Changing for Spring!

Male American Goldfinch beginning its spring molt

photograph © Bruce A. Morrison

We've really been enjoying the Goldfinches in the yard this winter.  We get around 40-50 birds every year that stay in the pastures around us and visit our feeders! 

Now that spring has arrived, we're getting more and more types of birds from their winter homes, now headed north, but the Goldfinches stay around all year long here.

One thing that is fun watching for is the Goldfinch molt.  We get to watch all the males really change into their spring/summer/fall finery, and it's taking place right now!  The image above is of the same male Goldfinch, just starting to put on the brilliant yellow feathers...little patches here and there.  None of our neighborhood birds has made the complete transition yet...I suspect that will take another week or more (?), but there is one male I noticed that has really made some progress with it's molt (see image below).

This male American Goldfinch is much further along in its change of color!

photograph © Bruce A. Morrison

This female American Goldfinch is not going to be the brilliant "stand-out" that it's male counterpart will be.

photograph - © Bruce A. Morrison

The ladies molt too, of course, but their plumage is much duller in color...kind of an olive hint when they've changed; nothing near the yellow gold of the males.  But "brilliant" or not, the Goldfinches are great having around the prairie pasture and yard all year long!  

As I was walking from the studio to the house this noon, an accipiter flew through the yard, scooping up a Junco for lunch!  It gets pretty exciting at times...high drama in the tallgrass.  I wasn't able to make an ID but judging from size it was either a male Cooper's or a female Sharp-shinned Hawk.  I only had a couple seconds view and it was moving "away" from me as I spotted it.

Aside fom bird activity, other things are undergoing changes for spring now; I'm looking for signs in the prairie here.  We're a bit far north for the Pasques to be in bloom yet but they may take us by surprise one of these days soon.  I have been hearing forb reports from the more southern parts of the state and they definitely are ahead of us!

We are eyeing the pastures here for spring burning also.  We have alternated section burns in the past few springs but may do more this year "if" we find the neighboring pastures being left alone...going to take some communicating before we get started.  

As I've mentioned in past years, it's important to leave some spaces untouched for invertebrate survival each year.  We have been fortunate in past years...the pastures bordering ours have never been burned since we moved here 9 years ago.  

Black and Yellow Argiope (Argiope aurantia) - female

photograph - © Bruce A. Morrison

If your site has a good number of invertebrates, you'll have more birds, reptiles, amphibians, mammals, etc....  In other words - more biodiversity.  Last year we had an amazing number of Black and Yellow Argiope and Banded Argiope spiders in the late summer pasture.  Our dragonflies, robber flies, butterflies, katydids, beetles, bees, wasps, etc, etc. - were amazing!

I know spring has finally arrived...now the games begin for another year!

Winter Prairie Musing

This is somewhat of a double posting from the studio, but not completely cut and pasted per-se.  It really hasn't seemed like a "long" winter here at Prairie Hill Farm.  Georgie and I have been extremely busy and that helps, doesn't it?  But the Tallgrass has been on my mind nearly every moment, I just can't, nor want to shake it.  

My seed from last year's harvest is waiting patiently to stoke up the road ditch this spring.  I wanted to get it in last fall but the weather was very uncooperative!  I hope this spring planting works as well as the last...sometimes I find the fall seeding to come out the best.

Most of my time has been spent painting or drawing the prairie, and doing studio business.  This summer I have a solo exhibit over in Spencer at Arts on Grand, I'll send out more info on that down the road.  It has put me under the gun to produce this winter; the exhibit title is "From the Tallgrass" and I'm working with the prairie as I have the past several years.

"Tallgrass Songster"

8X18" color pencil rendering

© Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view)

I finally finished a piece that is about the third attempt to an idea I first got 6-7 years ago.  The "star" of this drawing is a male Dickcissel belting out it's name, in song form, among the Tallgrass Prairie in bloom.  The bird is taken from a study I did, which is now in the permanent "drawing collection" of the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum in Wausau, Wisconsin.  I have been trying to find a "home" for my study and this is my first "finished" attempt to see if I have!  The foreground is a mix of forbs in a prairie remnant near us that Georgie and I often explore.  The Echinacea (purple coneflowers) are of our county's true native population - Echinacea angustifolia, or "Narrow-leaved Purple Coneflower".  The male Dickcissel is proudly belting out it's name, the call from which the bird was named (virtually sounds like Dick, Dick, cissel).  This is a larger piece for me with color pencil...I find the medium can be exasperating at times and generally stick with small studies instead...but I persevered and finished it this week.

"The Ritter Elevator"

11X19" oil painting

© Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view)

Another work finished earlier, was an oil painting that was "kind of" different for me; it was a commissioned work done for a client commemorating (if-you-will) her trips to the grain elevator with her father, back when she was a child.  The elevator is one I'm very familiar with, have driven past and around it for 30+ years.  What I didn't know were some of the history and stories behind the "Ritter Elevator" - was fun to research and depict the elevator during the early 1950's!  The red IH box truck was my client's father's truck.  I took the rest of the vehicles from the area and other sources...the red tractor is my neighbor's father's Farmall "M" and their flarebox wagon (did repaint that a different color though).  I do like doing work depicting the agricultural environment/landscape and felt this was actually a good fit.  I've said it before and will likely again - the Tallgrass Prairie made this state what it is today and without that natural heritage, we would not have that "black gold" the prairie gave us - the soil.  After handing the painting over to it's new owner, I asked her if I could have permission to share it with you here - she was very happy to!

My first "Morrison's Studio Newsletter" (Vol.1, No.1) went out this week!  If you'd like to sign up for it, there's a link to the form right along the sidebar to this blog...if you get this blog via e-mail you can go directly to the form by way of this link -

http://www.morrisons-studio.com/Newsletter%20page.htm

The Tallgrass up here is still under snow and ice!  I'll just keep working on it here in the studio...makes the time I can be outside all day come quicker!   Hope yours is thawing and growing soon! 

See ya on the Tallgrass!

Prairie on Paper

"Yellow Coneflower"

(Ratibida pinnata)

Color Pencil - 5X7" © Bruce A. Morrison

I'm double posting from my art blog this time...I think it can relate to the tallgrass!  

I've been delving in the prairie vicariously through my drawing lately.  If you can't go to the prairie "physically", then why not mentally or on the tactile surface of the paper in front of you?!  

My subject matter is likely one of the most common forbs (flowers) from the prairie, and can be found anywhere that allows it a seed bed.  But I love this plant, no matter how common place it may be.  And I look forward to gathering it's seed every fall...man what an amazing smell from a handful of seed!  If you've never collected it, I'll not try and describe it - just try it for yourself some fall.

I called this plant "prairie coneflower" for years, until I was corrected one day, being told it was a "Gray-headed Coneflower"  I had the scientific name correct - Ratibida pinnata, but was never keen on gray-headed...just doesn't sound appealing does it?  Well several months ago I got my new edition of  "Wildflowers of the Tallgrass Prairie" by Runkel and Roosa and the name given it there is "Yellow Coneflower"...I can live with that!  :)  So I'm titling the drawing at the beginning of this blog Entry "Yellow Coneflowers" and I'll throw in the Ratibida pinnata to boot, making it official and correct.

I may do a drawing of "Prairie Coneflowers" one of these days...that's Ratibida columnifera to you sticklers out there!  :)  They grow in our pasture as well, occurring naturally in this SE corner of O'Brien County.

Been working on this piece and others off and on since Thanksgiving...may plant a few more forbs on paper...or a landscape to wander through.  In the meantime I'm still finishing commissioned painting work...but a walk through the prairie in my mind is still a refreshing respite!  

Hope you agree!   See you on the Tallgrass!

Happy New Year on the Tallgrass!

2010 is on it's last legs here.  As I write this entry we're in a unusual weather event...instead of a blizzard, it's pouring rain and sleet; soon to be just snow.  Weird stuff for the last day of the year to be sure!

I was out on the pasture this week with the snow shoes; it is very retrospective to view things now that they are under winter's blanket.  Many vole holes appear here and there, as do tunnel ridges traveling to and from buried seed heads.  I always shake my head in wonder at how nature copes in the extremes...the snow's crust is now hardened by the weather change and, for those left "on top", things are going to get difficult!!!

The video at the top of this blog is a scene taken out one of the studio windows...kind of a "snow globe"  gift to you.  If you are an email subscriber to this blog, the video won't show up...you can either go directly to the blog (http://tallgrassjournal.blogspot.com/) or visit this link on You Tube -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzukbeAnzXs

I want to take a moment to wish all of you out there a prosperous and HAPPY NEW YEAR!

See you on the Tallgrass in 2011!!!

Best Holiday Wishes!

Winter on the Tallgrass

Well the solstice is past us now...the days will start to get longer!  OK, not by much at first but it's the thought that counts!  Hope you had a chance to view the total lunar eclipse on the solstice!  That will never happen again in our life time.  I had all my camera gear set and ready to go but when I got up at 1:30 a.m. to check it out here, the sky was still overcast and not any sign of even where the moon was.  Luck of the draw I guess.

The native pasture here is now pretty much buried in snow...we had a blizzard a week and a half ago and the 50+ mph winds and 6" of snow pretty much plastered everything down and buried the majority of it.  I think the voles and mice will have a bountiful winter with all the seed heads buried beneath where they are now living!

We've had a pair of Great Horned Owls in the pasture and yard each night for the past 2-3 weeks.  I think their efforts will be a little more hampered now, but even the rodents make a "snow top" run for it every now and then...and our bird feeders seem to suppy enough rodent fodder, so maybe the owls are just waiting for bird seed visitors?!

Been seeing a few deer around but the hunting season is on so they're a bit wary.  Know they're traveling about because their tracks are up and down the driveway each night and through the yard each morning.  Even the Coyotes are tracking through the yard, we had a fresh set of prints this morning outside the kitchen window.

Wanted to take a moment to wish everyone a great Christmas, holiday season, and a wonderful and prosperous New Year in 2011!

See you next year on the Tallgrass!

A Tallgrass Year

Purple Prairie Clover (Dalea purpurea)

Photograph © Bruce A. Morrison

Thank you to those folks who came to the Prairie Heritage Center for the Prairie program Thursday evening...although my voice gave out early on, you hung in there!

If you weren't able to make it to the center, I'm going to post the first part of the program which was a media program, recorded with images and audio from our prairie here at Prairie Hill Farm.  I should state "most" of the images were from here; they were all shot within a 35 mile radius of here but at least 90% were here on our property.  The music soundtrack was licensed through CSS Music, Inc.

The web address for "A Tallgrass Year" is -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjlGSSd_0Uw

We're very busy here at the studio, with the Christmas season upon us, but if you're in the area and want to stop by, please feel free!

See you on the Tallgrass!

Tallgrass On My Mind

Soldier Beetle ( family Cantharidae) on Heliopsis helianthoides

This entry is a reposting of my Prairie Hill Farm blog from yesterday...it is strictly prairie related so thought it'd be a good fit for the A Tallgrass Journal blog as well.

I've mentioned the Prairie Heritage Center before...it is a gem in the extreme SE corner of our county (O'Brien).  There is an exhibit of the tallgrass prairie at the center, running now and through January 6, 2011.  The exhibit is a state traveling exhibit entitled "Tallgrass Prairie - Past, Present, and Future", and is a great exhibit for all ages to see, enjoy and walk through!

With this exhibit, the host organization is responsible for putting on a program in conjunction with the exhibit theme.  I was asked if I'd be willing to do so and agreed...prairie is near and very dear to my heart and I'm always happy to speak on this subject!

The Prairie Heritage Center is calling the program "Colors of the Prairie".  I've put together a short media program which will be followed by "colors of the prairie" and a discussion of my experiences and personal viewpoint of the Tallgrass Prairie.  The program will take place at the Prairie Heritage Center on December 2nd at 7 p.m - that's this coming Thursday night, so if you have an opportunity to get away for a short evening event - be sure and stop by!

For those of you who may not have been to the Prairie Heritage Center, directions are "east" of Sutherland, Iowa on HY 10, or "west" of Peterson, Iowa on Hwy 10...or 4931 Yellow Avenue, Peterson, Iowa.  You can also call for more information at (712) 295-7200!

 

See You on the Tallgrass!