My Great Outdoors

"Are you coming??" Can you find the impatient puppy in this picture?

Really neat succulents growing out of a rock

Crazy fungi

Just look at those spores....

(These are the reproductive structures on the underside of the fern)

As some of you may have heard, 'Tropical Storm Matthew' passed through yesterday-for me this meant nothing more than a rainy day..but I was trapped inside all day when I had been really looking forward to a nice long hike on the mountain. The only thing worse than being trapped inside all day in the cold and rain-being trapped inside all day with a bored puppy-and like 3 movies I really wanted to watch that decided not to work anymore =(

Ah well, today while I did not awake to sunshine and blue skies, at least it wasn't rainy. So we geared up and headed up the trail. So I've got a kind of naturey post today. The park I work in is a humid, high elevation oak forest on one side, with an old pine plantation growing up on the other side, and a bit of overlap as well. I've just started seriously birding the area, trying to get a comprehensive list together so that I can put together a guide for the park. This is actually, officially part of my job-the next step will be training some locals in birding techniques and how and where to spot the birds we do have. Today was a good birding day. I guess everyone was out and about eating and enjoying the 'nice' weather, even though we got started kinda late (8 am).

Fiddleneck anyone? our park is filled with various species of ferns who are all loving our extended wet season and all the rain. Good, at least someone is...

Regardless, we got some new species today! Which I expect to continue to happening for a while-we've got a very bird species-rich park. Its all a matter of being in the right place at the right time-which is just a matter of spending more time in the park (oh darn). Today we found the usual culprits-Yellow-throated Brushfinch, Stellar's Jays, Pink-headed Warbler; as well as some new faces- Singing Quail, Red-faced Warbler, Grace's Warbler, Bushtit, Band-backed Wren, and Tufted Flycatcher. Sorry though, no photos yet, you can find them on google though!

Also a ton of wildflowers continuing to bloom, and even more interesting-lots of mushrooms. They loved the rains this past week, since the last time I went up, a few hillsides had just erupted with the fungi-and there is an incredible variety as well. I would love to get some fungi-identifying experience while i'm out here. Maybe something to prepare for for the next season-although i'd say we still have a good month left of mushrooms here.

All in all-it was a good Sunday-and much needed hiking about and doing what I enjoy most here-discovering more of what my little park has to offer. It's my job =)

This week I'm fairly excited about a new project involving the artesans who make fresh cheese here. The idea is arranging for tourists to stay in the homes of these artesans to get a demonstration of the cheesemaking process-from the cow to the finished product. So I am working with a woman in town to get this project off the ground-we are (hopefully) meeting with a few interested families this week.