A couple of weeks ago, I mourned the loss of little hill in Michigan called Eagle Top. This week I’d like to celebrate a place that — unlike Eagle Top — has been preserved in all its wild and pastoral beauty – the vast triangle of land along the California coast known as Point Reyes, and especially the narrow outcropping called Chimney Rock.
nature
On the Shores of Lake Michigan — Eagle Top, a Wild Place Tamed
Somebody owns Eagle Top. They bought it ten years ago and built a cottage on it. I didn’t think it was possible to buy, sell or own Eagle Top. Eagle Top was a wild place. I thought it belonged to itself. Read more.
Purple Bearded Irises — Close Up and (Very) Personal
There’s a heck of a lot of erotica going on inside an iris blossom. Stamen. Pistel. Haft. Claws. And, of course, those fuzzy, caterpillar-like beards. Read more.
Confessions of a Carnivore: Why Eating Meat is OK — Sorta
I don’t see a clear difference between slaughtering a pig and cutting down a seven-story tree. Between netting the wild salmon I eat for dinner and harvesting my breakfast oats. Faced with a choice between killing a pig and killing the tree in our backyard – I’d kill the pig. Read more.
In My Rain-Battered Garden — Nothing Is Forever, Not Even Those Poppies
St. Jerome kept a human skull on his desk to remind him of his mortality. We gardeners don’t need a skull . We’ve got stuff dying on us every day. Read more.
It’s Spring in Our Brilliant, Bursting, Buzzing Front Yard
I live in California where spring peaks in March. And by last week the little patch of hillside that is our front yard was alive with color. Read more.
Yosemite — More Beautiful than the Himalayas?
Is the Yosemite high country even more beautiful than the Himalayas? My hiking pal Al Aistrope thinks so. Read more.