Paula Whyman
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paulawhyman.bsky.social
Paula Whyman
@paulawhyman.bsky.social
4.8K followers 770 following 790 posts
Author, BAD NATURALIST: One Woman's Ecological Education on a Wild Virginia Mountaintop, Jan 2025 from Timber Press/Hachette. Website: https://paulawhyman.com Newsletter: https://badnaturalistnewsletter.beehiiv.com/
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paulawhyman.bsky.social
My contribution to Secular Pie Thursday-- rustic classic apple pie. @duchessgoldblatt.bsky.social
Nubbly looking double crust pie seen from above. Uneven edges and surface with a W made out of dough in the middle.
November 27, 2025 at 2:18 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Books make great gifts! Maybe you know someone who'd enjoy Bad Naturalist, a tale of my attempts to bring native meadows back to a 200-acre mountaintop when I didn't know anything about plants, plus I'm a terrible gardener--but other than that it went great!
🌿 #books (thx @lollardfish.bsky.social!)
Bad Naturalist book cover floating on a gray background with colorful drawings of wrapped gifts around it. Text going up the left-hand outer edge of the book cover says "Doug Tallamy calls it "humorous and thoroughly engaging". The same gray background with colorful wrapped gifts, scattered around and black text in the center "As featured in…" followed by a list in red: the Washington Post, Garden and Gun, Margaret Roach's "a way to garden" podcast, the Joe Gardener show, the revelator. And then underneath that list in black: "plus is a finalist for the Reed Environmental Writing Award"
November 26, 2025 at 9:24 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
There is no Thanksgiving without the Tacky Turkey.
Turkey made from brown, black, and ivory yarn woven over a plastic turkey form. Like a craft from the 1970s and it probably is. On a table set with a burgundy tablecloth, white dishes and cloth napkins in background.
November 26, 2025 at 8:50 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
This yellow garden spider sits on my package box day and night like a sentry. I wonder how the UPS guy feels about it.
🌿
Spider with very long legs that are yellow and black and a body that is bright yellow with black markings including the legs it's probably 3 inches long. This is a close-up, but it's clinging to the side of a tan box for package deliveries.
November 24, 2025 at 2:11 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Just fixed up my late uncle's old banjo uke. Now I just have to figure out how to play it.
A hand and forearm holding a red banjo-shaped ukelele. Has a red neck and a red resonator on the back. In the background is a normal size acoustic guitar case.
November 8, 2025 at 8:41 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Joshua Tree in Joshua Tree NP
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A lovely Joshua tree, well shaped crown, healthy. Standing in a desert landscape with a mountain in the distance and a deep blue sky in the background.
November 6, 2025 at 4:44 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Happy Halloween, quoth the raven
Raven with its beak open appearing to look at its shadow, in an asphalt parking lot
November 1, 2025 at 1:57 AM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
A poodle face for you.
Silver standard poodle, close-up of shining eyes and long snout. She's looking plaintively at me as if there is something she wants.
October 24, 2025 at 12:07 AM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
No Kings rally in tiny Flint Hill, VA!
#nokings
In the foreground, a person dressed as a king and wearing a Trump mask is dancing and waving a plunger as a scepter. Behind them, the street is lined with people, holding signs and flags.
October 18, 2025 at 7:56 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
For the accused in the case of the missing eye shades, the evidence could not be more damning.
Gray eye shades next to elk antler and pink stuffy on dog bed monogrammed with the name "Cleopatra"
October 6, 2025 at 2:55 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Not exactly the eensy weensy spider. (I think it's a rabid wolf spider)
🌿
Large, very large spider. In greenery and mulch. Has a white stripe down its head and a black stripe with two light brown stripes down. It's thorax. Long light brown legs. It's about the size of my thumb.
August 10, 2025 at 9:00 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
"One weed to rule them all"
Pulling goose grass and found one that had grand ambitions
🌿
Shadow of a woman in a hat falls on a massive weed that has spread its tentacles across a 4ft wide stone stair
August 9, 2025 at 9:59 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Sphinx moth on the patio
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Large brown moth with visibly segmented body. Wings and head are the same color and texture. Wing shape sort of reminds me of maple tree helicopter seeds
August 7, 2025 at 1:27 AM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
This is how my dog looks when she's happy. In this photo, she's at the vet waiting for her shots, and she just had blood drawn. Have you ever seen a dog this happy to be at the vet?
Silver standard poodle wearing purple harness and purple collar. Looking directly a camera and smiling.
August 5, 2025 at 9:24 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Exciting development! A little hard to see in the photo, but the black widow is preying on a spotted lanternfly. I've been watching these spiders for a few weeks, and when the SLFs got caught in their webs they were being ignored. Not this time. 🌿
Close up of spotted lanternfly seen from above, caught in a web near a brick wall above a stone path, A black widow spider underneath it and grasping it, the red pattern on her belly, clearly visible.
August 4, 2025 at 1:45 AM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
"Outdoor cat"

(Bobcat walking up the driveway.)
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Bobcat ambling up gravel driveway in broad daylight. Tall vegetation and two wood fence posts in background, but no fence. Short vegetation in foreground.
July 30, 2025 at 11:59 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Can anyone help ID this beetle? In Virginia, northern Blue Ridge, Piedmont region.
🌿 #invert
Small beetle slightly larger than a ladybug. Black legs, black and white strips around edges of shell with black in the center and two yellow triangles above. Black head with some orange on either side/underneath.
July 26, 2025 at 9:00 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
These barrels are full of seeds collected from native plants on the 2400-acre Shaw Nature Reserve in St. Louis. They collect 285 species, over 1100 lbs of seed, and sow them in the meadows as part of a massive ongoing ecological restoration.
🌿
17 brown barrel-like container sit on a concrete floor and an upper shelf that runs the length of one wall. There are black hoses emerging from the walls above the barrels and disappearing inside the barrels (part of the approach to keeping the seeds dry). Each barrel holds seed from a single plant, each with more than 9+ lbs of seed
July 25, 2025 at 4:39 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Prairie blazing star, Shaw Nature Reserve, St Louis
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Close-up of a cluster of purple blooms, lots of tiny flowers in a bunch on a longer stem surrounded by grasses
July 25, 2025 at 4:30 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
So much fun speaking at Missouri Botanical Gardens this week--and look at the cool art they made out of the Bad Naturalist book cover! Plus I got to see the beautiful gardens and the incredible ecological restoration work they're doing at Shaw Nature Reserve (pics coming soon). Highly recommend!
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A photo taken from the back of an auditorium behind seated audience. Up front a projector shows the opening slide of the talk--the book cover and "Learning the Hard Way." I'm seen toward the right, near a podium on a platform, holding a mic. I'm wearing a long blue and white sundress. Seen through an open glass doorway across a tile floor, there is a 3-panel display--3 vertical rectangles with space between them. Each panel is a part of the book cover, lit up from behind. On a dark brown "frame" with wood grain walls on either side. Above there are a sea of small white LEDs dangling from cords. On the floor is a reflection of the book cover panels.
July 23, 2025 at 8:50 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
They're heeeeere
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Spotted lanternfly seen close-up from the bottom through a window. Couldn't kill it because it was a second floor window...
July 18, 2025 at 9:56 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Spotted lanternfly nymphs massing on a small witch hazel that we recently planted. I will kill them with my bare hands
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Close up of spotted lanternfly nymphs covering trunk and branches of small witch hazel--they look like giant mutant ladybugs, red with white spots and black legs
July 9, 2025 at 1:31 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
This eastern velvet ant did not want to pause for a photo. Also, this is not an ant but a parasitoid wasp. The female has no wings but apparently its *half-inch* stinger delivers a painful sting. Its nickname is "cow killer."
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Close up of insect that looks like an ant. No wings. Dark red-orange with a black barlike marking on its thorax and black legs. It's crawling on gravel.
July 8, 2025 at 11:52 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Less than half of the spotted knapweed we pulled and bagged this week--45-lb bags. We made a dent but there is at least as much that we didn't get to.
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About 16 large clear lawn bags stuffed with weeds sitting next to a gravel driveway at the bottom of a small grassy hillside with a blue tarp covering a pile of topsoil in the background.
July 6, 2025 at 5:39 PM
paulawhyman.bsky.social
Spotted St John's wort--a new native plant discovered in the meadow
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Close up of cluster of small bright yellow flowers on a deep green stem along with buds that haven't opened yet.
July 2, 2025 at 6:38 PM