This section on natural communities honors our native plants and animals and the diverse and beautiful habitats in which they live. These are our wild natural sanctuaries, and I consider them to be sacred. Here you’ll find an article on Drawing the Natural Gardens of North Carolina, a project completed for the Certificate in Native Plant Studies from the NC Botanical Garden. There are sketches of diverse North Carolina habitats from my nature journals and selected illustrations of mountain, piedmont, and coastal plain ecological communities. I hope these drawings and occasional blog-posts about the plant and animal communities where I live will inspire you to savor the wild lands where you live and help to conserve them. Saving and restoring the natural communities of forests and wetlands will not only foster biodiversity, but will also sequester carbon in the soil and help to reduce climate change.
Animals may come to us in the wilderness of dreams and visions. A certain blue fish has appeared in so many of my dreams over the years that I have often cried in astonishment and surrender, recognizing a profound healing … Continued
“The closer you get to real matter, rock air fire and wood, boy, the more spiritual the world is.” -Jack Kerouac We admire the beauty of mountains and rocky outcrops and feel called to spiritual heights by their magnificence. Many … Continued
We are a small group of amateur naturalists committed to merging ecology and spirituality. For twelve winters we have traveled to the coast to witness the arrival of a hundred thousand tundra swans and snow geese to their wintering grounds … Continued
To complete the first year of Earth Sanctuaries, I’ll first summarize the year’s posts, each of which was about some important aspect of eco-psycho-spiritual community. Then I’ll describe a vision of deep belonging to the whole community of life, toward … Continued
One of the things I enjoy most in life is getting to know the native landscape in which we live, feeling rooted in a sense of Place. I love to experience the incredibly varied natural habitats of our state. … Continued
These illustrations are of native habitats that I consider to be not only beautiful, but sacred and to be treasured. The drawings are double page spreads reminiscent of a sketchbook. Green Swamp Savanna, Shaken Creek Savanna, and Roadside Wildflowers are … Continued
These double-page drawings are from a field sketchbook of North Carolina native habitats and natural communities in the coastal plain, piedmont, and mountain regions of the state. Each drawing shows characteristic details of each habitat on a particular day and … Continued
This is a report on Drawing the Natural Gardens of North Carolina combining art and ecology for the Certificate in Native Plant Studies. It contains descriptions of the habitats as well as how to visit them.