Oregon
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Bigleaf Maple
Acer macrophyllum is one big-leafed maple. Also known as Oregon Maple, these trees of the moist, shady canyons of the Coast Range can have leaves 9″ or more long. The leafstalk can be up to a foot long. Just wow! And, speaking of wow, check out this intersection of the great naturalist David George Haskell…
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With a Wild Surmise
Tillamook Head was the southern-most reach along the Oregon coast of Lewis & Clark’s Corps of Discovery in 1806. Captain Clark came in search of a beached whale and called the view here “the grandest and most pleasing prospects which my eyes ever surveyed.”This is now Ecola State Park. The sea-stacks in the distance are…
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Oregonia
There’s your beautiful world, NW edition. Here’s Masha Gessen, an old hand at autocracy, on surviving Trumpism, very necessary reading now.
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Giganteum
Seeds of the Giant Sequoia, Sequoiadendron giganteum. Mighty oaks from little acorns grow, and the largest trees in the world from these itty-bitty little seeds. Speaking of interesting facts, did you know that 3/4s of all Americans DID NOT VOTE for Donald Trump? In fact, fewer of them voted for him than for the Democratic candidate. But, you…
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Douglas Squirrel
David Douglas did get the small, vocal Tamiasciurus douglasii named after him, both ways. We saw one at Ecola State Park and a few more at Hoyt Arboretum in Portland, where this one was photographed well enough to present to you, but mostly we heard them. They let you know whose woods these are… (Looks like…
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Douglas-fir
Years ago I visited friends living just north of San Fransisco. My flight was delayed eight hours or so, so I arrived in Oakland at four in the morning, when there wasn’t much to do but watch dawn rise over the continent… After a short, unsuccessful nap, I was dropped off in Muir Woods National…
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Some Northwestern Birds
Western Gull, Larus occidentalis. Similar looking to Herring Gull (Larus argentatus), but note that heavier, down-turned bill. (All the Larus gulls seem to be able to interbreed, resulting in hybrids of this and that and making a mockery of the old definition of species.)And speaking of taxonomy: the Western Scrub Jay was divided into two…
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Pacific Great Horned
I didn’t recognize this owl at first. Great Horned Owls (Bubo virginianus) run rather darker in the shadowed forests of the Pacific northwest, under all those Douglas-firs and dripping epiphytes. They also don’t have orange faces, as our eastern birds do. This female is 16 years old and has lived at the Portland Audubon Nature Sanctuary’s wildlife rehab…
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You can see the slugs and the trees
A brief trip to some of the wet rainforests of the northwest was a revelation. There will be more to come, but shall we begin with an atypical sublimity?Banana slug, Ariolimax genus,perhaps A. columbianus, Pacific Banana Slug? There are two other species, and differentiating them sounds a bit gross. About 4″ long.These are named for…
Backyard and Beyond 