by don | Nov 22, 2012
Often lost in the North Shore Road (Road to Nowhere) controversy were the visceral ties to community and sense of place. There is a kind of melancholy intermingled with the surreal beauty of Lake Fontana. The lake is beautiful, no doubt, but it is an unnatural beauty...
by don | Nov 22, 2012
Back in spring of 2011 I wrote about a wetlands restoration project at Lake Junaluska – http://www.smokymountainnews.com/archives/item/3686-a-perfect-fit. Candace Stimson, in order to fulfill her Low Impact Development degree at Haywood Community College,...
by don | Nov 17, 2012
Early mornings kind of go with the territory around here. With work, kids and the never-ending list of chores every homeowner has the wee hours are often the only time one has to exhale. But I’m a crepuscular creature and that suits me just find. Last Sunday morning...
by don | Nov 2, 2012
Finch irruptions are not that uncommon. They generally occur in some numbers, in some locations almost every year. But in some years the movements are larger and more widespread. The winter of 2012-2013 is shaping up to be one of those years. Irruptions are not...
by don | Oct 26, 2012
This morning when I had coffee on my deck I did not hear the hooded warbler that nests in the tangles in the young woods below my yard. I did not hear a northern parula singing from the tops of the tulip poplars. There was no buzzy black-throated blue song emanating...
by don | Oct 18, 2012
Waiting in the ubiquitous checkout line, I spied a National Geographic special publication, “50 of the World’s last great places – Destinations of a Lifetime.” Thumbing through, right between Bialowieza (remnants of ancient European forests on the border of Poland and...
by don | Oct 11, 2012
Or at least a younger one anyway – one of the ranking members of the House’s Committee on Science, Space and Technology, Rep. Paul Broun, (R) Georgia, told a gathering at Liberty Baptist Church in Hartwell, Ga. on Sept. 27 that the world was about 9,000 years old....
by don | Oct 5, 2012
Apparently what was apparent to many scientists and researchers back in 2008 is becoming more apparent – or not. Honeybee Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) has been raising hackles and eyebrows for the better part of the last decade. CCD, characterized by the sudden...
by don | Sep 30, 2012
Foreword The Naturalist’s Corner has been in print since 1994 when I began the weekly outdoors column for Scott McLeod, then editor at Waynesville North Carolina’s Enterprise Mountaineer. When Scott left the Enterprise Mountaineer in 1999 to start his own...
by don | Sep 27, 2012
I had the pleasure of leading 9 women from the Great Smoky Mountains Audubon Chapter on an outing along the Blue Ridge Parkway last Saturday (Sept. 22.) Initially hyped as a birding trip, the early fog and high wind had us focusing on many other aspects of nature. Now...
