Flying by the Seat of Our Plans

Not much of a story here.  We were "herping", looking for reptiles and amphibians in the creeks and woods.  The class found a few salamanders, frogs, and toads.  I also found some nice macro subjects. - John

This isn't a particular trip, but rather the composite of multiple trips.  I like to get an early start on scouting for turkey hunting season because it is a good excuse to get out and hike the local woods before many other people are.  After the snow melts, it's nice to get out for some fresh air and take some photographs.  And, on occasion, we actually stumble upon turkeys!  There are also some pictures from other hikes and trips around the area. Laura conquering rocks She finds rocks when we're looking for turkeys. We just bought a new camera and finally have some control over the settings.  This was just a small trickle, but I was excited to finally be able to play with shutter speeds. One benefit of bushwhacking is that we find beautiful spots like this, that many other people never see. This turkey season was a difficult one because the winter refused to let go, which delayed the mating season for the turkeys.  I s...

Our friend, Micah, invited us to spend a few days fishing and floating the Eleven Point River in the Missouri Ozarks during spring break.  The original plan was to camp along the river, but overnight lows were forecasted to drop below freezing and rain was possible.  While we could camp in those conditions, we weren't after a "roughing it" experience.  I found very reasonably priced  cottages for rent in nearby Alton; these were really more "houses" than cottages, with up to 4 bedrooms.  Because it was low season, Brian rented us the largest cottage for our group of 4.  This proved to be a great setup; we used the cottage as base camp and did day floats on the river. There were so many hawks along the highway as we drove between Sikeston and Poplar Bluff!  Micah, Beth, and Beulah (Micah's wonder dog) toured through Mingo NWR.  Laura and I stopped along the way to photograph some snow geese that were in a canal and then on to Big Spring, MO....