Showing posts with label Duck Creek Recreation Trail. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Duck Creek Recreation Trail. Show all posts

February 28, 2013

Black Ribbon

The Duck Creek bike path is a black ribbon,


inviting you to trace each curve running through the wintery woods, by foot or by tire.




February 11, 2013

Ice Slabs

Ice slabs on Duck Creek trail.


Once they covered the creek bed upstream in a thick, solid layer.


Then a powerful pressure busted them into straight-edged slabs.


The were swept downstream in a churning cauldron of flood water, and piled up high on the creek bank.


Now they are the leftover relics of the brute force of nature, silent, still and landlocked.

September 4, 2012

Close & Closer

I found these radiant flowers the other day and had fun getting close to them.





I found that they had dew condensed on their little cone heads, which provided a natural mirror, reflecting the skyline.

August 30, 2012

Night Adventures

The first official Found on the Trail group field trip was conducted yesterday evening, with great fanfare and much excitement.

Family members asked, "You're going where?" and looked at us quizzically as we loaded up with highly sensitive instruments, meant to record scientific data.  And then, we were out the door!

As you will recall, yesterday's post was on those luscious, bright orange mushrooms called Jack O'Lanterns.  Multiple sources online had indicated that these fungi would glow in the dark.  Eager to see this phenomena, intrepid reader Sarah and myself conducted an investigative foray onto the bike path late last night.

And this, dear readers, is is what we saw:


Yep.  That's it.  Nothing.  Nada.  Zip.  Zilch.

Highly disappointed, we knelt close to the specimens, and peered under their thick, leathery caps.  No glow.

Imagine our disappointment!  Granted, there was a bright moon, and a street light cast its beam in the vicinity, but still.  We had expected something!  After all, their legendary glow is said to have guided lost pioneers home in the dark, in days past.

This glow is supposed to occur along the same principles as the glimmer produced in lightning bugs.  Even knowing this, we could not refrain from placing an artificial light sources under their gorgeous caps in an irrational hope of supplying a needed trigger.  This provided not even a residual flicker, once removed.

However, this photo, taken during the process, is a good example of the sort of glow we had hoped to witness naturally:


Sadly disappointed, and slightly startled by a big, brown creature that ran close by us, we decided to leave.  But first, we took photos to document for the world our devotion to scientific research.  There are almost no depths to which we would not plummet in order to ascertain facts for this blog:




Having concluded our field work, we proceeded to the research vehicle to a soundtrack of our own laughter and neighborhood dogs barking at us suspiciously.  We left the vicinity, confident that we had done all we could do, for that night.  More research will have to be conducted in order to determine the truth behind the alleged glowing properties of this fungi.

August 29, 2012

Jack O'Lantern Mushrooms

Are you ready for Halloween?  These mushrooms are.  Take a look at these massive, bright orange beauties!  They are called jack o'lantern mushrooms, or Omphalotus olearius.  (Say that six times fast in a row!)



A friend told me about these beautiful fungi.  She'd seen them on her morning bike ride, and left a note on my car windshield as to their location, because she knew I was out sleuthing in the nearby creek bed.  Thank you, Sarah.  What a find!

These mushrooms, while glorious to behold, are poisonous.  They won't necessarily kill you, but can cause you to have severe cramps and vomiting, among other reactions.  Yet oddly enough, I read on Wikipedia that some people suffer from poisoning more than once because they find them irresistible.  Sounds like a malignant plot twist in a fairy tale, doesn't it?

So, you can look, but don't taste!


And that's not all.  Their gills are supposed to glow in the dark.  Hmmm.  I'll have to check that out.  Anyone up for a field trip?