Wild About Nature Blog

This is one of the biggies, and tonight and tomorrow night are peak viewing times, the only ‘downer’ being the gibbous moon that will shed a little too much light on the subject.  You can expect to see a lot of falling stars — perhaps up to one a minute — and in the early evening, when the moon is still not interfering, you have a good chance of seeing ‘Earthgrazers’ — meteors that approach from the direction of the horizon, leaving long, bright, colorful trails.  They’re a real treat to see.  Find a good north vantage for prior-to-midnight viewing.  Enjoy!

Posted on August 11th, 2009 by Rebecca Whitman
Filed under: Natural Phenomena | 4 Comments »

A walk through familiar landscapes,

streams and gnarled trees,

rocks and damp moss.

Then an eldritch thing,

something from another world,

and we can only stare.

For a moment, the familiar landscape becomes strange –

the stream speaks a forgotten tongue,

ancient messages are scawled in the twisted bark,

the stones mark their age at a time of forgotten beasts,

and the moss is a forest where strange things crawl.

The moment passes, and we view this odd thing in context.

Something left for breeding by a creature we’ll never see.

Still strange, but small now, manageable.

We have our world back, which is a good thing.

That time we were almost lost.

Visit this week’s Adventure Journal, as well!

Posted on July 21st, 2009 by Kenton and Rebecca
Filed under: Nature Mysteries | 7 Comments »

We had a grand adventure yesterday, hiking to Glenwood Hills County Park with my Dad and Steph.  Rebecca was dressed as a true gentlewoman adventurer.

We came across two mysteries.  The one we solved, but the other is still eluding us.  You can experience the mysteries yourself right here –

The first was this tree.  Its rough bark was quite unlike any other tree’s bark we had ever seen.  Any guesses as to what it is?

Stepping back, you can see more of the tree.  But its nature still eluded us . . .

The mystery began to resolve itself when we looked up.

And a closer look confirmed it.  Not what we had expected.

A birch tree!  So old that its lower bark had split apart and become very un-birchlike in appearance and texture.

Then a deeper mystery confronted us.  Flapping through the trees, a large bird — clearly a raptor — alighted in a branch.  It was very difficult to get an angle for a photograph, so our pictures are very ‘Loch Ness Monster’, and we couldn’t get a shot that included the tail.  None of us had ever seen a bird quite like this, and our guesses started flowing.  It wasn’t until a dear friend of ours sent the pictures to a falconry expert that we received our startling answer to the mystery.  Here are the pictures — What do you think it is?

My guess was completely wrong.  Seeing those distinctive eye-stripes, I pounced on the only bird I remembered with those markings — the Peregrine Falcon — even though the habitat was all wrong. When we got home and consulted our Sibley Guide, the Prairie Falcon stood out as another possibility, although it wasn’t really in our range.  The falconry expert, however, took one look at the pictures and informed us that this wasn’t a falcon at all, but most definitely a hawk.  Without seeing the tail, the two possibilities were a Red-Tailed Hawk and a Red-Shouldered Hawk.

Puzzling over how the falconer could have been so sure it wasn’t a falcon, we carefully observed the photos, and decided that one could tell by the face — can you see how ‘long’ the bird’s face is in the above pictures? Then observe this photo from the Idaho Birding Trail website.  The Prairie Falcon has a much ’shorter’ face.  From what we can tell, this seems to be the case across the hawk/falcon world.

Visit our Adventure Journal to find out about this week’s adventure!

Posted on July 10th, 2009 by Kenton Whitman
Filed under: Birds, Plants | No Comments »

Even before I met Kenton and was swept away into the world of climbing trees and catching turtles, I was constantly amazed at the marvels of Mother Nature.  How could every agate be so beautiful and different, and how did they end up in the middle of a pile of ‘plain brown rocks’ on the side of the road?  Why did garter snakes always have to stink you when you caught them (and was there a way around this)?  Why did marshmallows taste better over a campfire than the kitchen stove?  Why did thunder come so far behind lightning (most of the time, at least) and what caused thunder during snowstorms?  Why did mosquito bites bother some people so much and others so little?  How did geese know where to go when they headed south in the autumn?

These questions were just the beginning of a dawning realization that the world around us is filled with far more mystery than we are aware of.  And the realization that everywhere we look we are surrounded by nature– take a peek sometime at the dust on your desk under the powerful lens of a microscope, or stroll through your downtown sidewalks and keep track of the bugs, birds, plants, and other creatures that you see along the way.  Examine your cauliflower before you chop it up for dinner or study the spirals of a shell from the beach– you’ll discover the inexplicably beautiful pattern of the Fibonacci series.

Sometimes I can feel less knowledgeable about these mysteries than I should– after all, I don’t know the answers to how salmon find their way back to their spawning ground each year, nor can I predict which dead elms will have morels in the spring.  With each new riddle that presents itself, however, I have learned one thing for certain:  all one needs in order to unravel the mysteries of nature is an open and curious heart, and a willingness to explore.

Is there a nature mystery that intrigues or captivates you?  Have you uncovered the meaning of one of Mother Nature’s curious enigmas?  Please feel free to share your insights with us in the comments– the joys of nature are often best when shared!

Visit our Adventure Journal to find out about this week’s adventure!

Posted on July 2nd, 2009 by Rebecca Whitman
Filed under: Nature Inspiration | 8 Comments »

The other day we were visiting someone’s home when we looked up in the sky and said ‘Sundog!’.  There was a huge, vibrant circle around the sun, and we found ourselves rushing about admiring it from different vantages — using the peak of the roof, the leaves of a tree, or Rebecca’s head to block the sun so that we could get a full view of the phenomenon.  The effect was of a clear rainbow circling the sun.

It was only later that we learned that this wasn’t a sundog at all, but rather a phenomenon called a 22 degree halo.  Sundogs are bright points that form on halos.  In fact, there are a whole mess of cool sun- (and sometimes moon-) associated rings, bright spots, and other visual amazements formed by ice crystals in the sky.   Here is a link to some great photos at Wikipedia.

This was an excellent reminder to us that it’s always good to stop throughout the day and look around ourselves.  There’s sure to be something interesting on the ground, over the horizon, or right up above us in the sky!

Posted on June 20th, 2009 by Kenton and Rebecca
Filed under: Natural Phenomena | 5 Comments »