Salubrious

Webster



archive
gutenberg
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 1803-1882
Conduct of Life
Part VII
Considerations By The Way

ALSO:
Misattribution Emerson Success

Zoo4 - Snowy Owl

One of my favorites at the zoo, was the Snowy Owl (Bubo scandiacus).

She (I think it's a female) would get a little excited— fluff up the wings/feathers, go around in a circle, and make noise— if I shuffled my feet in the pile of leaves on the trail. So that was quite entertaining. :) I should really capture these moments on video, but just wasn't prepared for that.

enature
Snowy Owl (Nyctea scandiaca)
"Strictly a bird of open country, it is practically never seen in a tree; it sits on the ground, a rooftop, or other exposed resting place."

wiki
Bubo scandiacus (Linnaeus, 1758)
Synonyms:
Strix scandiaca Linnaeus, 1758
Nyctea scandiaca Stephens, 1826
"Until recently, it was regarded as the sole member of a distinct genus, as Nyctea scandiaca, but mtDNA cytochrome b sequence data (Olsen et al. 2002) shows that it is very closely related to the horned owls in the genus Bubo."

Sign at Zoo said:
"...recently found to be very closely related to the Great Horned Owl through DNA analysis."
"adult male is nearly solid white, while the females are mottled with black."
"Unlike most other owls, they hunt primarily during the day."

owlpages
"These Owls are highly diurnal, although they may hunt at night as well."

Diurnality
diurnal [active during the day] vs nocturnal [night] vs crepuscular [twilight]

npwrc
"...the snowy is a regular wintering bird in North Dakota and can often be seen perched conspicuously on haystacks, fence posts and stumps."

Owls of North Dakota

Flickr

That Certain Something

Je Ne Sais Quoi

Dictionary

YouTube
Song:
Hera Björk - Je Ne Sais Quoi (Iceland)

Book

Movie
"This is a story of the mysterious force that fuels attraction and desire, success and vitality..."

Bag

Lanyard

I didn't know it was called a lanyard.

Via:
mefi

Last time I flew internationally the thing which helped the most on the plane was a little zip up bag with a lanyard on it so I could put it round my neck...generally keep my stuff near to hand...

wiki
lanyardsupply
dictionary

Sunflower Road

I tried different angles on the sunflower road view and I like these the best.

There was also this beauty further in the ditch:



And surprise, I had company.



He was the exact same color as the sunflowers.
Talk about blending in.



Then there was this sunflower which was very different and stood out from the rest along the road as we were driving by.



The petals (ray flowers) were fabulous:


Later, we saw this one lone sunflower in a field of wheat or grain of some sort. The result was a happy surprise with an unusual background effect to it. I like it.



Common sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.)

usda

efloras2

davesgarden
Family: Asteraceae (ass-ter-AY-see-ee)
Genus: Helianthus (hee-lee-AN-thus)
Species: annuus (AN-yoo-us)

(At first I didn't catch that double u in annuus.)

wiki
Sunflower varieties list

Try Google Images on Autumn Beauty sunflower.
Or how about Peach Passion sunflower.

Definitions:
phototropism
An orienting response to light.

heliotropism
An orienting response to the sun.

tropism
An involuntary orienting response; positive or negative reaction to a stimulus source.

Walk In The Field Part 21 - Buckbrush

Some notes on what the field is like mid-July.

Started walking in/around the creek/ravine area.



Big old oak trees down there that I've never looked at that closely. The branches, trunks look pretty rough. I'm not sure if they are stressed or just old. The leaves looked shiny new.



Lots of fruits, berries, blossoms, etc. all over, in general.





I can hear, more than see, lots of bird activity. I can hear chickadees and I would dearly love a good photo of that bird. I'm seeing goldfinches almost every time I'm out in the field now. A lot more active now than they were.





(Goldfinch closeups here.)

Lots of buckbrush blooming along the creek.
Common Names: Western snowberry, Buckbrush, Wolfberry
Species: Symphoricarpos occidentalis Hook.
Family: Caprifoliaceae - Honeysuckle Family





The coneflowers (purple, yellow, etc) are everywhere. The field is now covered with them.



Word Note:
ravine (canyon vs gorge vs ravine)
vs
gully (or gulley)
vs
creek (stream vs creek vs brook vs rivulet)

Another nice field view. Looking North.

Birds On A Wire

"Bird on a wire."
Where did that phrase come from.

I knew about the movie,
but I didn't know about the song.

And the wire was telephone wire, not barbed wire.

LeonardCohenFiles.com:

"On September 27, 1960, six days after his twenty-sixth birthday, Cohen bought a house in Hydra for $1500...was run down and had no electricity, plumbing or running water. Yet it was a private space where he could work,...

Here he could live in virtually complete seclusion, at a fraction of the cost it would take in Northern Europe or Canada, where the people were unconcerned as to who you were or what you [did]; And where breathtaking vistas opened up for the seeing - both external and internal...

Bird on the Wire began in Greece, when Cohen first arrived in Hydra, there were no wires on the island, no telephones and no regular electricity. But soon telephone poles appeared, and then the wires. I would stare out the window at these telephone wires and think, how civilization had caught up with me and I wasn't going to be able to escape after all."

How to get there?

House photos



Hydra, the island.
Hydra, the village (capital and main port).
No vehicles.

The Pine Cone Pineapple

A closeup of pine cones, which were more interesting than I thought, because they look like pineapples.

And yes, the word history connects the two.

Pine cones were at one time called pineapples. The tropical fruit was called pineapples because it reminded them of the pine cones which, at that time, were called pineapples not pine cones.

Got that. heh heh. My wording is a little silly on purpose.

Anyway, who knew.

Why "apple"? The word "apple" was used in a more general "fruit" sense.

Even today there are things like
"oak apple"
"earth apple"
"cashew apple"
which aren't apples in the more narrow sense.

Ref:
Pineapples first grew on pine trees

Hey, the Garden of Eden "fruit" become an "apple" somewhere along the way. What does this have to do with pine cones and pineapples, I'm not sure. My brain just retrieved some trivia.

These wonderful "pineapples" were at the top of a very t-a-l-l evergreen tree.



And what kind of evergreen tree?
Colorado Blue Spruce. (The tips look more blue green than the rest of the tree at the moment.)

I was reading verbiage online about how to tell the difference between evergreen trees.
Just a bunch of text, blah blah.
And then I found this:



Well there ya go. (More tree pics at that link.)

One of my little chipping sparrow pics featured a wonderful ponderosa pine:



See also
Conifers tag at Botany Photo of the Day.

I found the comment on Juniper cones (berry-like) interesting:

Juniper cones do indeed look like berries, and are often called by that name. But the resemblance to a berry is only superficial. A close examination of a juniper "berry" reveals that it is actually composed of fused cone scales. Instead of being woody, like other cones of other cypress family members, the cone scales of a juniper are fleshy, further reinforcing the notion of a berry. Of course, the word "cone" is somewhat misleading in this case, as juniper cones aren't cone shaped!

Botany Photo of the Day, Conifers tag, FAVS:
Pseudotsuga menziesii var. glauca
Larix speciosa
Pinus wallichiana
Cunninghamia lanceolata 'Glauca'

Cloud Putto

Cloud Putto:



Closeup of head:



Putto
(Plural putti)

Waxed Poetic

"Waxed Poetic"

I was thinking how odd that phrase seems to me. Not something I'd ever use.

(I was playing around with Sculpture in Paint Shop Pro 9 and made the image above. I like it.)

Here's the dictionary meaning of "waxed."



Now Google it for word origin.

From alphadictionary:

Start with Proto-Indo-European "wegs" meaning "grow, increase"
[g] became [k]
[ks] is spelled X
wegs --> weaxan --> wax

And there you have it. Makes perfect sense now. NOT. Read the much more complicated explanation at the link above.

How about some tunes to go with that?

Wax Poetic is a band. And Norah Jones was a member.
Didn't know that.

Google search for Wax Poetic music videos at YouTube.

The song, Angels, is pretty good.
Different music.
I have Norah's "Come Away With Me" CD.