Fern Shelf

Well I took apart a shelf on the "free table" at school and salvaged the boards. So, here is my fabulous dorky fern shelf. I bought several at botanic garden sales, and the really big one is from the supermarket. They have been getting too much sun now that the sun angle stays low throughout the day, and the big one got fried when I tried to move them, but they'll do better now. They'll be a little higher too.

Luckily frost hasn't been a concern yet. The Staghorn fern (epiphyte on left, attached to board) should probably come inside if we got a frost, as well as the bird's nest fern in the middle. The other haggard-looking one in the middle is the native Woodwardia fimbriata. Supposedly it gets up to 6 feet tall in the woods up north, and I think should be somewhat frost-hardy. I'll need to repot to get it that big, of course. We'll just see if I can keep it alive.
The african violet on the right is just hanging out- obviously not a fern.

Thanks Williams Sonoma

I've made my first cranberry sauce. Recipe from Williams Sonoma online. Only mild trepidations when I wasn't sure what to save- the orange rind boiling WATER, or the orange rind itself. "Drain and set aside" doesn't explain which part to save. And "boil" doesn't seem the correct term for a pan with primarily solid ingredients.

Anyway, it seems to have turned out OK. Luckily I'm not making anything else- just going to a friend's house.

Whew! 2.5 hours to turkey time...

Couldn't help myself

As usual, when my quantitative skills are needed (report due tomorrow), my creativity gets the best of me. This also manifests as a sudden urge to clean the living room.
This time, my new plumeria was just looking beautiful this morning. Well actually I did have a legitimate purpose- I need a photo of a whole leaf to photoshop and make into a logo. Obviously not these photos, but I got a bit carried away. I would have played with these two more (probably burn the bottom part of the one on the right so you can't see the edge of the pot, and also try to burn in some detail on the other one where it's washed out at the top of the leaf).
However, ironically my plant anatomy report calls me. Let's just call this an artistic study in plant anatomy to get my analytical skills flowing? (between us!)

fountaingrass scouting trip

Fieldwork "scouting" trip to San Diego County today. I was looking for fountaingrass Pennisetum setaceum, a weedy grass that's been invasive in Hawaii and is increasingly present along at least the roadsides in southern CA.
Loaded up some herbarium specimen locations on Google Earth and used that as our guide. We managed to find almost all of the locations, plus hundreds more specimens lining the roadsides. Apparently, these are pretty persistent populations.
We were headed into an area recently burned in the fires, and decided that the plants we were looking for were probably burnt. However, we did spot this Arundo (giant reed) plant, with huge sprouts just a couple weeks after the fire. Sadly, these clumps seem undeterred by fire.
Also, sadly, these Christmas trees burned, no doubt the livelihood of a San Diego county family.

Note to self

In four years, I hope to see that this page has documented how nature got me through grad school, or alternately, how grad school got me back to nature.
For now, I hope to post ideas, questions, records of trips and fun. I've traveled a lot in the past, but I won't dwell on the past here.
I hope that soon I'll have some more subject matter. At the moment, my application to NSF is my priority, and there won't be any trips.
"Until then, enjoy our wild America."