Natural Gifts
12/26/24 - a holiday present of some of Heather's lovely cards
Hello everyone:
As a gift to all of you - and, admittedly, to me - this week’s quick and easy post consists entirely of some of my wife Heather’s beautiful cards and a short write-up on each. I want to share with you a little bit of what makes her so wonderful.
My apologies to those of you eager to read some of this week’s curated Anthropocene news, but I’ve decided to take a much-needed holiday from the flood of information.
Here’s the rest of your sweet holiday surprise:
One of Heather’s jobs is working as a part-time naturalist for two wonderful local land trust/nature education organizations, Coastal Rivers Conservation Trust and Midcoast Conservancy (at Hidden Valley Nature Center). She graduated from the excellent Maine Master Naturalist Program a few years ago, and has kept busy leading walks for all ages and doing place-based nature education for schoolkids ever since.
If you’re curious about taking a Master Naturalist Program in your state, here’s a site with links to 41 state programs. You can read more on Heather’s work in the Maine Master Naturalist Program in the context of an essay of mine on biophilia, E.O. Wilson, Robin Wall Kimmerer, and more.
More and more in recent years Heather has shaped her life around connecting herself and others to the real world, whether in her educational efforts, her songwriting, or in her art. She’s happiest when exploring and honoring the beauty of the plants and animals around us. She creates these cards because she enjoys the artistic process and because she enjoys becoming closer with the life she’s illustrating. They’re gifts to herself as well as gifts for friends and family.
Her card above - Evergraceful Evergreens - is new this year, and consists of leaves selected from Trailing Arbutus, Goldthread, Partridgeberry, Wintergreen, and a wood fern, plus her watercolors of Wintergreen berries. We think of evergreens as the tall conifers that maintain their needles year-round in the starkest of winter forests, but there are many herbaceous evergreens too. If you’re out in the north woods this time of year, they’re a small but welcome sign of the green continuum of life.
The evergreen beauty and durability of Christmas Fern fronds makes the plant an ideal subject for a card celebrating the season. While not a common source of winter food, one source notes that Ruffed Grouse may rely on it and White-tailed Deer will forage it when other food is scarce. In the spring, Wild Turkey and Spruce Grouse may forage on young fronds, and both Veery and Ovenbirds have been observed nesting among the overwintered fronds.
Winterberry is a favorite of ours. In a good year, bright splays of red berries glow from the marshes and other wet areas where the woody shrub often thrives. It’s in the holly family, and is a popular native plant for landscaping. It’s popular also with wildlife, as the Maine Cooperative Extension explains:
The berries of winterberry are devoured by 49 species of birds, including songbirds, winter waterfowl, and game birds. Frequent songbird consumers include eastern bluebirds, hermit and wood thrushes, American robins, catbirds, northern mockingbirds, brown thrashers, cedar waxwings, and white-tailed sparrows. Because the berries are relatively low in fat content, they are often taken late in the winter when other fruits are scarce. This translates into a longer period in which we can enjoy the ornamental beauty of these winter fruits.
This subtle image may be less familiar to some of you. Heather and I have made a point of appreciating the delicate but hardy forms of dried winter plants, especially when they stand silhouetted against the snows of the new year. Here Heather highlights Ghost Pipe’s final upright dry form, which it adopts after the seed capsule has formed. Ghost Pipe is usually pictured in its pure white, soft, summer form, with its pendant flower head. The plant does not photosynthesize, drawing its energy instead from nearby trees via a parasitic relationship with the trees’ mycorrhizal fungi.
Emily Dickinson was particularly enamored of Ghost Pipe, calling it “the preferred flower of life.”
A solstice/winter card from a few years ago, with a raven and Sun standing in for the play of darkness and light.
And finally, a birthday card Heather gave me this summer, with two beautiful Staghorn Sumac leaves leaning into each other. Yes, I’m a lucky guy.
May the season, the holidays, and the new year be merry and bright for you all, or at least spacious enough to offer some peace and quiet. And as always, thanks for sticking with me.
And to Heather, my much better half, thank you for sticking with me too.
So much talent and generosity of spirit in your family🌱🌿💚💫
Thank you Jason , for showcasing beauty. Not just a soul mate, a kindred spirit, maybe a combination of each. Sharer of joy, joy mate, life sharer. Well, after 47 years , I haven’t figured out the exact name for what we have together. No need really, I think the Staghorn Sumac leaves say it best, tomorrow it might be something different, maybe a male and female Cardinal perched near each other on a wintered white branch. Actually, Heather said it best;
“Somehow the wind blew you here, next to me”.
Happy New Season & Happy and Healthy New Year. And thank you for sharing with a sharer.