New Mexico Tech Morning

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Our second morning in New Mexico started at the New Mexico Tech campus for an early morning look for birds. Before it was light enough for photography we heard, then saw, a great horned owl perched on a roof of a building. There were robins in the exotic pines.

As it got a little brighter, we headed to a pond and immediately saw western bluebirds!

There were ring neck ducks there as well…and American wigeons.

I took a couple of non-bird images – art and a pinecone among leaves. The campus has more trees that the general area around Socorro (they must water more).

There was a lone pied grebe.

A juvenile green heron was a surprise since it was in the 20s; most of the species has migrated further south already.

The most numerous birds were the interbreed mallards/domestic ducks. One had a tuft of feathers on its head that looked like a toupee!

Missouri Institute of Natural Science

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My daughter and I visited the Missouri Institute of Natural Science on Black Friday! Neither of us had been there before even though both of us had heard about it and were interested. We got there just after 11 and spent about 45 minutes looking at their exhibits and shop.

Their triceratops (name Henry) dominates the center of the largest space they have. It is part fossilized bones and part 3-D printed ‘bones’ to make a complete skeleton. Awesome!

There were some 3D printers to the side of the displays…it probably takes considerable time to create the pieces of a complete skeleton; there are pieces of a second dinosaur that they are printing and collecting under Henry.

A prehistoric fish was still in rock. I zoomed in for a closer view of the front fins.

Evidence of past eras of plants were also on display. Pinecones and dawn redwood!

A raptor (dinosaur…not modern bird) egg nest was in one of the cases.

And, of course, there were shark teeth…and modern shark jaws to compare. There were obviously sharks in the past that were much larger than any we have today!

Ammonites….the rock was donated and there no indication where it was found.

The display case of coprolites (dung that has been fossilized) was in a corner of one the museum bathrooms!

There was a case of trilobite fossils. I remember one of my teenage friends being keen to find them!

There is a display of lead mining equipment – part of the history of this part of Missouri.

It was worth the visit and I might take guests from out of town to the place (a good choice on a rainy day!).

There were more people arriving as we were leaving…we headed to lunch. The timing was great since by the time we finished our lunch there was a line out the door of the restaurant (the Black Friday shoppers had worked up an appetite).

A Walk in our Neighborhood – November 2024

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A lot of the leaves have fallen; the oaks are holding on the longest. As I walked around our neighborhood ponds, I took leaf arrangement pictures – on pine needles, in shallow water, in deeper water, and on the path.

I noticed a pine that had dropped cones near the path and picked up a few for my sister to use for a craft project with her grandson.

There are still some green water plants that the community is trying to establish at the edge of the pond. We haven’t had a killing frost yet. I hope they come back stronger and more numerous next year.

There was a very small red eared slider on a branch above the water….on the other end of the pond I saw a large snapping turtle – too far under the water to get a good picture.

The day was in the 60s and sunny – the aeration on the pond created a rainbow.

It was not a long walk; I should make the circuit more often.

Zooming – July 2024

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As I reviewed my group of zoomed images from July, the favorite subjects of the month emerged: hot air balloons, animals (birds, butterflies, a squirrel), museum and monuments, and (of course) plants dominated by flowers. The places included areas close to home, Springfield Botanical Garden, Oklahoma City (First American’s Museum and Oklahoma City National Memorial), Tulsa (Philbook Museum), and Joplin (Wildcat Glades)

The hot air balloons are from a Balloon Glow event. They didn’t leave the ground!

I enjoyed the pottery room and garden structures at the Philbrook, the light of late afternoon as I walked around the Oklahoma City National Memorial, and the wall art in the First Americans Museum).

Animals included a robin, a green heron, a skipper, a swallowtail (not sure what kind), a fox squirrel, and a juvenile male mallard.

And then there were plants. Most were flowers but there were seeds (dandelion puff), a pine cone, and olorful new redbud leaves.

It was a good month for photography and being outdoors. Only the pot and the wall art are indoor images.

Our Missouri Yard – July 2024

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The wildest part of my yard is the wildflower garden I planted last summer.

In front of the wildflowers are some pumpkin vines, lambs ear, and fragrant sumac. Behind the wildflowers there is a rose bush that has died back to the roots during both winters we’ve lived in the house but has come back each year to form a low bush…blooming small red roses.

That area is always a good place to do some macro photography with my iPhone 15 Pro Max. I’ve noticed that the native plants tend to harbor more insects although most of them are quite small. We’re missing the big butterflies in our yard too.

When I mow the grass, I stop to photograph anything I find of interest…like the shell of a robin’s egg (was it taken by predator or did the young hatched and the parent clear the nest?) and a plant that grows reliably by our mailbox.

There are frequently mushrooms that come up on the area where a tree was cut down (and the stump ground up) before we moved to the house. This month there were at least 2 different kinds.

One of our pine trees is not old enough to produce cones…but the other one is prolific and I wince when I run over a cone with the lawn mower (they probably cause the blade to get dull faster). The cones look good with green needles – or grass – around them!

I still have a few areas of the yard that I have not mowed this year. In one area – violets have escaped from the flower bed and spilled out into the unmowed area. I mowed some of no-mow May area and the clippings are slowing/stopping grass from growing there and the violets are moving there too! I am getting other ideas on how to extend the flowerbeds in a way that results in less need to use the weed-eater…and overall less lawn….that remains compliant with the Home Owners Association of our neighborhood.

Zooming – March 2024

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Lots of birds in the Zooming slide show this month – from the Whooping Crane Festival in south Texas as well as Josey Ranch (Carrollton TX), the Springfield Botanical Gardens (Springfield MO) and Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge (near Sherman TX). I find myself picking images that show bird behavior rather than portraits.

There are spring flowers in this collection as well…more of those coming in April!

Enjoy the March 2024 slide show!

Annual stick/pinecone yard clean up

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The chiminea left by the previous owner of our house comes in handy for burning sticks and pinecones that would otherwise be difficult to get rid of. The sticks come mostly from our neighbor’s river birch (the tree sheds into our side yard every time we have a strong wind!) but there is a mixture of crape myrtle and oak….and some branches trimmed from the forsythia last season that were thoroughly dried in their pile under a pine tree. The first two fires were all sticks! Most of them broke into short enough pieces easily enough but a few poked out the opening of the chiminea until they burnt enough that I could slide them the rest of the way in. The mornings were cool enough that I enjoyed watching the fire burn. My husband asked why I smelled like smoke when I came inside!

As I trimmed some lower branches off our largest pine, I realized that there were way too many pine cones and that I was going to need to burn some of them – particularly the ones that had fallen onto grass rather than the carpet of needles directly under the tree; otherwise the lawn mower was going to be challenged by them every time I mowed in the upcoming months.

I piled the cones into a wagon along with the forsythia sticks (which had broken easily into short lengths) and loaded the chiminea with the sticks and half the cones for the third fire of the season. I lit a paper towel wadded under the sticks to start the fire.

It was an interesting fire to watch. The forsythia sticks and most of the cones caught fire easily although some of the cones might have been damp enough to slow their burning. As the fire progressed, I enjoyed the movement of the flames…the shape of the cones and the way they changed from their brown color to black with glowing red crescents to black and white…and then ash. I added the rest of the pinecones once most of the initial load had burned….and they caught quickly. After they had burned down, I stirred the ashes and was surprised at the chunks that still hadn’t burned. I closed the screen on the chiminea and watched the fire die before I went inside – realizing how much I had enjoyed photographing the pinecone fire.

Macro Photography – March 2024

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Sometimes I get in the mood for macro photography. It has happened several times this month.

The first was at my mother’s funeral. I was thinking about the bouquet of daffodils/narcissus that her neighbor cut from their old yard (with the new owner’s permission) and decided to take some macro views of the flowers while we were waiting for the service to begin. I thought about all the joy my mother experienced with her garden…with the flowers growing there and the ones she cut to bring inside. And that she transmitted that joy to her daughters.

The second round of macro photography was when I trimmed some low branches from one of my pine trees and decided to take a closer look at one of the branches.

Pine cones are so sturdy….they are hard on my lawn mower…but there is a fragile aspect to them too. At close range they are wrinkled and folded and etched.

The bark on a small stem shows where needles once grew and the expansion of the stem making brown islands in gray green.nce.

The bud at the end of stem looks reddish surrounded by green needles. Once again – I realize how much color there is that is unnoticed until we take a closer look.

The last macro photograph is one my daughter sent via text when she visited the Memphis Botanic Garden recently. She knows how much I enjoy finding fiddleheads….and evidently had caught the macro photography bug too. These were interesting because of the felt-like covering that must have protected them until they started to unfurl.

Our Yard – February 2024

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On a warmer day in early February, I walked around the yard – still in winter lock down. The pavers provide a little color with splotches of moss…framed by grass I should pull before new shoots emerge in the spring.

Under the pine tree there is standing debris of last season’s pokeweeds. I am thinking about trimming off the lowest branches of the tree and planting wildflowers under the pine needles. They should get enough sun to create a little garden under the tree.

The forsythia buds already seem to be getting larger. The mulch/compost I put under the bush last season seems to be holding up well. Trimming the branches away from the fence after they bloom might provide room to add some space for additional plantings. I hope the pawpaw seeds I planted slightly under the bush come up and are protected by it until they get a good start.

I love the rich color of fresh pine cones in the needles….but I need to pick them up before I start mowing again….they can be hard for the mower to handle.

The rhododendron buds look healthier…and there are more of them…this year. Last year, they got damaged by severe cold at some point during the winter. I will be thrilled to have more of the flowers to enjoy this coming spring!

Overall – our winter yard is still full of photographic subjects…and holds wonderful potential for the coming season.

Our Missouri Neighborhood – November 2023

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I am planning to do a lot more walks around my neighborhood – get some quality outdoor time/exercise…maybe even what the Garmin calls ‘intensity minutes’. I’ll take a small camera with me…just in case I spot anything interesting. My daughter called me just as I was heading out so I didn’t photograph the great blue heron that was in a sunny spot at the edge of the pond; I just watched until it flew away while I talked to her.

I did some power walking almost to the furthest bridge before I stopped to photograph some oak leaves that had caught in the grass at the edge of the pond. The tree still had quite a few leaves to drop!

The willow seems to still have mostly green leaves!

A little further along there was debris on the walk; looking closer I realized it was seeds rather than leaves!

Even though the temperature was only about 40 degrees. The sunshine must have made the bank warm enough for a turtle to leave the water.

After I got to the other end of the ponds, I noticed a lot of maple leaves had fallen in the drainage channel and the grass along the path.

A short length of sidewalk on my route was almost covered with pine needles. I enjoyed photographing some cones that had fallen as well.

There was a stump at one end of the row of pines that must have been cut several years ago – maybe before we moved to the neighborhood. The color of the pine needles stands out against the gray of the wood and the powdery green of lichen/moss.  

A big plus – I accumulated 29 intensity minutes!

Plant of the month – Pine

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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.

Our Missouri Yard – December 2022

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I walked around my yard on a cold, windy, cloudy day….not a good day for landscape compositions; it was a good day for macro photography, though.

I had some fun with a bush with colorful leaves. One of the leaves looked (to me) like a green alien figure surrounded by a yellow and red prison!

There were seed pods and colorful leaves from last season, buds on the rhododendron for next spring, greens of pine needles and rich browns of cones, and lambs ear with water droplets in a flower bed.

The rose bush was caught by the abrupt and very cold spell in late October. It is putting on some new leaves which probably won’t last much longer. I decided to look at the thorns more closely….staying far enough away to not get caught!

I’ve also noticed that the two boxwood bushes at the front of the house have brown leaves on the ends of their branches. It took some time for the damage of that early frost to show…but it is very evident now. I guess in normal years, the bushes stop growing as the season cools down and the new grown is better prepared when the first days down in the 20s occur – unlike this year when it happened abruptly and early.

Our New Neighborhood – August 2022

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I started out an early morning walk around the neighborhood ponds noticing the moon….almost matching the blue of the sky and the resulting image looking like a cyanotype print!

There were still a few flowers at the pond edge…and seed stalks that caught the light.

I noticed that river birches were the most numerous trees around the pond and decided that looking up into their canopy of leaves and curling bark was more interesting that viewing the whole tree. From further way.

There was a pine tree from a yard that hung over the path….a dense cross hatch of branches and needles that had detained a pine cone. All the cones that must have fallen to the ground had been picked up.

The tree I was most fascinated with was a willow – glorious with the light behind it. When I got closer, I noticed that there was a metal stake embedded in the trunk. Perhaps when it was a very young tree, it had been braced with a stake on each side….and no one came to remove the bracing. Slowly the tree is incorporating the stake into itself (this could be dangerous years in the future if the tree needs to be cut down).

I also noticed surface roots on all sides of the tree. Did the soil erode after the tree was planted?

There is probably more the this tree’s story…..

Brookside Gardens Macro – March 2022 (2)

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Continuing the Brookside Gardens macro images…..

The dried flower clusters of the wood hydrangea from last season look fragile but they have endured all winter and many are still on the stalks. A few leaves have survided as well. The leaf I photographed with the macro lens still had some green…was probably still producing food for the plant! Most of the leaves from last season are long gone though.

The witch hazels are one of my favorite winter and spring trees. They bloom very early….and have unusual flowers – streamer petals.

The suction cups of a vine growing on the wall of the visitor center have held it firm all winter! They look so fragile…but are evidently quite durable.

I hadn’t noticed the Deodar cedar in the Brookside 1969-2009 Commemorative Garden before – I only know its name from the sign at its base. The needles and cones were a bit different than the evergreens I see more frequently. Taking a walk with my camera frequently causes me to notice something a little different!

As I walked back to my car – I saw some more familiar pines…took some macro images of the pinecones and a small branch with needles on the ground. I’m always seeking new insight into common items through the macro lens! The fibers in the breaks of the pinecones surprised me.

The pines have a lot of lichen on their trunks and branches…and some of it sluffs off. I thought the pieces in the grass with the dried pine needles made good color and texture compositions.

Volunteering Again!

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The nature center isn’t open at Howard County Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant but there are more people visiting with the spring weather. So – the plan until the nature center can open again is to have an outdoor greeter on Saturday, Sunday and Wednesday…and I volunteered last Sunday. It was a very enjoyable 2 hours. I had a table and chair set up near the parking lot across from the kiosk.

I was surprised at the number of people that were there for the first time…needed some orientation to the place. Right before my shift was over, a girl scout troop arrived and wanted to do a non-meadow hike; I highlighted the trail map for them - through the forest to the skunk cabbage wetland. And there were people that have come for years (and volunteered). The children of one family did cartwheels on the slope near the parking lot before heading out for their hike. A child with his grandfather already knew their way to the picnic area for their lunch. Two women arrived with their own camp chairs and walked to a picnic table near the community gardens…talking for an hour or so in the sunshine. I asked people as they headed back to their cars if they saw something interesting and got a range of answers. A small child pointed out some rocks. Some birders had seen a merlin capturing a meal. One child had searched for ‘stages’ that would work for musical performances – standing on the top of the large silver maple stump was his favorite.

The parking lot had 25-35 cars for the whole time I was there – so a very worthwhile time for a greeter to be around.

There was about 10 minutes that were ‘slow’ and I walked toward the picnic tables to take some pictures – pine cones in a tree top…and macro of pine bark.

Then my daughter called for a quick chat…and after a few minutes the activity picked up again. There wasn’t a lot of time sitting around. I have 4 more of the outdoor greeter gigs lined up; they are all weather dependent (if it’s raining…we cancel!).

It’s good to be getting back into volunteering in the outdoors at Mt Pleasant!

Mini Road Trip: Centennial Park

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

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

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

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

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

Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens – June 2019

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The plants that are the main attractions during  the June and July at Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens are the lotuses and the water lilies.

The lotuses were in full bloom in the later part of June when we visited but there weren’t many seed pods yet.

I also found a rolled-up lotus leaf that was interesting. The leaves are round, balancing on a central stem but they start out as a scroll like structure that unfolds. This one was still tightly coiled. I might use it as a prompt to create a Zentangle pattern.

 The water lilies did not seem as dense as they have in previous years and I wondered if the rains and cool temperatures earlier this summer impacted the water lily development.

The button bush was beginning to bloom; I didn’t notice any seed pods yet. There is a ways to go before all the flowers are pollinated…lots of bee activity.

Two trees stood out:

There was a group of developing pine codes high up in a pine near the entrance and

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Some shelf fungus growing around a knot (maybe where a branch had been). It looks a little like a bear face to me. I’d noticed it last year too. The shelf fungus look more cracked this year but they still have the orange underneath.

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I heard green frogs and searched the shallows from where the sound seemed to emanate….but never  saw the frog.

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A pearl crescent butterfly opened its wings as it sat in the grassy path and paused long enough for me to get a picture.

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We saw two different kinds of turtles (identified with the help of a reference from Maryland Department of Natural Resources): a small red-eared slider (not native to our area but invading) and

A large northern red-bellied cooter – which is native to our area. It was a large specimen. I wondered how long it had taken to get that big…about 12 inches.

Both ponds had a lot of algae and muck so the turtle shells looked grubby but the heads were vey distinctive…enough for the identification.

Overall – the field trip to Kenilworth was worthwhile and very enjoyable. We went in the morning before the day got too hot.

Belmont – March 2019

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Howard County Conservancy hosted a training session at Belmont for upcoming elementary school BioBlitzes last week. I hadn’t been to the location since January, so I looked around before going into the Carriage House for class. The plane trees (they are like sycamores but are a little different – have some seed balls in pairs rather than single) seemed full of seed balls. We’ve had quite a lot of wind and the fibers holding the balls to the tree look worn at this point. I wondered how long they would stay attached after I saw the zoomed image through my camera.

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It was sad to see the stump of the red maple they had to cut down recently. Evidently it lost a lot of big branches during some of the recent winds. The colors in the stump drew my attention. The tree was not extensively rotten but there were some insect holes. The stump would have to be sanded to count the rings. The tree had been struggling in recent years, but I always pointed it out because it had small branches low enough on its trunk for children to see the flowers and leaves.

It also had a root that was above the surface and been injured by mowers…but still survived.

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I almost always pointed out the red maple to contrast with the nearby sugar maple – which is still standing with some ivy growing on it. It was a good concept for student to think through – how the trees were alike and how they were different…both maples.

The class had an outdoor portion to try out the app and tablets the students would be using. I used the time to take a few more pictures. There were crocuses blooming in the grassy area near the mailboxes.

The wind had blown pine cones and sweet gum balls into the same area.

The pond still looked like it has all winter. The clouds had rolled in while we had been indoors. And this landscape shows the dimness of the day.

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I turned back to the view the manor house and notice a maple that no longer had its upper branches. One of the them was very rotten. But the tree is still blooming!

We headed up to the cemetery and I checked the hemlock. The tree looks like the treatment for wooly adelgid has worked. I tried an experimental shot with a cone highlighted…and blurry branches above and below.

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By the time I am at Belmont again – there will be even more signs of spring.