Entries by editor

Pitcher Plant

The lovely pitcher plant (Sarracemia purpurea) lives in the extreme acid conditions found in our local peat bogs and fens. A nearly spherical flower with showy pinkish-purple sepals is borne at the end of a scape (leafless stem) that can reach two feet. Unusual leaves, springing from the base of the plant, form tubular “pitchers” that fill with rainwater. The pitcher leaves have a flared lip that serves as a landing strip for insects. Inside the rim, downward pointing fine hairs and a numbing secretion cause the bugs to fall into the water, where they are digested by a whole ecosystem of organisms living in the “pool”. When an older leaf is sliced open, a collection of insect parts can be seen at the narrow base of the leaf. The pitcher plant is a carnivore like the Venus flytrap, supplementing its diet with insects to compensate for the nutrient poor environment of a bog.

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Claudia Schmidt, Dean Magraw perform in Empire

On Tuesday, July 16, at 7:30 p.m. the Beach Bards will present a House Concert performed by Claudia Schmidt and Dean Magraw at the Happy Place Lodge (Gerry and Charol Shiffman’s home) at 10120 W Phillips St in the Village of Empire.

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Grand Rapids Jazz Orchestra croons in the Dunes

The 15th annual Dune Climb concert will take place Sunday, July 14 at 7 p.m. Imagine a beautiful summer’s evening at the foot of the Dune Climb in the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, hundreds of families enjoying their pre-concert picnics and then a musical program provided by artists of national stature: this is the magical mixture which has filled audiences with warm memories every year since the first Dune Climb concert in 1998.

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Glen Lake Library holds July 25 home tour

The Friends of the Glen Lake Community Library host their biannual Home Tour on Thursday, July 25, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. As one of the Friends’ primary fundraisers, the event showcases five distinctive Glen Lake area homes.

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Protesting oil pipeline across Mackinac Straits

On Sunday, July 14, a group of state and national environmental organizations intend to bring the two lines out of the depths at a noon rally in St. Ignace, Michigan. The goal of “The Oil & Water Don’t Mix Rally”, say organizers, is twofold. The first is to define the potential risks of a leak or rupture to the Great Lakes, the largest body of clean surface freshwater in North America. The second, more ambitious, is to clarify the role that Enbridge and its customers are playing in expanding the transport and processing of a gusher of oil and natural gas under development on the American and Canadian Great Plains, and from the tar sands of Alberta, Canada.

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Jane Fortune, portrait of a philanthropist

Best known locally as the co-owner with Bob Hesse of Leelanau County’s new Bella Fortuna Restaurant in the center of Lake Leelanau, Jane Fortune, a long-time Leland summer resident, has been working quietly for years to rescue the works of female artists languishing in storage in the more than 40 museums in Florence.

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Biking for Kelly Boyce Hurlburt

On the first leg of his ToTheRockTour across the Upper Midwest and through two Canadian provinces, adventure cyclist Brian Perich arrived in northern Michigan to find the community mourning the death of a local cyclist whose life was taken in a horrific hit-and-run collision in the wee hours of July 5 in Traverse City.

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Glen Arbor Art Association hosts Driehorst, Tule

The Glen Arbor Art Association (GAAA) will exhibit paintings by Peggy Driehorst of Carmel, Indiana, July 12-14 at the Art Association, 6031 S. Lake St., Glen Arbor. Driehorst earned a BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art with training as an enamalist. She began painting murals and furniture professionally, and then decided to get back into fine arts. Driehorst is enamored with color and texture and paints abstract and traditional landscapes. Her show will include recent paintings of Leelanau County. Check out her work during these hours: Friday 6-9 p.m.; Saturday 10 a.m.-5 p.m.; Sunday 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

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Chickadees in Newtown

Just days after the Dec. 14, 2012, mass-shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, Leelanau County author Bill Smith wrote to the Cyrenius H. Booth Library in Newtown, Conn., and offered to send copies of his children’s book, Chickadees at Night. Like the hundreds of thousands around the world who sent prayers and gifts to the devastated community, he wanted to help the town heal.

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Center Gallery hosts oil painters Lombardo, Burian

Ohio artist Joseph Lombardo will exhibit his study of “Patterns,” plein air and studio paintings of Leelanau County, July 12-18, at Center Gallery at Lake Street Studios, 6023 S. Lake St. in Glen Arbor. The show opens with a public reception July 12 at 6 p.m.

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