Spoiler: It’s a Red Pine

Using my amateur tree sleuthing skills, I determined that the tree in the field is a red pine. Probably. It looks like a red pine more than any other type of conifer. (By the way, did we all know about tamaracks, the conifer that’s also deciduous? I was wondering why some of our ‘evergreens’ were suddenly not-so-greens.)

This was the photo I took of the needles/cones to help ID the tree. When I’m wondering what a certain bird/moss/tree is, I usually head to the Minnesota DNR site to narrow down the possibilities. Then I back it up with good ol’ Wikipedia. That’s where I discovered that the red pine is Minnesota’s state tree — we have our very own state tree out in the hay field! Now I just need to get a loon, a lady slipper, and roughly ten-thousand lakes — collect ‘em all!

And one last photo for everybody who’s ever wondered what a cat in a waistcoat would look like. Whether such a thing would be cute or not. Surprise, it is! I don’t usually let Beany out, even on a harness/leash (I don’t want her to get comfortable outside here; both times she’s slipped out before, she’s panicked and gone right back in, and that’s a good thing), but she was so desperate when I came back inside with the dogs, so I put Henny’s jacket on her. I think the fact that she didn’t complain at all about getting Velcroed in proves how much she wanted to go outside (she was still freaked out, though).