First cross country ski outing of the season. WinMan, located in Winchester, Vilas County, has a boatload of fresh snow and well-groomed trails.
#crosscountryski
#nordicski
#outdoors
#nature
#Wisconsin

Reminiscent of Dizzy Dean sliding into second base in the 1934 World Series to break up a double play when he was beaned in the head by the throw to first. Said the colorful Dean upon release from the hospital: They x-rayed my head and found nothing.

Northern lights over Wausau. The still photo captures the light much better than the video in my last post.
#nature
#NorthernLights
#outdoors
#Wisconsin

This video isn’t the best depiction of the northern lights, but turn the volume up all the way and listen to the coyotes yipping (plus a siren) during the first part. Don’t know what made them yip, but I like to think it was the northern lights.
#nature
#NorthernLights
#Wisconsin
#outdoors

Nice photo! Which stream?

Among everything else, great rocks!

Full moonrise over Wausau, Wisconsin. My sister-in-law, a nurse in Georgia, says, and I quote, “the crazies will be out tonight!”

Sunset over the Wisconsin River in Wausau.
#nature
#outdoors
#Wausau
#MarathonCounty
#Wisconsin

Our burning bush and sugar maple coming in to fall glory.
#nature
#gardening
#flowers
#bloomscrolling
#Wisconsin

Dawn Staley’s “Uncommon Favor” is an inspiring, informative, and entertaining read. Go Gamecocks!
#SouthCarolinaGamecocks
#WNBA

Lots of Joe Pye weed seed to drift around.
#nature
#flowers
#gardening
#bloomscrolling
#Wisconsin

But seriously, Zav, that’s funny!

Zav, as your fellow Georgian Flannery O’Connor said “Haw haw, he said politely.”

With hundreds of pounds of plants in our gardens for the taking, the deer, those cervine gluttons, just have to eat most of the flowers on our one hardy mum plant. I suppose the stems are too rough for their delicate digestive tracts. Really annoying!
#nature
#flowers
#bloomscrolling
#gardening

While most of our plants are fading, a rough blazing star, plenty of big leaf aster, and some New England aster have elbowed their way to the sunlight.
#nature
#flowers
#gardening
#bloomscrolling
#Wisconsin

My favorite coffee shop on planet Earth has won the Best Coffeeshop/Cafe award by City Pages in the greater Wausau area. The coffee, food, owners, staff, customers, and music—the whole vibe—are the best. Congratulations to Tucknee Coffee Company!
#Wausau
#MarathonCounty
#Wisconsin
#coffeeshops

A late season Monarch caterpillar among first season Butterfly Weed.
#flowers
#bloomscrolling
#gardening
#nature
#Wisconsin

Two billion years ago there was no “Wisconsin.” Sediments eroded off the southern margin of the Superior craton of the Canadian Shield into an ocean where they settled and lithified. But now they lie just north of Wausau.
#geology
#earthscience
#nature
#rocks
#fossils
#Wausau
#Wisconsin
#outdoors

I recently posted this close up image (left), but I neglected to post the normal distance image (right) for scale. Fossil trackway of Climactichnites in 510 million year old sandstone from Marathon County, now on the Riverwalk in Wausau.
#fossils
#rocks
#geology
#nature
#Wisconsin
#earthscience

LOL, yes, the master gardeners are correct. We do have a lot of bee balm that goes uneaten.

My all-time favorite song!

Our backyard coincides with the city limit. The other side of the boundary is the township, where the deer sleep and propagate. Our yard is literally their first and last stops on their grazing forays into and out of the neighborhood.

You are right, and we do use it to pretty good effect most of the time, but if we don’t cover every single plant species or go on a trip for a week or so . . .

This guy is a big part of the reason why we have so many deer that eat our hostas, asters, phlox, and just about every other plant.
#nature
#wildlife
#gardening
#flowers
#bloomscrolling
#Wausau
#Wisconsin

The underdogs in our garden. While the blue lobelia proliferates, the cardinal flower seems to get overrun by everything. And New England Aster is the perennial first choice of the deer; don’t know how this spindly stalk escaped the deer.
#nature
#gardening
#flowers
#bloomscrolling
#Wisconsin

I think we have a straggler here in the Monarch migration as our Monarchs in Wausau, Wisconsin, have been gone for about a week or so.
#nature
#flowers
#gardening
#bloomscrolling
#butterflys
#Wausau
#Wisconsin

The most comically looking and ironically named flowers in our garden which are said to be non-allergenic: sneezeweed.

#nature
#flowers
#gardening
#bloomscrolling
#wildlife
#Wisconsin

Today the Marathon County Historical Society broke ground in Wausau for the construction of the John and Carolyn Sonnentag Archive Center, a magnificent structure that will serve our archive and artifact needs for the next 50 years.
#history
#MarathonCounty
#Wausau
#Wisconsin
#historicpreservation

While walking along the River Walk in Wausau, I spotted what I believe to be a fossil trackway of Climactichnites in Cambrian sandstone about 510 million years old from the Blackberry Hill formation in Marathon County.
#fossils
#geology
#rocks
#earthscience
#biology
#nature
#Wausau
#Wisconsin

Yes, their mimicking songs are fun to listen to, and there’s no doubt when they are distressed.