I'm Still Here

For the past couple years, I've been building a house, and this has taken up much of my time and energy. Perhaps I will share more photos of the house, someday. Its theme is 'Outside In and Inside Out", which reflects an effort to merge the design of the inside of the house with the outside natural environment.  I've done a lot with wood and rock, and using free or found materials. If I were to give a name to the house, I would call it Windfall, since the monies for the land and the house were given to us.  I still think about story lines, and every so often I will work a little on Clouds Fall to Earth.  Right now I'm wondering if I should write an article to submit to the Dark Mountain Project, the UK group that published my story, “The Tragedy of Bernie the Homeless.”  The article would be on Sound, and explore Dark Mountain's theme of Confluence. To give you a hint of what the article might be about, I'll share a small but amazing occurrence that happened twice recently.  So, I am working on the house, which happens to be in a semi rural and heavily forested area, and happens often to be under the flight path of airliners flying in and out of the Asheville Regional Airport 20 miles or so south. For me, the sound of these machines, even those that are miles above, is pollution. Unwanted sound that steals from the natural sounds of wind in leaves, rainfall, birds and insects.  An airliner passes fairly low overhead, a plane whose engine produces certain frequencies, kind of a mixed whining and whistling.  And then a choir of coyotes not far up the mountainside joins in with a passionate, sorrowful and multi-voiced descant; both high and low parts merging into a confluence of human genius and technology and the hot blood and passion of a pack of wild creatures.  For now I leave you with a photo of a female monarch butterfly that was feeding on my potted milkweed.

The Southward Migration Has Reached Us

The early front of the southward monarch butterfly migration has now reached our area of the Blue Ridge Parkway, which is more or less south of Asheville, North Carolina.  This past weekend, I stopped at various places listed in my guide and saw anywhere from 2 to a dozen monarchs feeding on goldenrod, aster, and one on Joe Pye Weed. On the previous weekend I stopped at the Mills River Gap Overlook and met some of the hawk watchers.  They said they expected a peak of Broad Wing Hawks in four days or so, and sure enough, just five days later, as reported at HawkCount.org for the station called Mount Pisgah, they counted 5,781 on Friday, September 20. I drove up on the following Saturday and saw large “kettles” and the birds streaming from it for the first time in my life.  It was spectacular.  You’ve missed main flow of Broad Wings for this year, but maybe you can catch it next year.

 Another migratory creature I observed in large number for the first time was the dragonfly.  Nobody was counting them, but they easily showed in our binoculars.  I guess there were hundreds in the air at any one time, all zooming south over the ridge.  I need to do some reading on them.

I double-checked my book, and the peak day for the monarch migration over the southern Blue Ridge Parkway last year was October 13th.  One observer told me personally she estimated as many as 3,600 butterflies per hour passing overhead at Haywood Gap, which is just parkway north of the Caney Fork Overlook.  I will do my best to witness that spectacle this year.  It has to be incredible. I hope to catch some video. 

Haywood Gap features a Mountains to the Sea Trail crossing and a little parking area in gravel.  The best viewpoint for the monarchs is from the guard rail across from the parking area.  A long band of aster and goldenrod grows just there along the road.

A bit of good news for viewing:  The National Park Service has cleared quite a few trees on both sides of the road just downhill from Cherry Gap Overlook.  They seemed to have done a good job of balancing both opening views and leaving many of the beautiful trees, the oaks and hemlocks.  I think this will make monarch viewing better.  It also will allow for the fall nectar plants to have more sunlight.

My monarch migration guide is available for sale in several locations along the southern Parkway, including the Craggy Gardens Visitor Center, the Folk Art Center, the Blue Ridge Parkway Visitor Center, the Pisgah Inn Gift Shop, and the Pisgah Inn Country Store.  I have updated it for this fall.

About the photographs:  I take a lot of photos of monarchs, so many it’s hard to sort through them and pick out the best.  The ones I select for publication are often either just the most beautiful or instructive I can produce, or else they show some different perspective or detail.  For instance, the first one is both backlit by sunshine and frontlit by my flash.  The second photo shows the male gland (near the end of the abdomen) to be a slit or narrow oval, rather than the usual black dot. I just like the color of the third one, which is from 2018.

A Big Migration Day on the Parkway

Click to Enlarge

There was a solid stream of monarch butterflies passing over the Pounding Mill Overlook on the southern Blue Ridge Parkway last Sunday.  Here they're feeding on an aster plant at the edge of the overlook's steep bank.

Monarch Guide Update

Goldenrod and a solitary female in flight near the Pisgah Inn.  10/4/17

Update

October 4, 2017

The NC Arboretum’s annual Monarch Day is over for this year.  I had been invited to set up a table to sell books and talk with people.  Along with me was a National Park Service interpretive ranger.  I brought a flower arrangement I made with zinnias, goldenrod, and a American beech branch from which I hung three chrysalises to show.  I also brought a couple hundred almandine garnets I had collected locally to give away to children. (The garnets happened to be more popular than my book!)  The arboretum sold milkweed plants, some having live monarch larvae on them.  I thought that was great.  I didn’t mention it in the book, but the arboretum has had an ongoing live butterfly display for several months.  It’s called Winged Wonders and lasts through October 29.  Next year the Monarch Day is set for Saturday, September 8, but as the date nears, check the arboretum’s website to be sure it is still on, because there is some discussion about only holding the event every other year in the future.

The Cradle of Forestry’s monarch event also is past.  Next year check their schedule for the time and date.  I went this year and learned a lot from the speaker.

Observers reporting for Journey North’s Monarch Peak Migration Map say they’ve seen monarchs this fall at the following locations not given in my book. I’ll be including these southernmost Blue Ridge Parkway places in the 2018 edition.  To locate specific overlooks, zoom in and click the splash symbols on the BRP Road Closure Map.

The entrance road to Mt. Mitchell

Hornbuckle Valley OL

Woolyback OL

Scott Creek OL

Woodfin Valley OL

1 mile south of View Mt. Lyn Lowry

View Mt. Lyn Lowry

Roy Taylor Forest OL

Double Top Mountain OL, (mm 435, 100+ monarchs, 9/29)

Cradle of Forestry OL

One of the most interesting entries is this filed by “Keith.”

Date: 09/29/2017   Location: 35.33, -82.87

Number Sighted: 1000

Comments: Two miles north of the Blue Ridge Parkway, in Pisgah National Forest, 1:00-2:00 pm EDT, partly cloudy, 55°-60°, Monarchs feeding below Tennent Mountain on the Graveyard Ridge Trail between Ivestor Gap and the Mountain-to-Sea Trail.

Below is the report I filed at Journey North.  See all the Peak Migration Map reports and the accompanying photographs at: www.learner.org/jnorth/monarchs

Date: 10/1/2017

Number Sighted: 95

Comments: On Saturday, August 30, we drove between the Mills Gap Overlook and the Caney Fork Overlook on the Blue Ridge Parkway and didn’t see but two monarchs in five hours. On Sunday the following day we counted 95 in the two hours between 1:00 pm and 3:00 pm at the Cherry Cove View, milepost 415.7. Most didn’t stop to feed. Plenty more came over afterwards in that location until it got colder at about 6:00 pm. I drove up and down on the parkway, but didn’t see any monarchs at any other places and times. The weather was mostly clear to partly cloudy. A light breeze drifted from the north. The temperature midday was about 70 degrees F. Cherry Gap is where the National Park Service placed a monarch migration informational plaque. A dozen or more monarch watchers gathered there throughout the afternoon, including Jennifer who had lost a newborn son 20 years ago to the day. She had come to release a butterfly helium balloon at sunset in his memory, and she found support and fellowship in the company of other monarch lovers who she had just met. That morning a female monarch had eclosed at my home and I gave it to her to release.

                                                                                                        Mickey Hunt

The Monarch Butterfly Front Has Arrived!

There are no monarchs in this photo, which I took at 2:30 pm today, but at 11:00 am as I walked in the door here at Mr. K's Used Books, I saw three just gliding and flitting by maybe 15 feet off the ground right in front of the building.  In the next 25 minutes, as I stepped outside now and then waiting for my book deal appointment with the manager, I counted another dozen.  In total, just going about my business today, I counted 27 in four different locations, including when I was blowing leaves off the roof of our house. 

So far, in addition to Mr. K's,  the monarch book is for sale at:

The Botanical Gardens at Asheville
The Compleat Naturalist (in Biltmore Village.)
BB Barnes Nursery and Landscaping
Town Hardware in Black Mountain
The Cradle of Forestry (near Brevard)
The North Carolina Arboretum gift shop

Mountain Xpress Features My Photo

My cover photo was featured in the Mountain Xpress Community Calendar section, the paper edition, this week as part of an announcement of the arboretum's Monarch Day, which is this Saturday.

Cradle of Forestry

Here’s my book on display at the Cradle of Forestry’s gift shop yesterday. We attended their excellent “Bring Back the Monarchs” program, lead by Joyce Pearsall.  On the way to the event we stopped at the Mills River Valley Overlook and met Jerry and Liz Fishman who were bird watching there.  Later they e-mailed me an “unofficial” hawk watch count for the day: Broad-winged Hawks, 92 (70 streaming out of a single kettle), Falcon, 1 (not a positive ID but possible Merlin).  Turkey Vulture, 3.

After the monarch event we returned home via the parkway, but stopping on the way at mile 409-410 to hike to and climb the fire tower, where we met a 14 year-old young man on top.  He was there alone—some of his family members had dropped him off. He had been whistling a simple three-note tune through his hands sounding much like an ocarina. He said he had been born in Mexico. We enjoyed the cool breeze and fantastic views for a while, then we left the tower and the boy sitting on top of one of the other buildings on the ridge.  At the bottom of the trail his mother drove up and I gave her a copy of my book for him. We pulled out to leave and his sister approached to ask for my autograph, which he had requested by phone.  I told her about the monarchs overwintering in Mexico.  I was thinking the boy needed some encouragement, even if just a little book from a stranger, a book about something he might take an interest in.  (The fire tower hike is mentioned in the book.)  Or maybe he might find direction in life as a scientist or naturalist.    

Clouds Fall to Earth

Sunset from Craggy Gardens Visitor Center, BRP.  9/10/17

Chapter 1.
Hunting Day

Rho Aquilae encounters earthbound people for the first time. 

I began writing Clouds Fall to Earth in 2011 and worked on it off and on for two years, roughing out seven of the planned twelve chapters. I also created much of the world in some detail, including history, economics, technology, and culture. It actually connects with my short story "Shoreless Ocean of Eternity", which you can find in my when earth whispers collection. "Shoreless", then, is a prequel. Clouds Fall has been "on the shelf", untouched, since 2013, but always in the back of my mind.  This is chapter one.  It's not perfected yet, but I think it might be of interest.  I'd rather have something of the book out for people to read than for it to lay buried in my computer.  And this might motivate me to finally finish writing it and get it published.

Read the chapter HERE.

Published Today!

My monarch migration guide may be purchased at Create Space.

Or at Amazon.

(I make more money if you order from CS.)

Coming Soon!

From the back cover:

A favorite scenic road of the eastern United States, endless gorgeous views, and one of the most amazing migratory creatures in the world—all make for an ideal fall day outdoors.  This guide will help you make the most of your day, with tips of when and where to look, facts and photos of the monarch lifecycle, information on learning more, and practical ideas on how you can help the monarch butterfly population grow.  Plus, there’s a section on the best short hikes accessible from the parkway.

Mickey Hunt has been exploring along the southern Blue Ridge Parkway with his family for 30+ years.  He lives in east Asheville.

AVAILABLE NOW! Book: "When Earth Whispers & Other Mostly Speculative Tales"

click to enlarge

258 pages.  All my short stories in one collection.
Order at Amazon.
$14.00

NEWS!

I have just now posted all my short stories. Notice that the four Jonathan T. Barron paranormal fantasy stories are all here and listed in order on the right column of my main page. (They each won Honorable Mentions in a huge, international contest.)  Also, I've posted some links to my related videos on my YouTube channels.  Actually, the one channel UniversalDirt, is as about as intimate a profile of "the author" as it decently can be.

NEWS! "The Shoreless Ocean of Eternity" is Available

"Shoreless" (9962 words) transcribes one of the astonishing voyages of Captain Therreal mentioned in "Ships Passing in the Night".

From the published notes of "Ships Passing": [2] This is the same Therreal who commanded the starship UNS Chariot in the first intentional time-transcendence excursions based on the theories of Nobel Prize winning propulsionist, Dr. Pachero-Nanez, who discovered that as a vessel neared the speed of light, its mass decreased, enabling it to break the light barrier and escape the limitations of the material-energy-chronos universe.

Read "Shoreless" HERE.

NEWS: My story "The Tragedy of Bernie the Homeless" Comes Out Tomorrow in Dark Mountain, Issue 9.

This is my copy that just arrived in the mail today from the United Kingdom. The story works on several levels, environmental, social, and political. It might be more relevant than it first appears. Scroll down to the photo of the bear cubs for more information.

Denying the Signs

This 500 word story in the Harold Stumbo series was given an Honorable Mention in Rapid River Magazine's flash fiction contest. You may read it HERE. Check out my story "Homesick" that's featured a few inches below. I won't spoil the surprise.

Watch the 11 second video this image was lifted from HERE.

The Tragedy of Bernie the Homeless

     After his mother chased him away, Bernie enjoyed a simple life off the grid, but acorns, berries, and grubs grew boring and harder to find, and they didn’t always suit his digestion. Then winter struck and froze his butt. Also, he thought he’d eventually find company in the wild, but others who shared his freegan, opportunivore ways shunned him. Ran from him, in fact. Were afraid and thought him loony.

So, Bernie finally quit living in the forest...

"Bernie" [1000 words] was accepted for a April 15, 2016 publication by the Dark Mountain Protect, an international post-environmentalist/artistic network, in their bi-annual journal, in particular, Issue 9. Read a DMP description of the volume and find ordering information HERE.  You can read the story free HERE. UPDATE: 9/19/16: The story was published again, this time at the Rapid River Magazine.

The Greenlandic Windows

by Mickey Hunt

Jonathan T. Barron takes his new bride Isobel, a former police officer, and her toddler Scotty for a month long "honey and moon" at a mysterious stone house on the remote, frozen east coast of Greenland. The house, designed in trapezoids and possibly built before the first Europeans arrived, isn't the only mystery however, because the elderly caretaker's wife babbles on and on about space ships... in Greenlandic.  Fourth in the JTB short story series, "Greenlandic Windows" at about 11,000 words, received an Honorable Mention in a 2016 Writers of the Future Contest.  (Update 10/22/16: Read "GW" HERE.)

Board & Ivy

The photos tell a story of an abandoned house along the railroad tracks in Swannanoa, North Carolina.  I took them on 12/28/2014. Nothing in the rooms was touched, it's all as I found it. The photos appeared April 2015 in UNCA's creative arts magazine, Headwaters, pages 69 and 70. Click to enlarge.

Truth, War, & Story

NON-FICTION

by Mickey Hunt

A creative essay on the auto-biographical short story "How to Tell a Truth War Story" by Tim O'Brien. I recently wrote the essay for a literature class at the University of NC-Asheville.

READ HERE!  

Attack of the Gravid Amazons

A mid-30ish couple's marriage is on the rocks. He's an acoustical architect and she's an ob-gyn. About the only thing they have in common is a love of bug watching, so they are taking an entomological expedition to Indonesia to try to patch things up. Then Earth is invaded by pregnant green women. Among other inexplicable places around the planet, they attack in Singapore where the couple is staying for a few nights.

"Gravid Amazons" [8050 words] was revised in September 2016.  

Read HERE.

See my related Monarch Butterfly Photos from the Blue Ridge Parkway SW of Asheville NC, September 25, 2016.  Watch my 32 Second HD Video of them.