Outdoors
Notes from a plant nerd: Hey Buds!
Hunkered down for the long winter, wrapped in multiple layers and prepared for the cold, I have a lot in common with the flower and leaf buds of woody plants.
Up Moses Creek: I’ll Fly a Ways
It takes something special to draw me out of Moses Creek — there’s so much here to see and do and write about.
Notes from a plant nerd: In the pines
In the Cherokee cosmology, evergreen trees were given their ability to hold onto their leaves all winter as a reward for s taying up all night long for seven days, keeping the sacred fire lit.
Word from the Smokies: At 50, Endangered Species Act continues to protect life in the park
It’s no secret that the Great Smoky Mountains National Park is a hotspot of biological diversity. Not only does it offer a range of environmental conditions to support plant and animal life, no ocean or glacier has disturbed it for over a million years, giving species lots of time to evolve.
Notes from a plant nerd: Oh balsam tree, oh balsam tree
At the highest elevations of the Southern Appalachians grow two evergreen trees that give the Balsam Mountains their name — red spruce (Picea rubens) and Fraser fir (Abies fraseri).
Up Moses Creek: The Red Maple
The air was still and frosty when I started up the trail that November morning to watch Black Mountain light up in the sun.
Notes from a plant nerd: Like a podium
Creeping along the forest floor is a group of native plants that look like mosses, but aren’t mosses.
Word from the Smokies: Park volunteer makes big impact on visitor safety
“I’m just a backwoods guy,” Bill Gober says. “I try to stay out of the limelight.”
Notes from a plant nerd: You reap what you sow … if you’re lucky
Whoever first wrote down the phrase, “You reap what you sow” was definitely not a farmer or gardener. I’ve started following that phrase with, “…if you’re lucky.”