Snow, then sun, then snow, then wind, then sun, with both wind and sun coming in at a low angle, but not too much sun, turns the bunchgrass into a series of […]
The Wind and the Grass Taking a Deer for a Walk Among the Dead
Keeping Water
In the November sun, the mullein’s hairs soften its outline in the light. They hold the plant’s water and keep it from the sun. They keep it. In the December fog, the […]
A Poetics of the Earth
This is an indispensable book for all people in the Pacific Northwest. Whether we are gatherers, farmers, Indigenous or settler, poets, novelists or government planners, this is a book that shows us […]
Sheltering on the Open Range
Well, you can shelter in the strength of the Earth and shelter as well in how you read that as the balance that is often called beauty. Or you can shelter from it […]
The Long-Lived Annual Forests
Sure, some forests are 70 metres tall and live for 1,000 years. Some are 50 centimetres tall, maybe 60, and live for 6,000 years and counting. Both the words “grassland” and “forest” […]
Why It’s Called Porcupine Grass
It’s not prickly, or anything, like a porcupine, but it does catch the light like their quills do. See? First the grass: And now the porcupine: Well, yeah, he’s shy, but that’s […]
In Praise of the Wind
Porcupine grass teaches us that it doesn’t exactly grow up. Instead, it use the wind to shift “up” through over 180°. What’s more, long after the grass has stopped eating the sun, […]
What Colour is Big Sagebrush?
Great Basin Sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata), a member of the aster family, rolls across the hills of my country. You could say that where it is home so am I. Not just the […]
What a Great Year for Bees!
Look what they’d done to the road cut above the hill. They’ve absolutely tilled it, digging nests. I my eight years walking this hill, I’ve never seen anything like it. Go, team! […]
Tiny Footprints in the Muck
Look at the insect footprints surrounding this wasp, which is making some of its own, then notice how many there are in all. Some from wasps. Some from others who need mud. […]
