Last night after dinner I retreated to my bed to finish up a book I was reading. I was at 90% done and was making my way towards the end. I spent a good hour or so curled up in bed, quietly reading as the early autumn sun retreated for the evening. Eventually I got […]
Exploring the Denali Highway and Brushkana Creek
The season shift here has kind of thrown me for a loop. The light is shifting, the days are shortening, and that has made me pull inward and want to focus on other things. So much for all these photos I had ready to share! It’s a rainy evening here in greater Houston, where we […]
Cypress-Tupleo Slough Explorations in the Big Thicket
As I continue to see how crowded so many western outdoor spaces have gotten this summer with everyone seeking outdoor places to go, I’ve been glad that we live in area that sees less crowds. In general so many of the southern and eastern forests are less trekked than popular haunts out west or in […]
Late August Pollinators (and Friends)
Common Whitetail, Plathemis lydia If early summer felt like a bit of a drought in regards to pollinators, August and September always make up for it. This, I should know. And back with a fury they came! The gulf frits are busy as ever, searching for nectar, laying eggs, and generally enjoying life in the […]
A Brush with a Saddleback
There are three saddlebacks on the backside of this banana leaf—but we actually found a total of four later on! I have always wanted to see a saddleback caterpillar, Acharia stimulea, in person. Chris found one in the field a few years ago and texted me a photo of it and that has been the […]
Life Lately | August 2020
Thinking: My first thought is—I was overly ambitious to want to try a 10 mile bike ride at 1pm during a heat advisory day (I’m drafting this on Saturday)! *Laughs in Texas in August* I cut it short to 5 miles and hope to do the other 5 this evening. Tomorrow (or today when this […]
Snow in the Thicket
In late June we trekked back to Watson Preserve and the Big Thicket to see what might be blooming in early summer. I’d had word that the snowy orchids, Platanthera nivea, were blooming and they were a species I had not seen before. Chris says he had seem them but I wanted to get my […]
Exploring a New Section on the Lone Star Trail
Flowering Spurge, Euphorbia corollata Last weekend we ventured out to do a new to us section on the Lone Star Trail. We originally wanted to hike starting at the Cotton Creek Cemetery Road trailhead near Huntsville but when we pulled up to turn down the road we found it looked like it went through a […]
Quick Check-In
Hey! Yes, I’ve fallen off the face of the blogosphere! I should probably do this as a Life Lately post but I’m short of time so this will be a quick update and eventually I’ll do something a bit more in depth. Highlights: +Online school is going. That’s about it…going. I wish he was at […]
August Insects
Yellow Star Grass, Hypoxis hirsuta Last weekend I noticed that the mountain mint was abuzz with insects so I grabbed my camera to see what I could a snapshot of. It turned out we had quite a few interesting characters in the garden! Common Thread-waisted Wasp, Ammophila procera Two-striped Forceptail, Aphylla williamsoni I caught this […]
