Category Archives: Nature
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The unsteady rock: Descartes, salamanders, and the Nicene Creed
In my last post, I compared saying the Nicene Creed to stepping on unsteady stones across a creek, stepping here and not there, meaning this and not that in an effort not to end up with wet feet and an … Continue reading
Posted in Nature
Tagged Austin American-Statesman, David Abram, Georgetown salamander, Nicene Creed, Rene Descartes, Thomas R. Kelly
5 Comments
A tale of two kitties
We lost one of our cats recently. Mr. Allnut (named for Humphrey Bogart’s character in The African Queen) asked to go out at about 4 one morning a few weeks ago, and I let him go. He never came back, … Continue reading
Posted in Nature
Tagged Aldo Leopold, Austin, Austin American-Statesman, cancer, Isle Royale, predators, Susan Sontag, urban wildlife
10 Comments
Spring creed
In the endless heat of late summer, sometimes it’s hard to remember that Texas can be a cool and beautiful place—but it can, as we hope this poem will remind you. The lake’s complacent waters bloom before the glamorous, unhurried … Continue reading
Re-wilding the monocultural self
While reading the recently published Rambunctious Garden: Saving Nature in a Post-Wild World, by Emma Marris, I found myself simultaneously cheering and exclaiming with a steely squint: Hey! Real conservationists can’t think this! You’re just giving ammunition for them to … Continue reading
Posted in Nature
Tagged agribusiness, climate change, environmentalism, farming, Madroño Ranch, nature, nineteenth century
3 Comments
A furry flurry of fully furrowed brows: my beef with Freeman Dyson, part II
My previous post revealed the furry fury of the fully furrowed Kohout brow, especially when a flurry of furry brows furrow in unison. I’m a Kohout by marriage, not birth, and therefore, perhaps, I do not wield the full power … Continue reading
Posted in Nature
Tagged Dorian Gray, Ellen Davis, environmentalism, Freeman Dyson, religion, Roger Shattuck, science
2 Comments
Grape-Nuts, dynamite, and drought
This summer in Central Texas has been extraordinary even by our hellish standards. Yesterday the official state climatologist (did you even know we had one of those?), John Nielsen-Gammon, reported that July 2011 was the hottest month in Texas since … Continue reading
Posted in Nature
Tagged Aldo Leopold, Austin American-Statesman, C. W. Post, drought, Hugh Hammond Bennett, La Niña, Tim Egan
5 Comments
Silos: my beef with Freeman Dyson
I have a bone to pick with Freeman Dyson, professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and generally acknowledged scientific genius. I bet he’s really nervous. On a recent trip to Aspen, I picked up The Best … Continue reading
A river runs through me
“Oh, it’s all very well to talk,” said the Mole, rather pettishly, he being new to a river and riverside life and its ways. A river, even one as dammed and sluggish as the Colorado in Austin, is a great … Continue reading
Posted in Nature
Tagged Austin, Colorado River, fly-fishing, Kenneth Grahame, stand-up paddling, Tink Pinkard
4 Comments
Being still
We have spared no expense in securing the services of an ace guest blogger this week while we recuperate from our thirtieth college reunion in Massachusetts. Below, Thea Kohout offers some reflections on the importance, and scarcity, of stillness. I … Continue reading
Gratuitous beauty
Our friend John Burnett recently returned from a trip to Japan, one of a handful of places he’d never been in a long career as a reporter for NPR. As a specialist in the American Southwest and Latin America, he … Continue reading
Posted in Nature
Tagged Aldo Leopold, beauty, birds, David Brooks, Japan, National Public Radio, recapitulation theory
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