Aldo Leopold's cabin: this was the retreat for Leopold and his family, on eighty acres that he tried to reclaim and conserve - planting innumerable trees - and where, of course, he wrote the essays that became one of the finest volumes of American environmental/nature writing, A Sand County Almanac. It's about an hour's drive west of Madison: green turning into fall.
Also some very strange bugs - strange to me, anyway - the Boxelder Bug: totally common signs of fall to Wisconsin residents, apparently, but decidedly like something out of sci-fi.
Here's a gaggle of Vcologians inside the hut;
and here's some land, being cleared and replanted with white oaks - I think. The Wisconsin river is just beyond there ...
There are many wonderful aspects of coming to Vcologies (not the least, this evening, have more excellent sushi than I could think possible), but one of the best is our nature outings ...
The box elder bugs are dreadful! Every once in a while, we get an explosion in the TC. They cover our garage door and our screened windows. Some get inside. And one fell on my head once. Clearly, I have residual trauma!
ReplyDeleteThis conference/gathering looks delightful!
It was such fun! It's an annual get-together of about 14-16 of us Victorianist eco-critics, and for some reason often in the mid-West, and we always head off to truly interesting sites as well as doing much serious paper workshopping ...
ReplyDelete... but I'm sorry about the box elder trauma. I was like - WHAT ARE THESE?!? - and our guide was yeh, well, duh, box elder beetles, stupid. He didn't *articulate* the last word, but ...
Delete