Plant of the Week: prairie smoke

Prairie smoke

Geum triflorum Pursh

other common names
: old man’s whiskers, Johnny smokers
Geum: the ancient Latin name used by Pliny for this group
Triflorum: from Latin, meaning “three-flowered”
Rose family: Rosaceae

Wildflowers of the Tallgrass Prairie: The Upper Midwest, Second Edition, by Sylvan Runkel and Dean M. Roosa, photographs by Thomas Rosburg

Gardening in November

Friday, November 24

...it's probably time to harvest most of the greens and put a period to things before another Arctic storm comes along and makes its own conclusion. I'm not looking to set any outdoor records, just to keep eating our homegrown stuff as long as we can.

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

Interview with Andrea M. Jones: part 1

Andrea M. Jones is the author of Between Urban and Wild: Reflections from Colorado, published just this month. University of Iowa Press acquisitions editor Holly Carver asked her a few questions about the book. Come back next week to read the rest of the interview!

HC: You’re a native of Colorado. How has your homeplace influenced your writing?

AMJ: That issue of nativeness has essentially been my topic for the past few years, so my background in Colorado has most recently been an impetus to write, full stop. More generally and looking forward, I’d have to say that living in a place that calls my attention outward—with nice scenery and dramatic weather and very evident development pressures—urges me to resist being too self-referential. First-person narrative has the advantage of giving readers the sense that they’re connecting with a specific person, but I want to use my frame of reference as a point of departure, not as the destination.

HC: Who are your inspirations among nature writers and writers of place?

AMJ: Edward Abbey was an early influence, as I mention in Between Urban and Wild. Terry Tempest Williams shaped my perspective on the give-and-take between a person and the environment, and she’s also a role model for the craft of writing. In terms of thinking of and writing about place and constructing elegant essays, I am in awe of Scott Russell Sanders. Linda M. Hasselstrom, in both her writing and through the retreats she offers at her family ranch in South Dakota, pushed me to think longer and harder about the relationship between people and landscape and what that relationship means for those of us who live on the land but don’t make our living from it. And in the broader sense of the human place in the world, including the world of ideas, Mary Catherine Bateson’s Peripheral Visions: Learning Along the Way is a book I return to over and over again.

HC: You’re responding to my questions while, once again, it’s wildfire season in Colorado. How do you live with these annual dangers?

AMJ: Although we’ve been under persistent drought conditions for several years now, the fire risk will always be here—it’s built into the ecology of the region. There are days when I can put on my pragmatic hat and do some more planning; talk through evacuation scenarios with my husband, Doug; or go outside and pick a chore that counts as mitigation or that reduces an ignition risk around the house or barn. There are other days when I’m worn down by the anxiety and stress and wish I could just leave the whole issue behind. Aspects of our intense and destructive fires are climate-driven, however, and I know we are hardly alone in coming to terms with extreme weather events.

Trying to learn more about a topic is one of my coping mechanisms, so I continue to read and seek out information. And it remains true that fire season pushes me to be more attentive to our surroundings. This year, I am amazed yet again at how quickly and effectively the native grasses and wildflowers take advantage of whatever precipitation comes their way.

Between Urban and Wild: Reflections from Colorado by Andrea M. Jones

Excerpt from Esther's Town

Despite all the faults I can discover in the new, I like much of it. Life is more comfortable. I enjoy its conveniences. I could not have imagined as a boy that the average American would ever have it so deluxe. Dependable automobiles, household appliances, calculators, tools, typewriters, mechanical equipment, and furnishings abound. Homes, offices, stores, and industrial plants are well lighted, ventilated, heated, and cooled, and they are attractively appointed. Even though I still prefer fresh air over refrigerated air (which plugs my sinuses), I know this all sums up to progress.

What I am less sure of is that Americans are wisely using all their advantages and resources. I am encouraged that Estherville and the nation are developing awareness of the country's improvidence and wastefulness, but a happy mix of imposing environmental control and meeting needs of the economy has not been achieved.


Esther's Town by Deemer Lee

Midwest Nature Quote of the Week

The wild, untrammeled character of this landscape, its relatively large remaining prairies, and its unusual and rare species have attracted national attention in recent years. The Loess Hills have become the focus of scientific research, education, and conservation. Such efforts are not misplaced, any more than efforts to preserve Rembrandt’s paintings or Bach’s music would be misplaced. The Loess Hills can feed our spiritual hunger and our intellectual curiosity as richly as the highest products of human civilization would feed them. We are now coming to realize that maintenance of biological diversity and healthy natural systems, such as those in the Loess Hills, is necessary for the perpetuation of human life as well. Wisely used and managed, the Loess Hills can continue to satisfy the needs of both humans and native species indefinitely.

Cornelia F. Mutel, Fragile Giants: A Natural History of the Loess Hills

Midwest Nature Quote of the Week

Agile and sure-footed, raccoons are as much at home in trees as any squirrel. If they decide to leave a tree they can leap from alarming heights without apparent injury. Twice I have seen desperate raccoons weighing at least 20 pounds do this. In one instance the ’coon jumped from a limb over thirty feet above the ground without even having the breath knocked from him, leaping beyond the dogs and climbing a large den tree nearby before they could take him. In the other case, a very large raccoon made a twenty-foot high dive into a river and escaped.

John Madson, Stories from Under the Sky

Midwest Nature Quote of the Week

For an hour or two this morning, when I was thinning and transplanting the young broccoli and cauliflower seedlings, the sun was shining and the eastern portion of the sky was mostly blue. So vivid and inviting outside after yesterday’s gloomy pallor, I could hardly keep myself at the kitchen sink stuffing each of the seedlings into its own slot and filling them up with a wet transplanting mix. And two or three times, I couldn’t resist the temptation to go outside in my pajamas and take stock of things in the back yard.


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

Midwest Nature Quote of the Week

Within the prairies were many landscapes…. There were hanging bogs with strange calcareous flora, “walled” lakes with cobble beaches and orderly shorelines of glacial boulders, waves of flowers advancing with each stage of the growing season, and myriad patterns and textures of grasses that varied moment by moment with sun and wind and the cloud shadows that drove across the land. There were a thousand worlds within this one world of grass. Some men sensed that at once; others never did.

John Madson, Where the Sky Began: Land of the Tallgrass Prairie

Biographical Dictionary of Iowa: Cora Call Whitley

Cora Call Whitley
(May 7, 1862-December 30, 1937)
--clubwoman and conservationist--was born in Rowelsburg, West Virginia, to the Reverend L. N. Call and Mary (Guyon) Call. Her family moved to Pennsylvania when she was three years old, and to Iowa in 1867, when her father was sent there as a missionary by the Baptist church. As an adult, she recalled the perilous walk across the frozen--but thawing--Mississippi River with her mother and young siblings that took them to Iowa and their waiting father.


The Biographical Dictionary of Iowa, edited by David Hudson, Marvin Bergman, and Loren Horton

Midwest Nature Quote of the Week

Champions of grass-roots biodiversity must face the realization that in much of the United States, local plants and animals do not stir deep emotions; paddlefish, while having a certain appeal all their own, are not pandas. Nevertheless, I suggest that if you can care about pandas, you can care about paddlefish or amphibians or dragonflies or even clams.

Michael J. Lannoo, Okoboji Wetlands: A Lesson in Natural History

Midwest Nature Quote of the Week

There was a calm wordlessness over the water, a savage evening brightness, the presence of quick life, quick death, multitudes of fish, birds, and fishing men brought there by inexorable greed, balanced by the ages; and it was not something we asked for necessarily, as part of the acceptable world, but I took it as an offering, in answer to all need.

John Hay, In Defense of Nature

Iowa Nature Calendar: July 17

July heat triggers the hatching of millions of short-lived mayflies along the Mississippi; their remains often have to be shoveled from streets and sidewalks in Dubuque and other river towns.

The Iowa Nature Calendar by Jean Prior & James Sandrock

Raptor of the Week: Broad-Winged Hawk

Broad-winged Hawk
Buteo platypterus

This midsize buteo is a common migrant but a rare nester in Iowa. During
migration, it can move in large flocks of two to three thousand birds or more.
It nests sparsely across the state, usually in deep woodlands. Iowa birds are
gone by mid to late October and are virtually unknown in the state after that.

The Raptors of Iowa , paintings by James F. Landenberger

Excerpt from Esther's Town

Few Esthervilleans could forget the year 1936. A bitter cold winter was followed by a capricious spring and by an unfriendly drifting summer that added insult to the injury of empty stomachs. Heavy drifting snows snarled railroad traffic, and the cold soon emptied the coal bins. As coal trains stalled in mammoth snowdrifts, the community ran perilously low on fuel. Mayor Fred Ehlers recruited volunteer shovelers, who rescued a train loaded with coal that got almost as far as Estherville when once again it was stalled in a deep cut. Daily bulletins published in the paper kept anxious readers informed on the progress of the train bringing them coal, which finally reached the town as residents were steeling themselves for cold houses. Fears of empty coal bins were no more than allayed when other fears replaced them. On Thursday, April 30, a funnel cloud roared in from the west over the bluffs along the river.


Esther's Town, by Deemer Lee

Raptor of the Week: Sharp-Shinned Hawk

Sharp-shinned Hawk
Accipiter striatus


This exciting accipiter is a common migrant, seen in Iowa from mid March
to mid May. It is an uncommon winter resident and apparently a very rare
nester, with newly fledged young being seen in western Iowa and in Hardin
and Lucas counties in recent years. It may have been a fairly common nester
prior to the twentieth century.

The Raptors of Iowa , paintings by James F. Landenberger

Excerpt from Esther's Town

Lewis Paulson would long remember the miserable journey he made as postman in February 1861 when during a raging blizzard it took him five days to make the forty-five mile trip from Estherville to Algona. The public rewarded him with a $9 contribution for the trip he made on snowshoes. At one point he was temporarily blinded by the snow, lost his way, and wandered in virtually a circle for one whole night. He didn't stop to rest for fear of freezing to death. Stumbling accidentally near a cabin when he thought he heard someone calling hogs, he found hospitality that saved his life.

Esther's Town, by Deemer Lee

Interested in living off the land?

Today's post comes to us from Housekeeping: Knock Out Dirt and Clutter For Good.

As grocery stores continue to raise food prices, more people are turning to their own land to produce food instead of purchasing it at the store.  Whether you want to grow your own herbs, harvest your own fruits or vegetables or raise cattle, there are many ways you can maximize your land as a food source. These 25 blog articles will dig into how you can live off the land.

How to Do It

There’s no way that one blog could give you all of the information that you need to live off the land, but combining these five blog entries can give you some ideas on how to go about starting the adventure.

• Live Off Your Land—Fifteen Steps You Can Take to Get Out of the Cubicle and Onto Self-Reliance
• Infographic: How Much Backyard Do You Need to Live Off the Land?
• The Floyd Eco-Village: Living Off the Land with an Economic Plan
• Tough (and Valuable) Lessons from the Homestead
• Rural Free Delivery: Living Off the Land, Almost

Meat

Hunting isn’t the only way to have meat on your dinner table if you are living off the land.  Many folks choose to raise their own livestock to butcher for food.  A family of four can eat for several different meals from the meat that comes from a whole pig or cow.  If you live by water, you can add fish or other seafood to your diet.  These five blog posts will share some of their insights with you.

• Living Off the Land
• The Year in Oysters
• Living Off the Land
• Abandon the Office: Be a Hunter-Gatherer
• Living Off the Land – And Sea—In Kotzebue

Vegetables

Probably one of the easiest ways to start saving money and living off the land is by growing your own garden.  For instance, one tomato plant will yield about one bushel of tomatoes. These tomatoes will allow you to make and can your own tomato sauce, stew tomatoes and make salsa, in addition to eating them fresh.  Just think of all that you could do if you had more than one plant.  Making your own salsa is a snap when you grow your own onions, jalapenos and cilantro, and you don’t have to step foot into a grocery store.  These five blog posts will give you some ideas for getting started.

• A British Town Relearns How to Live Off the Land [Video]
• Garden Prep [What I’m Doing to Prepare for Spring Gardening in DECEMBER]
• Gardening in November?
• The Progressive Garden—Living Off the Land
• Living Off the Land

Off the Grid

Some people have taken ‘living off the land’ one step further and have decided that they are going to live off the grid as well.  Living off the grid means that you don’t pay for electricity from a company; instead, you create your own by using solar, wind or water power.  Or you could go completely electricity free.  Take a look at these five blog entries to see what others are doing to get off the grid.

• Living Off the Grid, Urban-Homesteading Style, With the Dervaes Family
• 16×9—Off the Grid: Living Off Land Hour from Vancouver
• Living Off the Grid—In a Bus
• Living Off the Grid: Could Decreasing Energy Dependence Ultimately Make Life Easier?  (Video)
• Living Off the Grid

Little House on the Prairie Living

When you were a kid you may have read the Little House on the Prairie books by Laura Ingalls Wilder or watched the spin-off TV show.  If you did, you may remember how hard life was on the prairie and how the Ingalls family survived by living off the land for the most part.  Read these five blog posts to learn a bit more about living like they did back then.

• It’s ‘Little House on the Prairie’ Up In Here
• The Meteorology of Little House on the Prairie
• In Search of Little House on the Prairie
• The “Historical Pa” (Little House on the Prairie, Controlling Love Etc…)
• Little House on the Prairie and Djibouti

Interview with Brandi Janssen

University of Iowa Press acquisitions editor Catherine Cocks is helping the press build a new list of publications on a topic everyone’s interested in these days: food. Recently, she asked Brandi Janssen, an anthropology PhD student at the University of Iowa who’s writing her dissertation on local food production, some questions about the rapidly growing “Farm to School” or F2S movement.

Catherine: What is “Farm to School” and what are the reasons for it?

Brandi: Broadly, Farm to School includes programs that link locally produced foods to K-12 schools. These efforts include, but are certainly not limited to, adding locally produced foods to school lunches and classroom snacks, providing nutrition and agricultural education, and developing school gardens. Farm to School programs generally aim to improve the quality of food served in schools and increase student knowledge of agriculture and food production, both in the classroom and through hands-on gardening activities and farm field trips. In addition, Farm to School programs develop and expand markets available to local farmers by increasing institutional purchasing of local food.

Catherine: When did these efforts start, and how widespread are they?

Brandi: It’s difficult to pinpoint an exact start date, as Farm to School efforts have been developing independently across the United States over the past ten to fifteen years. In 2004, however, the National Farm to School Program was officially authorized in the Farm Bill. [This is the omnibus act on agriculture and food policy that Congress enacts every five years.] While no funds for Farm to School were appropriated in that bill, the federal recognition was significant. In 2010 the Farm Bill included over $5 million in funding for Farm to School projects. Currently [in 2013], the National Farm to School Network reports that there are over 2,500 individual Farm to School programs serving over 10,000 schools, spread throughout all 50 states.

Midwest Nature Quote of the Week

Anyone who has looked across a ghostly valley at midnight, when moonlight makes a formless silver unity out of the drifting fog, knows how impossible it often is in nature to distinguish mass from hallucination. Anyone who has stood upon a lofty summit and gazed over an inchoate tangle of deep canyons and cragged mountains, of sunlit lakelets and black expanses of forest, has become aware of a certain giddy sensation that there are no distances, no measures, simply unrelated matter rising and falling without any analogy to the banal geometry of breadth, thickness, and height.

Robert Marshall, The People’s Forests

Sightings of summer tanagers are reliable at Waubonsie and Lacey-Keosauqua state parks in Fremont and Van Buren counties.


The Iowa Nature Calendar, by Jean C. Prior and James Sandrock