I did however see my first flock of southward headed geese last week so fall migrations could be starting. You could also look at pictures of brewers or yellow-winged blackbirds for more options of something in that sizerange of bird that flocks and creates a lot of sound.
As is typical for August here in S. BC, the air is very smokey from forest fires. The moon last night looked almost red through the smokey haze.
We had a real good rain last night and this morning, so the air is a bit clearer today and hopefully the fire danger is way down as well.
I picked my first Saskatoon/Serviceberry the other day in Spokane. it definitely wasn’t fully ripe, but was still pretty good. a little later, I found Kinnikinick for the first time. nasty little berries, and I don’t smoke, so it was way more exciting for just knowing it than anything else. But today, I went to a new place in Tacoma (Chambers Creek), and got a bunch of hazelnuts that were planted around some County building as an ornamental/watershed thing. I also picked a Cattail top for the first time, and haven’t figured out what to do with it yet.
Kinnikinick tea is good for your kidneys.
Our saskatoons are pretty much over. Any that are left on the bushes are starting to look like raisins. We got a ton of them and another ton of huckleberries this year. Best year in a long time.
Choke cherries are just starting now
shit. wish i’d known that. fortunately my kidneys are fine, but thanks for the info, i’ll be sure to remember that. do you just dry the leaves and do standard infusion type of thing?
wild grapes – muscadines – run rampant in these eastern woodlands. they produce sparsely it seems, but i ate the first ripe grapes of the season two days ago. some had even started to ferment a little (i gathered them from the ground – the vine hung 25 ft in the air). yum!
clicketyclack-
Yeah we pretty much have just made tea with the leaves. A tincture might work good too but I tend to keep things simple.
My wife is canning peaches this week. This is my nieces first time doing that. They canned huckleberry/saskatoon jam last week. I help here and there but she’d be pissed if she thought I was taking any credit for it 
saw some wild grapes last week, but couldn’t reach them
been eating some of the last blackberries in the area.
gathered some self-heal to tincture yesterday
Ate chanterells, angel wings, king bolete while out on TrollSplinter. Mushroom season has officially arrived on the Olympic peninsula! Also salal is in full swing out here, and the evergreen huckleberries are about to start getting ripe.
Yesterday in Skagit County I found Blackcaps for the first time, and a surprising amount of red huckleberries, and a little bit of Siberian Miner’s Lettuce on a walk with some friends who don’t know much about plants but want to learn.
I haven’t taken notice of this kind of stuff until recently, but here in New Zealand the Daffodils are sticking about 3-4 inches out of the ground, getting ready for Spring !
small observation, but hey, gotta start somewhere
Was up in the mountains yesterday and found Black Huckleberries for the first time (right before I saw my first wild bear!), and collected a bunch of Arnica.
woah sweet, was the bear close ?
i would have scared my tits off >.<
[quote=“anti_, post:108, topic:174”][quote author=clicketyclack link=topic=158.msg12142#msg12142 date=1220564903]
Was up in the mountains yesterday and found Black Huckleberries for the first time (right before I saw my first wild bear!), and collected a bunch of Arnica.
[/quote]
woah sweet, was the bear close ?
i would have scared my tits off >.<[/quote]
gosh, sorry for the long wait. it was pretty close, but it was running away from us, so not in the least scary, mostly just really exciting, especially since we had been told it was in the area, and were keeping our eyes peeled.
Mule deer rut is in full swing here judging by the smell and the huge neck on the buck I killed last week. A friend killed a whitetail buck the day before yesterday and it appeared to be in full rut too which is kind of early for the whitetails.
Whitefish are gathering in the deep pools here. I hope I can get time to fish before the water ices over on those pools.
Most the leaves are off the deciduous trees. The Tamarack needles are golden and beginning to fall off.
Snow in the high country. I was cutting wood in the snow on tuesday.
Full moon tonight!
At around 7 pm this evening I finished my shift at work and stepped outside. It was the first night I noticed the temp really dropping after sunset. Time to switch from the fall jacket to the winter one.
Been getting a lot of Madrone berries lately, as well as the bigger juicier berries from other introduced Arbutus species.
Pretty cold this morning. 25 below 0. Burning a lot of wood in the last week or so.
I’m so excited, i went to a “natural area” today that I had never visited, and the stinging nettles are starting to pop up out of the ground, should be a week or two before i can have nettle omelettes.
the bleeding hearts were coming up as well.