Pope Farm in the Fall!

"People like to say that it―significance, import―is all about the family. But lots of people do not have rich networks of hilarious uncles and adorable cousins, who all live nearby, to help them. Many people have truly awful families: insane, abusive, repressive. So we work hard, we enjoy life as we can, we endure. We try to help ourselves and one another. We try to be more present and less petty. Some days go better than others. We look for solace in nature and art and maybe, if we are lucky, the quiet satisfaction of our homes."

― Anne Lamott

Yesterday morning, I headed over to Pope Farm Conservancy to take in the fall colors. My morning commute takes me along Blackhawk Road, which runs along the conservancy's northern edge. I've been noticing some exceptional color along the woodland edge bordering the spillway's ravine. It's also a good spot for migratory birds, with plenty of cover and food to attract them.

There was at least one Lincoln's Sparrow ...

Other sparrows included Song, Field, Chipping, White-throated, White-crowned, Eastern Towhee and Dark-eyed Junco. There were also a few Yellow-rumped Warblers and a single Orange-crowned Warbler. I heard a Pileated Woodpecker call and a moment later it emerged from the woods and flew across the prairie toward the conifers at Blackhawk Ski Club.

But mostly, I was here to decompress, enjoy the sights, my steps, and breathing ...

Gaura and primrose were notable wildflowers in bloom ...

Grasshoppers and crickets were plentiful, but I didn't turn up any butterflies or beetles. The fall colors may not have developed quite the way I'd hoped, but Nature follows its own schedule. Northern Wisconsin is already past peak, while Sauk and Dane Counties are moving closer to theirs.

Today's plans may include a hike at Indian Lake Park, though I'm also tempted to make another stop along the Wisconsin River to see if any tiger beetles are still hanging on. Our unusually warm weather may have extended the season for a few stragglers, but temperature is only part of the equation. Longevity plays a role, too. The season is winding down, and even the hardiest holdouts eventually reach the end of their life cycle.

 

All images © 2026 Mike McDowell

Rant: My Idiot Sister

"The tide seldom shifts in favor of a selfish individual."

― Carlos Wallace

Just like when my brother died back in 1997, Kathy (my younger sister) is getting all bent out of shape over not being my Mom's POA (power of attorney). It's a shame that she's once again showing her ugliness when a family member is dying. My older sister, Sharon, is my Mom's POA, and rightfully so.

 

To be sure, this is family drama, and nobody can be blamed for skimming or skipping this post. The fact is, Kathy has taken to social media saying nasty things about me, so it's time to return the favor with some hard facts. Thus, this is retaliatory in nature.

 

It all came to a head when Kathy read this in my mom's POA document:

It states:

 

"Intent to Return Home. It is my intent to return home if I were ever to reside in a nursing home. Accordingly, I empower my Attorney to convey that intention to any and all persons."

 

Kathy believes this means that my mom wishes to die at home, but that's not the case at all. The "Intent to Return Home" clause is a standard legal provision stating that if the signer ever moves into a nursing home, it's their intention to eventually return to their primary residence, while empowering their designated attorney-in-fact to communicate that intention to others. Primarily utilized for Medicaid asset protection, this formal declaration helps shield the home from being immediately counted against asset limits or forced into a sale to cover long-term care costs.

 

In private messages to me, Kathy has made it clear how much she loathes that our Mom chose Sharon to be POA and used the clause above (and other things) to try to sway her to give it up to her. 

 

When texting Sharon, she's sounds so sweet and helpful, but she's a total witch with ulterior motives:

Such a two-faced diabolical manipulator.

 

As you can imagine, Sharon is under an extreme amount of pressure and stress right now. A few nights ago, I called her to say that, under no circumstances, should she relinquish POA to Kathy—and Sharon's husband, Mel, totally agrees that it would be an absolute shit-show. Who cares if Mel is helping his wife? Anyway, Kathy has barely has enough brains to hold down a job, having been fired from her last half-dozen or so. At her last job at Orthopaedic Associates of Wausau, she was terminated for making too many mistakes and being a pain in the ass to work with.

Nobody plays the victim card better than Kathy. It's a predictable pattern we have seen before—whenever she doesn't get her way or gets called out on her manipulation, she immediately rewrites history to make herself the target. Rather than taking accountability for stoking conflict while our Mom is in palliative care, she puts on a public show of grief and feigned innocence.   

 

Again, what a shame. But it's truly a relief that our Mom doesn't know any of this is going on. 

Escape from the Fever!

"It may be that the greatest of humanity's preoccupations is the denial of death. Our desperation to deny death is so strong that a number of other high-minded denials orbit around it. Humans deny that we are animals partly because animals die. We deny human nature for the same reason. We deny that we are bodies by insisting that we have them instead, creating distance between our mortality and the immortal minds we feel ourselves to be. We deny science that conflicts with our views of immortality or that reminds us of our certain doom. We deny the need to look at death honestly, and we even deny that we are denying death."

 

― James A. Lindsay  

It was late Sunday afternoon when I finally reached the Sauk City Canoe Launch to check on the tiger beetles. Sue took her own car as a precaution so I wouldn't get her sick. Burning extra gas wasn't ideal, but after feeling stuck indoors, we were both craving a little sunshine and a break by the water.

Within a few minutes, I located a single Bronzed Tiger Beetle ― it was the only one present!

Will it hold out until November? I doubt it, but I'll check again.

 

The calm of the river and the beach ...

Perhaps my last look at a Shoreline Wolf Spider for the year ...

No super large ones, but even the smaller ones are cool.

The sereneness of the Wisconsin River ... it's good for the soul, spirit, or whatever.

This was pretty cool ...

I'm fairly certain this Ground Grab Spider is Xysticus ferox.

Ring-billed Gulls were abundant, but there were virtually no passerines present. I thought I heard a single Yellow-rumped Warbler call note, but I never saw it. A Greater Yellowlegs was on one of the sandbars, but the moment I thought about photographing it, it flew off and left the area. Astonishingly, no sparrows ... not even a junco.

My mom isn't going to make it after all. My older sister, who holds power of attorney, is looking into hospice care. It's heartbreaking to watch — mentally, my mom is still fully present, but her body is giving out. She made her wishes clear about not wanting feeding tubes, and since she has virtually stopped eating and drinking, we know it won't be long. I helped my brother, Anthony, through this same transition back in 1997 (cancer). This brings back so many of those memories, though my mom is 84 and my brother was only 35. I'll probably live to be 102, but I'll accept anything, really. 

 

Live in the present moment, my friends. 

All images © 2026 Mike McDowell

Update!

I caught the bug that's been going around at work, so I probably won't have any material for a nature post this weekend. It's Sunday, and while I might head up to the Wisconsin River to see if any Bronzed Tiger Beetles are still hanging around, I'll likely just stay home and get more rest.

My mom is slowly improving, but she's well in the woods.

Family Emergency

Due to a family medical emergency, I wasn't able to gather material for a nature post this weekend. My mom suffered a significant ischemic stroke and remains in the hospital. The encouraging news is that she is fully cognizant—we've been holding a pad of paper for her, and she’s been communicating through writing. She is currently in the acute phase, which can last a few weeks. The next step will be entering the subacute phase, where she'll begin rehabilitation to focus on functional recovery. 

Beck!

"I'm afraid concerts spoil people for everyday life."

― L.M. Montgomery

In keeping with our resolution to attend more live shows, Sue and I went to see Beck in Milwaukee Tuesday night. Before the show, the only Beck album I owned was Morning Phase, which I think is absolutely brilliant songwriting ― it won three Grammys in 2015. At the concert, I decided to pick up Ride Lonesome on vinyl, his album released earlier this year. Probably overpriced as concert merch, but what the hell.

The venue was the Landmark Credit Union Live, which neither of us had been to before. It kind of reminded us of The Sylvie in Madison, only a bit larger. 

Back in 1993, when I first heard "Loser," I wasn't particularly impressed and figured Beck was going to be a one-hit wonder. Fast-forward to 2014, and I can't remember when/where I first heard a track from Morning Phase, but I was super impressed and added the album to my music library.

 

Here's a track from the new album:

 

 

A variety of stage sets and  light show effects were visually interesting ...

Then they played a string of songs in a box ...

Beck explained to the audience that he and his band often practice in a small room and wanted to give us an idea of what that's like. The moving wall projections created a pretty cool effect.

Although Beck is still considered an alternative artist, much of his music these days consists of haunting, bluesy/country-tinged ballads. But he can still rock when he wants to, as he demonstrated with the final four or five songs before a relatively subdued encore.

 

It was a fantastic show! 

Set List:

 

In the Night — Ride Lonesome (2026)
The Golden Age — Sea Change (2002)
Paper Tiger — Sea Change (2002)
Unforgiven — Morning Phase (2014)
For Your Love — Ride Lonesome (2026)
Bleed — Ride Lonesome (2026)
Slow Canyon — Ride Lonesome (2026)
Run Away — Ride Lonesome (2026)
The New Pollution — Odelay (1996)
Gamma Ray — Modern Guilt (2008)
Blue Moon — Morning Phase (2014)
Everybody's Got to Learn Sometime — (2004)
Say Goodbye — Morning Phase (2014)
One Foot in the Grave — One Foot in the Grave (1994)
Think I'm in Love — The Information (2006)
Girl — Guero (2005)
Farewell Ride — Guero (2005)
Nobody's Fault but My Own — Mutations (1998)
Disappearing Act — Ride Lonesome (2026)
Lost Cause — Sea Change (2002)
Tropicalia — Mutations (1998)
Ride Lonesome — Ride Lonesome (2026)
Devils Haircut — Odelay (1996)
Qué Onda Guero — Guero (2005)
Mixed Bizness — Midnite Vultures (1999)
E-Pro — Guero (2005)
Loser — Mellow Gold (1994)
Where It's At — Odelay (1996)
True Love Will Find You in the End — One Foot in the Grave (1994) 

 

All images © 2026 M. McDowell & S. Ulschmid

As Predicted!

"In wisdom gathered over time I have found that every experience is a form of exploration."

― Ansel Adams 

I arrived at Pheasant Branch Prairie just after sunrise, my sole mission was to find and photograph migratory sparrows. Although weather reports called for sunny skies, cloud bands to the west were threatening the bright light my antiquated camera needs for effective digiscoping.

The trail that runs along the eastern edge of the prairie is a good location. With the sun to my back, I walk and listen for bird vocalizations, identifying species of interest. Well, I'll photograph anything that perches in good light directly in front of me, like this American Goldfinch.

A Song Sparrow popped into view, thought a somewhat shier subject.

The favored light didn't last for long ...

A large layer of clouds moved in, reducing (changing?) photographing opportunities. 

Even so, I managed to capture some portraits of a dapper Lincoln's Sparrow. The softer light subdues their plumage features a little, but I'll take whatever I can get.

I was considering leaving, but I could see a break in the clouds heading my way.

With blue skies and sunny conditions restored, I came upon a flock of White-crowned Sparrows on the south side of the drumlin. Purists will say, "It isn't a drumlin," and they'd be right. Though it looks much like our region's glacial drumlins, it's actually capped by dolomite bedrock rather than glacial till. It's more geologically correct to refer to it as a drumlinoid. To me, though, "drumlinoid" sounds more like a medical condition than a geological feature. 

 

Anyway, back to the sparrows ...

 There were adults ...

And juveniles ...

But mostly adults.

The complete sparrow species list for the outing:

 

Song Sparrow

Swamp Sparrow

Lincoln's Sparrow 

Savannah Sparrow

Field Sparrow

White-crowned Sparrow

White-throated Sparrow

Dark-eyed Junco 

 

Other birds present included Yellow-rumped Warbler, Palm Warbler, Orange-crowned Warbler, Eastern Phoebe, American Pipit, Gray Catbird, Tree Swallow, Sedge Wren, Hermit Thrush, American Robin, Northern Cardinal Blue Jay, House Finch, Black-capped Chickadee, White-breasted Nuthatch, Downy Woodpecker, Red-bellied Woodpecker, Northern Flicker, American Kestrel, Cooper's Hawk, Red-tailed Hawk, Ring-necked Pheasant, Sandhill Crane, and Canada Goose.

By mid-morning I was about ready to call it an outing, so I started photographing other things that reflect the present state of the season.

But when one keeps looking, one finds things, like this Gray Treefrog.

A common sight of the season, Blister Beetles were occupying the trail on the south side of the drumlin. I really don't know that much about them. The species is likely Meloe americanus, but I'm not confident of that identification. All I know for sure is not to touch or pick them up. When threatened, as a defense they secrete an oily fluid from their leg joints containing cantharidin, a harsh chemical that can cause painful blisters on human skin.

While it's easy to write-off the slow-moving beetles as boring compared to a lightning-fast, glittering tiger beetle, that reaction overlooks one of evolution's most brilliant trade-offs. Speed requires massive amounts of energy, streamlined bodies, and constant vigilance; tiger beetles have to be fast because they are vulnerable visual hunters like robber flies. Blister Beetles, on the other hand, surrendered speed and flight because they simply didn't need them anymore. Far from being a dull ground-dweller, its sluggish pace is actually an adaptive flex—a quiet confidence born from millions of years of evolutionary mastery where speed becomes obsolete. Though people do accidentally step on them from time to time, given their vast numbers at the prairie, their overall strategy appears to be serving them well. 

And that's it for this week's Nature Post!

Saturday's weather forecast is calling for sunny skies and temperatures in the 80s. I can guarantee I'll likely return to a tiger beetle haunt or two to see which species remain active. 

 

All images © 2026 Mike McDowell