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Growing giant pumpkins may be a lot like baseball. After all, both are traditional, competitive sports that require hard work, determination, discipline, attentiveness, patience, and the ability to anticipate. Both continue to grow in appreciation; not just in this country, but internationally. The season starts in the spring. And fall is the time of final defeat for most; victory for a lucky few.
During the final weeks of September and throughout the month of October, millions of people around the world take in fall festivals featuring giant pumpkin weigh-offs. Many also showcase pumpkin parades, pumpkin carving contests, pumpkin sculpture, pumpkin pie-eating contests, and pumpkin beer, as well. » Continue Reading.
There’s little in life more pleasing than biting into a crisp, juicy, slightly sweet, slightly tart, fresh-off-the-tree apple. And what could be healthier? Apples contain vitamins A and C, antioxidants, potassium, pectin, fiber, and no cholesterol. They can be eaten fresh, baked, or stewed; turned into juice or cider; made into sauce, butter, jelly, vinegar, wine, and delightful confections when coated with candy (sugar syrup), caramel, or toffee and nuts; or cooked into pies, crisps, crumbles, cakes, doughnuts; even meat dishes.
If you’ve noticed a lot of monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus) lately, you’re not alone. From my own observations and from what people have been telling me, this summer appears to have been a very successful one for them; at least in this part of the northeast.
During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the use of feathers in women’s hats was all the rage.
Farmers Markets (marketplaces where people gather to buy and trade goods and services, exchange news, and share stories with one another) can be traced back 5000-years, to Egyptian villages and towns along the Nile.
Before the 19th century, cougars were abundant across the American continent. In fact, the cougar was the most widely distributed land mammal in the Western Hemisphere. They were found in forests from tropical to boreal; from Chile to the Canadian Yukon.
I’ve always been fascinated by ruby-throated hummingbirds (Archilochus colubris), the only hummingbird species to regularly breed in eastern North America.
The season of daylight and blooming flowers has finally arrived. But, along with the emergence of all things green, comes the emergence of all sorts of flies, bugs, mites, worms, and mollusks. Many of these are unwelcome home, garden, and agricultural pests which, as the weather continues to warm, will only become more active.
Rebecca J. Barthelmie, is a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Cornell’s Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering who specializes in developing wind as a renewable energy resource. Her colleague Sara C. Pryor is an atmospheric scientist and Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences professor who uses a combination of field measurements and numerical tools to improve understanding of the climate system. Barthelmie and Pryor are part of a consortium of 28 scientists, researchers, and engineers from several American universities proposing an unusual and thought-provoking alternative to building a nondescript wall along the US-Mexico border. 
“The early bird catches the worm.” It’s an old adage that most likely refers to the American robin (Turdus Migratorius). This year, I first saw robins in late March, right around the time that maple sap started running.
I don’t think there’s a more magnificent forest tree or more glorious shade tree than the sugar maple (Acer saccharum); a deciduous tree that matures in 30-50 years, generally growing to between 70 and 90 feet tall, with a crown that turns a brilliant, fiery yellow, orange, or red at summer’s end. The sugar maple is the official state tree of New York, Vermont, Wisconsin, and West Virginia. It’s also the national tree of Canada. And the maple leaf is the Canadian national emblem.
Perhaps the most significant energy question in the North Country in the coming year will be the potential long-term advantages and/or disadvantages of advancing industrial-scale solar photovoltaic (PV) project development in the region.
I enjoy a wide variety of dairy products. And I especially like cheese. All sorts of cheese. Hard, soft, sharp, mild, pungent, curds. Sliced, shredded, cubed, balled, spread, powdered, creamed, and whipped. A little tossed into my breakfast omelet; a slice, perhaps two, on my sandwich at lunch; a touch grated or sprinkled into my salad and/or over my pasta and/or drizzled on my veggies at supper. And then, of course, there’s pizza, cheesy burritos, mac and cheese, cheesecake, cheese Danish, wine and cheese. I can go on. 
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