Decades ago, when I was a much younger man, I was a serious waterfowl hunter.
Large, handsome, fast-flying birds, canvasbacks were not exactly numerous during those years, but they were plentiful enough to be considered fair game. No matter how hard we hunted, however, we never bagged a single one.
I retired from duck hunting and sold the boat decades ago, but in truth, I never totally lost the desire to bag a “bull can,” as hunters call the male (or drake) canvasback. Recently, I realized that I’m not getting any younger, and I decided that if I’m ever going to do it, I should probably do it soon. And I knew exactly where to begin my “hunt.”
On a beautiful spring morning a few years ago, Randy Evans, director of Three Valley Conservation Trust in Oxford, was walking through a wooded area with the owner of the property, admiring the stunning array of wildflowers in bloom.
Evans thought of all the Little Free Libraries that were springing up at the time, offering books for anyone to take, and thought that maybe a similar program might encourage more people to plant wildflowers. It was a project, he figured, that would fit right in with 3VCT’s mission.
Three Valley Conservation Trust is a nonprofit group that promotes conservation measures in Butler, Preble, and Montgomery Counties. Its 250 members mainly work to secure land conservation easements and raise awareness of the importance of protecting natural habitats and resources.
When severe winter weather recently swept across Ohio and much of the eastern United States, it put significant strain on the electric grid. As temperatures dropped, electricity demand surged and fuel systems tightened. It was a challenging period that once again showed what truly matters during extreme cold: a reliable, diverse power supply that performs under pressure.
With the exception of humans, likely no other species on earth can control its environment like the beaver. They do so, of course, by building dams — creating habitat not only for themselves but for other wetland wildlife species as well.
The rodents are so large (weighing up to 60 pounds) and unrelentingly industrious (“busy as a beaver,” of course), sometimes it may seem their secret motto is “Dam the Humans!”
Until recently, the main solution to beaver issues has been to do away with the beaver; eliminate the beaver and you eliminate the problem, or so goes the theory. But that kind of thinking is slowly beginning to change. Many rural landowners enjoy having beavers on their property, along with other wildlife their ponds attract — as long as the beavers and their dams can be kept under control.
The name of John Solomon Rarey is known to most folks in the small Franklin County town of Groveport; there’s a statue of him at the community’s recreation center, after all, and his brother William was one of the original founders of the village (which at the time was called Rarey’s Port).
Rarey cemented his international reputation as one of the greatest horse trainers the world has ever known when he won a bet with England’s Earl of Dorchester in 1852. The earl, it so happened, owned a horse named Cruiser, reported to be the fastest in England. But Cruiser also was vicious — a living fury who kicked two grooms to death, and who, as if in a rage, snapped an inch-thick iron bar with his teeth as numerous witnesses watched. He was considered too dangerous to race.
As electric cooperatives, our main job obviously is to keep the lights on. We’re also dedicated to keeping our members informed about things like reliable service, affordable rates, and important rules that affect our business. We often talk about the benefits of being self-regulated, even though there are plenty of laws and regulations that also apply to us as we perform those important functions.
Like many Kelleys Island residents, Charles and Cindy Herndon spent their childhood summers in the bucolic setting on western Lake Erie before returning decades later to live there. But they didn’t just come back to fade away into retirement.
“The lake is a provider for paintings using propagation, waves, the stones it brings to shore, its movement, repetition, and variety,” he says. “The natural world is important to my soul and its creative juices.”
Before he painted, Charles mostly sculpted, and the garden portion of the campus is home to about 150 pieces ranging from smaller works to massive creations 7 or 8 feet tall. Some are wood, steel, or bronze; others are pieces of glacial erratic (granite) and limestone, many quarried from the island.
Each visit to Passion Works Studio is a visit to joy. It’s part art studio, part gift shop, and part community gathering place — and it bursts with creativity and whimsy. There are bold lines and vibrant color combinations everywhere. Each visit brings a new discovery.
What the Athens studio is best known for — its signature pieces — are the Passion Flowers, which festoon the walls and hang from the ceiling.
The flowers, made from recycled metal newspaper printing plates, have put the town’s creative spirit on the map. Stop in numerous Athens businesses and you’re likely to find them. They also decorate several downtown outdoor spots.
“My dream is to be a roadside attraction,” says Patty Mitchell, Passion Works founder and executive director.
At about 4:30 a.m. one frigid Monday this past December, a signal went out from Columbus that temporarily switched off electric water heaters, furnaces, heat pumps, and geothermal systems in tens of thousands of electric cooperative members’ homes around the state.
Buckeye Power, the generation and transmission cooperative that provides the electricity Ohio’s co-ops distribute to their members, can reduce costs and ease strain on the grid by cycling those appliances off and on for short periods of time when the demand for power is at its highest. More than 100,000 co-op members in Ohio volunteer to participate in the program.
