Create everlasting bouquets and decorations by preserving summer blooms.
Drying flowers is easy—it’s remembering to actually cut them that is a challenge. Just before your favorite flowers reach their peak, think about how you might use a dried version of them, whether it’s for classic indoor wreaths and arrangements or a decoration on your favorite straw hat.
Pick flowers for drying in the early afternoon on a sunny day, when their water content is lowest. Collect blossoms right at their peak—any older and the petals may drop as they dry—and play around with these simple drying methods.
FORGET THE WATER
This story is from the August/September 2019 edition of Birds & Blooms.
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This story is from the August/September 2019 edition of Birds & Blooms.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
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Sense or Nonsense? - Why some birds can taste and smell - but others can't
Does a porcelain berry taste like a blueberry to a gray catbird? Does a block of lard smell like frying bacon to a northern flicker? The short answer is no. While some avian species do have a well-adapted sense of taste or smell, they can't distinguish between flavors and odors the way humans can. They're not picking up every ingredient in the suet you put out, says José Ramírez-Garofalo, an ornithology researcher at Rutgers University in New Jersey and the director of Freshkills Biological Station in Staten Island, New York.
Maple Mania - Amazing facts about this fall foliage mainstay
Amazing facts about this fall foliage mainstay
Food-Focused and Fierce - Meet Canada jays and learn why they eat almost anything they can find
Even if you haven't heard of Canada jays, you've heard of their relatives. Members of the corvid family, they belong to the same group as American crows, blackbilled magpies, and jays including blue, Steller's and scrub. "Unlike many of the other jays, a Canada jay doesn't have a crest of any kind; it just has a rounded head," says Dale Gentry, director of conservation for Audubon Upper Mississippi River.In 2018, the Canada jay's name was changed from gray jay, but Dale thinks the former adjective was fitting. "Most of its body is shades of gray with some white," he says. "There are different subspecies that have different physical traits, but most of them have some lighter coloring on their foreheads, upper breasts and throats, each with a darker streak that starts at each eye and goes back."
IN GOOD COMPANY
BIRDS OF A FEATHER MAY FLOCK TOGETHER, but what about other collectives of critters-and what do you call them when they do?
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