Plants are creatures of light. They live in the air, eat light photons, and give off oxygen, yet strangely the dimmer the light they’re nibbling on the more efficient their photosynthesis becomes. […]
Soil Atmosphere and Eternity
The Art of the Palette
Art can be made out of land in many ways. One is to build a highway. These art projects often are a form of politics. Take the highways of Eastern Washington, for […]
The Mother of All Plants
Miss your Mom? Here she is, the dear: This is the German Poet Johann Wolfgang Goethe’s Ancestral Plant He was taken with the idea that all plants of the world could be […]
One Room School
Do you think the prairies and big skies are east of the Rockies? Think again. Sometimes you climb up the arroyos out of the Columbia River Canyon and the winter wheat gleams […]
The Biggest Waterfall of All
So, just imagine. You’re beetling along happily across the wheat fields of the Washington desert after a freak spring snow, getting passed by giant fertilizer trucks every time you stop to take […]
Hints at a New Science of Life
The science of botany got its start in plant classification and botanical gardens. Because of that, contemporary human understanding of plant communities largely revolves around species and their interactions. The results can […]
Of Wine and Cheese
Here’s a photo from the pre-digital era of 2003. Its colours look as quaint as old Life Magazine covers. It does the job, though … Chasselas Vineyards, Vevey Switzerland The Swiss have […]
Wine and Light
Talking about wine today. Thinking about how the bacterial crust on the soil shows up in the wine. Thinking that it’s a story of light. So pick up a glass, sip that […]
Grapes at Work
Our grapes are up to something we never suspected. You know those leaves on grape plants? Grape Leaves Waiting for the Light Assmannshausen am Rhein, late June, 6 a.m. Photosynthesis is the […]
The Problem with Winter
Spring, summer, autumn and winter, the four seasons, right? In the temperate zone, of course. But what about the wet season and the dry season? In Vancouver or Seattle or Reykjavik, for instance, […]
Okanagan Okanogan 