The Nature of Nature 2020

This trip for me was very similar to our trip to Johnson’s Woods. I was expecting to see some wildlife there, but only saw a lone woodpecker. There was an abundance of trees, who had all lost their leaves except for a few juvenile beech trees. This left me with very little to look at besides moss. Just like Johnson’s Woods, there was also a boardwalk that made the bog very accessible, though it had some water covering it and at times I thought it might break. However here we had the opportunity to explore an area with just a footpath. I think I liked this part of the trip more because I felt more involved with the nature as I had to really watch where I was stepping to make sure I wouldn’t slip and fall in the mud. I think it would be interesting to visit the bog in the warmer months to see the difference the season has on it.

During our trip, I thought that it was really cool to see and experience what I read about as a young child.  I never thought once that I would ever see a carnivorous plant in the ~wild~ and never in the winter.  Although I think I would have enjoyed it in warmer months so I could see more vegetation and experience the rest of the ~wilderness~.  I also thought it was interesting that people who manage the bog were cutting poison sumac that was nowhere near the boardwalk, which I thought the whole point of cutting them was for human benefit, but what is the benefit if they are not reachable to humans? Just some food for thought.

We went to Brown’s Bog on a day with crummy weather. I think this had a large effect on my view on the trip. There were no birds chirping and no sun shining through the trees. I think on a day with nice weather, Brown’s Bog could have seemed much prettier and full of nature. On the day we went, it seemed kind of dead. There did not seem to be much life there, other than what was constantly reiterated to be poison sumac or poison ivy and we had to be sure to stay away from it. There were small things growing from the ground that looked like they could have been mini tree stumps. This was interesting to me because the only other time I’ve ever seen this was at a national park in South Carolina. I know that they were not actually the same thing, based on looks and how they would have been described differently if they were,  but it was still interesting to see the visible similarity. If given the opportunity, I would love to visit Brown’s Bog again on a nice day to be able to truly take in the beauty it has to offer.

Hello!

It’s your friendly TA. As you may have guessed, this Monday was my second trip to Brown’s Bog. As you also may have guessed, the scenery was very different this time around. Visually, the bog looked like an alien planet. Not just from how it was before, but also in general.

The ferns, once buoyant and vibrant, had turned orange and curled in on themselves. They looked like the strangest insects. The pitcher plants, once hidden among so many tall plants, are standing proudly above the rest. The star moss, which I barely noticed before, is a collection of strange bright green bursts against all of the dead plants.

While walking down the boardwalk, I expected to fend off all of those plants, the ferns and poison sumac, but instead I was free to look around and see for yards and yards. Some would call the scenery depressing but I found it fascinating. In the dreary grey weather, every muted color popped. It felt special. I pictured how this setting would be a great place to film a scene for a movie. The atmosphere adds so sense of suspense and mystery.

In a way, the bog felt more alive. The ground was a character in and of itself. It was responding dramatically to every footprint, painting mud onto my shoes. I was thrilled. I love mud. And I love overcast weather. I’m happy to say that Brown’s Bog in Spring now has a special place in my heart.

 

 

 

During our immersive experience through Browns Bog, I was particularly drawn to the pitcher plant, also known as Nepenthes. These pitcher plants were somehow able to maintain their beautiful, yet subdued sunset coat compared to their neighboring vegetation, which were either dormant or dead. Pitcher plants resemble a nutshell skeleton in the winter and latex skin in the summer. Having never heard of this species, I was fascinated by how these plants can modify their physiology to trap their prey, like ants, termites, and other insects. For instance, the plant will adjust the slipperiness of its pitcher’s surface to trap its prey. Once the prey has entered the pitcher, the plant’s digestive enzymes and acidic liquid, similar to humans, will start to break down the organism into a protein. I was struck to hear that plants share similar biological processes as humans. It has sparked a new interest and now I want to explore more into the field of botany.

While walking through the woods on our class trip to Brown’s Bog my attention was drawn to the size of the trees. More specifically the smallness of the greater majority of them. When walking through Johnson’s woods during the past field trip, there were countless trees that were massive and could easily have been over 200 years old. Contrast that with the size of the trees at Brown’s Bog, and it is easy to see how different old-growth forests are from those which were clear cut at one point. While walking the kame trail there were only a small handful of trees which I would believe to be 200 years of age. The largest discrepancy which I noticed was the sizes of the beach trees. While nearly all of the beach trees at Johnson’s woods were quite large, I only recall seeing two small beach trees clinging to their leaves in the Browns Bog. The tree size discrepancy which I perceived allowed the group to experience variance in ecosystems processes in Northeast Ohio.

One observation that struck me at Brown’s Bog was seeing the beech tree with some of its leaves still clinging desperately onto the branches. On this dreary winter’s day, all of the other trees were completely devoid of vegetation so the beech tree really stuck out, despite its leaves being dead and yellow instead of alive and green. Professor Bourne explained to us that only young beech trees have the ability to retain their leaves. This image of the young, stubborn beech tree refusing to de-leaf reminded me of a fond memory of my childhood. In our backyard, we have a beech tree much like the one at Brown’s bog. Every winter, my mother and I would go out into our backyard and she would comment on how we need to give this tree a “haircut” because she was just like me and hated “cutting her hair”. Together, my mom and I would pull these dead leaves off of the branches one by one so that they could regrow in the springtime. I don’t know if this actually helped that process, but it was a nice ritual. I always thought that our beech tree was just stubborn and refused to let go of her hair, and was always delighted when the green leaves would appear in the spring, proud to have helped her embrace a new haircut.

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.

I really liked this quote that was found in this chapter of our reading. I understood it to mean that people who live in society blindly live unfulfilling lives. I completely agree with this quote. Which was a first for me since I really despise Thoreau and everything that he writes. If everyone followed what society told them what was right or what was acceptable, nothing would change. There would be no revolutions of any kind, no need for justice and injustice. Things would just be bland and uneventful. Thoreau probably wouldn’t even be a writer that would be read in countless classrooms. Although this seems pretty favorable, under all his pompous words and views, there are some important messages that can be learned. I find this quote to be very moving, inspiring, and interesting to ponder.

Thoreau evokes Shakespeare to make a claim on what in human life he views to be “evil”.  Reflecting on “the auction of a deacon’s effects” (155), Thoreau borrows from The Tragedy of Julius Caesar: “The evil that men do lives after them. ”  He elaborates that the evil, for his purposes, are those effects that are left behind, and those items are auctioned off in such a way that increases their value in a manner that seems to exploit the death of a man.   Thoreau illustrates, “The neighbors eagerly collected to view them, bought them all, and carefully transported them to their garrets and dust holes” (155).  Thoreau seems to find despicable the tendency of fellow man to value objects over living beings, and he highlights this perversity by providing his readers with the image of people eagerly going after the objects Thoreau claims to be the “evil” of man.  In such an illustration, Thoreau also succeeds in categorizing the majority of humankind as “evil” for their enthusiastic pursuit of such “evil” material.

Further, the second clause of the Shakespearean quote which Thoreau omits concludes, “The good is oft interred with their bones”.  Consideration of this quotation augments the categorization of things as bad and people, their being and essence, as good–emphasizing Thoreau’s value of the individual over the value of the materials we possess.

Thoreau talks a lot about the “necessaries” of life in this chapter and how they intertwine with the economy. He focuses a couple pages worth on what people wear and how wasteful the more wealthy are. His comments about one being truly comfortable in their own clothing, comes from the multiple wears, something that the wealthy do not experience. This makes me think that Throeau has a conflicting opinion on the difference between the wealthy and the poorer.