A wonderful day outside leaves a wonderful feeling inside. Everyone has a story. That’s true of all creatures great and small. The love of birds and their stories can change a person. Take me. My wife claims I haven’t always looked like a sandhill crane.
Almost daily, Violet the Dog and I take a walk at the Cedar Bluffs Natural Area above Cedar Creek in Mahaska County, Iowa, and these are my observations, photos, and Merlin bird logs.
Wild birds and good dogs, timeless books and endless questions, lonely places and moving water, the grass below and the sky above, and the never-ending absurdity and enduring beauty of life.
It's about personal contact with nature, especially birds, native plants, and other wildlife in rural Iowa and farther afield. Whenever I can, I try to give nature a helping hand.
These are select articles that ultimately will be compiled to one or more book projects that spans everything from my own personal development as a botanist and conservationist to academic topics on the natural history of the Southeast US.
