Diario de merkertgrace

Finally got around to posting some of those pictures from my trip to Alabama and Georgia. Important lessons learned:

1. Check the weather before planning a trip, it might just be the rainiest week they've had in a while. When it rains, the bugs are not out, which is devastating.
2. Always bring fresh shoes and socks in case you fall into a river
3. Get the number for local animal control before heading out, in case of lack of data and encounters with really large aggressive dogs
4. Be so, so careful about double checking settings. About 3/4 of these photos ended up in RAW format with higher ISO, the grain and visual snow is awful, I lost about 400 pictures to quality issues. These also take SO much longer to post, since every single one has to be reformatted.

The lil booklet/zine thing I'm doing for Michelle on local vines is coming along really well! I wish I had someone to check it for accuracy, but I don't really intend to give it to anyone else so it doesn't reeeeally matter.

Tallulah Gorge kind of sucked, lots of people and stairs, but a very helpful park ranger got me a permit to hike in an extremely secluded trail off to the north, which was nice. Reminder to not bring anyone other than Michelle (or other naturalist, if anyone wants to come?) on a hike.
Finally got most of the settings on the camera worked out. I cannot STAND the "bokeh" feature that makes my edges blurry, but it sort of happens on purpose with the macro lens? It seems to be impossible to explain that I want magnification with nearly 100% clarity in depth of field up to an inch. The new flash is working out INCREDIBLY well, all of the photos taken on 8/17 (as of this moment unposted) utilized the flash, and instead of my normal discard rate of roughly 40% I only lost 10% of my photos to underexposure and blur! I'll still have to cull for near duplicates and slight blur, but it's an amazing advancement!

Finally made that Instagram page like my mom's been insisting. She fully expects me to become famous. I love her so much. Even more than I hate Instagram. @gmnaturephotography if anyone's interested.

I broke my sobriety. 6 months without liquor, 3 months totally dry. It was only two beers, but I still feel pretty crappy about it. Haven't had another since, currently 2 days sober. We begin again. We go forwards.

While I'm addressing the imaginary attentive audience: How do you overcome the fear?
It's so silly, because I did it before. I went to Puerto Rico on a whim, and I saw an iguana, and it literally changed my life and reawakened my passion for biology. It gave me my hobby. It gave me my joy. I leapt off of a pier, into deep ocean water (terrified of deep water) into an area above a coral reef (terrified of fish) and it was one of the best moments of my life! Nothing bad happened!!! I faced my fears and they blinked!!
I was so, so, SO scared to start this job; to leave the only industry I ever knew for the chance at a bright future. I was wrong to fear! I love my work! I love everything about it! Everything in my life is so much better for SO many reasons! I faced my fear, and it blinked!
So WHY, why, why, WHY, is it so scary to think about making my passion my job? Why does the thought of going back to school make me feel paralyzed? Is it my age? 31 is so young! Is it the thought of failure? I've failed plenty of times, and I'm still here! Is it the idea of choosing only one field of study? Is it the idea of change? Is it the fear that turning my passion into a career will kill my joy for it, as culinary did? What is the cause of this inner rot, eating at me? Is fear what defines us, as animals? Or is it passion, love, that drives us forward each day, despite the fog of terror?

Put some heavy duty towels into my car so that if I see any more snapping turtles on the road I can spend less than 30 minutes getting it to safety this time. Put my spare camera in the car as well, just for some better pictures.

Final note to self:
I'm gonna be okay.

A quick (ha) collection of helpful comments and resources so far, for personal reference:

via @andrewtree
conifers.org
Thomas Elpel's 'Botany in a Day'.

via @davidhljordan
http://www.amanitaceae.org/?Sections+of+Amanita
https://www.mushroomexpert.com
A Field Guide to the Mushrooms of Georgia (Bessette, Besette, and Hopping, 2023)
A Field Guide to Mushrooms of the Carolinas (Bessette, Bessette, and Hopping, 2018)

Gilled polypore
The gills on Trametes betulina are often (very) white and flappy. Daedaleopsis confragosa, when its underside is displaying gills, they're usually rusty-red to dark brown in color, often getting black, but are thin and brittle, and usually cracking already. Trametes betulina isn't all that morphologically variable, but it's always gilled. Daedaleopsis confragosa is sometimes gilled and sometimes (a) maze-like or (b) poroid. And, when Daedaleopsis confragosa does have a white underside, it usually stains some shade of red. Further, Daedaleopsis confragosa is often confused for Fuscoporia gilva and Trichaptum, as well as Trametes betulina.

Purplepore Bracket
Trichaptum abietinum and Trichaptum biforme are your toothed polypores. The former grows on dead conifer, while the latter grows on dead hardwood. The substrate in your picture is dead pine. Your 2nd picture shows teeth rather than pores, so Trametes gets ruled out entirely.

Dacrymyces chrysospermus is found only on conifer wood. One of the deciduous tree look-similars is Tremella mesenterica. (seconded by avlmike)

via @pynklynx
False Puffball
Touching these and observing the texture can be very helpful and a peek at the inside makes it more obvious.
With the photos available in this observation the biggest clue is the attachment point of the brown-ish blob to the wood. If we look very closely at the top left section (10-11 if it was a clock) of the blob we can see kind of a crusty edge suggesting this mass is not growing directly from the wood like a fungus and instead it is merely stuck to the bark surface like a slime mold

via @janetwright
http://flora.huh.harvard.edu/FloraData/001/WebFiles/fna27/FNA27-1-Morphology.htm
Sue Alix Williams' Ecological Guide to the Mosses and Common Liverworts of the Northeast.
Note on Smilax glauca.: Pale underside, edges very slightly turned under, pinkish veins & petiole, bluish color.

via @txwoofus
https://gallformers.org/gall/1492

via @comradejon
Lichens of North America by Brodo/Sharnoff/Sharnoff

Did the boardwalk only. Boardwalk is high among the trees, it was really cool to see everything that is normally so far overhead. Absolute abundance of sunburst lichens and blister wart!! It was a delight to see something orange on almost every single tree.

Lots of really friendly people, helpful park rangers, clean bathrooms, ample parking. The boardwalk is handicap accessible for wheelchairs and strollers, but benches are pretty spaced out: will need to bring extra painkillers and salve next time. Trail is well maintained and well labelled. Area was free of litter. Many trails available, will have to go earlier in the day next time. Ended up going very quickly through the last 0.5 miles or so due to the light fading. Park ranger said it was okay to go off the trail a short distance, but to not get lost or stuck in the mud. Did get stuck in the mud. Twice. Need to invest in some taller waterproof boots.

Best combination for proper images thus far seems to be Shutter priority, an aperture of roughly 1/40-1/60, manual white balance, and manual iso control: kept mainly around 100-400, with exceptions for the undersides of certain lichens and mushrooms. Shutter priority seems to make a big difference in helping moderate the hand shake issue. Removed lens cap entirely. Exhausted one full set of batteries, will have to charge: have not reached anywhere near the limit on the SD card.

4.5 hours hiked, trail is labeled as 2.6 miles. 625 pictures taken, 429 saved after culling due to quality concerns or duplicate photos. Total of 109 observations posted