Terri Waters Gallery Blog
Momma Bears and Cubs of the Smokies
In the Smoky Mountains, bears are most active during the early morning and late evening hours of Spring and Summer. In the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, black bears inhabit all elevations. Biologists estimate that approximately 1,900 bears live in the park. Black bears in the Smokies are black in color, but in other areas of the country, they may be brown or cinnamon. They may be six feet long and up to three feet high at the shoulder. In the Summer months, an adult male black bear can weigh approximately 250 pounds, with adult females weighing slightly over 100 pounds.
Mountain Scents - The Holly and The Ivy
The images and symbols in the English carol "The Holly and The Ivy" are older than Christmas itself and have been expressed in countless ways. In the southern mountains, two hollies are worthy of mention, both famous for their roles in celebrations. The evergreen holly (Ilex opaca), so-called for obvious reasons although not unique in this regard, has its bright red berries hanging in clusters on stems perhaps an inch or so long. The terminal growth of twigs with berries are used throughout its range (New England to Florida, west to Oklahoma) as Christmas decorations - in wreaths, on mantles, hanging from door knockers, in centerpieces for the dinner table, to cover the base of the Christmas tree -- not only for their beauty, but because the fresh quality will last for some weeks without water.
Smokies Wildlife - Owls: Creatures of the Night
Painting - "Barred Owl" - Terri Waters
The last rays of sunlight filter softly across the mountains, colors of rose and burnished gold agai...
Reaching Out... Touching Life... Autumn
There is no darkness quite like the darkness of the mountains. In the autumn daytime, the Smokies are alive with the brightness of reds and golds and oranges and mixtures of colors in-between. And then there is night.
Pioneer Lifeways - Antique Scents
Potpourri should be pretty to the eye as well as the nose, so the maker ought to choose the most colorful of flower petals. For a wild potpourri, consider wild roses, sweet purple clover blooms, Queen Anne's lace, butterfly weed, and iron weed. Tame roses can be used as well.
Smokies Wildlife - Monarch On The Wings
Watch the autumn skies for a faraway hint of orange wings, as the last of the migrating monarch make their mystic journey southward, passing through the Smoky Mountains.
Listen to the Mountains ...
As the story goes, a certain man once stretched wires tautly between two trees, hoping to hear harp-like music when the wind blew. But he was disappointed. The timbre of the sound was less than beautiful as the gentle breezes caused the strands to vibrate. One day, however, a gigantic storm came raging in and the tumultuous wind whipped the wires furiously. Suddenly, an magnificent melody sprang from the dancing wires.
Smokies Wildlife - White-Tailed Deer
Shyly they wait among the shadows of the trees, chewing patiently on leaves and tender young buds as they watch with silent eyes. The cars come, long lines curving through the Cades Cove valley, and the deer bound away, swift runners across the wide fields.
Early Logging Days
"Nobody does manual labor like we used to do. Not in this day and time. W. B. Townsend, McCormick, and a couple of others (they were all log...
Happy Trails
Leaving Cherokee Orchard, we entered a shadowy wooded area known as Roaring Fork. At once we noticed a fall in the temperature, though we continued to stick our heads out the windows to look for wildflowers, particularly the leather leaves of trailing arbutus (which I never managed to see). We stopped for lunch beside a rocky stream, eating our sandwiches as we looked through woodlands that were carpeted with partridge berry and trillium, a few wake robins as well. Our necks craned, as we gazed upward at the pines, giants that dwarfed the rest of the forest. How long they had grown there was something we could not know, without unnecessary speculation, however, we again took up our journey on the narrow road.
Reaching Out... Touching Life... Springtime
It was springtime and the little girl was glad to hear the school bell ring. After all, when you are six years old and live in the Great Smoky Mountains, springtime is more fun outside than it is inside.
As she walked home from school, however, she thought about a word her teacher had used a few minutes earlier as she read a story to her students. The word was "courage" and it sounded like such a good word the way the teacher had used it.
Mountain Scents
Painting - "Morning Light at Greenbrier" - Terri Waters
As the Smokies enter into spring, woodlands no longer shiver under winter's dark ...
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