Continuing our occasional series on landscape, I thought I’d share a few images from near home. A cool front (the first in weeks) promised some relief from the heat and humid air but stalled out last night and gave us only clouds and light rain. But we could not have hoped for better. Not here. …
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Flight of the Kite
A snippet of local birdlife: The young Mississippi Kites are on the wing now and starting to hunt for themselves over the neighborhood. The parents are provisioning some, also; so there is a lot of spectacular kite activity overhead! Last night my twins and I witnessed a moment that would have made a great study …
More Dogs at the Beach
Thought I would share some pictures taken Monday night. It’s been a while since I pictured Sadie and you can see how much she has grown. She was at 46 pounds at her last official weigh-in. As I have said before, there is just so much for dogs at the beach. Surf lines to chase …
Jacarandas
One of the signs of late Spring and Summer here in Southern California are the blue blooms of jacarandas, an exotic tree that is a commonly planted ornamental. The trees are native to southern Africa and South America and are apparently a common ornamental planting in Australia, just as they are here. The two pictures …
Scientists to Rebuild Neanderthal Genome
The New York Times has this interesting piece on plans to reconstruct the Neanderthal genome using DNA extracted from bones discovered in Croatia. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology in Germany and 454 Life Sciences in the US will collaborate on the work. The study of Neanderthal DNA has been stalled by …
Sign of the Times
Garage sales are pretty common in our neighborhood. This is the first sign like this I’ve seen!
Terrierman and The Mammoth in the Hedge
I wanted to recommend this wonderful post by Terrierman that he put up last week while our blog was on its mysterious outage. The title alone is wonderful and it is a meditation on how humans need to take a long term view (10,000 years at least) of our species and our planet. In a …
Rina and The Skunk: A Budding Romance
OK, this is getting stranger but is true. From a note to Steve and other friends regarding recent chance meetings in the woods: “Rina and I have met the skunk again two nights in a row. Last night Rina’s attitude seemed to shift (from predatory interest to….what? Something more benign…?) when I made it clear …
Giant Yellowjacket Nests
… in Alabama. I mean, GIANT. One fills a’55 Chevy– see photo– and consists of possibly a hundred thousand individuals and several queens. “Without a cold winter to kill them this year, the yellow jackets continued feeding in January and February — and layering their nests made of paper, not wax. They typically are built …
Dangerous Book For Boys
This book sounds like grand fun, although some disagree. “The sort of fun promoted has also raised eyebrows. In a society that is preoccupied with safety, The Dangerous Book promotes activities in which boys are likely to get scuffed. This is a book for tree-climbers who occasionally pause to decipher enemy code or erupt into …