Red Sky In The Morning

Day 55: "Red sky in the morning / Sailor take warning / Red sky at night / Sailor's delight" is an aphorism based in observation, i.e., if clouds are painted by a rising sun, unsettled weather is forthcoming. Conversely, if skies are sufficiently open below the horizon that the sinking sun can turn evening clouds rosy, a clearing trend will ensue. At least that's the logic behind the rhyme here in the Pacific Northwest, although we seldom trust to any promise of sunny days. This morning's sunrise was particularly vivid to the southeast. The Mountain, however, was shrouded by greyer, lumpy wool: a quilt batting gone sour with moisture and mildew, heaped on the foothills without a hint of warmth in its layers. Still, I heard the crows calling up the dawn, revelling in a riot of colours visible only to their more discriminating and sensitive avian eyes. That thought was enough to make me wonder, "What am I not seeing here?" even as I marvelled at the sight.

The Bird Tree

Day 54: It's St. Nicholas' Day, and that means it was time to put up the Christmas tree. This has become my tradition, although it was not one which carried over from my childhood. The decorations have gone through several iterations, but when I no longer had a life-partner with whom to share the holidays, birds began to dominate the boughs. Nowaways, at least 90% of my ornaments are birds, the remainder largely dedicated to other creatures from nature such as frogs, a caterpillar on a leaf, a beehive and a few sheep. To be sure, there are snowflakes and icicles as well, presented as backdrops for my avian horde. One might notice a preponderance of cockatoos and to a lesser extent parrots, nods to feathered family members long gone but no less dear for the passage of time. I do not celebrate Christmas in the traditional sense, but rather as a somewhat tardy acknowledgement of the Solstice, a festival of light and renewal, and of remembrance.

Old Dog, New Trick

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Day 53: This old dog has learned a new trick: nålbinding (or at least the Oslo stitch, so far). I happened across the word in reading about språng, and from hereon out, I'm going to dispense with the diacritical marks for the sake of my English-speaking readership. Indeed, nalbinding can be spelled multiple ways including naalbinding, nalebinding, nalbindning or naalebinding, depending on what part of Scandinavia you're in. The term was only coined during the 1970s and means "needle-binding," although the process has been documented from 6500 BCE. You can read more in Wikipedia if you're curious, and especially since that is currently my main source for its history. Traditionally, it is done with a large-eyed flat and somewhat blunt needle made of wood, bone or horn, but not having one handy, I made do with a yarn needle to create a pair of wristlets. It took a few false starts. In fact, I still have a tendency to make a Möbius strip when starting the second row if I'm not paying close attention to my work. Strangely enough, once I had completed a sample piece, I recognized the technique as something I'd seen before and assumed was knit. Apparently, even the experts have some difficulty telling whether a piece is nalbound or knit when certain stitches have been used. Oslo stitch appears almost braided, and in worsted, makes a very dense textile with an attractive surface character. It has very little horizonal elasticity (i.e., following the direction of the rows) but is somewhat more stretchy on the vertical. The major drawback of the technique is that it must be done with short sections of yarn because the full length must be drawn through the loops as each stitch is made. When worked in wool, new strands are joined by felting, but in synthetics, the needleartist winds up with a lot of tails to tuck. Each wristlet was made over 25 stitches and required two 10-yard lengths of yarn to complete five rounds. Oh yeah, my real needles will arrive Monday. I like nalbinding.

Recommended By Experts

Day 52: Day before yesterday, I received an early Christmas present in the mail with no clue as to the sender save for the return address of the bookseller, but that was a dead give-away. I immediately sat down and wrote Arnie a letter of thanks. The arrival of the book was remarkably timely; I had been eyeing the ads for it in Scientific American and was very close to ordering it for myself because...well, because you just can't go wrong when David Sibley is talking about birds. His expertise is only surpassed by that of the birds themselves and, such being the case, I thought I'd put it to the ultimate expert for final approval. A bribe of a few sunflower seeds was all it took. "What It's Like To Be A Bird" has the official Beak of Approval from Mr. Dee.

How Many Angels...

Day 51: I think I may have come close to answering the age-old question of, "How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?" The mob of Porch Parrots (Coccothraustes vespertinus, aka Evening Grosbeaks) descended on the feeders (three feeders, mind you) as soon as I laid out seed, and it was "flapping room only" here when occupancy achieved eight, four on each side. Nine or ten managed to crowd into the two pole-mounted dispensers, but many harsh "CHURP" objections could be heard even from inside the house. Although this image only shows the males, there were ladies present in this flock, unlike the group which came a week or so ago which consisted entirely of boys.

Starring Role

Day 50: "Lifesaver Plant" (Huernia zebrina) is another one of those forgiving, go-ahead-and-ignore-me houseplants no one should be without. Unlike its cousin Huernia procumbens, whose sole mission in life appears to be to sprawl with abandon and drop bits of itself in other flower pots, zebrina rewards the lack of care it receives from its grower with displays of star-shaped blooms several times a year. The raised disk in the center of each flower give it its common name, and each one has more freckles on its face than Huckleberry Finn. Starts may be made by taking a section of the foliage and sticking the end down in soil, keeping it damp until it takes root. Indeed, segments may root themselves wherever they touch down. The "spines" are soft rather than spiky. I think of Huernia zebrina as a "happy plant," content to play its starring role without any great coaching on my part.

Sporophytes On Ice

Day 49: Think about this for a minute. What vegetation can be found in cold climates like the arctic tundra? Why, mosses and lichens, of course! While some vascular plants can withstand freezing temperatures, many others die off as soon as Jack Frost touches them with his paintbrush. What's so special about mosses and lichens in this regard? The answer may be in some part their ability to accumulate sugars in their cells. As cell walls shrink due to dessication, the sugars in the interior of the cell are concentrated into a smaller area, thus lowering the freezing point. Mosses and lichens can adapt quickly to even minor elevations in temperature, thus making it possible to uptake sugars on relatively short notice in a cycle of freeze-thaw events. Although we tend to think of mosses and lichens as primitive, they actually have some pretty clever survival strategies.