[intro music] [intro music] [intro music] [intro music] [intro music] Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of Scenic
Stops. We've really got some
great stories lined up in this episode for you. You
know that we always bring you
the in depth stories that put a focus on
what is so great about this
region of Ohio. Amazing people and great places
right here in your back yard. So, let's hit the road again to
get out there and learn and
discover more about northwest Ohio. First up
on the prog
ram tonight the crew and I
have traveled to Paulding county and it is here where we are in
Cecil, Ohio. It's a little
village about 15 miles West of Defiance. We're here at
the Forest Woods Nature Preserve. It is so
beautiful and it is maintained
by the Black Swamp Conservancy.
Now, you know I am an outdoors
girl so I can't wait to get back
there and check it out. So we
came prepared we have our bug spray. We're
gonna need it, so let's get in there and learn
more about the Black Swamp
Conservanc
y. Well the crew and I are really
enjoying our visit here to the Forest Woods
Nature Preserve, and I am so
glad to be joined by Eric Kraus. Eric, why does the
Black Swamp Conservancy exist? What is your role here?
We're here to protect both
natural areas, green space, and
agricultural areas for future generations. So Black Swamp's
role is to help both private and public land owners to
achieve that goal in protecting land in perpetuity. How much
property does Black Swamp
Conservancy maintain. Rig
ht now, we're
working in about a 16 county
area. And we have a little over
13,000 acres protected. And here at the Forest Woods Nature
PReserve, how much property does this consist of?
This is just under 300 acres. And really a unique piece
because it's surrounded by agricultural land. The ground
we're standing on right now was farmed until 2008, but it also
is a really nice combination because we've got
some really, really high
quality woodland habitat as well as water
running through the prope
rty so
it's a nice diversity of habitats. So I
understand you've helped
maintain the animals and the plants on
all these properties, but are
there some that you don't like to see as well? Sure, any
time you manage a habitat, you've gotta deal with
the bad as well as the good,
and we have an example here of a species that
isn't so attractive. Uh-huh and what is
this? This is an invasive called Teisal. This is in a
place that it wouldn't
naturally be. It wouldn't
natively be, and as a result it te
nds to
spread like wildfire. So we
wanna get rid of him. Right. You can
literally pull No you kinda can't. He's in
there pretty good. That's the
easiest. The easiest step. And all
you're doing there is removal
of the seed-head, and then herbicide treat the actual
base, and so those are the two management tactics to
address teasel. So, this is native big blue
stem. This is actually last year's growth and you can see
the new growth coming up. So, this is an example of a plant
that you have purpose
ly
planted. Tell me about it. It's important
because it really was one of
the dominant species in northwest Ohio
pre-agriculture. This plant can get well over 8
feet tall. Wow. If it's happy where it is, it
can grow very densely, but again the goal in prairie restoration is to try
and create a diversity of
different species and allow for a diversity of
habitats. So, just like a forest, a prairie
provides that foundation for a real variety of life. And, here's proof of a lot of
wildlife here. We
even have this brown snake. We have really been enjoying this
beautiful outdoor space today,
and I am lucky to be here today with Rob Krain,
the executive director of the
Black Swamp Conservancy. Rob, thanks so
much for having us our today.
Absolutely, thank you for
coming. Behind us is this beautiful
water land. Can you tell us a
little bit about this space. Sure, this is Marie
Deland creek which runs through
the center of our preserve, and it outfalls into
the maumee river just about 12,000 fe
et out of here. This
is an incredibly diverse property. We have over 30 rare,
threatened and endangered species on site, and a species
inventory of I believe somewhere around 500
species, and we certainly
haven't captured them all. Tell me more about the
conservancy and importance of
the work that you do. The Conservancy's mission is to
protect and preserve natural habitats and
agricultural land here in
Northwest Ohio for the benefit
of future generations, and really
what we do is we're here to
make sure that woods stay woods, family farms
stay family farms, wetlands
stay wetlands. And to make sure that future
generations have the same
outdoor opportunities that
we've had. Well, I'm going to need you to grab
your cowboy boots for our next
Scenic Stop, we're going horse back riding at a ranch in
Findlay after this. Do you know of a unique place
that I should visit or maybe
and interesting person that I have to meet?
Well, I'd love to hear from
you. Now, it's simple. You can like Scenic
Stops on
Facebook, and be sure to tweet #scenicstops during the show.
You can also play Scenic Stops Trivia every week on
Facebook for a chance to win
some great prizes. Go ahead, it's really
easy. Just go to
Facebook.com/scenicstops and we'll see ya there. Well, it is a beautiful day to
be outdoors in Northwest Ohio. The crew and I have traveled to
Findlay, Ohio and we're here at
a ranch. The Triple T Ranch to be exact,
but this isn't your typical place. They do have horseback
riding, but they'
re also a B
and B. They're a bed and breakfast. So
I guess if we have a good
enough time, we're gonna spend
the night. Well, I am exciting to meet and
talk with the owners Matt and Sande Theis to learn
more and then to saddle up and
take a ride. Matt, thank you so much for having me and the crew here
today. Absolutely, glad to have
you. It's beautiful out here, so and thanks also to Bo for
joining us for our interview. How long have you had this
property here in Findlay. We
started building a ho
use in 1989, this was all solid woods,
we cleared for the house and then we
cleared it for the patio and
the pool and where we're
standing right now and beyond into the paddock
here and then the trails. Yes, the trails, the trail
riding. Tell me, how long of a
ride is that if folks want to come
out and do some horseback
riding. Well, we offer a half hour ride and we offer and hour
ride as a standard. You can
ride as long as you want. We offer lessons right here.
You can take a lesson from
myself
or from anybody else that helps us out
doing the trail rides. They're
all experienced people, and know what they're doing. But
the biggest thing is just
learning how to steer that horse We set up cones and we go
around the cones and we have you steer. We don't have you
trotting and cantering and that
type of thing for a lesson, but
you do learn how to steer that horse and how to
control the animal. Being in
Findlay, obviously there's the equine
program at University of
Findlay. Do you have a lo
t of
those students who come here and
learn? We have a lot of those
students that come here and learn and
then we also have some other
students that come here and
help out and become part of what we're
doing right here. That's one of
the keys A lot of those people have so
much experience and over the
years they've been very
instrumental in helping our program and
being supportive of our program
and things like that, and that's really been a
big help for us. So Sandy, tell
me about the different
horses that you have
here at the ranch including
this beautiful guy right here. Well, this is our little
blue-eyed sheriff, Cody. We
have three miniature horses and he is the oldest of all of them. We have a little
female named Razzleberry, and
then our newest is Little Chief. He's been on
trail rides, we use him for
lessons. And he actually pulls the pony
cart. We have the full grown
horses, we'll start with Big Red, he's actually our
carriage and wagon horse. He's the head of the heard
right n
ow, but coming up fast
is Cherokee. He's kind of the football
player, you know, he's big,
he's strong, he's beautiful. And then we have Seneca. We
like to use him lot on trail
rides. And then we have a new one by
the name of Bo. He's only 4 years old so he's still
a baby too, but he's almost as
big as Big Red. Have you been involved
with horses your whole life?
Well, I did some riding when I was in
girl scouts a long time ago and
I took a wonderful mountain trail ride when I was
in college that
I loved. And
then for about 26, 27 years I didn't do
anything until I met my wonderful
husband about three years ago
and have become totally immersed.
I've been around horses pretty
well most of my life and the first
thing that her and I bought
when I met Sande before we married,
after my late wife passed away,
was a horse. And I tell you what, that's
when I really started to enjoy
the horses because we get up every day and the horses are
doing something different. They
each have such a huge per
sonality of their own
that...it's just amazing to watch them. The
first thing that we bought
together, so yeah, we love horses. Well, I can see why,
and this is a beautiful place
to come out and enjoy and do some riding.
Speaking of, do you think we
can go do some riding? That's why I came. Absolutely,
let's ride. One thing That we're finding out is that
a lot of Americans are not
familiar with what a bed and
breakfast is. A bed and breakfast is a
private home where you contract, basically,
with
the family The family lives in the home,
but you are their guest. It's
your personal residence. It's our personal
residence. But is well
appointed, and you have
separate guest facilities, and private baths.
The business is basically a bed and breakfast
events center for people that want to have birthday
parties and anniversary parties
and all that type of thing. And
it's also a place e to go trail
riding. It's one of the most difficult
things that Sande and I manage,
but it's one of the biggest
pleasures. We have people that
come that want total solitude
and everything else, but the come while and event is going
on and they just love it. When
they get ready to leave they say, 'Oh my goodness,
thank you so much for letting
me be part of watching this event.' or
whatever. It really helped with
what I wanted to get out of being at the Triple T,
but they didn't know it. We
actually call ourself the 'Destination
Getaway' because you can
actually come here and spend a full
weekend, and you
could actually
spend your whole time here and be very happy and have a
lot to do. We want to make sure
that everybody is satisfied and gets
out of this place what they
want to get out of it. Our motto is "Come as a guest
and leave as a friend." And actually we've had guests
say, 'No that's not true.' And
of course Matt and I kind of look at them kind of
startled and they say, 'No,
it's come as a guest and leave
as family.' We love having people here, so
if they contact us and we have the
availab
ility, we would love to
invite anyone to come. That was a
great trail ride, Matt. Thank
you so much. If you think you'd like to come
out and go horseback riding,
you can check them out online at the tttranch.com. Well,
let's go ride some more. Well, what a great ride there at the Triple
T Ranch. Okay, for our next
scenic stop, we venture a little bit
out of northwest Ohio down to
Dayton where we introduce you to a talented
painter who explains his method
of brush before the brain. Here's
more fr
om member station ThinkTV in Dayton. I grew up in a small town North
of here in Botkins, OH, and we didn't have art. I played
sports, baseball basketball, I always enjoyed art but we
didn't have any classes or any formal training. I went to
school at Ohio University a journalism major, and had no formal training, and then I
sold health insurance to schools and corporations. I was
introduced to art by Roger Sayer. He was a
well known artist. I bought some of his art back in
the 80s and met Roger.
He
painted on steel. I got to know roger
and took a space at the Front Street Warehouses where I
became his studio assistant for 3 or 4 years, and I would
go out on the road and take a load of steel in the
back of my truck and paint it
wherever I might be. In the batina of
the ocean spray or the desert or sun, rain. All
added to the steel. I don't really know of anybody
really using weathered steel on a full time basis.
It's pretty gritty. The recycled steel, a lot of it
comes from the scrap ya
rd just a quarter of a mile from
here. Represents again and imperfection and the trails
and tribulation that we go through in life. The
steel always is interesting 'cause I don't know what it's
former life was or where its brothers and sisters are
going, and it's interesting,
there's a lot of textures, imperfections, and different
imagery that comes out of the steels. It also represents
strength and durability. Some of my work, you could
stand on. I'm not sure that's
much of a selling point. I p
retty much paint brush
before the brain which means I paint first and
think about it later. I'm not worried about mistakes,
not knowing which direction the
piece is gonna hang. So I'm just enjoying the moment being in the moment and getting
into whatever textures and
colors I might be using that day. I just love the color and
texture and I paint very texturally
with a lot of texture. I use pumice, steel
shavings, tar, silicate sand from local gravel pits.
Literally everything in the
store. And I
just love the use of
color and learning how to apply it and blend it
with texture. I paint acrylic on steel and then I finish it
off with an oil which stops the
oxidation I paint so fast, I'm painting
on 20,30 pieces at one time. I paint 30,40 50,60 days on pieces as opposed
to a very short time frame so I get different
looks, different moods,
different light and it will come to you if you
just let it be. If you don't try to push it, so I
paint real thin almost watercolor-like so
there's a lot
of luminosity, depth down in the painting and
in the steel. It kind of represents life and the
different places and trials
we've been exposed to. I think that's
the biggest skill an abstract artist has: is knowing
when to quit. And I think I get about 1 out
of 15 that are really good, and I seem to know on
those. The rest of them, it
seems like I'm continually painting on them.
If you don't worry about finishing it out and you just
enjoy the moment, then it's not
so critical to try to decide tha
t. I do classes and they're called
Brush Before the Brain. And you paint first, you think
about it later. And there's no mistakes. I also have charity side of
things. I enjoy being able to donate to charities
and...either through a class or the art work add value that
way. I'll probably do more
charitable :work. Well I'm painting big
pieces; 10 footers, triplicates that size, and I'm
going organic where I don't use as much paint and I use
more of the elements of nature
and texture, so I've been
able to
travel around and so my
inspiration comes from different locations.
Appreciation of just being alive and being able to paint and
have spaces to paint in. Still to come, one more scenic stop, and it's one of
the biggest annual celebrations
of art in Ohio. We'll visit the Black
Swamp Arts Festival after this. Here in Northwest Ohio, we
enjoy our festivals. Music, food, fun,
and art, and one of the most popular each year is held
in Bowling Green, and it
appeals to people of all ages. Our fi
nal Scenic Stop
is to the Black Swamp Arts Festival. Our focus is always on
connecting art to the community, providing opportunities for
artists, and showcasing the
best in live performance. My name is
Roger Schope. I am the Chairman
of the 22nd Black Swamp Arts Festival. The
origins of the Black Swamp Arts
Festival was 22 years ago, some
community members, business
leaders, decided that it would be nice
to have an arts festival, and
it started as a grass-roots organization built
on wanting to p
rovide opportunities for
artists and also to connect art
to the community. And we're real excited, our
poster this year, the 2014
poster, was actually made by a young man
named Will Santino, and he actually grew up on Main
Street, Bowling Green during the arts festival, and we're real
proud to have, what we're
calling, a festival kid
actually create the poster. Folks that have never
experienced the Black Swamp
Arts Festival will find youth arts. They'll
find an opportunity for kids to
make hats,
rainsticks, tiles, construction
projects, finger painting, tye-dye. You know, from the
Kiwanis Youth Arts Village
where that all takes place, down on the north end, all the
way down to the 3rd annual high school chalk walk
competition. We have over a hundred and twenty juried
artists regionally, nationally,
international artists in all forms of media:
paint, 2D, 3D, sculpture. We've got
everything, and we also have
three stages for live music. We have
a mainstage venue that provides
the larger
venue for some of the
bigger acts. We also have the
acoustic stage here on Main. We also have a
stage located in the Youth Arts
Village, the family stage, and what is one of the
things we really enjoy about our performing arts
portion of this festival is
that our main stage acts, many of them play in multiple
venues in order to provide the best opportunity for folks to
see the live music. Also, we've
got wonderful food we've got a beer garden, a
place for beverages, a place to
gather with friend
s and talk and get
together and enjoy the
mainstage productions. Yeah, the Black Swamp Festival
is really a, just a wonderful exhibit. I've been
doing the exhibit, this show, for about 10 years off and on.
And it's really got a unique name as
well because the area, the Black Swamp area
in this region, it really kind
of lends itself to what it's all about,
and it's just wonderful. I'm a
painter and I paint in watercolor,
acrylic, and oils, and I think
that is really kind of unusual to
paint in al
l 3 of those
mediums. It's really at the top of my list of shows
to participate in. The quality of the show, it's not real big but it's big enough to that
people can get to all of the
artists It's really a fantastic show, a
fantastic venue in downtown Bowling Green, and I just love
it. The artists that make up this festival are almost
countless in number. We've got
professional juried artists, we have a Wood
County invitational, we have
artists all young and old. You know, I was
just down at the
Youth Arts
Area, and we have youngsters as little as 3
finger painting, creating their own crafts and their own
things. We've got artists from
the Wood County in Bowling Green
Community which really was the
anchor, the very beginnings of
this festival. It was rooted in local artists
and artisans, and those folks we still feature in the Wood
County invitational art show
which is located down on the South end
of the festival, and those are
50 artists from within a 30 mile
range of Bowling Green,
so we
have artists young and old, repeat artists,
new artists, and we're
continually receiving more and more
applications, so the quality of
our juried show continues to get better, and we
focus on quality variety, as well as folks who
know how to have a good time and treat all of our
citizens with respect. I am a 3D mixed media artist from
Columbus, OH. Being an artist for the past 5
years, I've participated in a
great deal of outdoor arts festivals and the
community response to this festival h
as been
wonderful. There's a diverse group of artisans here from
sculpture, glass, jewelry, and I've enjoyed
walking through the show, and there's a good-quality of work
available for people to enjoy. And the significance of the
Black Swamp Arts Festival, and
all regional and local arts programs, is that art matters.
Making art in public schools and private
schools, and university settings really helps children and
adults connect to things that
are bigger within themselves. It provides
and outle
t for families to get together to make memories,
and it may just inspire the
next artist It may inspire the next creator
of our poster. We don't know, but we're gonna be here
and we're gonna provide that
platform and celebrate the arts in every way we can and
continue to enjoy working hard all year long to
put this show on. Well, that's all for this
episode of Scenic Stops. We
really want to thank all the folks at
the Black Swamp Conservancy for
having us out today so that we could enjoy the
For
est Woods Nature Preserve.
Really had a wonderful time. I'd like to
remind you though, if there are
any segments that you have
missed, and you'd like to see from
previous episodes, you can log
online to our website at ScenicStopsOhio.com
and while you're on there you
can suggest your story ideas. We might even
use them right here on the
show. So until next time, I'm
Kathleen Phipps, and remember
the view is always nice from our Scenic Stops.
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