2016 was the year of the hawks and the fox at our home in southeast Urbana. We saw four fledging hawks grow to adulthood in July and August. And late in the fall we watched transfixed as a red fox enjoyed a little me-time in the fallen leaves outside our kitchen window. When my wife Lois first...

There's a miniature prairie nearby, a gem of green space under an open sky in a neighborhood shadowed by mature trees. It is rich in native plantings, and is attracting quite a variety of wildlife. Casual visitors are surprised to learn it is not a park, but a retention pond built by the City of...

You might actually know this plant more for its mottled leaves than for its flower. White Dogtooth Violet, Erythronium albidum, is a delicate, early spring, native perennial; it is usually found in colonies and has an affinity for moist soil on gentle woodland slopes. The word "Dogtooth" appears in...

Great White Swamp Oak Beech Each of us has a favorite "heart" tree. Whether you remember climbing a weeping willow as a child, planting a small apple tree and watching it grow, or pausing in a hike under a glorious oak or maple, most of us sense a satisfying alignment and affinity to special trees...

We had some interesting encounters with nature in Texas this year when we went down to spend Thanksgiving week with our sons. The day we arrived in north Austin this guy was standing in the middle of the road a couple of blocks from our rental house as we were driving home from dinner. It seemed...

A two-century-old homestead site, turned into a public garden, once had a large wood lot for fuel. The wood lot, part of the upland forest along the upper reaches of the Sangamon River corridor, is now declining. Huge earthbound white oaks spatter the wood lot's western cusp with snags and...

As a group we Master Naturalists are a hopeful bunch. Just about all of our work anticipates future rewards. And so it is with the "pollinator pocket" my wife Cathy and I began two years ago. First, of course, we had to go to the Grand Prairie Friends plant sale. We got a Missouri ironweed, a...

The words 'carnivorous' and 'butterfly' aren't often used in the same sentence outside of fifties-era grade B monster movies. But a chance encounter in my back yard set off a flurry of research into the lifestyle of this singular species. Meet Feniseca tarquinius, the Harvester. It is North...

While hiking the trail along the rim of Kilauea Iki volcano crater on the Big Island of Hawaii last July, we came across a dazzling beauty of a plant. It had multiple tiers of yellow flowers off a single central stem. As we neared the end of the trail, we came across knobby growth covering large...

Late winter, frightened winter, winter that knows it's losing its grip on the earth. Late winter can't hold rivers in suspension like stone or hardened iron. Rivers are quietly coming to life, moving through the heart of Illinois like new blood coursing through the veins of winter's victim. Last...

While wandering the grassy side paths at Meadowbrook Park, I stepped into a colony of medium-sized brown butterflies with circular orange and black markings on their forewings. It turns out they were Common Buckeye Butterflies (Junonia coenia). The markings are apparently a form of protective...

NATURALIST N ature A bounding with T errain U rban R ural A ll around L and forms I slands in lakes and oceans S...

Save the date!

On a chilly March evening my wife Cathy and I stood in the starlight facing a nearly invisible wetland. We were listening to what sounded like thousands of tiny sleigh bells tinkling in the darkness, but was actually the calls of male spring peepers competing for mates. We listened for perhaps...

Most of us who live or spend time in rural (and not so rural) areas have seen them, slender canines with long bushy tails usually casually loping away from us. Some of us are thrilled to spot east central Illinois' largest carnivore; others abhor them. Most of us are just surprised. However you...