CliffNotes
Wonderful Pelicans…
“A wonderful bird is the pelican, His bill will hold more than his belican. He can take in his beak Food enough for a week. But I’m damned if I see how the helican.” Dixon Lanier Merritt A postcard sent by a Florida-vacationing reader inspired Merritt, then an editor at Nashville’s daily paper The […]
They’re Everywhere! Invasion of the Lady-Bugs
“Lady-bug, lady-bug fly away home. Your house is on fire, your children’s alone” When Mark Twain put this version of an old English nursery rhyme into Tom Sawyer’s mouth in 1876, he was not thinking of ridding his home of multitudes of beetles. Particularly this autumn lady-bug beetles invaded homes, colonized ceiling corners, fouled curtains, […]
Plant Names Offer Clues to Past Uses and Beliefs
The names of many of our bluff lands plants offer their own archeological record of cultural pasts. Rather than rock hammers, small brushes, transects, and sieves, the archeology of words needs a tool kit that begins with a dictionary. Nouns – names of things – can tell as much about the namers as what they […]
Wild Turkeys: Bellwether Birds of Healthy Habitats
Wild turkeys are a magnificent bellwether bird, proof positive that our bluff land forests afford healthy and sustainable habitats for a variety of wildlife. Wild turkeys (Meleagrus gallopavo), the largest game bird in North America, have long held a special place in the natural world for peoples of our continent. Many Native American tribes considered […]
“Green Chaos” of Natural Landscapes or Monoculture of Invasive Plants?
Writer John Fowles spent a portion of his childhood in rural England when his family moved from a London suburb to escape World War II blitzkrieg attacks on the city. His memory of life in the country, particularly life in a setting with woodlands, was, he later wrote, “Slinking off into trees was always slinking […]
The Waders of August
Pools of water along the Mississippi River floodway and bottomlands – pacing summer’s decline with a steadily reducing size – often host large congregations of wading birds. A late-summer leisurely drive along Levee Road offers viewing of hundreds, sometimes thousands, of herons and egrets. Adult birds, many still sporting worn remnants of once fine nuptial […]
Snakes are: COOL!!!
Irresistible. Couldn’t be ignored. Had to look. Must – oh my! – even be touched. “Not slimy” – the first reaction – turned into the next observation: “This is so COOL,” accompanied by a feeling of accomplishment made even more pleasant by the admiring glances of onlookers. Everybody wanted to touch a snake. The live […]
Festival of the Bluffs ~~ Hikes, Displays, Music, Food…FUN!
Monroe County boasts the greatest contiguous swath of hill prairies in the Midwest. The largest complex, at Fults Hill Prairie Nature Preserve, has been designated a National Natural Landmark by the U.S. Park Service. One of only 600 such Landmarks in the U.S., Fults Hill Prairie’s recognition is testimony to its enduring value in the […]
April: Not At All the Cruelest Month…
April is a wonderful month to view the dynamic and beautiful natural processes at work in our bluff lands. Our still leafless woods allow us to see the physical structure and layout – the skeleton – of one of Illinois’s most important natural treasures. A simple driving tour along Bluff Road, from Columbia to Modoc, […]
Nature’s Cleanup Crew: Vultures
Although members of The Turkey Vulture Society proudly display their unofficial slogan – ‘I brake for carrion’ – on bumper stickers, for most people, the thought of vultures most often calls forth memories of Western movies in which the hero’s fate was left to dark birds circling ever nearer. This idea of vultures’ waiting to […]