photography and musings from a Midwesterner
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Snow, Not White Sand!
The Lake Michigan beach at Bailey’s Harbor on the very northern part of Wisconsin is hidden in winter by a heavy covering of snow, and rows and rows of snow fences.
Sure, some of the tropical parts of the world have pure white sand beaches, but this beach’s white stuff is of the frosty variety.
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When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.
Helen Keller
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A Place to Rest
I am prepared for the craziness that will soon descend on my typically quiet home. Usually there are only two of us to make a mess, take a shower, fix a meal, get a little out of sorts. Today and tomorrow there will be 16 people, adults and teenagers, filling every nook and sleeping in every corner. I’m hoping there is no last minute clothing emergency because the washing machine was pronounced dead by the Maytag man on Monday, and a new one can’t be delivered until next week. Hmmm.
This photo is my solution if there are any situations that may require a time-out. I took this photo earlier this summer in northern Wisconsin, and it always brings back memories of nearly colllapsing in one of those blessed chairs after hiking for many hours. I was hot and tired and maybe – just maybe – a little cranky. But I leaned back in the chair, solid and comfortable, closed my eyes, and just rested for a while. Just relaxed in my own little space.
Gradually, I noticed a graceful breeze, brushing over me ever so gently, cooling away the hot stickiness. The sun tucked itself behind a few wandering clouds and provided a brief respite. I heard a few birds chittering in the branches above me, and grasshoppers were doing their thing in the tall grasses. It was only a short stop, maybe fifteen minutes, but it re-vitalized me in those few moments.
So if I need a time-out over the next few days, I know exactly where I’m heading. These chairs will be waiting for me, tucked in a cranny in my mind. And if I really get desperate and I need a visual reminder, I’ll pop open the computer, and just tell everyone I’m going to check my blog stats.
What’s that you say? I cannot check my stats in the middle of Thanksgiving dinner?
Hmmmmm.
Then maybe it would be better if I take a peek while everyone else is doing the dishes…
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This June the Yellow Lady’s Slippers were profusely decorating the woodlands of Door County. Considering how picky and complicated their life cycle is, it’s almost amazing they grow at all.
All Lady’s Slippers grow in acidic soil which must have a certain underground fungus. The seeds of these plants are about the size of a dust speck and have absolutely no nutrients. Their “fungus buddy” attacks and eats the outer coating of the tiny seeds and allow the inner cells to absorb nutrients from the fungus and then germinate. This process can take several years. After the slipper finally germinates, it can take up to 15 years for the plant to mature enough to flower.
And it doesn’t get any easier after it flowers. Its pollination is equally complicated, requiring a bee to enter the pouchy flower. Once inside, the bee will often get trapped and either dies or has to chew its way out. The bees that manage to escape this demanding mistress then carry pollen to other blossoms, but even after all this trouble, only a small percentage are actually pollinated.
Guessing the only reason these ladies survive is due to their long lives – each plant can live for 100 years, providing they are not lunch for one of the many Door County deer. Once a flower actually is pollinated it is very prolific though, and can produce more than 60,000 seeds.
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Can anyone out there identify this? Looks like a small tree or bush, about 2 feet high, and I found it growing in the Ridges Sanctuary in Northeastern Wisconsin’s Door County.
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