Low key day today. I hurt my back on Monday, probably doing to much bending in weird ways to take odonate pictures on the river. The trip yesterday to the McCormick Tract didn’t help much either. Right now I’m getting by on Aleve, Dogfish Head rum, and heating pads.
I was pretty limited on what I could do today. I might have gotten into a kayak but I wouldn’t have gotten out. Just shove me down river and let me die there. So we settled on a trip to a nice little bog close to the cabin. This bog is pretty cool. Very north woods looking. It’s rimed with a belt of sphagnum moss over water. When you step on it you can feel it shake below you. Your footsteps make the plants ahead of you quiver. If you stand for more than a few seconds water starts seeping up around your feet. A couple of years ago I broke through the sphagnum. One leg sank up to my thigh while the other one stayed on top. Major splits. Had I done that today there would have been a loud ripping sound of the muscles that once held my spine in place. You could have heard the ripping and my cursing back in Okemos. So yes, I was pretty careful. 
Sand River Bog.
The bog has a lot of pitcher plants. In the past I’ve seen sundew there too. I’m not a big plant person but these plants are cool. They exist in a nutrient poor environment so they get their energy by eating bugs. Not unlike Fido, our lizard. They sit there and wait for their food to come to them. Not unlike Fido, our lizard. Hunting is such an energy drain.
Pitcher plans have this bowl of liquid that draws insects into them. After the insect gets trapped in the liquid, it is dissolved and becomes part of the plant. There’s something intriguing about carnivorous plants. It’s like the food chain got inverted. Or some lame 1950s Japanese horror movie. When I lived in Japan I had a Venus flytrap for a pet. I used to feed it little pieces of hamburger, trying to grow it large enough to eat a cat. They didn’t have scrapple so I was limited to hamburger. My Japanese girlfriend was horrified by the idea of a meat eating plant and hated the thing. Eventually she killed it off.
Flowering pitcher plants.
Pitcher plants.
I guess this looks inviting to bugs.
I was hoping to do some odonate photography at the bog but the day was cloudy and a bit cool. Not too many odonates out and about. Mostly some spreadwing damselfly species. Lise did get us a new bird species for the year, and a good one too. Olive-sided flycatcher. Not one you see everyday.
Female amberwing spreadwing.
Male slender spreadwing.
After a few hours on the deck in a chaise lounge looking at the river, Lise dragged me down to Lake Superior for a walk. Kind of neat to be in the Midwest and looking across a lake where you can’t see the other side. Almost makes you feel like you’re on the ocean.
Across Superior. Canada is over there somewhere. I suspect there will be a lot of boats headed there should Romney get elected.
Superior sunsets. Sunset pictures are a bit cliche but these are Superior. I can truthfully say I take Superior sunset pictures.
Ed's and Lise's Biggish Years 