Features

 By John Nelson

I could be accused of featuring plants in the mint family too often, probably. It is definitely one of my favorite plant families. This week we have yet another member, and I think you’ll agree it is worth a thought or two.

 IF YOU GO

What: 61st annual Dixon Chapel United Methodist Church Oyster Roast

When: Noon to 4:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 1

Where: Dixon Chapel United Methodist Church, 190 Varnamtown Road, Varnamtown

Information: 842-6425, 842-6492, 842-6832, 842-9840 or the church at 842-5530. Coolers and alcoholic beverages are not allowed.

Varnamtown is getting ready for another round of roasted oysters, fish plates and a festive day of autumn fun and fundraising.

Renowned bluegrass band Balsam Range will headline a benefit concert for Friends of Fort Fisher at 7 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 1, at Brunswick Community College’s Odell Williamson Auditorium.

Balsam Range consists of five outstanding acoustic musicians and singers from Haywood County in western North Carolina.

For their band name, they thoughtfully and respectfully adopted the name of a majestic range of mountains that surrounds part of their home county, where the Smokies meet the Blue Ridge, the Balsam Range.

 By John Nelson

In the case you ever visit central South Carolina, you will want to check out our Congaree National Park, one of the most breathtaking places in the world. It boasts an impressive diversity of plants and wildlife, especially migratory birds. Some of its acreage is dominated by tracts of land never before timbered, and thus, some of eastern North America’s tallest forests are here. I’d like to show you an example.

SUPPLY — It’s a community effort to help pay for a community building.

Nearly two years after opening their new community center, residents of the Cedar Grove community converged at the site for a fall festival Oct. 18 to help raise money to pay off the Cedar Grove Community Center.

When the Blues Hall of Fame Tour rolls onto the Brunswick Community College campus Friday night, Oct. 17, it’ll be a chance for blues fans to treat themselves to live performances of three living legends.

The show, anchored by harmonica ace Charlie Musselwhite and his band on the stage of BCC’s Odell Williamson Auditorium, will consist of individual and collaborative contributions by fellow Blues Hall of Famers James Cotton and John Hammond.

 By John Nelson

Such a friendly plant and so easy to please, but once you’ve got it in your backyard, it may never want to leave.

This is one of those plants from far away, an introduced species that has actually been popular in Southeastern gardens for a good while now. It is a native of southern Asia, mostly India and China. If you start looking into it, you’ll discover that many of our favorite garden plants (in fact most of them) have their original homes somewhere else.

By John Nelson

 This one is for the fiddler crabs, sandpipers, snails and everybody and everything else that lives in or otherwise enjoys our beautiful coastal estuaries. It’s a plant of open salt flats or meadows landward of the beach, places that tend to be frequently flooded by salt water during high tide, and then drained away when the tide goes out. These sorts of places are fascinating biologically, and there are plenty of natural history stories here to be investigated.

The season of spookiness has descended.

You can tell, because ghosts and ghouls and indescribably ghastly things are converging starting this weekend at Grissettown Longwood Fire & Rescue’s six annual haunted trail wending its way next to the fire station at 758 Longwood Road (N.C. 904).

Yes, it’s eerie, but each year more brave souls turn out to walk the trail.