In Pursuit of Wonder

I was going mushroom hunting, looking for dryads though a few morels would be delightful, I didn’t think I’d find any or at best only a couple. To save some time (I had only an hour and a half before I had to get back to make cheese), I took…

The western chorus frog, Pseudacris triseriata, is a very small frog, barely over an inch long; males are slightly smaller than females. This is Minnesota’s smallest frog. Skin color is variable, ranging from green, gray red or light brown. It has three, dark longitudinal stripes on its back, which are…

Mom, Elisa (my niece) and I went to the National Wildlife Refuge by Minnesota City to view migrating waterfowl. Traveling on an unmaintained road, we drove slowly, watching the water. At the water’s edge, the first bird we saw was a sandhill crane; this trip was planned in hopes of…

There were many special places on my childhood farm that I loved. One spot that I liked to go to on a warm, sunny day was in one of the pastures. On a side of a hill the ground dips down a little, slopping with the hill, deep enough that…

Note: The following is a blog I wrote for the farm two years ago. It seemed fitting for my nature blog too. It had been awhile since I looked at the area we had burned this spring. The first thing that hit me was the stunning colors, red, maroon, deep…

There was a buzz of many voices filling the air as people talked and shared a meal at Eastside Park. There was a sense of excitement coursing through me as I ran back and forth across the green, cultivated grass, wet with a thick layer of dew as I played…

March 12, 2015 Spring arrived abruptly on Saturday (7th), though it may be a false spring. Wednesday night had been -10 degrees Fahrenheit and Saturday was at least 45 degrees Fahrenheit, by Tuesday it was 65 degrees Fahrenheit and sunny, night time lows around 40 degrees Fahrenheit. It was absolutely…

  Round, bright yellow, the sun was a glowing orb sinking over the western horizon. It went with a flash. Streaks of gold and orange spread out from it, reflecting off the few clouds in the sky. It was perfect in all its splendor. Like a painting, brushed by the…

There was a bit of a breeze today, cold, but fully sunny. Larry and I headed out on the marsh again. It was the first time we went out on a sunny day, the other two days were completely overcast. The sun glared off the snow. We were still exploring…

Larry and I set out to traverse another section of the marsh. As we were driving along, I got a good view of the snow laden prairie. It was fascinating to see the prairie in winter; I look forward to seeing it in the spring and height of summer with…