One iNaturalist Observation a Day, 2022 Edition

What does the daily practice of making one iNaturalist observation a day look like? Take a read of this blog post highlighting one observation per each week of 2022. Insects! Fungi! Wildlife! Plants! Costa Rica! Canada & California! Perhaps you’ll be inspired to start your own streak of observing something in nature every day!

Oooo La La Orchids, Costa Rica Blog pt. 3

Would you travel to Costa Rica to hunt for orchids? That’s exactly what we did, and found an incredible diversity of species, structures, colors and sizes. From the 2-3 mm flowers to ones the size of tennis balls the world of orchids is one to admire and fascinating to learn about.

Nature Journaling, Monday to Friday: Backyard Flowers

Looking for a way to combine your creative side with an interest in botany or nature? Nature Journaling is the activity, the practice, the mindfulness activity for you! Each day Monday to Friday I journaled a flowering plant that was currently blooming in my backyard in Fernbrook, CA.

Why So Many Yellow and Purple Flowers?

Why were all the flowers I was seeing in Central CA yellow and purple in color at the end of summer? Take a read to see what I discovered, or didn’t . . .

Calochortus, The Coolest Lilies of California?

Have you ever found yourself oo-ing and aww-ing over a Mariposa Lily? Or a Cat’s Ear Flower, or a globe flower? Well you were looking at the Calochortus genus! It’s a beautiful and interesting genera, let me tell you a bit about it!

Five Fantastic Fire Following Flowers

Fire is a natural process is in California’s natural history. Once a wildfire has come and gone the landscape can be transformed into a sea of color, it’s not all doom and gloom. I investigated five fire following plants and tell the tales of how I stumbled upon them.

Marin County and Beyond! What this naturalist got up to in April

Wow, April was the month of wildflowers! Exploring from our home base in Mill Valley we camped, hiked and explored many different habitats in order to see as many flowers as possible. If you are curious and want to see a sampling of our finds and hear about the corresponding adventures, read on!

Spurge is the word . . . around these parts.

The deserts of Southern California have some incredibly interesting plants with unique structures and beautiful colors. In this post I explore the spurges and their cousins that I’ve found recently! Super neat plants!

Questions for a Cactus

The charismatic plant of the desert that cant be avoided visually, but intentionally avoided physically is of course the cactus! After hiking around Joshua Tree NP for weeks I had some questions for these funky fun plants.

Who are you? Ft. The Daggerpod.

Thriving in a wind, cool, and dry climate the Daggerpod is an incredible plant. It was a joy to stumble upon while backpacking near Carson Pass.