Saturday aftermath

Well, It appears that we have all recovered from the trauma of the lockdown we had at work this past week. I am pleased how well everything went, even though we found some glitches that can now be resolved. I was very proud of my students.

Today was the first day for service learning for the spring semester. My students impressed me with that as well. Chilly and drizzly, they began the restoration of the wetland area at St. Stephens park. We are removing Chinese Privet, multiflora Rose, and Japanese Honeysuckle. This is a project I have been planning for 2+ years, and I am very happy to see it get off the ground. My computer is being a pain and not letting me upload the pictures I took...oh well.

Well...today was cool and cloudy. My sister, brother-in-law and niece came by and visited in the afternoon. Greg had never met my horses so we had fun with the introductions. Of course, they missed all the fun the kiddies had before they got there.

Popcorn and Moe matching strides

May I have this dance?

Moe and Blondie playing tug of war

Blondie plays rough

Poppy and Moe again...sigh

I'm working on my spider list for the Catawba Valley Crazy Big Year.

It's slower going than Dwayne and his birds or Lori and her moths, but I'll catch up so I'm not too worried. So far I have 7 species, but of those, I have 20 'specimens'.

One of three Metacyrba that I have (Salticidae).

Classes started on Thursday this week. I really have a good feeling about this semester. The students seem interactive and eager to learn. If it stays like this, I'll have loads of fun. We'll see how it goes.

E--

HAPPY NEW YEAR from Whisper Wind Farm.

The day is partly cloudy and cool with temps around 40F at 9am.

Day one of the year that is supposed to end in the destruction of human civilization. We'll see what happens. I for one, think that too many people forget/ignore the calender that takes place AFTER the supposed end of days. I'll let you know what happens.

I am participating in a crazy idea hatched by a former student of mine. In the four county area (Burke, Catawba, Caldwell, and Alexander) that makes up the Catawba Valley, a survey of selected plants and animals will be taking place. Dwayne is doing birds, Lori is doing butterflies and moths, Tracie is doing wildflowers and ferns, and I am doing spiders.

The different habitats we have in this area could make this tricky. Plus the fact that there are so many picture identification guides for spiders that have errors and are sorely lacking data. I'll have fun looking and sorting. I shouldn't have any problems collecting new species, but I'll not do any naming.

Hoping for a great year.