700,000 years ago

Okay, let's imagine that unfortunately a doomsday catastrophe, the blowing up of the super volcano (caldera) in Yellowstone National Park, which blew approx. 700,000 years ago, has happened again and all easy access food from the local supermarket comes screeching to a sudden unimaginable halt! What would you do?

Would you give up? Would you say to yourself, "I don't know what to do?" Fortunately, we have many natural resources available to us.(unless, they're under a foot of ash)

In the last post, I told you about the cattail, which can be found throughout the United States, usually in ditches, marshes, swamps, shallow water, lakes and ponds.



Do you realize that the cattail can be eaten? The Indians knew this and historians have told us they usually would set up camp around a waterway which was abundant with the cattail. The cattails are 46 percent starch and 11 percent sugar. This is why the Native Americans ate parts of the plant every day. The roots of the plant are the most nutritious part.

The root...



...is covered by a sponge like layer that needs to be peeled off; this is easy to do with the fingers. The roots can then be eaten raw or boiled. After boiling for 30 minutes,



they taste much like potatoes, as I am told. The roots can also be sliced thin and dried for future cooking or ground into a white flour. The pollen of the sausage like head of the cattail is full of protein and may be eaten raw in a survival situation!

Let's hope this information is never needed!

(By the way, every 700,000 years the supercaldera has blown and it's about due...the clock is ticking.)



I'll give the person who can name where this clock stands a present..be the first individual to name it!

Bog?

Hopefully, a place where Hunter and Dancer will eventually play around and venture into the wilderness with adult supervision is the bog. A bog is a wetland that has no FLOWING water running to it. Through rainfall, and runoff, the place continues to have a shallow depth of water year round. At times it's depth is up to 4 feet deep, depending upon how much precipitation has fallen!



We have a bog that has its own ecosystem. The bog has many different plants growing in and around it. One being the cattail, along with other various plants and grasses.



This grass grows near the water as well...



The bog allows ducks, geese, and other wildlife have a constant water source to drink from and live on or around. My dad loves to hunt ducks and geese from his duck blind.





It's a mosquito haven in the summertime, but the benefits of having a constant water source is a great natural resource for all kinds of wildlife. If you sat quietly and motionless by the bog for a couple of hours you'd see an amazing amount of flora and fauna...diversity at its best!