A Woods Walk (much tiny beauty)

Since I have been sick the whole month of june (with suspected parasites from my pond, still waiting for test results to come back) .... i haven't been able to really walk much in the forest. I have been resting my body alot. The anti parasite herbal remedies i took made me half better, so today i went for a walk to see what the forest floor would behold. Cause if you look real close, there is always something going on - no matter how tiny the patch of ground you choose.
I found wild red bee balm, and mannnnnny mushrooms pushing their way up from the dirt...
Mushrooms hold some kind of magic, and no i don't mean the hallucinating and poisoning your enemy kind.... i mean, the way they always look like something in a fairy tale. Always manage to be beautiful, mysterious, and a sign of nature at it's best.
I saw alot of these tiny white flowers, which hang like bells or rain drops... or a saddness that is stunning in it's beauty.

I always get supremely excited when i see these mushrooms that look like underwater coral! I love when sea and land are so similar.
Tiny red wildflower.... growing near the red bee balm, but is not bee balm. Just a disguise.
XoxOXOX

Cha Cha Cha Changes

Sometimes I want to change my life. It's possibly a habit I have developed over the years... made worse by changing seasons (which I did not experience growing up in the tropical south.)
But on this rainy PMS day, i have no clue what the change is i desire. Or no real way to plan it out.
When it is something simple like, 'i want to move' then i can look for a new house. When it is vague and lingering, almost nagging - it has no rules, it has no plans, it's only a strong desire that hasn't found a form.
*
I want things, that I dont know if i can have. And if I can have them, I dont know how i will get from point A to point B... although usually the dominoes keep falling on their own knocking the next day into the next without any effort on my part.

Xoxoxox

Trees VS Solar

I have an sustainable issue that maybe ya'll can help me with...
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I moved into the forest, and there is only scarce amounts of sunlight coming to the Luck Cabin. While I would love to get off the grid entirely, when it comes to doing anything solar related... well the trees are blocking out the light. It seems crazy to me to cut down trees to have solar energy, but which option really is the most environmentally sound? I mean, how much is destroyed when I use up all the electricity... more then 10-20 trees?
I have a small hot water heater, run by electricity - it's small enough to fit under the kitchen counter. But I long to have a solar tank, that uses the sun to heat up the water. I have a stove and fridge run by electricity too... but I use maybe 30-40$ a month total, so switching to solar should be somewhat easy.
That is, if i had sunlight (and $).

I would love to open a discussion here where people can share their ideas of better ways to live Off Grid without using electricity generated by the electric company. Do I even need solar panels (sunlight heat), or is there a truly efficient and realistic way to live with no electricity year round without solar energy?
My suggestion box is open!
***
Here are steps I have already taken to be sustainable::::

• Gravity fed spring water
• Organic gardening (planting fruit trees, herbs, veggies etc to feed myself)
• Using wood to warm the cabin (also can cook on the wood stove too)
• Building my gray water system, instead of a septic tank
• Composting toilet
• My donkey! (using her poop as garden fertilizer and I plan to train her to take long rides, carry pack saddles, hike etc...)
• Rarely drive a car (i have a bike too, but don't have the strength to ride it in my area)
• Wear only organic, vintage, fair trade, used, thrifted clothing and shoes

Xoxoxox

Ready, Aim, CHoP!

It's that time of year again, when a few chilly nights are the wild's warning of the soon to come winter. My source of heat is wood, in a Treemont wood stove that was already here at the Luck Cabin when I moved in. I lucked out cause it holds a coal overnight, and that means I won't have to start a new fire every morning, which may be one of the harder things about heating with wood.
but not the hardest.
The hardest for me would be splittin' those logs into firewood! Remember last year when I was just learning how to really do it right? Weighing in at about 100 pounds (that would be me) made splitting wood with an ax something of a zen practice more then force.
I set up the log in a stable place and take a good look at my aim. I don't have tons of extra energy to waste on missing my mark, I have to make my swings count.

I am using a "Go Devil" type ax (heavy sledge hammer-ish shape on the back end), which works WAY better then the standard tree chopping ax. I figure if i start splitting a few logs a day now, by the time the real cold comes I will be ahead of the game unlike last year which was a harsh HARSH winter that caught everyone off guard.

It may take me way more swings then I would like (check my swing style I learned last year here) and my wood may still be a lil' green (aka- not totally dry)... but it's way more efficient, good exercise, and saves alot of money to spilt the logs myself. A stack of logs a day keeps da' doctor away!

How do ya'll stay warm for the winter and what do you think is the most earth friendly way to heat your home?

XOxoxoox

Trees In The Woods

I went for a walk in the woods next to the Luck Cabin, here are the trees I saw that made me say WOW, neato, and DAng!

Xoxox

Trees in Inter-Species Relationships

Is this hot or not? This tree hugging, by trees hugging trees of another species is.... well.... look at this! It's awesome.
And this, well it's like watching late night HBO in the late 80's .... this pair is actually....
K-I-S-S-I-N-G! Is it getting hawt up in here?!?
XoXoooox

I See Dead Things

It's not everyday I walk into something like this in the woods, but there was obviously a frenzy of activity up there beneath the trees ... tracks everywhere, holes dug, scat and then I walked almost right on top this fresh skull and jaw bone. Still partly red with blood, still pink flesh hanging off the bone, preserved in the icy snow.
My guess is it's a opossum or raccoon skull. Maybe groundhog or feline too?
Made me think I should stop making those jokes about a coyote possibly eating my face off... which I jest about after hearing them howl nearly 5 night a week now.
XoXo

Animal Tracking: Wet Snow Tracks & Scat (and a fun walk too)

It is not often I can walk in the woods this winter, the weather has been the harshest cold & snow I have ever seen in Western North Carolina, since I moved here 9 years ago. The trails on the mountain behind the house where I live don't get any sun during the cold season and are therefore freezing and the snow barley melts... i guess it's north facing? Big Sandy Mush (the area I am in) has virtually turned into Big Snowy Mush. Yesterday was remotely 'warm' in comparison and I could not resist the urge to get out of the house and move my limbs... being inside all winter is driving me bonkers! Bort, my most best nature friend came along too...
At the top of the apple orchard there was a super highway of melting deer tracks, some fresh some old and frozen. Further up the trail was what we thought is a raccoon (pictured below), there were quite a few of these going off to trees and then ending at the bottom of a tree trunk.
On the trail of the raccoon tracks were these GIANT canine tracks, which we assumed is a dog because if a coyote got that big that would be terrifying!
Then there was a bit of this scat (poop) in the snow... raccoon poop maybe?
Due to all the storms alot of trees fell down blocking the trail, and had to be climbed over. Most the trees that fell were locust, which makes really good firewood but makes me wonder if a disease killed a bunch of them too. Living here in Big Sandy Mush with Bort has helped me learn way more about identifying different types of trees (and animal tracks), I will miss this when I move.
Treasures....At the peak of the trail, the view of the half melted snow across the valley and the solid snow topping the balds was freakin' awesome! The white snow, silhouetting the wet trees makes a dramatic, ominous scene.
Once we got to the top the wet snow was melting through our shoes, and making cold squishy wet feet. So basically I hauled ass back down the mountain to soak my feet in a pot of hot water & epsom salt. So nice. :)
XoXo

Oh, Deer! And Hidden Turkey Too...

Deer! Yesterday afternoon me and Bort followed some sounds which I thought had been ducks by the pond. We both slowly, quietly step by step made our way towards the pond in hopes to see some wild ducks, but when we got there we saw nothing at all but water. We decided to keep going up through the orchard into the woods to see if it had been wild turkeys instead...
when we got to the edge of a stream and looked up there were three beautiful deer grazing on the mountain WITH a group of about 5 wild turkeys! All together. Which as I took pictures and moved in closer, it dawned on me that we were also now a part of this moment where deer, turkeys and humans were sharing the same space in nature - where nothing much was going to take place that was dangerous to any of us. My mind stood still and raced back in time to wonder if mankind and deer ever used to sit in the same forest casually, before things were hunted to near extinction for sport... before the animals became utterly terrified that all we ever would do were bad things to them. I imagined there was a time when we humans were more likely not to kill them, and they were more likely to trust in that. When the scales tipped, evolution taught them to run from us. Certainly the deer were not running from the turkey. ;)
In these pictures with the pink stars, I have put the pink star mark above each deer standing in the woods frozen... they are extremely difficult to spot unless they are moving and flip up their tail to show the white in warning to other deer nearby that there is serious danger.
You can't see the turkeys in the pictures, but what was really awesome was the turkeys were taking cues from the deer about safety - walking when they walked, relaxing when they relaxed and freezing when a deer walked then suddenly froze to check out the humans.
After what seemed like 10 minutes or more, the deer began moving along the trail together - but not usually walking at the same time. One would go...pause...another would go...pause... and so on, till they were out of sight. When I heard some yipping and howling right then, I though "oh shit, now the coyotes are coming for the turkeys!" and began moving swiftly away. It turned out to just be a neighbor's dog though howling alone at his house. :)
XoXo

Animal Tracking: Can You Guess Who Done It?

A specific creature has created the holes you see in the tree trunk above. See all the shavings on the ground underneath it?
Can you guess which species it is that does this !?!

Here's some hints:

• It's rarely seen
• It's bigger than your head
• It's not a unicorn sharpening it's horn
  

Ya'll try to guess what it is, and I will tell you the answer in a few days!!!

XoXo

The Naked Winter Woods

While winter may open up the views, cleanse the earth, and tone down the bright colors into a meditative gray... I have the hardest time adjusting to this season because of the cold. I can see the fantastic beauty but I can hardly stand my freezing cold toes under the the thick socks and boots, my Cajun DNA has no clue how to get motivated for many outdoors adventures! When I look at the naked trees day after day I will confess to ya'll that by mid january I struggle to not go insane. This is why winter is a good time for being creative on a personal level, a time to discover and pursue hobbies, to make wish lists, to form new dreams, and to spend too much time on the internet reading each other's blogs. ;)
Please share with me your winter time hobbies, so I can get extra inspired to do something other then put wood on the fire and hold my hands over the wood stove like a slave to the heat! Oh, and check out the stark beauty and lines of winter in these pics....
XoXo

Native Plants: Usnea

When I went for my walk in the woods today, it was the first time I had been around the trail in a while... the rains and the cold make me look for more indoor projects. I felt disoriented at first by the now open, vast and dead-ness of the wooded area, I was beginning to feel a little nostalgic for the summer cause there was nothing but brown dead leaves to look at on the ground, and alot of briers to get caught on my clothes. Until I came upon a wonderful bright green lichen (a fuzzy wuzzy fungus) called Usnea! I learned about this plant many years ago at a "wellness weeds" class, that it was an herbal cure for strep throat, but I found my curiosity was peeked to really make sure this was the same usnea sold in health food stores and loved by wildcrafting herbalists.
So, while looking up info on identification, I found a neat trick in making sure it is really Usnea and not some other look alike lichen! Break open the main stem and check for a white middle, kinda like peeling the bark off a tree and seeing the lighter color inner wood underneath. Usnea's inner stem is a white strip. I broke mine open and found the white!

Here is some medicinal info on this cool little lichen:::

"Usnea has been used medicinally for at least 1000 years. Usnic acid (C₁₈H₁₆O₇), a potent antibiotic and antifungal agent is found in most species. This, combined with the hairlike structure of the lichen, means that Usnea lent itself well to treating surface wounds when sterile gauze and modern antibiotics were unavailable. It is also edible and high in vitamin C.

In modern American herbal medicine, Usnea is primarily used in lung and upper respiratory tract infections, and urinary tract infections.

Usnea lichen is important to note because it has life-saving potential. Native Americans employed it as a compress to severe battle wounds to prevent infection and gangrene, and it was also taken internally to fight infections. Usnea contains potent antibiotics which can halt infection and are broad spectrum and effective against all gram-positive and tuberculosis bacterial species. Usnea has several unique characteristics which make its identification easy if stranded in the wilderness far from a hospital. "

Go here to read how to make your own Usnea tincture!

XoXo

Alone In The Wilderness With Dick Proenneke

Yesterday I got a DVD in the mail from a friend and commenter here at The Oko Box (Thanks Blair!)... the video was about a man who went out into the remote woods and built a cabin without any power tools, and ended up so comfy & happy there he stayed in his hand built cabin for the next 30+ years. I found a condensed version of the video on youtube, and although it leaves out some extraordinary parts of his creative abilities - you'll get the idea of how bad ass this guy was! He has inspired my already inspired self to follow my earthy dreams and heart, and don't let anything stand in the way of my love for nature.



XoXo

Free Fun In The (Fall) Forest

The woods are opening themselves up again with the coming winter- leaves are beginning to drop, native plants have gone to seed so wildlife can store up on food. Plants have died back and there's more to see then in the fullest part of summer, everything looks like a spot I never saw before. The change of seasons I think feels good for everyone, even the flora and fauna.
There were tons of these tiny yellow mushrooms, but not too many other species today...
there were plenty awesome hiding spots though for critters and bugs. If i was a mouse I would totally make the log below my winter home. But I guess then a snake might eat me?
At the top of the hill I jumped the fence (i know, more trespassing- it's becoming a vice). The fence line is marked by the oldest, biggest trees that were not logged back in the day. They left those trees for property markers, some of them have very old rusted barbed wire growing right through the middle of the trunk!
I found this awesome wild grapevine that was reallllly long, going at least 40 feet into the tops of trees...starting at the ground I climbed from the bottom. I leaned first on my stomach and tried shimmy'ing my way up but not only was that too freaking hard, but the vine itself STUNK like rotted mothballs.
I spun around upside down and had flashbacks to playing on the 'monkey bars' at St. Rita elementary school, maybe living in nature is like living in a perpetual recess!?!
Dirty, stinky, and feeling way good. I only made it about 10 feet off the ground and stopped. Don't be fooled by the illusion of the plants below me, they are tall and growing on a steep incline.
Woo!
XoXOooo