Geek out with me about critters and plants on a mountaintop in Virginia. I’ll share what I’m learning as I try to bring native plants back on 200 acres of old farmland and tell stories from my encounters on the mountain.

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In this issue

• Field notes: The little grassland that could

• Signs of life: Plenty of pollinators

• Recommended reading

• A visit to Missouri Botanical Gardens

• The Official Mountain Poodle

Field notes

The little grassland that could

All of the rain we’ve had the past couple of months may have been bad in other ways, but it has been good for the meadow: flowers blooming longer, butterflies and birds galore. The bluebirds have populated far beyond our nest boxes, and we see them everywhere, even around the house, hovering over a juicy caterpillar and snatching it up from the field. This year, each of the four boxes has seen at least two clutches of eggs turn into fledglings — and one of them produced three clutches.

Virginia Working Landscapes returned this year for the first time in four years to survey plants on the mountain. These surveys on farms and other private lands help inform VWL’s research. You might recall that last year around this time, we discovered an orchid growing in the meadow. All summer, I’ve been wondering whether we’d ever see it again or it was just an anomaly. I joined the folks from VWL for part of their final survey day, and the timing was fortunate—while I was with them, they discovered an orchid in another part of the same field. There are numerous species of ladies tresses, and iNaturalist tells me this one is Southern slender ladies’-tresses.

The field where the orchid was found, a slope the spreads out below twin sassafras trees and ends a short distance from a stream, was burned two winters ago. I think the burn helped improve its diversity. Natalie Izgal, VWL’s botany technician, told me that the types of grasses and other plants they were seeing there point to a healthy grassland: they found two types of panic grass, tiny Southern grape fern, little bluestem, globe flatsedge, beadgrass, wild bergamot, tick trefoil, St. John’s wort, goldenrod, and more. One of the panic grasses, panicum capillare, also known as witchgrass, is also a common plant in Midwestern tall grass prairies—but years ago, there were prairies all over the South as well where this native grass would have grown.

The diversity of plant life means a diversity of insect and bird life, too. Yellow-billed cuckoos are forest birds, but they were announcing their presence throughout the day, as were indigo buntings, eastern wood peewees, and red-eyed vireos. The pollinators were busy as well, including carpenter bees, spicebush swallowtails, and wild indigo duskywings.

Signs of life

New plants bring pollinators

Other than a tree planting at the far end of the meadow, I hadn’t attempted to plant anything new on the mountain—all of the native plants that grow here reached the seedbank without my help. But, while I was focusing most of my attention on the meadows, the area right around our house was getting pretty weedy, and not in a good way. Last month, we pulled more than 30 large lawn bags of spotted knapweed. It has been joined by weeds like lamb’s quarters, goose grass, white campion, fescue, brome, and beefsteak plants. We decided to do some intentional planting there. We called on the expertise of local native plant expert Janet Davis whose nursery, Hill House, only offers native plants, most grown from seed. That way I knew that the plants would not have been treated with pesticide, a practice that threatens the pollinators and birds that most people who choose native plants are hoping to benefit.

Now, with the help of all the rain, something is always in flower—species of phlox, rattlesnake master, coreopsis, tickseed, indigo, white heath aster, witch hazel, and mountain mint— and we have a continuous parade around the house of monarchs and swallowtails, sulphurs, silver checkerspots, and even sphinx moths, hummingbirds, and clearwing moths (aka bumble bee moths). The clearwings seem to love the phlox. The clearwing is the moth version of a hummingbird—it’s constantly in motion. It hovers in front of a flower and use its long proboscis to sip nectar. From a distance it looks like a giant bumble bee because of its coloration. It’s also easily mistaken for a hummingbird because of its behavior. The first time I saw one, I mistook it for both before figuring out what I was looking at.

Common milkweed has been abundant in the meadows for a few years, but I’m seeing more monarchs this year than ever before. I’ve spotted several mating pairs as well, in particular one stalwart couple flapping wildly through the air during a windstorm and then landing by default in the grass. And, the other day, I discovered a caterpillar on our recently planted swamp milkweed.

The white heath aster’s flowers are about the size of my pinky fingernail.

This little pearl crescent didn’t want to wait until I finished watering.

Spider update

Since I shared that photo of the black widow near our garden wall, I’ve seen three more of them in different spots outside the house, which probably means there are 300 of them... The big news is that one of my kids spotted a black widow preying on a spotted lanternfly. I’ve seen a bunch of the invasive insects getting caught in spider webs, but this is the first time I’ve seen a spider actually interested in eating one. So of course I took a video. Which I will spare you.

But here is a rabid wolf spider. It is the size of my thumb (both joints). Everything grows big on the mountain… These keep coming indoors by mistake, at which time we politely escort them out, so I was glad to find this one in the garden. By the way, this spider isn’t “rabid,” and although it looks rather imposing, it’s unlikely to bite you. These spiders hunt rather than catching prey in a stationary web. They have good eyesight, so I don’t know why they keep mistaking my living room for the meadow. After its eggs hatch, the female will carry its babies on its back for a couple of weeks, until they’re mature enough to make it on their own.

Recommended Reading

Earlier this year, I had the chance to hear author Jonathan Mingle talk about his latest book Gaslight: The Atlantic Coast Pipeline and the Fight for America’s Energy Future. It’s a fascinating and inspiring examination of how neighbors in Appalachia worked together fighting powerful corporate interests to stop a project that posed threats to their health and the health of natural resources along its route, which was set to start in West Virginia and travel through Virginia to North Carolina. Recent events related to the cancellation of renewable energy projects, the increased water and energy demands of data centers (in particular due to AI), and the revival of pipeline projects that had seemed dead, make this book even more relevant. Publisher’s Weekly called it a “propulsive story” and an “impressive account of a David vs Goliath struggle.”

A visit to the Missouri Botanical Gardens

I was thrilled to travel to St. Louis, MO, in July, where I gave a talk at the Missouri Botanical Gardens. While I was there, I was treated to fascinating, in-depth tours of the gardens and the Shaw Nature Reserve. Shaw, about 30 miles from the Gardens, consists of 2400 acres of tall-grass prairie, forests, wetlands, savannahs, and glades where ecological restoration has been ongoing for decades. (Shaw celebrates its 100th anniversary this year.) One of the fun parts for me was recognizing some of the plants or similar species that also grow on the mountain (eg, wild bergamot, goldenrod, ticktrefoil, little bluestem, panic grass). Restoration at Shaw relies on prescribed fire, invasive removal, and the most impressive seed collection program I’ve ever seen. Director Quinn Long and his staff collect more than 1,100 pounds of seeds each year from 285 native plants growing in the Reserve, which they then preserve and distribute on other parts of the property. Seeds are separated and kept dry using systems created from repurposed materials and machinery. Shaw’s walking paths are open to the public, and if you’re in the St. Louis area, it’s well worth a visit. It is cool to see a successful and sustainable restoration like this on such a large scale. And there’s something about standing amid a vast native prairie that just feels right.

I hadn’t realized that Missouri is one of the oldest botanical gardens in the U.S., opened to the public in 1859, and it’s home to the largest pure plant herbarium in the world, with 8 million samples. The gardens are maintained without chemical pesticides—weeding is done mostly by hand. I learned that there is a Society for just about every type of plant, and volunteers from these societies are key to helping maintain the corresponding gardens. The highlight for me was the 14-acre Japanese garden, Seiwa-en, designed by Koichi Kawana, who also designed the Chicago Botanic Garden’s famed Sansho-en.

You can find these links and more on my website news/event page.

Upcoming Events

If you’re in the area, come out and say hello! Or tune into a remote event!

Land Ethic Live! Aldo Leopold Foundation, remote conversation and Q&A. Thursday, September 11, 8pm EST. Registration required.

New Dominion Bookshop, in conversation with Priscilla and Henry Ireys about their new book of essays, The Keep: Living with the Tame and the Wild on a Mountainside Farm. Charlottesville, VA. Saturday, October 4, 7pm.

Green Spring Gardens, in-person talk and Q&A followed by book signing. Alexandria, VA. Saturday, October 25, 11am.

Check my website event page, or my Instagram or Bluesky feeds for details about events, and for more interviews, podcasts, and features. If you don’t see your city or town on this list yet, please reach out, and I’ll see what I can do to get there!

Bad Naturalist is available wherever books are sold in stores and online, in hardcover, e-book, and audiobook formats. You can sample the audiobook here.

A special request

If you read the book in any format (and if you enjoyed it!), please post a review on the Amazon book page! It helps!

Tell me where you are and what you see this month in a park near where you live, or in your own yard or window box. Send me a photo if you like.

And don’t forget to tell me about your favorite nature-related book or podcast.

The Official Mountain Poodle

August is a mood. Even when you’re a poodle.

Now’s a good time to subscribe for more mountain discoveries, book news, and the requisite poodle photos.

Thanks for joining me on the mountain!

Until next month—

Paula W.

P.S. The cover photo this month is a bobcat walking up our driveway. It was taken by one of my sons who happened to gaze out his window early one morning, at just the right moment.

Bad Naturalist: One Woman’s Ecological Education on a Wild Virginia Mountaintop

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