Hiking
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The Last Wildflower Walk for Awhile
It’s looking more and more like our hike at Lake Somerville State Park two weekends ago is going to be our last hike for a good while. Last weekend we had camping reservations at a state park just an hour from here on the west side of Houston but opted to cancel due to the rain forecast. It was a good decision but I was already concerned about using the bathrooms. Most state parks do a decent job of cleaning up every morning but still…you can only control the surfaces you know, right? And even up to this weekend I thought that maybe we’d get out and go somewhere less…
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Texas Spring
If there’s one thing we can count in in spring here in Texas it is that the bluebonnets and paintbrushes will continue to rise out of the soil and bloom. The sandyland bluebonnets (Lupinus subcarnosus) were the species blooming on our trip over to Lake Somerville State Park last weekend. Only a few paintbrushes (Castilleja indivisa) were seen but there were plenty of other wildflowers to gaze upon. We did find these wonderful patches of bluebonnets nearly 2 miles down the trail in an open field as it sloped towards Nails Creek. This weekend is rainy and cooler and so we’re not leaving the house to explore much. I suspect…
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Lepidopterans & Sunshine at Lake Somerville State Park
Yesterday I wanted to get out and do some hiking and thought it would be nice to head west to Lake Somerville State Park. We haven’t been there since I was pregnant with Forest in May 2014! Not for lack of interest, though. Every time we checked into going we would find the state park closed due to one of the various flooding events over the last few years. Harvey did a number on the parks and just within the last month was the Somerville Trailway between the two units open once again. Our last good hike on the trailway was in 2013 with our AT friend Redhat. Wanting to…
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Signs of Spring – Huntsville State Park
Camping two weekends ago at Huntsville State Park was pretty fantastic. The weather was gorgeous for late February and everywhere the signs were out that spring was coming and there was no stopping it. On Saturday we took a 7 mile hike around the lake and got to see what was blooming or beginning to push through the pine needles. Fox Squirrel, Sciurus niger – the squirrels at our campsite was all about looking for whatever scraps might be left from campers. One of them wanted to become our BFF and hop into the food containers which required constant vigilance even if we had the lids on to our food…
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Flora, Fungi, and Fauna along the Florida Trail in Bronson State Forest
Let’s wrap up my Florida trip with this final post from my hike at Bronson State Forest. Sand Heath, Ceratiola ericoides Rosemary scrub habitats in Florida are considered to be a particularly endangered habitat. It thrives in sandy, old inland dune habitats and prefers to have a good burn once in a while—and well, you can imagine that sandy habitats and burning can be in short supply when people build homes right on top of and up next to the perfect habitat. A few sites with more information: Scrub Rosemary via UCF Arboretum, Endemic Florida Rosemary via Florida State Parks, and Rosemary scrub via Florida Hikes. Deer Moss, Cladonia evansii…
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Raptor Leftovers
Every now and then a hike gets you a glimpse of something wild and interesting. In some areas maybe you get to encounter a large mammal—a bear, maybe a panther or bobcat. Sometimes you just get really cool animal interactions like the time we watched a bald eagle steal a fish from an osprey on the last day of our Florida Trail thru-hike. Occasionally you come across the weirder but still interesting animal presence such as this dead opossum we found on a hike at Huntsville State Park over the weekend. Since we travel at a 5.5 year old’s pace these days we had been stopping and slowing down, and…
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Silent Sunday | Trout Lillies
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A Hike in the Chuluota Wilderness | Florida Trail
On the Sunday of the short weekend in Florida, I went on a hike with Sandra of Florida Hikes and Kate Dolamore, an artist friend in central Florida I’ve gotten to know the last couple of years. I wanted to hike on a section of the Florida Trail that was new to me, a piece in the Bronson State Forest that was in the process of being re-routed when we hiked in 2011. During our hike we had to road walk a large chunk of this section. So, after breakfast with some of the crew from Billy Goat Day at the Townhouse Restaurant, I met up with Sandra at the…
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Weekend at Lake Livingston
We kicked off February with a camping trip to Lake Livingston State Park. It is one of our closer camping locations and thus allows for easy access on weekends when we don’t feel like trekking across the state. In the past we’ve tried to take off work a bit early on Friday to make it a longish weekend at the campsite. We weren’t really able to leave that early this time and so when we arrived it was nearly dark. We would end up setting up the tent in the dark as well as making dinner in the dark. This was something we really couldn’t fathom doing a few years…
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A Hike at Split Oak Forest
As I mentioned a few posts ago, when I flew into Orlando I went for a hike over at Split Oak Forest WEA. After I made my flight plans a few months ago I knew I wanted to hike somewhere, probably on the Florida trail, and I had thought I’d likely hit up Tosohatchee WMA. But over the last few months I began seeing a lot more press about a potential toll road proposal going through the southern portion of Split Oak Forest. In late December, Osceola county commissioners ended up approving the toll road plans which was seriously disappointing to hear. Then, late last month a commissioner asked her…