Tree of the Week

For the months of November and December, we'll be showcasing pine trees in hopes that you'll see one you might want to help you celebrate the holiday season. Enjoy!

Red Pine, Pinus resinosa Ait.

DISTINGUISHING CHARACTERISTICS: Leaves in bundles of 2, slender, 4 to 6 inches long, fairly flexible but breaking readily when bent in two. Cones 1 1/2 to 2 1/4 inches long; basal scales remaining on the twig when the cone falls, leaving a small depression in the base of the cone; scales without prickles. Bark divided into flat plates separated by shallow furrows and covered with red-orange scales.

SIMILAR TREES: Austrian pine has strongly whitened buds and larger cones that retain their basal scales when falling from the twigs. Ponderosa pine has some bundles with 3 needles and much larger cones with sharp prickles.

IOWA DISTRIBUTION: Planted throughout the state but not commonly so in the west.

Forest and Shade Trees of Iowa (Third Edition), by Peter J. van der Linden and Donald R. Farrar

Gardening in November

Wednesday, November 8

"In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure-dome decree: where Alph, the sacred river, ran through caverns measureless to man, down to a sunless sea." No wonder we got up early this morning and drove two hours west through rolling fields of pale dried corn and lush green winter wheat, the Black Angus feeding on hillsides in the middle distance, the steely farm ponds nestled in below, the flocks of crows circling overhead in the bright blue sky, scattered with mauve and white clouds. The clouds and the crows and the ponds and the cattle and the corn were still there on the way home, and so were the hillsides of evergreens and the browning oaks and the red-berried hawthorns -- but looking it seemed just then, like fields of chrysanthemums. Maybe it was that we were heading east and the sun was at our back. Or that we were tired and the light was playing tricks with our eyes. But somehow I don't think so.

Carl H. Klaus, My Vegetable Love: A Journal of a Growing Season

On the Fly: An Interview with Connie Mutel

Check out this link to the UNESCO City of Literature featuring Connie Mutel, author of The Emerald Horizon: The History of Nature in Iowa and A Watershed Year: Anatomy of the Iowa Floods of 2008.

http://www.youtube.com/cityofliteratureusa

Habitat of the Month

Pacific Coastline

Black Oystercatcher

Where land and sea meet, expect to find interesting habitats. Cliffs carved by the force of waves beating against rocks make perfect homes for birds that eat fish and shellfish.

Black oystercatchers are large shorebirds that live along rocky coastlines. They have all-black bodies, yellow eyes, light pink legs, and long orange bills. When you walk on a beach, you can hear them noisily peeping as they look for food along the water's edge. Sometimes their call sounds like a whistle.

Oystercatchers make nests called scrapes in shallow dents along the rocky beach. The parent birds line the nest with small shells and pebbles. When the eggs hatch, both parents care for the chicks until they can fly. Most black oystercatchers live all year round where they nest.

When oil from big ships and garbage spills into the ocean, the black oystercatcher's home is in danger. Keeping the ocean and beach clean is most important to the birds that live along the coast.

Where Do Birds Live? by Claudia McGehee