'FORT MCNAIR' BUCKEYE, AND BLACK LOCUST

A VERY WET EAGLE

FORT MCNAIR HYBRID BUCKEYE...

,,,FLOWERS

BLACK LOCUST...

...PANICLES OF FRAGRANT FLOWERS

Sunday, 7:00 AM.  55 degrees F at the ferry dock, 53 on the back porch.  Wind ENE, calm with light gusts  The sky is partly overcast and cloudy, the humidity 94% and the barometer is beginning to fall, now standing at 29.87"  We are due for more rain tomorrow.
   Like everyone else, we are stunned by the senseless massacre in Charleston.  I believe these outrages are caused by the confluence of two factors: hate, and drugs, the first of which can only be combated  by a return to faith and morality, and the second by treatment  and law enforcement.
   While returning from Ashland yesterday, I spotted this very wet immature eagle sitting on a piling in the water, just off Hwy. 2.  He evidently didn't feel like flying, as I got up quite close.
   A few years back we planted a half dozen interesting and very pretty 'Fort McNair' hybrid buckeyes on 6th street (which is Hwy 13) in Bayfield.  This tree is a hybrid between the horse chestnut, Aesculus hippocastanaum and the red buckeye, Aesculus pavia.  Both are in the Horsechestnut Family,  They attract a lot of attention when they are in bloom.  Hardy in Zone 4, they have an upright habit and can be a nice small street tree.  They have indeed proven winter hardy but have taken a beating from snow plowing, and I have found them hard to obtain from nurseries due to losses during the last few winters, but eventually I would like to see a whole alley of them as an entrance to the city.
   Another often unrecognized tree that is quite nice in bloom is the black locust, Robinia pseudo acacia, in the Pea Family.  Being a legume, it enriches the soil where it grows.  It is native much further south in the US, but is hardy north.  Black locust wood is highly resistant to rot, so was much used for fence posts at one time, and therefore was grown on farm woodlots, so appears almost everywhere there are farms.
   Unfortunately, black locust is extremely invasive and has nasty thorns, and is a real problem in farm fields and pastures.  It will be blooming everywhere in Wisconsin at this time, and in some locations the woods and fencerows will be white with its sweetly fragrant blooms.
   Like the rose, its beauty comes with the price tag of its thorns.