Passport to Texas

A dad and his son jetty fishing at sunrise.

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This is Passport to Texas

My father was not what you’d call an outdoorsy guy, but I do have some outdoor memories of him.

I remember Dad took us kids to the nearby forest preserve and taught us how to ride bikes. We had room to wobble and wipe out on the trails until we became proficient thanks to his encouragement. And once we could stay upright, he’d find a shady place to sit; he wore a big smile as he watched us zip around with abandon.

Or in summer when my mom had to work late, dad would have us kids pack up some food while he put a couple of bikes in the back of the station wagon. He’d take us to our local state park for an evening picnic that always ended with us chasing lightening bugs at dusk.

These are small moments with my father that I cherish. My dad’s gone now, but if yours is still with you, perhaps this Father’s Day—June 17—you can share the magic of the outdoors with him.

Take your dad to a Texas state park for a picnic, or a day of biking, hiking or paddling. Maybe you can do an overnight campout, or just hang out on the bank of a lake with a line in the water, and enjoy one another’s company. If you are a dad—spend time with the kiddos outside.

The great Texas outdoors and father’s day equal sweet memories.

That’s our show…. brought to you in part by Ram trucks: built to serve.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Matt Morris will not be tamed. Image: www.tpwf.org

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This is Passport to Texas

Matt Morris grew up in the Chihuahuan Desert, exploring the Franklin Mountains.

I’ve been exploring the mountains since I was a child. It was just always a very calming experience for me.

Matt is standing up for the wild places of Texas; sharing his story through Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation’s We Will Not Be Tamed Campaign. He says he found healing in nature.

At 25 years old, I was diagnosed with inflammatory bowel disease; I wasn’t able to keep any food in my system. Medication wasn’t really helping out. And around that time that I was diagnosed, the surgeons were recommending that I remove those infected portions of my intestines. And I refused to get the surgery. A friend of mine got me into the mountains, and we started doing some running. All of a sudden I started noticing the more I pushed myself, the next few days I was feeling a little bit better. And so I started putting two and two together, and just started really pushing my body. The more I was pushing my body, the better I was feeling. Because it’s an autoimmune disease I felt like maybe I’m at this point where I’m suppressing the immune system to a point where my body’s saying, like, okay, we’re actually getting some time to calm down a little bit and to heal. And then I jumped into yoga. And the yoga was what really catapulted me to almost feeling 100%. Today I am off all my medications; I recently had a colonoscopy and there was no sign of the disease. So, it’s a possibility to heal yourself taking a natural approach to life.

Find more stories of outdoorsmen and women standing up for Texas wild places at tpwf.org.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife, I’m Cecilia Nasti

The calm before the storm?

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This is Passport to Texas

This Saturday, June 9th, the 56th Annual Texas Water Safari gets underway. Known as the World’s Toughest Canoe Race, individuals and teams of paddlers endure the grueling non-stop, 262 mile trip from San Marcos to Seadrift.

Read a nail-biting account of the trek written by adventurer, Russell Roe, for the June issue of Texas Parks and Wildlife magazine. It’s another installment of the magazine’s year of Epic Texas Adventures.

Roe captures the spirit of the event as he follows novices and seasoned veterans alike, as they wipe out at rapids and lose all their gear, negotiate log jams, suffer blazing heat, oppressive humidity, the indignity of biting insects.

These intrepid souls paddle on, despite the dark of night, losing their way, and the weight of exhaustion that descends on them all. Paddlers have a 100 hour time frame to reach their destination.

What’s even more remarkable is there’s no big cash prize at the end of the race. Just memories and bragging rights. Talk about an epic adventure.

Read this thrilling story called Epic Texas Challenge — Texas Water Safari by Russell Roe in the June issue of Texas Parks and Wildlife magazine. On Newsstands now.

That’s our show…. brought to you in part by Ram trucks: built to serve.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

There’s plenty of wildlife and plant life in cities and the City Nature Challenge proved it.

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This is Passport to Texas

More than two thousand Texans uploaded tens of thousands of observations of plants and animals to iNaturalist.org during the annual worldwide City Nature

Challenge in April. Texas made a good showing in two of the three categories.

Number two in number of observations was Dallas Fort Worth they came in just behind San Francisco. And then for number of species Houston came in second, also behind San Francisco.

San Francisco also came out on top for number of participants. Marsha May, a Texas Nature Tracker biologist with Texas Parks and Wildlife, coordinated the Austin region.

There was one woman from Austin who amazed me. She pretty much covered the whole area: from far west Blanco County to far east Bastrop Country. She went to all these state parks. She was just constantly out there. She had a microscope that she had out in the field so she could get these entire little organisms. Unbelievable!

Overall, 17,000 people worldwide competed; they recorded more than 441-thousand observations—nearly three and a half times the observations recorded last year.

The data can be brought to the city councils in cities to say: Look at the diversity of species in our area, and the people involved. A lot of people say that there‘s no nature in cities.

But the City Nature Challenge tosses that assumption on its ear. Find more results from this year’s challenge at citynaturechallenge.org.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife, I’m Cecilia Nasti

The kind of bird species seen in the Lower Rio Grande Valley during the City Nature Challenge.

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This is Passport to Texas

During the last four days of April, nearly 70 cities on six continents participated in a friendly competition called the City Nature Challenge.

[It’s about] who has the most wildlife diversity—including plants—within
their community.

Marsha May, a Texas Nature Tracker biologist with Texas Parks and Wildlife, says seven cities in Texas took part. Using the iNaturalist app, participants uploaded photos and audio of species they saw, competing in three categories: observations, species found and participants.

San Francisco came in first [in all three categories], and last was  Antarctica.

In Antarctica, three observers documented 27 species for 36 total observations.

I think it was amazing that they were involved, because the species diversity in Antarctica is not really large. But it is wonderful that they were involved.

Meanwhile, San Francisco documented 42-thousand total observations, followed by second-place DFW with 34-thousand. In species found, about a hundred species stood between second-place Houston and first-place San Francisco. Regarding participants, SF had more than 1500, whereas no city in Texas cracked the top five.

Tomorrow: more about Texas and the City Nature Challenge results

Our show receives support in part from Ram Trucks: Built to Serve.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife, I’m Cecilia Nasti