The Gall

Here's my new bae Andricus quercusstrobilanus, Mom. He's a fake pine cone that is in fact a gall, the space station of a gall wasp parasitical on oak trees. Fairly rare to see them so fresh and orange; usually they're seen and photographed in the dryish brown stage. I was just lucky, I guess. It was my moment. Their months are July and August and they seem to like wet, steamy weather. Is that more than you wanted to know, Mom?

Mom, did you ever imagine that your kid (nay, the fruit of your womb) would be curious about, like, strange growths like fungi, galls and slimes? Kind of be a geek about them? Wondering what the heck this planet has in this walk-in closet called reality? Remember spanking me with a hairbrush?

Sole Picnic

On my screened porch, on a brawny picnic table built on the spot because assembled it wouldn't fit through either door, is where I serve most summer meals, but another picnic table, much older, waits patiently in the shade beneath the twin giant oaks, its paint pummeled off by at least 15 years of rain and snow, its joints rotting. About every other year I nail, C-clamp, or wood-screw its raggedy pieces together, hoping it will last one more year as a buffet table or a stand for my cast-iron grill. But this summer I hadn't hosted a buffet nor had I grilled. Patient as ever, the shabby eyesore looked appealingly toward me each day while I refused to consider risking splinters, wasps, or the ticks and chiggers teeming in the taller grass around it, but most of the time it was beneath my notice.

Today was the day, a perfect September day, about 78 degrees, sunny, with cotton-ball clouds in a vivid sky, the grass recently cut; and almost everything is still so intensely green I thought, "The earth is covered with plants."(A marvelous fact.) As I gazed at the decrepit picnic table I suddenly understood it, and loved it, and set my dinner out there: a bowl of jambalaya, a flaxseed wrap, and a beer.

Usually I picnic in the open air away from home, doing it a pleasant number of times during this mild summer, but today I woke again to how amazing it is that I can cross the lane, sit down, picnic in my own Missouri yard right in the mainstream flow of life, "bugged" only by a very small wasp which drowned in the jambalaya.

The planks in the grass are the last surviving pieces of a cold frame Demetrius built in 2002.

Up an 80-Foot Tree: The Canopy Climb

The Canopy Climb event at the Shaw Nature Reserve consisted of myself and two other people (everyone else in the world was too scared) and John the instructor, who'd slingshotted pulley ropes up into a venerable 80-foot White Oak deep in the woods, gave us safety gear, and invited us to hoist ourselves up there.

Uh huh.

Coordinated movement is required. One's right foot is placed in a loop of rope. Push against that, straightening the leg, while hoisting yourself  on a rope with a "magic knot" whose magical element was not explained, but I had faith. Arborists ascend into the forest canopy all the time to study the environment or trim branches; John said that advanced canopy climbers can cozily sleep on branches or swing from tree to tree, provided the proper outfitting.

When the three of us were strung up, John ascended and took our photos; here I am 60 feet above the earth repeating to myself, "Faint heart never won fun." John swung me a bit to see how I'd like it. I said, "Tone it down or I'll probably throw up."

I beat my lifelong fear of heights to do this. After a while I rather enjoyed dangling in the air in a forest. John said this sport was invented in the 1980s and there was something very 1980s about it: aggressive outdoorsmanship. I'd do it again.

The Blind

Took a new path through the conservation area today -- a really new path, because I know the place well and that path was never there before or I'd have walked it -- and found a secret pond, connected to another larger secret pond. I am charmed by seeing a sudden shine of water between trees and discovering a water feature not on any maps. Here the path seemed to end. While searching the leafy floor of the woods for any further path, I raised my eyes and suddenly saw this blind which I hadn't noticed before. Gee, I wouldn't make a very good deer or rabbit!

A choice hunting spot this was, on a slope above the smaller of the two ponds, in a quiet area far from the road. Its design, placement, and camouflage of genuine oak branches were all the result of much thought by the wily hunters. Some yards away in the classic Missouri oak and hickory forest I also saw a tree stand. It's the season. And now I know how the new path got made.

Crunch Crunch

You'll never see another photo like this one: The beaver team down on the LaBarque thought they'd fell this mature creekside oak -- which would have been the largest timber in their dam -- but then changed their minds, apparently. Wonder why? Their jaws got tired? Too much chance it would fall the wrong way and create a fatality? Too tall to guide down their mud chute into the creek? They've simply abandoned this particular tree.

The Trespasser

My first autumn here, in 1998, a red pickup tore out from the woods through the meadow, skidded in a spray of gravel onto my lane and down and away onto Highway F. Caught a glimpse of the driver -- a bald old man with his mouth gaping like Pac-Man -- and the license plate: New Mexico. I followed the tire tracks and crushed grass back into the woods. The trespasser had made my woods his dump. He hadn't dumped anything identifiable, though, just cans, bottles, rusted oil drums, old miniblinds, an old sink, and so on.

Called the sheriff. Two deputies came and asked me everything except my personal body measurements. I led them into the woods and showed them the fresh dump. They knew who the dumper was but pretended they didn't; only one old bald guy around here had a big brand-new red pickup with a New Mexico plate, and if I hadn't been so new I would have known him, too: the area's biggest landowner and richest man.

Every day I marched back into the woods and hauled out heavy bagsful of his trash. I did it 18 times before I got tired of it, and some of it is still there. At the spot where he'd driven across the meadow and between trees into the woods I wanted to erect a barrier. I couldn't haul stones big enough. Finally down near the road I found sawn pieces of a tree trunk. I couldn't lift them so I lugged and dragged five pieces uphill and down my lane one by one. It was the hardest physical labor I have ever done. Set up four of the pieces in a row.

The photo shows three of them. All four are are still there, and behind them, instead of open meadow, are young oaks The oaks are my work, too. While hauling trash I noticed that the red cedar trees, nice enough but an invasive, non-native species, were choking off the young oaks and hickories. So every possible day for several seasons I went into the meadow and yanked, chopped, clipped and uprooted all red cedars I could. If the cedar trunk was big enough, the stump wept sticky red tears like blood. I did it for the native oaks and hickories.

Today the barrier of stumps still stands and behind it are several stands of young oak trees gaining strength every day, and no one's going to be driving his pickup truck between them anytime soon.

Drought's First Casualty

I heard "CRAACK!" and turned just in time to see this fully-leafed branch from the huge twin oak peel off and land, completely blocking our only access road. Thank God I wasn't under there and my car was garaged. My neighbor and I were now trapped so I phoned the handymen at once. They said, first thing in the morning. With time to inspect it I tried to find out what had gone wrong with a branch that looked healthy.

What looks like interior rot is the tree's heartwood, and in any tree it's dead already, having done its job. As you know, a tree feeds itself through the wood just beneath the bark, and its concentric rings are what hold it up. It's like a hollow metal pole; its strength doesn't depend on its core. I didn't see real rot. And a sick or bug-infested branch wouldn't have such healthy greenery.

It was, however, a horizontal branch on a very old tree, richly weighted with other leafy branches, after two consecutive years of severe drought. In June we didn't get a full inch of rain here (the city got a bit more than we did). Our towns cancelled Independence Day fireworks for the first time ever because of the fire hazard, and I hope the kids shooting off fireworks for fun aren't doing it anywhere near our dry-as-dust woods and fields.

Where the branch peeled away

Next morning the handymen chainsawed the branch and also amputated the branch from the redbud across the lane that broke beneath the weight of the oak branch. The twin oaks must be among the oldest trees on the property; they are 80 feet high at least and a glorious sight as you drive up toward the house. Branches do fall from them sometimes, but usually only dead ones. Hope not to see any more like this.

Made in the Shade

After finishing my outdoor work in the cool of the morning, I sat down beneath the twin oaks and had some organic Chock Full o' Nuts coffee and just reveled in the gorgeous month of May, right here at home, and then thought to take a photo and post it for all the folks back in the office in the city who hate working there every single minute of it, just as I did. Except I earned my freedom and now have it made in the mid-morning shade. How did I do that? Just by being my gifted self and writing five books. Try it!

Twin Oaks and Twin Oaks and Twin Oaks and....

About 150 years old (judging from the rings of similar-sized trees) this pair of oaks looms over my lane, across from the garage, and they're massive. See, if you can, my six-foot picnic table at their feet. Wind and ice rip off some branches, but in autumn they simply rain acorns and some of 'em take, especially just to their north which is sunlit meadow. And the young trees (three are pictured below) are twin oaks just like their parents. That tickles me no end. I uproot or hack down competitive and invasive red cedars and vines to keep the native Missouri oaks and hickories thriving. After living here 10 years I can see the results, new oaks that will long outlast me, and am so very happy.

My Life Among the Tree Nymphs

The pear tree in the Divine yard had pears on occasion, usually no bigger than an inch long and never edible. Planted in the yard's unfriendly soil, most of it pure clay, the tree never thrived and never grew any taller. Then two years ago my friend Ace told me to prune the suckers, meaning the branches growing vertically from established horizontal branches. I pruned the suckers I could reach. Darned if the tree didn't grow a couple of feet in a year, large enough to cast shade. Again I pruned as far as I could reach. This year, pears. They'll probably be pecked and wormy before it's time to pick, but they are beautiful and this is progress.

This is the only fruit tree on my 100 acres. The Dutch couple who lived here before me planted it. Europeans are genetically wired to plant fruit trees. My father had a plum tree and nearly threw a party when after three years the skeletal thing produced one plum. Demetrius, who lived here, planted an apple tree in the meadow where it only encouraged Oak Apple Gall Wasps and was eaten by deer. Obtaining a baby nectarine tree, like a crazy man he dug a pit for it in the clay near the house. After four years this tree maxed out at a couple of twigs about knee high. Now and then it put forth a leaf, as if shyly waving hello to a hostile and uncaring universe. I left it in the yard to remind me that Demetrius, like all gardeners, was a person of hope. Then, about two weeks ago, mowing the lawn I accidentally mowed it over and wrecked it utterly. So ended its unlucky little life. I heard Demetrius shout abuse at me from beyond the grave.

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The Missouri Department of Conservation asks you to plant these native trees wherever you've got the space and desire -- their chart tells you what type of soil the trees will thrive in. Oak, Sycamore, Tulip Tree, Osage-Orange, more -- if you are Missouri, your small investment of $8 or so per seedling will last several lifetimes! Look here for the details.

Merry Messenger

This pileated woodpecker was swooping around the house at 8 a.m., joyfully screaming, "Wake up everyone for a mile radius! It's Christmas!" I ran outside to hang the suet for her. After two solid days of rain, the earth has today a very light dusting of snow. A blessed Yule to you!

Odd-Looking Balls

Odd looking pods about the size of golf balls found here and there on the ground. Never seen them before. Looked them up in tree books. No luck. Opened (pictured at right), these light hollow spheres contained marvelous white dry fluff, but no seeds. Turns out this was a home of the parasitic Oak Apple Gall Wasp, Biorhiza pallida. And a fine comfily upholstered home it is. The wasp who dwelt in its center was long gone, to lay her eggs at the base of the oak tree and further parasitize it. These "pods," or more precisely "galls," may grow on either oak twigs or leaves. So if you see these they aren't spring fruits. Photos taken 11 May.

Male Flowers at Prom Season

Oak trees have catkins -- that's what these long strips of tiny flowers are called -- and catkins are long streamers of male flowers, releasing their pollen everywhere during prom season. Just as in the old V.D. movies, the catkins then drop off one by one, until your car or roof is covered with both yellow pollen dust and thousands of spent catkins.

It was TreePete who answered me "Catkins" when I asked what they were. He doesn't come around anymore, not since I invited him over and left him to tend the barbecue grill and he let everything burn rather than simply say he didn't want to barbecue.

TreePete aside, oak branches simultaneously have little red barely visible nubs. These are the female flowers. They hide ovaries that develop into the more familiar offspring of the oak: acorns. But they couldn't do it without the male flowers. The acorns too drop off onto your car or roof until you're fit to be tied.

Snowstorm at Night

Snow last night and today made it nearly impossible to get out of here; I tried but the snow packed my tires like wet sugar. So I turned back and then couldn't get the car up the driveway without a shovel and cat litter. However, I did do it. Tonight stepped outside where snow was falling straight and fast and I could hear it like a whisper. I could also hear spinning tires as other folks around here tried to go places. With the floodlight on I saw bunny tracks. The photo shows my bird feeder strung from an oak. January is almost over. Yay.