There is a silence accompanied by a misty morning that is unlike anything else.
This morning I sat on the porch to have my morning coffee. The roosters refrained from crowing. The logging activity is either done or stopped for …
Category: Nature
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Nature Sketching Day 14
At this time of year it’s even harder than usual for me to make a quick trip to town and back. If I bring my camera with me, it’s a guaranteed impossibility.
Today I had to stop for photos …
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Nature Sketching Day 13 – Green Grass in Fall
I always like to see green grass in fall among the dead leaves.
Yesterday I missed my sketching. I missed the day before that too, but had taken a photo of the leaf so I could draw it later. But …
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It’s beginning to look like fall here at Wild Ozark
Yesterday it really felt like fall, and it does again today, too. It was almost 40*F this morning.
I took a few photos yesterday, but was in a hurry to get somewhere so didn’t bring the monopod and the quality …
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For all the little acorns
May they grow to mighty oaks
For the past several weeks one of the first morning sounds have been that of heavy equipment moving into place on the mountains to our southeast. Later, as the sun rises, it’s chainsaws. And …
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Nature Sketching Day 8
Yesterday’s Nature Journal entry was created today because a new grandbaby of mine entered the world the night before and I slept through my usual drawing/entry time.
There’s a post that corresponds to this entry at the main site. You …
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Nature Sketching Day 6 – “Lobelia Inflata”
Today I went out on foot, backpack loaded with my towel and cushion to sit on, sketch journal, and pencils to do my daily entry for the Wild Ozark Nature Journal.
Once I found my subject, this aging Lobelia inflata …
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Busy Days at Wild Ozark
I’ve been busy lately, but you wouldn’t know it from my lack of posts to the blog. New projects started (Wild Ozark Nature Journal) and a new website to go with it, new products, and new adventures. Last Friday I …
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Nature Sketching Day 3 – Sycamore Leaf
Each day I’ve picked what I think will be a simple subject. Today’s was a single sycamore leaf with no effort to include background, foreground or any other difficult or distracting thing.
Then as I settled in and began my …
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Nature Sketching Day 2 – Asters Along the Driveway
Today’s nature sketch is of the purple asters that were growing along the driveway. Each day I try to make an entry with a pencil drawing.
…
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Is it Ginseng Root, Tree Root, or what?
Do you know what kind of roots these are?
The other day I got an email asking for some identification help.
From the photos, I do not believe it’s ginseng, but I can’t tell what it is. Some of them …
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What Happens to Ginseng in Too Much Sun
Why is this ginseng turning yellow?
…UPDATE 10/5/24 This is an old post from when I first started observing ginseng in the wild and among my wild-simulated patches, and thought I knew a lot more than I did. The ginseng
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This Beaver is One Heck of an Optimist
This beaver must possess tremendous optimism. Either that or he’s a long-term strategist, or both! Most farmers dislike beavers with a passion bordering hatred. The reason why that is, at least for the ones I asked, is because they’re always …
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Spider Stick
Anyone who has ever ridden, or rather, *driven* a four-wheeler on a tree-lined path will know exactly why this four-wheeler is sporting a lovely branch of wilted leaves.
It’s a “spider stick”. And it’s the person in front, if you’re …
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Do Your Dogs Sing with the Chickens?
Badger howling at coyotes. We have singing dogs. Every morning at sunrise when the rooster crows and the hens wake, and during the day when the chickens get all a-cluck over an egg laying, the dogs break into song with …
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Rattlesnakes and Dogs don’t Mix – Snakebit dog
A WildOzark Timber Rattlesnake They’re not aggressive. Really.
This one just wanted to be left alone. It’s the second one I’d encountered that week, and both were relatively calm. Badger even stepped on the first one and didn’t notice until after …
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The Slow Descent of an Ozark Mountain Landslide
I’ve been observing and recording our slowly descending Ozark landslide. Leaning trees and driveway encroachment, photographed day by day.
Since the flood last Monday I haven’t done a whole lot of cleanup. The main reason for that is the landslide.…
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The Impermanence of Things
We’ve had a lot of rain in the last days here in the Ozark Highlands. 7 inches in a few hours Monday night. That’s too much rain for our little creeks and hollers.
Lots of folks have lost homes, cattle, …
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Rattlesnake at the Gate
Gnats have made it nearly impossible for me to stand being outside at my potting bench for very long.
Yesterday I did the little bit of work I needed to do at it while trying not to breathe so the …
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Unripe Fruit
I have a hard time believing I have no pictures – at all – of ripe elderberry fruit. After digging through file after unfruitful file, I thought it might be faster to just go get a new photo.
Not quite.…
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What’s Blooming at the end of May?
Wild Ozark plants blooming at the end of May
I took a little walkabout yesterday to photograph some of the flowers that are setting berries, blooming, or getting ready to bloom right now.
Yesterday’s post highlighted the orchid I’d been waiting …
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Talk about Delayed Gratification! (Twayblade Orchid)
I’ve been waiting a whole year to see this flower.
When I first found the plant last summer there was only the two leaves. Without seeing a flower, it’s hard to positively identify a plant, unless that plant has something …
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Water Over the Bridge-Videos
When you can hear the roar of the wet-weather waterfall from the house, you know the water’s up. If you can see the waterfall from the front porch, it’s a fair bet the creek is way over the bridge.
When …
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A Woodland Habitat – Dragons among the Nettles and Cohosh
There’s a particular woodland habitat at the far corner of our property that I love.
The variety of plants that grow there is amazing.
It’s the perfect place for American ginseng, but those plants have nearly been extirpated by diggers …
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Dragons Hatching, Clematis Blooming, and Feeding Horses in the Rain
Dragons Hatching!
Last fall I collected seeds from a large Green Dragon. I put the berries directly into pots and kept them overwinter in the ginseng nursery. The other morning I noticed they were hatching – er, sprouting! The …
