The Nature of Things

One of the really neat things about birds is that they are very adaptable creatures and they can be found almost everywhere on Earth. There is virtually no place you can go where there will not be at least a token presence of feathered flying critters. Of course, some places are birdier than others. I am fortunate to live in Southeast Texas which much of the North American population of birds passes through at some time in the year, either headed to more northern climes in the spring or to Mexico and Central and South America in the fall. Many of them do, in fact, linger with us throughout the year. So, I'm never at a loss for birds to watch in my own backyard. One might assume that the urban areas of the world would be unlikely places for people who enjoy watching birds, but one would be wrong. David Lindo in his recent book, How to be an Urban Birder , shows his readers just how wrong that assumption is. Lindo is a U.K. birder and most of the birds that he discusses in his book a...

The Bee: A Natural History by Noah Wilson-Rich My rating: 4 of 5 stars The argument could be and has been made that bees are essential to life on Earth as we know it. They are most certainly crucial to the reproduction and diversity of flowering plants. The creatures are known to pollinate more than 130 fruit, vegetable, and seed crops that we rely on to survive and those plants make economic contributions in the tens of billions of dollars every year. Therefore, it is very important on many levels that we have a healthy population of bees. But bees are in trouble. They are dying off at an alarming rate, and although in some cases the cause of the die-off has not been absolutely pinned down, scientists are pretty much in agreement that pesticides and the practices of modern agriculture are the main culprits. In The Bee: A Natural History , Noah Wilson-Rich explores some of the challenges faced by bees and how we can ameliorate them in order to aid the bees. This book primarily focuses...

Trees of Western North America by Richard Spellenberg My rating: 4 of 5 stars For those readers and Nature-lovers who need a comprehensive field guide to help them identify the trees of western North America, here is your book. This new guide, soon to be published by Princeton University Press, covers both native and naturalized trees of the western United States and Canada. The territory covered extends as far east as the Great Plains. This book is very easy to navigate. It is divided into two main sections, the gymnosperms and the angiosperms, and within those sections it is further divided into families of trees. Overall, there are descriptions of some 630 species, which the publisher says is more than any comparable field guide. (I guess I'll take their word for it!) An important part of any field guide, maybe the most important part, is the pictures. Trees of Western North America has thousands of meticulous color paintings of trees by David More. These are invaluable identi...

Leucophyllum frutescens in my backyard garden, July 8, 2014. Leucophyllum frutescens , aka "Texas sage," "ceniza," "barometer bush," "purple sage," "Texas ranger" and probably several other common names, is a medium-sized evergreen shrub of variable growth habit that is native to Texas and Mexico. When Zane Grey wrote Riders of the Purple Sage , this was the plant he was referring to. Texas sage is the name it is most often known by in my area. It is a tough, tough plant, extremely tolerant of our triple-digit summer weather with its long dry spells but also able to survive fairly cold temperatures for extended periods. The frequent unusually cold spells which we experienced last winter, with temperatures down to 20 degrees F. or below, did not faze my plant at all. One of the most interesting things about this plant is its bloom habit. The shrub produces abundant tubular flowers in response to high soil moisture or humidity. In summer...

Deep-Rooted Wisdom: Skills and Stories from Generations of Gardeners by Augustus Jenkins Farmer My rating: 3 of 5 stars Augustus Jenkins Farmer, known to his friends as "Jenks," gardens in South Carolina, using the traditional skills and techniques he learned from his parents as a child and later from a large cast of teachers and mentors who had, in their turn, learned from generations of gardeners. In a straightforward and engaging style, he writes about what he has learned from all of them and from his own experience. He espouses a model of gardening that is quite different from the corporate-driven one that we see in many slick gardening magazines and in television commercials for weed killers, insecticides, and manufactured fertilizers. It is a kinder and gentler way of gardening, one that is in harmony with Nature. He writes about the basics of his kind of gardening, which starts with building a fertile soil to encourage a healthy web of life. He goes on to discuss harn...

Butterflies of Houston and Southeast Texas by John Tveten My rating: 5 of 5 stars A book that I have owned for many years, which I am constantly re-reading sections of, and which I refer to almost every day especially at this time of year, is Butterflies of Houston and Southeast Texas by John and Gloria Tveten. This is the most accessible and, at the same time, the most comprehensive guide to butterflies that I have found for this area. The guide describes and illustrates with color pictures more than 100 species of butterflies that can be found in Southeast Texas, as well as often occurring farther afield in other sections of the state. In my many years of relying on this easy-to-use guide, it has never failed me. Every butterfly that I have come across in Southeast Texas has been found in the book. As a habitat gardener and amateur photographer who delights in photographing butterflies, I particularly admire the work of those who photographed the butterflies for the book. They are ...

While I was weeding the area around my little backyard goldfish pond last Saturday, I happened to interrupt the nap of this handsome fellow. He is a Southern Leopard Frog ( Rana sphenocephala ) and he and a number of his relatives inhabit my pond and its immediate environs. Leopard Frogs are pretty common anywhere there is shallow water. This can include lakes, marshes, streams, or backyard goldfish ponds. They are nocturnal and become active at night. Throughout the day, they generally hide among the plants, like my little friend. Sometimes, if they are startled, they will leap into the water. This guy, though, seemed too sleepy to bother. These frogs are large and slender and can grow up to about five inches long. They can be green or brown or, as this one is, green AND brown. with the large dark spots which give them their common name. Southern Leopard Frogs breed from March to June. Once mated, the female frogs lay egg masses of up to 4,000 eggs in shallow water, usually attached t...

Crossvine is a native perennial vine that is a member of the trumpet-creeper family ( Bignoniaceae ). It grows in the woods in many of the eastern parts of the United States, including in east Texas and occasionally to westernmost central Texas. It is a robust woody vine that can climb up to 50 feet due to its tendrils which have claws at the tips, enabling the vine to catch and hold on. In the spring, it produces masses of brilliant flowers in shades of orange. The leaves are glossy dark green in summer and turn reddish after frost. In areas of mild winters, such as southeast Texas, the vines keep their leaves through winter and once the weather warms up it is ready to grow and produce flowers. Like many native plants, this one has been cultivated by horticulturists and new varieties created. I grow one of them in my backyard. This is 'Tangerine Beauty' and it is well-named for it is a beauty, and, at this time of year, the vine is completely covered in these blossoms. Native ...

Three springs ago, I was sitting in my favorite seat under my red oak tree one day when I looked down at my feet and saw a pretty little wildflower growing there. It was an allium , a wild onion, but where most of the wild onions in my neighborhood have white flowers, this one had pink flowers. I thought it was quite pretty so I dug it up and put it in a pot and later transferred it to a bed in my garden, where it has flourished and bloomed for the two springs since then. Referring to my guidebook, Wildflowers of Texas by Geyata Ajilvsgi, I determined that the wildling was most likely Allium canadense . Bloom period for the plant is March - May, and just now the plants are full of these pretty, delicate little blossoms. While I was admiring the plant on Tuesday, I got a bonus treat. A small, dark butterfly landed on the blooms and began to feed. It was a butterfly that I didn't remember ever seeing before, so I ran for my camera to try to get its picture. I wasn't particularly...

Sometimes you get lucky. I was sitting on my backyard bench by the pond over the weekend with my camera in my hands because I was trying - unsuccessfully as it turned out - to get some pictures of a red dragonfly. Then, Fate brought me another subject for my photography efforts. A tiny butterfly landed in the grass near my feet and I aimed the camera at it and snapped. When I looked at the picture later, I realized that it was a butterfly I had never seen before. Actually, it was so small, with a wingspread of perhaps an inch, that it is possible I had seen it before and had simply not noticed it. That's often the case of some of the tiny butterflies. We are distracted by the Monarchs and the various swallowtails, all large and showy butterflies that grab our attention, and we forget to notice some of the smaller treasures that are right there under our noses. The Dainty Sulphur certainly qualifies as one of those treasures. It is a pretty little butterfly and the smallest of the f...

The berries which give beautyberry its name, photographed in my garden this week. Beautyberry is well-named. Those shiny berries that develop in late summer and early fall on the 3-5 foot tall shrubs are indeed very attractive, both to humans and to birds which love to feast on them. In fact, I am sure that all the purple-berried beautyberries in my yard were planted by birds - birds who either pooped out the seeds from the berries or dropped them in flight. I do have several of these native shrubs from the verbena family, because, generally, if possible, I just leave them alone and let them grow where they are planted. Historically, Native Americans made a tea from the leaves and roots of American beautyberry ( Callicarpa americana ), sometimes called French mulberry, which they used for sweat baths for rheumatism, fevers, and malaria. A root tea was used for dysentery and stomach aches. Root and berry teas were used for colic. The plant is very valuable in a native plant landscape be...

My rating:  4 of 5 stars If you are interested in creating a habitat garden, a garden that fits seamlessly into your local environment and is welcoming to local wildlife, this is a book that can help you achieve your goal. George Adams' emphasis is upon attracting birds to the garden, but, in fact, his gardening method will also attract butterflies, bees, and other pollinators, small reptiles and amphibians, as well as avian visitors. It will be a place that is welcoming to them all and that is much more interesting for any humans that spend time in it. One of the most popular hobbies in the country is feeding birds. An entire multi-million dollar industry has grown up around supplying feeders and feed to the hobbyists, but putting up a bird feeder in your yard is not necessarily the best way to attract birds or to attract a wide range of species. You might wind up with nothing but House Sparrows, which is not what most people who want to watch birds in their yards are aiming for. ...

If you are a person of a certain age, you may remember the summer of 1969 when Neil Armstrong took his "giant leap for mankind" on the Moon. Around that same time, there was a song that was very popular and was getting a lot of play on the radio. It was called "Poke Salad Annie" and told the story of a poor Southern girl who picked a wild plant called pokeweed and cooked it as a vegetable. Annie, however, would have actually called her vegetable "poke salet." It is a vegetable that many poor Southerners were then, and probably still are, very familiar with. It is properly known as pokeweed ( Phytolacca americana ) and it grows wild and rampantly in the eastern United States. It is a member of a family of perennial potherbs that are native mostly in Africa and the New World. The plant's name supposedly is derived from the Algonquian word "pakon" or "puccoon" which referred to a dye plant. It is also sometimes spelled "Polk"...

An incomplete fairy ring, or fairy circle. More like a fairy semi-circle.  After several weeks of dry weather, we had rain last week and after the rain, the mushrooms started popping up around the yard. Some of them formed circles, or parts of circles like the large one above that appeared in my front yard in an area of patchy grass. These naturally occurring rings or arcs of mushrooms are commonly known as fairy rings or fairy circles. You may also sometimes see or hear them referred to as elf rings or pixie rings. Because the mushrooms pop up overnight as if by magic, folk tales have associated them with these magical folk. In folklore, these phenomena are said to result from the dancing of fairies (or elves or pixies) on moonlit nights. These beings were thought to dance in circles; thus, the mushrooms that became visible in daylight marked the area of their nighttime frolics. If you are more inclined to a scientific explanation, you'll be interested to know that mushrooms are t...

This is a short film by Louie Schwartzberg called "The Beauty of Pollination." I thought it was quite gorgeous. I hope you will, too.  That seems like a nice place to start our weekend. Happy weekend to you!

The migration of animals is one of the true wonders of Nature, and none of those migrations is more wondrous, bordering on the miraculous, than that of the Monarch butterfly. Each late summer and fall the colorful orange, black, and white butterflies from all across the North American continent head south toward their winter home in Mexico . For such a fragile creature to make such of journey seems incredible, but it happens to be true. And when winter is over the butterflies head north again. An individual butterfly may not necessarily make the entire journey. The female butterflies lay their eggs on milkweed plants along the way and succeeding generations of the species then continue the trip until they reach their final destination. Some of them go all the way to Canada. There has long been speculation about what percentage of the butterflies actually fly the entire distance and what percentage are born along the way. Now there has been some research done which has given answers t...

Did you read the story this week about the discovery of giant Jurassic fleas ? It seems that scientists in northeastern China have found fossils of fleas from the Jurassic period! Think about that for a minute - flea fossils. Will wonders never cease? Not only have they found these fossils but they are really, really big as fleas go. The female of the species was up to one-half inch long, a veritable giant in the world of fleas. The male was smaller but still much larger than modern fleas. In fact, these Jurassic fleas were ten times as big as today's fleas. The scientists speculate that these giant fleas may have fed on dinosaurs. They had very elongated and sharp mouth parts made for sucking blood and it is believed that these siphons were long enough and sharp enough to have pierced the dinosaurs' leathery skin. Although there were some mammals around in the Jurassic era, they were small and probably were not hosts to the big fleas. I am fascinated by the fact that these sc...