-
Hints Of A Bear
The remains of Hurricane Helene came through with her wind and rain, leaving many branches and some trees down on the mountain. Nothing serious thank goodness and how nice to have neighbors that travel with a chain saw in their truck. Many of those branches and trees were taken care of before it was even…
-
Pumpkin Inspector
Betelgeuse, my GrandKitty, the Grand Pumpkin Inspector.
-
Purple-flowering Raspberry In Autumn
Purple-flowering Raspberry (Rubus odoratus) still in its summer finery. Not quite in the mood for autumn yet. Lots of time left though for the leaves to turn their golden hue. A native bush that is growing in a good part of eastern North America, to a height of 6 feet and a width of about…
-
American Chestnut Bur!
Those of you that know me, know that I’m extremely interested in the American Chestnut (Castanea dentata), the blight (Cryphonectria parasitica) that came close to totally wiping out the species, and the work being done by The American Chestnut Foundation. So you can imagine how surprised I was yesterday afternoon while I was out with…
-
Incredible Round Mushroom
Went out this afternoon to get a picture of this Giant Puffball (Calvatia gigantea). I put a pair of scissors next to it for scale, but I realize now that those scissors were a poor choice since they are small but in the photo they look large. They’re just 5 inches in length. But with…
-
Hydrophobic
Hydrophobic, meaning water-repellent. Many plants have hydrophobic leaves and they can be found looking for them while it’s raining, or soon after it stops. This one is Virginia Spiderwort (Tradescantia virginiana). Sensitive Fern (Onoclea sensibilis) is also hydrophobic. The reasons that leaves might be hydrophobic are many. One reason is to protect the plant from…
-
Dot-Lined White Moth
With the look of a tiny stuffed animal wrapped in a white fluffy fur coat, this is a Dot-lined White Moth (Artace cribrarius). Wingspan of one to nearly two and a half inches, males are smaller than females. These moths are generally found in the eastern United States. Their larval host plants are species of…
-
Surprise, Surprise!
What a delightful surprise this morning. Well, actually not really a surprise, but after almost a whole week of fog, drizzle, rain, and no sunshine – there it was, the sun was out creating lovely shadows all over the mountain! I grabbed my dear camera and the two of us roamed with thoughts of capturing…
-
A Queen
Roaming with my camera a couple days ago as the drizzle came down, I came upon an Eastern Yellow Jacket (Vespula maculifrons). This one though was larger than I’m used to seeing. Turns out it is a queen Yellow Jacket. The size difference? The worker Yellow Jacket is about 1/2 inch long and the queen…
-
Dogwood
Another day of thick fog, drizzle and rain. Another day of wet leaves that brighten the colors of the leaves and color the beginning of autumn. There are well more than thirty — to nearly sixty — species of plants in the genus Cornus. Twelve of them are native to the United States and Canada.…