July update - Pikes Peak (July 9 - 10)

After returning back to Gothic for one night (for real food and shower), my friend accompanied me to Pike National Forest to help me measure Mertensia alpina.

Passing by Taylor Park Reservoir (larger image here).  I was here almost two years ago.

July update - Plants & Mushroom

Here are some of the flowering plants and one of the many fungi that I saw this month.

Shooting Stars (Dodecatheon pulchellum) at Kebler Pass.  Apparently these flowers have no nectar but are visited by bumblebees for their pollen.

Long weekend at Windy Pine

This past long weekend, I returned to Peterborough and went back to Windy Pine to visit friends and tried mothing once again (just like last year).

Since I returned back to Ontario last week, I found this summer to be cooler and smoggier than I remembered.

Windy Pines Conference Centre

Windy Pine Conference Centre on the shore of Lake Kushog consists of 6 cabins owned by the Canadian Studies Department of Trent University.  For more information, please visit the official site.

On Saturday, I had the opportunity to help out with season-opening of the centre, as well as exploring this area for the first time.

Back of the main cabin.  The cabin has a very homely feel to it, with a functional kitchen, bathroom, fireplace, bedroom, and more.

Flowers of Ivvavik

Celebrated my 27th birthday yesterday with people in my lab and had dinner at Tim Horton's.  Nothing super interesting in my life at the moment - working on my thesis, teaching, and thinking about what I should do with my future.

I have to teach a lab this Friday that requires me to identify tree species on one of the surrounding drumlins here at Trent.  I spent some time last Saturday identifying the trees from a guide, but I still wasn't too comfortable with my skills.  So yesterday, the lab coordinator took us teaching assistants to the drumlin again to identify the trees together.  Hopefully, everything will work out fine on Friday.

Speaking on trees and plants, I have been wanting to share my flower photos from this past field season for some time now.  Here they are.

Dwarf Fireweed (Epilobium latifolium)