A Visit to the Planetarium

Today, I visited the John C. Wells Planetarium at James Madison University where they offer two free shows most months. This month they are showing A Part of the Sky Called Orion and To Space and Back.  JMU students give an informative and entertaining star talk after each film.  I saw both films and heard two star talks today.  The first show was suited more to families with younger kids.  The second show was suitable for general audiences, but it was more of a feature for adults and older kids. Such is the show pattern on Saturdays at the planetarium.

The show on Orion told how three historic cultures interpreted the constellation Orion.  The folklore was pretty cool.  After the film the song I'm Coming Out played while the GOTO Chronos opto-mechanical star projector dramatically rose from its casing. Since I am internally seven years old, I thought this was THE BEST THING EVER!!!

Just look at that big purple bad boy!

We got to photograph it after the family star talk.

And check out this meteorite and its little push-pin pal (front) in their meteorite exhibit!

The To Space and Back show was especially interesting and well presented.  It gives a short overview of how space based and space influenced technology makes our lives better on Earth.  I really liked how this film made good use of the planetarium's shape to show enormous striking images.  I have been to a few planetarium shows that felt like watching a filmstrip under a dome- not this one though.  This one was a visual treat.

The star talks are fun as well.  Viewers learn how to find seasonal constellations.  This planetarium is also a great advocate for dark sky and less light pollution.

It was a great free thing for a dreary Saturday.  On some clear Saturdays, they set up the solar telescope; looking at the sun is also a great opportunity!  JMU also offers nighttime star observation parties.  While I have heard a good review of these, sadly, I have not yet attended one of their star parties.

Old Nature Reading for a New Year

This year, I am reading an 1848 translation and reprint of Christoph Christian Sturm's 18th century daily devotional, Reflections on the Works of God, and His Providence Throughout All Nature.  Here is the Goodreads author's page for the Rev. Sturm.  Clicky

As may be deduced by the title, Sturm writes a brief segment for each day on the natural world in the corresponding time of year and how God may be seen through seasonal events. Yesterday, for New Year's Day, we were reminded that God has watched over us from birth and will continue to care for us in the new year even if it has bad parts.  Today's reading notes that winter is bleak, but we have all that is needed for our comfort in winter and should be thankful.

I read ahead a bit after buying the book and opened up to a warm day on which Sturm was amazed at the vast multitude of gnats that God made.  Sturm got pretty giddy about all the gnats; that's my kind of guy!

Although my edition came with a rather puritanical introduction, Sturm himself seems contemporary, positive and broadminded in his theology thus far.  So hopefully this will translate across the years and distance and be a nice devotional tool. I also enjoy the grand language used by Sturm and the translator; my favorite word so far was "sublunar".

I first learned of this book when working with regionally published copies at the library.  My own imprint is from a local book dealer and was a personal copy.  The woman who checked me out  when I bought it noticed a relative's signature and the date 1956 inside.  How cool is that?!  It is a small world here in the Shenandoah Valley.
Sadly, my copy isn't in such good condition.

I wanted to invest in a hard copy, but you can also join in the nature devotions for free online.  Sturm, once very popular, has been digitized!

So, Happy New Year, and as the Rev. Sturm wrote for January 2 back in the 1700s, "Let us only bestow more attention to the works of nature, and we shall never find occasion to arraign the wisdom of God...all tends to one grand point, the glory of God, and the happiness of man." p. 12

Critters On My Frontier

Since moving to my small Frontier (acre in the suburban countryside), I have been able to host several critters.

There were already bluebird houses here.  Seven bluebirds auspiciously flew over the house when I first visited in the winter.  Sadly, there have been few bluebird since then.  Perhaps they are afraid of the outdoor cat, although I have never seen the outdoor cat hunt.  He much prefers to instead lounge all day, visit with his cat friends, and receive cat food.  

Anyway, some other birds moved in this spring, including a lovely swallow couple.  They are always nice to watch and can be very approachable when they are not nesting.  When they are nesting, they are territorial and engage in scary bluff attacks on the people who are trying to mow the lawn.

My second attempt to attract birds was purchasing a screech owl house. The house is cedar.  It faces East.  It is lined with cedar chips.  An owl has not yet moved there.  European Starlings nested in the house earlier this year.  I understand another owl nesting window of time is now here, so fingers crossed on attracting an owl.  Here is a

 selfie picture with the owl house.  I climbed the tree to install it.

Then, there are the cats.  I understand  that they are non-native bird eaters, but I am also a non-native bird eater, as are many of us.  Here is Dandelion inside and feral Bucher outside.  Bucher was a member of a feral cat colony, but he joined my cats and me and became very attached to us at the last place where we lived.  He stopped using the feral colony's resources in favor of sitting in my yard all day and night.  I was able to trap and move him here with permission and help from the feral cat colony's manager. Although he has some mannerisms of a pet, like his goofy pose shown below, he is very skittish and avoids direct contact.

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My latest venture is housing mason bees.  Several mason bees visited the flowers here in the spring and summer.  I read that hosting these native bees is now a "thing."  It is good to help our declining pollinators.  Next spring, I would like to plant a small pollinators garden for the pollinators.  A few companies also now sell mason bee houses, and the bees themselves!  I went with cute and inexpensive.  

I am not sure about this, though.  What if something goes wrong and instead of helping out the mason bees, I end up hurting them?   For example, I read not to use bamboo tubing because it will degrade.  Maybe the bees here are doing just fine without their new little house.  One thing that appealed to me about the mason bees is that they are solitary nesters.  Every female mason bee is queen of her own tube.  They are also said to be non-aggressive. The mason bees also need mud for their nests.  I don't mulch so they may be picking up mud from the flowerbed.

By the way, companies are also selling leafcutter bees, which can also be non-aggressive and are native, but bringing in leafcutter bees would be an ugly thing to do to the neighborhood.

I would like a bat house although I am uncertain how the neighbors would feel about a bat colony.  They were not too thrilled about the skunks that were living  under my enclosed  porch.

Free Nature Books for Kids

Kelloggs and Scholastic are teaming up to give away books for kids.  The promotion is done by signing up for their Kellogg's Family Share Program and entering codes from specially marked boxes of products.  Information is here: http://www.scholastic.com/kelloggs/
It says you can enter up to 30 codes.

It looks like at least three of the books from which people may select are nature books for young readers!  The first listed book appears to be a sensational one about deadly animals, but there is one on animal camouflage and what looks to be a nice story about a bat.

I ordered the one on animal camouflage to give to a charity that my mother works with that provides supplies for disadvantaged families.  Next on my wish list is the bat book.

Signing up for the promotions program was not all that bad.  My preference is for locally sourced foods, but there were some Kelloggs products with codes in the pantry.  I am 100 points away from being able to cash out to plant a tree through Treecycler.

Corporations working with charities is A-OK in my book.

Book Review and Little Outing

I finished neurologist Oliver Sacks' book, Hallucinations. See it here at Amazon.  It was an interesting and surprisingly quick read.  Sacks seems kind, very intelligent, and patient-centered. He also proves false the commonly held idea that having a hallucination means that a person is psychotic, although psychotic people do also hallucinate.  Apparently people hallucinate fairly readily under several circumstances that distort perception.  Dr. Sacks writes about people who hallucinate due to blindness, deafness, certain diseases, intoxication, migraines, grief, sensory deprivation, mortal danger, and isolation.

The chapter in which Sacks recalls hallucinations that he had after trying various mind altering substances was especially interesting.  I couldn't tell if Sacks was bragging about his adventures opening the doors of perception or if he was admitting a youthful addiction, or both.

The chapter on grief hallucinations was sad.  I have heard of people who had such experiences of seeing, hearing or smelling lost loved ones.  Some people thought they were grief induced mental tricks and others thought they were visitations from the spirit world.  What is kind of creepy to me, but not addressed in the book, is that some people have apparently experienced these grief hallucinations before they knew of their loss.

Sacks briefly wrote about the Third Man Factor.  I finished another book specifically about it this summer. Amazon info.  That is when a presence, usually helpful, appears to a person who is isolated and/or in deep trouble.  The Third Man is especially associated with mountain climbers, those working in the Arctic, astronauts, and people sailing alone on the ocean.

Sacks tells all kinds of stories. Some are sad and some are humorous or inspiring. I liked the sweet one about the woman who had a comforting visit from her cat that died the previous day.

You may know of the author as the doctor from "Awakenings."




Also, I visited my favorite agritourism destination over the weekend.  It is White Oak Lavender Farm in Harrisonburg, VA.  It is a beautiful place and the lavender is so relaxing.  My favorite part is their friendly farm animals.  Here are some pictures I made there.

I like this one because it looks like the one hen is saying, "That's some awesome highlighting on your feathers there, girlfriend!"

The Post of Human Origins

PBS aired two episodes of the amazing First Peoples program last night.  These were episodes about the first peoples of America and Africa.  How very interesting!  I was hoping for some good archaic humans information, and PBS did not disappoint. There were also theories of modern human migration that turned on their heads the old ones that I had been taught.

One very interesting theme of both episodes was that the first peoples who settled America and Africa did not come out of solely one gene pool, such as in a Garden of Eden theory.  They told how remains have been found of people in the Americas who were dated as being here before the previously supposed first people who crossed the famous Bering Straight Land Bridge and who  hunted the great mammoths. This means there must have been at least one different route of human migration into the Americas other than the Land Bridge that we all learned about in elementary school? Interestingly, one of these ancients has been linked genetically to modern Native Americans. That is fascinating.

When we got to the Africa episode, they told of archaic humans!  These were the humans who lived before and with us, the modern humans.  There was a very cool story about an African-American family with an enslaved ancestor who may have been carrying DNA from an archaic human group in Africa.  The family learned this after doing some commercial DNA ancestry testing.

I am also interested in archaic humans due to DNA ancestry testing.  After many years of speculation of Asian or Native American genes in my mother's family, I forked over some money to  a company to test my genetic makeup and report for certain what is there.  Well, the results came back very heavily Southwest Virginia mountaineer by way of England, Ireland, Normandy and Germany.  That is what I had expected.  There was a tiny amount of Subsaharian Africian DNA, which also did not surprise me.  What did surprise me was a little Finnish ancestry.  Where did that come from?  Vikings?  And, the supposed Asian or Native American DNA?  Only teeny amounts showed up, like .001 percent.

The big surprise is that the company said I carry 3.2 percent Neanderthal genome DNA. Apparently this is high normal for a modern human of European ancestry.  Now I am a big Neanderthal fan and sometimes like to type like a Neanderthal, ugh. :)

Mom, whose maternal halogroup we now know, and I visited the Hall of Human Origins in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum this spring. We saw casts of Lucy and the hobbit and facial reconstruction of archaic humans.  When there was an opportunity for a photo shoot that merged my features with the Neanderthal reconstruction, I did it, with this result.  I think you could only be a male Neanderthal.

Thanks, Smithsonian!

Spider web Photos

Here are some spider webs early this morning, all wet from last night's rain.  Those dewy spider webs reminded me of autumn, but today was hot and humid and certainly did not feel like autumn.

I also like how the morning light was captured in the first two photographs.

A side note:

I love to drink bottled teas with natural ingredients and am currently having McCutcheon's Real Brewed Peach Iced Tea.  It is from Frederick, Maryland.

Blog is back with a post that is no bull!

I have decided to resurrect the nature blog. There are certainly many fascinating things happening in nature and science these days!  This post will not be about American chestnuts as promised in the last entry, however.  Perhaps later we will have a chestnut post. Get it, a chestnut post?! 
Let's move on.

Some of the biggest nature news lately is the upcoming papal encyclical on climate change.  This made me ask, what is an encyclical and how is it different from the papal bulls that we heard about in history class.

Well, I looked it up and an encyclical is a circulating letter written by the pope to bishops, archbishops, etc. Pope Francis said that this letter will be to all good people of the world though in addition to the clergy.  Sometimes an encyclical is written to end a theological debate.

When talking about older documents, a bull is a somewhat nonspecific term for a document from the pope. These were first written on round metal plates that reminded people of boiling bubbles.  Later, they had affixed lead seals.  Modern papal bulls may or may not have the metal seals. Modern papal bulls are the most formal documents currently issued by the Vatican.

It will be interesting to hear what Pope Francis says tomorrow.  He often seems to model and teach Christlike behavior.  

In other news, I am reading two science/ nature books this summer and hope to report here on them.  One is on sharks!

PS- I don't know how to make that white background above go away.  Sorry.

Here, Kitty, Kitty. A post on Pumas

One of the things that amazes me about cats is how they come in all sizes.  There are tiny house cats, medium sized wild cats and giant man-eating beast cats.  Americans are fascinated with our "man-eating beast cats," the pumas (Puma concolor).  

I first heard about Eastern cougars while growing up in Western North Carolina. As far as I know, there have been no scientifically accepted modern sightings, or even evidence, of native-born "wild" panthers in Western North Carolina or Virginia.  There was a great deal of lore about them though.  People talked about how when spending the night in the woods, the pumas could be heard screaming like a woman.  We called them painters, panthers and mountain lions. Nobody seemed very afraid of them.  That was, until I heard about Precious. Everyone under twelve was afraid of Precious.

Every camp needs a good ghost story and one that I visited had Precious, the ghost panther.  Her story went something like this:
There once lived an older man and woman in the house down the hill. (Point ominously to the benign looking small home.)   One day a cute orange kitten wandered into the house.  Aw!  The old couple loved the sweet kitten.  They named her Precious.  Precious grew and grew!  One day, the woman was petting Precious and noticed she had a little red dot on her nose.  The man and the woman didn't know what it could be, although it did look a bit like blood.  Precious continued to grow and be loved by the unsuspecting couple.  Then, one day, they could no longer escape the fact that she wasn't a kitten.  In fact, she had grown into a mountain lion!  She killed the man and woman who raised and loved her!!! Authorities soon tracked down Precious and disposed of her.  (At this point, you can take your camp mates down to the house to view a "claw mark"  and red stains on the door screen.)  So, they thought Precious was gone.  But some people have seen Precious since then!!!!!

Yeah, writing that brought back childhood trauma.  Now, beyond blinding fear of a ghost panther attack, I can see the deeper elements in this haunting story.  It reminds me of  archetypal folkore and urban legends.  There are strong undercurrents of deception of the innocent by creeping evil. Yes, the tale of Precious continued to spread, not just because it was a spooky ghost story but due to the the underlining psychology.

Most people under twelve are no longer afraid of Precious.  I have heard many adults spread urban folklore about pumas though.  Around here (Western NC and VA)  it is that they are black cats, that they hide in trees, that my uncle's friend saw one, that my brother saw one, that they will attack you when you jog, that they will eat your children as you hike, that they will eat your pets, and that the government is covering all this up.

These majestic beasts are clearly established in the American psyche.  I don't have knowledge enough to judge if the people who claim to see pumas in the wild in this area really are seeing these big cats, if it is collective wishful thinking, or if they are running into the abandoned "pets of drug dealers."  All those ideas are theories as to modern regional puma sitings.  No matter what is going on, many people claim to see pumas.  My archetypical side wants to believe these people are inwardly longing for the lost wilderness.

Puma lore may also be spread by an inherent fear of the strength, quietness and necessary brutality that comes from cats.  I recently lost a dear calico cat to cancer.  She went from 14 pounds to a little under 5 pounds and though a gentle girl, she didn't want to take her medicines. She was a scrappy little fighter to the end.  Several times, I couldn't resist the teeth and claws of a five pound struggling house cat and a few times I got worked over at medicine time.  There was an incident where her claw got caught in my lip (poor thing) and it was difficult to extract- but we won't talk about that. A 100 lb pound cat that deliberately attacks must be the stuff of nightmares.  I have seen images of  unfortunate people who were mauled by cougars and it was truly gruesome.  Maybe it is the fear of the beautiful deadly that allows cougar lore to grow.

Of course, there are areas of the country where pumas do live in the wild. I have been reading about them:

Some recent light reading was Carl Hiassen's, Scat (2009).  A team of unlikely heroes join to save a Florida panther cub in this fiction book for young readers.  There are quirky characters reminiscent of Edward Abbey, humor, some swamp action and gently delivered ecological messages.

A bit heaver is science journalist David Baron's work, The Beast in the Garden:  The True Story of a Predator's Deadly Return to Suburban America.  It is an exploration of humans' (and pets') relationships with pumas in our modern landscape, especially in Colorado.  Although I found it to be a bit sensational in parts, this book is extremely well investigated, engaging and packed with interesting puma facts. It left me in awe of pumas and a bit afraid of them.

On the more scientific side is The Eastern Cougar:  Historic Accounts, Scientific Investigations, and New Evidence edited by Chris Bolgiano and Jerry Roberts.  This 2005 work reads like case files of modern Eastern cougar evidence.  The differences between true wild Eastern cougars, released captive cats, and non-native cougars living in the wild are well explained.  The book has an impressive bibliography.

If i remember correctly, the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries' magazine Virginia Wildlife ran an article a few years ago about the controversial Eastern cougar existing (or not) in the wilds of the state.

On a personal note, largely unrelated to cougars, I still miss my sweet calico cat.  A few days ago, I met a new orange kitty friend, however.  He is named Dandelion and here is is his picture.  I am hoping things turn out better than they did with Precious.

Likely not a puma cub in disguise

 Coming soon:  American Chestnuts

Brainwashed or Just Entertaining?

Last night I watched the "Brainwashed" episode of the show Curiosity on the Discovery Channel. I think this episode first aired in October 2012. My reaction to this show was: ?!

 I have to admit being a bit disenchanted by  the new wave of "educational" television.  (PBS, with its innovative and well-researched programming is an exception).  The new mood of commercial learning programming is sensational and has turned from somewhat well-researched documentaries into exploitative programming that goes for shock value more than facts.  There are some good nature and astronomical programs on these days but I think the general quality of programming on most of the commercial education channels is quickly going to you know where in a reality TV hand basket.

In this program, researchers apparently carried out an experiment in which they tested the possibly of creating a Manchurian Candidate, a hypnotized person who could be programmed to kill on cue and then forget the experience. I didn't catch the very first part of the episode so do not know if they used the term "Manchurian Candidate" but that seemed to be the idea. The experiment used the control of relaxing in an icy bathtub upon command to see if select hypnotized subjects were truly responding to hypnotic command or just "playing along" with the commands.

One subject was shown to relax both physiologically and mentally in the icy bath. Having passed the control test apparently showed that he was truly responding to hypnotic command and was ready for the next scenario. He was told that the experiment was over but instead a Manchurian Candidate situation was set up for him. He was placed under hypnosis without his knowledge and instructed upon cues to retrieve a (harmless) firearm from a backpack and go for a visiting "bad guy" (really an actor, of course) who would be entering the building while he left. Near the end of the show, the subject was indeed shown carrying out the instruction of retrieving the gun on cue and seemingly using it on the stranger. The show ended with him being debriefed on his actions and meeting the actor he had "shot" while under hypnosis.

 My biggest questions were as follows:
What review board would approve such an experiment?
 Is this ethical?
 Is this for real?

I have volunteered for scientific research in the past, most recently microbial analysis of my house, and have completed somewhat extensive human subject explanation and release forms for each experiment. Most of the experiments involved such benign procedures as answering questions online and filling out paper test forms.  Comprehensive ethical human subject guidelines were still followed. It seems hard to believe that an experiment with potential psychological fallout would even be allowed.

A quick Internet search of the show's commentary revealed that I wasn't the only one with questions. The test subject has a budding acting career, which was not revealed in the program and apparently concerned the viewers who discovered it. There were also some accusations that the entire thing was staged and a few people upset by what they viewed as pseudo-science passed off on viewers as a valid experiment.

I do not have enough facts to make an opinion on the show or its scientific versus entertainment value. I take most TV programming with a grain of salt these days but this one raised some interesting questions for me about the line between scientific reality and entertainment.

It was not as upsetting though as when I found out that MTV's Bully Beatdown was said to be staged. Now that's a good show.

Edit- December 7, 2012
But wait!  I have just purchased a book from a used book sale that deals with with this topic!  It is:  Jane Gregory and Steve Miller's Science in Public:  Communication, Culture, and Credibility.  Chapters include:  The Coming Age of Popular Science, Populatrization:  Why and from Whom?, Science on Television, The Fasination of Unorthodox Science, etc.

Learned about Today:
Light at Night!  http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/NPP/news/earth-at-night.html
Save the Frogs! http://www.savethefrogs.com

Nature Cation

Some of the entries on my new nature adventures blog will be scientific.  Other posts will be conversational. This first one is conversational.

It is getting to be that time of year when a person thinks about vacation.    I enjoy socially responsible and ecologically friendly nature-based activities while on vacation.

Last winter, I was fortunate to go on a whale watching tour to Virginia Beach.  I like to participate in regional guided bus tour packages because I totally get lost when going anywhere on my own they are a fun way to travel!  I met the bus early morning in Roanoke, Virginia.  Being overly excited about viewing whales,  I was the first person to arrive at our pick up site.  After a drive through the beautiful scenery of the Shenandoah Valley it seemed we were soon at the beach.  We had lunch on the way during which time I enjoyed a big chipped beef sandwich. This is probably too much information but I don't eat much red meat and it wasn't "sitting very well on my stomach."   Our tour guide had said the water might be too choppy to go out and see whales.  I was like, Choppy water be hanged!  Just get me on the boat!  That was the point where I should have taken some motion sickness medicine but because I had never been sick on a boat I thought it would be okay to chance it.

It seems like I misunderstood and it was actually the next day's brunch cruise that was questionable.  So, off we went to see the whales.  The group before us got there at the whales' feeding time and observed several interesting whale behaviors. We didn't see anything for a long time.  Then, we saw some whale backs!  And some whale spouts! I began smiling happily at the whales.  Unfortunately, I also began projectile vomiting around this time. I wasn't the only one getting sick but it was still unpleasant and embarrassing.  People were very kind. My tour guide wasn't around or didn't care but another tour guide brought me some wet tissues.  A nice family gave me some motion sickness medicine to put behind my ears.  A friend gave me a motion sickness tablet.  Most of the medicines went overboard.  Still, I was so happy to see the whales that it was a good overall experience.  Their backs were so cute, gray and blubbery as they rolled in the deep.  Their spouting made rainbows.  I really wanted to poke one and see how his skin felt. :)


That night, I walked downtown at Virginia Beach to buy  motion sickness medicine.  Snow started pouring down as the wind picked up.  I rarely visit the beach and to see it in snow was a treat. The thin covering of snow on the Virginia Beach statuary the next morning was especially noteworthy.
 

Waking up with an oceanfront view!

We went to the Virginia Aquarium and Marine Science Center early the next morning.  Several people asked, "Are you feeling better today?"  I thought it was a bit of a silly question since I had returned to my normal color and was walking around without spewing.  But the people were just being friendly and concerned so that was nice of them.
The aquarium was amazing.  I took this photograph.

A resident of the aquarium.

 I've never been a huge turtle fan but who can resist a smiling turtle?

The brunch cruise that day went well.  I took some motion sickness medicine to be on the safe side but it turned out to be a lovely smooth ride and a great meal.

In 2013, I am thinking about a repeat trip for more whale watching.  I am also thinking about a trip to Florida.  I haven't been there in about twenty-five years and would love to see the Everglades.

Welcome

Welcome to my citizen scientist blog.  I had such fun researching and writing a yearlong monthly nature article for the journals of a local newspaper in 2012 that I decided to keep writing about nature.  I hope to share nature observations, opportunities and opinions through this new weblog.

I am not a professional scientist of any type but I very much enjoy exploring and sharing the natural world.  It seems new opportunities for citizen scientist travel, training and reading are always open to those who look for them.

Like my column, this blog is likely to be a hodgepodge of topics.  Some subjects I covered in the 2012 column were edible wildflowers in my yard, spiders around my house, bats, fungi, astronomy, winter birding and nature reading.

Blogging is a new experience for me.
So, let's hit the trail!