Tag Archives: travel

Prairie Bingo (if you like that kind of thing)

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I don’t know about you, but a nice quiet walk through the prairie can often help me deal with everything else going on around me. Last weekend, I spent parts of both Saturday and Sunday cutting trees and fixing fence at our family prairie. I also wandered around a fair amount and, as always, found things to stir my curiosity and wonder.

Many of us don’t need added incentives to draw us outside, but that doesn’t mean incentives can’t help. Or, maybe you have friends or relatives who aren’t sure what they’d even do or look for in a prairie, especially this time of year. After all, isn’t it all just a bunch of brown grass out there right now?

Goldenrod stem galls are just one of many little treasures you can find in the late winter prairie.

Well, if it’s at all helpful, I’ve created a prairie bingo card. If you just let out an exasperated sigh when you read that sentence, that’s fine. This isn’t for you. No offense taken.

If you are still reading this, maybe you’d find it fun to add a little extra twist to your next trip to a local prairie. Maybe you have some friends who would come play a game with you but wouldn’t otherwise consider going for a prairie hike. I don’t know your situation.

I tried to create a bingo card that would be accessible to just about anyone. Anything that might be unfamiliar should be easy to quickly find an explanation of online. Everything on the card is something I’ve seen in the last couple weeks during walks in prairies near here.

If this looks like fun, feel free to save or print the bingo card. Or just make your own, using this one as inspiration. If you plan to go out with friends and don’t want to all use the same card, I’ve made two more versions (below) with the same terms but in different arrangements.

If you decide to try this, I’d love to hear what you think. Whether you play prairie bingo or not, though, I hope you find some time to go exploring. Even in the late winter, there’s plenty to see out there!

Photos of the Week – January 24, 2026

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Well, I was out sliding around on the ice again this week. I made two trips up to the tiny reservoir north of Aurora to search for photo compositions on its frozen surface. I was not disappointed.

Hemp dogbane seed (Apocynum cannibinum)
Dogbane seed.
Dogbane seed.

Some recent windy days had blown seeds of both dogbane and milkweed on to the ice, where they’d ended up perched on their comae (their fluffy parts). Wasn’t that fortuitous! They look really pretty when they do that.

Common milkweed seed (Asclepias syriaca).

Both times I visited, there was a small duck hanging out on the ice. I approached carefully and it seemed amenable to being photographed. I’m pretty sure it was my soft, comforting voice and non-threatening hat.

Ice duck (Anas carolinensis var. polyethylene).
The same ice duck (I assume) a couple days later.

It was good to see I wasn’t the only lunatic walking around on the ice. Several raccoons had also been around, based on the numerous tracks I found.

Raccoon track in a skiff of snow.
A raccoon that didn’t wipe its feet.
Frosty smartweed (Polygonum sp.)
Ice on the tip of a grass leaf dangling near the ice’s surface.
Frost at the entrance of a tunnel made of an elm leaf on the ice.
A frosty grass stem.

The highlight of my two trips, of course, were the ice bubbles. Most of the ice looked like frosted glass and wasn’t transparent enough to show the ice bubbles that were surely trapped within it. Around the base of some plants, though, it looked like the ice had melted and refrozen, and that’s where the bubbles were. The rest of the photos here are just a few examples of the many, many bubbles I enjoyed photographing. I find them mesmerizing to stare at – like little galaxies of bubbles.

We’re in the middle of a big cold snap as I write this. I’m hopeful that I’ll get some more chances to photograph ice bubbles, seed comae, frost, and other winter wonders soon. Stay tuned!