Bayfield Almanac

7/05/09 UNUSUAL FLOWERS ON A SEE-FOREVER DAY

2009-07-06T09:12:00.004-05:00

Monday, 8:00 AM. 62 degrees, wind W, light with stronger gusts. The channel is wrinkled, and the sky cloudless. The barometer predicts rain but it appears unlikely today. It is a see-forever day, at least to the far off Penoke iron range from the top of 11th street.
The fluffy-flowered shrub is false spirea, Sorbaria sorbifolia, of Asian origin. It is valuable in the traditional landscape because it follows the lilac in the bloom sequence and is quite showy. The conical bloom is the female flower head of the staghorn sumac, Rhus typhina. The male and female flowers are borne on different plants

7/05/09 CLOUDS AND SUNDROPS

2009-07-05T08:23:00.004-05:00

Sunday, 8:00 AM. 65 degrees, wind W, light. The channel is calm, the sky clear and the barometer predicts rain. Another beautiful morning.
I awoke early and took Lucky to the beach. I took a trash bag along since I assumed there would be lots of litter after yesterday, but there was very little to pick up, people are really pretty respectful. We watched the La Pointe fireworks from the porch, that was enough for us this year.
The yellow flower is sundrops, Oenothera perennis, also called evening primrose. It is in the evening primrose family, the Onagraceae. This one is on the beach, but it is a rather common plant of dry soils.

7/04/09 OUR LIVES, OUR FORTUNES AND OUR SACRED HONOR

2009-07-04T10:47:00.006-05:00

Saturday, 8:30 AM. 62 degrees, wind WSW, calm to light. The channel is calm, the sky almost cloudless, and the barometer predicts mostly sunny skies.
"OUR LIVES, OUR FORTUNES, AND OUR SACRED HONOR"
That’s what the fifty-six signers of the Declaration of Independence pledged on the first Fourth of July, 1776. What was their reward for such patriotism?
Five of them were subsequently captured, tortured and killed. Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned. Nine died from wounds or the hardships of the war.
Carter Braxton of Virginia saw his shipping empire destroyed by the British navy, and he died a pauper.
Thomas McKeam and his family were hounded into poverty.
Dilley, Hall, Clymer, Walton, Gwinnett, Heward, Ruttledge and Middleton had their properties looted.
Thomas Nelson Jr. urged General Washington to shell his own home at the Battle of Yorktown because the British were using it as a command post. It was destroyed, and Nelson died penniless.
Francis Lewis had his home and properties destroyed, and the British imprisoned his wife, where she died.
John Hart was driven from the bedside of his dying wife, his property destroyed, and his thirteen children scattered
(the above information is adapted from text by Fight Back Wisconsin)
Abstractions like “freedom” and “independence’ are seldom truly appreciated until objectified by their absence.
How many of us would, today, pledge “our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor” for these abstractions?
How many of us would stand with their neighbors and fight at Bunker Hill?
How many of us would have the courage to wait with Francis Scott Key, a prisoner on the deck of a British warship, for the dawn’s early light and the sight of those “broad stripes and bright stars?”
How many of us would ride through the enemy lines, the wrong way, to join Travis, Bowie, Crocket and the rest in certain death at the Alamo?
How many of us would sing, “let us die to make men free,” amidst the carnage at Gettysburg?
How man of us would endure the stench and death of the trenches of the Great War so that Frenchmen might be free?
How many of us would charge up San Juan Hill with TR?
How many of us would say “nuts” to surrendering to the surrounding Nazis in the dead of winter at The Battle of the Bulge?
How many of us would help raise the flag at Iwo?
How many of us would not surrender during the retreat from the Chosin Reservoir?
How many of us would follow the Code of Honor and give up the opportunity to leave the Hanoi Hilton before the others?
How many of us would march with Martin?
How many of us would stand with the Poles and Hungarians throwing rocks at Russian Tanks;with the Gipper at the Brandenburg Gate, defying the Evil Empire; with the Chinese people in Tiananmen Square, the Iraqi crowds pulling down the statue of Saddam, or with the protesters in Tehran?
The 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence would have, I am certain.
The Fourth of July has magic in it: two principal authors of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, first comrades, then bitter enemies, and finally reconciled in old age, both died on the Fourth of July, 1826, the Declaration’s fiftieth anniversary. Jefferson’s last words were, “Adams still lives.”
And indeed, the Declaration and its signers still live in spirit, and inspire us today to stand and if need be to fight for our guiding principle, unique among all the nations of the earth, “that all men are created equal, and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among them being life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” To these holy abstractions may our Creator give us the courage to pledge our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.

7/03/09 FLEA FLOWERS

2009-07-03T09:44:00.005-05:00

Friday, 8:30 AM. 60 degrees, wind WNW, very light. The channel is glassy, the shoreline trees of the Island casting their reflections far out onto the water. The sky is partly cloudy and the barometer predicts more of the same. It is a fine day.
Pictured is a common native plant of fields and roadsides, the daisy fleabane, Erigeron philadelphicum. There are white flowered species of Erigeron as well. This one may be a garden escapee, as fleabanes are somewhat used in the garden. Fleabanes are in the Aster family and look quite similar but the composite flowers are much smaller and more delicate. Its name is said to be derived from the fact that the small seeds look like fleas, but I find no mention of it being used to ward off fleas, as the appellation "bane" would indicate, although it does have some uses in folk medicine.

7/02/09 COWS AND PARSNIPS

2009-07-02T09:43:00.005-05:00

Thursday, 58 degrees, wind W, light. The channel is calm, the sky overcast but the barometer predicts sunny skies.
The cow parsnip, Heracleum lanatum, is a tall (3’-10’) showy member of the parsley family (Umbelliferae) that grows in rich moist soils in northern latitudes. There are quite a few growing along Star Route and the north branch of Pikes Creek west of Bayfield. I have no idea why it is called cow parsnip, as it is not likely to be found in cow pastures. This plant looks a lot like Angelica atropurpurea but is much larger. The parsley family is huge and many species are hard to identify one from another.

7/01/09 THE BEACH PEA, FOOTLOOSE AND FANCY FREE

2009-07-01T08:37:00.004-05:00

Wednesday, 8:00 AM. 50 degrees, wind WNW, moderate. The channel is surprisingly calm. The sky is overcast but it has quit raining. There is .25” of rain in the gauge but the barometer predicts sunshine.
I have been reading a novel set in Scotland, which describes the persistent cold rainy summers in the Highlands, always a fire burning on the grate and the Aga going. Sounds familiar, except that I have run out of firewood, and must lay some in before August gets here.
The beach pea, Lathyrus japonicus forma spectabilis (crimson flowered) is a common native, very showy wildflower of beach dunes and areas near the lake. The species name, japonicus, indicates that it is a circumpolar species, growing in like situations many places in the northern hemisphere and beyond. It can be weedy in the garden but is more than welcome. One can imagine the plentiful seeds awash in seas everywhere, landing on sandy beaches and becoming established, a real world traveler.

6/30/09 A (K)ALMING, RAINY DAY

2009-06-30T09:14:00.007-05:00

Tuesday, 8:00 AM. 52 degrees, wind WSW, light. The channel is wrinkled, the sky is overcast and it is raining lightly and looks as though it may do so all day, although the barometer predicts sunny skies.
Saint John’s wort, Hypericum kalmianum, is a common native summer flowering plant of fields and roadsides. There are over 300 species in the confusing genus, so without spending a lot of time I will call this one the species kalmianum, which grows around the great lakes. It is named for the 17th Century Swedish botanist Peter Kalm, who discovered it. His journal is fascinating, and gives real insight into pre-Revolutionary America. St. John’s wort has long been used in herbal medicine, and is much prescribed as a calmative in Europe. I have no personal experience with it.
The pink flowered plant is Crown Vetch, a legume much used in roadside construction plantings. It is extremely invasive, gets into everything, and should not be used.

6/29/09 "CONSIDER THE LILIES OF THE FIELD"

2009-06-29T09:51:00.005-05:00

Monday, 7:45 AM. 59 degrees, wind WNW, brisk. The channel is crawling and dark, the skies partly cloudy. The barometer predicts rain, of which we got a welcome .1” of yesterday in some random showers.
The roadside wildflowers pictured are on Hwy. 13, between Bayfield and Red Cliff. Added to the usual mix of lupines and other flowers are native orange wood lilies, Lilium philadelphicum, which grow freely around Hwy. J as well, adapted to the sun drenched, sandy soil. “Consider the lilies of the field. They toil not, neither do they spin; yet Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed as one of these.”

6/28/09 HONEYSUCKLE AND DEWBERRIES

2009-06-28T10:58:00.005-05:00

Sunday, 9:00 AM. 64 degrees, wind SW, strong. The sky is mostly overcast and the barometer predicts rain. The rain gauge shows .2” of rain from yesterday’s showers.
The plant with the tubular yellow flowers is bush honeysuckle, Diervilla lonicera, a native under story shrub of our northern woods. I found it up the hill on Old Military Road.
The beach walk this morning was pleasant, the bay sheltered in the lee of the wind. The white flowered plant is northern dewberry, Rubus flagellaris, a native bramble in the rose family. It does a good job of helping to stabilize the dunes, and when the berries are ripe I will try to beat the birds to a few.

6/27/09 HIGHWAY J, THE WILDFLOWER ROUTE

2009-06-27T10:24:00.005-05:00

Saturday, 9:00 AM. 65 degrees, wind WNW, light. The channel is calm, dimpled by the gentle rain that is falling from an overcast sky. The barometer predicts rain, so it may be a rainy weekend, after several days of barometric predictions of the same.
Hwy. J, the orchard route, is fantastic with roadside wildflowers. There are acres of yellow Coreopsis in bloom on the north end of J, just past The Bayfield Apple Co. An anomaly that blooms every year there is a self-seeding variety of Verbena peruviana, a flower farm escapee from years ago. Purists will decry this foreign intrusion but the effect is startlingly beautiful. There are other flowers in the mix, including the purple American vetch.

6/26/09 SWEET, SWEET CICELY

2009-06-26T10:00:00.003-05:00

Thursday, 8:00 AM. 65 degrees, wind W, calm. The sky is cloudless, the channel glassy. The barometer again predicts rain but it looks unlikely today.
I have keyed out the tall white flowered plant growing among the lupines on the corner of Hwy. 13 and Bodin Rd. as a sweet cicely, Osmoriza divaricata, in the parsley family. Fasset’s Spring Flora of Wisconsin states that this species grows only in Bayfield County near Lake Superior, so if my identification is correct I have found a rather rare local plant. It is very attractive and has a nice fragrance.

6/25/09 SHE LOVES ME, SHE LOVES ME NOT

2009-06-25T20:42:00.007-05:00

Thursday, 8:30 AM. 75 degrees, wind W, light to moderate. The sky is cloudless with some haze in the east. The barometer predicts rain, but it doesn’t look like it. This will be a fine summer day.
The country roadsides and fields are awash with colorful wildflowers, some native others not. The common white daisy, Chrysanthemum leucanthemum, escaped from gardens centuries ago and is now ubiquitous. This is the daisy children pluck the petals (technically ray flowers) from while chanting, "she loves me, she loves me not."

6/24/09 BEES AND FENCEPOSTS

2009-06-24T16:59:00.002-05:00

Thursday, 6:00 AM, temperature 69 degrees, wind W, light. The channel is calm, the sky mostly cloudless and there is some haze over the Island. It will be a warm summer day.
The black locusts, Robinia pseudoacacia, are blooming along Eleventh and Manypenny, their presence heralded by the sweetest of perfumes. I like the old black locusts but many consider them an invasive weed tree, even though they are a North American native. They were spread all over the continent in settlement times because of the usefulness of the rot-resistant wood for fence posts, in the days before steel posts. There are few trees more attractive to bees. They have some problems but I would miss them if there were none around.

6/23/09 CREATING GARDEN ROOMS

2009-06-23T20:49:00.012-05:00

Tuesday, 7:30 AM. 56 degrees, wind W, dead calm. The channel is obscured by fog, and the sky is overcast with foggy clouds. It is a quiet and peaceful morning.
Garden rooms are an ancient landscape concept, still viable today. They are spatially separate areas of the landscape (landscape and garden are often synonymous terms) devoted to different aesthetic concepts or different activities. Properly executed, even the smallest property can be made much more interesting, functional and beautiful when divided into “rooms.” One does have to respect and enhance vistas and borrowed views. I offer examples from Garden View, even though they may not be the most exemplary.

The very secluded front garden, with small deck, stone patio and swing.
The very informal perennial garden, with borrowed views.
The porch, with lots of plants and furniture and lake view.
The work area on the side deck, with potting bench and grill.
The picnic area with fire pit, bench, table and old apple tree.
The quite formal, small “herb garden.”
The lower level patio, with tea table, swing, and garden and lake views.

A small lawn ties several of the “rooms” together.

Outdoor rooms can be improved and embellished over time and offer great satisfaction and usefulness. Garden rooms can be delineated by trees, shrubs, and hedges and by walls, fences and other architectural features. They do not have to be completely secluded, but can flow into each other if appropriate. This concept has been handed down from Roman gardens, to Italian and French and English manor gardens, and of course Islamic gardens. Even cottage gardens make use of garden rooms, as do tiny Dutch gardens and many modern American gardens. Give the concept a try in your own garden and landscape, whether small or grand.

6/22/09 RENOIR ROADSIDES

2009-06-22T09:38:00.006-05:00

Monday,8:00 AM. 67 degrees, wind W calm. The channel is glassy. .1” of rain fell last night. The sky is partly cloudy with high, thin white clouds. It is a very quiet morning.
The patch of white cow parsnips on Eighth street has burst into bloom, rather pretty but it is best to leave all things in the Umbelliferae, the parsnip family, alone as many are poisonous and at least one causes acute dermatitis when handled.
The wild rose growing in the ditch on Mannypenny Ave. is the native Rosa blanda, very pretty and with a nice scent.
The roadsides are clothed in wildflowers. These growing on Hwy. 13 between Bayfield and Red Cliff, with orange hawkweed (Hieracium aurantiacum, introduced from Europe with settlement) fronting lupines could be the subject for a Renoir painting.
On Saturday I had a very pleasant surprise. Susan and Kevon from St. Paul stopped by to introduce themselves as avid readers of The Bayfield Almanac. I showed them around Garden View, and hope they were not disappointed, as it is probably not as special as I make it out to be, and certainly not very grand at all.

6/21/09 A "PERFECT TEN" AT THE BEACH

2009-06-21T10:59:00.007-05:00

Sunday, 10:00 AM. 75 degrees, wind W, very light. The channel is smooth, the sky mostly clear with some high, thin white clouds. Today is a “perfect ten.”
The beach was fantastic this morning early, deserted except for a few dogs out walking their owners, and a lone kayaker emerging from the Sioux river. I talked with him for a moment, he was in a neat little Kayak that looked extremely stable, a Walden Scout, he says he often fishes from it. The plants pictured are all natives of the beach and similar environs. The tiny white flower is a Ranunculus species, a white buttercup, which I could not key out exactly without putting in a whole day doing it. The blue is the native Iris versicolor, and the other is another meadow rue, I think either Thalictrum confine or T. venulosum. A large lake freighter is just now going south in the channel, towards Ashland.

6/20/09 THE EYE OF THE MASTER

2009-06-20T09:43:00.006-05:00

Saturday, 8:00 AM. 69 degrees, wind W, brisk. The sky s blue but hazy, the barometer predicts sunny skies. The channel is wrinkled and sailboats are scudding about under full sail. I suspect there may be a small craft warning this afternoon.
Andy, Judy (they are going back to Cedarburg for three weeks) and Myron came to dinner last evening, and we ate out on the porch for the first time this season. It is finally summer, right on schedule. It has been a wonderful spring.
The gardens look as nice as can be, everything blooming at once. I am quite pleased with the overall effect, and things have grown up to provide a great deal of privacy on a small city property. The landscape has “good bones.” Professional plans are a great tool, but the very best landscapes and gardens are those that have been carefully thought out, planted and tended over the years by an owner with a decent sense of esthetics. As we used to say at The New York Botanical Gardens, “the eye of the master is evident,” as it indeed it is in nature itself.

6/19/09 AN EXCEPTIONALLY PRETTY THING

2009-06-19T21:37:00.003-05:00

Friday, 8:00 AM. 66 degrees, wind W, calm. Fog obscures the channel but the sun is trying to burn through. The western sky is mostly clear. The barometer predicts rain, which we got .25” of last night. It is a quiet, fresh morning, with a hint of ozone in the air.
The puffy azure blue flower is meadow rue, Thalictrum dioica, a less-common wild plant of meadows and woods. It is an exceptionally pretty thing.

6/18/09 BEAUTIFUL EXOTICS

2009-06-18T09:55:00.007-05:00

Thursday, 8:00 AM. 66 degrees, wind W, calm. The channel is calm. The sky is quite hazy and the barometer predicts rain.
Andy and Judy had a camp cookout last evening, a fish boil (whole whitefish, heads and all, potatoes, whole onions, all boiled, served with lots of melted butter). There were eight adults and three small children plus the two dogs. The usual suspects were there, plus neighbors whose daughter and kids are visiting from Alaska. She married a young Saudi man who had also attended the U of A, so the children are Saudi-American. He had to stay at home working. It is an unbelievably cosmopolitan world we live in, and events and cultures around the world touch our lives now, no mater where we live in America. We all had a fine time, and the children were a delight.
The ‘Paul’s Scarlet’ English hawthorn in Triangle Park is blooming beautifully, and the red buckeyes we planted last spring on Sixth Street are as well. How much poorer our lives would be if we only accepted the familiar, and did not welcome the exotic.

6/17/09 PRETTY TRUE, OR PRETTY FALSE?

2009-06-17T09:52:00.005-05:00

Wednesday, 8:00 AM. 56 degrees, wind NNE, light. The channel is calm to lightly wrinkled. The sky is clear but the barometer predicts rain.
The woods across the street has large patches of false Solomon’s seal, Smilacina racemosa, growing beneath the oaks. It is very pretty in flower. The “true” Solomon’s seal has flowers borne down the stem rather than at the apex. Both are woods plants in the lily family. I have no idea whether they were used by King Solomon as his seal.
I have finally caught up pretty well with the yard and garden work, and the perennial garden, even though overgrown, is becoming quite nice.

6/16/09 FLOWER WANNABES

2009-06-16T11:35:00.005-05:00

Tuesday, 8:15 AM. 56 degrees, wind N, light. The channel is lightly wrinkled, the sky blue with some high, hazy white clouds. The barometer predicts partly cloudy skies.
Confer cones can be quite as beautiful as flowers. The Colorado spruce in the front yard bears bright purple female cones several inches in length, and the tamarack little rose-bud-like cones the size of a fingernail.
Conifers are far more primitive than flowering plants, without floral parts or fruit (gymnosperm means naked seed). Conifers are basically wind pollinated, so they have no need to attract pollinators with bright, odoriferous flowers. And yet the cones are amazingly flower-like in appearance.
It is as if their form anticipates a yet-to-be determined function. Things evolve, usually over eons of time, and yet the future seems somehow ordained in the present. Just look closely at the cones of conifers; they are virtual flower wannabes.

6/15/09 SEASONS OF INTEREST

2009-06-15T09:40:00.004-05:00

Monday, 8:30 AM. 54 degrees, wind S, calm. The channel is like glass, the sky blue and hazy. The barometer predicts partly cloudy weather. Standing in the shade of the woods on Ninth Street Lucky and I could both see our breath, but it will warm up nicely.
The highbush cranberry, with it’s unusual ray flowers, bears cranberry-like fruit but is actually a Viburnum. This old fashioned pink Wiegela has been blooming for some time but still looks very nice. It is only attractive in bloom, having no other distinguishing characteristics so is not much used anymore. When selecting trees and shrubs for the landscape it is advantageous to select for as many seasons of interest (flower, fruit, fall color, winter form) as possible. The perennial garden is overgrown and too shady but is beginning to bloom and be attractive in spite of its shortcomings.

6/14/09 THE BEACH AS METAPHORE

2009-06-14T10:33:00.005-05:00

Sunday, 9:00 AM. 63 degrees, wind WSW, light. The channel is lightly wrinkled, the sky clear with a few high, puffy white clouds, and the barometer predicts partly cloudy skies. We had a few nice showers yesterday that left a trace of rain in the gauge.
The walk along the beach was exceptional this morning, with sandpipers flitting about decoying their nests.
The primary colonizing plant of our Lake Superior beaches is the beach grass, Amophilla breviligulata, which spreads by tenacious underground rhizomes. There is some confusion as to whether it is strictly native or was introduced by conservationists, since it is a very widespread species. At any rate it does its job very well and is everywhere, forming dense stands on the beaches just back from the water’s edge. It is followed further back from the water by other soil-holding plants such as blueberries, poison ivy, wild roses, meadow sweet, raspberries, and finally sand cherry, dogwoods, red maple, ash and white pine, until at last the northern forest takes over. All this succession can be interrupted at any time by wind, wave and fire. There is a constant dynamic struggle between the water and the land.
In nature some conflicts never end, and the essence of all life is continual struggle for survival and dominance, and a striving toward mystical goals, individual and communal.
The ecology of the beach seems a fitting metaphor for the ecology of the soul.

2009-06-13T15:19:00.005-05:00

6/12/09 IN THE GOOD OLD LUPINE TIME

2009-06-12T14:48:00.006-05:00

Friday, 8:00 AM. 50 degrees, wind W, very light. The channel is glassy, the sky clear, and the barometer predicts partly cloudy skies. The wren in the apple tree is announcing to the world that it is a superb morning.
The lupines, Lupinus perennis, are in bloom everywhere, happily coinciding with the Bayfield in Bloom garden tours that take place tomorrow. I am taking the place signs around to the tour sites this morning. As I have commented before, it is unclear whether our lupines are truly native to the area or are naturalized, and this seems to bother some folks. They are native in the region, and also have long been cultivated, so there has been ample opportunity for their naturalization in fields and along roadsides. Anyway, they are native enough for me, and my advice is to enjoy them for what they are and what they give us, and not to fault them for what they may or may not be.