Discovering the world around me.
On a morning walk, I hear a high-pitched whistle, and a rapid chatter seeming to come from the same tree. My Merlyn Bird ID tells me that what we have here is a brown-headed cowbird (Molothrus ater). He is shiny black on his body with a dull brown head. He’s courting the smaller, drab brown […]
Continue reading Easy Pickings: Brown-headed Cowbird
When I was a little girl, we had a huge lilac bush in the yard. It was big enough to play in, hide under, and explore. And whenever we came in from that play, Mom started searching in our hair for ticks. When she found one, which she often did, she lit a cigarette, kept […]
Continue reading Little Vampires: Ticks
Spring is finally showing itself here on Owl Acres. The cherry trees and the apple tree are in bloom. Catkins hang from other, less showy trees like the elms. We haven’t mowed yet, so the yard is loaded with little flowers. Yellow dandelions, purple henbit, and bluish-purple violets. There are at least 600 species of […]
Continue reading Another Yard Flower: Common Blue Violet
I’m sitting out on the deck, enjoying an evening chorus and glass of wine when that familiar trilling floats through the soundscape. There are lots of birds out there, but this isn’t a bird. It’s an American toad. He’s been hibernating over the winter, and now the ground temperature tells him that spring has arrived. […]
Continue reading Toad Breath: American Toad
Dandelions. they’re everywhere in the yard shining their yellow faces to the sun, brightening the ground along with the deadnettle, henbit and violets. Extermination is the plan for most lawn owners. Those bright yellow flowers scattered across a lush green monochrome seem to disturb the senses of the modern eye. This is a fairly new […]
Continue reading Little Soldiers: Dandelions
I’ve always discounted bees as nuisances, little demons wanting to sting me. My closest encounters have been with bumblebees and sweat bees, but there are between 300 and 400 different species of bees in Iowa alone. Worldwide the number of species is in the ten thousands. Bees branched off from wasps some 120 million years […]
Continue reading Buzz: Bumblebees
Last spring around Easter time, we were on the way to church when, just down the road from Owl Acres, Bryan stopped the car. A whole bean field was blooming in purple flowers. It was beautiful. But what were they? Certainly not beans. He collected some plants so we could ID them later that day. […]
Continue reading Noxious Weeds or Pretty Flowers: Henbit and Dead-nettle
I’ve always associated lilacs, peonies, and Mother’s Day with morel mushrooms. Hunting them each spring was a family ritual. Dad would gather all us kids and we’d troop out to the woods. He knew just where to look for them. Some years we’d come home triumphant with a bag full. Other years we’d find only […]
Continue reading The Best of Things: Morel Mushrooms
Imagine that you had 50 pairs of legs. Not two legs like a human, not four legs like a dog, or six legs like an insect, and not eight legs like a spider, but one hundred. When you move, a ripple runs along them, propelling you forward in search of the same things all creatures […]
Continue reading Recyclers: Millipedes
Last summer, we decided to build a new shop. That meant cleaning out a bunch of old junk in the fence row and digging down to make a foundation. in the process, we disturbed legions of night crawlers (Lumbricus terrestris). They had made their homes in and around all the debris that had been dumped […]
Continue reading Intestines of the Earth: Night Crawlers