Photos shot for the August | September issue
Find your wild spirit
Writing about our passions is a touchstone for this publication. After all, the best storytelling is accomplished by those that care about their subject.
Knock on Wood
No other bird is made to survive in trees quite like a woodpecker.
One warm spring day, decades ago, a movement caught my eye, and I quickly ducked behind a tree on our family property deep in the East Texas woods. Not 25 yards away landed a giant woodpecker — at a round hollow carved into the side of a massive black willow trunk.
The bird and its mate were excavating in a cavity. The male immediately lowered its head, dropped its entire body into the cavity and, except for the tip of its tail, disappeared momentarily, only to emerge with a bill full of wood chips. Then, like a wet dog shaking off water, the woodpecker shook its head and sent those pieces of wood raining ot the ground.
A Splash of Teal
Me, pressing a shotgun into my shoulder and taking aim at a flock of ducks flapping past?
You'd just as likely find me base-jumping off a skyscraper.
Or so I thought.
Rolling Thunder
High school mountain bikers vie for glory in Texas' unpredictable weather.
Ryan Eaker eys the dark line of clouds as an icy wind announces the approaching cold front.
"We'd better step on it," he warns the line of a half-dozen boys behind him on mountain bikes, and they push off with urgency.
Then the storm hits.
Keep Texas Wild
It's not just for kids. If you like nature-related topics in an easy-to-read format, you can find three years of our popular Keep Texas Wild issues and the teacher resources to go along with them.
