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THE SOUTH CAPE MAY MEADOWS the Hibiscus moscheutos place!

This is a great time of year to visit places where the Swamp Mallow is blooming. It is a monumental plant with huge flowers that can open up to approximately 6-8 inches in diameter. The pink ones are our favorite! They love to be in wet locations. I love seeing them in ditches along I -95 in the Carolinas, Virginia and in swampy areas in the New Jersey Meadowlands, just for starters. You have to keep your eye out for them, and once You tune into them and train your eyes, you will see them in many places, always brightening up your day!

Last Tuesday, August 1, 2023 Isabelle and I went on a field trip to Cape May, New Jersey and visited the Nature Conservancy property adjacent to Cape May Point State Park. There were so many Swamp Mallow plants blooming that we decided to call this place the Hibiscus moscheutos place. We also saw a rabbit, and many birds, including the Great Blue Heron.

A stunning abundance of the wide and magnificent pink Hibiscus moscheutos!

This place felt like a time capsule of what the Jersey shore must have been like before it was taken over and developed. The Nature Conservancy is making a very serious effort to preserve and restore the former glory of the property. Most impressive was the beach conservation effort being made. Dune restoration and an emphasis on preserving ground-nesting birds.

Parking was easy and accessible and there was even a phone charging station and accommodations for bicyclists.

Campsis radicans waiting for a hummingbird.

The trails took us to the Atlantic Ocean!

Summertime!!

Please comment if you have a favorite summertime place that celebrates conservation and restoration of a natural area!

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Midsummer between spring and fall

Isabelle and I did a twenty mile bike ride and hike to the Wissahickon today in honor of her brothers sudden passing during a run in the Pyrenees this day two years ago. We saw blooming asters, surely a preview of fall!

Also Bloodroot with an illuminated fallen leaf, portending the fall while still keeping the flame of Spring alive! It’s that time of year! Yes indeed the first hints of fall are here, even in this years most crazed and disturbing turbulence of summer.

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CATASTROPHIC I-95 DISASTER IN NORTHEAST PHILADELPHIA

We are interrupting our ongoing coverage of street trees in French and Spanish cities to briefly outline the deep vulnerabilities and flaws in the current U.S. transportation infrastructure, a theme we have been pounding away at in recent posts here at the Sanguine Root.

It is totally pathetic that the entire East Coast can be disabled by a section of crucial highway approximately 50 feet across and 100 feet long is taken out. We can do better than this!

Here are some solutions that conform to the laws of physics:

A: Build real high speed rail on the Northeast Corridor and implement a nationwide network across the U.S.

B: Build the Subway/ light rail along the Roosevelt Boulevard in NORTHEAST PHILADELPHIA which it was originally intended!!

C: Thoughtfully consider scaling our economic system to be weighted towards a local scale instead of the wasteful hyper-capitalism which is straining to the breaking point the weak US transportation infrastructure among so many other things, such as the environment.

Below is the blue French TGV that Isabelle and I just rode from Toulouse to Paris, France at 200 miles per hour! Passengers are casually departing the train like they just got off a subway train! Contrast this image with the I -95 images on the news of the collapsed highway.

Let that sink in!