Birds (Great Egret, Northern Shoveler, Great Blue Heron, Northern Pintail, Red-tailed Hawk)….evergreens…dried (or frost damaged) plants…Texas sky - January was good month using the optical zoom on my camera! The locations were Texas (Carrollton, Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge) and Missouri (Nixa, Springfield). Enjoy the slideshow!
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.
What links litmus paper and lichens? – How did I not know that litmus dye was made from lichens? I remember using red cabbage to tint paper for an elementary school science project with my daughter. We tested everything in the house…discovered that even the fumes from toilet bowl cleaner turned the strips we made bright pink!
How donkeys changed the course of human history – The beast of burden. During Roman times the subspecies used was larger than modern donkeys…specifically bred for the expanding empire.
Jungle realm of the Snake Queens – A 5-part article about 2 Mayan queens: Lady K’abel and Lady Six Sky.
Marriage in Minoan Crete – A surprise – it was very common to marry one’s first cousin!
Kenya’s Rift Valley lakes are rising, putting thousands at risk – A study reveals that there have been increases in rainfall since 2010…an increase of only 0.4-2% of mean annual rainfall leads to the observed rising lakes/flooding.
EPA requirement keeps electric buses out of low-income schools – Low-income school districts often don’t own their school buses; they rely on contractors or subsidized lease deals. So --- they can’t meet the requirement to scrap the old diesel buses.
Ten-minute scan enables detection and cure of the commonest cause of high blood pressure – The hormone aldosterone causes 1 in 15 cases of high blood pressure. This new technology/treatment is a big improvement for the way those cases can be treated.
Dead Humpback Whale Washes Ashore at Assateague Island – This is the second one recently. I am familiar with the place this time…Assateague Island was a place my husband and enjoyed for birding when we lived in Maryland.
China’s population declines for the first time in six decades – Changing demographics in China.
Bees exposed to common weedkiller via wildflower nectar – Evidently the flowers can be contaminated even if they are not sprayed directly!
Wallace Nutting started out his adult life as a Congregational minister but retired at 43 because of ill health. His ‘second act’ (he lived to be 79 years old!) included photography and colonial furniture collecting and reproduction; his reproductions and photographs are still widely collected today. Both aspects are represented in books he published and are available on Internet Archive. The ‘Beautiful’ books reflect his travels; he was evidently an avid bicyclist and took up photography to document what he was seeing. Nutting’s pictures capture places as they existed in the 1920s; since he tended to photograph landscapes, some of the places might look very similar today. The only one not in the northeastern US is Ireland!
Connecticut Beautiful (1923)
Ireland Beautiful (1925)
Massachusetts Beautiful (1923)
The Internet Archive also has Nutting’s book documenting Windsor chairs – which he collected and reproduced. I selected a child’s highchair as the sample image…remembering my daughter sitting in a similar chair for lunch the first time she visited Mount Vernon (Washington’s home) and we stopped for lunch at the restaurant there (back in 1990).
New Hampshire Beautiful (1923)
Maine Beautiful (1924)
A Windsor Handbook (1917)
Vermont Beautiful (1922)
He’s a great role model of redirecting your life in a positive direction after encountering a roadblock (like ill-health) on the path you thought would be yours.
It was warmer than I expected when I walked around our neighborhood pond…a pleasant surprise. I photographed the Lambs ear in our flower bed on the way out…both the mother plant and ‘children’ seem to be weathering the winter.
The dying back of vegetation makes it easier to see nests in the trees and the reeds/grasses at the side of the pond. Was this one built by a red-winged blackbird last spring?
There are many leaves decaying in the pond…and bright green algae. I wondered if there might be some interesting macroinvertebrates in the water. We did see a lot of dragonflies in the summer so their larvae might be in the water. Maybe I will get a small net to see what is hiding in the decaying leaves.
I always stop to look at the weeping willow at the edge of the pond that has grown around a metal stake. The leaves are gone now…but the lichen on the trunk is colorful! I took pictures at various magnifications with my phone (Samsung Galaxy S10e). I’ll continue to check the lichen on my walks around the neighborhood pond…see how much it changes when the weather is warmer.
My husband and I enjoyed a walk in the Lake Springfield Boathouse last week. The first bird I saw was an Eastern Bluebird! Unfortunately, I was dealing with glare on my camera’s (Canon Powershot SX70 HS) viewfinder/screen, so I didn’t get a very good picture. I guess it was enough thrill to see the birds there.
There were some birds further out in the water…not very photogenic…but it seems that they are all mallards.
The most numerous birds we saw were black vultures – in a sycamore, warming up in the morning sunshine. There were three that seemed to be communicating with each other.
I photographed two birds almost too far out on the water – realized once I got home that they were scaups (male and female).
And then….a red-tailed hawk…perched at the top of a sycamore with lots of seed pods near the dam. The bird’s breast feathers were fluffed against the cold. The area has more traffic, and I was glad the hawk did not seem disturbed by the noise.
Last week, my husband and I picked a sunny morning to walk in the Lake Springfield Boathouse area. It is an easy drive from our house along curvy 2 lane roads. It was cold enough for a jacket but the winds from the previous day were gone – so not uncomfortable. The place was very different that our previous visit back in September (see posts (1) and (2)). Now the lush meadow is full of dried vegetation…providing a very different photographic opportunity. It was so sunny that it was challenging to see the camera (Canon Powershot SX70 HS) screen or view finder!
In one of the open areas along the paved path, there was a gingko tree….complete with a few leaves from last season and the distinctive buds for next spring.
Back at the boathouse – I took a picture of a youngish sycamore near the water. Tomorrow I’ll post about the birds we saw on our walk.
18 degrees Fahrenheit and humidity at 98% in the sunshine shortly after sunrise. Those were the conditions shortly after sunrise a few days after we got some snow. I went outside on the patio for some macro photography.
My first stop was where there was some residual snow (and maybe some fresh frost) on the deck stair railing. There has been too much freeze thaw…maybe a little interesting, but not worth standing out in the cold to fully capture.
I looked around for another surface where frost crystals might have formed…took a closer look at the wrought iron table and charts. There were small crystals around the edge of the table! I set my phone (Samsung Galaxy S10e) magnification to 8x and walked around the table. Most of the crystals looked like ferns to me! I am going to check the table rim on upcoming cold mornings…and document how the forms of frost change with temperature and humidity. Enjoy the sideshow below to see the results of 18 degrees and 98% humidity!
I went outside just after sunrise to photograph the fog; there had been no color with the sunrise because the fog was so dense. There was an advisory for the morning commute and I was glad I didn’t have to leave the house. Then I looked up and saw that the sky was quite blue and the moon distinct! The blanket of fog was clearly thin and close to the ground!
I am a morning person. This time of year, I am always up before the sunrise and ready to welcome the light of the new day. A colorful sunrise is always welcome but sometimes clouds and fog can be just as interesting because they alter the perception of surroundings. Noticing the beginning of the day…however the increase of light happens…is the best way to start my day.
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 do snowflakes form? Is each snowflake really unique? Why is some snow light and fluffy or heavy? The amazing science of snow – A good topic to explore in the winter! The article includes a video of snow and ice crystal growth.
Falling birth rate in US not due to less desire to have children – People are not having as many children as they say they want, especially at earlier ages. There is some evidence that people reduce the number of children they intend to have as they get older. They may realize how hard it is to have and raise kids in the US…and decide to only have one child rather than two. They may have more challenges conceiving as they get older too. Larger economic and social forces are also impacting birth rates.
Meditation and mindfulness offer an abundance of health benefits and may be as effective as medication for treating certain conditions – An overview of the strengths/weaknesses of studies about mediation/mindfulness…a good introduction.
Drone Photography Celebrates the Beauty of Historic High-Rise Buildings in the U.S. – Wonderful views of the highest parts of tall buildings.
9 in 10 drivers in the US would save money on fuel by going electric – Good! Hopefully the cost of the electric cars will come down a bit…and we’ll have more models to choose from…and the places to charge them during road trips will be convenient.
Why obesity is more dangerous for men – Evidently men have a lot more inflammation associated processes and don’t grow as many new blood vessels in their fatty tissue.
See the Lavish Pompeii Home Owned by Two Men Freed from Slavery – Reopened after 20 years of restoration work. It was originally excavated in 1894-1895.
Broccoli looks more like cauliflower in a warmer world – Looking at the chemistry behind the changed growth of broccoli at higher temperatures…avoiding the change in the lab…but will it enable us to still produce broccoli that looks like broccoli as the planet warms?
Another step toward an insulin tablet - A lot of diabetics would appreciate ‘no more injections’!
Why Electrifying Everything Is a Critical Pathway to Decarbonize The World & Our Lives – I like these articles that get specific about the options that individuals/families can take. It gives me more hope for my future and the future of the planet to take the actions I can to 1) decarbonize the electricity used by my home, 2) move toward an all-electric home and transportation, 3) improve efficiency/reduce waste, and 4) sequester carbon. Focusing on the ‘all electric’ concept this week. I have natural gas powered heating and hot water heater…will probably replace the heating/cooling first. The gas fireplaces are turned off already – removing them is not a high priority.
The week’s book post includes 13 books…travel books written and illustrated by Sven Hedin from the late 1800s to the 1930s…available from Internet Archive. As usual – my interest was primarily in the illustrations which include drawings, watercolors, and photographs. The author was Swedish geographer, topographer, and explorer…and the books are his documentation of his work. His sketches of people and places…as well as a picture of himself outfitted for very cold weather in Tibet…make these books good windows into the places as they were.
Adventures in Tibet (1904)
Bagdad, Babylon, Ninive (1918)
Durch Asiens Wüsten : drei Jahre auf neuen Wegen in Pamir, Lop-nor, Tibet and China (1919)
Through Asia V1 (1898)
Through Asia V2 (1922)
Southern Tibet (1913)
Finally – I was not in Texas when it snowed last week in Nixa, MO; so… I have experienced my first snow at my new home. Unfortunately – I had an appointment and had to drive in it! When I first backed out of my garage, it was still dark, and sleet was falling (it seemed large enough to be small hail!); I almost decided to cancel my appointment. The data that kept me from doing that was the temperature: it was 38 degrees F. I continued to my appointment; the sleet was just rain by the time I was halfway there and then the rain paused just as I finished parking.
A little over an hour later my appointment was done. It was snowing but still above freezing. I had to clean snow off my car. The side mirror heaters worked very quickly! The roads were wet with the temperature at 34 degrees; I still was careful to keep plenty of distance between my car and the next. There was a snowplow on one road….not plowing but probably deploying to be in position if the roads started to be too slushy. I was glad to get home…and that I didn’t need to get out again
I decided to take a few snow pictures before I took off my coat: snow caught in dried vegetation,
The evergreens (holly, rhododendron, pine) flocked with snow, and
The snow dust on yard furniture and stones leading to yard.
We have three pines in our new yard, and I appreciate them as big contributors to the greens of January. Only one of them appears to have cones…and it has a lot of them in all stages of development. It has shorter needles than the other two.
I enjoyed taking some macro images of the cones close to the ground. As the cones get very old, I will probably harvest some of them to add to the pinecone wreath that was made years ago from cones from my sister’s house. It will be a good way to fill in thin places as the wired cones (that are larger) shift a little…and add even more of my heritage to the wreath.
I read an article recently about pine needle tea and have started cutting a small handful of pine needles from the two longer needle pines to add to the black tea bag and home-dried orange peel in my tea maker (a coffee maker that has never-ever been used for coffee!). I like the flavor of the result…no sweetener required…and it smells good too.
I am thinking about my diet strategy for 2023. It’s a mix of things that have worked before to keep my focus on nutrition and moving toward a sustained ‘normal’ weight…skewed toward lowering my carbon footprint.
Use the Cronometer app to watch nutrition and calories until I am at the ‘normal’ weight for my height. This worked for me 5+ years ago so I am going to do it again now that I have gained a few pounds. It is important to sustain a healthy weight rather than yo-yoing. Using the app I know I am getting enough protein; if I need to reduce something to get the calories low enough, it is usually a fat…and I want all the calories to go toward meeting nutritional goals.
Reduce ultra-processed foods (those foods that have a long list of ingredients…some of them unrecognizable). The hardest might be soft drinks. I also notice that when I travel, there are more instances of ultra-processed foods in my diet.
Eat less red meat. In 2022 it was about half my protein. In 2023, I want to reduce it to 25%. I’ll ramp up eggs, chicken, turkey, and vegetarian sources of protein (although I am not keen on the vegetarian sources of protein with ingredient lists that indicate they are ‘ultra-processed’).
Become vigilant about avoiding lactose. The Lactaid does not seem to totally solve the problem anymore, so it is better to avoid the foods. The big change is moving away from Lactaid Milk to Soymilk. Deciding what to eat when I travel will be a bit more challenging as well.
The theme for my 2023 diet is:
The January yard is full of plants surviving the cold – a cedar damaged by last summer’s drought, the hollies that are very green all 12 months, and bushes with growth damaged by the abrupt frost from last November.
There are pokeweed fruits that never ripened (because of that abrupt frost) and seeds on ornamental grasses.
I was surprised by the irises already coming up in one bed that must have been planted by the previous owner and a few of the bulbs I planted in November sprouting through the stones in another location.
The rhododendron is full of buds. The first time I looked at the house was just after it bloomed last spring, so I am looking forward to seeing it thise season. The leaves are not universally green and I am wondering if it too was damaged by the November frost or if this is just the way rhododendron leaves look when they are old. This is the first time I’ve had a rhododendron at my house.
The lamb’s ear is surviving the winter. There are small plants coming up in other locations. I’ll need to decide about whether to put mulch around the ones in the yard to curtail the growth of grass around them!
I posted about my parents’ 70th anniversary back in December; now I am celebrating my own 50th wedding anniversary with my husband. The anniversary prompts me to think about those 50 years of shared life from different perspectives.
Our external focus shifted through the years:
For the first 10 years, we were completing our education – a PhD for him, a masters for me. I was working full time during those years…not thinking about computer science as a career for the first 5 years but gradually realizing that I liked the work too much to switch fields. From the beginning he seemed to have a clearer idea of what he wanted to do. We were the first in both our families to go beyond an undergraduate degree.
We moved to the east coast for my husband’s work; it was a great career move for me too. We were both focused on our careers for about 5 years.
Then we decided to have a child and took the precautions needed for a successful pregnancy in our mid-30s. We thought we were prepared when our daughter was born but quickly realized that there was a learning curve that was just beginning. Between the two of us we successfully juggled parenting and careers…until she went off to college 20 years later.
There were 5 years of career focus with occasional bursts of activity to help my daughter move out of the dorm into an apartment, get to an internship, or move for graduate school. The internship and graduate school were more than halfway across the US!
10 years ago - I retired and my husband started a ramp down from his career that continued for several years.
We’ve lived in several states over the 50 years: Texas for 10, Virginia for 3, Maryland for 36.5, Missouri for .5 years. The two long haul moves (from Texas to Virginia and from Maryland to Missouri) were quite different. We had a lot more household items to move the second time, the technology of finding a new house/selling our old one had improved dramatically, and we were able to buy our current house rather than get a mortgage.
Our shared interests have evolved over the years.
Photography. My husband was the one that enjoyed photography from the beginning….doing his own black/white and color developing (and printing too). I remember in our first house when one of the developing chemicals was not diluted enough when he poured it down the kitchen sink and it dissolved the disposal flaps! We have a lot of negatives and slides from those pre-digital years. The transition to digital happened about the time our daughter was old enough to start taking pictures. My interest in photography picked up a little when my daughter was born but ramped up dramatically once I retired.
Travel. From the very beginning we’ve both enjoyed day trips and vacations to outdoor destinations: gardens, state parks, and national parks. In the beginning, we economized by car/tent camping and not eating out. By the time we moved to Virginia we could afford flying, staying in hotels, and eating out although the road trip still dominated our vacations. When my daughter was born, we shifted our accommodations to ones that had a small kitchen to accommodate her food requirements/preferences. Some of our travel was associated with either my career or my husband’s…so that part of the travel was paid for as part of our work. After she got older and as we travelled more on our own, we enjoyed short term house rentals. For a few years before the COVID-19 pandemic, my husband and I used birding festivals as a focus for our travels.
Astronomy. My husband was interested in astronomy before I knew him. One of our early dates included a lunar eclipse at the local astronomy club’s observatory. In the early years of our marriage, we participated in grazing occultations (stars and the mountains of the moon); my role was to help him get the telescope set up as quickly as possible in the assigned location so he could take the measurements. Later I used the cast iron telescope mount to add weight in the back of my rear-wheel drive car – to give it more traction on snowy days in Virginia. His astronomy activity ebbed although he did replace his telescope; we (daughter included) observed the sunrise in 2000…our celebration of the new millennium. Once he retired, he became active the local astronomy club in Maryland and we both camped on the field for a star party at a dark sky site in Virginia several times; he liked the dark sky (and being able to call it a night whenever he got tired) and I enjoyed being outdoors, hiking during the day.
A lot has happened in 50 years and we’re both realizing how fortunate we are that the big decision we made all those years ago was a good one for both of us!
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.
Study investigates source of Amazon’s “Dark Earth” – Created intentionally? It is less acidic than surrounding soils…probably from the addition of ash.
New York City Greenery Absorbing All Traffic Emissions on Many Summer Days – There is a lot more greenery that previously thought…looking beyond parks to modest backyards, shrubbery growing in vacant lots, and trees dotting city sidewalks. That’s good for the summer when everything is green and growing….but it also implies that winter air quality is problematic.
‘Stomp’ Performers Hang Up their Garbage Lids – After 3 decades off-Broadway. Watch the video!
Riddle solved: why is Roman concrete so durable? – It wasn’t just volcanic ash that made Roman concrete better…lime clasts play a self-healing role!
Why is every parking lot covered with solar panels? – Evidently Michigan State has done it…hopefully other universities and big box stores do similar projects.
How the war in Ukraine is killing marine mammals – The dolphins that were washing up on the shore of the Black Sea prior to the war were few and usually had markings suggesting entanglement in fishing gear. The theory about the increased number appearing now, without marks, is that the dolphins are experiencing acoustic trauma from the increased use of sonar by Russian submarines.
Climate impact labels on sample food menu had strong effect on food selection – A study done by Johns Hopkins. The result indicate that this kind of labelling could promote more sustainable choices….and have positive health benefits as well!
Aerial Photos Capture the Abstract Beauty of Salt Ponds – From a new book….with images and background about these man-made landscapes.
Great Salt Lake will disappear in 5 years without a massive ‘emergency rescue’ – My husband and I visited the lake back in 2008. The pictures in the article are so different that I needed the captions to recognize the place. The lake was already shrinking in 2008 but the shrinking has increased with long term drought and increased population diverting more water that would otherwise flow into the lake. Aside from the ecological collapse if the lake goes dry, the dust from the dry lakebed is kicked up by winds and can damage lungs/exacerbate other respiratory illness. This does not bode well for public health in Salt Lake City.
Painted skulls from Peru’s Chincha Valley analyzed – The red paint on the skulls was not all the same on all the skulls: some have iron-based ochres and others have mercury-based cinnabar….the red paint on one of the skulls was a combination of the two!
Paul Edmonds visited Burma and wrote a book published in 1925 Peacocks and Pagodas that is available from Internet Archive. I enjoyed the illustrations.
The author is not as judgmental as many European writers of travel books in the 1920s; he acknowledges the cultural difference: “The Burman know that happiness is better than wealth” --- whereas “The Englishman believes that wealth is better than happiness, or at least synonymous with it.” He frees himself to simply observe by getting that difference acknowledged from the beginning…also recognizing that the colonial system will try to force Burmese culture to move toward the European/English, perhaps destroying the focus on happiness over wealth entirely.
And here we are 100 years later….so many people still conflicted about the relationship between wealth and happiness.
My daughter hosted lunch last week at her house. While we were waiting for it to be delivered, I bundled up and walked around her yard; I hadn’t been there since she and I handled the fall leaves back in November. The day was cold, breezy, and sunny.
I enjoyed the textures and colors of the plants left from last summer: leaves of low growing plants in a protected bed with green veins, dry flowers, plants collapsed and curled by frost.
There were seed pods from redbud (a cluster still on the tree!), maple, cones, and magnolia (alas, all the red seeds were gone from all the magnolia pods).
I found myself looking for green – noticing moss and weeds on the brick/stone walkways,
Boxwood, other evergreens along the shady path on the east side of the house, and a fresh magnolia leaf wedged in a pile of leaves from last fall.
I was very pleased that the large piles of leaf mulch my daughter and I made around some of the trees stayed in place. She’ll have less to mow around the trees next summer!
It’s been a year since my cancer surgery. All the diagnostics at the one-year mark show that I am cancer free….so the surgery was a success.
My last post was 4 weeks after the surgery but now I realize I should have done a post at 8 weeks since that is when the hematoma was finally gone. And two weeks later, in the area where the last hematoma color had been, cellulitis developed. The cellulitis might have been unrelated to the surgery, but it was a first instance of cellulitis for me…disconcerting; it was quickly resolved by antibiotics (unfortunately, I develop a reaction to the first type prescribed right after the second dose).
My fingernails became very brittle in the spring. They have returned to normal now. I suspect that the surgery and associated medication change might have been an issue but that my body had recovered/acclimated at this point.
The scar and puckering around it are not fading as quickly as I expected – perhaps because of skin sensitivity to the recommended topical vitamin E and/or cocoa butter and sunscreen, developing hives in the scar area (reaction to an antibiotic), and the silicon patches not being as effective as advertised. My current strategy is to cover the scar when I am out in the sun (rather than using sunscreen) and to use the mildest of moisturizers.
My cancer was detected early before it impacted my perception of health, and the surgery happened expeditiously. A year later, I am feeling healthy (almost like I felt before the surgery) but 2022 had the most health related ups and downs of my life!
Previous cancer diary posts:
Back in November, I stopped at Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge on my way down to Carrollton, TX. It is just outside Sherman, TX…a little over an hour away from my destination. The refuge was active in the early afternoon…with some migrants still around (link to November post).
In December, I opted to do a quick drive through on my way home so it was in the morning about an hour after sunrise; it was not a great time for seeing large numbers of birds. It was too late to see birds that had roosted in the ponds…and it was too cold and windy to linger very long with the windows open (I was using my car as a mobile blind).
I enjoyed seeing a flock of male red-winged blackbirds in stubble near the road….rise up as a group then coming back down like a wave crashing on beach to feed again…repeat. Their red and yellow markings were flashing every time they started up out of the dried vegetation and when they landed again.
A heron stood in the shallows with its feathers ruffled by the wind. The day was still new enough for the water to be morning blue.
I also saw a Harrier Hawk – hunting…circling over the stubble and water’s edge. I didn’t get a picture, unfortunately, but I spent a few minutes watching the awesome grace of the bird dealing with the wind and looking for breakfast.
The clouds began to cover the sun periodically and I took some refuge landscape shots – complete with oil pump jacks (it is Texas).
The pintails, mallards, and shovelers were around….enjoying the bounty of the refuge.
Gulls were mostly staying put in the shallows.
My plan is to stop at the refuge as I continue to make monthly treks to Carrollton…see the changes at the refuge as the winter progresses….and then the spring migration and flowers.
Copyright © 2025, Gwen Morrison. All rights reserved.
Celebrating the whole of life....
Thanks for visiting my blog! Enjoy the photo picks from last month:
Copyright © 2024, Gwen Morrison. All rights reserved.
Powered by Squarespace.
