On the evening of 6 April 2006 Jingjing Zhang, Jenna Lee, Jonathan Lu, Jeff Sun, Valerie Marten, John C. Mcginley, er, Jon Avaols, Rosario Perez la Mesa (aka Ro), and Barry Sullender visited Brazos Bend State Park (Google Earth required to see location) to take a peek at the herpafauna there. Snakes were kind of sparse but we did manage to see most of the frogs that were actively calling. As usual for the park at night, there were more raccoons, deer, and armadillo than you'd care to count. Earlier in the evening while the two Jons and Ro went off in search of flattened fauna, the rest of us took a little hike down the Red Buckeye trail. There we managed to inadvertantly spook a roosting group of turkey and black vultures. Nothing quite like the sound of all those deep wing beats in the impending darkness.

As the evening drew to a close marshmallows were roasted and abused in various sorts of ways. Afterwards some folks retired to their tents while others crawled into that higher form of sleeping accomodation, the Hennessy Hammock. That following morning all claimed that things visited the campground as they slept while some reported an ungodly sound deep in the night -- such is the way of the woods.

On 2 April 2006 Jonathan Lu, Jingjing Zhang, Jeff Sun, Jenna Lee, and Barry Sullender went to Brazos Bend State Park (Google Earth required to see location) ostensibly to check out the lichen flora. Like a lot of people at the park that day, we got sidetracked watching alligators devour one of their own.

Other notables seen that day... "sweet, sweet, sweet" Prothonotary Warbler, American Bittern, and plant favorites the Swamp Privet and the anachronistic Honey Locust.