Outdoors: Page 28

It’s About Time – April 2013

About Time

April is the month we’ll be saying goodbye to most of the wintering waterfowl. I am going to miss the buffleheads. The resident early birds have already started nesting while many migrants are just arriving. They will be checking to see if the old nest is suitable for refurbishing for another season. If it is, they will soon start singing songs of domestic joy. The bushtit flocks don’t break up while nesting and feeding young. They do forage by themselves now, unaccompanied by their usual winter companions, juncoes and chickadees. Continue reading →

Who Got Game?

Why so few African-American hunters?

Outdoors

I recently took a short drive north to interview Donny Adair, president of the Afro-American Hunting Association. Adair is a Pacific Northwest outdoorsman who’s hunted everything from burly southern whitetail deer to the wild turkeys of Eugene. The former UO student and current Portland resident had a lot to say about his mission to promote hunting and outdoor pastimes among the African-American community. Continue reading →

It’s About Time – March 2013

About Time

Watching ducks on the Delta Ponds keeps me entertained. Shovelers continue their circle dances this month, the males trying to pair bond before heading north in April for nesting season. You still have time to experience this courtship ritual unless you choose the rare sunny morning when they line up on a log to bask in the warm rays. Continue reading →

Take Your Temperature

Planting vegetables before May

Gardening

Until this year, a month-by-month portion of Eugene Weekly’s annual vegetable planting guide began in May. In a way, that’s logical — May is about when our heavier valley soils become workable. These days, however, with many people building raised beds and all-season gardening becoming ever more popular, lots of gardeners know that the planting year can start a lot earlier.  Continue reading →

EW’s Planting Guide 2013

Gardening

Asparagus Cultivation: Plant 1- or 2-year-old crowns during March, spacing them 12 inches apart in trenches 8 inches deep. Hold off on harvesting spears during the first year for stronger plants the following year. Soil/Sun: Loose, rich, well-drained soil with a high pH. Full sun to partial shade. Suggested Varieties: Mary Washington, Jersey Giant, Jersey Knight Purple Passion.   Arugula Cultivation: Sow March through June, and in fall.  Suggested Varieties: Sylvetta; Roquette   Continue reading →

Winter at Silver Falls

Waterfalls and icicles abound

Outdoors

Silver Falls State Park is Oregon’s largest state park, with more than 9,000 acres to explore. The early American history of the area included private ownership of South Falls. The owner pushed old cars into the canyon and charged 10 cents to see the falls. Thankfully that insane use of such a fantastic area has ended. Early logging removed much of the massive trees that once surrounded the incredible falls in the area. American activity around Silver Falls in the early years of settlement was based primarily on exploitation. Continue reading →

It’s About Time – February 2013

About Time

Why do mosses and lichens fall out of the trees in winter? Close to the end of every year, clumps of moss and lichen appear around almost every oak and maple tree in town. These are the branch species, different from terrestrial mosses and lichens. It is most prominent in parks where the lawn hasn’t been mowed since late fall. For years I attributed the lichen rain to wind storms, but that never struck me as the whole story. A comment in the Mount Pisgah Arboretum newsletter by its caretaker made a light go on in my head. Continue reading →

Are We Getting Warmer?

Planting for a disrupted climate

Gardening

The numbers are in, says The New York Times: 2012 was the hottest year ever recorded in the contiguous U.S. 2012 also turned out to be the second-worst on record for climate extremes, amassing 11 weather disasters that exceeded $1 billion in costs, including tornadoes, freak storms, floods and catastrophic drought. Globally, the decade from 2000 to 2010 was the warmest on record. Nobody who is under 28 has lived through a month of global temperatures that fell below the 20th century average, because the last such month was February 1985. Welcome to a warmer world.  Continue reading →