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 […]
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 […]
Pre-Birthday Hike on the Lone Star Trail
Our last hiking adventure has been a few weeks now, the Friday before my birthday. I took the day off and after we’d decided to back out of our initial idea of going to the beach, we opted instead to go for a hike on the LST and then head over and check on our […]
San Bernard NWR Wrap-Up
I thought I had enough photos for at least two more posts from our trip to San Bernard NWR but it looks like I only have a smattering of photos that don’t really congeal into a write-up about a specific trail. The rest of our time at SBNWR was spent popping in and out of […]
The Sundew Trail | Big Thicket National Preserve
Rhynchosia sp. The Sundew Trail was our last stop during our East Texas adventures back over Memorial Day weekend. It seems like it was last weekend and also about three months ago. I don’t recall having hiked the entire Sundew Trail in previous visits but I will say that I think I enjoyed it more […]
Watson Native Plant Preserve | Part I
Posts from 2011: Part I, Part II, and Part III—I’ve noticed a few mis-identifications on those old posts and need to go back and fix them. Small-Flower Pawpaw, Asimina parviflora We arrived to Watson Preserve mid-morning before the heat started setting in. And honestly, as I’m writing this two weeks later, it is much hotter […]
The Pitcher Plant Trail | Big Thicket National Preserve
Things are quite heavy in the US at the moment. I have thoughts, of course, but I’m going to sit on them a few more days and hopefully incorporate them into my usual monthly Life Lately posts later this weekend. For now we will re-wind back to two weeks ago when we visited the Pitcher […]
Zebra Swallowtail Caterpillar (Eurytides marcellus) | Wildlife Wednesday
Our trip to east Texas last weekend had us visiting the Watson Rare Native Plant Preserve and two Big Thicket National Preserve units, the Turkey Creek Unit (and the Pitcher Plant Trail) and the Hickory Creek Savannah Unit (and the Sundew Trail). I can’t recall where we saw the first zebra swallowtail adult fly by […]
A Quick Trip to Kleb Woods
Last Friday Forest and I ventured out for our first drive-thru food since this pandemic started. Chris had a field job south of town and took the opportunity of being so close to Galveston to get some fishing in after the field work was done. That meant he was not going to be home for […]
Trapped by Water at Great Egret’s Ridge Day Use Area | Trinity River National Wildlife Refuge
Our last stop on this Trinity River NWR tour was only a few miles away from the Knobby Knees Trail. If you look at the map you can see how the two trails get very near each other far back towards the river. Green Anole, Anolis carolinensis A whirlpool caused by the water rushing through […]
