Banana Slug on Redwood tree. (Photo: eyesontheroad/flickr.com)

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The American turkey vulture is a marvel of sensory power.  It can smell the whiff of a dead mouse under leaves from 200 feet in the sky.  It sweeps dead raccoons clean off the roads.  And still, when we see it’s bald, wrinkled red head at work, we say “ick.”

Gardner-journalist Constance Casey has made a specialty of “icky” creatures.  She can tell you all about vultures and slugs, ticks and jellyfish. The love life and dead fish consumption of snapping turtles.

Yes, they look bad, she concedes.  But they have their place in the world. 

This hour, On Point: icky creatures up close, with Constance Casey.

You can join the conversation. Tell us what you think — here on this page, on Twitter, and on Facebook.

-Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Constance Casey is a former newspaper editor and New York City Parks Department gardener.  Last summer, she started an ongoing series on revolting creatures for Slate.  She’s covered ticks, jellyfish, vultures, and slugs.  Her next article is about snapping turtles. She writes at The Observant Gardener.

James Harding is a naturalist and a wildlife specialist at Michigan State University.  He’s the “critter guy” for MSU Museum’s Wildlife and Natural History Question Line.  His specializes in amphibians and reptiles, especially turtles.

More links:

Watch Isabella Rossellini act out the bizarre mating rituals of bees, spiders,  and limpets in Green Porno.

Photo: Mark Steil/MPR

The American lawn can look like it’s been around forever. Smooth, green and – if you’re lucky – trim, it stretches over millions of acres of American landscape. It carpets America’s suburbs and frames our standard vision of home.

But it is a modern invention in its ubiquity. And not everyone loves the lawn. It’s good for croquet. Not so good for the environment. And around this time of summer, you may be a little tired of mowing it.

So let’s hear it out. We’ve got a top lawn guru with us, and a bone-deep foe of lawns.

This hour, On Point: Turf wars, and the future of what grows in your yard.

-Tom Ashbrook

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Guests:

Paul Robbins, professor of geography at University of Arizona, author of “Lawn People: How Grasses, Weeds and Chemicals Make Us Who We Are.”

Trey Rogers, professor of turfgrass management at Michigan State University, author of “Lawn Geek: Tips and Tricks for the Ultimate Turf from the Guru of Grass.”

Barbara Damrosch, co-owner of Four Season Farm in Harborside, Maine, she writes the weekly column “A Cook’s Garden” for The Washington Post, and is out with a new edition of her book, “The Garden Primer.”

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Links:

“Turf War,” a recent article by Elizabeth Kolbert in The New Yorker, looks at the history of the American lawn and its critics.

You can keep up with Trey Rogers’ 2008 Olympic Field team at their blog.

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]]> http://www.onpointradio.org/2008/07/turf-wars-and-american-lawns/feed 0 http://www.onpointradio.org/2008/06/the-gardening-art http://www.onpointradio.org/2008/06/the-gardening-art#comments Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:00:00 +0000 Wen Stephenson http://www.onpointradio.org/2008/06/the-gardening-art/

We love our gardens. The fresh tomatoes, the melons, the zinnias, the peas, the flowering bushes placed just so, the trowel and shovel, the garden path.

But sore backs, dirty knees and, finally, sweet corn are just the beginning of our affair with the garden, says philosopher-guide Robert Pogue Harrison.

Harrison has gone deep on forests, deep on cemeteries. Now he goes deep on the garden, and humanity — back to Babylon, Versailles, the Garden of Eden, paradise itself.

This hour, On Point: the garden, in history, literature, and the human soul.

- Tom Ashbrook

Guests:

Robert Pogue Harrison, professor of Italian literature at Stanford University, is author of the new book, “Gardens: An Essay on the Human Condition.”

Irene Virag, garden columnist at Newsday and a writer for Better Homes and Gardens and Garden magazine.