This Week in Iowa Nature

Summer flowers of damp woodlands include Joe Pye weed and jewelweed, which soothes the itch from stinging nettles, often encountered in the same lowland habitat.

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

Gardening in August

Friday, August 4

Now, when all the plants and vines are pumping out vegetables like a mass-production line, I'm suddenly tempted to put the gardens on automatic pilot and take a few days' break from the constant vigil of tending them. And I mean break -- a complete break. No weeding, no dusting, no watering, no hindering, no cultivating, no pruning, no trying. No checking on this, no fretting about that. Not even any harvesting. No gardening activities of any kind. The yearning to be free of it all takes hold of me every year around this time, brought on no doubt by the long and continuous labor of bringing the gardens to this point of abundance.


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

This Week in Iowa Nature

Before school starts, explore the corals, crinoids, and brachiopods preserved on the ancient sea floor at Devonian Fossil Gorge in Johnson County.

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

Prairie of the Week

North Dakota:
Little Missouri National Grassland

1.2 million acres, USDA-FS, McKenzie Ranger District, (701) 842-2393; 
Medora Ranger District, (701) 225-5151

Subtleties of mixed-grass prairie compete with eye-popping badlands, creating landscape that has made a big impression on countless visitors, including the young Teddy Roosevelt. Hikers and horseback riders can strike out on the 120-mile-long Maah Daah Hey Trail, which begins at Sully Creek State Park south of Medora. A 58-mile self-guided auto tour of the grassland begins at the Medora office.
Information and maps at McKenzie office, 1 mile south of Watford City on Highway 85; Medora office, 161 21st Street West in Dickinson.


Suzanne Winckler's Prairie: A North American Guide

This Week in Iowa Nature

Sphinx moths, hovering over flowers at dusk, are sometimes mistaken for hummingbirds.

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

July Rain Garden Update

What can we say about June except rain, rain, and more rain? We can only imagine what our office’s basement would have looked like if it were not for the rain garden and the berm that help siphon water away from our building. The rain garden proved its ability to handle large amounts of precipitation without sending it flooding into the street in one big gulp. We are now looking at aerating the soil in back of our building in another effort to enrich and manage our small habitat. Newly blooming in the rain garden—and also in our prairie garden—are gorgeous red beebalm, brown-eyed Susan, purple coneflowers, and cup plant. We also transplanted little bluestem and prairie dropseed from our home gardens.

Ragbrai Week

John Karras


     No question, it changed my life, and all for the better.
     Because of it, I stopped smoking, kept biking, discovered the beauties of the state of Iowa, met thousands of friendly, decent and upstanding people and a few scoundrels, and formed dozens of friendships that have lasted years and years...What I have enjoyed most on RAGBRAI, however, and especially in the earlier years, is seeing middle-aged women find independence.
     Modern feminism was in its adolescence when RAGBRAI began in 1973, and a lot of women in their 30s, 40s and 50s were still laboring under the illusion that they couldn't do much of anything or go much of anywhere without a man at their side. RAGBRAI helped demonstrate to at least one and perhaps two generations of women that they could pretty much go any damn where they pleased without a guy hanging around. The demonstration dismayed as many traditional men as it pleased traditional women. I was more than pleased to have been a part of its happening.


John Karras and Ann Karras, RAGBRAI: Everyone Pronounces It Wrong