Updo :: Troll Doll Hair-bun

The other day I was working in the garden and it was HOT so I put my hair up in a bun with two pencils, one of which has an old Troll Doll Pencil Topper I found at Goodwill. 

He's so cute!  Now, that's a high-fashion updo ~

The Big Tree :: Ever Wonder What A 1000+ Year Old Tree Looks Like?

photo: Big'un © Biologie.

"The Big Tree" at Goose Island State Park in Texas is said to be the oldest living coastal live oak tree in the Nation. To give you an idea of it's "gorgeous oakiness of grandeur" (as I like to call it), you may use my family and other visitors on the far side of the tree as a size reference in the above photo! Wow!

The tree is a hop, skip and a jump from the coast of Aransas Bay and "he" is part of a family called Coastal Live Oaks (Quercus virginiana). These trees don't have the typical large, lobed oak leaves of the big oaks found further North. Rather, the leaves are small and ovoid.

In addition to allowing visitors to gaze happily at the wonderful mighty oak, Goose Island State Park also offers camping, birding, and fishing. You can sign up to borrow fishing gear through their "Loan A Tackle Program" if you forget your own equipment.

It's also a nice park for picnicking, nature study, wildlife observation, and photography. If you are a boater you'll be happy to note that the park even allows boats with motors! Also, there are guided nature hikes year round and guided birding tours are held from January through April. Unfortunately our visit was too short to take full advantage of all the activities offered, but we did enjoy the drive to see the handsome oak with it's gnarly branches and wonderful shade!

The Big Tree's girth is around 35 feet and it's branches make up a 90 foot canopy! Even though it's surrounded by a protective fence, you can check out the behemoth of a tree from all angles by following a circular paved pathway all the way around. When you walk up to the tree along the path you will pass it's offspring in the grove.

While my family was in Rockport for vacation my niece, Ahlyssa, picked up a list of "51 Things To Do" while we were there and that big ole beautiful tree was on the list, I'm so happy to have seen it and what a great time we all had that afternoon!

We visited The Big Tree in early April and found it surrounded by pretty Texas wildflowers of Orange Globe Mallow and Pointed Phlox. This photo (below) reflects my mood today, bright and shiny!

photo: © Biologie-me. FLICKR

Happy Easter

My natural brown eggs don their Sunday Best!

I bought these adorable Egg Cozies from Raige Creations' shop on Etsy.

Aren't they too cute for words?

Drop by her blog and say hello, here.

I hope everyone has a wonderful and Happy Easter!

1. wildflower, 2. Bunnies, 3. Easter Egg Cozies, 4. Pink Wildflower :: What is it?

Bluebonnets Tell Bees Which Flower To Pollinate :: Nature In Harmony!

Last month I mentioned bluebonnets are the state flower of Texas:

The very first bluebonnet I photographed in my backyard this year was very young and none of the flowers on the spike had been pollinated yet. You can see my blog post about the "baby" bluebonnet, here.

How do I know if the blossom has been pollinated?

When the bees pollinate the bloom, the white section in the center of the little "bonnet shaped" flower turns a pinkish-red. My blogger friend, Hali, mentioned she'd like to see the color change and I promised a photograph so today it's time to deliver!

Here we go:

Why the color change?

Bees don't interpret colors the same way humans see colors. They see the world in colors of blues, greens, and ultra-violet light. They can also see oranges and yellows. They can't see the color red.

Since bees can't detect the color red the flowers of the Bluebonnet have adapted to save energy and time for both the bees and the flower. The flowers want to be pollinated so they can produce a seed and continue the cycle of life. They bloom and present a pleasing flower of blue with a white (or yellow) center to attract pollinators. The bees can see the bloom no matter what the color, however, that center of white or yellow is the key attractant. As far as the bluebonnets are concerned, they want the bees to ignore a flower that has already been fertilized and move up to a flower on the spike with a white or yellow center (colors bees are attracted to and can "see").

In a nutshell, the reason the center of the bloom changes color is to encourage the pollinators to move to a flower on the bluebonnet spike that still needs pollination.

Nature in harmony!

The way bees and flowers work together is called symbiosis. Symbiosis is a relationship between two organisms of different kinds which benefits both organisms. Yay!

Go forth and bloom! :)

Buggin' Out On Thursdays :: A Little Side Tour

It's Buggin' Out On Thursdays!

Buggin' Out is a weekly blog post about the creepy crawlies in my life. I like bugs and love to take macro photos of the ones I find in my backyard (and occasionally a few home invaders like Peaches The Crab Spider). I try my best to identify and research the insects I photograph and share all the Bug Wonderfulness with you. It's a virtual bug collection! This house is a no squish zone and most pests are "released back into the wild", i.e., moved outdoors using the glass jar, paper magazine technique of which I am an expert at these days!

Today, I'm going off the grid a little bit. The theme is still bugs, of course, but these are made of metal. My mom and dad gave me a little basket of goodies for Valentine's Day which included a cute bee and butterfly tea light holder set plus a heavy iron FLY! I named him Frederick and he's currently my most favorite paperweight of all time. I thought it was cute that my mom picked these out for me in lieu of my new hobby and this weekly blog series.

Frederick The Iron Fly

What kind of bugs have you seen lately?

Gloomy Cold Day

Blooms To Brighten The Day!

This winter seems especially gloomy and cold. To brighten the day I'm sharing this cheerful, sunny photograph I took at the San Antonio Botanical Gardens last Spring. I love to go to the gardens in April and May when all the spring flowers are in bloom.

I've been a fan of botanical gardens ever since my professor in Botany gave us an assignment to visit and write a report on our experience.

"Awake, thou wintry earth-
Fling off thy sadness.
Fair vernal flowers,
laugh forth Your ancient gladness!"
-Thomas Blackburn, Source: An Easter Hymn

Buggin' Out On Thursdays :: A Green Lynx Spider Pounces Into The Virtual Bug Collection

It's Buggin' Out On Thursdays and I love this pretty spider! Yes, I think he's pretty. Greens, yellows, black polka dots, and crazy wicked looking hairy bristles on the legs. Awesome.

Green lynx spiders (Peucetia viridans) are a very welcome addition to my gardens. One little green spider up close in the macro lens brings a whole new world to life! I never knew this guy had transparent yellow legs with black spikes! I found my little buddy living in the foliage of my squash plants waiting for prey. I get these spiders in my gardens every year.

Like most anybody, green lynx spiders will bite you if provoked but are generally harmless to humans. Interestingly, in addition to injecting venom into their prey with their fangs they are capable of spraying venom from them as well. They eat insects that destroy crops like moths who feed on cotton. Unfortunately they don't discriminate if a bee or other beneficial pollinator happens to come around while they are hunting.

These spiders hunt during the day and roam low foliage, herbs and shrubberies. They can "pounce" on their prey when they come across something worth eating. They don't have a web but they can spin silk and use it as leverage or as a safety line when moving from one plant to another.

The species name, viridans, is Latin for "becoming green". The spider inspired me to make these earrings entitled "Green Lynx. Love Her. A pair of Peucetia viridans earrings" and they are part of my Mother Earth Collection @ Etsy.

They'd be wonderful for St. Patty's Day, yes? Unless of course you like getting pinched!

Buy the earrings here!

Mosquito Game :: Be A Vector And Bite The Humans!

Become Speedy Ann, an Anapheles mosquito whose flight you control past obstacles, hungry birds, and insecticides so you can bite humans, give them Malaria, and use their blood to produce new eggs.

The first time I played the Mosquito Game I had a hard time figuring out the controls and immediately got eaten by a bird. Starting again, I found a human, hovered over him (a blue or orange dot) and started trying to settle down to take my blood meal (have to press and hold the space bar to "eat") when he noticed me and smashed me dead. The game had me laughing. Try and get the High Score by being the fastest mosquito to drink enough blood to produce eggs!

Play the game at NoblePrize.org: Mosquito Game

Fast Facts:

• Malaria is caused by a parasite, Plasmodium species.

• Usually, people get malaria by being bitten by an infective female Anapheles mosquito. Only Anopheles mosquitoes can transmit malaria and they must have been infected through a previous blood meal taken on an infected person.

• Once a mosquito ingests malaria parasites from an infected human, the parasites must undergo development within the mosquito for about 10-21 days before they are infectious to humans.

• The mosquito Anapheles gambei is the main vector of malaria.

• Each year 350-500 million cases of malaria occur worldwide, and over one million people die, most of them young children in Africa south of the Sahara.

• From the CDC website:

"Some Anopheles species are poor vectors of malaria, as the parasites do not develop well (or at all) within them. It is hoped that some day, genetically modified mosquitoes that are refractory to malaria can replace wild mosquitoes, thereby limiting or eliminating malaria transmission."

Gathering Moss.

While a rolling stone may gather no moss, these earrings reflect just the opposite using the natural beauty of moss jasper. Moss jasper is also known as serpentine stone because of the cork-like or reptilian variations within the stone. Yesterday I was bitten by the earring fairy and conjured up 5 pairs of earrings.

The Gathering Moss Earrings are available now in my Etsy shop: Biologie - Inspired By Sunshine & Science.

Within the next 5 days I'll be uploading and listing four more pair of unique earrings, all handmade by yours truly.

Cheers!

Buggin' Out on Thursdays :: Bee Flies for the Virtual Bug Collection

Bee fly drawing copyright © 1996 by Louise Kulzer

Eating larvae and sipping nectar is a way of life.

It's a bee? It's a fly? It's a bee fly!

It's also Buggin' Out on Thursdays.

When my husband and I celebrated our wedding anniversary a couple years ago, we stayed at the Lost Pines Resort and Spa outside of Austin, Texas. The resort has a small butterfly garden. Even though it was nearing the end of September there were still flowers in bloom and insect activity. I was mesmerized by a little fuzzy buzzy "bee" sipping the nectar of yellow wildflowers.

After checking out BugGuide.net (a site where naturalists post and identify bug photos) I tracked down my "strange little bee" and found out it's actually related to flies and is, in fact, a true fly which mimics a honeybee so as to ward off predators.

It has a plump, fuzzy body with stripes of (sometimes) brown and yellow. The species I captured in my photos has a long proboscis with which to reach nectar. There are different types of bee flies and the Family name for them is Bombyliidae. Their name reminds me of Tom Bombadil from J.R.R. Tolkien's writings!

They have been called the Harbingers of Spring. The early "bee fly" gets the "worm", so to speak, because these insects get busy at the very beginning of Spring to lay their eggs near the eggs of beetles, bees, wasps, butterflies, moths, or on eggs of grasshoppers. The bee fly larvae hatch first, have a chance to mature a bit, and when the host egg hatches our little buddy has something good and nutritious laying within easy reach!

If you think you spot a bee fly I hope you have your camera ready because they hover and dart. They are much faster than true bees. They remind me of hummingbirds! I had trouble following this little one around with my camera because she was so speedy. I love the way her back legs trail behind her as she zips to the flowers!

If you have a bug story, blog post, or photo you'd like to share leave a comment and add to the Virtual Bug Collection!

What kind of bugs have you seen lately?

Buggin' Out on Thursdays :: A Virtual Bug Collection

Butterfly Cocoon - Lost Pines Resort Butterfly Garden

Apparently, based off all the photographs of insects and bugs and other creepy crawlies I've collected over the last few months, I like bugs! I hadn't really noticed how often I find and snap pictures of little bugs and spiders until I started sorting through all the photos stored in my camera.

I love the picture of this butterfly cocoon (above). It was taken at the Hyatt Regency Lost Pines Resort and Spa outside of Austin, Texas when my husband and I were there to celebrate our wedding anniversary. The resort is wonderful and we spent a lot of time hiking and swimming but also squeezed in time for kayaking down the river!

I'm blogging my collection of bugs starting every Thursday with photos and a few interesting tidbits about each specimen in my "virtual" bug collection. I guess I prefer collecting bugs via photos rather than to euthanize them, stick a pin through them, and mount them in a glass case!

Here is a preview of what is to come:

:: Dreamflower Purple. A Delicate Bracelet ::

Dreamflower Purple

A delicate treasure trove of amethyst, shell, glass, silvers and Swarovski crystals. This one of a kind bracelet is designed and handmade by yours truly! The asymmetrical design breaks away from the norm in a subtle and glorious way. It's sure to please and makes a sweet stocking stuffer.

I fell in love with the look and feel of the little flower beads on this bracelet. It took me a month to find the right design and complimentary colors to go with the flowers until I came across the pretty purple glass beads and Swarovski crystal spacers.

Lovely!

Get It Here: etsy

Ooo, one more thing, don't forget my holiday special as mentioned here - free shipping and free gift-wrapping now through January 4th; anytime...anywhere!

What's better than free gift wrap?

Free Shipping and Free Gift-wrap for the Holidays and beyond!

Shop online and support handmade goods this holiday season. Sit back, relax, and browse at Biologie.

Receive your handmade jewelry in a homemade ribbon pouch & beautifully wrapped in a hand-folded sturdy paper gift box, all shipped to you for free beginning November 24, 2009 to January 4th, 2010.

Etsy: Your place to buy & sell all things handmade Biologie.etsy.com

Veggie Garden

In August I planted a vegetable garden. It was my first attempt at something like this and I've been meaning to blog about how things are going!

My husband built me a raised bed which I sectioned off like a square foot garden. I planted seeds of bunching onions, long thin cayenne peppers, bok choy, golden hubbard squash, bush beans, spaghetti squash, zucchini, and yellow squash. I used organic soil mixed with organic compost. The only things I transplanted were the pepper plants which I grew by seed indoors some months beforehand.

The bok choy were the first to show their cute faces to the world! They are very slow growers so I didn't expect to see them sprout first. The seed packet was a good one, practically every seed I sewed sprouted. A few days later the squash started sprouting as well as the bush beans (but I never did see a single bunching onion, the seed packet was old).

It didn't take long before the white-flies found my little garden plot. Here is an excerpt from my garden journal:

August 27, 2009
Whiteflies EVERYWHERE! It's awful. I spent pretty much an entire afternoon researching ways to kill them. I sprayed them with my soap solution recipe (it's for aphids but I read it will kill the whiteflies too). They are all over the leaves of my squashes and bush beans, plus the larvae on the underside. I hate them! I just read that the solution might be harmful to my squash plants so I may have killed them along with the flies. :(

I researched a few organic garden pest recipes. My dad used a pepper spray to protect his Tabasco and habenero peppers from being eaten alive by garden chompers. This is the recipe he used as he remembers it:

Ingredients:

• dishsoap
• several cloves of garlic
• 6-10 hot peppers (hotter the better!)
• 1 gallon water

Directions:
Place garlic, peppers and a small amount of your water in a blender/food processor and puree. NOTE: Avert your face when you take the lid off because the fumes are very strong. Strain the mixture and add the liquid to your gallon of water.

When you are ready to use the solution on your garden, fill up a spray bottle, add 2 tsp dishsoap, shake and spray every few days until the pests are under control.

Shake well before each use.

We had to leave for a few days in September. I left a soaker-hose attached to a timer so the seedlings would stay moist while we were gone. When we came home the garden was not only growing and alive, it was wild and the squash plants were huge! They pretty much took over the garden.

Next season I'm going to make a new bed where I can plant just squash separate from everything else! The bush beans and the peppers were still getting enough sun so I just let everything grow so I can see how things turn out. This is definitely an experiment in progress and I will have more pictures and info as the garden saga continues.

Additional photos of my Veggie Garden are found on my Flickr page.

If you are interested in building a square foot garden box like mine, check out Emily's instructions for making the garden box on her My Square Foot Garden blog: Build It!

Rockport, Texas: Flying South for the Winter

A little town on the coast of Texas, Rockport is the place to visit if you ever plan a trip to nearby Corpus Christi.

The beach I visited this summer with my mom and my nephew was clean, beautiful and the water at that time of year is calm and warm. We left at sunset and I took this picture of their little painted amphitheater.

This September 17th through 2oth, Rockport is holding it's annual Hummer/Bird Celebration. The birds begin flying South for the winter and bird-lovers from all over the country come to see them off. There are tours, seminars, artists, bird experts, and beach-goers intermingling for a wonderful September celebration at Rockport.

If you saw my recipe for Hummingbird Cake you know that the teeny "Hummers" have been on my mind lately. It's raining outside due to the tropical disturbances and they flit around in the rain like it doesn't bother them at all. I saw them this morning. I think I have about 6-8 hummers visiting my feeders each day (or it seems like that many).

Click here if you'd like to visit the Rockport-Fulton area website.

Cherry Blossoms

I love cherry blossoms.

I recently learned several polymer clay techniques and I immediately fell in love with doing "appliqué" to make a miniature work of art on a bead. First and foremost, pink cherry blossoms!

Here, I share with you my sketches and a few of my new designs in the making. I love the look and style of Chinese disc beads. The soft, flat circles are pleasing to the eye and feel good to the touch. Add a chocolate brown branch of beautiful pink cherry blossoms and I'm hooked!

By definition, appliqué is a decoration or ornament, as in needlework, made by cutting pieces of one material and applying them to the surface of another. In my case, I've made a stone-effect disc bead and instead of cutting out a branch or flowers I hand-sculpted a branch of miniature cherry blossoms and applied it to the bead.

I make the pendants out of white or gray polymer clay with inclusions of art sand to mimic a stone disc bead. I began the design using a gray stone-effect, however, subsequent experiments lead me to prefer white because I think it's a better background to show off the pinks and browns.

I had no idea of the time and tedious effort it took to use an applique technique on polymer clay but I'm in love with the results. I certainly have a higher respect for sculptors and other artists who work in fine detail than I ever have before in my life! In addition to working with this new medium, I am now learning the art of Chinese knots so I can showcase my precious pendants from a pretty satin cord.

Next up, dogwood?