the common milkweed: Traditions

Saturday, December 20, 2025

Traditions

Well friends, hi! It's that time of year again where I write and I can hardly believe it...it's a strange life we live if you think about it too much, isn't it?

That's when I find joy in showing up on a wildlife cam like this. United with another human. Sharing love. Sharing time outdoors.

In the same spot, but at a different time, this buck found the staghorn sumac and made his presence known with significant scent marks.

Others came to read the message.

We smelled them too, but we don't communicate the same way and cannot understand what he said. We know part of it is to mark territory or alert others of his presence, but might their be more?

Before the land became covered in white we savored a mild end of fall. Frogs found our lamp lit windows and dined on moths attracted to the brightness.

We explored with friends and found incredible caterpillars.

Checkered-fringe Prominent:

Spiny Oak Slug:

Oval-leaved Ladies' Tresses made herself known at Persimmon South:

Our traditions are minimal or so I believed until I thought through our days, our weeks, our months. Some folks could definitely pass off our activities as habits, but given that we are repeating human patterns, we will call them traditions.

Musclewood seeds (good cardinal food we learned this year):

As I thought through this year, not in a nostalgic way, but in a practical, logging type of way, I realized our traditions are mostly defined by plants and by sunlight and all who depend on them. Shortening daylight correlates with seed gathering and dormant planting so that is what we did.

Persimmon Pilgrimaging is a bonafide annual tradition and the 2025 late fall exploration took us on the road headed southwest from Ohio towards Missouri for multiple quests.

Hunting swamp chestnut oaks for a friend was first on the agenda. Little bits of information and plant discovery (or not) is exciting! The thrill of the chase is real!

Though we didn't find the trees where he wanted us to look, we did find a monster at Big Oak Tree State Park in Missouri.

As we look for plants we don't know as well, we learn to look for certain clues. Like the way Quercus michauxii has distinctive flared scales on the acorn cap.

Our second quest was the FOREST grown, not open grown, state champion American persimmon tree in MO. The height was draw dropping and the fruit SO VERY delicious. This tree is in decline, but there are sprouts coming up everywhere around the mama that are getting mowed; we think it's time to let them grow.

Magnificent!

We also found many wild grown American persimmon trees in Tennessee and Missouri and as wild trees do, they exhibited so much interesting variability.

The bark is always a give away. Chunky, dark, blocks. This boy scrounged around the ground like a mad man after gold. Definitely a man after my heart!

With the abundance of acorns and American persimmons, we decided to try a new tradition I read about long ago: persimmon ash cakes. How to do it, I couldn't remember fully, but I remembered enough so we gave it ago. We mashed persimmons and chopped white oak acorns as best we could with a tiny knife:

formed patties and put them in the ashes first:

then moved them to the coals and let them roast. Our first attempt ended up burnt, but you can bet we will try again next year with a little more knowledge than this year.

We are grateful for the traditions in our lives, for noticing what happens daily in the nonhuman world, for always witnessing this is a shared planet, not just with other Homo sapiens, but with the estimated 8.7 million other species on Earth. The very end of November brought us into contact with:

Jumping Bush Cricket (male) on our porch:

Orange-banded Checkered Beetle on the Kamelands Trail in the Highlands Nature Sanctuary:

Red Flat Bark Beetle on the Jungle Brook Trail at Malabar State Park:

Wheel Bug on the north side of our garage:

Wheel Bug laid to rest in the leaves...

The last of the big migratory flocks of turkey vultures:

And before the wild December snows of Morrow County, Ohio...into the presence of beautiful autumnal forest.

As the snow fell and blanketed the Earth, we said so long to our insect friends and to easy tread on trail and embraced the next season of 2025. What else can we do, but be here now?

Alvin said ok:

Luke said no way:

Minnie Pearl said I don't care:

Happy (almost) Winter Solstice! What a joy to say! I do believe this is our most favorite day of the year - we made it to the darkest day and we are only brighter from here. Bring back the light! Take care friends. Please let us know your traditions.