I am pleased to offer the 18th of my new GBH Brief Form Posts (Less than three minutes to read, plus viewing the short videos!). I tend to get a bit long-winded 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.

Brief-Form Post on Inspiring Clouds and Sky mid-June 2023 at Lake Guntersville State Park

I visited Lake Guntersville State Park for an Alabama State Parks Foundation Board meeting on July 19, just a month following my triple bypass surgery, my first recovery venture to one of our 21 Alabama State Parks. No, I did not explore sylvan realms along shady trails. Instead, I found rewarding vistas from my lodge room balcony and from the observation deck outside the restaurant.

I embraced and photographed the late afternoon (5:00 PM) view of the lake with cirrocumulus clouds spanning the sky above. The balcony perches 350 feet above the water.

I scurried (within the limits of my recovery!) to the observation deck outside the restaurant when, almost too late (7:55 PM), I noticed the setting sun.

Because a still photo misses so much spirit and magic, I captured the moment with this 42-second video at 8:03 PM!

Sunset moments bring the day to an end, yet they fail to express the promise, hope, and joy of a new day dawning. My dawn balcony view (6:17 AM) offers the same perspective as my prior afternoon’s 5:00 PM vista.

I recorded this 30-second video from our Lodge room balcony just five minutes later.

Just 13.5 hours had elapsed (from 5:00 PM to 6:33 AM) since my first image the prior afternoon. However, my re-entry to the State Park Nature arena returned a incalculable measure in form of her beauty, magic, wonder, awe, and inspiration. This view to the ENE gazes directly into the rising sun, apropos to my feeling of returning to the normalcy of a new day…a new time…a new beginning…emerging from the murky uncertainty of major surgery spurred by a life-threatening medical condition.

I’m ready to tackle new ventures…a second chance, as summer promises to transition to fall’s cooler weather and welcoming trails.

I accept the challenge of distilling these Brief-Form Posts to a single distinct reflection, a task far more elusive than assembling a dozen pithy statements. Sometimes, I borrow a distinct reflection from the truly great minds of antiquity, for no matter how hard I try I am unable to best those whom I have followed and revered across my seven-plus decades. In this case, it is John Muir who captured the essence of Nature’s elixir 120 years ago:

• The world’s big and I want to have a good look at it before it gets dark.

NOTE: I place 3-5 short videos (15-seconds to three minutes) on my Steve Jones Great Blue Heron YouTube channel weekly. All relate to Nature-Inspired Life and Living. I encourage you to SUBSCRIBE! It’s FREE. Having more subscribers helps me spread my message of Informed and Responsible Earth Stewardship…locally and globally!

On May 11, 2023, I revisited the Wheeler Dam construction era (1930s) recreation area (along the Multi-Use Trail) on the Wilson Lake side of Alabama’s Joe Wheeler State Park. The 90-year-old area, once serving thousands of workers and their families, now lies in decay, deep within the second-growth forest enveloping it.

I am not yet fully satisfied with translating my on-the-ground discoveries to the reality of the mid-1930s. I’ve already published a Great Blue Heron Post as my first attempt August 12, 2020: https://stevejonesgbh.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=7284&action=edit&classic-editor=1

Via this current Post, I’m bringing us a step closer, aided in large measure by my May 2023 visit, accompanied by then Park Naturalist Sam Woodroof (since moving on to alternate employment), and fellow retired forester Chris Stuhlinger, and further assisted by a US Government Printing Office 1940 book, The Wheeler Project, A Comprehensive Report on the Planning, Design, and Initial Operations.

The old recreation site lies entirely within the 2.26 mile Multi-Use Trail that loops along the bluffs overlooking Wilson Lake. The Google Map image (left) highlights the route of old County Road 411, the road no longer visible in the aerial photograph. The Multi-Use Trailhead is where the old road leaves the current state highway.

Nature is reclaiming the former thoroughfare, hence the route highlighting above, where Chris is walking below right. The paved surface is inexorably yielding to time, weathering, and life forces (moss below left).

The Civilian Conservation Corps built all the infrastructure within the recreation area, including this stone culvert and crossing where the old road enters the forest on the far side of the power line right-of-way.

The former County Road 411 ended with dam construction at an observation cul-de-sac on a peninsular bluff above Wilson Lake. Immaculate stone work, typical of the CCC, lends significance and permanence to the turn-around. Imagine the 1930s view to the lake unobstructed by trees. The maturing second growth forest obscures the Lake Wilson viewscape.

Note also below that a large oak tree stands within the cul-de-sac, an impossibility when the overlook feature carried automobiles. Nature has a way of making short-shrift of human constructs.

These two northern red oaks evidence relatively rich soil and the passage of 90 growing seasons. They certainly witnessed workers enjoying the recreation amenities, but only decades after the area fell into disuse did they attain their stature as forest monarchs.

The Wheeler Project book describes the recreation area:

Within the reservation immediately south of the dam, the Authority [TVA], with the cooperation of the National Park Service and the Emergency Conservation Work program, developed two small areas for intensive recreation use. [The smaller is on the Wheeler Lake side of the primary dam road.] The larger of the two areas is located along the shoreline of Big Nance Creek and its junction with Wilson Lake, and consists of approximately 50 acres of heavily wooded land. Note: Big Nance Creek is at the west side of both map images above.

Facilities include a cherted access road [County Road 411], a parking area, a frame picnic shelter with twin fireplaces, a rustic overlook building, a latrine building, drinking fountains, tables, benches, and outdoor ovens, together with foot trails leading to various points of interest.

A National Park Service CCC camp constructed the facilities in these areas between April 1934 and November 1935. The areas are used extensively by individuals and local groups from the nearby and cities within a radius of 75 miles.

This excerpt warrants a few clarifying comments. What is now Joe Wheeler State Park remained in federal ownership until 1949, hence the narrative about the 1930s mentioning the National Park Service, CCC, and other federal agencies. The 1940 book narrative indicates that the recreation areas continued to operate through the date of publication. I’ve found no indication of a closure date. I assume that the responsible federal agency ceased operations before the state acquired the property in 1949, suggesting abandonment and subsequent neglect over three-quarters of a century.

Here is the rustic overlook building, which I and others have referred to as the gazebo, with stonework still intact and wood elements collapsed.

Here is what remains of the frame picnic shelter with twin fireplaces (my photos from July 2020).

I recorded this 1:18 video at the shelter. Note that the tree lying across the chimney below in 2023 was not there in 2020, corroborating my consistent observation that nothing in Nature is static.

Here is what The Wheeler Project refers to as the latrine building, and I’ve described it in modern parlance as a bathhouse.

To supplement my narrative and the still photo, here is my 0:51 video of the latrine building or bathhouse

Here is the picnic area, with concrete construction standing firm, the wooden benches long since decayed.

Here is a photo of me at one of the tables in July 2020.

We examined these concrete and rebar structures carefully, puzzling about their purpose. We referred to them as outdoor cook-pits, their flimsier grates burned and rusted to oblivion. Could these be the outdoor ovens mentioned by The Wheeler Project?

Here is my 0:34 video of the barbeque pits (outdoor ovens).

Interestingly, this 30-inch diameter yellow poplar stands within a pit, having grown around one of the rebar cross-members. Nature keeps her secrets well hidden.

I plan to return to the old recreation site mid-winter, when greenery hides less effectively. I want to find the parking area, drinking fountains, benches, and foot trails leading to various points of interest, among other evidence of this once vibrant recreation area. I am hoping that recently-designated Alabama State Parks Chief of Interpretation, Renee S. Raney, can add her keen and practiced naturalist skills to the effort, on-ste here at JWSP, and at other of our Parks where the CCC played major roles.

Other sleuthing awaits me (and Renee). Google Maps allow me to see only recent aerial views. I want to examine aerial photographs that date back to the 1930s and 1940s, periods that will reveal ground structures, paths, and roads.

I’ve focused this Post on the old recreation area. The Wheeler Project also offers informative narrative about the associated housing facilities for white and Negro employees. Both camps were located just ENE of the Multi-Use Trail loop. What might we find on the ground? Perhaps such exploration will yield a subsequent Post…and additional invaluable interpretive resources.

The book offers considerable detail on land clearing and reforestation efforts associated with Wheeler Dam construction and the land inundated and now bordering/buffering the lake. Watch for a future Post.

Alabama State Parks Foundation

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

• Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better. (Albert Einstein)
• The intersection of human and natural history is rich with mystery and discovery.
• It’s not what you look at that matters; it’s what you see. (Thoreau)

Inhale and absorb Nature’s elixir. May Nature Inspire, Inform, and Reward you!

If only more of us viewed our precious environment through the filters I employ. If only my mission and vision could be multiplied untold orders of magnitude:

Steve’s Three Books

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), and Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit) to encourage all citizens to recognize and appreciate that every lesson for living, learning, serving, and leading is either written indelibly in or is powerfully inspired by Nature.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

• I love hiking and exploring in Nature
• I see images I want to (and do) capture with my trusty iPhone camera
• I enjoy explaining those images — an educator at heart
• I don’t play golf!
• I actually do love writing — it’s the hobby I never needed when my career consumed me
• Judy suggested my writing is in large measure my legacy to our two kids, our five grand kids, and all the unborn generations beyond
• And finally, perhaps my books and Blogs could reach beyond family and touch a few other lives… sow some seeds for the future

All three of my books (Nature Based Leadership; Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading; Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits) present compilations of personal experiences expressing my (and co-author Dr. Wilhoit for Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits) deep passion for Nature. All three books offer observations and reflections on my relationship to the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any and all from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

May 10, 2023, I spent most of the day at Cane Creek Canyon Nature Preserve, departing with late afternoon showers to Joe Wheeler State Park, where fellow retired forester Chris Stuhlinger and I would spend the night to tour the Park May 11 with Park Naturalist Sam Woodroof. I focus this Post on the blustery evening of May 10, 2023 at Joe Wheeler State Park and the glorious May 11 dawn and sunrise from the Lodge pier.

A Squally Evening

As showers raced to the park late afternoon, Chris and I visited the Day Use Area overlooking Lake Wheeler. Gusty winds, rumbling thunder, and showers greeted us.

I wanted to capture the evening’s unsettled weather. The two still photos above only hinted at the stormy condition. My 15-second 4:20 PM video captures the intensity on our exposed perch above the lake..

I walked down to the Day Use Area dock, somewhat protected from the wind racing across the half-mile fetch from the south. The leaden clouds upwind carried rain that would grow steady by the time we returned to our vehicle.

The 33-second video from pier at 4:28 PM depicted a much quieter interval between showers. The dark sky and calmer winds offered a soothing respite from the wilder conditions we had just experienced.

I enjoy Nature’s changing moods, her shifts coming unexpectantly and unpredictably. I relish that spending 30 minutes on such an evening in this one place is akin to being in several different places, as the weather surges, pulses, attacks, and abates. One place shape- and effect-morphing. Bursts of energy, vigor, and easing that transport me literally and metaphorically within a single space.

A New Day Dawning

I refuse to allow a dawn and sunrise to pass unattended, especially when I am on the road to experience Nature. By 5:30 AM I was on the dock at the Joe Wheeler State Park Lodge. The sun still 20-25 minutes below the eastern horizon, I captured this view of the surrounding forests and the marina. I’m never disappointed by a new day.

This civil twilight new beginning warranted a full 2:22 video, May 11, 2023 at 5:42 AM.

Serenity, tranquility, and peace meet the promise of a new day!

By 5:57 AM, the sun had not yet broken the horizon. The twilight show continued, and I am grateful for every minute!

The sun is just lifting above a distant horizon-hugging cloud deck at 6:08 AM, a full 38 minutes from my first dawn photograph above.

I can only imagine the relative worth to those who may have said, “I think I’ll catch another 40 minutes of sleep before heading down to the dock.” The greatest gifts of Nature bear little cost. All that is required is choosing to show up for the moments that accompany every new dawning.

John Muir missed little of Nature’s wonder:

The grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor is ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming, on sea and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls.

Alabama State Parks Foundation

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

• Nature’s greatest gifts require only choosing to be present…one dawn daily!
• The grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor is ever rising. (John Muir)
• I enjoy Nature’s changing moods, her shifts coming unexpectantly and unpredictably.

Inhale and absorb Nature’s elixir. May Nature Inspire, Inform, and Reward you!

If only more of us viewed our precious environment through the filters I employ. If only my mission and vision could be multiplied untold orders of magnitude:

Steve’s Three Books

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), and Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit) to encourage all citizens to recognize and appreciate that every lesson for living, learning, serving, and leading is either written indelibly in or is powerfully inspired by Nature.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

• I love hiking and exploring in Nature
• I see images I want to (and do) capture with my trusty iPhone camera
• I enjoy explaining those images — an educator at heart
• I don’t play golf!
• I actually do love writing — it’s the hobby I never needed when my career consumed me
• Judy suggested my writing is in large measure my legacy to our two kids, our five grand kids, and all the unborn generations beyond
• And finally, perhaps my books and Blogs could reach beyond family and touch a few other lives… sow some seeds for the future

All three of my books (Nature Based Leadership; Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading; Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits) present compilations of personal experiences expressing my (and co-author Dr. Wilhoit for Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits) deep passion for Nature. All three books offer observations and reflections on my relationship to the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any and all from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

May 10, 2023, I spent a pleasant morning and afternoon, interrupted by a brief thunderstorm, deep in Cane Creek Canyon within the Land Trust of North Alabama Nature Preserve of the same name. The Preserve is a wild and special place, evidencing the wonder and magic at the confluence of geology, water, time, and abundant life.

I published subsequent to the visit one of my Brief Posts on Cane Creek deep within the canyon: https://stevejonesgbh.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=13606&action=edit&classic-editor=1. I offer this full Post as a follow-up to my June 2, 2023, Brief Form Post #11.

The Preserve Legacy

I first visited the Preserve in April, 2018 (https://stevejonesgbh.com/2018/03/20/cane-creek-canyon-preserve/), meeting then with proprietors Jim and Faye Lacefield, and touring the property, delighted to have met new friends, experiencing the canyon and its rich spring wildflowers with Jim.

Chris Stuhlinger (fellow retired forester) and I began our May 10 visit relaxing with Jim and Faye, land stewards extraordinaire! Since my 2018 visit, Jim and Faye have transferred Preserve ownership to the Land Trust of North Alabama. This special place will remain protected in perpetuity — kudos to Jim and Faye.

I’ll begin this Cane Creek photo-essay’s dive into the canyon from above. The topographic interpretative sign at the Preserve’s trailhead hints at the sharp canyon walls that drop 350 feet to the canyon floor.

Anyone familiar with topo-lines will immediately recognize the severe local relief from the tightly packed contour lines.

The Canyon

With my left knee total replacement surgery scheduled for just five weeks beyond our visit, I am grateful that Jim toured us via his four-wheel all terrain vehicle, leaving our still-extensive hiking to the canyon floor. For those of you who have followed my personal health issues, you know that emergency triple bypass surgery (June 19, 2023) delayed my knee replacement and placed a temporary hold on subsequent forest wanderings.

A canyon-rim stream (low flow from 2-3 weeks without significant rain) dropped its first of many steps where we also began our descent into the canyon.

The Point (below left) captures the canyon (and Cane Creek) opening to the north as it empties into the broad Tennessee River valley. I’m a sucker for cerulean sky, puffy cumulus, overhanging pine trees, and forested hillsides. I love deep forests…I’m in love with rimrock vistas. I could have perched at The Point for hours!

I recorded this 58-second video at the overlook:

Sharing the view with friends (Chris at left; Jim by the benches), especially those who share my deep passion for Nature, sweetens the moment.

Beyond Jim and Chris, mountain laurel in full flower shows faintly. Closeup the blossoms are spectacular. Thank God for the perfect timing in placing us a Cane Creek at peak flowering. Hard to beat serendipity and fortuity.

A favorite spot at Cane Creek Canyon Preserve — count the overlook as one of many.

Cane Creek

We dropped into the canyon, where we found yet another favorite place! Peace, serenity, tranquility, warm breezes, and birdsong welcomed us. Once again, I could have settled in for hours…perhaps days! The gentle creek gave clues that its mood varied across wide arcs of extremity. Water-deposited debris from recent deluges hung to branches several feet above the banks visible streamside in both photographs. I snapped these photos from a low-water concrete trail crossing. During flash flow I would have been crushed and swept by a torrent ten feet deep. Peace, serenity, and tranquility would have yielded to the deafening roar of rushing water, rolling rocks, and tumbling branches and forest detritus.

Sure, I’d like to visit when water roars, but I’ll accept the calm of our May visit…and simply envision the wild side.

Here’s my 18-second video of the creek’s calm-side:

I’m accustomed to finding box turtles roadside and on the forest floor. This was the first time I’ve found one luxuriating in a woodland stream. The creek-turtle-spa looked inviting, another place to spend relaxing hours.

As we hiked along the canyon creek, approaching the point where Jim had pre-determined we would head back to the creekside shelter where we had left our transport, we felt clouds thickening and heard the first rumbles of thunder echoing within the canyon. As subsequent booms grew louder, we began our retreat, covering ground with an increasing sense of urgency.

Thunderstorm Sanctuary

We made it to the shelter just as the first fat raindrops fell around us. I can think of no better place to wait out a thundershower than a deep woods picnic shelter along Cane Creek. We listened to the rain, actually felt and heard one particularly loud thunderclap, enjoyed a refreshing breeze, and embraced the creek’s pleasant gurgle. I estimated that a quarter-inch of rain fell, not enough to influence the stream, but enough to generate some satisfaction from the three of us that we were able to experience yet another face of the Preserve and her sundry moods. Jim (left) and Chris in the shelter below.

I recorded this 23-second video as we relaxed under the streamside shelter, absorbing the sights and sounds, grateful to be out of the storm.

In comparison to memorable storms that swept over me in years past when shelter was not at hand, this one proved entirely pleasurable. I recall a dawn storm that overtook me during a marathon training run when I lived in Prattville, Alabama in the early 1980s. Four miles from home when cloud-to-ground lightning drew way too close for comfort, I found “shelter” in a roadside ditch, where I dropped to all fours to reduce my target profile. I survived, yet returned home shaken and chilled. That was in the days prior to readily available live weather radar.

Special Curiosities

Always alert for tree form oddities and curiosities, I watched as Jim and Chris debated the oddly shaped leaves of an American beech (left). We found a sugar maple woodpecker buffet nearby (right). We assumed pileated woodpecker given the size and scale of the excavations.

I stay vigilant about finding what lies hidden in plain sight.

Flowers

Are northern Alabama forests are seasonally alive with wildflowers, shifting as the seasons progress from February through mid-summer. We found small ragwort (left) and a pale blue beardtongue.

I don’t recall seeing bigleaf snowbell in flower. A lovely flower; a great find. Once again, serendipity and fortuity at play!

American columbo, a large and dominating presence, greeted us with lush leaves, red stem, and a profusion of flowers.

Jim made sure we visited a sandstone glade, characterized by shallow soils, seasonally wet, with a unique floral community. Lavender phlox provided the color.

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

• Snowscape and ice-locked waterways are rare in northern Alabama; instead, Nature’s water-worlds reign!
• Water is the driver of Nature. (Leonardo da Vinci)
• Nothing in Nature is more dynamic than her endless, restless, life-giving cycle of water…and life.

Inhale and absorb Nature’s elixir. May Nature Inspire, Inform, and Reward you!

If only more of us viewed our precious environment through the filters I employ. If only my mission and vision could be multiplied untold orders of magnitude:

Steve’s Three Books

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), and Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit) to encourage all citizens to recognize and appreciate that every lesson for living, learning, serving, and leading is either written indelibly in or is powerfully inspired by Nature.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

• I love hiking and exploring in Nature
• I see images I want to (and do) capture with my trusty iPhone camera
• I enjoy explaining those images — an educator at heart
• I don’t play golf!
• I actually do love writing — it’s the hobby I never needed when my career consumed me
• Judy suggested my writing is in large measure my legacy to our two kids, our five grand kids, and all the unborn generations beyond
• And finally, perhaps my books and Blogs could reach beyond family and touch a few other lives… sow some seeds for the future

All three of my books (Nature Based Leadership; Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading; Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits) present compilations of personal experiences expressing my (and co-author Dr. Wilhoit for Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits) deep passion for Nature. All three books offer observations and reflections on my relationship to the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any and all from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

Inhale and absorb Nature’s elixir. May Nature Inspire, Inform, and Reward you!

May 4, 2023, I spent a lovely late spring afternoon on the nearby Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge. I offer reflections, observations, photographs, and five brief videos from my six-stop wanderings within a five-mile driving radius: gravel road wildlife; riparian forest; Tennessee River; Blackwell Swamp; January 2, 2021 tornado recovery forest; Beaverdam Swamp Boardwalk.

Jolly B Road — Gravel Road Wildlife

I entered the Refuge about 15 miles due south of my Madison, Alabama residence, turning from County Line Road east onto gravel Jolly B Road. About a mile into the Refuge I stopped to admire (and usher from the road surface) a five-foot long grey rat-snake. The snake certainly has a right to sun on the road, but I feared that other driver’s may be less apt to recognize the snake’s privilege.

I recorded this 29-second video as the snake slithered into the forest.

Within a quarter mile, this incredibly muddy cooter turtle was near the road edge about to enter the forest. Once again I braked to capture an image. I would love to have the turtle’s explanation for its supremely mud-caked carapace!

Speaking of privilege, I felt fortunate to visit with two reptilian friends along Jolly B Road!

Riparian Forest

Within four hundred yards, I turned west onto HGH Road, parking a half-mile further, where I entered the riparian hardwood forest, one of my routine exploration areas. I’m never disappointed by what I find hidden in plain sight. This large black oak presented itself. Two features suggested its heart-rot-hollowed trunk. Its swollen base is an external signal of internal decay. It also provided a direct peephole into its hollow core at roughly five feet above the ground. A squirrel left its teeth-gnaw marks around the hole’s perimeter, as the rodent attempted to prevent the tree from callousing over the point of entry. This is apparently a family den tree for the aerial rodents. The tree may also furnish habitat for chipmunks, snakes, birds, lizards, and other forest residents.

I recorded this 1:02 video of our black oak family tree:

I found one of my favorite fall-fruiting plants in full spring flower, strawberry bush or hearts-a-bustin’. Their soft yellow-green flowers give little hint to their special fall-fruit-glory (see public domain image below).

The aptly-named hearts-a-bustin’ fruit.

Public Domain Image

Along the Tennessee River

The entire Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge exists around its Lake Wheeler core, the body of water created by Wheeler Dam 40 miles downstream on the Tennessee River at Rogersville, Alabama. The shoreline below is a little more than a mile south of the riparian forest. I chose (it chose me) a picture-perfect day of cerulean sky, high white clouds (alto cumulus), and light breezes to wander the Refuge.

As I strive to do, I captured a short (20-second) video to amplify my narrative and still photos.

The Refuge manages some 4,000 acres for crop production under an arrangement that calls for leaving a percentage of the crop for winter wildlife food. The contract agricultural operator was sowing seed this day in the fields adjacent to the river.

Here’s my 0:18 video of seeding underway in the agricultural fields adjacent to the river:

Dazzling clouds and magnificent sky bring life to the river and its adjoining forests and fields!

Blackwell Swamp

Blackwell Swamp lies just a few hundred yards north of the Tennessee River, the swamp created by a Refuge drainage gate that impounds water, thus artificially keeping the swamp well-watered year-round, all in the interest of maintaining waterfowl habitat. I snapped the photo below from the gravel road crossing the wooded outflow at the gate.

The swamp offers a welcome habitat break from the continuous riparian forests that border the swamp. Again, cerulean sky, fresh summer greens, ample wetland vegetation, and plenty of associated wildlife.

I recorded this  sound- and sight-dense 30-second video from the southwest shore of the swamp, the same location as the two photos above.

Tornado Recovery

January 1, 2022 an EF-1 tornado dropped from a strong cold front adjacent to the swamp’s northern end, approximately 1.5 miles from the earlier swamp photo points.

I’ve been monitoring forest recovery since I first discovered the twister track March 22, 2022, when I photographed the shattered bur oak below left.  I revisited the shattered tree May 27, 2022 (below right) following green-up. Already, the oak was fighting back, transferring root reserves to growing resurgent foliage.

May 4, 2023, I made the fifth of six stops at the bur oak. Nature equips all living organisms with the genetic capacity to overcome setbacks. The bur oak, and the entire “destroyed” forest within which it stands, is rebounding remarkably. The tornado did not destroy this 80-90 year old forest. Instead, the storm delayed the forest’s rush toward maturity. It remains a forest, albeit altered.

Nature is always lovely, invincible, glad, whatever is done and suffered by her creatures. All scars she heals, whether in rocks or water or sky or hearts. John Muir

Beaverdam Creek Boardwalk

I made my sixth stop at the Beaverdam Creek Swamp National Natural Landmark, an ancient water tupelo swamp transected by a boardwalk, reconstructed during summer 2022. I see little need to offer detailed reflections and observations. Suffice it to say that this is one of my favorite Nature-destinations in north Alabama. This special place exudes its magic and mystery.

I recorded this 15-second video from the boardwalk, telling a palpable visual and audio tale.:

The great tupelos reach back at least two centuries, having born witness to many seasons, storms, droughts, deep cold, and searing heat. Oh, if only we could hear their stories!

Six stops on an early summer day, a rich sampling of a small corner of a magnificent national natural treasure. I’ve resided nearby since January 2018. I’ve met many people who have lived in the area far longer, yet have never visited the swamp. I am blessed to have such a special place in my backyard. However, so many of the long-term residents know nothing about the Refuge. Perhaps Posts such as this will find their way to those who have not yet sampled the mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual fruits of this exquisite slice of Nature.

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

• Nature is a panoply — a magnificent or impressive array.
• The Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge is a 38,000-acre ecosystem potpourri.
• Nature appreciation involves seeing and understanding both the components and the whole!

Inhale and absorb Nature’s elixir. May Nature Inspire, Inform, and Reward you!

If only more of us viewed our precious environment through the filters I employ. If only my mission and vision could be multiplied untold orders of magnitude:

Steve’s Three Books

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), and Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit) to encourage all citizens to recognize and appreciate that every lesson for living, learning, serving, and leading is either written indelibly in or is powerfully inspired by Nature.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

• I love hiking and exploring in Nature
• I see images I want to (and do) capture with my trusty iPhone camera
• I enjoy explaining those images — an educator at heart
• I don’t play golf!
• I actually do love writing — it’s the hobby I never needed when my career consumed me
• Judy suggested my writing is in large measure my legacy to our two kids, our five grand kids, and all the unborn generations beyond
• And finally, perhaps my books and Blogs could reach beyond family and touch a few other lives… sow some seeds for the future

All three of my books (Nature Based Leadership; Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading; Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits) present compilations of personal experiences expressing my (and co-author Dr. Wilhoit for Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits) deep passion for Nature. All three books offer observations and reflections on my relationship to the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any and all from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.