NATURE WALKS

July 7, 2024 After admiring wild tiger lilies (Lilium columbianum) growing alongside a mossy creek on a trip to Oregon last year, I was...

Gone are the days when the current state of the prairie could be described by a dominant color. There are now splashes of gold, white,...

June 29, 2024 A few days ago, I learned that the eastern prairie fringed orchid (Platanthera leucophaea) was spotted blooming nearby....

White wild indigo (Baptisia alba) is one of my favorite prairie flowers. Its bright white flowers spike from a tall, graceful stem in a...

So much has changed in the prairie during my week away. The white blooms of foxglove beardtongue (Penstemon digitalis) are now abundant...

It was a beautiful afternoon to walk through the prairie. We had a picnic dinner on the quartzite rocks at the edge of the oak savanna,...

The prairie is growing rapidly following frequent rainstorms and sunnier days. As the yellow blooms of golden alexander fade away, they...

Faville Prairie is a remnant prairie down the road from our house that was preserved in part due to the efforts of Aldo Leopold and other...

It's our first spring at Faville Grove, and each day in the prairie has been filled with exciting discoveries of plants emerging in the...

A light coating of snow covers the prairie, reflecting and amplifying the orange and pink glow of the sunrise. Tiny prints reveal...

With the fall color fading outside of the bedroom window, which now frames the blue morning sky and rustling, bare branches, the thought...

It was a beautiful morning for the last seed collecting volunteer day of the year. We walked up a narrow path through a stand of tall,...

The air now has a sharper chill that leaves you shrugging for warmth. The volunteers gather for seed collecting assignments and disperse...

The landscape looks like a painting of a fall day. The sky is clear and blue against a backdrop of the brightest leaves. We walked back...

The color is seeping away from the prairie and the leaves are rustling down to cover the paths. The bright golden and red foliage has...

From a distance, the prairie looks like a sea of golden-brown grass. Once you spend a little time walking through it, you start to notice...

It’s fall in the prairie, and the golden hills are dotted with the deep reds of sumacs and varying purples of asters. Milkweed pods are...