A monarch on the the milkweed...

Five years ago a volunteer milkweed plant sprung up in our backyard. Initially it was just one sprout...one strange little plant that kept getting taller, and taller, and taller. At first I didn't know what it was, until suddenly it dawned on me...milkweed! I have no idea how that downy little seed made it to our backyard, but it did, and it's done well. The single plant has grown into a stand of fourteen plants that live around my little pond beside the deck—definitely not an ideal place for the gangly plants, but that's okay. There are no other milkweed plants in the area, which makes our stand all the more special. We've had milkweed beetles and milkweed bugs, but until last week, the most famous milkweed-loving insect of them all, the monarch butterfly, had never visited. Our wait is over, because finally, there's a monarch on the milkweed...

Monarch on the Milkweed
(I used Sennelier oil pastels to create this painting inspired by the first monarch to visit our volunteer common milkweed patch. I hope she comes back and lays eggs so I can do a painting of a monarch caterpillar!)

Monarchs need our help...
Monarchs lay their eggs exclusively on milkweed, and the caterpillars that hatch out of the eggs never leave those plants. They only eat milkweed, so without a healthy supply of their host plant, monarchs will die out. Forever. Like...extinction forever. The problem is milkweed is being eradicated in the monarch's summer breeding grounds. In the midwest, where most of the monarchs are born, genetically engineered crops resistant to Roundup (an herbicide with the active ingredient glyphosate) are being planted. Previously, milkweed grew in the channels between the rows of crops, but now, GMOs allow for mass applications of the herbicide that leave the crops unaltered but the milkweed dead.

Plant milkweed...
If you have a patch of grass, turn it into a small urban or suburban prairie. I'm getting ready to do that in my backyard. This autumn I'm going to sow the seeds of native perennials, including milkweed, wildflowers, and grasses to form a small backyard prairie. I'll put a sign up that says Wildflower Garden...or Butterfly Garden...or Pollinator Garden...or maybe even Monarch Rescue Station!

The sun was sinking fast when this female Monarch butterfly decided to take nectar from one of the common milkweed flowers in our backyard. Even with a flash it was too dark for a good photo, and the monarch is blurred, but you get the picture!

Common milkweed smells wonderful with a sweet fragrance that hangs heavy in the air. 

I hope she comes back again.

The complete picture...
It's not just milkweed eradication that is harming the monarchs, though. According to "Conservation Status and Ecology of the Monarch Butterfly in the United States (March 2015)," by Sarina Jepsen, Dale Schweitzer, Bruce Young, Nicol Sears, Margaret Ormes, and Scott Hoffman Black, there are three main factors causing their rapid decline: loss of milkweed breeding habitat due to "Roundup Ready" crops and herbicide, logging at overwintering sites, and climate change and extreme weather. Other causes are disease, predators, parasites, and insecticides. If you want to learn more, click here to download their interesting 30-page pdf document where in addition to the monarch's conservation status, you can also learn about the butterfly's life cycle and diet, breeding grounds, migration routes, and overwintering locations.

For more information:

Click here for the Xerces Society press release, "Monarch Butterflies in North American Found to be Vulnerable to Extinction," March 10, 2015.

Click here for the Xerces Society press release, "Monarch Numbers up Slightly, but Butterfly Still at Risk of Extinction," January 27, 2015.

Click here and here for nice representations of the monarch's life cycle including photos of its five instars.

Native Plant Nursery in our area...and ecosourcing...
If you live in the Cincinnati area, and you're looking for a native plant nursery, try Keystone Flora. They grow their plants from seeds and cuttings generated from their own nursery. All the original sources were within 100 to 150 miles of Cincinnati. These plants originated from our region, so they are well suited to grow here without fertilizers or special water requirements. "Ecosourcing" is using native plants from local seed for local use. It's important because it preserves the genetic diversity and genotypes of local plants. Although plants may be the same species, there are often genetic differences between the same plants from different regions. To learn more about why native genotypes are important, click here for the article, "Problems Associated with the Introduction of Non-Native Genotypes on NRS Reserves."

Click here for a list of some of the native flowers Keystone Flora sells.

Our field sketching class at the Biggest Week...

...was awesome! We had so much fun, and one of the participants, Pam DiFazio, photographed the workshop and sent me photos to share. Usually the class is outside since it's a field sketching class, but with a cold front moving through, 20-mile an hour winds and temps in the high 40s drove us indoors. We were at Pearson Metropark, so it was easy to find shelter in the Window on Wildlife (WOW) bird blind. What a perfect location! It was warm and toasty, but with all the windows, it was like being outside. For all the "non-artists" that walked in to the class, everyone walked out artists with the skills needed to observe nature and sketch what they see...

Looking through the "Window on Wildlife" at Pearson Metropark. The bird blind offered us a comfortable place to learn field sketching skills.

If you can draw a flower...you can draw a bird. We practice seeing geometric shapes in flowers and break away from what we think is there (symbols) and what we actually see.

...signing my field sketching book for Kim. 
(Thank you, Pam, for taking such wonderful photos! I love the unique angles you use, which add interest to all of your photos.)

John sketching birds using the "two circles and a triangle" method! :-)

Pam used time-lapse photography to record John drawing a cardinal.  COOL and fun!!

Thank you to all of the participants. I had fun, fun, fun, and it was amazing to see everyone drawing flowers and birds with ease by the end of the workshop. I have lots of memories tucked away from the class, including the "wiener bird," the "field sketching nomads," and "Aunt Mary Clare!"

      

I will be blogging about the Biggest Week over the next few weeks. The birds, the people, the events...everything about the Biggest Week is amazing!

All packed up and ready to go...

I leave tomorrow morning for Toledo and the Great Black Swamp! On Tuesday morning, I'm teaching a class on field sketching for beginners. This will be the third time I've taught this class, and it will be fun. This class is part of the "Biggest Week in American Birding" sponsored by the Black Swamp Bird Observatory, and if you love birds (especially warblers), it's the place to be in May...

The workbook I wrote for the class and other field sketching supplies are ready to be packed up. 

Why do migrating warblers love the Great Black Swamp and Magee Marsh? 
...because they are exhausted from their long flights from their wintering grounds in South America, and they need to rest up before crossing Lake Erie on the final leg of their journey northward to their summer breeding grounds. The trees literally drip with warblers, and they are often at eye level instead of high in the treetop canopies.  Click here for a must-read article titled "Magee; Anatomy of a Migrant Hotspot," by Kenn Kaufman. It's on the American Birding Association blog, and it explains everything going on at this birding hotspot.

A female Canada Warbler is giving some unsuspecting insect the eye.

Female Canada Warbler
The large, bight eye ring stands out so well on Canada Warblers and adds to their charm. 

...the yellow lines above the nose on a Canada Warbler create a nice pattern.

...now, to get busy packing!

...now to pack the car!

Click here for another article you might want to read called "I've got Swamp Fever," by Kim Smith who writes the blog, Nature is my Therapy. She explains a little more about the Great Black Swamp in her post.

      

I will be blogging about the Biggest Week over the next few weeks. The birds, the people, the events...everything about the Biggest Week is amazing!

Interviewed by Erin Shaw on her TV show "Nature's Corner!"

I was recently interviewed by Erin Shaw, an ODNR park naturalist for Caesar Creek State Park, on the TV show "Nature's Corner." Erin is the host of the show and made the experience fun and exciting. Erin is a naturalist extraordinaire and this August was named the Ohio State Parks' Naturalist of the Year! I was so nervous on the show and worried my spazzzzy tendencies might show through, but Erin reigned me in and kept me in line. We talked about my book "Sketching in the Wild," made a little owl out of clay, visited with a Screech Owl, and talked about tips for photographing birds in winter. We also talked about the Little Miami River and how I draw much of my inspiration for paintings and photos from it.

A little Dark-eyed Junco from my backyard graces the splash screen of the TV show "Nature's Corner." Erin Shaw, the host of the show, interviewed me a few weeks ago about birds, field sketching, photography, and painting.

The show will air on Monday, November 24 on Lebanon's Channel 6. Daily airtimes are 8:00 am, 1:00 pm and 8:30 pm. You can watch the show anytime online by clicking here.  Also on the show is Ken Simmons who carves birds out of wood. He talks about his process for carving the birds, which is interesting. You can watch his segment, or just click on my name to skip ahead.

The first edition of my book, "Sketching in the Wild!" is completely sold out. I'm working on the second edition which will include a chapter on frogs, turtles, and snakes. It will be out by February. I'll post on the blog, when it's ready for purchase. 

Note:
If you want further instructions for the little owl I made in the video, click here for an older post with step-by-step directions.

Sketching skeletons and skins...

Matty and I spent a couple of hours Friday afternoon sketching bird skeletons, skins, and mounted specimens at the Geier Collections and Research Center in downtown Cincinnati. The Geier Center is the research arm of the Cincinnati Natural History Museum. It's a state-of-the-art facility that houses all of the collections not on display at the Museum Center. It also includes laboratories for the paleontology, archaeology and zoology collections. I contacted Dr. Herman Mays, the curator of zoology, to see if Matty and I could sketch a few of the specimens in the collection, and he said yes! Dr. Mays was wonderfully accommodating and incredibly nice. He set us up in the room holding the massive zoology collection and let us know we could sketch and photograph anything we wanted to. My head is still spinning from everything we saw. I got to work right away and sketched non-stop. Matty studied a lot of the collection and sketched a few birds with me as well. It will take several posts to cover our adventure...

Sketch of a Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias) skull from the Geier Collections 
and Research Center (the Cincinnati Museum of Natural History)

I'm writing a book for the field sketching class I'm teaching at the Biggest Week in American Birding warbler festival and wanted to see and sketch close-up views of bills, wings, and skeletons for a few of the illustrations. Everything I needed was at the Geier Center. I'm so glad Dr Mays let us visit the center!

...the Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias) skull I sketched. 
I loved seeing all the bird skeletons, bones, and skulls. 

An American Coot (Fulica americana) skull from the Geier Collections and Research Center

I chose this mounted Pipit as my first bird to sketch...and what a sweetie! I drew him quickly, pretending I was sketching the bird in the wild (a very cooperative bird who sat very close...).

Matty sketched a Baltimore Oriole. He took his time and did a great job! 
(He's an artist, he just doesn't know it yet!)

Cute little Pipit!
Sketching mounted birds is a great way to practice drawing birds from "life." Translating a three-dimensional object into a two-dimensional image on paper takes a little practice.

Lots of racks of mounted specimens...

...lots of drawers of bird skins. The collection is amazing with between 20-30,000 bird specimens.

The ornithology collection has new and old specimens dating back to the mid 1880s.

A Wooly Mammoth family grazes in the front lawn of the Geier Collections and Research Center. I remember these gargantuan bonded bronze sculptures when they stood in front of the Eden Park/Mt. Adam's location of the Natural History Museum. As a kid I loved seeing them because they set the stage for what was to come! I was glad to see them again.
(The artist who created these beautiful sculptures is Norman Neal Deaton, click here for info on him.)

Sketching in the field...museum!
If you love to paint and draw birds, head to your local natural history museum and take advantage of the wonderful collections available to you. Being able to hold these specimens and view them up close gives you a greater understanding of a bird's structure. You can count the primaries and secondaries on the wing...see the underwing coverts...see all the bones and joints in the toes...study the unique S curve in a bird's neck or the bone structure in the wing and legs, or anything else you can think of. The knowledge you take home will help you draw birds better, and your appreciation of their amazing adaptations and abilities will grow.

If you're in Cincinnati, the Geier Collections and Research Center is located at 760 West Fifth Street. 

Click here to read more about it. 

Sketching on the boardwalk!
Another way to get up close with an extraordinary variety and number of birds is to visit the boardwalk at Magee Marsh (near Toledo, OH) in May where you can witness the amazing phenomena of spring migration. The trees along the boardwalk literally drip with neotropical migrants as they rest and fuel up for the last leg of their journey across Lake Erie to their nesting grounds up north. Head up to the Biggest Week in American Birding, May 6 - 15 where you can walk the boardwalk and meet lots of other birders too.

Click here for the Biggest Week in American Birding workshop information. 

Click here for festival registration information. 

"Two-second" bird sketches...

Nothing says spring like the love song of the Mourning Dove, so I was very happy to hear a male singing on our deck today. I had my sketchbook nearby, so I grabbed it and did a few "two-second" bird sketches to record the spring-is-finally-here event.  These little scribble sketches are fun to do, and as the name implies, take only seconds to complete. Tiny, non-detailed field sketches help you get the "feel" of a bird and capture behavior and movement. When you're out in the field, two-second sketches are a great way to record what you're seeing.

Small "two-second" bird sketches of the mourning doves on our deck. Each little sketch takes between 2 and 10 seconds. I call them "two second" sketches so I keep moving fast and am not tempted to stop and throw in detail.

This May I'm going to teach a class on basic field sketching techniques for beginners at the Biggest Week in American Birding warbler festival. Fun!!! We'll learn several ways to draw and write about birds (including the two-second bird sketches, as well as ways to draw detailed bird renderings with accurate field marks). We'll also work on techniques for drawing  flowers, leaves, and even landscapes. If you're not an artist, don't worry. The goal of field sketching is not to create finished pieces of art, it's to learn how to get better at observing nature...and develop a deeper appreciation of nature. 

...keep singing those spring love songs Mr. Mourning Dove.
I'll keep sketching you!

Spring Migration 

at the Biggest Week in American Birding!

While I'm at the festival, I'll be blogging too. Hope to see you there!

For more information on the field sketching 

and nature journaling class and bus tour, click here!

Check out the new BSBO Swamp Shop! 

All proceeds go to the Black Swamp Bird Observatory:

    

Spring Migration at Magee Marsh is so much fun. I'm looking forward to walking the boardwalk and seeing all the warblers!!

Yellow-rumped Warblers at Fort Ancient

...what are you?

...ahhh! That's what you are, you little Yellow-rumped Warbler, you!

(I love it when the name really matches the plumage...)

Even though I'll miss the blues of summer, the Yellow-rumped Warbler's subdued autumn colors are just as pretty.

Sunday afternoon I went to Fort Ancient to my favorite little pine stand (the one located off the field by the Mound Trail). I sat down on the forest floor and sketched. While I was drawing, three or four Yellow-rumped Warblers foraged in the branches overhead, flitting and peeping and gleaning insects. It was so nice to listen to them while I scribbled out saplings with my pencil. Then...out of nowhere, splat! One left me a little gift...

Thanks, sweet little Butter-butt...

It didn't really matter. I quickly wiped it up and finished my journal entry. Now it's a funny memory. I laughed out loud when it hit the paper. All these years of field sketching, and I've never had a bird go the bathroom on my paper!

Halloween Ravens

Painting #52 - Common Raven Flying Over a Pumpkin

I loved painting this painting. Usually I rely on a reference photo, but this one appeared in my head and poured out of my paintbrush. I could hear the whoosh of the wings as he flew past, and saw the shadow pass over the pumpkin. This painting made me fall in love with Common Ravens even more than I already did.

Painting #53 - Night Raven Looking at the Moonbow

...again...no ref photo. Quite a big thing for me. The Golden slow-drying acrylics I'm using are so freeing. I squeeze out the paint, start playing, and images come to life. I'm really enjoying the 100 Painting Challenge. Being under the pressure to create 100 paintings in a year causes me to paint just for the sake of painting. I used to paint for a purpose (a card, a present--a reason), but with the challenge, there is no reason. You simply create all the time. The challenge continues to help me grow. Because of the challenge, I found out I love painting ravens and all the darkness that surrounds them.

Painting #54 - Nocturnal Raven

Painting #55 - Common Raven in a Patterned World

I painted this painting twice. I didn't like the first take, so I scraped it off....then decided I loved the scape marks and just added the Common Raven in with a few brush strokes.

Painting #56 - Creepy Primitive Halloween Raven

The scrapings in the previous painting inspired this one. Originally it was supposed to have the feel of a wood block carving image, but it soon turned into the feel of a carved pumpkin. I painted the background orange/red/yellow and let it dry over night....then painted over it with black the next morning....grabbed a plastic spoon and started "carving" out the image. I decided to go primitive because it's creepier, and one-shot carving with a spoon doesn't allow detail. After it dried, I painted over the moon with orange again...then went back in and re-carved over the previous carving. That helped brighten up the moon... This was a lot of fun, but very messy!! (I'm happy to report all of these paintings passed Matty's stringent creative requirements. He thought they were cool.)

...no bird in this painting, so it's not part of the challenge. I just wanted to wish you a Happy Halloween filled with lots of treats...and black cats...ravens...and ghosts...witches...and scarecrows...and...candy corn, of course!