A Rim of Storms

A dome of high pressure over the Southeastern U.S. is causing two interconnected weather problems.  Beneath the dome, air is sinking and hea...

Farther South

We left Dalton this morning in rain and fog, conditions that persisted throughout much of Georgia.  Within that moist haze, bird sightings w...

A Drab Beginning

On our journey to South Florida, we left Columbia this morning under a low, gray overcast; unfortunately, the weather conditions did not imp...

Leaving Winter

Our first road trip of the new year will take us from the wintry landscape of central Missouri to the warm, marine environment of southwest ...

Arthur and the Trough

Last evening, as Tropical Storm Arthur churned off the east coast of Florida, a broad dip in the jet stream, known as an atmospheric trough,...

Commercialized Nature

On our recent visit to Lookout Mountain, in Tennessee, my wife and I decided to visit Ruby Falls and Rock City, two heavily advertised touri...

The Goose Duck

Black-bellied whistling-ducks are permanent residents of South America, Central America, Mexico and southern Arizona and have long been summ...

Lookout Mountain of the Southeast

Like the Allegheny Front in western Pennsylvania, Lookout Mountain, which stretches from Chattanooga, Tennessee, to Gadsden, Alabama, repres...

Grundy Forest Natural Area

Driving southeast on Interstate 24, one encounters the first ridges of the Appalachian Plateau (known in Tennessee as the Cumberland Plateau...

Georgia's Geophysical Provinces

Driving north through Georgia, one crosses three major geophysical regions.  The Coastal Plain of southeastern North America cuts across the...

From Winter to Summer

Yesterday morning, we left Columbia and drove southeast across frozen, snowy terrain.  The snow depth peaked in southern Illinois, where a l...

Cape Fear's Gift

Though I have been fascinated by nature as long as I can remember, my childhood explorations were limited to woods and fields near my Cincin...

The Potomac River

The North Branch of the Potomac River rises on the Appalachian Plateau of West Virginia, within the boundaries of Fairfax Stone State Park. ...

Red Wolf Controversy

When European explorers first reached North America, red wolves inhabited the southeastern quadrant of the Continent, from New England to th...

Pascagoula River Basin

Of the many landscapes that we crossed on our trip back to Missouri from South Florida, the broad tidal marsh of the lower Pascagoula River ...

Traveling Blind

Those of us who love to travel look forward to seeing new landscapes, whether they are natural, rural or urban.  Some, including myself, als...

Edge of the South

Where does the American South begin?  As a child, traveling to the Gulf Coast on summer vacations, I determined that it was somewhere beyond...

Crossing Rivers

Heading for our condo on Longboat Key, Florida, we left Columbia this morning and drove east on I-70, undulating across the southern edge of...

Delta Blues

Molded by the glaciers and meltwater torrents of the Pleistocene, the broad Mississippi River watershed stretches from the Rockies to the Ap...

Painted Buntings

I will never forget my first encounter with a painted bunting. George, my good friend and fellow birder, was visiting us in Wilmington, Nor...