Preserving the FW Nature Center and Refuge

November 2, 2024 / Michael Smith / 1 Comment

I’ve lived in North Texas for a long time, and the Nature Center and I go back many years. In the opening pages of Mindfulness in Texas Nature, the very first words are, “I went home on Christmas Eve 2019 to the Fort Worth Nature Center and Refuge.” I meant that those prairies and woodlands have shared so many days with me over the years that it feels like home. And so, sitting on a bench there on Christmas Eve was like visiting an old friend.

And the very first words in Herping Texas (published 2018) bring back a memory of surveying the reptiles and amphibians there: “Toward the end of March a few years back, a group of us took a walk through a bottomland forest at the Fort Worth Nature Center and Refuge.” I described the group of us walking through that forest and one member of the group accidentally discovering a rat snake making its way down the tree trunk where she was about to lean.

In recent years I have written about the place many times for the online publication Green Source DFW. As a reporter I’ve covered the re-building of the marsh boardwalk, the bison deck overlooking bison pastures, the recognition of some of its woodland as an old growth forest, the statue honoring the work of the Civilian Conservation Corps on refuge property, and the re-introduction of prairie dogs there.

Now the City of Fort Worth is considering handing over the management of the Nature Center to the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT). The city would still own it, but BRIT would be in charge of some – or all – of its management and direction. I wrote about the issue in an article for Green Source DFW, which I hope you will read – “Should BRIT Take Over the Fort Worth Nature Center?“

The Fort Worth Nature Center & Refuge (FWNCR) has been managed by a series of dedicated, smart, and creative individuals. At its inception it had the guidance of my friend Rick Pratt, and in later years there have been people like Wayne Clark, Suzanne Tuttle, Rob Denkhaus, and now Acting Manager Jared Wood. Those are big boots to fill, and I hope that any management changes leave such people in charge. They are people whose first commitment is to the integrity of the refuge as a relatively wild remnant of the Cross Timbers and prairies that were here before White settlers.

As I see it, the FWNCR connects us to the wildlife, woods, and prairies that are like our extended family. That family includes the trees and other plants that give us oxygen, pull carbon dioxide out of the air and sink it into the soil, the wetlands that filter our water, the insects that pollinate our crops. The land, water, and all the living things provide a spark of wonder that adds joy to our lives.

*A swallowtail at the edge of the lotus marsh*

When we walk through the preserve, we become part of the land for a little bit, sharing a kinship with the rest of nature. We might even come to see our separation from nature as an illusion that we create, while the woods and prairies are the authentic reality.

What does the future hold? Can that authentic reality of the refuge hold its own against the urge to build more and more attractions, drawing in so many paying customers that the wildness is gone? We want everyone to share the refuge, learn from it, and fall in love with it. But not everyone all at once, and not by offering so many built attractions that people miss the point, which is the wildness.

I hope you will read my story at Green Source DFW and keep track of plans for what direction the city will take with FWNCR. Please step up and offer comments when the time comes, if you feel that your input is needed (and input from those who love nature is always needed!).

Sunset in an Urban Oasis

August 28, 2024 / Michael Smith / Leave a comment

As Fort Worth grew, with buildings and highways proliferating, a little patch of the east side remained in a natural state. Much of it is dominated by hills and ridges, making it less attractive to developers. Over the years it was sometimes treated as a dump and also as a playground for recreational vehicles, but the native grasses, flowers, juniper, and lots of other life persisted. Finally, it was recognized and protected as a Fort Worth treasure, Tandy Hills Natural Area.

Yesterday, at the end of a hot August day, I took a walk there with my friend Kat as the sun sank toward the city skyline. We followed those beautiful limestone trails through native grasses and the stalks of the past spring’s basketflower, over patches of prairie and along the ridge.

Kat is an ideal person to take a walk with, to share these hills with. We talked about absent friends and missing their presence, and we talked about the dragonflies and the succession of prairie plants around us. Snow on the prairie is starting to make its late summer appearance, and the little bluestem is beautiful as always. Kat and I discussed how we look for the myriad subtle colors of this grass, pastel blue-green with a few scattered suggestions of almost-violet. On a previous walk I told her that I’ve described those tall thin stems as “vertical brush strokes” on the prairie’s canvas and complained that I had no other way of describing little bluestem. She immediately suggested, “icicles,” and yes, they are like upside-down thin icicles!

Hardly anything allows a person to unwind and become content and restored like a walk at the end of the day in a place like this, with a friend like this. The shadows lengthened and the heat diminished, and there was always something wonderful to pull us around the next bend of the trail. However, our plan for the evening brought us back to the top of the ridge just at 8:10pm as the orange disk of the sun touched the horizon. Having found a quiet place to sit, we wordlessly watched what unfolded.

It took five minutes for the sun to disappear beyond the horizon, and it continued to illuminate the streaks of cloud in red, orange, and pale yellow. A good, fairly steady breeze blew across the ridge as we sat. The pale, almost pastel blue sky shaded deeper blue to the south, where the half-moon shone in the sky.

As light faded, we could see the rocky limestone path in front of us bend and disappear behind the taller dried plant stalks and the green growth near the ground. The ground dropped away and there was a dark sea of green tree tops beyond, stretching out toward the city.

It struck me that the clouds near the horizon rippled and waved in bright sunset colors like waves on water somewhere. And then the angle of the sun hit the clouds in a particular way for one more bright moment, and those clouds were bright streaks of orange against a turquoise sky. Even the hazy clouds above us were rose pink.

At 8:27pm the drone of insects began from nearby trees, and after a short time they just as abruptly stopped. We were left wondering if some disturbance, maybe people leaving the area, caused this, but I don’t know.

Sitting and maintaining our attention on the sky, there were several subtle shifts. Color faded from parts of the sky in a couple of places, probably when some irregularity of the land to the west blocked the sun. Where the color drained away, the clouds were left like patches of ash in the wake of the fiery sunset. Above us, the traces of cloud were white again. The western sky became more pale, no longer turquoise, while behind us the blue was deepening.

By 8:35pm the steady breeze carried less warmth – the heat of the day was fading along with the twilight. And even with the surrounding city lights and nearby highway, it felt quieter and calmer with the oncoming darkness. We heard a few dogs bark in the distance. When we finally spoke, Kat agreed that it seemed quieter, and yet we wondered if sound levels had actually decreased. Maybe the enveloping darkness brings a perception of quiet that is not about measured sound levels.

At 8:50pm we picked up our stuff and walked out, in silence or else speaking in quiet voices as if not wanting to disturb the tranquility of the night. Kat said that I could expect a different sort of sunset when there are more clouds, and she wondered what the winter sunset will be like on the ridge where we sat. I look forward to finding out.

(This article first appeared 8/13/24 at Rain Lilies on Substack)

A Sunset at the Ridge

August 20, 2024 / Michael Smith / Leave a comment

A recent mid-August Sunday was the hottest so far in 2024, with a high of 104F. When Kat and I walked up the trail at Sheri Capehart Nature Preserve to the sandstone ridge, the stone was quite warm to the touch. Regardless of the day’s heat, we wanted to experience a summer sunset there, and we arrived at the ridge about 8:00pm with the sun still glaring yellow through the leaves of oaks. Those trees grow immediately below the sandstone ridge, a curtain that hides the Fort Worth skyline and offers some shade.

*Kat, making a few notes in her journal*

We sat on the stone ledge with water bottles and notebooks at our sides. Looking behind where Kat was sitting, there were tall stems of little bluestem reaching above our heads, and with each little breeze they waved as if they were the tops of trees. The breeze was welcome, of course, but for the most part the air was still and with the humidity at 50%, it felt sticky. Turning back to the west, the disk of the sun peeked through branches and leaves in yellow-orange sparkles, as if coming from the facets of a jewel.

The constant nearby traffic sounds dominated, but at 8:10pm a wave of insect calls moved through the area and then stopped. Although at some point the Merlin app picked up the call of a northern cardinal, I could hear no birds. After a few minutes another wave of insect sounds lasted several seconds and then abruptly stopped.

Meanwhile, a pastel yellow sky at the horizon filtered through the trees, silhouetting leaves and branches. I reclined on the still-warm rocks to be able to see the whole field of the pale blue sky, watching for birds or insects and hoping to see the first star become visible. I saw none of those. At 8:26pm the temperature at the ridge was still 92F, with humidity dropping a little. The western horizon was a deeper orange.

*Sandstone, little bluestem, and sunlight in the blackjack oak*

Behind us, the canopies of blackjack oak were dimly lit by the remaining light from the western horizon, almost glowing with a yellow tint that contrasted a little with the surrounding vegetation. And when we looked lower down in those blackjacks, through bare branches we could see the bright, round full moon rising.

It was about ten minutes later that we could see the first glimmers of a couple of stars. “Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight,” but these tiny bright pinholes in the not-yet-dark heavens did not seem bright. Kat’s younger and more perceptive eyes could soon make out four stars.

*Moonrise through the trees (photo by Kat Oliver)*

Shortly after that, we started walking back in the relative darkness, much darker under the trees. But in open areas, the full moon had risen higher and provided enough light for walking. When the moon is bright enough to light your way, and you walk along a path just visible, it may bring to mind childhood adventures in back yards or campgrounds. Something about it makes it seem special, a moonlit faery world much different from the bright daylight colors.

And what is the attraction of sitting with the sunset, riding that transition between day and night? The world rides along with us as we notice the settling of birds, the emergence of insects or frogs, the way any clouds transform the last light of the sun. Most days we declare our independence from the rhythm of the Earth, turning on our lights and continuing whatever we are doing while the sun disappears and gives the night to the moon and stars. Sitting outside with the sunset is a way of reconnecting with that rhythm. Through such a connection, perhaps we synchronize ourselves with something important.

Seeing Horned Lizards Again

May 27, 2024 / Michael Smith / Leave a comment

I just got back from a couple of days in the Rolling Plains with three wonderful friends. We saw Texas horned lizards, snakes, and a beautiful springtime landscape out there past the city of Vernon. This note is a “heads up” that my friends and I plan to collaborate on the story of our visits to Copper Breaks State Park and Matador Wildlife Management Area. Stay tuned and consider subscribing to Rain Lilies on Substack.

Road trips alone are OK, and there can be a wonderful quality to solitude out in some natural place. For me, going with like-minded friends is probably the best. There were times when we were the eyes and ears for each other. If I’m more focused on the ground where lizards skitter off the trail and Kat is attentive to a more distant view where Mississippi kites soar and buntings perch, we complement each other. Alaina is particularly attuned to the insect and spider life, and Sheryl takes in the birds but also those miniature worlds of flowers, fungi, and insects. One of us commented that together we’re like one organism, because we are closely attuned to each other while focusing on different aspects of our surroundings.

Where we went, the Texas horned lizard is doing well, and we saw six or seven of them. At night, we found three massasauga rattlesnakes along with other snake species. The landscape is thick with blooming thistles and basketflowers as well as (in places) skeleton plant, lemon beebalm, firewheel, and other flowers. It was a beautiful trip, and we’ll have more of the story – and lots of photos – at Rain Lilies soon.

Rain Lilies

May 14, 2024 / Michael Smith / 2 Comments

Last September, after flipping over to Substack for a while, I came back here as the home base for my writing. I did not want to get too caught up in trying to get paid subscriptions, which is Substack’s business model. Anyway, there were several factors which I won’t bore you with. Now, embarrassingly, I find myself flopping back. Again, there are several factors in the decision, but I guess the bottom line is that I’m a flip-flopper.

I have created a Substack newsletter and called it Rain Lilies, with a focus not so different from this blog. I wrote, “I hope that what you will read here will be like those beautiful flowers that suddenly emerge after a rain, offering what might be a moment of unexpected wonder. Maybe it could offer a bit of insight into how we are a part of the natural world around us. Rain Lilies also takes a bit of inspiration from our wonderful granddaughter’s name.”

At Rain Lilies I plan to keep writing about nature and our place in it. I also have in mind a continuation of the “Letters to Nature Kids” idea, as well as news or comments about my books and related activities.

I do hope you will give Rain Lilies a try. You’ll have the opportunity to be a paid subscriber, and I’ll offer some things to make that worthwhile. However, most of my stuff will be available to free subscribers. This site will continue for now with the pages of information and downloadable materials, particularly in the area of herpetology.

“Kaleidoscope of Color”

April 19, 2024 / Michael Smith / Leave a comment

All around, kaleidoscope of color

I think that maybe I’m dreaming
–The Byrds, “Renaissance Fair”

So far this year, Tarrant County rainfall is about 3 inches above normal according to drought.gov. At Sheri Capehart Nature Preserve, the plants have responded with an explosion of growth and flowers.

Walking up the switchback trail to the bluff, I have never seen so many spiderworts, their blue-purple flowers dotting the trail’s edge and the openings in the woodlands. Engelmann’s daisies grew in a few of the sunny spots, and the brighter yellows of chickory were common.

It was cloudy, and an Arlington weather source said that it was 61 degrees. The next day was predicted to be full of rain; I could imagine tomorrow’s shining raindrops on the leaves and the water soaking into the sandy places and forming pools where there is clay. But during my walk it was cool and dry.

At the boulders the green stems and leaves of vetch are overflowing and the bees and butterflies are feasting on clusters of purple flowers. And there were a couple of patches of firewheel (Indian blanket).

The butterflies scattered up from the trail as I walked, including sulphurs, red admirals, and question marks. This last butterfly has a small mark on the underside of the hind wing that is said to look like a question mark, but for the most part with wings folded it looks like a dead leaf and the opened wings are a beautiful study in smudged and burnt orange.

It’s remarkable how different plant species have their time and then move on. The year progresses in a “kaleidoscope of color” as each one has its appointed time. There was no sign of toadflax blooms, even though only recently they seemed like the prominent flowers of the hillside. Near the trailhead, Maximilian sunflower was getting started, although we won’t see their blooms for some time.

Change is constant; nothing stays the same. The woods, prairie openings, and ponds change from season to season, and even within a season everything is in motion. And yet it’s the same place, a constant familiar presence even as it constantly shifts. How wonderful is that!

*Engelmann daisy behind new growth of Maximilian sunflower*

Creek Kids

April 5, 2024 / Michael Smith / Leave a comment

In her book, Wild DFW, Amy Martin says that people like her and me are “creek kids.” Each of us spent some formative years wandering nearby creeks. In my case the creek was my second home from about age 12 until high school, sometimes going with a friend or two and sometimes spending most of the day there by myself. For Amy and for me, the creek played a part in creating a lifelong love of nature. What would have happened, had we not had a creek, or a woods, or a prairie? I strongly suspect that if childhood slips away before we have had a close acquaintance with some place in nature, it might be too late. If there had been no creek, maybe I would have an intellectual or aesthetic interest in nature, but I don’t see how it could ever feel like home. For a creek kid, the attachment to places in nature and the things that live there is visceral. It’s like a beloved sibling, not a casual acquaintance.

My creek was and is in western Tarrant County in what originally was prairie with black soil above white limestone. It sometimes filled up and ran like a raging river, but mostly it flowed quietly in a small stream from one pool to the next over that limestone. Under overhanging tree branches the water was sometimes crystal clear and cool, and mostly I had sense enough not to drink it. It was, in the early 1960s, full of wildlife, enough to keep me coming back day after day during the summer. My passionate interest was herpetology, but I was learning to love the armadillos, herons, and sunfish along with the reptiles and amphibians.

The creek is still there, but much has been lost in the 60 years since I first walked and waded it. The spaces between pools, those broad gravel bars and broken slabs of limestone, were inhabited by greater earless lizards in colors of pale gray and chalk white. They would run ahead and stop, waving their tails to expose black bars underneath (perhaps meant to confuse or disorient a predator). I haven’t seen one at the creek in many years. Ribbonsnakes used to thread their way through stream side vegetation, hunting for cricket frogs. When spooked, these slender harmless snakes would swim across the pools with bright orange and cream-colored stripes glistening in the sunlight. They seem mostly to be gone as well, at least at my creek. As populations of wildlife disappear here and there, younger generations know of them only through the memories of us older naturalists, or they may never know what is missing (see the article on shifting baseline syndrome).

I keep coming back, though the city’s development has forced me to find access points further upstream. Occasionally I will bring someone, but it’s a little like in Mary Oliver’s poem, “How I Go to the Woods” – those who smile and talk too much are kind of unsuitable, and if I do take someone, it is a person with whom I feel comfortable and close.

*Fleabane growing on the banks of the creek*

In particular, my visits there with Elijah have been important to me and, I think, to him. He is not quite a grandson but I’ve known him since he was born, so he’s family. I first took him to see the creek when he was six, and we’ve visited on and off since then. I described one such visit in an issue of “Letters to Nature Kids.” Giving kids time in nature, introducing them to the turtles and fish and other things that set the engines of curiosity and wonder in motion, that feels like part privilege and part responsibility. Taking my granddaughter for a walk to see birds and draw in the sand on the path through the woods is a great pleasure, and I think it is more than that. It is planting seeds that might, if she chooses, grow into a source of joy and connection with the world around her.

So my creek is still there and has not been swallowed up by the city. I imagine kids playing in that creek and exploring it as I once did. I imagine it, but I do not see it. I have not seen anyone who appeared to be playing or learning about the life of that creek in a long time. Is this part of the cultural trend that Richard Louv wrote about in Last Child in the Woods? He documented the increasing tendency for children to play inside, to spend their time in front of screens, with little time in woods and fields. As parents, we may worry that no place out of our sight is safe. For a child to be outdoors for an extended time away from contact with a parent seems neglectful to many people. Yet I survived and thrived at the creek with no cell phone, just a watch and a rendezvous time for mom to pick me up.

I hope you have a creek, and that you take your kids or somebody’s kids there. I know that it might not be a creek; it could be a woods or a pond or some other place in nature. I would love to hear about it in the comments – either a place in your memory or some place you can visit right now. And I hope that you can visit it, for an hour or a day.

*A near-perfectly camouflaged cricket frog, hoping that I’ll walk on by*

*Blue water-speedwell, according to iNaturalist, growing along the creek*

A Mournful Moth on a Spring Afternoon

March 28, 2024 / Michael Smith / Leave a comment

Spring is fully underway and it’s not yet April. Things are green and growing, and the insects – the beetles, flies, dragonflies, damselflies, skippers, and butterflies – are busy. On March 27 I wandered the trails at Sheri Capehart Nature Preserve, up the hill to the bluff and over to the boulders. There were filmy high clouds but it felt sunny and the breeze was cool. A nearby weather station reported that it was 65 degrees and felt like 74.

Many of the oaks were leafed out and a few stragglers were still putting out small leaves tinged in red. Along the trail’s edge there were some spiderworts with their deep blue flowers, three petals surrounding a cluster of yellow anthers. And everywhere I looked in the sandy soil of the hillside, it seemed that I saw Texas toadflax. I’ve really looked forward to this!

Last year, toadflax really captured my imagination. I wrote:

“To tell the truth, part of the reason I’ve focused on them … is that name – “toadflax” – which immediately made me think of The Wind in the Willows. A plant with such a name surely belongs in an old children’s tale centered on the English countryside with animals such as the toad.”

Even if it had a completely unimaginative name, I would think this delicate-looking plant was worth paying attention to with its tall stems and pale violet flowers.

Near the top of the hill there is an area with plenty of southern dewberries, and on one of the flowers was a pretty black-and-white moth called the “mournful thyris.” That’s just the kind of name that gets me wondering about how it was named, and an internet search or two did not yield much. Thyris is part of the name of the family – the group of moths – to which this one belongs. The word is said to be a Greek reference to “window,” and they have a spot on the wing that is translucent, like a sort of window. But why is this one mournful? I looked for a window into its grief but could find nothing. If any readers know the origin of the name, please share with us in the comments.

*Mournful thyr*is moth on southern dewberry

I walked the rest of the way to the bluff, along the way seeing beautiful yellow woodsorrel in a few places, with leaves reminding me of clover. Up on the bluff there were places with groups of what appeared to be leastdaisy, with tiny white flowers. It can be so rewarding to pay attention to little things like this, just stopping and maybe getting on hands and knees to get to know something small and magical.

There were plenty of butterflies – skippers, sulphurs, and a couple of beautiful tiger swallowtails. And the soundtrack to this lovely spring day was provided by a Carolina wren’s calling, with a blue jay heard in the distance. There were cardinals, too, and it sounded like an ideal spring day. I’m waiting for that first Texas spiny lizard on a tree trunk, which will add that perfect touch to a delightful day. I’m sure I’ll see one soon.

Humility, Connection, and Prayer

March 22, 2024March 23, 2024 / Michael Smith / 2 Comments

We may feel big, like the most important thing in the Universe, re-shaping the planet and living in worlds of technology and invention. We have been to the moon and back; we could, in a fit of international rage, make the planet unlivable (we came close during my lifetime, and might again). We have created an industrial system that is currently making the planet unlivable, but being like gods, we are sure that we can continue to live anyway.

But some of us don’t feel so big, at least on a collective level. Sure, we sometimes make the mistake of grandiosity as individuals, but we aren’t convinced that we have special rights to convert our world into the exclusive garden of Homo sapiens. We feel a relationship with the living things around us that includes respect and relatedness. We may be consumers, but we’d rather it not be in the industrial sense of consumer and product.

Many of us seek connection with something bigger than we are. Sometimes we sit and look at the heavens and see something so big that it reminds us of our true size. We might experience awe and gratitude. At such times, we might have a desire to relieve suffering or add to the goodness of the world. Could we describe those feelings and that intentionality as prayer?

Practitioners of forest therapy sometimes ask the woods for permission to enter a particular spot. Treating trees, rocks, or rivers as sentient, as beings whose wishes need to be considered, also appears in some Native American cultures and in ancient Japanese Shinto practices. A person might wade into a stream and say “thank you for your cool, clear water.” They might silently say, “May my presence here cause no harm.”

Are such things prayers? I don’t know the answer, but I do greatly value our experiences of awe, of gratitude, of stepping outside of ourselves to connect with something greater. I wish that those things, along with humility and acceptance of the limits of our understanding, were more common.

Like many of us in the U.S. I grew up periodically attending a Christian church and learning the basic stories. I was of course taught it as outright history, not as myth and metaphor. No one questioned how Noah collected pairs of all the world’s animals or got them all on a handmade boat. We learned that praying was talking to God, imagined as an old man like in the Renaissance paintings. Maybe talking but usually asking – for forgiveness or for rescue from danger and disease. Or maybe for stuff we wanted.

I’m not promoting that, and I would go along with those critics who point out that throughout the ages, organized religion has been a great source of misery for many (and a malignant source of personal power and enrichment for quite a few). Jesus’ teachings described a radical love for all, envisioning a society turned upside-down, with the high and privileged brought low and the poor and humble elevated. All this was quickly transformed into a religion in which the right beliefs allowed us to escape eternal torture. Popes dressed in splendor and wielded immense power; so much for the privileged being brought low.

And now we have prosperity gospels claiming that being rich is a reward from God (and therefore being poor must be a sign of failure). So much for elevating the poor. Christian Nationalism is a movement seeking essentially to turn the U.S. into a theocracy, welding the beliefs of the church onto the power of the state. No wonder Christianity is losing ground. A Pew Research Center study finds that fewer people in the U.S. identify as Christian, and 29% say that they are atheist, agnostic, or “nothing in particular.”

So should we throw away the idea of prayer, along with the rest of religion? Even when the prosperity preachers and dominionists have gone away, our capacity for awe and our tendency to believe that there is something bigger than us will remain. Many of us will still seek a connection beyond ourselves.

Some might consider prayer to be very abstract, a process of opening oneself to the beauty and symmetry of a flower or the immense dome of the sky overhead. There is awe and gratitude in those moments, transcending oneself and feeling a part of such things, of all of creation.

Others may pray in a very direct and personal way, such as Willie Nelson describes in one of the songs from the album, Spirit:

“Remember the family, Lord?

I know they will remember You

And all of their prayers, Lord

They talk to You just like I do”

– Willie Nelson, “Too Sick to Pray”

A famous prayer of St. Francis, the “Canticle of the Sun,” expresses gratitude to the Lord for Brother Sun and Sister Moon, as well as for the wind and air, the water, and Mother Earth. There is also gratitude for those people who forgive and endure trials in their lives. He saw all of creation as a wonderful gift, and all the parts of it – including ourselves – related like siblings.

That brings to mind the Thanksgiving Address of the Onondaga Nation of Native Americans. Some of us first encountered it in Robin Wall Kimmerer’s book Braiding Sweetgrass. Is it a prayer? (Kimmerer says it is not.) From the descriptions I have read, it is a powerful way to affirm the group’s identity and values, its gratitude and the relationship of reciprocity between the people and the rest of nature. Participants in a meeting or students in a classroom recite words beginning with these:

“Today we have gathered and we see that the cycles of life continue. We have been given the duty to live in balance and harmony with each other and all living things. So now, we bring our minds together as one as we give greetings and thanks to each other as people. Now our minds are one.”

Subsequent portions of the Address express thanks to the Earth, to the waters, the plants, animals, and ultimately “to the Creator, the Great Spirit.” Each time, there is the refrain, “Now our minds are one.”

Chanting, singing, or reciting something in unison can be a powerful way of transcending oneself. Joining our voice with those of others, we are more than just our individual selves, and perhaps we become something greater. And perhaps that is like prayer.

“To whom do you pray,” some might ask, wanting to know what deity we recognize. But there is more than one way to conceive of the divine. One can have a spiritual life without personifying God as a human-like figure modeled after fathers and kings. Neither does God have to be personified as a mountain or a flower; maybe the Creator need not be personified at all. Maybe it’s all much more abstract than that, and maybe it’s unknowable.

It’s not like I have answers. I’m just thinking out loud, into the keyboard, pulling in the bits and pieces that I’ve read and heard and imagining that prayer is broader than what most of us heard in church as we grew up.

A Big Place on a Winter Day

February 16, 2024February 16, 2024 / Michael Smith / 1 Comment

Sitting beside the Trinity River, on the Crosstimbers Trail, I wrote, “The place is so big that it makes the voices of the occasional human visitors seem small.” On a warm Friday in February, there were quite a few people at the Fort Worth Nature Center and Refuge, making bigness an important quality if the trail was going to live up to the name “refuge.”

This is a big place, as nature centers go. Its 3,621 acres are loved by many, and that is partly because it is big enough for a little solitude. The Crosstimbers trail borders the river for the first half-mile or so, and that’s a popular walk for people who want to see the water and maybe hope to see a ‘gator. Once the trail bends back into the woods, there are fewer people, and once you get pretty far back on that loop trail, you might be on your own for a good while.

*Two red-eared sliders – an old melanistic male and a younger one on the log below him*

I got started at 10:40am on a day when thin clouds could not hide the sun and you could walk comfortably in a t-shirt. I watched a great blue heron fly over the nearby marsh and said hello to the cooters and sliders basking on fallen logs and branches in the water. There were plenty of American coots swimming nearby.

*Three American coots swimming in the river*

The bottomland forests beside the river were full of stately old trees – cottonwoods and other species – and they are often entwined with one or another climbing vine including poison ivy. One old cottonwood tree has huge vines braiding around its trunk.

Bare woody branches of shrubs frequently contained a spray of bright red berries where a kind of holly called possumhaw grows. And around me in the woods were the calls of many birds, including Carolina chickadee, tufted titmouse, and northern cardinal (identified by the Merlin bird ID app). My thermometer showed that it was 71.8F at 11:25am.

Then it was time to follow the trail back into the woods. There are plenty of oaks; big bur oaks with big notched leaves and the post oaks that are a signature species of the Cross Timbers region. There is ash, cedar elm, and some hackberry trees. Here and there the woodland opens up to a little glade or pocket prairie with native grasses. I took a few photos on the “pano” setting because today the place seemed so big that only a very wide photo might do it justice.

The trail leads through galleries of old trees and the land slopes away to the north toward a wetland. On the other side, the woodlands and open grassy patches gently climb toward a high place. On my walk, the winds seemed to shift around 11:35am and become cooler.

At what seems to be the highest point, there is a bench, perfect for sitting and taking in the wonderful forms of the trees, the carpet of dropped leaves, and the birds. Today it was very quiet and peaceful.

I started back, and as I walked the breeze scattered leaves ahead of me on the trail. That breeze was strengthening and making its voice heard through the tangle of trees. The branches shredded the current of air. Sometimes it was a whoosh and sometimes a soft roar, falling away to silence.

As I got further along, at one point I looked down the trail to see two deer looking back at me. They were silent and still as statues, sizing me up and deciding if I was a source of trouble. After a moment, the group took off, with those white tails flashing a warning to the rest of the group.

*Two white-tailed deer froze on the trail as I came into view*

When I reached the river and sat on a bench, there was the chatter of a belted kingfisher somewhere nearby (though I could not see it). Merlin also identified the call of a northern flicker. The thin clouds were pulling apart, and when the sun shone down it felt warm. The temperature had fallen a little to 67.6F, but in the little nook where I sat on my bench, the sunshine felt good.

The kingfisher clattered persistently. Another bird came in for a dramatic fast landing, wingbeats skimming the surface of the river. The bird then paddled around as if nothing had happened, sometimes diving down into the water. With the lens on my camera I got a good enough look to see that it was a pied-billed grebe.

The relatively thick bill with a dark ring around it was a giveaway. The Cornell website gave more information about what I observed about its diving: it was hunting. This bird likes crayfish and also eats small fish, dragonfly larvae, and it would not mind a leech or a small frog.

In that last hour I was grateful to have seen no one along the trail, and was happy to be by myself. I do like walking with others, but on some days like today, the solitude was peaceful. I am so thankful that Fort Worth has one of the biggest urban preserves in the country – and that it “feels” big.

Our Lives In Nature

How nature supports, informs, and inspires our lives

In the Field