Thursday, September 10, 2009

NATURE'S HALF ACRE

One of the nature documentaries that I will always remember was done, I think, by the Disney people. It was called, "Nature's Half Acre" It was all about bees and bugs and worms and the creatures that are right there beneath our feet. When I was in the Bronx one of my happiest projects were three years of running Summer Day Camps. It is so great when kids can get out in the country and discover birds,flowers, fresh ponds and streams....and Yes...bugs!!!! I remember that there were some kids, mostly but not always..girls, who did not like to be near dirt and bugs, salamanders and the like. I was initially quite misunderstanding about this. But now I know that all people do not have the same sensitivity to the outdoors. But one thing that I most certainly believe that all people, like or not like dirt and bugs...is that we are "all connected". Those little critters in Nature's Half Acre all have their purpose in the web of life and it is not just to be shunned by the people they disgust or try to bite. They all are important or they would never have come into the circle of life. I say this because one of the easiest things I can do with my little digital camera is take great shots of bees, flowers and bugs. So enjoy.

MORE SHAUPENEAK PEAK BEE SHOTS

Shaupeneak Bee' Work is Never Done

Monday, September 7, 2009

Rambing Through Pell Farm on Labor Day

My brother Dan and I took an early walk to the Pell Farm. The Purple Beach, which is one of about four, "may or may not" be 200 years old. Many of these trees were planted by Robert Livingston Pell himself. Or they "may" have been there long before he inherited the farm. They are powerful and beautiful. There is a small cementery with what were probably Pell workers behind what seems to be a "House of Leaves". There are the name Terpenning there. There is one grave to an "AMANDA" who was born around 1732. Fr. Gene takes care of the cementery in the sense that he mows around and up to it. The cementery measures about 30 by 20 feet and has about 7 or eight gravestones, most of them now fallen.

Pell's "Barnless Silo" at Esopus

Pell Farm "House of Leaves"

My Brother Dan and 200 Year Old Purple Beach