Summer Updates (publ. 2025-06-03)

I haven't been getting out of doors as much as I would like, owing to a lot of overcast days and some rainy weather. A cold wind has been blowing this last week or two, so that it is uncomfortable to go out on a day that is not sunny.

Here are a few notes from the last week:

2025-05-29

4:41pm

Am spending some time out in the front yard, grilling chicken in the Webber.

I note that the lodgepole pine cones are about 2 cm long and around 15 mm wide. The outer parts of the cones are light brown, but the inside edges, or grooves, are a deep purple color (reddish-blue). The small white blossoms are in full bloom on the chokecherry trees.

2025-05-31

11:59am

While taking a walk along the Tanana river dike trails with my family, I notice one tree which, uniquely, has some hook shaped buds, or at least I suppose they are buds. These buds are bulbous near the base but then narrow going outward, curving up a bit until reaching a sharp point. The buds grow in a helical arrangement, going up the twig, and are sparsely arranged.

2025-06-01

4:39pm

Back out in the front yard, the weather is mostly cloudy, with thick cumulus clouds covering about 80% of the sky.

I observe that the lodgepole pines have perked up now a lot, making each tree about 6ft high. One tree is sporting a lot of cones, while the other tree has lots of the small green balls, which I think will become the male flowers.

2025-06-02

12:31pm

I am walking down one of the dike trails by the Tanana. As I approach the river, I hear the warbling sounds of a bird which sings "dee dee dee dee" for about 1.5 seconds. And then the sound trails off into a shaky "dah dah dah" for about a quarter of a second.

The Tanana River is still very low compared to my memory from last summer — about six or seven feet lower, I'd estimate. I can walk out onto large sand and mud islands that were mostly covered in water last year. Just underneath the edge of the water, I can see some dune-like patterns in the mud. There are many miniature ridges, going parallel to the shore, which meet up at larger ridges that point away from the shore. These larger ridges are wavy. This first section of mud has a very small slope (almost level). About one foot out from the shore, the smaller ridges disappear, but the large ridges continue on for another foot or so down a steep incline (about 30 degrees) going deep into the water and then are no longer visible due to the murk.

A small flock of ducks — around ten of them — swims around in one of the ponds near the river.

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