Since May 5th I’ve had a very small Amorphophallus corm aegment growing in a plastic fountain drink cup on a windowsill. Today I was looking along the sides of the cup to see if any roots were pressing against them. I saw something halfway down that I thought might be a beetle grub but on closer inspection turned out to be a snail. Taking a photo of that, I saw at least 3 nematode worms. Nematodes are the most abundant animal on Earth, with 57 billion for every human. (My other 56,999,999,997 not pictured.)
I decided to carefully move the plant to a wider but shallower container to better accommodate growth of the wide but shallow roots. I lost track of the snail but found a fair sized earthworm alive and seemingly well near the bottom where it had been surviving unnoticed for more than three weeks in the cup. Apparently it was getting enough to eat in there, but it seems like a pretty small territory for it. (The snail was less of a surprise, they can “hybernate” for more than a year.) I transferred the worm to the new container, where it will help aerate the soil and is welcome there. (No photos of the earthworm, my hands were dirty at the time.)
When these plants wake up they can grow crazy fast. Here is May 5th
Yesterday I was out with the dog in the backyard. There is a section with some brush and I saw a baby deer. Doing some research the deer was probably between 5 and 8 days old. This morning I checked (without the dog) and it was gone. I guess mommy moved it, probably into the woods behind the yard.
Oh gosh, it’s that time of year. Last spring we had several baby deer. Lately I’ve been seeing the adults around, so we’re keeping an eye out for the littles.
The annual Common Spotted Orchid photo. Including some not in shot, I estimate ~400 spikes. And they meet the criteria for “Today in nature…” because we didn’t plant them - they just invited themselves.
I spotted a doe with two new born fawns today, they were running away from the cities lawnmower. Usually don’t see them quite this early, they were tiny.
Some of my favorite garden flowers here are also serendipitous - morning glories, wild honeysuckle, sweet potato vine, blackberry lilies (though I do help the latter by spreading their seeds for them).
Two weeks ago I randomly found some smallish elephant ear corms at my local grocery store and bought one. It has sprouted faster than I thought it might. Here’s what the first leaf looked like this morning after I misted it.
(From the late 1990s to the early 2000s I had a really nice elephant ear patch. I had an old hose (with a sprayer attachment on the end) that had pinhole leaks in it that I allowed to constantly spray a light fine mist on the patch providing a constantly moist, humid microclimate where they thrived. I’d like to have something like that again.)
Yeah, we have lots of elephant ears here. They’re great. When I was a kid, living on the St. John’s River, we used to make sailboats out of the leaves.
5 bears deemed “problem” animals were killed a couple of miles from us last month because they were breaking into homes. We always make sure to never have pet food out unless we are actually sitting on the porch next to the food. I also keep guard on trash day to make sure there is no bear issue. Being bear aware is part of life here.
I expect some of the euthanized bears were ones we have seen around. It was sad to lose them but I understand some folks had actually been feeding these poor bears which is pretty much a death sentence for them.
Anyway, I hope today’s bear is discouraged and goes back into the hills.
