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Curiosities and Oddities at Marshall Forest Preserve National Natural Landmark in Rome, Georgia!

July 15, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

NOTE: Some of my GBH photo essays were not routinely distributed from mid-February through mid-June. I will resend those one by one, beginning the first week of July. Here is my Post from March 5 (https://stevejonesgbh.com/2026/03/05/re-visiting-auburn-universitys-louise-kreher-forest-ecology-preserve-and-nature-center/)

Fellow retired forester Chris Stuhlinger, retired videographer Bill Heslip, and I visited Marshall Forest Preserve on April 5, 2026. Established as Georgia’s first National Natural Landmark, near Rome, Georgia, the Preserve is recognized by the Old Growth Forest Network (https://www.oldgrowthforest.net/). The preserve encompasses ~300 acres of undisturbed upland pine and hardwood forest. Our wandering began as persistent overnight rain ended, rewarding us with trunks stem-flow-darkened and bark surfaces beautifully algae-patterned in the relatively limited light under low clouds. The dampened woodland seemed to accent the curiosities and oddities I highlight in this weekly photo essay.

A twisted, stunted, dwarfed black cherry tree presented a gnome-arch trailside near the trailhead. Were I younger and more nimble, I may have made a ceremonial entrance on hands and knees. However, were I not incessantly young at heart, I may not have viewed the natural scupture as a fairy gateway!

A forked chestnut oak provided an eye-level sightline into the forest. There is nothing unusual about a forked oak. I include this tree only as a prop for the interesting photo that follows.

A bark-stripped standing dead loblolly pine had recently yielded to gravity, snapping three feet above the ground, vectoring gently enough that its bole neatly lodged in the forked notch of an adjacent oak, not unlike the lower-forked oak above. What were the chances? Perhaps within five of the 360 degree circumference available to it. The fallen stem leans at a perfect 45-degree angle. I wonder how long the laws of Nature will hold the pine trunk aloft before it slams to the ground, where agents of decomposition will act more earnestly. Ashes to ashes; dust to dust; an inevitable end game for life on Earth.

I love seeing Vaccinium arboreum, the only tall shrub/tree form of the blueberry genus. I encounter it most often on rocky slopes and cragggy exposed sites. Its orange-striped, twisted stems compel me to take a closer look, engage my imagination, and snap a photograph. Its physical form, distinctive bark color, and common names demand more than a casual glance. How can I resist sparkleberry, farkleberry, and winter huckleberry!

Resisting being out-contorted by sparkle/farkle/huckleberry, this understory black cherry insists not to comport by the natural laws of geotropism and phototropism. It seems to live indepedent of the laws generally applicable to its main canopy brethren that reach straight and tall in opposition to gravity and drawn by sunlight above.

Only its distinctive cornflake shredded bark and emerging spring leaves belie its identity as Prunus serotina.

Nature is amazingly resilient, valiantly attempting to survive impact and injury to eventually produce seed and extened its genetic lineage. Some force (a branch from above, a tree, or a heavy snow or ice load) slammed a sapling black cherry to horizontal several decades ago. The fallen stem activated a shoot from a dormant (adventitious) bud 15 feet from the overturned base. The vertical shoot may produce seed, achieving its ultimate purpose.

I marvel at Nature’s endless novelties. However, even as I classify these phenomena as new or unusual (i.e. novel), I admit that I never fail to discover tree form oddities and curiosities wherever I wander forests. Are these features deserving of special recogntion as novel, odd, curious, or unusual? A question worth pondering. I believe the answer is, yes, any circumstance that prompts me to wonder about the cause that led to a visible result is worthy of a special recognition moniker: oddity, curiosity, novel…

Leonardo da Vinci observed 500 years ago that natural phenomena can be explained by the universal laws of nature.

and

Nature never breaks her own laws!

Albert Einstein would have concurred:

I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious.

and

The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.

Dead and Down Woody Debris

Significant biomass in dead and down woody debris is one distinguishing feature of old-growth forests. The resin-saturated pine skeleton below is the interior lightered core of a long dead pine. The outer dead wood that was not decomposer-resistant worked its way into the carbon cycle decades, if not centuries, ago.

The distinct pine knots will litter the forest floor for many years hence.

My companions agreed with me that this fallen pine corpse retains a dragon head reaching to the trail edge.

A standing dead pine snag retains a curious cupped depression three above ground. The wound looks mechanical, yet I’ve never seen a chainsaw create such a scoop mark. We noted the novel appearance…and moved along the trail, content that even we could not discern a cause for every result.

This veteran oak sported a porcine snout 20 feet up its bole. An old branch stub, the snout likely opens to a hollow core.

This wound on another oak clearly opens to a hollow interior. The misshapen swollen trunk is a sure indication of rot and fungal infection.

Yet another oak shows the signs of decay, suggested by an open branch stub portal, also signalling a hollow decayed core. A large burl also attracts attention. The rarity in this forest my be trees without distinguishing oddities, curiosities, and novelties.

A total anomaly, this black cherry tree comported with none of the identifying criteria listed in species keys.

The conspicuous lowland gorilla face did not assist our musings.

We marveled at an agrobacterial oak crown gall. I reminisced on the two years when I was responsible for procuring hardwood sawlogs for a Union Camp (my employer 1973-1985) hardwood lumber mill near the Virginia/North Carolina coastal plain border. Nearly every novelty I’ve mentioned would have been a defect rejecting delivery to the mill yard. Union Camp did not reward my latent talent for pondering tree form curiosities, oddities, and novelties!

I find beautiful patterns, especially on rain-wetted bark, this loblolly pine as an example. Bark crevices, with their associated microclimates, support fissure-colonies of algae, highlighting the plate margins with pale green.

I saw only a single tree example of this loblolly pine with a unique shredded, shed-bark trunk collar phenomenon, which shouted out for my attention. I suppose that the shredded bark skin at its base is resistant to decay (dry-layered above the moist mineral soil), even if very flammable. This segment of th MFP has not burned, at least for decades. Sometimes seeing a curiosity accomplishes little more than spark my interest in being on the lookout for seeing it again. Repetition may open my eyes to seeing it often enough to foster understanding and explanation.

We’ve all heard the admonition about not seeing the forest for the trees. Across many chapters of my life and career, I saw the forest and the trees. Only later in this retirement life-chapter did I begin focusing on curiosities, novelties, oddities, and mysteries. Like Albert Einstein, I have evolved into a creature of passionate curiosity.

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

There is no result in nature without a cause; understand the cause and you will have no need of the experiment. (Leonardo da Vinci)
Death is a powerful and ubiquitous part of forest life. Ashes to ashes; dust to dust; an inevitable end game for life on Earth. (Steve Jones)
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better. (Albert Einstein)

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

Note: Unless otherwise noted, all blog post images are created & photographed by Stephen B. Jones.

I am available for Nature-Inspired Speaking, Writing, and Consulting — contact me at steve.jones.0524@gmail.com

Subscribe to my free weekly photo essays (like this one) at: http://eepurl.com/cKLJdL

A reminder of my Personal and Professional Purpose, Passion, and Cause

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

Mission: Employ writing and speaking to educate, inspire, and enable readers and listeners to understand, appreciate, and enjoy Nature… and accept and practice Earth Stewardship.

Vision:

People of all ages will pay greater attention to and engage more regularly with Nature… and will accept and practice informed and responsible Earth Stewardship.
They will see their relationship to our natural world with new eyes… and understand their Earth home more clearly.

Tagline/Motto: Steve (Great Blue Heron) encourages and seeks a better tomorrow through Nature-Inspired Living!

Steve’s Four Books

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit), and Dutton Land & Cattle: A Land Legacy Story (2025) 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. All four of my books present compilations of personal experiences expressing my deep passion for Nature. All four books offer observations and reflections on my relationship with the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

I love hiking and exploring 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 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 grandkids, 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

Marshall Forest Preserve National Natural Landmark in Rome, Georgia!

July 1, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

NOTE: Some of my GBH photo essays were not routinely distributed from mid-February through mid-June. I will resend those one by one, beginning the first week of July. Here is my Post from February 18 (https://stevejonesgbh.com/2026/02/18/mid-november-25-year-return-to-alabamas-chewacla-state-park/)

Fellow retired forester Chris Stuhlinger, retired videographer Bill Heslip, and I visited Marshall Forest Preserve, established as Georgia’s first National Natural Landmark near Rome, Georgia, on April 5, 2026. Recognized by the Old Growth Forest Network (https://www.oldgrowthforest.net/), the preserve encompasses ~300 acres of undisturbed upland pine and hardwood forest. Our wandering began as persistent overnight rain ended, rewarding us with trunks stem-flow-darkened and bark surfaces beautifully algae-patterned in the relatively limited light under low clouds. I’m a big fan of National Natural Landmarks!

Bill and Chris stood at the traihead monument, a provocative stone symbol, rich with imagined meaning.

The stone graphic and concentric metal totem below hinted that the forest itself may pose mysteries and puzzles for us to ponder.

I recorded a 60-second rain-dampened video of our entry to MFP.

Although the preserve forest falls short of the scale and sanctity of old-growth redwood and coastal Douglas fir stands, an eastern US perspective allowed me to appreciate this untouched upland ecosystem. A large loblolly pine reached well over one hundred feet above, spreading wide.

Nearby, a regal red oak stood fat and tall. Had a logging crew been given a chance (logger’s choice), this specimen would have been the first to grace a log truck mill-bound. We foresters commonly sleuth stand history by the quality of tress left, even long after severed stumps have decayed. I saw no evidence at MFP of prior high-grading, the practice of removing high quality standing timber and leaving less commercially valuable stems: smaller, degraded, lower desirability species, hollowed, and decayed.

Like the loblolly, the oak occupies a dominant canopy position.

Old-Growth vs. Undisturbed Forest

I’ve been guilty a few times by my own persistent stereotype that the term old-growth implies an ancient forest of magnificent large trees, heavily-shaded understory, mossy ground cover, and fairy tale images fleeting among wisps of fog and vapors. I’ve seen such forests in west coastal rain forests, from northern California redwoods to Oregon’s Douglas fir to the western hemlock and Sitka spruce of southeastern Alaska. I’ve wandered into an occasional dreamscape, magical stand here in the eastern US under the right conditions of landscape, weather, light, and mood (my mood!). I relax my criteria for the reality of our eastern forests.

I also distinguish old-growth from undisturbed forest. Marshall Forest Preserve is undisturbed according to the historical narrative that supported its classification as a National Natural Landmark. Likewise, I cannot contest that it is old-growth. I make the distinction because I routinely visit two local north Alabama disturbed forests that are crossing the threshold (and may have already entered) from late mature to old-growth. One is an 80-90-year-old bottomland forest on the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge. A second is what I call the Cathedral Forest on Monte Sano State Park. The WNWR stand regenerated naturally from abandoned farmland. I believe the Cathedral Forest regenerated naturally following a combination of natural disturbance and timber harvesting.

Additional Old-Growth Evidence

Allow me to attempt conveying additional evidence of the old-growth character of MFP. I’ll borrow photos from two places on prior occasions to make my point. The 22-inch diameter loblolly pine below stands in a rich riparian abandoned agricultural field on the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge near Huntsville, Alabama. The tree is ~80 years old. I am sure that the annual growth rings are wide, evidencing rapid diameter growth. The bark furrows are deep, also suggesting vigorous radial expansion.

This loblolly, planted less than 30 years ago on an old field converted to a disc golf course on the North Alabama Land Trust’s Chapman Mountain Nature Preserve has grown rapidly across its short life. Thinned at least once, the forest is growing audibly (okay, I’m exagerating a bit). Prescribed fire is holding vegetative competition at bay. Nothing could be further from exhibiting old-growth character than this intensively managed forest.

Perhaps 30 inches in diameter, this MFP loblolly tells a different tale. It’s shallowly furrowed broad platy bark suggests an extended period (many decades) of mature radial expansion. This old sentinel is content for now. There is no need to secure additional moisture, nutrients, and space. Its shredded, shed bark trunk collar is a phenomenon I have seldom seen, yet it shouted out for my attention. I suppose that the shredded bark skin at its base is resistant to decay (dry-layered above the moist mineral soil), even if very flammable. This segment of th MFP has not burned, at least for decades.

Its spreading flat-top canopy stands beside a massive dominant oak.

Another dominant loblolly pine stands tall, with crown space separating it from adjacent hardwoods, another indication perhaps that the old, mature stand has achieved a level of equilibrium. No longer does fierce competition among trees rule the day.

I recorded this 60-second video of a large white oak and adjacent loblolly tree near the trailhead, expressing the same characteristics of main canopy stability.

Another reverent white oak monarch stands watch on a preserve hillside.

Large ancient trees are absent across much of the preserve. Every acre does not portray the old-growth label. In fact, I wonder whether without having read the MFP history and its desgination as a National Natural Landmark, I would have immediately declared, “This forest is unquestionably old-growth.”

Old-growth or not, spring was erupting on the preserve.

I shall never tire of seeing mountain azalea proclaiming the vernal season in our southern forests!

I recorded this 59-second, a celebratory homage, as the sun broke through the persistant stratus.

Succulent oak gall wasp ovipositors have riddled these fresh oak leaves with visible postules.

Life in the forest ecosystem is complex, layered among its richly diverse floral, fauna, food chains, consumers, decomposers, competitors, symbionts, and life forms, and agents of death and renewal.

An Enigma

I’ll end with a full portfolio of old forester embarrassment. I spotted a strange growth (fungal; bacterial; alien life form; extraterrestrial???) on the side of an old sweetgum. Odd grey matter with a green wig-like shroud, and some lateral orange highlights.

I snapped a few photos, including close-ups. My colleagues were forging ahead. I didn’t take time to feel, probe, or handle. I thought I could identify later with iNaturalist and reference books, or perhaps a query with relevant FaceBook groups.

If nothing else, I felt that I may have discovered a new or rare life form. My reference books, internet search, and iNaturalist efforts yielded nothing. So I shifted to Facebook groups. Several folks pointed to nothing more exciting than some former woods traveler had bound the younger sweetgum with a colorful nylon or polypropylene rope; the tree grew around it; and only the cut ends protrude from the tree. Perhaps my camera managed to capture fairy tale images fleeting among wisps of fog and vapors.

Albert Einstein would have chastized this old forester:

Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.

I failed to look deeply into these strange organisms. I’m embarrassed, yet not fully convinced that an old-growth forest sweetgum could scam me with a modern rope protruding from its ancient core. Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me. I want to go back for a second, deeper look!

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

I shall never tire of seeing mountain azalea proclaiming the vernal season in our southern forests! (Steve Jones)
I’m a big fan of National Natural Landmarks! (Steve Jones)
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better. (Einstein)
Don’t be fooled by fairy tale images fleeting among wisps of fog and vapor. (Steve Jones)

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

Note: Unless otherwise noted, all blog post images are created & photographed by Stephen B. Jones.

I am available for Nature-Inspired Speaking, Writing, and Consulting — contact me at steve.jones.0524@gmail.com

Subscribe to my free weekly photo essays (like this one) at: http://eepurl.com/cKLJdL

A reminder of my Personal and Professional Purpose, Passion, and Cause

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

Mission: Employ writing and speaking to educate, inspire, and enable readers and listeners to understand, appreciate, and enjoy Nature… and accept and practice Earth Stewardship.

Vision:

People of all ages will pay greater attention to and engage more regularly with Nature… and will accept and practice informed and responsible Earth Stewardship.
They will see their relationship to our natural world with new eyes… and understand their Earth home more clearly.

Tagline/Motto: Steve (Great Blue Heron) encourages and seeks a better tomorrow through Nature-Inspired Living!

Steve’s Four Books

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

I love hiking and exploring 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 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 grandkids, 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

Red Buckeye, a Colony of Aphids, and a Swarm of Tadpoles: Spring in Our Midst!

June 25, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

I met with friends Chris Stuhlinger, Marian Moore Lewis, Bill and Becky Heslip, and Ben Hoksbergen on the morning of March 26, at the Taylor Road entrance to Huntsville, Alabama’s Goldsmith-Schiffman Wildlife Sanctuary. The five of us wanted to learn more from archaeologist Ben about the Native American history he gleaned from a prior survey he conducted on the Sanctuary. Rather than share the fascinating history, I offer you our never-disappointing ecological saunter through the Sanctuary, revealing seasonal spring discoveries.

Red buckeye showed its colors amid the morning vapors above Hidden Spring.

I recorded this 59-second red buckeye video.

Hidden Spring lies 30-feet below the entrance deck and shelter. Something within the deepness beckoned me, but the steep descent and the vegetative jungle compelled me to stay at the bluff to capture the Hidden Spring magic from above. What would have been a quick descent, brief exploration, and return scamper to the brim at age 45, is now daunting 30 years hence. Such a possibiliy is now reduced to a Southern term: “usedtocould“!

A still photograph and my 59-second video will have to satisfy my curiosity for a closer look.

Hidden Spring Brook collects and channels the Hidden Spring flow, beginning its jorney to the Flint River.

Here’s my video of Hidden Spring Brook.

Approaching Jobala Pond, Hidden Brook is terraced by a beaverdam. Ever the habitat-modifying stream engineers, beavers insist on having it their way!

A city crew rectifying a drainage issue temporarily muddied Jobala Pond with sediment inflow.

I’ve been monitoring a large and rapidly expanding burl five feet above ground on a water oak at the Jobala Pond outlet for eight years. I always snap a photo, wondering what is the endgame for this unusual growth.

Nearby, a pileated woodpecker is creating a high-rise apartment complex. I could not get close enough to see whether there are different unique compartments…or separate entrances to the tree’s hollow interior. The woodpecker’s excavations serve a self interest. Does the bird know/understand/care that in pecking away to secure food (insects and grubs) that it is performing a valuable ecosysten function? How many mammals, birds, reptiles, insects, fungi, and other lifeforms interact with the bird’s ratta-tat-tat drumming?

John Muir appreciated the essential interdpendency of all things earthly:

When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.

AND

When we contemplate the whole globe as one great dewdrop, striped and dotted with continents and islands, flying through space with other stars all singing and shining together as one, the whole universe appears as an infinite storm of beauty.

Butterweed’s season exalts across three glorious early spring weeks. She tends her stored sunshine secretively through our southern winter. Suddenly after the requisite threshold of degree days, she lets loose, explosively…from drab dormancy to lasered brilliance emanately from roadside ditches.

Most specimens along the main sanctuary trail were pest free, this heavily black-bean-aphid-infested plant an exception.

Oh, the ecological lessons in plain sight on a three-hour spring saunter, like this silky field ant tending black bean aphids! Ants and aphids share a well-documented symbiotic relationship, which means they both benefit mutually from their working relationship. Aphids produce a sugary food for the ants, in exchange, ants care for and protect the aphids from predators and parasites.

A small flowered buttercup expressed spring’s urgent call to action. Summer’s rampant vegetative growth will rapidly smother this harbinger of spring. Her call is to get it done now, while the gettin’ is good!

Bulbous cress is another early spring ephemeral whose window will soon close.

We puzzled a few minutes over the streamside identity of buckthorn bully. I love the interplay of enthusiastic Nature enthusiasts clamoring, researching digitally, testing with iNaturalist, and even arguing (good naturedly) to see who can claim the identity summit. The competition was so savagely engaged that I already forget who prevailed!

One of us noticed a roadside puddle thick with tadpoles. I recorded this 60-second tadpole video.

I pondered the fate of the tadpoles. Did rain replenish the puddle long enough for frogs or toads to emerge? Will predators prevail?

We proceeded to the wetland mitigation area, where I recorded a video.

The project’s intent is to restore the agricultural fields to their original hydrology and to restore bottomland hardwood forest species. The tree shelters protect planted wetland hardwood seedlings.

I’ll close this post with a repeat from a prior recent photo essay. I’m drafting this narrative 25 days after major left shoulder replacement revision surgery. Recovery includes lots of physical therapy and encourages walking. Walking on the sidewalk and greenway variety! Woodland excursions are weeks away for a less-than-sure-footed 75-year-old. My Doc discourages falling, jarring, and stressing the prosthesis! I chose to once again employ the closing. I’m not yet at the end of my forest hiking/sauntering, but one day we all will reach that juncture when we’ll hike again with old friends, long gone. Until then, I will trek my haunts while I have the chance…until I can’t.

Closing

I recalled and reflected upon the lyrics of a beautiful, haunting, sobering song written by Cody Johnson and recently re-released by Kid Rock:

If you got a chance take it
Take it while you got a chance
If you got a dream chase it
‘Cause a dream won’t chase you back
If you’re gonna love somebody
Hold ’em as long and as strong and as close as you can
‘Til you can’t

Here’s Kid Rock’s performance: https://video.search.yahoo.com/search/video?fr=mcafee&p=kid+rock%27s+til+you+can%27t&type=E210US752G91913#id=1&vid=65bad198429e2f998a60294e98819e09&action=view

After wandering forests for three-quarters of a century, I was struck with the notion that I intend to continue doing so…until I can’t. A day will come when I can’t. I look at my wife, kids, grandkids, friends, and colleagues through the same reality filter. A day will come… when I can’t.

I recall the dawn…my dawn…from a growing distance. I sense the evening gloam approaching. I ask myself, do I want to invest a single woods venture by racing with a group from one place, through the woods, to another, with virtually no time for inter-personal, social intercourse? And certainly too little time to harvest photo essay fodder. I relish each step at my own pace, embracing the beauty, magic, wonder, awe, and inspiration?

I shall remain a dedicated servant of encouraging informed and responsible Earth stewardship...Until I can’t…

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe. (John Muir)
I shall remain a dedicated servant of encouraging informed and responsible Earth stewardship…Until I can’t… (Steve Jones)
Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world. (Albert Einstein)

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

Note: All blog post images created & photographed by Stephen B. Jones unless otherwise noted. Please circulate images with photo credit: “©2026 Steve Jones, Great Blue Heron LLC. All Rights Reserved.”

I am available for Nature-Inspired Speaking, Writing, and Consulting — contact me at steve.jones.0524@gmail.com

Subscribe to my free weekly photo essays (like this one) at: http://eepurl.com/cKLJdL

Reminder of my Personal and Professional Purpose, Passion, and Cause

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:

Mission: Employ writing and speaking to educate, inspire, and enable readers and listeners to understand, appreciate, and enjoy Nature… and accept and practice Earth Stewardship. Until I can’t!

Vision:

People of all ages will pay greater attention to and engage more regularly with Nature… and will accept and practice informed and responsible Earth Stewardship.
They will see their relationship to our natural world with new eyes… and will understand more clearly their Earth home.

Tagline/Motto: Steve (Great Blue Heron) encourages and seeks a better tomorrow through Nature-Inspired Living!

Steve’s Four Books

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit), and Dutton Land & Cattle: A Land Legacy Story (2023) 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. All four of my books present compilations of personal experiences expressing my deep passion for Nature. All four books offer observations and reflections on my relationship with the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

I love hiking and exploring 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 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 grandkids, 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

Curiosities, Oddities, Mysteries, and Seasonal Features on The N AL Land Trust’s Oak Park Trail!

June 10, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

I co-led a North Alabama Land Trust Nature Hike on December 13, 2025, at Monte Sano Nature Preserve. I had never trekked the Oak Park Trail, which climbs ~300 feet up the north side of Monte Sano Mountain. We returned via a counter-clockwise circuit to the trailhead. I didn’t know what to expect, but my focus on woodland curiosities, oddities, mysteries, and seasonal features yielded plenty to cover in this photo essay!

Always alert for unusual tree forms and features, I spotted this agrobacterial crown gall about 20 feet up the trunk of a yellow buckeye.

This triad of pole-size hickory, paulownia, and hackberry (left to right) struck me as peculiar with three distinct species clustered so tightly. Winter honeysuckle serves as basal greenery. A Virginia creeper vine, with air roots clinging to the stem, grows diagonally along the paulownia.

Paulownia is native to east Asia. Common names for paulownia include princess tree, royal paulownia, and butterfly tree. Its bark, flowers, and leaves are distinct.

People often see Virginia creeper’s prominent air roots and mistake the vine for poison ivy, which has finer, more hair-like air roots.

An Indian marker tree? No, this white oak was an acorn long after resident Native Americans were wildland residents in what is now Huntsville. Instead, something from above crashed upon the oak when just a sapling, bending its stem to 90 degrees at three feet above ground. The crushed stem sent a shoot vertically and another at the stub end of the bent and broken top. Sure, the bent stem points to something, but only coincidentally.

This elbow-bent white oak likewise suffered injury from above. My imagination, ofttimes a little too vivid, sees a deer face glancing to my left.

Perhaps it is I, rather than these curious tree form features, who is the anomaly…the oddity. I seldom meet other Nature enthusiasts so enamored with woodland mysteries as I.

Let’s call this a sweetgum war club! Emerging from a limestone crevice, the tree sports a burl seeming to rest at its base, secured by the stone fissure. Burls result from fungal, bacterial, or viral infection, alone or in combination, triggering physiological abnormalities, much like a benign tumor in humans or other animals.

Known as Buzzards’ Roost, this exposed limestone ledge overlooks the cove and its wet season stream below. The ledge hosts a terrarium depression holding moisture, mosses, and shallow soil, and supporting a colony of herbaceous and woody plants. Does the scant isolated growth meet my criteria for oddity, curiosity, or mystery? I suppose that Nature sets no limits for standard, normal, and possible. Because I write the rules for these weekly Posts, if it catches my eye or piques my interest, a vegetated rock ledge depression qualifies.

There’s nothing unusual about a moss-covered stone bedded in a brown leaf carpet, yet it did catch my eye and encourage a seasonally appropriate image. This is winter in our North Alabama woods. Don’t wait for a snowy forest floor scene. We average only two inches of snow annually. A warm sunny next day afternoon will not spoil this visual expression!

Any port in a storm may best account for these saplings finding suitable anchorage and succor atop a limestone outcrop. The storm consists of high seed predation, mice and other nibblers consuming germinants, physical stressors (desiccation, freezing, sunscald), insects, and diseases. Will these seedlings secure sustenance by extending roots to exploit mineral soil beyond the barren stone surface?

Speaking of ports in a storm, what self-respecting chipmunk would not welcome the shelter of a near-ground white oak cavity, which likely extends into the trunk many feet above?

Peek into this three-feet-high red oak hollow. Soft interior debris evidences that critters have made a home. Reptile, bird, or mammal? Does it matter? I remind you that a tree does not a forest make. A tree is just one element of the entire ecosystem.

John Muir made the vast global life system complexity and interdependence clear:

When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.

Just as all living things are interconnected, life and death are a continuum. The labelled pignut hickory’s life has thrived in part on the decayed organic remains of prior life. Likewise, the fungal-hollowed tree’s decaying wood is already nurturing vegetation surrounding it. The carbon cycle spins without end.

Our woodland roaming 12 days before Christmas revealed many hidden mysteries and delights. Some anticipated…some not!

John Muir distilled Nature into one succinct observation on a grand scale:

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

Just as all living things are interconnected, life and death are a continuum. (Steve Jones)
Perhaps it is I, rather than these curious tree form features, who is the anomaly…the oddity. (Steve Jones)
When we contemplate the whole globe as one great dewdrop, striped and dotted with continents and islands, flying through space with other stars all singing and shining together as one, the whole universe appears as an infinite storm of beauty. (John Muir)

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

I am available for Nature-Inspired Speaking, Writing, and Consulting — contact me at steve.jones.0524@gmail.com

Subscribe to these free weekly Nature Blogs (photo essays) at: http://eepurl.com/cKLJdL

Reminder of my Personal and Professional Purpose, Passion, and Cause

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:

Mission: Employ writing and speaking to educate, inspire, and enable readers and listeners to understand, appreciate, and enjoy Nature… and accept and practice Earth Stewardship.

Vision:

People of all ages will pay greater attention to and engage more regularly with Nature… and will accept and practice informed and responsible Earth Stewardship.
They will see their relationship to our natural world with new eyes… and will understand more clearly their Earth home.

Tagline/Motto: Steve (Great Blue Heron) encourages and seeks a better tomorrow through Nature-Inspired Living!

Steve’s Four Books

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit), and Dutton Land & Cattle: A Land Legacy Story (2023) 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. All four of my books present compilations of personal experiences expressing my deep passion for Nature. All four books offer observations and reflections on my relationship with the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

I love hiking and exploring 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 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 grandkids, 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

Early Signs of Spring on the Goldsmith-Schiffman Wildlife Sanctuary!

May 27, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

I co-taught a Huntsville, Alabama LearningQuest session on America’s National Parks on the morning of February 12, 2026, at the Hampton Cove WellPoint Senior Community. Afterward, an exquisite early spring afternoon beckoned me to explore the eastern half of the nearby Goldsmith-Schiffman Wildlife Sanctuary. Walk with me as I share some early signs of wildland spring within the 400-acre reserve in the bottomlands along the Flint River.

The Flint generally runs high with winter rains. On this day, the river is shy of bank-full, yet is high enough to submerge this sycamore’s base.

Here is my 48-second video of the main channel a few hundred yards from the Sanctuary’s east side entrance.

I’ve scheduled a prior winter season hike at the Sanctuary following several days of winter rains, only to be turned back by the Flint River overflowing its banks and sending floodwaters to within a hundred feet of the gravel parking lot.

I recorded this 58-second video of side channel with narration, at a point opposite the cut-off island one-half mile from the lot.

The main river channel lies just downstream from where I stood.

Here’s the same view (51-second video) without my annoying narration.

The bottomland forests and meadows were saturated. Soaked areas welcomed male frogs already intent on attracting females. All critters are single-minded. Life is all about reproduction…sustaining the species…whether amphibian, reptile, bird, mammal, fish, human, or fungus.

This little guy is of lone voice, yet persistent. Is some lonely girl frog listening…tempted, lured, and approaching?

My 42-second video recorded the lone male calling plaintively.

I like the rustic signage, slowly yielding to time and decay, reminiscent of Sleepy Hollow!

Old agricultural fields, populated with sedges and various other meadow species are transitioning to forest courtesy of natural tree and shrub regeneration, as well as trees planted in seedling shelters, many of which are protecting seedlings that died when planted during an extended fall drought two years ago.

Here is my 60-second video of wetland mitigation efforts in the meadows.

The trail passes east from the mitigation fields through this meadow that is regenerating with volunteer, now shoulder-high sweetgum trees.

I recorded this 60-second video as I strolled along the trail.

Ironweed (left) and sweetgum line the trail.

Mature hardwood borders the meadow.

I repeat often that every tree tells a story. This American beech along the trail in the dense bottomland hardwood forest within hearing distance of Highway 431 traffic noise, supplies life-sustaining sustenance via root grafts to three living stumps, including the one below right at the tree’s base.

I reecorded this 61-second video with explanatory narrative of the beech and the three adjacent stumps.

Although still six weeks from the spring equinox, our peeper friend evidenced that spring was in the air. That’s a far cry from our time living in the far North.

Early Spring Ephemeral Bonus

I’m drafting my photo essay prose on February 26. This morning at 5:00 AM Central Time, when our Madison, Alabama temperature was 58 degrees, I checked the temperature in Fairbanks, AK, my home from 2004-2008. It was negative 37; that’s 95 degrees colder. The snowpack was 40 inches. I copied these images at 11:00 AM local time from the University of Alaska Fairbanks webcam atop the Geophysical Institute.

The Fairbanks ground will not be absent snow cover through most of April. Spring flowers may not appear until mid-May.

I’ve adjusted my calendar here in the South. Within the regenerating meadow, in mid-February, I spotted two Virginia spring beauty blossoms (one at left). The flowering cress (right) presented itself on the sandy shore across from the island.

I loved our four-year Alaska venture, even the deep winters. I could have stayed for many years, but both of our adult children blessed us then with our first two grandkids, who this May will graduate high school! Life itself is a rewarding adventure, enriched many fold by our time in The Last Frontier — The Big Broad Land Way Up Yonder!

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

Life is all about reproduction…sustaining the species…whether amphibian, reptile, bird, mammal, fish, human, or fungal. (Steve Jones)
Spring work is going on with joyful enthusiasm. (John Muir)
Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. (Helen Keller)

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

I am available for Nature-Inspired Speaking, Writing, and Consulting — contact me at steve.jones.0524@gmail.com

Subscribe to my free weekly photo essays (like this one) at: http://eepurl.com/cKLJdL

Reminder of my Personal and Professional Purpose, Passion, and Cause

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:

Mission: Employ writing and speaking to educate, inspire, and enable readers and listeners to understand, appreciate, and enjoy Nature… and accept and practice Earth Stewardship.

Vision:

People of all ages will pay greater attention to and engage more regularly with Nature… and will accept and practice informed and responsible Earth Stewardship.
They will see their relationship to our natural world with new eyes… and will understand more clearly their Earth home.

Tagline/Motto: Steve (Great Blue Heron) encourages and seeks a better tomorrow through Nature-Inspired Living!

Steve’s Four Books

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit), and Dutton Land & Cattle: A Land Legacy Story (2023) 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. All four of my books present compilations of personal experiences expressing my deep passion for Nature. All four books offer observations and reflections on my relationship with the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

I love hiking and exploring 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 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 grandkids, 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

Me at right from a prior visit.

Lawson Branch Loop; Shoal Creek Preserve Spring 2026!

May 17, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

I hiked the Lawson Branch Loop Trail of Shoal Creek Preserve on March 6, 2026, with fellow retired forester Chris Stuhlinger and retired videographer Bill Heslip. Chris and I had previously circuited the Jones Branch Loop Trail (https://stevejonesgbh.com/2025/02/26/early-december-circuit-of-jones-branch-trail-at-shoal-creek-nature-preserve/). We sauntered a counterclockwise loop through the second-growth hardwood forest, noting the view above the Wilson Lake Shoal Creek Inlet, the tumbling Lawson Branch, and other notable natural features along the route.

Mixed oak, hickory, and other upland hardwoods populated the hillsides.

We enjoyed the winter, foliage-free video of the inlet.

Summer’s full canopy will obscure the view when leaves return.

Here is my 58-second video from above the inlet.

Chris (left) and Bill provide scale.

Mountain laurel graced the hilltop. I cut my youthful Ridge-and-Valley hiking teeth in the Central Appalachians, thick with this beautiful evergreen shrub. The valley view and the laurel transported me six decades aft temporally, to a period when I knew I would hike the trails, ascend the bluffs, and log the miles without end. A couple of months shy of 75 years, I am blessed to still cover Nature’s gentle woodland pathways, immersed in her endless beauty, magic, wonder, awe, and inspiration.

How could I possibly want for more than a spring stream, a wooden bridge, and a rustic bench for three seasoned seniors to rest a spell among the trees.

I recorded this 59-second video along Lawson Branch, referring to it incorrectly in the narrative as Jones Branch.

Spring sky, fresh waters, and absolute serenity and tranquility streamside are beyond compare.

I recorded this 40-second video of Lawson Branch.

Tumbling, gurgling, and singing require only an investment of time, energy expended, and woodland conversation. I’ve never played golf, but I sense that it breeds frustration, encourages drinking fermented beverages, provides exercise entailing getting on and off of a motorized cart, and leads to betting foolish sums of money. I know golf is referred to as a game that grownups play. I’ve witnessed too many miserable golfers to believe it is better than woodland rambling!

I recorded this 58-second video along Lawson Branch.

Golf courses are lovely summer places at dawn and after the daytime heat abates at gloaming. Otherwise, give me late summer woodland shade, preferably streamside!

Tree Form Oddities and Curiosities

I like scouting the forest rough for oddities and curiosities, not searching the brambles, vines, and snakepits for little white balls!

I am seldom disappointed when I seek strange critters like this dead snag with gaping maw, contorted jaw, and a single eye, daring the three old guys to approach the creek below.

I can never get enough of bizarre tree countenances, pattererned surfaces, and mossy complexions.

An imtermediate canopy black cherry with a prominent agrobacterial crown gall beckoned us to take a closer look.

Our Planet’s Most Essential Epidermis

I took two undergraduate courses in forest soils. As a practicing industrial forester in the southeastern US, I served 1975-79 as Project Leader for Tree Nutrition and Fertilization for our company’s 2.2 million forested acres (VA; NC; SC; GA; FL: and AL). My subsequent PhD explored soil-site relationships in the Allegheny Plateau of NE Pennsylvania and SW New York. I consider myself a forest soil scientist. Soil, whether forest, agriculture, urban, or anywhere is Earth’s essential membrane…all terrestrial life on our planet depends on this living and life-giving veneer. I seldom enter a forest where I don’t encounter a mature wind-toppled tree…having lifted its rooting mass and accompanying soil.

Bill is standing by an oak root ball lifted within the past few months. Although the regolith (the unconsolidated, loose, heterogenous superficial deposits covering solid rock) extends variously deeper below this lifted three-foot layer, this mantle is the essential stuff of life. Root penetration even on this large oak, ended at this depth. The exposed soil profile consists of a surface organic layer; an ‘A’ horizon of mixed mineral and organic matter (AKA topsoil); a zone of accumulation of leached organic and mineral components, the ‘B’ horizon. The root ball lifted at the boundary between the ‘B’ horizon and the ‘C’ layer of unweathered regolith.

Such is the simplistic equation of life in the woods…the magic of chemistry and physics. The soil holds, recycles, and processes through its rich association of living organisms, moisture, and thermal fluctuations everything needed for life. As we walk along wooded byways, our attention is focused above ground and high into the canopy, where it’s easy to assume that biological activity concentrates. However, I recall from my extensive and exhaustive dissertaion literature search that 75 percent of carbon turnover (biological activity) occurs below ground, within the soil. Watch yourself, that biological hotbed may reach out and grab you!

Near the fallen oak, a handsome green ash reaches far into the canopy. I wonder whether it realizes that while its essentail life-energy derives from its solar partner, the real life action takes place below in the permanent darkness of its rooting zone. Is there a human parallel? An essential dimension of our human fulfillment that derives hidden from plain sight…a spiritual dimension that too often we shelter in darkness? I know I am guilty of reaching under the basket far too infrequently. I worry that the day will come when its too late to open the shutter.

I recorded this fifty-eight-second video near this green ash. I refer erroneously to the stream as Jones Branch. It is Lawson Branch.

Northern spicebush flowers early in the season, a delightful forebearer of spring ready to launch.

Spicebush seems a good place to close the narrative.

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

I worry that the day will come when it’s too late to open the shutter to the things I hold dear. (Steve Jones)
Such is the simplistic equation of life in the woods…the magic of chemistry and physics. (Steve Jones)
Soil, whether forest, agriculture, urban, or anywhere, is Earth’s essential membrane…all terrestrial life on our planet depends on this living and life-giving veneer. (Steve Jones)

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

I am available for Nature-Inspired Speaking, Writing, and Consulting — contact me at steve.jones.0524@gmail.com

Subscribe to my free weekly photo essays (like this one) at: http://eepurl.com/cKLJdL

Reminder of my Personal and Professional Purpose, Passion, and Cause

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:

Mission: Employ writing and speaking to educate, inspire, and enable readers and listeners to understand, appreciate, and enjoy Nature… and accept and practice Earth Stewardship.

Vision:

People of all ages will pay greater attention to and engage more regularly with Nature… and will accept and practice informed and responsible Earth Stewardship.
They will see their relationship to our natural world with new eyes… and will understand more clearly their Earth home.

Tagline/Motto: Steve (Great Blue Heron) encourages and seeks a better tomorrow through Nature-Inspired Living!

Steve’s Four Books

I wrote my books Nature Based Leadership (2016), Nature-Inspired Learning and Leading (2017), Weaned Seals and Snowy Summits: Stories of Passion for Place and Everyday Nature (2019; co-authored with Dr. Jennifer Wilhoit), and Dutton Land & Cattle: A Land Legacy Story (2023) 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. All four of my books present compilations of personal experiences expressing my deep passion for Nature. All four books offer observations and reflections on my relationship with the natural world… and the broader implications for society. Order any from your local indie bookstore, or find them on IndieBound or other online sources such as Amazon and LifeRich.

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

I love hiking and exploring 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 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 grandkids, 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

Brief-Form Post #58: Forest Discoveries While Measuring Tree Heights on Monte Sano State Park

April 29, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

I am pleased to add the 58th 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 occasionally publish these brief Posts.

Alabama State Parks Northwest District Naturalist Amber Coger, fellow retired forester Chris Stuhlinger, and I measured selected tree heights on the morning of February 10, 2026, at Monte Sano State Park. We chose the exceptionally fertile lower, concave, northeast-facing slopes along the Sinks Trail. The soils are limestone-derived, deep, and well-watered. I visit the area several times annually… and marvel at the diversity of hardwood species, the towering heights of the trees, and the straight boles. I refer to this stand as a cathedral grove.

I brought my measurement tools for the tasks, positioned below with my trekking pole for scale: a 100-foot reel; a diameter tape; a 10-factor basal area prism; and a clinometer. Don’t look for a detailed exposition on their use. We used the reel to measure 100 feet horizontally from the tree base. At 100 feet, the clinometer percent scale translates directly to vertical feet below and above eye level. The diameter tape measures the tree diameter at breast height (DBH). The prism estimates the square feet of basal area per acre (at breast height).

Amber quickly learned the fine art and skill of employing these basic forestry instruments, in this case tallying basal area.

A Magnificent Chestnut Oak

From my exhaustive experience in New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia, Virginia, and here in Alabama, chestnut oak commonly dominates ridgetops and upper slopes, poorer sites with shallow rocky soils that can be drouthy and of low fertility. Here’s a particularly gnarled ridgetop chestnut oak, squatty and mishapen, on the Rainbow Mountain Nature Preserve in nearby Madison, Alabama.

My chestnut oak stigma paints chestnut oak unfavorably. On better quality sites, chestnut oak doesn’t compete effectively with faster growing species like yellow polar, basswood, northern and southern red oak, and hickories. This chestnut oak along the Sinks Trail had caught my eye on previous visits. Stately, straight, and fat, this individual is 35.8″ DBH, and stands a remarkable 122 feet tall. Across the 53 years since earning a forestry bachelors degree, I don’t recall seeing such a superb chestnut oak.

But low and behold, my search of the Alabama Forestry Commission’s 2025 State Champion Tree List revealed a different image than the one I’ve held for years. The Commission lists 32 oak species, including the chestnut oak champion, which stands at 147 feet, 25 feet taller than the Monte Sano specimen. Only the champion cherrybark oak is taller at 156 feet.

I pledge to adjust my chestnut oak stigma. I assure you that this is not the first time I have altered an impression based on knowledge, experience, and time, whether it be of people, places, or things. Another teachable moment surfaced during the morning. I have known this species as Quercus prinus since taking Dendrology in 1970, more than a half-century ago. Amber and Chris informed me that the esteemed gods of systematic botany and plant classification have recently (RECENT to me alone perhaps!) changed the species from prinus to montana. The Missouri Botanical Garden online reference reduced my chagrin:

Quercus montana, commonly called chestnut oak (also commonly called basket oak, rock oak and rock chestnut oak) is a medium to large sized deciduous oak of the white oak group that typically grows 50-70’ (less frequently to 100’) tall with a rounded crown. It is native to wooded slopes in dry upland areas, often with poor soils, from Maine to Indiana south to South Carolina and Alabama. It grows tallest in rich, well-drained soils.

The old timber beast occasionally resurfaces within me. This baby is a beauty: veneer log quality to at least 32 feet. Clear lumber all the way to the live crown. The thought just as quickly faded. Come on, Steve…for God’s sake, this is a State Park you old fool! Yet, I can’t shake the aroma of fresh sawdust and the rich patina of finished oak furniture. Or the heavenly warmth of a fine whiskey aged in a white oak barrel!

Whether commercial forest product or State Park forest treasure, its value is high wherever it grows. Measured and noted, the tree will stand as a lesson within the park’s information and interpretation portfolio. Why is this specimen special? What site factors (soil, slope position, nutrients, moisture, aspect) enable this individual to succeed?

Yellow Poplar Reaching Skyward

A few hundred feet downslope, I made note of the cathedral grove of primarily yellow poplar when I entered the stand near the lowermost signatory sink on the trail five years ago (March 12, 2021).

I photographed Jerry Weisenfeld, Alabama State Parks Advertising and Marketing Manager, standing beside the very same specimen that Amber, Chris, and I measured this February.

The prominent sink captures all surface water within the karst basin, directing it to subsurface. I have not encountered anyone who can tell me where the subterranean flow surfaces.

I have told many groups that some of these poplars exceed 140 feet.

The state champion yellow poplar stands at 172 feet. The three of us measured DBH at 28.1″ and height at 155 feet, 17 feet short of the champion! Keep in mind the champion designation is based on three measures: height, crown width, and bole cicumference. There may be, and often are, trees of the same species that are taller than the winner.

Two complementary Delights

We found a colony of scarlet elf cup mushrooms near the yellow polar. I love the moniker, the cup shape, and its spectacular scarlet and white.

Here is my 57-second video of the elf cup forest floor population.

Within the sheltered poplar stand, I found a cankered hickory, a tree form curiosity posing near the poplar.

Leonardo da Vinci studied Nature’s forms and shapes:

To such an extent does nature delight and abound in variety that among her trees there is not one plant to be found which is exactly like another.

Nature is the source of all true knowledge.

Closing

I accept the challenge of distilling these Brief-Form Posts into a single distinct reflection.

I often observe that every tree, every stand, and every forest tells a story. Sometimes we can’t discern the individual tree’s tale while we are distracted by the forest. We chose to focus our attention on two trees. We know them now as individuals. We hope that Amber and future park naturalists will share their stories and the lessons drawn from them.

Leonardo da Vinci would have appreciated our intent:

To such an extent does nature delight and abound in variety that among her trees there is not one plant to be found which is exactly like another.

Brief-Form Post #57: Reflection In & On Beaverdam Tupelo Swamp — Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge!

April 21, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

I am pleased to add the 57th of my GBH Brief-Form Posts (Less than five minutes to read!) to my website. I don’t want my enthusiasm for thoroughness and detail to discourage readers. So, I will occasionally publish these brief Posts.

I returned to Beaverdam Swamp Boardwalk on the afternoon of January 4, 2026. In the vicinity with time to spare, I leisurely sauntered the half-mile to the boardwalk terminus at the creek. The Boardwalk transects a National Natural Landmark within the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge. This ancient tupelo forest is one of my very special natural places in North Alabama, just a twenty-minute drive from my home. I visit it 3-4 times annually to witness changes across the seasons.

I offer a few observations, reflections, photos, and three brief videos. A mixed hardwood stand occupies the gravel trail approaching the boardwalk, which crosses the tupelo swamp.

I recordedd this 58-second video beside a handsome green ash tree prior to entering the boardwalk.

I’ll spare you a detailed narrative. The elevated wooden walkway snakes through the ancient stand. I’ve seen the swamp nearly flush with the underside of the decking, perhaps 18″ higher than the current level.

We’ve received almost three inches of rain since then. I will visit once more before winter’s flush ends.

This is my 59-second video of the swamp from the boardwalk.

The swamp is rich with reflections and ripe for the kind of mind, heart, body, soul, and spirit reflecting that most of us enjoy but too often push aside in the hurry and scurry of life and living.

The buttressed tupelo trunk, draped in resurrection fern, etends downward in reflection and reaches high above.

The tupelo forest canopy is uniformly high. There is little understory or intermediate crowns, contrary to most of our upland forests..

A view upward reveals only the main canopy crown.

Darkness comes early early January. By 3:30 PM the sun was dipping to its winter nadir at 30 degrees south of west.

I recorded this 60-second video at the Beaverdam Creek terminus of the boardwalk.

The creek empties into Lake Wheeler’s Limestone Bay within a mile of the deck.

Death and Decay

A hollowed tupelo stands along the creek just upstream of the boardwalk terminus. Life and death dance breast to breast. One (always the same) will ultimtely prevail, returning tons of organic matter to the grand cycle of swamp and creek birth, decay, death, and rebirth.

Oyster mushrooms adorn a downed log. This common decomposer fungi, I’ve learned by observation, aggressively colonizes dead and dying trees, seeming to prefer hickories, hackberry, and elms.

I also found an aging lions mane mushroom on a heavily decayed stump.

This magnificent National Natural Landmark never disappoints, whether deepest January or during the dog days of August. I relish being so close to a special natural place

Robert Service, a Brit who spent time in the Far North 125 years ago, wrote in Spell of the Yukon:

It’s the great, big, broad land’way up yonder,

It’s the forst where silence has lease;

It’s the beauty that thrills me with wonder,

It’s the silence that fills me with peace.

The Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge is not a great, big, broad land ‘way up yonder, but it does grasp me in its beauty, magic, wonder, awe, and inspiration:

There’s a land–oh, it beckons and beckons,

And I want to go back–and I will.

The freshness, the freedom, the farness–

Oh God! how I’m stuck on it all.

Closing

I accept the challenge of distilling these Brief-Form Posts into a single distinct reflection, a task far more elusive than assembling a dozen pithy statements.

The Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge is not a great, big, broad land ‘way up yonder, but it does grasp me in its beauty, magic, wonder, awe, and inspiration:

There’s a land–oh, it beckons and beckons,

And I want to go back–and I will.

Nature’s special treats await our discovery, our understanding, and our interpretation!

Subscribe to my free weekly photo essays (like this one) at: http://eepurl.com/cKLJdL

Brief-Form Post #56: Quick Circuit of the Dallas Fanning Nature Preserve

April 15, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

I am pleased to add the 56th of my GBH Brief-Form Posts (Less than five minutes to read!) to my website. I don’t want my enthusiasm for thoroughness and detail to discourage readers. So, I will occasionally publish these brief Posts.

I returned to the Dallas Fanning Nature Preserve in Huntsville, AL, on January 4, 2026. I sought a taste of Nature near home. I had previously described the preserve as a 58-acre wounded landscape, a remnant product of associated industrial development. I sauntered along the preserve’s 1.5 miles of flat trails, intent on finding what Nature lessons lie hidden in plain sight. The preserve does not protect pristine wilderness from imminent threats in our rapidly urbanizing region. Instead, its designation reserves the property for immediate low-intensity nature-based recreation and for its long-term natural transition to wildness.

I first visited the preserve on November 28, 2022. My January 11, 2023, Great Blue Heron Post summarized my impression: https://stevejonesgbh.com/2023/01/11/dallas-fanning-nature-preserve/

The preserve is well-marked within a light industrial zone. I circuited all trails in 90 minutes, at a leisurely pace, pausing frequently for photographs and brief videos.

The trails are gentle well-surfaced, and flat. The only challenge I encountered was mental — trying to reconstruct the story of the past use that created the tortured land, most of which through preservation is destined to recover naturally to brush and forest.

My 60-second video captures the most severely disturbed area.

The associated industrial development stripped and leveled at least 20 percent of the tract, since planted to loblolly pine. This is raw subsoil…course, stony, absent organic matter, infertile, and xeric. The pine are chlorotic, stunted, and doomed to at least decades of insufficient nutrients and moisture.

Dark green foliage and much larger trees signal pockets of lesser disturbance. Imagine standing at this location in 2126 at a photoboard showing vegetation progression in ten-year increments since 2026!

Less harshly disturbed sections beyond the planted pine, where some modicum of residual topsoil remains, are converting to brush and hardwood trees. Shining sumac is flourishing. Nature is adept at reclaiming abused land. A new forest is emerging.

The trails also transect a 30-50 year old forest. Always alert for tree form curiosities, I spotted this black cherry tree that some force (falling branch or tree, an ice storm, wind, or machine) bent and broke the then saping-size stem. The tree sent a shoot skyward at the break, retaining its bent lower trunk and the break-point stub. Every tree has a story to tell.

Here is my 60-second video of the preserve’s 3.5-acre greenspace adjacent to the ample parking lot.

I stopped near a loblolly pine destined to provide summer shelter for a picnic table.

Already its crown is depositing pine straw mulch, yet another example of Nature’s insistence on healing the insults from past disturbance.

Taken from near the green space pine tree, this photo shows the emerging forest surrounding the green space.

Preserve managers have recently planted longleaf pine along the field edge. The seedlings will require supplemental watering during dry periods over the initial 2-3 summers.

I view the Dallas Fanning NP as a novelty variety of preserve. I’m accustomed to seeing wildland preserves. I view this one as an outlier, in effect a former wasteland…an afterthought…attempting to steward its transition to a desired future condition. Additionally, I see it as a cause worthy of monitoring, documenting (permanent photo-points), and celebrating. I plan to visit every 2-3 years. I’ll keep you posted.

Closing

I accept the challenge of distilling these Brief-Form Posts into a single distinct reflection, a task far more elusive than assembling a dozen pithy statements.

I cannot offer a quote more apropos than an observation I made in the text above:

Nature is adept at reclaiming abused land. A new forest is emerging.

Nature’s special treats await our discovery, our understanding, and our interpretation!

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Mid-December Delights and Mysteries on the WNWR Hiking and Bicycling Trail

April 9, 2026/in Updates /by Steve Jones

I visited the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge Visitors Center and Observation Building on December 19, 2025. See my Post on welcoming the sandhill cranes (https://stevejonesgbh.com/2026/01/27/theyre-back-sandhill-cranes-return-to-alabamas-wheeler-national-wildlife-refuge/). I then hiked the refuge’s nearby Hiking and Bicycling Trail, a 5.5-mile trek south through woodland, agricultural fields, and waterfowl impoundments, and along the Flint Creek arm of Lake Wheeler. As with all of my wildland saunters, I discovered Nature’s delights and mysteries, many of them hidden in plain sight.

Hardwood and pine intermix in the patchwork of forest, farm, and wetland. I love winter’s sharp contrast of evergreen and deciduous. Contrary to most of my fellow deep-south neighbors, I am in no rush for the return of what I view as a too-long summer.

Give me the dormant greys and subtle hues of winter…and the distant crane calls…absent the irritating hum of hungry mosquitoes.

I recorded this 59-second video of a field commercially farmed to produce soybeans and leave a designated portion for winter wildlife consumption.

Residual soybeans (left) and ponded rainwater (right) attract diverse wildlife.

The WNWR website succinctly describes this richly diverse property blessedly located within 30 minutes drive of my home:

Although designated as a waterfowl refuge, the 35,000 acre refuge provides for a wide spectrum of wildlife. Its great diversity of habitat includes deep river channels, tributary creeks, tupelo swamps, open backwater embayments, bottomland hardwoods, pine uplands, and agricultural fields. This rich mix of habitats provides places for over 295 bird species to rest, nest and winter, including over 30 species of waterfowl and an increasing population of Sandhill cranes and a small number of Whooping cranes.

The refuge is also home to 115 species of fish, 74 species of reptiles and amphibians, 47 species of mammals, 38 species of freshwater mussels, and 26 species of freshwater snails. Other animals such as the endangered Gray bat and Whooping crane benefit from the protection of the National Wildlife Refuge System, and the care of dedicated refuge staff and other friends of wildlife, like you.

An Alabama Cooperative Extension System online brochure introduces 69 of the most common native trees found in Alabama. Some of the 69 common tree species do not reach this far north. However, many Alabama tree species are not considered common. Where am I heading? I know, I’m hedging on my own wild guess of how many species of native trees and woody shrubs inhabit the refuge’s 55 square miles? Given the rich tapestry of wetlands and uplands, and the fertile overlay of bottomland and alluvial soils, I am going for broke, aiming high. I estimate 150 species of native trees and woody shrubs. If you know, please send me a reliable citation.

Tree Form Curiosities and Oddities

I relentlessly peruse woodland haunts for tree form oddities and curiosities. Spotting them only accomplishes part of the task. It falls to me next to explain the form. Leonardo da Vinci astutely observer that cause generates result:

There is no result in nature without a cause; understand the cause and you will have no need of the experiment.

My 60-second video introduces the first of four curiosities I encountered.

I recalled the multiple times that someone conjectured that a navigationally-motivated Native American bent a young tree to show the way to a game blind, water source, trade route, or the nearest coffee shop. However, this black cherry is a mere youth, 60-70 years old at most. Eastern Woodlands Indians of the Southeast region no longer dwelled naturally in this area since their forced relocation to the West in the 1830s…along the Trail of Tears

I imagined an extra point or field goal piercing the uprights to win the game!

This example still retains the stub at the broken branch end, from where an adventious bud shot a branch vertically.

Such tortured stems are common in our forests. This one tells its own story. A branch fell from the overstory canopy, crushed a sapling and snapped the top, leaving the young tree permanently bent. A new stem grew at the break point.

The broken point now shows a clear snout as the tree callouses over the broken end scar.

Two water oak saplings grew side by side, just six feet apart,close enough that their roots touched and grafted, a form of below ground inosculation. Some falling object snapped the nearer tree 30 inches above the ground. The larger oak provided nourishment to the broken tree, sustaining it, adding growth increments to the stem, and callousing the wounds. I call this phenomenon a ghost stump, kept alive after a fatal incident. I’ve seen, photographed, and cataloged other examples.

Here is my 59-second ghost stump video.

The ghost stump is a macbre ogre dwarfed by its mature cousin behind it.

Woodland Decay as a Life-Force

Life in our forests is not an idealic Disney-like utopia. Nature is rife with scars, weaknesses, sickness, rot, falling (and fallen) objects. Death is a powerful and ubiquitous part of forest life. Had I passed by this former willow oak three-trunk cluster two or three years ago, without close inspection, I may have marveled at its massive dimension, vigor, and vitality. However, the near-view stem crashed unceremoniously away from the photo point within the past two years, showing its remarkably hollow interior and revealing the hollowed bases of the other two. The falling tree knocked the top out of the right stem.

A decay mushroom cluster lines the crater of the fallen stem. Their mycelium are consuming cellulose and lignin of the dead and dying three-stem giant, assuring that the carbon cycle is continuous. The old saw holds — don’t judge a book by its cover.

I found this dead lichen-encrusted oak branch on the trail. Somewhere high in the canopy, American amber jelly mycelia were decomposing the branch, until autumn breezes sent the organic matter home to the soil.

I stumbled across a particularly photogenic colony of false turkeytail mushrooms trailside. When I entered college (1969), fungi were classified within the plant kingdom. Shortly thereafter they elevated into their own kingdom. I neither celebrated nor took note of the epic reclassification. I was too busy with education, life, and career. Today, such things mean more to me.

I recorded this 54-second video at the impressive mushroom cluster.

I marvel at Nature’s cycles and fractiles. More than a century ago a willow oak acorn sprouted along a field edge within the rich bottomland destined to become part of the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge in 1938. A rabbit nibbled the seedling to ground level. Because oak evolved in a world occupied by rabbits and other grazers, the seedling tapped its root reserves and issued three shoots that shot beyond the reach of rabbits and deer. The three oak stems prospered despite some physical injury (a farm kid with a penknife; a deer scraping velvet from antlers; a beaver gnawing; mechanical farm equipment), openimg an infection court for decay fungi. The decay worked within the trunks for 50-70 years, slowly, inexorably the ratio of solid wood rind to tree diameter decreased. Eventually, gravity and wind exceeded tree stength. Decay fungi have mastered the end game. Ironically, this fungus produces mushrooms that are wood-like. They, too, will yield to other fungal decomposers. In time, an acorn will sprout from the aggregated organic debris and mineral soil composite. A nature enthusiast may rediscover the magic in 2175, a century and a half hence.

Necessarily, the food chain extends from microbes to invertebrates to fungi to plants and to animals, large and small.

Powerful Food Chain Impoundment Water Enters Flint Creek

I was fortunate, last winter and this, to make this trek and witness s freshwater food chain spectacle. The water control mechanism below enables WNWR managers to block and maintain winter water levels in flooded areas for overwintering faunal residents. The area beyond the gate is flooded.

The Flint Creek arm of Wheeler Lake reflects the midday sun.

The bubbles (lower left) indicate the discharge from the impoundment entering Flint Creek.

The discharge plume is teeming with small fish feeding on what I supporse is organic debris suspended in the flow. Clouds of tiny fish (up to 2-3″ in length fill the flow. Occasionally a larger predator fish exploded into the school.

Here is my 58-second video (note snake entering for a fish-snack!).

Although mid-December, this brown water snake was warm enough to catch a snack-fish.

Others like this great white egret, stayed withing reach of the fish-chain feeding frenzy. I also saw several great blue herons and belted kingfishers.

All good things must come to an end, yet another apropos idiom!

I recorded this 61-second end-of-trail video.

An ancient white oak stands as a fitting trail end totem.

I lead or co-lead many local hikes and Nature santers. I relish sharing my Nature knowledge, passion, and curiosity with others. That said the certifiably introverted scientist filled with youthful exuberance still cherishes occassional ventures alone. I can endulge my pace, my interests, my mood; my imagination; my mental pursuits; my mysteries. I’ve learned that alone in Nature is often all the company I want or need!

Thoughts and Reflections

I offer these observations:

There is no result in nature without a cause; understand the cause and you will have no need of the experiment. (da Vinci)
Death is a powerful and ubiquitous part of forest life. (Steve Jones)
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better. (Einstein)
I’ve learned that alone in Nature is often all the company I want or need! (Steve Jones)

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

Note: Unless otherwise noted, all blog post images are created & photographed by Stephen B. Jones.

I am available for Nature-Inspired Speaking, Writing, and Consulting — contact me at steve.jones.0524@gmail.com

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A reminder of my Personal and Professional Purpose, Passion, and Cause

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

Mission: Employ writing and speaking to educate, inspire, and enable readers and listeners to understand, appreciate, and enjoy Nature… and accept and practice Earth Stewardship.

Vision:

People of all ages will pay greater attention to and engage more regularly with Nature… and will accept and practice informed and responsible Earth Stewardship.
They will see their relationship to our natural world with new eyes… and understand their Earth home more clearly.

Tagline/Motto: Steve (Great Blue Heron) encourages and seeks a better tomorrow through Nature-Inspired Living!

Steve’s Four Books

I began writing books and Posts for several reasons:

I love hiking and exploring 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 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 grandkids, 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