Summer in Review

Summer 2015 has been busy. So, this blog has been a little quiet for several months. Here's a brief review of the summer's events.

June: Drive to Washington State...

Redding, CA. Despite the name, we didn't stay here. We stayed at the Thunderbird down the street, and it served us just fine. We rolled in at 2am with no reservation; they were dog-friendly and the room was clean.

Heavenly Donuts, Redding, CA. The donuts were heavenly, the breakfast bagel was not.

...to get married (photo: Jenny Jimenez).

Hanging out with family for a few days in La Conner.

Kiket island, low tide, June 2015.

 Brief Ritchlips Road Trip (a few more photos here on Instagram).

Ice for sale (for beer and fish), Nordland/Marrowstone, WA. Across the street from this is one of the most comprehensive and well displayed General Stores I've ever visited.

Former site of the Elwha dam, a must-see destination for restoration tourists like ourselves. This is the largest dam removal site in US history.

Enormous driftwood at South Beach, Olympic National Park.

July: Back home with visitor Mabel.

Special visitors from ABQ.

August: Back to Work. The ring holds up to gardener work.

Go hang out in Canada for a week.

Yes, we had our limousine driver stop at McDonald's. The good times were only beginning!

This is a screen shot from my iPhone, which counts your steps. The lull in the middle of this graph represents our time at Balsam Lake. I wasn't as much of a sloth as it appears -- I just didn't have my phone with me, or on, most of the time. I think the spike was the day that Andrew, Lila, and I went to the Blue Jays game and kicked around Toronto.

Late August: Move. 

Original reservation with U-Haul: check out truck at 8am, return by 9pm. Reality: We returned the truck at 6:56am after pulling an all-nighter of packing as we moved. Lessons were learned!

Now, it's late September, our new place is still on a room-by-room basis, but we're happy here. Fairly regular (?) posts from americanature will resume. I've been having fun with instagram, too.

Tellima grandiflora, depth of field

Tellima grandiflora (with a visitor), Miwok Trail, Marin County, February 2015.

 Tellima grandiflora, or fringecups, is one of the gems of Marin County's native flora. Like many, it shows itself in the spring, adding color that is easily overlooked to the woodland understory and streambanks. But upon closer study, one notices a transition in color from the base of the panicle (flower spike) to the top; looking closer, one can see delicate fringes on the tips of its petals. It's kind of a marvel. It is the kind of thing that makes me wonder -- why? Why the detail? Does this help this plant survive somehow? Maybe it doesn't matter; beauty is subjective. But, perhaps it has made it this far in the face of so deleterious a species as the human being because of its beauty. Perhaps it will help save woodlands and streambanks from the pressures we put on their native ecosystem types.

Then again, maybe its beauty has led to it being planted elsewhere in the world, outside of its native range. And, maybe now, like other plants that have performed similar feats, it has become invasive somewhere and loathed by native plant community defenders elsewhere in the world. I am pleased that a quick google for "tellima grandiflora invasive" only yielded results indicating that fringecups is a desired plant that must be saved from invasives. 

At any rate, when I encountered a few individuals of this species on the Miwok Trail a few miles from my house, I was faced with a challenge. I only had one lens -- a 90mm. But I wanted to get as close to the flower as possible. I got a few individuals from many angles. On the one below, I took four separate shots and changed the focus as I stood above it. I started at the bottom and began focusing my way up the top. Light was limited and I had no tripod, so I needed to keep my shutter speed no slower than 1/60 second. So I opened up my aperture all the way and embraced my narrow depth of field (could that be a metaphor for something?).

Then, after developing my film and receiving my photos on CD from Photoworks SF,  I combined the four images into an animated.gif with the free software PhotoScape. (The animation repeats continuously.)

Tellima DOF GIF, Marin County, February 2015.

For the full length HD link to PBS' documentary adaptation of Michael Pollan's The Botany of Desire -- click here.

Glitterpoop at Oakwood Valley

Watch out, Beardog! That's glitterpoop!

It makes me chuckle to think that there is a person out there who does this. He or she embarks on their regular hike at Oakwood Valley with a glitter dispenser and a keen eye for rogue dog poops. Those that catch his or her eye get a little sprinkle. 

I have only seen this here, on this particular Marin County trail, and I have seen it done for a few years. 

Is this:

1) A citizen's arrest of sorts, calling out irresponsible dog owners who don't tend their pets' excrement?

2) art/protest?

3)  another form of littering?

You decide. 

Cool Yard Mushrooms

In response to the rain from two weeks ago, a couple of cool mushrooms have popped up in the yard.

Catey discovered this one, growing in a dirt scrape under our front porch where Beardog often prefers to hang out. It is probably one of the cooler places of our yard, but always dry. I think this mushroom is still emerging and may have to wait to identify it. The closest I can come up with is shaggy mane, Coprinus comatus. 

Next up, emerging under a pine in our yard which had a small crop of these two years ago, is what I believe is Amanita muscaria. 

It will also be fun to watch this one mature, providing the squirrels or skunks don't get to it again. The reddish color should intensify and it should continue to have white spots. This is a famous mushroom.

Per Wikipedia:

"In remote areas of Lithuania Amanita muscaria has been consumed at wedding feasts, in which mushrooms were mixed with vodka." Sounds like quite a party!

UPDATE, 2/24:

I think they were both the same species, 

Amanita muscaria. One was eaten at the base of the stalk, and died. The other burgeons beautifully. 

Odd dew on Poppies -- My first iPhone post

OK, a new era has truly begun as I sit here and post from my new iPhone.  After only a few weeks of ownership, this thing is changing my life. Catey just pointed this out, with a chuckle, as I sent her a web address I wanted to share with her via text message, no words spoken. (Would one consider this "over the Internet and through the room"?)

What does this mean for americanature? 

1. More frequent posts, most likely. 

2, Possibly some strange formatting and careless grammar. 

3. More reliance on digital photos. But I will continue to shoot film and post selected photos here, as previously. 

The above image shows a strange occurrence that has taken place on the poppies in our planter box lately. Each of the leaflets has tiny droplets on them. It may be hard to see this in the photo, but I did my best. 

I assume this is a method the plant has of regulating moisture, but I can't imagine why. We are in a record warm spell, and despite December rains heavy enough to cause widespread flooding, the winter has been very dry. These plants. Like the rest of our backyard natives, receive occasional dish rinse water, but have not lately; their soil is very dry. 

Any ideas out there as to what this phenomenon might be?

A New Decade, tiny mushrooms, time and knowledge.

Thank you, family and friends, near and far, for ringing in my 40s with me over the past weekend. It feels different than I thought it would. I don't feel old. I just feel here. I enjoy each new day more than the last, just as I did in my teens, twenties, thirties. So why would I not want to get older? (We have no choice anyway!)

As days continue, I hope to appreciate small things; accept all outcomes; validate all those with whom I interact; be confident in myself; continue to strengthen my partnership with Catey; and I look forward to more shared experiences with family, hers and mine. 

Here's a picture of a tiny mushroom from my last roll of film. (See the tiny one? Look up and left, into the shadows, and find an even tinier one). These guys showed up on the pear tree in our backyard after the first rains. We hope this doesn't mean bad things for the tree...but it may. But it means good things for the mushroom (which, by the way, I am unable to identify). Because the mushroom is a fruiting body, it is merely a small expression of the entire living organism. It's like an acorn on an invisible tree of mycelia, in a way. The mycelia are alive throughout the tree.

Tiny mushroom on pear, December 2014.

Life comes in so many forms, and we, as humans, have the ability, more than any other form, to appreciate and understand so many of the others. It takes a lifetime to even begin to learn about all the stuff out there, and we spend so much time focused on the Human World. It wasn't so long ago that humans were much closer connected to nature. I think it's important to maintain that connection, at the very least to respect that it's complicated out there. And, know or like it or not, we need lots of things to work out there for our own survival to continue.

With the heavy rain we had in the Bay Area last month, mushrooms have been appearing. I grabbed All that the Rain Promises, and More off my shelf and have been using it to identify a few mushrooms out there, just for fun. My new coworkers at San Francisco Recreation and Parks have taken on the challenge collectively, on our lunch breaks. We've made a few spore prints in our break room.  

This is a hilarious book: the photographs would be enough, but the narrative adds to it. And, if you read closely enough, you'll find some philosophy in this book. I read one of the passages about collecting boletes, or Porcini, mushrooms. There is an essay about Italian-American mushroom hunters. They are old, know the land, and are very slow and methodical at their craft. They are secretive about their locations. The essay calls attention to a way of life that is quite un-American. The definition of success, in the eyes of the Old World mushroom collector, is, by the end of your life, to have lots of time, and lots of knowledge. 

It was a fitting idea to ponder on my 40th.

Many tiny mushrooms on pear, December 2014.

Many tiny mushrooms on pear, December 2014.

I have been getting up too early

Fog condensed on Lonicera hispidula, November 2014.