This may be the single most relevant-to-my-blog thing I have ever linked to. It’s not often you find writing and botany in the same link. But here’s one. Found via Sandra Gail Lambert, a poem about kudzu!
I was looking for pitcher plants in the Apalachee Savannahs when I happened to see this little plant, the pale grass-pink (Calopogon pallidus). It’s a member of the orchid family, as you may have guessed from the oddly shaped flowers. The flowers may be small, but they’re very interesting up close.
Florida anise, growing in a ravine. This flower always surprises me; it doesn’t look to me like a flower that would be on a tall woody shrub.
I was nearby around lunch time, so I went down to the river and ate my sandwich on the bank and took one picture before my camera battery went dead. I was a bit disappointed that it was not more ominous-looking, to match its name. (This is the Styx that is a tributary of the Apalachicola. There’s another one south of Gainesville, near Micanopy.)
I’m changing the rules of the ID-a-Day project a bit. For one thing, it’s obviously not going to be every day. (Was it ever?) For another, the subject doesn’t have to be something I don’t recognize. It can be something I do know, but if so, I’ll look it up and find out something about it that I didn’t know before.
But today’s is one I didn’t know, and I had no business not knowing. It’s the needle palm (Rhapidophyllum hystrix), a fairly common plant in hardwood hammocks of northern Florida. The needle palm is so named because of the sharp, pointy old leaf petioles that stick out from the base of the plant.
And we all know what that means: photos!
The first comes from the Apalachicola Bluffs and Ravines Preserve, and in this photo you can see all the elements of its name: the Apalachicola River, big and muddy from a recent rain; Alum Bluff, on the eastern bank, from which the photo was taken; and the mouth of a steephead ravine, sort of hidden down behind that strip of pine trees dividing the bluffs.
And next, a photo from the Apalachicola National Forest. This was actually the second alligator I saw today, but the other startled me and by the time I thought to grab my camera, it had slipped into the tea-colored water alongside the road and disappeared. This little guy is maybe about 18in (45.7cm) long.
Another animal you’ll see frequently in the forest is the ordinary domestic cow, like this one, who came over to sniff the truck right after I took the photo.
It’s been a while, and much has changed. I’ve moved, for one thing. I’m now living in the Florida panhandle. And why did I move? Because I have a new job! I’m working for The Nature Conservancy, an organization whose awesomeness I’ve been aware of for a long time. I always sort of hoped to get a job with them someday. So I’m pretty stoked. I work with awesome people, for a good cause, and I’m enjoying my job. Can’t really ask for more than that!
Because I get to work outside again, at least part of the time, the ID-a-Day Project will be starting up again. Only, it’ll probably be more like the ID-Twice-a-Week Project. I’ll have to come up with a catchier name.
I had originally intended to finish up my novel this month and participate in National Novel Editing Month, the follow-up to National Novel Writing Month. Yeah… not so much. I don’t think I’ve touched it this month, even though I had just reached the good part when things started happening. Things happen in sudden bursts of activity for me. I can go with very little progress or excitement in any area of my life for years, and then all of a sudden multiple events happen. These usually coincide with a move, whether the other event(s) cause it or result from it or are mostly unrelated to it.
Maybe I can keep the momentum going and follow up with selling The Afflicted. Or at least finishing it.
Like everyone else on the web, I'm an aspiring author. I'm also an aspiring wildlife biologist, artist, and lottery winner. I'll settle for any two out of four.
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