New Blog

Here is my new blog:

www.lukabotanical.blogspot.com

The Botanical Adventure in Missouri is over

Thank you all very much for reading my blog, and for your support this summer. I had a great time.

I am interested in keeping a blog going about my photosynthetic friends. Let me know if you have any suggestions for how I can better organize the blog for your enjoyment. Any other comments on what you would like to see more of/less of, or any comment at all is welcome.
I am also interested in somehow including a database of plants that I will update containing my latest notes on identification or uses. Any suggestions?

Thanks again,
Luka


P.S. Here are some pictures from a trip to the Missouri Botanical Garden on my last day.

It's getting to be that time...

My internship in Missouri is slowly coming to an end. There are only a few plots left to sample tomorrow, and then on Thursday a field trip to find some rare plants. This is it. I cannot believe it has gone by so fast.

From the very common Desmodium nudiflorum, to the many great friends, to the elusive Cypripedium reginae, this has been a wonderful summer. Yes, maybe I totalled a car, but it was a good learning experience because I didn't get hurt and insurance covered the cost.

I am excited and looking forward to see how the plant knowledge I may have aquired here in Missouri will face the plants of the northeast. If anything, maybe I'll know my graminoides by genus a bit better than before. :)

This blog isn't over yet, because I am still in Missouri, but I will let you know with an official last post. This blog may turn into the "Botanical Adventure of Maine" or even "of the World", but we'll see. I would like to keep a blog about my botanical interests going beyond Missouri.

The Key to Gnat Protection

Spiders.

Yes spiders.

You may not understand or even hear my tone of voice but perhaps the following explanation will help.

Spiders have been a nuisance throughout the summer. Not the huge ground spiders, but the small ones that build invisible webs across any opening in the forest. I have to keep my arms up when walking so that their webs don't entangle my face and body. The feeling of web on skin is like the sensation of non-bubble chewing gum that you couldn't resist the temptation of blowing into the bubble that is now cemented your face. Except this feeling extends past the outer edges of your lips. Therefore, as beautiful as the spiders here are, there has still been frustration with their presence. Until recently, that is.

An even greater frustration are the gnats. They fly around your head in colonies, trying desperately to get into every orifice they can. One gets used to repeatedly inhaling, swallowing and digesting them. Eyelid reflexes also increase as attempts are made to close eyes before the Kamikaze gnats bury themselves between skin and eyeball.

Then, a discovery was made. While admiring a perfectly constructed web a few weeks ago, I noticed some small flies stuck in it. I had not noticed them before, but then realized why. The gnats around my head were flying into the web I was looking at. I realized the full potential of the spider's creation when I backed up and counted over thirty gnats stuck to the web and no longer buzzing around my head. Peace had been made with the spiders.

Now whenever anyone on the crew or I have a gnat problem, we seek a web and admire it closely in exchange for some silence.