purpleturtles

"The strange. The bizarre. The unexpected."

Hello! And greetings from northwest Arkansas!

I live in a heavily forested, hilly area of the central U.S. called the Ozarks. The area is composed of heavily eroded limestone, and we have lots of springs, rivers, and caves here. My girlfriend Brenda and I live on a hill overlooking Beaver Lake; a large reservoir built in 1963 that has around 780 km of shoreline. We live in a small housing community about 16 km east of Rogers, Arkansas, with our dog Soshia and our cat Katie.

The weather here is often miserable in the summer due to the heat and high humidity. Winters are mild with 3 or 4 snow events per year, though the snow usually melts away in a day or two. Ice storms sometimes occur and can cause hazardous traveling conditions for several days. Temperatures in the summer rarely get above 38 C, or below -10 C in the winter. We get about 120 cm of precipitation per year, mostly in heavy rain events or thunderstorms. Storms can be common here in the spring and early summer. Every year there is at least one tornado within 30 km of our house.

The hills and soil are very rocky and support many varieties of trees. Common are several species of oaks, hickories, pines, cedar, walnut, sycamore, maple, dogwood, redbud, and sassafras. And where there aren’t trees, there are uncountable varieties of bushes, shrubs, weeds, briars and brush. Poison ivy and blackberry thorn bushes are very common. The place is infested with woody growing things.

All these woods support a large variety of critters, varmints, and birds. Common fauna include deer, skunks, squirrels, opossums, chipmunks, fox, coyote, box turtles, tree frogs, armadillos, raccoons, beaver, groundhogs, bobcats, moles, and rabbits. Flying things include turkey, bald eagles, vultures, chickadee, cardinals, blue jays, titmice, sparrows, robin, crow, scissortail, herons, hummingbirds, and lots of bats. The less pleasant critters include many kinds of bugs, spiders, ticks, chiggers, and snakes – several of them being poisonous.

Some of the more interesting things you can find here are fireflies (bugs that flash light at night), lots of fossils, and a blue tailed lizard whose tail will break off and wiggle when grabbed while the rest of the lizard escapes.

This area has been settled by a mix of western and northern European people for only around 150 years. Before that, the indigenous people (or Native Americans) made this their home for around 10000 years. Before that, there were no humans here at all.

It would be an honor to receive a postcard from you. Thank you, and may your life be filled with happiness.