The Olentangy- 60 Second Landscape

The Olentangy from Thomas Arbour on Vimeo.

The idea of creating a 60 second landscape was inspired by Chase Jarvis.


Enjoy your Sunday morning-

Tom

Mallard, Belted Kingfisher

I have been remiss to capture any photographs of Delaware County the past two workdays, so this evening, I'm posting two images that I captured on Sunday afternoon, just before I photographed the great blue heron.  This drake mallard was doing its best to swim upstream through a riffle on the opposite bank, while this female belted kingfisher was perched high above the river, ready to dive for a fish.

Ohio and the rest of the east is experiencing frigid temperatures.  A few years ago at this time, I was still able to photograph autumn meadowhawks, but now everything is absolutely frigid- we're headed for a low of 14 tonight. Stay warm!

Tom

Morning and Afternoon

Orchard Orbweaver,  Leucauge venusta

I'm getting in a groove on the weekend for insect and macro photography- early morning I head to the backyard to photograph tiny creatures like this Orchard Orbweaver, a type of spider that I've seen often but hadn't yet photographed.  Early morning is a great time to get this type of shot since it is usually very calm at dawn.  Any little bit of wind causes the web to move, making it extremely difficult to focus and expose without image blur.

Possible Swamp Darner Epiaeschna heros

Now, fast forward to the afternoon. We've done our family outing in the morning (Saturday it was to the zoo, yesterday we lounged at the Alum Creek Beach, today it'll be the Worthington Memorial Day Parade). We've had lunch- Weston takes a nap, and I'm out the door to photograph insects again, but this time, I'm headed to the Olentangy River. Sunny, hot afternoon days are typically the worst times for photography, unless you're photographing dragonflies. That's the perfect time to get them in flight.

I believe this dragon maybe a swamp darner, but I was surprised to see this species on a river. I've only seen them deep in forested swamps, but you just never know what you might find.  I'm still not closing the door that it might be another species.

This week I'm headed out west.  And when I say West, I don't mean Brookville, Ohio.  I mean Yellowstone National Park West.  I'll be visiting my good buddy Bryan in Livingston, Montana.  From there, we'll be headed for a three night camping adventure in the park, with the intent on photographing Spring- the baby animals, the migrating birds, a little snow, and who knows what else.  I'll be incommunicado from Tuesday evening through the next Monday- so this week I'll have a lineup of images from yesterday's trip to the Olentangy.

Tom

MyWorld- Exploring a New World

This is my contribution to this week's "My World" Meme. I invite you to participate and show your world as well. Go here to do so.

There's nothing like a 68 degree, late December day to motivate anybody to get out and start exploring. This past Saturday, Megan and I did just that, taking a hike along the Olentangy River near our new home in Worthington.



I say our "new" home, but it depends on what your definition of "new" is. We have lived here just shy of six months, and I still feel like I'm getting to know the ins and outs of our new house and have only scratched the surface when it comes to exploring our neighborhood. We have moved almost exactly two miles north from our last home, a rental in the Delawanda neighborhood of the Beechwold/Clintoville area. Before, I could be at the Olentangy river, literally, seconds. Our house was only two removed from the urban forest that covered the floodplain of the Olentangy. In our new neighborhood, there are homes close to the river as well, but our house is not one of them. We live about eight tenths of a mile east of the Olentangy, in the ever so 1960's-esque Worthington Estates.

Back to Saturday. Why not explore the same Olentangy river near our new home? It was only a matter of time before I brought the cameras to capture what we would see along the river. Feeling like spring, we parked the car, stepped into the park, past the playground, and onto the Olentangy Bikeway, one of the busiest bike paths in Ohio.

We walked north, and shortly we crossed under Wilson Bridge Road, continuing north where a footbridge leads the trail northwest across the river. I must say that the river here is a disappointment. Compared to the runs, riffles, pools further south, actually further into the City of Columbus, the river in Worthington has been channelized. Instead of the root wads of trees lining the bank, limestone rip rap is present, and the stream is one long corridor, even in times of lower water.



The river crosses under a major thoroughfare just north of this footbridge. If you've driven through Columbus, chances are you crossed the Olentangy River here on Interstate 270, the beltway that rings our city. One of our major commuter freeways in town, State Route 315, was built alongside the stream in this area and the river was probably channelized at the same time the new freeway was created. You may recognize this sign, especially if you are a buckeyes fan.



Looking north, towards the bridge that carries Interstate 270 across the Olentangy River.



The trick in these urban environments is to really look and explore- although rare and sensitive species may not be present in such disturbed areas, there are plenty of interesting things to be seen and discovered.

As we walked north of the bridge pictured above, the path takes on a more natural feeling. There are less invasive species in the floodplain forest, the trees are more mature. We walked further, and Megan stopped us suddenly.



A Virginia oppossum- I haven't seen one of these since we moved from Girard Road. This one was young- who knows why it had perished alongside the path. I would hate to think that it was hit by a bike, but I suppose that is always a possibility. Even in winter, the trail is used often.

Megan and I continued to walk, noting the occasional downy woodpecker, Canada goose, and mallard. And finally, we reached the end of the trail, which is adorned with one of our areas most interesting geologic features- concretions.





They may look small, but these boulders are huge. Megan gracefully and graciously volunteered herself to be the size reference for the concretions.



These are actually limestone concretions, founded bedded in the Ohio Shale, our bedrock of the area. The jury is out on exactly how they are formed, but sometimes there are fossilized fish bones in the center of them. The Ohio Geological Survey has put together a nice fact sheet that I'll have to more in depth. The ones here must have been dug up during building construction, I presume, and place in the grassy park area at the trail head for decoration.

There were still other interesting things to be seen on the floodplain that I noticed on the way back. First up was a nice (or not so nice) population of the invasive plant wintercreeper, or Euonymus fortunei. You may recognize this one from your home landscape, but in nature, it can escape and be a nasty weed. Here it has climbed up a sycamore tree.



A closeup of the leaves. Do they look familiar to you?



A little on down the trail, I saw another clump that was fruiting. I'm not sure if I have seen winter creeper fruiting before.



The wintercreeper wasn't the only thing fruiting. Columbus seems to be a hotbed for Osage Orange trees, a non-native species that was extensively planted for hedge rows and other agricultural purposes. I always find these fruits extremely interesting- for those of you that haven't seen them, they are about the size of a large grapefruit. I was reading on Wikipedia that some scientists have theorized that the fruits may have been eaten and dispersed by now extinct mammals. Amazing! The tree is native to the the south-central U.S.



This year seemed to be a mast year for box-elder trees. A maple, the samaras of these trees went crazy this year.



One last tree that seemed to be quite common along the drier reaches of the flood plain was honey locust, a tree that is adorned with three-pronged thorns often several inches long.



It was so great to get out with Megan this past Saturday and walk. She really gets the prize for growing this baby inside her. It is truly an amazing experience for us, and I get all the wonder, and she gets lots of pain! It is hard to believe that in only a few more months, we'll be doing walks with a three person family. Let the count down begin. I've added the widget Megan has on her blog to remind me of just how close this thing is all going to shake down!







Tom

Olentangy Sycamore

Olentangy Sycamre, originally uploaded by Tom Arbour.

This evening I played around at creating HDR images again using shots taken last evening. This time, I downloaded the full blown version of photomatix and wow, was I happy with my tone mapping results! Isn't this image cool? To generate an image without watermarks, one needs a license, which will set me back about $100. For now, I'm satisfied with just playing around, but digital photography is incredible. It wows me every day.

Today was a fantastic day at Shawnee and I'll have pictures of our trip tomorrow. Be sure to stop by and see what fascinating creatures Shawnee had to offer.

Tom

Olentangy

Olentangy, originally uploaded by Tom Arbour.

For today's Sky Watch post, I dug into the archives. Last June 19th, we had a spectacular late spring sunset along the Olentangy River. When we move away from our home at the end of August, I'll surely miss being able to pop down to the river and take shots like this one. Megan and I really enjoyed this scene, and we have several shots of us with this sunset as a backdrop, one of which I used for my Flickr avatar. Have a happy sky watch Friday!

Tom

A Furry Woodland Creature

April 21, 2008.

The best image of a fox squirrel (Sciurus niger) that I have managed to get to date. I was scoping out some map turtles on the bank of the Olentangy when this creature came running my way. It was quite surprised when it saw me, but it stuck around for about 30 seconds, allowing me to fire two salvos with my camera. Looking at this relatively cute looking, fluffy animal almost makes me forget a warm early summer evening last year when Megan and I watched from below as fox squirrel raided a blue-gray gnatcatcher's nest with both parents scolding the creature as it ate their eggs.

Tom

Olentangy Pool

Olentangy Pool, originally uploaded by Tom Arbour.

Warm today! Wow. I couldn't believe it. My car thermometer read 66 on my way home from work. There was a semi-decent sunset, so I headed down to the park to get a few shots of the sun reflected in the river. Well, I didn't get there. But with the morning's rain, this large pool filled with water, making for a nice composition! Check out the green leaves at the bottom of the photo. They are from Amur honeysuckle, which surrounds the hillside behind the camera. The honeysuckle leaves are finally dropping and the forest is almost bare once again. Also, I uploaded several new photos to Flickr! this evening. You can see them by clicking on the photo collage on the right side of the page.

Tom

First Snow on the Olentangy

First Snow on the Olentangy, originally uploaded by Tom Arbour.

We had the first real snowfall of the season here in Columbus today. It started about midnight, and continued until mid afternoon. I just do not understand why snow shuts down the city of Columbus, but only two inches will have people driving fifteen miles and hour, and at that speed, everyone bunches up and they are just asking to hit each other!

The snow was beautiful today on the Olentangy River. The water is very high. Even during winter I can often walk through this channel. But not today. If you look closely you still see a few green leaves in this shot. The ones on the left hand side of the shot, up on the bank of the river are from Amur honeysuckle. These leaves are still falling, and it was quite interesting to see green leaves that had landed on the bright white snow. I'm sure I'll be sick of the snow come February, but for now, it really brightened winter. We even had a break in the clouds this evening, with a fairly fantastic and surprising sunset. Enjoy the snow!

More on the Olentangy and Ohio Flooding

Last night I went to check the Olentangy River, and the water was up higher than yesterday. Actually, it was higher than I have ever seen it. The first picture is from last night, the second is from two nights ago. Hopefully, the river has crested. Although the two pictures aren't perfectly the same, you can see where the water has risen by comparing the trees. Also, a patch of upland vegetation was completely submerged last night that was dry two nights ago.

 

 

Just for kicks, I went to the USGS Ohio water resources website to see if the Olentangy is retreating. The simple answer, it isn't. I'm sure that water is gradually being released from the Delaware dam, and we might see these high levels for the next day or so. In fact, I just looked again at the USGS site for this stream guage, and they say that the stream is "is completely regulated by the Delaware Dam since 1951." Here is a nice graph provided by the USGS of current water levels on the Olentangy at Worthington, which is just a few miles above where I shot the pictures:



This graph measures the total water flowing through the stream past the gauge. Normally in August, the average is less than 100 cubic feet of water per second. Wednesday night, when the second picture was taken, the river was discharging about 2000 cubic feet of water per second, and last night, that figure had risen to about 3500 cubic feet per second and rising! That is a ton of water!

In fact, according to the USGS, during the last 40 years, we have set a record for August 24th. The highest recorded discharge for this part of the stream on this day was 2990 cubic feet per second, which we reached in 1980.

So, I'm wondering what the maximum discharge recorded for this station has been?

USGS has that information too. Looking at this graph, the Olentangy is holding its own. Discharges of 5000-6000 cubic feet per second happen about every year, although I'm not sure why there is such a large gap in the middle of the graph. I'm glad I wasn't around in the flood that happened about 1960. 15000 cubic feet per second would have been a real doozy.




So, lets turn now to the Blanchard river, which caused all the flooding in Findlay, Ohio.

The Blanchard is rather calm and placid in August, with discharges averaging less than 100 cubic feet per second, about the same as the Olentangy River. So remember, the Olentangy is way up and it is only discharging less than 4000 cubic feet per second. Here is what the Blanchard has done over the last week:



Take a look at the scale. Yes, the river peaked at just under 20,000 cubic feet per second! That is a ton of water, and that is why there was such catastrophic flooding the in the area. When that much water is flowing through the river, it just simply floods its banks and goes where it normally doesn't go. Lets look at the historical graph for the Blanchard to see how this flood compares with historical highs.



And there you go. You have had to been alive in 1915, it looks like, to see have seen a flood like Findlay has experienced. That the peak flow was over 20,000 cubic feet per second! Yes, they do happen, but not very often, at least when compared to the life span of a human being. In geologic time, floods like this are common.

My thoughts this morning go out to all across Ohio that were affected by all of this rain that northwestern Ohio has seen in the past week.

Tom

Prairie Fens and Island Alvars

I've been out in the field the last two days. Yesterday, I traveled to Gallagher Fen and Prairie Road Fen State Nature Preserves. Both sites only open by permit through the Division of Natural Areas and Preserves, and both sites pretty darn cool. I've had plenty of experience in the northeastern Ohio fens, but the sites in western Ohio have plenty of prairie plants like prairie dock and blazing star.

Then, this morning, I headed up for Kelleys Island where I met Jim Bissell and crew of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. I was introduced to several new plants, including the state listed rock elm, smooth rose, and green milkweed. I'm back, exhausted, and ready to go to sleep!

Oh yeah, Megan and I took a little walk down to the Olentangy, and boy was it full of water. Columbus had several hours of rain this morning, and things have really transformed around Kenney Park. I haven't seen the water this high since early May. I hope everyone is getting out in the field. We're having fantastically cool and non-humid weather for this time of year, and this makes for some great prairie viewing. The Ohio Prairie Conference is happening this week at my alma mater, Hiram College. I don't think I'll be making it up for the event, but I'm sure it will be a great botanically themed weekend!

Tom

Please, Give the Olentangy a Drink.

 

I am quite fortunate to live very close to one of Ohio's major rivers, the Olentangy. This river is particually famous for dissecting the campus of The Ohio State University, where my wife Megan currently spends her time pursuing a PhD in nursing. About five miles due north of campus, the river is still somewhat wild. No dams, an excellent wooded corridor, and relatively intact pools, riffles, and runs, all different types of river habitats. Central Ohio has been extremely dry this summer, and the river is simply not as wet as is should be. The water has gotten so low that I can see to the bottom in places that last year were murky and dark. The water has cleared considerably. Two feet of crystal clear water is common, and I can watch sunfish and hognose suckers scatter about as I wade near their pool. The fish are well contained to nice holes and pools, making them quite easy to catch but admittedly, they do not offer much of a challenge. But yes, we could use rain here in central Ohio, and we could use this rain soon. Today we had a few drops, I maybe felt one hundred at lunchtime in my backyard and then another several hundred drops during my afternoon walk around my office grounds. Obviously, this is not enough. Even the bush honeysuckle, an agressive non-native species, is beginning to wilt along the fencerow parallel to our street. The heat gets to me when we have multiple days above 90 degrees coupled with very high humidity. I stay outside waiting for it to become cool late in the evening after the sun drops below the horizon, but it is still dissapointingly muggy and warm. Alas, we are almost in July. Botanically, things are quite slow along the river. We've had a splash of color added by the white and purple blooms of water willow, but they have mostly faded and nothing has replaced their color. I'm anxious to see if any Cardinal flower grows along our stretch of the Olentangy. For those of you that don't know this plant, it produces beautiful and large clusters of red flowers, and its preferred habitat is along wet shores and swampy places. We'll see if it shows up in the next few months. I hope you enjoy the photo I have posted above: this was actually taken last week, and the water in the river is even lower now. You can see Megan in the background. She's holding her cell phone talking to her brother Mike. She's an excellent big sister.

Tom

A day on the River

Yesterday I spent a good two hours photographing cool stuff along the Olentangy. One new "tool" i used yesterday was a five dollar bug net Megan and I purchased at Target. I figured that I might be able to catch a few damselflies and get some extremely closeup pictures. For the powdered dancer shot I posted yesterday, I was actually very carefully holding the damselfly with my fingers. Today, I have posted yet another shot, this time of a stream bluet, I believe, where you can see just how small these guys are. You can clearly see my thumbnail. Other cool things from yesterday were a new type of damselfly. Although it looks pretty similar to the other ones I have been posting, it was a wee bit smaller than the stream bluets and the blue coloration on the abdomen isn't the same. In this picture, the top parts of the last three adomen segments are blue, which would rule out the stream bluet.

I also was able to capture a very nice picture of the tiger swallowtail. This is the first example of this species I have seen in Kenney Park, but hopefully there will be more. My Target bug net doubles as a good tadpole catcher, and sure enough, I was able to snag a relatively slow swimming bullfrog tadpole.

A fun day on the river (until I dropped my camera in the water, I was able to rescue the pictures from the memory card).

Tom

 

 

 

 

Damselfly Orgy

Here are the aforementioned damselflies. In total, we have 9 individuals, including two females with attached males laying there eggs on submerged water willow. These little guys were hovering all over the water willow. Looking for mates, I presume. Damselflies have intensely bright colors best appreciated with some close focusing binoculars. In the past most identification was done in the laboratory after catching these creatures, but once dead they loose their magnificent color. Various guides, both local and national, have come out that help you identify them with binoculars. According to my count, there are at least 8 powdered dancers, Argia moesta, in this photo. The males look like they have been coated in blue-gray talcum powder, hence the name. The only females in this shot are at the bottom, and they are attached to males, who actually seemed to over in the air while their abdomens were pointed straight down into the water, somehow holding onto the partially submerged ovipositing (that's the official name for laying eggs used by experts) female. A single male of another species also popped into this shot, and although I am not certain, I have seen and photographed Stream Bluets, and these seemed to match . Not as large as the powdered, this damsel is jet black and blue, quite a stunner.

 

Great Blue Heron

I spent yesterday morning photographing two Great Blue Herons wading along the Olentangy River. Herons are common now but they are fascinating birds. Depending on the angle you view them, they either look like a ferocious hunter or a dopey muppet. Here is a heron in its warrior pose.

 

And, here, I present the same exact bird looking mightily like a muppet.



This wasn't the only heron on the river that day. A young heron, very different in coloration and feather patterns, was also present. Instead of wading, this individual sat in the river, extended its neck up and down a few times, but didn't do much else. Notice the lack of contrasting light and dark feathers, especially on the head. It also lacks the backward directed plume of the adult. Overall, this young heron has a more "fluffy" look to it.

The Olentangy River

Tonight, in this river, I caught my first small mouth bass of the season. I am quite fortunate to live only steps from such a great river.

 

Tom

Summer already?

What summer like weather we have been having here in Ohio. Today was hot. Driving home from work was comparable to sitting in a blast furnace. I had all my windows down and the thermometer on the dashboard read 90 degrees. I think the official high of the day was in the low 80's. The calendar still tells me it is spring, but it certainly felt like summer today. Except the mosquitoes are still absent, making my evening hike to Kenney Park that much more pleasant. I searched for the blue-gray gnatcacther nest I photographed only 3 days before but I completely bonked. I couldn't find it. I kept looking for the box-elder tree but just never found the right one. I did relocate the hairy woodpecker nest. And the American cardinal nest. All seem to be doing well, and the peeps from the woodpecker nest seem to be getting stronger. Another sign of summer was the ethereal song of the wood thrush. This bird, related to American Robin, was calling throughout the park tonight. Along the river bank I tried my luck with the fishing pole, made several hundred casts, but only managed to hook what was probably a small rock bass before he jumped off my line. Oh well. The trees along the riverbank, most noticeably the silver maple, have leafed out. Sure, the leaves will get bigger, but they are no longer naked. Even the riverside cottonwoods, giants with diameters of three and four feet, have leaves. It really looks like summer. I'm starting to find pieces of the Olentangy river that I remembered from last summer when Megan and I first moved to north Columbus. A gravel bar or riffle here, a stone there, all hidden by high water from me until tonight's walk. Megan is off dining with the midwives of Columbus, so I had the night to explore. I'm tired, and if you checked out the times of my blog posts from this morning, you might be able to guess why.

Spring is wrapping up.......get out and see stuff before the mosquitoes beat you to it.

Tom

Black and White Warbler

Another species to add to this Spring's list!

Megan and I are quite fortunate to live where we live. Most people would probably look at our street and consider it, well, not that desirable. Our house itself has everything that we could ask for in a rental property. Our street is a little rough...one side is basically a parking lot for a shopping center, and many of the houses on the other side are rental properties that have seen better days.

BUT, we do live very close to the Olentangy River, known mostly as the river that flows through THE Ohio State University. But upstream from Ohio State, the river is really quite nice and even further north, the Olentangy has been designated a State Scenic River. What does this mean? We can walk to to this lush green corridor and really observe nature at its best. Yes, we are in the city of Columbus. Yes, the area is full of invasive species. And yes, there are unleashed dogs scampering throughout the park near our house. However, there are plenty of native plants, birds, mammals, fish, freshwater mussels, and an unlimited number of other cool natural things to look at. I have found that this blog is a great outlet for my pictures. I know that I have a few regular readers....I hope you are enjoying what Megan and I find.

Today, Megan spotted a black and white warbler for the first time. It was great. She was holding my binocs, saw a little bird scampering through the honeysuckle, and said something like, "wow, that is a cool bird but it isn't yellow." I had told her that most of the spring warblers migrating through Columbus and all of Ohio usually have some yellow feathers. If you haven't seen one, the black and white warbler could be called the zebra bird. They are more black than white, but have plenty of white striping. The word "referee" also comes to mind when I picture this small bird.

Other birds we saw on our mid-day walk.

Wood Duck
Mallard
Canada Goose
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
American robin
Northern Cardinal (including one female on the nest)
Gray Catbird
White breasted nuthatch
Grackle
Red-eyed vireo
Goldfinch

Tom

Olentangy- Dry and Cold

I went to the riverbank of the Olentangy River this afternoon. The air is so cold and dry that it has sucked all the moisture from the riverbank. I was expecting to see ice, and I did see some. However, I was most struck by the dry sand that has gathered along the banks. This sand was being blown by today's constant chilling winds. Here are a few shots from this afternoon journey down to the river. In order of appearance, these shots depict the sandy riverbank, the binding power of buckeye and hackberry roots, an overflow channel marked by ice, and finally, the tentacle like roots of the silver maple slithering into the frozen ground.