New Year Gratitude – The Prairie Ecologist

A big thank you from the Prairie Ecologist to all those who have followed the blog and participated in conversations.

Read more here:  http://prairieecologist.com/2012/01/02/new-year-gratitude/

Photo of the Week – The Prairie Ecologist

Two end of the year photos.  See them here:

http://prairieecologist.com/2011/12/29/photo-of-the-week-december-29-2011/

Submarine Sora – The Prairie Ecologist

Ever wonder why it’s so hard to find a rail, even when you see exactly where it landed?  Why they seem to be able to disappear into thin air? 

Find out how they do it here:  http://prairieecologist.com/2011/12/27/submarine-sora/

“Be A Radical” With Your Landscape Anyway

By Jon Morgenson

The winter months seem to be a good time to consider personal change, including your home landscape. If you are considering a change in your home landscape in the coming New Year to something say easier to care for, something easier on the environment that might save a few shekels as well as benefit wildlife then why not try something radical.

Take a serious look at your landscape and decide what is working and what isn’t; some parts may be working fine and holding their own, so leave them alone and incorporate them into a new plan. Decide where you want to make changes and consider if they would improve the sustainability of the landscape. The changes to be made can be done in steps over time.

During the planning process don’t be afraid to try something radical. Is there is an area that would lend itself to the creation of a natural area. Think about a small duplication of a local native environment. It could be a prairie (meadow), wetland (rain garden), woodland or woodland edge. These types of plantings can include native plants as well as adapted non-native plants that do not pose a threat of escape and damage to native areas. The long range hope for this type of planting is matching growing conditions with suitable plant materials so that everything works together to make the planting sustainable with minimum inputs. I’d like to give an example of a woodland edge planting.

Sample Woodland Edge Landscape Plan

This planting could include a large shade tree such as bur or red oak and a few understory (edge) trees like redbud, pawpaw, or hop-hornbeam. Shrubs to include could be gooseberry, coralberry, wolfberry, elderberry, and dogwood. Shade tolerant grasses such as Virginia wild-rye and bottlebrush grass along with perennials like elm-leaved goldenrod, Solomon’s seal, purple cone flower and columbine can be planted in groups among  the trees and shrubs. To keep the initial planting cost down use smaller groupings of purchased perennials and then collect seed as the plants mature which can be sown where desired to fill out the planting. This type of planting will provide landscape beauty as well as an area for wildlife to use and be viewed.

After the planting is established, watering, maintenance and other inputs should be low. Leaves can be left where they fall to decompose and add to soil fertility as well as act as a natural soil cover (mulch) and a place for birds and critters to forage and hide. With time and patience a small sustainable system can evolve. If you are feeling radical, try this type of planting in the front yard for everyone to see!

DSLR Video: A new trick for this old dog

Close-up Bighorn

That old saying is true. I’m not afraid to try new tricks, but the closer I get to “Old Dog” status, longer the odds of me actually liking it. Well, I tried something new recently – shooting video on a D-SLR – but I’m far from ready to say I like it.

I volunteered for the assignment to cover Tyson Ritz’s bighorn sheep hunt at Fort Robinson. Ritz’s name was drawn from 1,762 entries for the Lottery Permit. He had never entered the $25 drawing before, and technically, he still hasn’t. His mother, Paula Heidtbrink, threw his name in the hat. So I guess I have her to blame for Tyson drawing the permit that was rightfully mine. That makes 17 years that I’ve donated to the cause. But I digreess.

At least Tyson’s luck gave me an excuse to return to my old stomping grounds in the Pine Ridge. They didn’t have to twist my arm to go, even considering the nature of the assignment: capture stills and video.

I’ve toyed with video on my point-and-shoot digital camera. From that experience, I knew shooting video with the same DSLR I’d be shooting stills with would be a challenge. I’ve always shot stills and my brain and finger have gotten pretty used to working with each other, with the former telling the latter when to trip the shutter.

The Nikon D3s I was shooting with requires you to start the video with the function button on the front of the camera and stop it either with the same button or the shutter button. On more than on occasion, I instinctively tripped the shutter during the middle of some neat action, grabbing a still at the expense of a movie.

That D3s was on loan from Nikon. Along with the rest of the world, we’re waiting for the D4, which everyone assumes will have full HD, 1080p, video (the D3s only shoots 720p) before we upgrade from the D3. Hopefully they’ll do something different with the start/stop function. The Canon boys here on the Magazine staff – Doug Carroll and Jeff Kurrus – took the plunge earlier this year with a EOS-1D Mark IV, which allows you to grab a still without stopping the movie. While that’s cool, the verdict is still out on whether the sound and vibration of the shutter trip will be easily edited out of the flick. We don’t have to worry about Jon Farrar jumping into the movie business. When I told him about it, he said he’s swore off new technology, or in other words, he’s too old to learn new tricks. (I can write a blog without getting a jab into Jon about his age, but it’s not nearly as much fun.)

Other things I learned about shooting video:

-        We may need to invest in some new tripod heads if we want to do much action panning. My Really Right Stuff ball head is smooth as silk, but it doesn’t look that way when you put a big lens on it. See the attached videos for proof..

-        Don’t count on the camera’s built-in mic. It’s worthless if there is a stitch of wind. Amazingly, that’s all there was on this trip west. I can’t imagine how bad it would’ve sounded if it would’ve been the standard 10- to 20-mph blow.

-        If you’ve shot stills your whole life like I have, you will find yourself stopping the movie long before you should. You’ve got to learn to think in seconds and minutes, not hundredths or thousandths of a second.

Who knows where this experiment will take us. “Multimedia” is the soup d’jour, and some folks think you have to have it to be relevant. I’m old school in that I like it, but don’t think it’s required. You can tell me a story with stills, and I think I can still tell you one, too. I certainly don’t want us to do what so many have done online: posting videos (or photos) just to post them, with no regard for quality.

NEBRASKAland has built its reputation on the quality of the photography, thanks to the likes of Farrar and many others. (wonder if that compliment makes up for the age dig?) I’d hate to see that suffer.

I found long ago that if you carry a camera and a shotgun in the field, you don’t shoot either well. I don’t think the still/video thing will be that extreme, but I do know I missed some great stills shooting video on the trip, and messed up some great videos to get some stills.

I certainly have some new tricks to learn. Wonder if I’ll get a treat if I do? My dog gets a treat when she does tricks. Have to work on that.

I’ve attached a few random videos and stills from the trip for you to peruse. Oh how I wish the Pine Ridge wasn’t so far away. The ram eating on the knees is the one Tyson harvested. All of them were too lovesick to worry about me.

Have a very Merry Christmas.

Eric Fowler

Fog in the Red Cloud Buttes at Fort Robinson