National Take-Back Prescription Medicine Initiative

September 29, 2012 (10:00 AM - 2:00 PM) 

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has scheduled a way to safely dispose of unwanted, unused prescription medications.  At the last event, on April 28, 2012, citizens turned in 276 tons of unwanted or expired medications for safe and proper disposal at the 5,659 take-back sites that were available in all 50 states and U.S. territories. When the results of the four Take-Back Days to date are combined, the DEA and its state, local, and tribal law-enforcement and community partners have removed over 1.5 million pounds (774 tons) of medication from circulation. For more information, see http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/drug_disposal/takeback/index.html or call 1-800-882-9539.


Prescription drugs are one possible source of intersex, or reproductive endocrine disruption in smallmouth bass (Micropterus dolomieu) in the Potomac River basin.

Project Budburst

Fall into Phenology With Project BudBurst! September 10 - October 31, 2012

Mark your calendars for Sept 10th to Oct 31st and share your fall observations of plants changing color, shedding leaves, and more during the 2012 Fall into Phenology campaign. Project BudBurst was delighted that so many citizen scientists participated in 2011, resulting in many more reported plant observations than have been reported during past fall seasons. Thank you for making our first seasonal campaign a success! We hope you'll participate again this year and make the 2nd annual Fall into Phenology campaign even more successful than the first.  Learn more atbudburst.org/fall.  Of course, we're always accepting your observations of plants and animals.  Click on the "Report what you're seeing" link at  tiny.cc/hampshireoutdoors.

Wolf Spider?

Photo by Neil Gillies

Neil found this handsome spider in his kitchen in Baker, WV, last week.  Among the 2000 wolf spider species in the Lycosidae family, I guessed that it was among the Genus Hogna (maybe H. aspersa or H. carolinensis).

Wolf spiders are distributed nearly worldwide (except for the poles).  They are hunting spiders, and their behaviors range from waiting to stalking to actually chasing their prey.  Although they can bite, many find them favorable because they prey upon many less desirable insects and arachnids.

Among the distinguishing features of wolf spiders is that they carry their eggs, and that two of their eyes are much larger than the others, and those eyes actually reflect light!

Photo by  Opoterser on Wikimedia Commons.

In trying to identify this spider I was surprised by how much variety there is among individuals in this Genus Hogna, and I realized that wolf spiders may be a great species to demonstrate variation due to geographic isolation.

Fall Frost Dates - Hampshire County

Our Fall frost dates for Hampshire County, WV, courtesy
of Dave's Garden:

Romney 1 Sw, WV (Hampshire county):

Temperature 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% Fall 32° Sep 29 Oct 4 Oct 7 Oct 10 Oct 12 Oct 15 Oct 18 Oct 21 Oct 25 Fall 28° Oct 12 Oct 16 Oct 19 Oct 22 Oct 25 Oct 27 Oct 30 Nov 1 Nov 6 Fall 24° Oct 15 Oct 20 Oct 24 Oct 28 Oct 31 Nov 2 Nov 6 Nov 10 Nov 16

Container Gardens

We don't have to worry about a first frost in Hampshire County for a while (only a 10% chance before October 1), but if you've been wondering about container gardening to lengthen your growing season indoors, consider this list, courtesy of the Homesteading Survivalism blog:

==================

Homesteading / Survivalism

No Garden?  Here Are 66 Things You Can Can Grow In Containers.

Tree fruits
1. Apples
2. Kumquats
3. Avocados
4. Blackberries
5. Blueberries
6. Pomegranate
7. Cherries
8. Figs
9. Pears

Citrus fruits
10. Dwarf oranges
11. Grapefruit
12. Tangerines
13. Meyer lemons
14. Limes

Tropical fruits
Tropical fruits can also be surprisingly easy to grow indoors, even in non-tropical climates. Such as…
15. Bananas
16. Pineapple
17. Papaya
18. Guavas

The real surprises
19. Hops
20. Aloe Vera
21. Strawberries
22. Tea (well, herbal tea)
23. Quinoa!

The non-surprises
24. Tomatoes
25. Summer squash
26. Other squashes, like acorn and pumpkin
27. Hot Peppers
28. Sweet peppers
29. Cucumbers

Melons
30. Small cantaloupe
31. Jenny Lind melon
32. Golden Midget Watermelon

Herbs
33. Basil
34. Oregano
35. Parsley
36. Rosemary
37. Chives
38. Catnip
39. Thyme
40. Sage
41. Parsley

Leafy Greens
42. Kale
43. Mesclun greens
44. Spinach
45. Swiss chard
46. Lettuces
47. Mustard greens
48. Collard greens
49. Arugula

Root Vegetables
50. Carrots
51. Beets
52. Potatoes

Other healthy stuff
53. Sprouts
54. More sprouts: mung bean and lentil sprouts
55. Wheatgrass
56. Kohlrabi
57. Turnips
58. Rutabagas
59. Celeriac
60. Parsnips
61. Jerusalem Artichoke
62. Sugar snap peas
63. Rhubarb
64. Mushrooms
65. Pole Beans
66. Asparagus

 

Weather Watch

There are many strategies for predicting weather, but none has proven more useful to me than monitoring RADAR".  In the 1990's I worked on Capitol Hill representing retail agricultural suppliers, the organizations that recommended, sold, applied and troubleshooted the applications of fertilizers, pesticides, and other products on crops for farmers throughout the U.S.  Whenever I visited, there were always farmers huddled around the DTN satellite  monitor at the sales counter.  Now of course, we can do the same from any Internet connected computer and in many big cities, there are dedicated channels to local RADAR.

*RADAR is sometimes called an acronym, but technically it's only an initialism.  Acronyms are initialisms that spell actual words.

In our area, I've found the best way to plan the day is to monitor the Pittsburgh RADAR rather than Washington/Sterling's (north of Dulles Airport).  Whichever you choose, be sure to set it to loop to get the best estimate of potential weather.

http://radar.weather.gov/radar.php?product=NCR&rid=pbz&loop=yes

Trouble for the Potomac?

The Isaac storm track will probably turn abruptly to the Northeast when it hits Alabama; and that means it could travel straight up the South Branch, North Branch, Cacapon and Shenandoah watersheds.  That could provide anywhere from 3 to 6 inches of rain (or more if it slows or stalls) in each, as all three travel in that same direction.

Check for updates at
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/refresh/graphics_at4+shtml/205536.shtml?gm_track?large#contents

Blog updates

Way out on our meander of the South Branch we're still suffering intermittent power and Internet access in particular.  The folks at Frontier are very nice and helpful, but have their hands full this month.  So, I have a backlog of images stored on Google+ (add me if you'd like) and promise to have them posted by July 29.  

Vegetable Garden Calendar

I found this on the Homesteading Self Sufficiency Survival Blog (don't read too much into my following that blog), but haven't determined the source.  I'm interested in whether you think it's above or below our 39th parallel.  Down here by the river at 570 feet above sea level, I consider May 1 to be frost-free, but friends on Dan's Mountain and Jersey Mountain add as much as two weeks to that.

TinEye Reverse Image Search

As a former field biologist, friends often ask if I recognize this or that critter.  The one pictured here was new to me.  But after down;loading the photo or copying the URL, I went to tineye.com and within a minute or two I found the same picture labeled, "Blue Seaslug".  A wikipedia search confirmed it was Glaucus atlanticus.

Nesting Turkeys

Ruth Martin stumbled onto this nest of turkey chicks at Church View Farm, near Three Churches, WV.  She was mowing a nature trail and the hen was startled when she passed by and flew away. Later, she and her husband Steve walked back to take a look and found about a dozen eggs in the nest. Last night they walked back again, the hen took off, and they heard lots of peeping. All of the eggs were hatched, and Steve and Ruth scattered too, waiting to see the whole family later in June looking for insects around the farm.

Indigenous Roses

The Carolina Rose (Rosa carolina) is native to the Eastern U.S.  We've been spotting these along the trails just above our wetlands .  You can find it from hardiness zones 4 through 8.  The shrub (actually classified a sub-shrub) grows from 3 to 6 ft high with 2 inch pink blossoms appearing once annually in spring or summer.  The hips appear in fall-winter.

Carolina Rose (Rosa carolina)

Daylilies

You're probably seeing daylilies showing up in gardens and elsewhere this week.   Asiatic daylilies are in genus Hemerocallis, and are considered to be an adaptable perrenial staple for many gardeners.  I've read that they're considered by some to be invasive, and I've seen little clumps in remote places occasionally. I like them for the same reason I like the mallows: they produce a new flower almost daily (although each flower lasts for only about 24 hours).

Bees and Poplars, Poison Ivy, and Propolis

I need some feedback from Mid-Atlantic bee experts (or specifically you folks in the Eastern Panhandle or Western Maryland).

Yesterday I recorded bees returning loaded with a very orange pollen.  My friend thought it was from poplars.  Tulip trees (Liriodendron tulipifera) are sometimes called Tulip poplar or yellow poplar by older foresters and the lumber industry, and I knew of only younger Tulip trees nearby.  Cottonwoods (Populus deltoides) are in the same genus as aspens, the true poplars in the Salicaceae family.  We have a giant cottonwood down by the river and of course, they produce seeds like no other tree, but their pollination should have been complete many weeks earlier (March or April).  You'll hear us confuse this in the video.   Now that I've done some reading, I'm guessing he was talking about tulip trees, not cottonwoods.

But the next day I was building a new horse trail / walking trail and heard a lot of buzzing.  When I went exploring I found honeybees pollinating the Poison Ivy (Toxicodendron radicans and formerly Rhus toxicodendron and Rhus radicans).  I haven't finished researching this, but I've learned some believe that the raw honey helps build a resistance to the allergic reaction from exposures to the plant oil.  Interestingly, I've also read that many people are allergic to the Cashew tree (Anacardium occidentale), in the same Anacardiaceae family as poison ivy, and that makes them more expensive to harvest.

So after further exploration, I now think the orange material these bees were transporting is propolis from the cottonwoods.  According to the well-researched Wikipedia article, propolis is believed to reinforce the structural stability of the hive, reduce vibration, make the hive more defensible by sealing alternate entrances, prevent diseases and parasites from entering the hive, inhibit bacterial growth, and prevent putrefaction within the hive.  And while bees usually carry waste out of and away from the hive, they sometimes seal larger invaders in propolis, essentially mummifying it and making it odorless and harmless.

Red-Winged Blackbirds

I saw the first Red-winged Blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus) in the lower fields today.  These birds sometimes winter as far north as Pennsylvania, but in Hampshire County they are always a signal of Summer.  The females are non-descript and resemble a very large sparrow.  In fact, I've spent an embarrissingly long time trying to determine what large sparrow I was seeing only to later realize it was a female RWB.   Of course, the males are unmistakable.  

Capturing a Swarm

The old hives are gone.

I burned our old, unused hives last week in preparation for three new nuc (for nucleus) boxes this afternoon.  Brian Umstead offered to replace my old hives because of our setting, and I welcomed the opportunity.

I've researched native pollinators and done workshops on building habitats, but I'm relatively new to honeybees.  In 2005, one of my ninth graders, almost apologetically, asked if he could build an apiary for his project even though there was no control, or independent or dependent variables.  I said, "Of course." and we talked about mentors and training classes with local beekeeping groups.  


After I left to teach at Virginia Tech, he and other students convinced the principal and the school system administrators to keep hives on the roof of the school.  I regularly use this as an example of the importance of student autonomy in project-based learning.  But beyond that, and a few lessons in harvesting honey from Steve Martin at ChurchView Farm, I don't have much  experience with honeybees.

Above:  Brian captures the swarm with sugar water.

Below:  Luring the remaining bees into the hive in the new 

location.

So just as we were finishing, Brian suggested trying to capture a swarm and installing a larger hive.   I grabbed one of the taller ladders and we drove over to Foxwalk Farm.  Brian put on a suit and climbed up with a sugar-water soaked comb to lure the bees from a cedar tree.  A couple hundred climbed on, and I swapped the comb with a fresh one.  But after a short while, it became clear that to get the swarm to come as a whole, we'd need to remove the whole end of the branch they were swarming.  I did the cutting, so I only caught some of the events on video.

We clipped the branches around the swarm and stuffed them all into a box for traveling back to our farm.  The challenge then became removing them from the branch. Eventually, we had to just knock them off, then help those inside the hive attract the rest inside.

We're concerned that we might not have much of a Black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) bloom this year, but we have an abundance of early and late blooming raspberries, and then Osage orange (Maclura pomifera) that will hopefully keep them interested in staying.

In case you're wondering, the louder, constant hum you here in the background is not the hives, it's Diane mowing on the bigger tractor.

Mating Wood Turtles

We see wood turtles (Glyptemys insculpta) in and just above the annual flood plain nearly every week from April to October and beyond, but this is the first time I've seen them mating.

Snapper

We found this very mature snapping turtle (Chelydra serpentina) near the top of the sand/silt bank to the smaller channel of the South Branch.  The back of her shell was covered with mud, but otherwise we didn't see evidence of egg-laying nearby. If this turtle was laying eggs, it would be about two to six weeks earlier than predicted. Like many reptiles, snapping turtles can store male sperm for several years, possibly because they may sense when conditions are better.  That may be giving them too much credit. If eggs are incubated from 75-80 F (24-26 C), they are nearly always male; but if the surrounding environment is significantly cooler (20 C) or warmer (30 C), they're nearly always female.

Last year we found a snapping turtle that seemed to be struggling up a steep slope.  I've been handling these turtles comfortably since I was a pup, so I lifted it to the top of the steep slope, immediately discovering that it had just deposited about 12 ping-pong sized eggs.  I tried to put her back, but she wanted nothing to do with the nest.  I felt terrible whenever I thought of it, even though I really don't want a bunch of snapping turtles in our ponds.

Spotted Salamanders

After the last big flood, someone must have decided it was easier to bury flood debris rather than remove it.  I'm told FEMA flood insurance often prescribes that, and some floodplain owners have had to watch dozers bury entire trailers in their lower fields rather than pay for big trucks to remove them.   But there is an upside.  It seems that one of every three or four times I discover buried debris, I find big spotted salamanders (Ambystoma maculatum) using it as an underground cavity.  I first learned of these when a good friend and biology major in college had one as a pet, because her father studied the ability of newts and salamanders to regenerate their eyes at the University of Pennsylvania back in the 1980's.

It's Invasive Time! (Already)

Our interns Jamie and Mary pulled lots of invasive cattails (Typha spp.) from the wetland frog pond last year, but they're back.  I can't remember ever seeing new shoots this early in April.   I got a few by the roots, but I'll bet at least two dozen broke off, leaving the rhizome beneath the surface.  I've never done it, but you can grind the rhizomes to make a flour, and eat other parts too.