The water in the streams here in New Hampshire is so clear you can easily see the bottom. I wonder if it is like that in other places too. This is the stream I found one of the deadliest plants known-water hemlock- growing in. I wonder-if you were downstream from such a toxic plant and drank the water, would you be poisoned?
I understand what lenticels are and what they do and that all trees have them, but I wonder why only some trees, like this speckled alder, have large lenticels and some have only tiny dots almost too small to see. I suppose I might as well wonder why some of us have blue eyes and some brown.
It’s easy to see why the sensitive fern is also called the bead fern-the modified leaflets that hold the fern’s spores look like black beads in winter, but I wonder what happens to them later in the year. I’m always so busy gardening in the spring that I’ve never taken the time to find out.
Years ago I earned part of my living building dry stone walls and for pleasure I used to hunt minerals. In both cases I had to break large stones with sledge hammers. I know that most stones are very hard, and that leads me to wonder who went to all the trouble of drilling this hole into this granite stone, which is out in the middle of nowhere. If it was done by hand with a 10 lb sledge and a star drill, it took someone many hours. I wonder who, how, and most of all, why?
This-what would you call it-a crypt? A root cellar? Whatever it is it is built to last, with cinder block walls and concrete slab roof. The dwarfish door–too small to stand and walk through-looks as if it has been painted recently and is locked, even though the debris built up in front of it would probably make it impossible to open. Someone has even put sheet metal over it to keep the rain off. What really has me wondering is that it is far enough from any houses so as not to belong to any house in the area. Who built it? Why? What is inside it?
If I find the answers to any of these mysteries, I’ll let you know.
in our Science classes here at Kearsarge Middle School in Sutton NH, we are making presentations on vegetation that surround our campus. I found your site while researching. Regarding your Sensitive Fern … I use the brown stem seed pods in a vase for decoration and also on wreaths that I make. The brown stem is still there in the spring..it will eventually open and spread the seeds if it is not cut. They start out dark green…after the fern leaf dies off they turn brown. Thank you for the picture!
Mrs Nelson
Thank you for the information. We’ve always had dried flowers but for some reason I never cut any sensitive ferns.
I’m glad you’re enjoying the blog and I hope your students do too. I’d be very happy if this blog could get young people interested in nature.
[…] find something similar if you visit Allen at New Hampshire Garden Solutions…but his has a door…out in the middle of the NH wilderness…scroll down to the […]
Excellent post! I have thought about doing something similar, starting a draft to keep track of some of the things that strike my curiousity as I am out wandering around, but I keep putting it off. Sorry I can’t answer any of your questions other than yes, there are other places that have water as clear as in New Hampshire, so of our streams in northern Michigan are so clear that it is a good idea to check the depth with a stick before stepping in, as you can’t tell how deep the water is by sight alone.
Thanks! Glad you liked it. I think we all run into things that we wonder about. I had several things along with pictures, so it evolved into a post even though I doubted if anyone would be able to answer any of my questions. I’m glad your water in Michigan is clean too. With all the pollution that went on in the past I wonder how many states can still say that.