A view while laying on the forest floor at Zaleski State Forest.
Tag Archives: Ohio
Camping at Zaleski State Forest
This Labor Day weekend, Jenn, Matt and I went backpacking at Zaleski State Forest, Ohio. The forest is south of Wayne National Forest and surrounds parts of Lake Hope State Park. Oaks appeared to be the dominate tree in the sandy soils, particularly Swamp White Oak, and, as a result, there was a constant barrage of acorns heavily thumping on the ground around us.
Most of the trip was dedicated to eating – I brought and ate some Johnsonville sausage over rice and washed it down with some freshly made coffee using the French press below. Good stuff.
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A couple of Bog flowers with low depth-of-field
Marsh St. Johnswort (Triadenum virginicum) and Three-way Sedge (Dulichium arundinaceum).
Welcome Class of 2014
In celebration of the start of a new academic year, Kent State sponsors a concert and a competitive array of fireworks. The show was pretty extravagant, given that it’s a celebration of incoming students into one university – an event that seems certainly worthy of celebration, after all, ‘they’ are the future, but it was a little over the top for me.
Anyway, I gave photographing the show a shot; Night photography is very different and difficult, but here’s a few.
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Black Squirrel Triathlon 2010
Pat, Allison and I recently participated in the 2nd annual Black Squirrel Triathlon in Kent, which involved a 2 mi canoe down the Cuyahoga River, 2.5 mi run and a 10 mi bike. I don’t know our times or our place… but if I find out, I’ll post it. Here are a few photos from the day, including some of Emma-Lisa, who is a former graduate student and office-mate of mine at Kent.
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Jenn’s Flowers
Desmognathus ochrophaeus
Northern Dusky Salamander caught in Triple Springs Creek in West Branch State Park, Ravenna, Ohio.
Snake predation
In Palo Verde, a student noticed this Leptophis mexicanus preying on a tree frog (I think it’s Smilisca baudinii). This is the second time I was able to observe a Leptophis attack a frog, although this occasion was quite different, given that the snake had captured the frog by the hind legs; the frog made distress calls and the snake had some difficulty dragging and controling its prey.
Additionally, I’ve been feeding frozen rats to the two corn snakes I’ve recently inherited. Below is 1 (that’s its name) gulping down a rat.
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Rocky sleeps
Rocky, my pet Eastern Box Turtle, tends to sleep in peculiar positions. I’m rarely able to get my camera before he notices, wakes up and shifts positions, but I managed to snap this photograph of him using his bark home as a pillow before he awoke.
Spring Peeper
Although there were a few instances when wood frog calls were heard, the only species of anuran we caught or saw at this week’s trip to Cuyahoga Valley National Park was Psuedacris crucifer. Unfortunately, the frogs did not seem to be as active or abundant this year as in the past, when we would regularly see peepers calling, wood frogs mating (even with green frogs), and hear little else than a deafening buzz of frog calls.
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