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Winding Pathways encourages you to create a wonderous yard, whether that yard is an expansive acreage, a suburban lot or a condominium balcony. Go outside and play!
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Why Is There a Snake in My Garden?
On a July evening, Rich reached down to pick string beans and was startled to spot a garter snake peering up at him from beneath a plant. We’ve seen the three-foot-long snake many times this year around the yard but it seems to particularly like lounging in shade cast...
How Parents Help Our Fledglings – birds and people
Watching baby wrens fledge.
Prairie Renaissance Part Five
Learning from the Prairie Wow. It’s August! We recently completed a management step on the prairie planted in early June. Weeds were outgrowing infant prairie plants that need sunshine. We buzzed off the weeds at the highest setting possible on our battery-powered...
How We Have Spent Our Time in The Great Pause
Guest Bloggers Reply Readers offered their activities in The Great Pause. Most were home-centered with some careful forays into society. And, of course, connecting with self and nature. SA: My mother was in a nursing home in Bettendorf. Visitors were prohibited but I...
Can a Chickadee Give Us Joy?
How enchanting the spring birds are. Read one guest blogger’s experience.
Why Do Raccoons Tear Up Feeders?
What to Do About Raccoons One June morning we peered out our dining room window to see bird feeder carnage. The shepherd’s hook that holds up suet and seed feeders were bent and the board it was anchored in shattered. The feeders were gone. One we later found in the...
What To Do About Cats Under the Feeder
One morning while watching the arrival of spring migrant birds, we were startled and annoyed to see a cat lurking under the feeder seeking a bird victim. We so enjoy the Summer and Scarlet Tanagers, and Indigo Buntings at our feeders. They add diversity to our usual...
Prairie Renaissance Tools of the Trade
Prairie Seedlings Tuesday, June 2nd was an exciting day. We walked to our 3,000 square foot patch of dirt that, until recently had been a lawn, and spotted bits of feathery green poking through the dirt. They were baby partridge peas, scattered somewhat evenly through...
What Did You Do In the Great Pause?
We are fully into summer and still pausing as SARS-CoV-2 and the subsequent disease COVID-19 resurges. So, looking back how did you manage from Mid-March through now? What interesting activities did you do? How did you connect with Nature? How did you nurture...
Why Do You “Shoot” Birds?
She feeds 'em. I shoot 'em. Guest Bloggers STB Yes, this sounds like a love/hate relationship. But, it is truly pure enjoyment for my wife and me to witness the birds that visit our backyard feeder here in SE Minnesota. Throughout the year a variety of birds comes...
Who is Mistress Mary?
Another beautiful, blue-sky day. This early morning I am drinking tea and looking out the patio windows. As I enjoy the view of the freshly cut lawn and watch the birds flit about, a bit of busy-ness above the deck catches my attention. A small, loose clump of grey...
Scarlet Tanagers
We’re lucky. Scarlet tanagers nest near us. Winding Pathways abuts Faulkes Heritage Woods, a protected 110-acre forest of mostly monstrous oak trees. So, every May we’re delighted as this brilliant bird arrives and sets up home. Male scarlet tanagers appear at our...
Would You Sit With George Floyd and the Policemen?
We wish that we could have sat on our back deck with George Floyd and the policemen who caused his tragic death. This may sound strange. Yet, we know the healing power of nature. We wish that they and all could experience the peacefulness of the trees, grasses,...
Goose Daycare
We like geese. Yes, they leave piles of poop on trails and urban grassy areas. And, that is a pain. We’re not fond of running the gauntlet of goose dirt on the sidewalk. Still, we like geese. They recently made us laugh with an antic we found hysterical. While driving...
Toads in Spring
For many years Rich wrote a nature column for the Cedar Rapids GAZETTE about little known aspects of natural history common in suburbia. He was amazed when more people responded to a column on toads than anything else he had written. People like toads. Some readers...
Prairie Renaissance continued
Planting Day Saturday, May 9th was our big day. We planted our newest prairie and we’ll tell you how after we explain the ground preparation we did before a single seed was dropped to the ground. We’ve established several prairies with no ground preparation by simply...