearby. I know from the time that the sun has just come up this morning but the clouds are hiding it; it’s too dark too look for the bird and try to get a picture.

Cleaning off the covered deck furniture. With the temperature forecast to get into the 70s in the afternoon, I cleaned off the table and chairs on the covered deck in the morning so I could spend time there in the afternoon. Everything was very dusty since it hadn’t been used over the winter. The furniture is over 20 years old and had been on the covered deck since we got it. It is undercover but ‘outdoors’ and I noticed there are some bubbles in the paint on the metal parts. It probably needs to be sanded down, primed, and repainted…which I am not enthusiastic about attempting.

2020 04 IMG_8815 (1).jpg — **Walking the neighborhood.** The forecast here is for cooler/wetter/windier after today so I wanted to get out and enjoy the sunshine…look around the neighborhood. Things change fast in the spring. Our cherry tree lost most of its petals overnight when thunderstorms rolled through. Most of the petals were on the ground. At another house the driveway was polka dotted with petals.

2020 04 IMG_8815 (4).jpg — The azalea still just has buds (and the deer have browsed the bush so there are not very many buds left).

A neighbor has a deciduous magnolia in bloom and it held its flowers in the storm.

2020 04 IMG_8815 (7).jpg — There is another tree blooming nearby. A fruit tree?

I recognized the redbud. ‘Cauliflory’ is a recent vocabulary word I learned from a tree tutorial; it means that the flowers are on branches and trunk…not where the leaf buds are…and that is how redbuds bloom!

There were several kinds of maples in various stages of producing seeds.

When I got to the pond, I noticed several flowers nearby (dandelions being everywhere but not always so thick as near the pond).

2020 04 IMG_8852.jpg — And then I looked more closely at the water retention pond itself. There were turtles! There were two large ones and one small. They were all Eastern Painted Turtles. The two big ones slipped into the water and then came back. The smaller one didn’t move except for the head and I noticed the scutes looked like they were peeling. Maybe they do that more when the turtle is growing up?

2020 04 IMG_8815 (14).jpg — And there were robins just about everywhere.

**Enjoying some outdoors-with-the-laptop-time.** I tried standing at the table on the deck…that lasted for about 10 minutes…then I spent about an hour in one of the chairs. It was a great way to savor the spring day…listening to the birds (they came to the nearby bird feeder while I was there) and windchimes and breeze through the forest.

Catching up with the Cincinnati Zoo’s Home Safaris:

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

April 08, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/7/2020 – Macro Cecropia

April 08, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Taking pity on the red-bellied woodpecker’s contortions…..refilling the bird feeder. I noticed the woodpecker late in the day on Monday…waited for it to dry out a little yesterday morning before I refilled the feeder. The pictures are clips from our birdfeeder cam videos.

Putting away groceries. The non-perishable groceries had been sitting in the back of my car since Saturday evening. We had put them there after they were delivered….to give any coronavirus time to dry up and die before we put them away.

Washing the plastic table covering – making a Zentangle mosaic. I’ve had the covering for over 20 years and have generally just wiped it down thoroughly. It was time it seemed grubbier than usual, so I put it in the washer with a few towels. I hung it over some deck chairs to let it dry thoroughly afterward. Then I made a mosaic of Zentangle tiles under it when I put it back on the table. Now we have new art to look at while we’re eating…during the pauses in conversation.

Creating some face mask variations. My husband discovered that his favorite pizza place does not deliver to our area….so he will pick it up as he has done in the past. He’ll wear a face mask as recommended by the CDC. I got some hair ties (covered rubber bands) in our last grocery delivery and I have coffee filters on hand. He had some old handkerchiefs to make his. If I must go out, I’ll make mine from a bandana or washable silk scarf. We are not going out very often so it will be easy enough to launder the cloth part of the mask after each use.

Catching up on Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series:

Is the heroic age of exploration over? (absolutely not!...this is probably my favorite video in this series so far)
Where did life begin?

Noticing a Northern Flicker in the yard – next to a robin. I saw the robin first through my office window then noticed the other bird when it moved. I had on my computer glasses, so my distance vision was not great. Then I used the zoom on my camera to id the bird…and take the picture in the next second.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the first installment of macro photography with our mail-order bugs. Today I am featuring the Cecropia Moth. It’s the one pictured in the lower part of this picture – our order from The Butterfly Co.

I used my smartphone with a clip-on macro lens for this session. The Cecropia is the largest moth in Maryland. This one is a male based on the antennae. They are somewhat feather-like in that they have a central rib…but the stems off the rib are different. The Cecropia stems seems to be in pairs and there might be tiny fibers connecting each pair. I’ll have to get more magnification with a loupe next time (and be very careful not to break the antennae off).

A few years ago, we had the caterpillars at the Wings of Fancy exhibit at Brookside Gardens, so I am more familiar with the caterpillar than the adult moth. I didn’t unpin the specimen for this round of photographs but I know that it doesn’t have mouth parts….all the calories for the life of these moths are eaten when they are caterpillars. The adult form is only mating and laying eggs!

The wings have scales – sometimes looking like scales on butterfly wings…other times looking fur or hair-like. Another opportunity for my next round (using the loupe rather than the clip-on lens).

The downside of the loupe is that it works best sitting on the specimen…and inevitably some of the scales will come off. I am giving my husband the opportunity to photograph the bugs before I do anything that might damage them. Tomorrow’s post will be about the Luna Moth.

April 05, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/4/2020 – March 2020 Contemplation

April 05, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Arriving bugs. We ordered them back on 3/18 and are letting it sit on the living room floor for a few days – let any viruses die. Then we’ll start our photography project!

Savoring favorite recipes of the past week. I’ve enjoyed experimenting with food a bit this week.

*Kale‘n’eggs.* I got a bag of kale pieces in my grocery order over a week ago. I’d been using them in smoothies but thought to do something different – maybe as a spinach substitute in scrambled eggs. I chopped the pieces in to small bits using my small food processor, sautéed them a bit before I added the beaten eggs. As little Mrs. Dash for seasoning. Tastey!

Sweet potato soup. I had baked a larger sweet potato than I could eat with the rest of a meal, so I had it left over in the refrigerator along with some chicken. I made a light broth with chicken bouillon and dried onion then added the mashed sweet potato and cut up chicken. Fried onions (the store brand like French’s Fried Onions) made a great topping…or I could have used black bean chips.

Whole wheat biscuits. I don’t eat breads very often. When I do – a batch of drop biscuits is probably my favorite thing to make. It’s a highly modified version of the recipe in my 1960s cookbook (the one I got about the time I became a teenager): Set the oven to 450 degrees. Combine in a bowl (2 cups whole wheat flour, 3 teaspoons baking powder, 1 scant teaspoon salt). Combine in a measuring cup (1 cup milk (I used non-dairy), 6 tablespoons olive oil). Pour the milk and oil into the dry ingredients then blend with a fork to form the dough. Drop onto an oiled cookie sheet; I tend to like a heaping teaspoon size drop biscuit. Eat them hot with butter or orange marmalade or ginger preserves. I usually eat about 1/3 of the biscuits on the 1st day and freeze 2 packages for other days.

Getting a grocery delivery. The only time slot available when I first tried to do the order was for delivery between 8 and 9 on Saturday night! I took it. The order was left on the front porch and we brought it into the house…to the floor of the foyer. We put the refrigerator items away then put the non-perishables in the back of my car in the garage – with the intent of simply waiting 48 hours for any coronavirus contamination to dry up and die before the items were put away in the panty.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now a little contemplation of what happened to us in March 2020….

On the national level, there were 75 cases of COVID-19 at the beginning of March and 188,000+ at the end; 1 death to 4,000+ deaths in the same time period. Things have changed on a personal level too…and that is what I am thinking about today. Here is the timeline for me:

3/1 Touch Tank and Discovery Cart at Robinson Nature Center
3/5 Grocery store early. No crowd. Used hand sanitizer when I got in the car. Washed my hands with soap and water before and after putting the groceries away.
3/7 Cancelled trip to Texas originally planned for later in the month; decided not to go to training or volunteer gigs after 3/8
3/8 Touch Tank at Robinson Nature Center
3/9 Carload of ‘stuff’ to landfill
3/10 Following “stay at home as much as possible” guidance from CDC
3/11 Grocery store early buying to keep 2 weeks of food in the house always in case we got sick. Store not crowded.
3/15 Starting the daily “Filling a Day of Social Distance” series of blog posts
3/16 Last trip to the dentist for me (finishing some prior work)
3/17 Last trip to the doctor’s office for my husband
3/18 Grocery store early…but they had changed their hours to open an hour later. More crowded. Carts outside. Wipes and hand sanitizer at the door to use before shopping.
3/19 Another grocery store early to find things we couldn’t at the previous store. Not crowded…found a few things
3/20 Another grocery store during senior hours still looking for a few items. More crowded than I expected (all older people too).
3/25 Scheduled 1st grocery delivery…deciding to make do with what we could get delivered
3/27 Telemedicine appointment for my husband
3/31 Gutter clearing – all arrangements made online

During March, we started changing in ways that are fast becoming habitual: more frequent hand washing, using a lot less toilet paper (water spray bottle and toweling), eating at home all the time, appreciating home and family more consciously. We are also paying attention to keeping ourselves mentally healthy…engaging in activities we enjoy and exercising rather than watching the news all the time. Yes – we are worried about family and friends near and far. But we’re all taking precautions to stay healthy. I try to accept that and move on to whatever activity is next in or around our home.

What’s planned for April? The calendar is empty. We have arrangements to spend even more time at home than we did in March…keeping healthy.

April 04, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/3/2020 - Gleanings

April 04, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

2020 04 IMG_8728.jpg — **Photographing the sunrise.** I seem to get busy and miss the sunrise most mornings…but not yesterday!

Catching up on Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series:

Noticing more sycamore leaves emerging. There are now three buds that have popped…lots of tiny leaves.

Making experimental face masks from materials I have at home….for when/if we need to go out. I made a mask with a paper napkin, small binder clips, the cut off top of a small gift bag (for the loops). The napkin would be replaced after each use…the rest sprayed with Lysol. It would probably fit better over the nose if I made some pleats. Even better using a scarf (or paper towels) and two hair ties/covered bands. (How to videos I watched). This is all about protecting others; I don’t want anyone to get sick if I happen to be an asymptomatic carrier.

Started Fashion as Design course on Coursera. The week 1 optional 2-hour video of 4 speakers and then Q&A (Under Review and then Reading) on the topic was well worth it.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the normal weekly gleanings post….

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.

25 Photos of Madeira's Dreamy Fanal Forest by Albert Dros – Calming nature. It is a quite different forest than the one I see from my office window. Both views are much appreciated.

Tips for how to stay happy in troubling times - BBC Future – Hopefully, some of these work for you. I find that limiting the time I spend catching up on ‘news’ is the one I need to keep reminding myself about; it’s so easy to get absorbed in all the pandemic news (none of it good). I want to be informed but not 24/7.

Monarchs Covered 53 Percent Less Area in Mexico this Winter | The Scientist Magazine® - The last paragraph of the article was the worst news: “The butterflies have already begun their journey north but there is not enough milkweed in Texas to support the butterflies’ reproductive cycle this spring.”

How your personality changes as you age - BBC Future – It seems like there are a lot of positive general trends in personality as we age: more altruistic and trusting individuals, willpower increases, a better sense of humor, more control over emotions. They’re calling it ‘personality maturation’ and it continues until at least the 8th decade of life! And its observed across all human cultures.

Top 25 birds of the week: Eagles - Wild Bird Revolution – Never can resist the birds….

On This Scorching-Hot Exoplanet, a Forecast of Molten Iron Rain | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – 640 light-years outside our solar system

Tour A National Park from The Comfort of Your Couch - Hmmm….I’m going to start working my way through the virtual tours….Maybe one a day?

Unprecedented preservation of fossil feces from the La Brea Tar Pits: A 50,000-year-old Snapshot of Los Angeles trapped in asphalt -- ScienceDaily – The La Brea Tar Pits have been studied for more than a century….but apparently there are still things to learn from them. Fossilized rodent pellets found in context (so definitely not modern, they also were radiocarbon dated to ~50,000 years ago). They are preserved along with twigs, leaves and seeds….an intact woodrat nest!

Massive Mammoth-Bone Structure Found in Kostenki, Russia - Archaeology Magazine – A circular structure about 41 feet in diameter…made with bones from at least 60 mammoths.

Tree Tapping Isn’t Just for Maples – The 2020 season is over for getting sap from trees – this is still an interesting article about how it is done…and other trees that also have sweet sap. I was surprised to see sycamore on the list.

April 03, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/2/2020

April 03, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Finishing the Coursera course: In the Studio: Postwar Abstract Painting from MoMA. The last module was about Yayoi Kusama – the only artist featured in the course that is still alive and the second woman.

Making a Yayoi Kusama inspired Zentangle tile. Kusama’s Accumulation 18a from 1962 is made with paper savers (circular adhesives to reinforce holes punched into paper) and charcoal on paper. My tile is smaller, lightweight cardboard instead of paper…and it was brown instead of white. I used some very old paper savers that were a woven material (I had saved them in the office supply cabinet even though I didn’t think I would ever have a use for them); I wondered if the adhesive would still work…was pleasantly surprised when it did. And I used a graphite pencil instead of charcoal. Once I had done the paper savers and pencil…..I diverged by coloring the holes green….and added a black circle on each paper saver (feeling the nubs of the weave). I took a series of pictures of the progression.

Tracking the changes in the COVID-19 Projections. The model gets a daily tweak as new data is available. I made some notes the night before so it could detect some of the changes between the 4/1 and 4/2 version of the model.

The peak for the US overall moved from 4/16 to 4/15…one less day to prepare.
For Maryland the peak moved from 4/28 to 4/29, the peak death day rose from 51 to 53 deaths, and the peak number of ventilators moved from 638 to 659.

Hearing about my daughter’s transition from in-classroom to virtual teaching (university level). My daughter has been calling when she takes her (almost) daily walk around her neighborhood in Missouri. A positive bit of news: her gen-ed class has transitioned to virtual mode. She thought the first class might have been a fluke because about the same number of people attended as were in her classroom before the pandemic; she thought that maybe the students were curious enough to make the effort to attend; but then they joined again for the second virtual lecture…so now she is realizing she and her students have made a successful transition.

Photographing a minute at our birdfeeder. A lot can happen. The gold finches were there at the beginning of the minute – 3-4 of them. Then the female red-bellied woodpecker showed up and scattered the other birds. She ate some seeds at the feeder then got a peanut and flew away. I noticed a female cardinal below the feeder about that time. A second later, a chickadee arrived…quickly got some seed and flew back o the safety of the trees.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

April 02, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/1/2020 – eBotanical prints

April 02, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

**Weighing in at a new low for the year.** 0.6 pounds lower than my last ‘new low.’ I am celebrated with 2 squares of dark chocolate for breakfast!

Hearing the recycle truck at 6:25 AM. That’s their usual time. It’s reassuring to know that they are still on the job making their rounds…that some things continue at a normal pace. I am thankful to the crews to hoping they stay well.

Catching up on Cincinnati Zoo’s Home Safaris:

Making two Ad Rinehardt Black Painting inspired Zentangle® tiles. I didn’t make the whole tile black but I did make a black square. The technique was not the same either since I used Sharpies and layers rather than making the special matte low-oil paint that Rinehardt is known for. I finished the Rinehardt module in the Coursera course: In the Studio: Postwar Abstract Painting yesterday.

Taking breaks with nature cams. There are a lot of them out there! A post from the Nature Conservancy here (the spoonbills and alligators swamp cam can be very noisy in the morning – a great way to start the day – they are in the EDT zone). A list I collected from the Maryland Master Naturalist emails:

https://explore.org/livecams
https://www.wbu.com/owl-cam/ (Barred Owl)
https://www.charlescountyparks.com/parks/eagle-cam (Bald Eagle - 2 young)
https://chesapeakeconservancy.org/what-we-do/explore/wildlife-webcams/great-blue-heron/ (Great Blue Heron – 4 eggs)
https://chesapeakeconservancy.org/what-we-do/explore/wildlife-webcams/peregrine-falcon/ (Peregrine Falcon – 4 eggs)
https://chesapeakeconservancy.org/what-we-do/explore/wildlife-webcams/osprey/ (Osprey – nest building)

Clearing my calendar for April. I had left some volunteer gigs on my calendar in April – being overly optimistic. I took them off this morning. The organizations are closed. Everyone is preparing for the coronavirus peak in Maryland; as of today, the model is saying it will be around April 28th. Maryland has a stay at home order (since 3/30), all educational facilities are closed (since 3/16), and non-essential services were closed (since 3/23…and the definition of non-essential is not ‘loose’). It looks like the social distancing measures are flattening our curve but there have been some outbreaks that are troubling (nursing home and mental hospital) and sad.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the normal monthly post about botanical prints from eBooks.

There are 16 new books added to the list in March. There is quite a variety this month --- mostly from the 1800s although one book from the late 1700s and another from the early 1900s, some color others drawings, exotic places (Ceylon, India, Madagascar, and Australia), some traditional botanical prints and some textbooks of botanical traits.

The volumes are all freely available on the Internet by clicking on the hyperlinked title. The whole list of 1,864 books can be accessed here. Sample images and links for the 16 new ones are provided below. (click on the sample image to see a larger view). Enjoy!

A hand-book to the flora of Ceylon Plates I-XXV * Trimen, Henry * sample image * 1893

A hand-book to the flora of Ceylon Plates XXVI-L * Trimen, Henry * sample image * 1893

A hand-book to the flora of Ceylon Plates LI-LXXV * Trimen, Henry * sample image * 1893

A hand-book to the flora of Ceylon Plates LXXVI-C * Trimen, Henry * sample image * 1893

The British flora, or, Genera and species of British plants V1 * Thornton, Robert John * sample image * 1812

The British flora, or, Genera and species of British plants V3 * Thornton, Robert John * sample image * 1812

Indian medicinal plants : plates * Kirtikara, Kanhoba Ranachodadasa; Basu, Saman Das * sample image * 1918

Histoire naturelle des plantes (Madagascar) Atlas V3 * Baillon, H; Drake del Castillo, E. * sample image * 1903

Histoire naturelle des plantes (Madagascar) Atlas V4 * Baillon, H; Drake del Castillo, E. * sample image * 1890

Histoire naturelle des plantes (Madagascar) Atlas V1 * Baillon, H; Drake del Castillo, E. * sample image * 1902

Histoire naturelle des plantes (Madagascar) Atlas V2 * Baillon, H; Drake del Castillo, E. * sample image * 1904

Giftpflanzen-Buch, oder, Allgemeine und besondere Naturgeschichte sämmtlicher inländischen sowie der wichtigsten ausländischen phanerogamischen und cryptogamischen Giftgewächse - Atlas * Berge, Friedrich * sample image * 1845

Traité de botanique générale V1 * Herincq, Francois * sample image * 1860

Traité de botanique générale V2 * Herincq, Francois * sample image * 1860

A specimen of the Botany of New Holland Vol 1 * Smith, James Edward * sample image * 1793

A course in botany and pharmacognosy * Kraemer, Henry * sample image * 1902

March 31, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 3/30/2020

March 31, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Hearing traffic noise in the early morning. I woke up about an hour before my time to get up and heard traffic noise. We’re close enough to I95 that sometimes in the winter when the trees don’t baffle the sound and the weather conditions are right…we hear the trucks. I hadn’t heard it as much recently and thought it was the effect of the pandemic. Today it seemed more like a pre-coronavirus Monday. I dosed until my Fitbit vibrated at the usual time.

Discovered HiJinx podcasts from my local library. I listened to the most recent one - ‘A most notorious woman’ about a Grace O’Malley – Ireland’s Pirate Queen. (Anne Chambers’ book on O’Malley available at Internet Archive here.)

Seeing deer just after 8 in the morning….going back to the forest. I wonder where they spent the night. The forest behind our house is part of the green space along the river. Did the deer spend their night elsewhere or did they leave the forest for a morning browse on tender plants in the neighborhood (like my daylilies) for ‘breakfast’ and were returning to the forest because a car or two had come down our street.

Later in the day – when it was warmer – I walked around the yard and noted that the daylilies were recovering from the deer browsing several weeks ago. They were not eating them this morning. Also, the daffodils are on their last legs. I took some macro shots of them.

More violets were blooming.

Dandelions are becoming more numerous too. I’m being lazy and leaving them alone. After the heavy rains a few years ago caused some of our lawn to turn to dirt with patches of grass I have come to appreciate the deeper roots of dandelions that hold the soil.

The leaves on the tulip poplar are a little bigger but the flower buds are not open yet.

The cherry tree was attracting bees!

It was a wonderful sunny day and warm enough to have the windows open again. Hearing birdsong in the forest never gets old.

Remembering something I forgot to include in the post for last Friday – my husband had a telemedicine session. It was a first for us. It was a follow up after some tests and lab work from back in February….not coronavirus related. It was a lot less stressful than going into a doctor’s office during this time.

Receiving a communication from our Community Supported Agriculture farmer about what they have been doing to social distance while they work and the modified share pickup process planned when the season starts for us in June. I am reassured that they are thinking ahead…that I can still enjoy the bounty of fresh veggies this summer.

o IMG_8625 (8).jpg — **Photographing the sunset.** The sunset is not in my line of sight from my desk, but I can see it if I stand in front of the window and look to the left. I timed it right last night. The clouds reflected the orange light in an arc over the tall trees.

Previous “filling a day of social distance” posts: 3/15, 3/16, 3/17, 3/18, 3/19, 3/20, 3/21, 3/22, 3/23, 3/24, 3/25, 3/26, 3/27, 3/28, 3/29

March 29, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 3/28/2020

March 29, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Watching Winchester Mystery House Virtual Tour. I saw the blurb about the tour in one of my news feeds…and followed the link to view it (a little over 40 minutes). I remembered having an afternoon free during a business trip to San Jose – probably over 10 years ago - and touring the house. It was memorable and this virtual tour showed it very well…a good reinforcement to the memory.

Turning electronics off during thunderstorms. There was a line of thunderstorms that came through while I was watching the Winchester House Tour….I switched to watching on my laptop screen (on battery) rather than my big monitor. The lightning and rumblings passed quickly; the rest of the day was just rainy.

**Stir-frying with ground turkey**. Using a seasoning packet I found in the pantry – a few months past the ‘use by date.’ This was my first experience using ground turkey; I’d put it on the list since it would be easy for the shopper to get what I wanted. We liked it – but I think I’ll go back to chicken breasts for next time. Maybe I’ll used ground turkey for chili though.

Taking end of day photos. It was a raining most of the day – not a good day for pictures…so I opted to experiment with the ‘night scene’ setting on my camera for the ‘through the window’ picture in the early evening.

Reviewing the birdfeeder camera videos. Saturday evening might become my regular time to review the videos from the birdfeeder cam for the week. It worked well for this past week. Here are the highlights:

On Sunday – a Carolina Wren was in the first video of the day at 7:38 AM…a female Cardinal was in the last. A frustrated squirrel was first at the feeder on Monday about 8 AM.

On Tuesday, a female Red-Bellied Woodpecker was first at 7:47 AM. On Wednesday, a pair of House Finches were at the feeder at 8:27 AM and there was a grand finale with a pair of House Finches and a female Cardinal at 5:40 PM.

On Thursday, the Carolina Wren came while it was very foggy at 7:06 AM. There were a lot of birds at 5:49 PM: female Red-Bellied Woodpecker with a Titmouse and a Carolina Wren. Then a chickadee just after the woodpecker flew away with a peanut.

On Friday, a Titmouse was the first visitor at 6:55 AM. And the Cowbirds arrived – males first…then females…then male again. The last bird of the day was at 6:45 PM…a male Cowbird.

On Saturday, the Carolina Wren was the early bird at 7:31 AM. There was a grand finale at 6:48 PM with House Finches and Chipping Sparrow. Most of the time the house finches come as a male/female pair.

Previous “filling a day of social distance” posts: 3/15, 3/16, 3/17, 3/18, 3/19, 3/20, 3/21, 3/22, 3/23, 3/24, 3/25, 3/26, 3/27

March 29, 2020

6 Free eBooks – March 2020

March 29, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

With so much time at home this month – I have browsed through many more online books and ramped up my monthly post about eBooks from 3 to 6. I’ve chosen 2 novels for their illustrations, 2 Ernst Haeckel collections, and 2 volumes from the 1840s with drawings of Yucatan ruins. Enjoy!