Blackwater NWR

Friday after work we headed off to Cambridge, Maryland, stopping en route for dinner at the Fisherman’s Inn, located in Kent Narrows on the Eastern Shore.  What the restaurant lacks in ambiance, it makes up for in tasty Maryland crab cakes.

The 226-mile (364 km) roundtrip drive was too long for an overnighter in the Phaeton, so we left the coach at home and opted to stay at the Comfort Inn & Suites in Cambridge instead.  At $160/night (incl. taxes) it was a bit pricey, but ‘tis still the high season in this area, so we bit the bullet.  For that rate, we got a clean, spacious room with a separate sitting area, and hi-speed wi-fi and breakfast, though we checked out too early this morning to take advantage of the latter. 

The drive to Cambridge is an easy shot on Route 50.  Though we traveled during rush
hour on a Friday, traffic was light and we didn’t hit any snags along the way.

Our destination was the Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge.  We could have just driven down for the day, of course, and saved ourselves some big bucks on the hotel room, but we wanted to be at the refuge bright and early, so staying overnight in Cambridge worked out better for us.

Arriving shortly after 6:30a, we certainly made it to Blackwater NWR early, but it wasn’t bright by any stretch of the imagination.  I have no idea what happened to the sunshine that was forecasted when we made our plans, but we didn’t see one single ray the entire time we were there.  In fact, our morning was overcast with low, grey clouds and occasional sprinkles here and there.

Since the light was so dull, I didn’t take any landscape pictures of this very scenic refuge this time.  In hindsight, I probably should have taken at least a photo of the brand new observation deck that just opened on August 12.  The 200-foot (60 m) long deck overlooks the Blackwater River marshlands and is a great place from which to observe the birds and waterfowl … when they are there to be seen.  We were skunked here, but it made a nice breakfast spot for us.  And we did see a bald eagle perched in a tree far, far away.

(Scenery shots (and wildlife, of course) from our April trip are in this gallery.)

My goal on this trip was to practice with my Wimberley gimbal head and also test a 400mm prime lens I rented against my 70-200mm lens (not that I have any plans to get rid of my 70-200mm; that one’s a definite keeper).  The prime lens was nice, but no comparison to my shorter zoom lens, which is far superior and gives me the same reach with the 2x extender with no noticeable degradation of quality.

Following is a selection of photos from the Wildlife Drive.  We made two runs on this road, which we had to ourselves until around 8:00a.  Then, all of two cars drove by without stopping except to ask us if we’d seen anything interesting.  I wanted to say, “Yes, and so would you if you got out of the car and spent some time here.”  But I was nice, and just told them what we’d seen.

In addition to the usual suspects of ospreys, great blue herons, and egrets, there were some small birds, such as semipalmated plovers, yellowlegs, gulls, and terns.  But neither lens had sufficient reach for the small birds, so we focused on the big birds instead.  Mui played with whichever lens I wasn’t using, reliving memories of his days taking still photographs before he got into videography.  Hence, there’s a combination of photos from both of us.

First, some shots of ospreys …

… and some great blue herons …

... Mui playing with the 400 mm lens ...

… here’s the lone greater yellowlegs I saw; a juvenile from the plumage …

… some great egrets …

… for a change of pace, a beaver …

… one of a pair of eagles that took off just as we arrived at the stand of trees where we had our best eagle sighting in (check out the gallery linked above) …

On our second time through, we decided to use the Key Wallace Drive to exit the refuge.  We were hoping to get a closer glimpse of the blue-winged teals that are making a migratory stop here.  Unfortunately, they were too far away for any decent pictures.  The drive wasn’t without its rewards, however, as we had our closest great egret sightings before and after the end of this drive.

This egret took off from the tree it was perched on just as we came upon it.  I took the photos from inside the car; luckily Mui’s window was down …

… and this great egret was strutting about a roadside farm …

And that’s the story of our morning at Blackwater NWR.  By 10:30a, we were on the road back home.  Despite the dreary day, we stopped at the Queen Anne County Visitor Center in Kent Narrows to eat our packed lunch.  Then it was back on the road again.  There was more traffic on the trip home, but we’ve seen worse on this road, so no complaints.  And we never came to a complete stop; which is unusual for a weekend even if we were going away from the beaches!  That’s a good thing.

For those who want to see more; there’s more from this trip in my online gallery for Blackwater.

Butterbur, Butterdock, Pestilence Wort...

On a recent walk I spotted an unusual-looking plant which I had never come across before. I asked for help in identifying it and wonderfulMeggie on the Prairievery kindly did some research and found that it was a Butterbur.

In between digging jobs in the garden I have found a little time to do some reading about the plant and its uses in folk medicine. I found it interesting, so I thought I'd post about it.





First of all, why the strange name - well it seems that the leaves were used to wrap butter. At the time I found the flowers there were no leaves visible, but apparently they can grow to a metre in diameter, on a stalk of up to 1.2 metres. I can't wait to go back and have another look - it will probably be a jungle in there by now.





There are many other common names for it, Bog Rhubarb, Butterdock, Devil's Hat, and Pestilence Wort (my favourite), Umbrella leaves, Flapperdock and many others. It was well known to country folk!





Nicholas Culpeper, the great herbalist, called it a great preserver of the heart and reviver of the spirits and documented the use of Butterbur to provoke sweat and fight the plague, and fevers.

Borrowed image of Nicholas Culpeper

The roots were dried, beaten to a powder and drunk in wine. Not sure how effective it was. Please do not try this at homeKnatolee!

Folk medicine applications include use as a diuretic, to treat coughs, wounds, hayfever, asthma, stress and stammering. It was used mashed into a poultice and applied to wounds and broken skin. Warning: Butterbur contains liver-toxic and possibly carcinogenic components.





In a lighter vein, historically the seeds have been used for love divination. So, according to English folk lore, a young maiden should sow the seeds of Butterdock/Butterbur on the grass on a Friday morning, in a lonesome place, half an hour before sunrise, saying:





"I sow, I sow,

Then, my own dear,

Come here, Come here,

And mow, and mow."

A painting by Walter Hunt

Once the seed is scattered she will see her future husband mowing with a scythe, at a short distance from her. She must not be frightened, for if she says "Have mercy on me!" he will immediately disappear.





This is said to be an infallible method, if somewhat desperate and bold!

One wonders where we find them

I know this is the Gold Coast, and that people here aren't exactly known for their intelligence, but even after making those allowances, there are still some incredibly nonsensical situations that totally defy explanation. Two morons decided to block a road in Broadbeach last evening by fighting over a parking space. I'm not sure what was so special about that parking space, it certainly wasn't the only vacant one there -- the rain kept quite a few people away. It wasn't undercover (not that any sane person tries to avoid the rain around here anyway), but they insisted on that one anyway.

Of course, as always happens in these situations, I pedalled straight through their little stand-off totally unconcerned, and this was when one of them decided to do the old Queensland horn-lean. Now tell me this wasn't a waste of time. I certainly wasn't going to stop after I'd gone straight through. I had no intention of going back and either apologising or exacting "revenge", why would I? Still, it's his stress levels, so I guess he's entitled to do what he likes. Of course, he might have been honking at his adversary for the parking spot, but why he'd wait until I passed to do that, or why he thought it would help I have no idea.

The rain was nice though, even if it did stop on my ride home, meaning I didn't get to ride in it. It did some nice things to this morning's ride to Austinville. Hopefully it's the onset to a decent wet season this year.







The other thing to come out of Friday was the need for a decision soon on "The Green Machine", the old bike that I sometimes use as a back-up and for shopping. It's clear that riding any sort of distance (even a short one) with a backpack in a Queensland summer is extremely unpleasant at best. I need to either get it a pannier rack or pension it off completely. I'm thinking of a new bike next year, which means the current #1 (which I still haven't named as yet) will become the back-up. I'm thinking of maybe a touring bike, because it might suit the type of riding I do than a MTB. On the other hand, I'm concerned about how it would deal with dirt roads, which might reduce my options a little in that area.

Plenty of time to think about it. Perhaps the tour of Victoria will give me something more to think about. 7 days to go!

Amping up the Tweed Valley

I hadn't planned to do it this way, but last week I decided to do something with the old Tweed Valley ride that I've been doing regularly for over eight years. The distance was still similar (178km), but change to the route on the way home from Chillingham would totally change the complexion of the ride. It all started simply enough with the now customary southern ride via Urliup to get away from the coast. The first slight variation came after Murwillumbah, and the decision to detour along Richard's Deviation, a beautiful detour that I had almost forgotten about.

Beyond Uki, I headed for the really beautiful stretch of the ride along Byrill Creek. This is actually a long grind of a climb on the dirt, but on a slightly cooler day, I was able to enjoy the scenery of the rainforest, waterfalls and distant mountain views. This area must be an amazing place t0 live, with the fresh air and the tranquility of the forest.

The stretch through Brays Creek, Tyalgum and back to Chillingham is one that I've been riding in the wrong direction for all these years. Heading north opened up the views of the Lamington ranges and Bald Mtn. The two climbs out of Tyalgum made me work, but the surroundings compensated. Also hard at work today was the new altimeter that I had fitted to the bike the previous evening. I smiled at it particularly, because after Chillingham it would get one hell of a job.

Returning from the Tweed Valley via Numinbah Gap and Springbrook is hard enough at the best of times, yet I was about to attempt it on the back of a century ride. Still, it was a pleasant enough day, and the promise of rain on the climb of Numinbah gap (it seems to rain every other time I climb it from this side) might just keep me cool enough to pull it off. As it happened, it didn't rain until the descent on the other side, but I managed to maintain a grinding rhythm that pushed me over the 10-15% climb and into the Numinbah Valley on the other side.

Now it was on. I cruised down the long, steady descent into the valley, and caught a ride toward the Springbrook turn off on the back of a tailwind. The only problem was that my legs were totally shot, with a 24% climb still to come. I commenced the climb to the sound of screeching tyres in the valley -- the climb might be physically impossible, but at least it would keep me from associating with hoons. As it happened, I eventually made the summit (albeit with a couple of unscheduled rest stops), and was simply too tired to raise a victory salute. At least it would be all downhill from here.

The 8km descent that followed just didn't seem to be long enough to allow my legs to recover, and there was still some work to do. I actually thought about detouring to the Fudge shop at the old Craft Corner, but decided I wasn't up for an extra climb. Instead I simply mopped up the remaining kilometres and was glad to just make it home in one piece. It had been a memorable (if tiring) day. A few more of these, and I might start to get fit.

Unusual Seismic Recordings from Mount Rainier Glaciers

This is Steve Malone with the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network located at the University of Washington in Seattle. We operate seismographs throughout the Pacific Northwest and have three located high on Mount Rainier. We often record seismic events from all of our glacier-clad volcanoes that we associate with glacier motion, i.e. "ice-quakes." However, since about May 20, we have detected a strange set of these events coming from the upper Winthrop Glacier. We are calling these small events "clones" because the seismic waveforms from one event are near-duplicates of those from other events indicating a repeating source. They also seem to occur at very regular intervals.
The interval between events is often as short as every 3 minutes but changes from time to time and has been as much as 15 minutes between events. We think that their magnitude (on the Richter scale) is about M = -1 (i.e., 8 orders of magnitude smaller than the Nisqually earthquake of 2001).


So, what are these puppies? We think they represent small periodic slips at the bed of the glacier. Perhaps there is a large rock embedded in the bottom of the glacier and as the glacier moves it scrapes this rock along the bed, only a few mm in each slip. But why are they so regular in time? Maybe water pools up-hill of the rock until it slightly lifts the glacier allowing the rock to more easily slip and this then drains that small pool of water starting the process over. We think that water has an important influence on glacier sliding but don't understand the mechanism very well.
How can you help? Anyone climbing Rainier on the east side (upper Emmons or Winthrop Glacier routes) may see or hear things that would help us pin these suckers down. Please let me know of anything you think may be out of the ordinary (sounds, sights, feelings???). Particularly those of you who have been in this area before and can compare what may be different from previous climbs. Our best guess where these originate (based on stacking 4000 individual events to get the best relative seismic wave arrival times at six seismic stations and using a 1-D seismic velocity model with station elevation corrections, blah blah blah, other scientific mumbo-jumbo) puts the location at 46.85950 north 121.7610 west (i.e., 2.5 km WSW of Camp Schurman or 3.4 km NNW of Camp Muir or about 600 meters up from the top of Russell Cliffs).
To see these suckers yourself check out our "webicorders" at: http://www.pnsn.org/WEBICORDER/VOLC
and click on the date-time for one of the high Rainier stations (RCS, RCM, STAR). The small blips that have about the same size and shape are our "clones".
Send email to: steve@ess.washington.edu or give me a call (206-685-3811)
Steve Malone

Two Much Fun

These Salvias grow at my friend Mindy’s house, scene of last Saturday’s project for the Divas of the Dirt. We Divas are a group of Austin women who work together on each other’s garden projects. I joined the group in January .., making this my seventh season as one of the seven Divas. On Saturday we were eight, when Mindy’s houseguest, also a gardener, joined us for great food, interactions with nature, and conversations. The Divas worked on one short project and one very long one, and as we left, Mindy shared some extra Salvia greggii and a few pots of Barbados Cherry seedlings. By the time my friend Sophia dropped me at home just before 8 PM, I looked so wrecked that a family member handed over the bottle of Ibuprofen and pointed to the shower. But any day spent with seven wonderful gardeners is a good one, even if exhausting.
Sunday was shared with a different group of seven gardeners - all of them write about gardening and are informally known as the Austin Garden Bloggers. Two April days, each spent with a distinct group of seven other gardeners – what could be more fun? Pam/Digging, R.Sorrell/The Great Experiment, Julie/The Human Flower Project, Vivé/Something About Blooming and Butterflies, Susan/South of the River, Dawn/Suburban Wildlife Garden, and MSS/Zanthan Gardens and I carpooled around the city, stopping to wander around six gardens with some delicious finger-food in one hand and a glass in the other, talking nonstop.
Certain familiar plants were seen in almost every garden, while others were unknown to all but the owner. We have may have trees that are still saplings, or venerable trees that have survived generations of Texas weather. Some of us garden where the land is flat, others with slopes. The houses vary in ages, types and designs, and the gardens used so many plants and contained so many ideas that my head is spinning now as I think about the exhilarating day. But unlike Susan and MSS, I didn’t like awake and think about it last night – for the first time in weeks, I was too tired to think, and fell asleep immediately.
It’s ridiculous how pleased I can be by a single flower. Near the back fence there’s an area planted with red flowers to entice hummingbirds in summer, and a few months ago, I planted some Anemone coronaria ‘The Governor’ to add a little red in spring. Out of 20 corms, only 2 came up, each making a few flowers - this one was gracious enough to be open when the Garden Bloggers were here. One anemone would be lost among the hundreds of flowers in the lush and established gardens I saw yesterday, but one anemone had to be enough in this otherwise green bed.
Although its bud was visible on Sunday, the Siberian iris waited until today to unfold, refusing to perform for the guests. While it’s true that Siberian Iris don’t grow well here – and this single flower took three seasons to appear – it wasn’t a foolish choice ordered from a catalog, but a passalong from my friend Barb in Illinois. We used to trade starts of Siberian iris when I lived up there, much as Pam/Digging and I have traded Iris here. I like to see passalong plants blooming, celebrating our friendships and standing as the emblem of garden friends everywhere who like to plant things just to see what will happen.

Fort Union and the Santa Fe Trail

On the road again - to Albuquerque. Tuesday was a long day of driving. Drove from home to Pueblo, CO (about 680 miles). Wednesday I did not get out of the room until 8am. In Raton, NM (basically the state line on I25) I found the Tourist Information and picked up some brochures.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
While there, i asked what there would be to stop and see along by route. The suggested Ft. Union and the Turquoise Trail. Ft Union is only 8 miles off I-25.
To get to Ft. Union National Monument drive I-25 to exit 337. Take the road to West (NM 165) to the Fort. You can't miss it, because the road ends at the monument.
The fort was constructed and manned to guard the Santa Fe Trail. The trail was an important commerce route between the Indian tribes of the Southwest and the merchants to the East.
Today's photo shoes the shows the rut in he earth caused by the trail. Ruins of the Fort union Hospital was in the background.
Actually, there were 3 different Fort unions. The first 2 were temporary structures. The ruins at the monument are the remnants of the last Fort Union.
The fort had most of the materials for its construction. Sandstone was quarried in the area. Wood was available in the nearby forests. There were mud pits for adobe. In the days if the fort, there was a lake in the area. Fire break was about the only building materials transported long distant 0 that cam from the St. Louis area.
As you walk on the self-guided tour, to can see many more foundations. Unfortunately, scavengers got to Ft. union before the National Park Service aquired it and started protecting the ruins.
Check the the web sire information about Ft. Union. It was a hub of activity. A great break from the boring drive on the prairie of NE New Medico

Poetry, pastures and a pot of gold

From our muddy walk around Melrose last week. Above, the stone marking the site of the Eildon Tree, where in the 13th century Thomas the Rhymer is supposed to have met the Queen of the Fairies and been spirited away to Elfland from where he returned years later as a prophet. His prophesies are meant to include the death of King Alexander III in 1296, the succession of Robert the Bruce to the throne, and the Union of the Crowns in 1603.
Below, typical rolling Borders landscape.

On our drive home we passed through sun and showers, and a succession of glorious rainbows.