slabtown – Page 2 – Black and White

sunrise

Town Creek AM — Yesterday a tractor trailer was blown off the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel, winds were gusting to 45 mph, snow fell. The water here was churned to the horizon. This morning it is like a millpond. Another day.

Overexposed

dreadfully overexposed but I like it regardless. These birds make me happy, big feet, big beak.

riparian buffer 02

5 foot tubes for deer browse control — nine months later.

untitled

150725-tennis-ball

ephemeron

yard sale find — P.S. Reed is my name, Richmond is my station, protestant is my belief, Heaven my expectation and when I am dead and all my bones are rotten this little book will tell my name when I am quite forgotten. P.S. Reed”

Butorides virescens

heron — Green herons are one of the few species of animal known to use tools. In particular, they commonly use bread crusts, insects, or other items as bait. The bait is dropped onto the surface of a body of water in order to lure fish. When a fish takes the bait, the green heron will then grab and eat the fish.–Wikipedia

Town Creek

slabtown — Outside the window, deer, deadrise

snake in the grass

black snake — I hope black snakes eat moles and voles…

two parent household Branta canadensis

geese and goslings — During the second year of their lives, Canada geese find a mate. They are monogamous, and most couples stay together all of their lives. If one dies, the other may find a new mate. The female lays from two to nine eggs with an average of five, and both parents protect the nest while the eggs incubate, but the female spends more time at the nest than the male.–Wikipedia

These geese have gone native, they no longer migrate.

Maladera castanea

picking them off by hand — Maladera castanea (the asiatic garden beetle) flies and eats at night.
AGBs belong to the order Coleoptera. The order contains more species than any other order, constituting almost 25% of all known life-forms.
I am having a yearly run in with these insects. They function like a self reproducing electric utility. They top trees, preferentially feeding on new growth at the top of trees: “the terminal leader”.
The AGB is a major drag on my afforestation effort. The establishment of a forest or stand of trees in an area where there hasn’t been forest for centuries is a challenge. All the complexity has been removed, roots, biomass, beneficial fungi, and that has created a zone that is remarkably hostile to young trees, a fragile system.
Complexity is good in natural systems. When people farm, the complex system is removed. The dirt remains, to be used as a media for the desired plant making chemicals to promote growth and chemicals to control insects necessary.