Iowa Praires presented in Watercolor really tells it all. Check out the book: The Elemental Prairie Sixty Tallgrass Plants Watercolors by George Olson Essay by John Madson This is truly the best portrait of Iowa gone by. I recently had the honor of going to a presentation by George Olson. I've been working on a small praire on my back acreage. I plan on expanding to my road ditches. This was a very good time to bring this to light Ironbelly. Very Well spoken. Whoops writen I mean.

Was in Guymon last evening and my pu just turned in at Wally World as I was leaving. So being I was in the parking lot went in to see what they had put out over the last week. Almost everything was out inside the store now. Just a few bulbs though and didn't see any seed potatoes. They had a lot of boxes stored just outside the doors in the outside area. I didn't go out to see what was there. This year they have a large Ferry-Morse seed display and a fair sized display with organic seeds from Seeds of Change. The FM seeds were very reasonable. Not sure if someone put the wrong price on the SoC seeds or not. They showed $5.49 a pack. Which I consider very high. Didn't buy anything but looked through both racks. They had all of the usual potting and seed starting mixes and supplies out. Last week they had a sale on plastic containers which I bought a few of and using as flats for onions, leeks, ect and wanted to buy a few more buty they were all gone and the area full of garden/lawn/Bar-B-Q items. Just 2 years ago I couldn't find any seed starting mix or potting mix anywhere before Feb 1st. So since I've kept at least a partial bag and some potting soil for insurance and both years the stores have had it out in mid Jan. More geese have moved in from the south over the last week. Notice a few more flocks moving north during the week. Everyone that is talking about it says it is due to little water and food south of here. They say the ducks/geese that use this fly way can go clear to the Mexico border and not find many water/food combinations. So not sure if them moving north is a good indicator of an early spring or just an indicator of hungry birds. I would say the numbers here have climbed to over a thousand now. The wheat is growing and some fields that they didn't even cut must have a little grain down on the ground as I've been watching them feed in them. They don't stay out feeding over an hour which indicates they are getting plenty to eat without a lot of work. Which somewhat surprises me. My two youngest apple trees just lost the last of their leaves a week ago and are showing signs of the buds growing now. The older one has buds I'm afraid won't wait long enough to bloom out from the way they look. I remember in the late 80's a winter like this. The last day of Jan it started raining. And then turned to ice and snow. Then the cold set in for around 2 weeks. Hope that isn't the case this winter. I keep telling everyone not to store their coats away yet. The good thing is the longer we go without a severe cold spell the less likely we are to have a prolonged extreme cold spell. But I've seen really cold weather through the 15th of Feb so not getting in too big of hurry starting too many seeds yet. Jay

Jo, You're welcome. I keep track of our rain here at our house, but usually just in my head. So, I'll know we have had, say, 1" more than the closest Mesonet station or a half-inch less of whatever. Even though there is variation within the year, by the end of the year it is always just a difference of an inch or two, which is pretty amazing. For years I tried writing down rainfall on my gardening calendar and keeping track of it, and I always start out keeping track of it really well, but somewhere along the way I start forgetting to record the rainfall and eventually I give up keeping track of it on paper. I like the Mesonet maps because they give a great general picture of what is happening anywhere in our state's weather, even though none of us get exactly identical temps or rainfall or whatever. As rough as the weather has been this summer, it is not even close to being the dryest summer we've had nor the hottest one. I guess there is some comfort in knowing that....we can say 'it could be worse'....... Dawn

Love the 18 wheeler I have a son that drives double bogies, he did his apprenticeship at Mack Trucks in Vic, he always loved Macks,and KW"s. Nice looking rig that one. And Bam Bam looks good. And you have my favourite bird there, dont you just love the way the Noisy Miners hang upside down to get the nectar its a wonderful sight I love your Pics, and the Lorikeet too. Beautiful pics once again Barbara .Cheers..MM.