Oak MSP

Brief-Form Post #41: Outdoor Alabama Adventure Elementary School Field Trip at Oak Mountain State Park!

I am pleased to add the 41st of my GBH Brief-Form Posts (Less than five minutes to read!) to my website. I tend to get a bit wordy with my routine Posts. I don’t want my enthusiasm for thoroughness and detail to discourage readers. So, I will publish these brief Posts regularly. As a member […]

At the Cross Section of Nature and Holiday Festivity

I know the date is January 31, 2025! Thirty-six days after Christmas. Why am I posting a Christmas-themed Great Blue Heron photo essay? I published a full essay earlier this week focussed around a typical Nature-Inspired Life and Living theme. This essay has a mood that I want to persist year-round. Although this one presents […]

Blackwell Swamp

Blackwell Swamp and Rockhouse Bottom in Early October on the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge (Part Two)

On October 6, 2024, a little longer than six weeks since my total right knee replacement surgery, I ventured to Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge to gently explore Buckeye Impoundment, Blackwell Swamp, and Rockhouse Bottom by automobile and dirt road strolling. Not yet ready for woodland trail wandering, I welcomed the fresh air, seasonal transition signs, […]

Flint Creek Trail

Mild Fall Afternoon at the Woodland Flint Creek Trail on Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge!

Fellow retired forester Chris Stuhlinger and I co-led a group of 22 OLLI (Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, University of Alabama in Huntsville) members on a Nature Walk along Flint Creek Trail (Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge) on Sunday afternoon, November 10, 2024. Two days earlier the Sunday forecast predicted an 80 percent probability of rain. Nary […]

Brief-Form Post #40: Active Decay in Monte Sano State Park Wells Memorial Forest

Brief-Form Post #40   I am pleased to add the 40th of my GBH Brief-Form Posts (Less than five minutes to read!) to my website. I get wordy with my routine Posts. I don’t want my enthusiasm for thoroughness and detail to discourage readers. So, I will publish these brief Posts regularly.   Active Decay […]

Oak MSP

A First Circuit of the Lunker Lake Trail at Oak Mountain State Park!

I often wander forest trails alone, content to saunter leisurely absorbing the sights, sounds, and feel of Nature. I relished having friends to share a November 7, 2024 hike with fellow retired forester Chris Stuhlinger, Tom Cosby, fellow former Alabama State Parks Foundation board member, and Dennis McMillian, an old friend from Fairbanks, Alaska now […]

Autumn Stroll at Huntsville Alabama’s Goldsmith-Schiffman Wildlife Sanctuary!

On November 1, 2024, 72 days since my total right knee replacement surgery, I sauntered within Huntsville’s Goldsmith-Schiffman Wildlife Sanctuary with dear friends Marian Moore Lewis, Chris Stuhlinger, Bill and Becky Heslip, and Judy (my bride of 52 years)! I felt the lift of a new month, the freshness of an early fall day, and […]

Green Mountain

Mixed Forest along the Lower Slope of Green Mountain Trail

On October 25, 2024, fellow retired forester Brian Bradley introduced me to the lower mile of the two-year-old Green Mountain Trail, beginning at the Astalot Trailhead. Cognizant of my August 20, 2024 right knee replacement surgery, Brian planned sauntering approximately a mile to what I’ve come to call the Halloween Forest. We had no reason […]

Monte SSP

Brief-Form Post #39: Pits, Mounds, and Sinkholes in the Wells Memorial Forest at Monte Sano State Park!

Brief-Form Post #39 I am pleased to add the 38th of my GBH Brief-Form Posts (Less than five minutes to read!) to my website. I get wordy with my routine Posts. I don’t want my enthusiasm for thoroughness and detail to discourage readers. So, I will publish these brief Posts regularly.   Sinkholes, Pits, Mounds, […]

Green Mountain

Halloween Forest of Rare Smoketrees (Cotinus obovatus) on Green Mountain Nature Preserve!

I don’t recall ever seeing our north Alabama native smoketree (Continus obovatus) nor learning about it so many years ago when I took Dendrology in 1970. The species does range as far north as West Virginia, much less where I began my undergraduate studies in western Maryland. I didn’t know what to expect when fellow […]

Monte SSP

Brief-Form Post #38: Tangles, Loops, and Vines in the Hardwood Canopy on Monte Sano

Brief-Form Post #38: Woodland Delights!   I am pleased to add the 38th of my GBH Brief-Form Posts (Less than five minutes to read!) to my website. I get wordy with my routine Posts. I don’t want my enthusiasm for thoroughness and detail to discourage readers. So, I will publish these brief Posts regularly. Grapevine […]

Hints of Autumn in Mid-October along the Rainbolt Trail at Madison AL’s Rainbow Mountain Nature Preserve

  Hints of Autumn   On October 13, 2024, my new right knee (August 20, 2024) and I ambled along the moderate Rainbolt Trail on Madison, Alabama’s Rainbow Mountain Nature Preserve, where I observed the early signs of the coming winter. Judy and I made 13 interstate moves across our five+ decades of married and […]