Karen Keninger, Author at Heartland Safari

Spotted Orb Weaver

Updated November 23, 2025

Earlier this fall, a yellow garden spider set up housekeeping beneath the morning-sun-facing window of my study. She has vanished, and in her place for a while another species of spider called a spotted orb weaver chose that same location to build her orb webs. Apparently that location is good for catching insects. Our newest […]

Insects and Spiders

A team of black Percherons pulls a hay rack at an antique power show near Owl Acres. Two Amish farmers in straw hats pack the loose hay onto the wagon with pitchforks.

Power on the Prairie Part 2: Horses

Updated November 17, 2025

We didn’t have horses when I was growing up on the farm. The year I went to college, though, my younger sister got her first horse. I learned to ride over the next couple of summers, and really loved it. Life took me away from the farm and the horses though, and the opportunities to […]

A green, columnar plant sends triangular branches up from a central stem. Short spines line the edge of each lobe. Triangle cactus or Dragon Bones or any of numerous other names, it makes a great house plant.

Living Sculpture: Dragon Bones

Updated October 23, 2025

About fifteen years ago, I went to a fundraiser and bought, for $10, a little cactus. It was an odd little thing, about six inches tall with a triangular stem and a weird head at the top. It looked like a deformed little tree with spines on it. I decided I didn’t like it much […]

Twenty or more fived-petaled blossoms burst from green foliage in this photo from the fencerow. The blooms of Bouncing Bet are small, a little over half an inch across. Long white petals and short stamens splay from atop tube-shaped flowers.

What’s in a Name?: Bouncing Bet AKA Soapwort

Updated October 23, 2025

Often a well-chosen turn of phrase, or a name, can immediately conjure an image. These are the jewels that writers look for. And they’re the names that last through the centuries because of their aptness. And yet, as language changes, the name may be retained without the surrounding context to provide that image. Knowing where […]

Plants

Photo by Author Alt Text: A tiny black insect clings to a wall. The camera can’t zoom in close enough to get much detail. We submitted the photo to an AI-powered insect identification app to see what it might tell us. We were not disappointed.

Guess who: AI Identifying Insects

Updated October 23, 2025

In the news here at the beginning of October, we’ve been hearing about the tiny flying, biting insects we call no-see-ums. Minute pirate bugs and biting midges have been flushed from the fields by the harvesters and are looking for a warm place to winter. They’re so small (1 to 3 millimeters long) that you […]

A small songbird is pictured from behind and above, in flight with wings fully outstretched. Vivid, iridescent blue light shines from every feather. As the bird is in flight, this is an instant shot that can only be captured with a camera, by a committed and patient photographer. Please enjoy this moment with our Eastern Bluebird.

Eastern Bluebird

Updated October 19, 2025

One day in late September, I heard a bird that was new to my soundscape. Its song reminded me of a scolding chatter followed by an upward-trending whistle. It’s not mating season, so this call undoubtedly meant something else. It was an Eastern bluebird on migration to somewhere warmer. It stayed for a day or […]

Birds

A few dozens of Bryan’s hundreds of chigger bites decorate his calf, ankle and foot. Even though the chiggers came from Virginia, Bryan is one of the creatures who lives on Owl Acres, so this counts.

Phantom or Real: Chiggers

Updated March 16, 2026

When I was a little girl, I could still see some, and I absolutely loved the fireworks. We would go as a family to a park in my home town, sit in the grass, and watch that beautiful display of color. I’d go home happy, and in the next couple of days, I’d start itching—the […]

Insects and Spiders

Brown Eyed Susans are in profusion in the prairie garden. Karen is surrounded by the riotous horde of yellow inflorescences with dark brown centers. Each flower-unit is actually a mass of dozens of separate flowers. Ringing the edge are ray flowers, each bearing exactly one of the long yellow petals. At a distance, it resembles a single, daisy-like flower about an inch and a half across.

Yellow is for Fall: Brown-Eyed Susan

Updated October 5, 2025

On a sunny fall day, our prairie garden is calling all bees, flies, butterflies, wasps, beetles, and anybody else who wants some nectar and pollen for dinner. A bunch of brown-eyed susans (Rudbeckia triloba) vie for their share of pollinators by waving their flowers above the fray. They have come into their own now that […]

Plants

A deep red, fat larva (Mouse Bot Fly) wriggles free from near the anus of a dead mouse, which has been the bot’s host until today. The larva is not ready to pupate and will die also. This bot is one of at least three that were inside the mouse’s body. A second bot can be seen exiting beneath the mouse’s hind foot.

A Little Horror Show: Mouse Bot Fly

Updated September 11, 2025

The other day Bryan was out in the shop patrolling for mice. He discovered that one of the traps he had set contained a white-footed mouse. As he watched, a deep red creature wriggled its way out of the mouse. The mouse’s abdominal wall was also pulsating as something tried to escape. It was the […]

A black morph Fox Squirrel sits up in the yard, clutching a nut.

Squirrels, Labs, Genetics

Updated September 25, 2025

We have a number of fox squirrels (Sciurus niger) on Owl Acres. Clancy loves to bark at them, and I suspect they like to tease him as they run across the yard and shoot up the trees where they sit and chatter incessantly. Our fox squirrels are reddish-brown in color. Except, what’s this? A black […]

Mammals