7.22.10
roger tory peterson and a young osprey photo by alfred eisenstaedt
I had my first guest-post on a kindred spirit’s blog this week. The visionary Peter Buchanan-Smith honored me with a feature on his fascinating blog, Best Made Projects. We share an interest in the natural world, so when he asked me to review a field guide, I chose one by the naturalist and early environmentalist Roger Tory Peterson (seen above holding a movie camera mounted on a gun stock). Peter has kindly allowed me to re-post my review in its entirety here.
FIELDING QUESTIONS: A Review of Roger Tory Peterson Field Guides – Eastern Forests
Returning home to Sullivan County from the stinky summer streets of New York City brings a surge of relief and gratitude: the cool night air filled with the rustle of leaves and the throbbing drone of cicadas is a tonic. The woods I now call home are not the same as those I grew up with in the Santa Cruz mountains of California. Fog-shrouded sequoias and wild surf are here replaced with blazing summers and snowy winters among the hawthorn, hickory, maple and pine. The Steller’s jay of my youth is now the equally brazen blue jay of my mid-life. The fence around our small property does little to keep out all the critters that also live here, and long rambles on our kind neighbor’s thousand acres have led to countless discoveries, animal, mineral and botanical.
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6.23.10
the house site (photos by george billard)
We’re seriously considering buying this piece of land that was brought to our attention by a guardian angel up here in Sullivan County. The idea would be to build our dream house on it one day. It’s a nice-sized 5-acre lot that starts with a gorgeous meadow and rolls down a hill to a breathtaking reservoir. The best thing is that across the reservoir is all state-owned land that is a protected sanctuary for the bald eagle. We put the canoe in there the other day and it’s absolutely stunning. The prospect of being able to live in such a place seems almost too good to be true.
So you can imagine how my heart broke when I watched Josh Fox’s gripping documentary, Gasland, on HBO the other night. It was a hit at Sundance and I imagine it will get theatrical distribution at some point, but I urge you to see it now; you can watch it on HBO On Demand. Hot, bitter tears rolled down my cheeks during most of the film, which is about fracking—the hydraulic fracturing process that is being used to free up natural gas from within vast shale deposits. Natural gas is being touted as the ideal “transition” fuel that will take us away from fossil fuels and toward alternative energy sources. In fact, this extraction method is entirely unregulated, thanks to a loophole created by Dick Cheney, that evil and calculating sonofabitch. He even convinced the Bureau of Land Management, an agency that is supposed to look after 264 million acres of pristine public land—that’s OUR land—to allow drilling.
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5.24.10
This weekend was full of interesting animal friends. Pulling off the road to get a closer look at some baby geese, we wound up near a swampy pond where we saw a big osprey nest poised on top of a tall, limbless dead tree. With the binoculars, we could just make out the top of somebody’s head and then, sure enough, mama (or daddy?) came swooping in with a big fish dangling from its talons! And just then, lumbering across the field and heading straight for the water was this big dame—a snapping turtle with a long tail like an alligator’s, big beady eyes and plenty of attitude. She must have weighed about 20+ pounds, but they can get up to 45!
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5.9.10
all photos by george billard
That’s sure what it sounded like some time after midnight last night, when this tree came crashing down onto our little barn. We were just drifting off to sleep when we heard a few strange squeaks that we thought might be some new sort of nocturnal visitor. (In retrospect, I think it was the straining of the wood before it split.) It was windy last night, powerful gusts blowing in the rogue snow showers predicted for early this morning. Suddenly there was a loud wrenching thud, the sound of damage. G went racing out with the night-vision goggles and reported back that a major tree was down. In the morning we were greeted with this grim aftermath…
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5.7.10
You won’t believe this, but there was ANOTHER bear in the yard and this one was ENORMOUS. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get a picture because it was night. (This one is an approximation I pulled off the web.) We came home late and I was puttering in the kitchen when I heard some loudish crashing noises outside. Thinking it was G, I called out to him but he was in the bedroom, on the other side of the house! He immediately ran over with the night-vision goggles (the best birthday present I ever got him) and spied a huge bear UP IN THE TREE behind our house. It was trying to pry open our metal bird-feeder to get at the black sunflower seeds we’ve since learned are a bear favorite. (The feeder is now dismantled. Sorry, Tweety.) Then I looked through the goggles and was TERRIFIED! The bear was looking right at me and, because of the night vision, his eyes were like big green saucers. My heart was pounding and it didn’t help that the sister-in-law was giving me a blow-by-blow over the phone of how a bear broke into David Letterman’s house and ripped the door off his fridge. WTF? Our house started to feel like a cardboard shack. G said the bear was over 7 feet tall!!! But eventually it scrambled down and lumbered away, and later I fell so sound asleep I didn’t even hear it come back in the middle of the night. Good thing G stays on the alert…
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4.22.10
photos by george billard
Today is Earth Day. I remember the first one, back in 1970. We planted trees at Delaveaga Elementary School. Mock plum, if I’m not mistaken; something with lots of pink blossoms. Do you feel at home in the great outdoors or, like Woody Allen, are you “two with nature”? If you don’t live in the country, I encourage you to head out to the biggest park you can find and take a walk, or just sit for a while. Open your senses and take in the beauty. In this consumer society, we are continually made to feel as though we (and our fat thighs, stringy hair, deficient pecs and shabby clothes) are the center of the universe. The opportunity to see where we actually fit in—our place in relation to the vastness of the ocean and sky—is truly invaluable. Show this to your children (live, not on TV).
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1.13.10
I took this with my iphone!
On my way out to snowshoe this afternoon, I came across this poor mourning dove at the bottom of our drive. Her head was nowhere in sight. Yet another mystery of nature I cannot solve. As you can see, she had just dined on some of our delicious birdseed. I hope this isn’t too gory for you. (If it is, you may not want to read on.) At 35 degrees, it seemed almost balmy outside today! Within minutes of commencing my 90-minute trek, I had to shed my hat and gloves and tie my jacket around my waist. Despite all my good intentions, this was my first exercise in a week. There were those 3 days in the city, and a few days where it was barely 13 degrees but, still, I’m a weak woman and one who needs to work off a large and indescribably delicious helping of soft-serve green tea ice cream from Mitsuwa. (Yes, we paid a visit to Edgewater, NJ, on our way back from the city and stocked up on all manner of wonderful Japanese ingredients, including fresh bamboo shoots, yam noodles, taro and chrysanthemum leaves.) So there I was, huffing and puffing along, thinking about how it had been months since I’d seen any evidence of the coyotes that used to “mark” the path when what should I come upon? Read the rest of this entry »
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1.4.10
photo by george billard
I’ve always been attracted to the natural world. To my eye, nature’s designs are the most poetic and intriguing. My home is full of things made from natural materials, especially wood, cork, rattan, slate, shell and clay. We also have a little cabinet of curios to house all our special finds: a wild turkey feather, a locust carcass, a tiny and perfect bird’s nest, a piece of tortoise shell. So you can imagine how I go crazy when I’m in Ted Muehling’s shop on Howard Street. The place is gorgeously curated in a very simple way. I love everything from the worn shearling on a chair to the “not for sale” found objects you would kill to have. Aside from his own jewelry, the porcelain pieces he has designed for Nymphemburg and his glass for Steuben, Ted showcases other designers’ work. Among them is Gabriella Kiss, a sculptor who studied at Pratt and became Ted’s apprentice. Her delicate, figurative jewelry is inspired by flora and fauna and often has a slightly scientific quality. I was thrilled to open a familiar little box on Christmas morning to discover this gorgeous bracelet in the shape of deer antlers. When I’m not wearing it, I’ll just leave it out to enjoy it for the beautiful piece of sculpture it is.
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1.3.10
If only G were not out of town, this is how we would have looked today. Instead, I forged out into the wilderness on my own, snowshoes strapped onto my boots, hood up and ski gloves on. The sun was like a 40-watt bulb, its pale yellow light barely cutting through the grey haze. The path was silent, the new snow muting my Yeti-like footfalls, and just one delicate waxwing flitting along beside me. I rounded a bend and there were three deer, noses to the ground. Another step toward them and they bounded away, their upturned tails like ivory plumes vanishing into the woods. (With the clarity that comes to me when I’m fasting, I realized that I will always have this place. When I’m old, I will return to it—in mind if not in body—and it will still afford me this sense of peace.) Back home, I had a steaming cup of mint-lemon balm tea, brewed from herbs dried from the garden this summer. Read the rest of this entry »
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12.29.09
photo by george billard
As in, cold enough to freeze the balls off ‘em. Love that British expression. Somehow a bit classier than the old witch’s teat reference, still hanging on from the days of the Salem trials. My point being: it was damn cold today. We were out snow-shoeing in 13 degrees. I have a deep dread of slipping on the ice, but those metal teeth really do grip into even the slickest surfaces. Realized that the large and interesting tracks we had seen the other day and were sure were from a bear turned out to be our own. How embarrassing. Now I’m finally convinced that the bears are hibernating and so I can stop imagining Werner Herzog-worthy scenarios where one chases me into a snowdrift and mauls G who has run to my defense. Tromping on crusted snow, I could almost see the North Wind puffing out his cheeks and blowing an icy blast our way. It sent the delicate top layer of powder gusting through the air, like a frigid version of the apocalyptic ash that’s always drifting down in Cormack McCarthy’s brilliant The Road. (Read the book; skip the movie. Sorry, Viggo.) Read the rest of this entry »
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