Welcome to my newest blog! You will find a great many things in the blog as time goes along. I am a freelance writer. I write in the spaces of the outdoors and the environment. I am not what a person would call a “tree hugger, necessarily, but I do understand we are taking undo advantage of the planet and eventually it could be our undoing.
I also enjoy bass fishing and fish many tournaments each year. I run a bass team tournament trail with my boyfriend, Chet, and we also run our own soft plastic bait making company. As you may already see, some of these things do not seem to fit with one another. I am a bit of a conundrum in that respect.
I am a learning gardener. I hope to always be learning in that area of my life. We recently bought a house and I am working at getting some gardens going here. The photo attached to this post is the home we bought. Several changes have already been made. In the same vein, I am also very interested in self-sufficiency and shortening personal supply chains. Once my gardens are established next year, I will be looking to preserve the herbs and vegetables I am able to grow to help feed the two of us over the winter.
My gardening endeavors are also bird and pollinator driven. I have planted many native plants in the front flower beds and have taken out all but one chunk of the trailing nightshade that was taking over both beds when we moved in. I have kept a piece of it for food for the birds this winter. I will monitor that and see if it is worth keeping for next year.
I am also starting to get interested in permaculture, and you will likely find information about that here as well. Permaculture is not simply the shortening of a supply chain, but building back an ecosystem that works with the land, rather than against it, and that provides for the people on that land as well.
Citizen science is another area of interest for me. It started as being a weather spotter for NOAA. From there I moved to the Clean Boats Clean Waters program. I am now also involved in the Water Action Volunteers (WAV) stream monitoring program, the Wisconsin Frog and Toad Program, the Wisconsin Mussel Program and birding/phenology projects such as Feeder Watch and the Great Backyard Bird Count. I have also been involved in the wolf tracking program in Wisconsin and may look at getting back into that program again, time permitting.
I have my own podcast, which can be found most anywhere you listen to podcasts. It is called Fish Like a Girl, which is my personal brand I have been working under for many years now. I have a YouTube Channel @fishlikeagirlus as well.
I am looking into getting into more videography and film making. I am sure my successes and failures in that area will be chronicled in this blog as well.
So, welcome to my world – our world – and everything in it. For those interested in the outdoors and keeping wild spaces wild, or combining humans and nature in the best ways possible, I hope you will stop back often to read new posts and leave comments as you see fit.
Beckie Gaskill's Blog 