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Joe Mason

@moreorloess.bsky.social
3.1K followers 1.4K following 9.5K posts

UW Madison Geography, opinions are mine. Geomorphology, soils, dunes, loess, in the Midwest, Great Plains, northern China. He/him. Living on Ho-Chunk lands.

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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 17m
Geese flying overhead, quoting Walt Whitman at me
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 34m
South of Valentine in the Sandhills
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 1h
Wisconsin Central Sand Plain finally wins MinCup.
View across the western part of the central sand plain of Wisconsin, a landscape of thin sandy soils over quartz-rich sandstone bedrock. The landscape is forest covered, in fall color, with small hills in the distance.Top of a small bluff of Cambrian sandstone, with a rock outcrop surrounded by birch trees and a mix of forest and open land in the distance. There is snow on the ground.
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Adam Serwer @adamserwer.bsky.social · 16h
“Between the Christianity of this land and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference.” — Frederick Douglass bsky.app/profile/atru...
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 11h
The billionaires may be funding the campaign, but he has a lot of very enthusiastic supporters with giant Tiffany signs in every rural area I've been to lately. Did see some places where the giant Tiffany sign has a Crowley sign staring at it from an annoyed neighbor's property.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 11h
This policy, cuts in NIH and NSF spending, restrictions on international student visas, etc., all have the effect of making universities into desperately underfunded, subservient institutions. I increasingly wonder if that isn't the most important goal.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 12h
Background: Cumulative rainfall in the upper Pecatonica River basin through mid to late September:
Plot of cumulative rainfall in inches at three Wisconet stations. Althree show a steep rise on Sept 18-19, with a little more gradual increase to between 4 and 6 inches total by Sept 21. Curves are then flat until yesterday and today.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 13h
Thinking about stages of my education and career(s) as a series of Kwik Trips on the highway of life.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 01/08/2025
A memory: Riding in a taxi at night across the city of Yaounde, Cameroon, with the windows wide open. And loud and clear from somewhere off in the darkness comes the music of...the Doobie Brothers.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 14h
I think this is okay as long as Earth doesn't get carried away with it.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 14h
Update through yesterday. Could be a textbook example. Today, rising again at all three sites. See basin map, etc. in the quoted thread.
Hydrographs for the Pecatonica River system as it responded to heavy rain in mid-late September. Small upstream sub-basin shows quick response at Blanchardville, slower response though higher peak downstream at Martintown, and even slower response even farther downstream near Shirland.
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J. Raasch @jraasch.bsky.social · 15h
Weedy rock face just beyond parking lot. There are tire tracks across the “white” sand.
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J. Raasch @jraasch.bsky.social · 15h
Probably not as exciting as a large crystal clear #quartz crystal. But here’s a photo of sand eroded from the Eau Claire formation behind the Culver’s restaurant in Reedsburg, Wisconsin. Vote #Quartz! And now I want fried cheese curds! #MinCup26
Photograph of largely colorless sand grains. Afocal, approximately 18x.
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Eileen Clancy 🧿 @clancyny.bsky.social · 15h
Fatou Traore, a legal resident in the U.S. for 20 years, was grabbed by ICE on her way to work at the University of Iowa on Sept. 24. Traore was told she'll be sent to Sierra Leone, which she’s never even visited, leaving her husband & sons: Yousouf, 3; Boubacar, 8; Mamadou, 14; and Esoumaila, 19.
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John Van Hoesen, Ph.D. @jvh-vt.bsky.social · 17h
Fantastic detail in this 1920 OS map: inclines, railways & mill buildings surrounding Blaenau #Ffestiniog, #Wales. #geology #thestoryofslate
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David @archaeomather.bsky.social · 18h
I wrote about rats for @racketmn.com!
racketmn.com
How I Accidentally Pinpointed the Arrival of Rats in MN Through Environmental Archaeology  - Racket
Turns out ‘Steamboat Willie’ was actually a documentary.
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Dr. Sam Anderson @sam-science.bsky.social · 21h
Happy new water-year! Welcome to hydrological 2027!
Mountains reflect on Widgeon CreekBraided streams on Devon Island, NU.Copper Island on Shuswap LakeReflections on Duffy Lake
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 23h
Happened to think about the La Porte rainfall anomaly this morning and started looking up publications on it while riding the bus. Had not seen or had forgotten this letter: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
science.org
La Porte Precipitation Fallacy
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 23h
Braided flow on asphalt pavement.
Water running down a street, breaking into two or more strands in places and forming a single wide sheet in others.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Followup on that flood watch.
Map of 24 hour rainfall at across eastern Nebraska and Kansas, western Iowa and Missouri, from CoCoRaHS observations. Many points in the 3.28 to 7.39 inch range, especially through Omaha and Lincoln.USGS water dashboard showing much above normal streamflow or all-time high streamflow for this date across the same area with high rainfall in the other image.
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Bethan Davies @iceybethan.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
🚨New article🚨 on AntarcticGlaciers: the last British-Irish Ice Sheet in Northeast Ireland. By Alex Clark. www.antarcticglaciers.org/glacial-geol...
antarcticglaciers.org
The Last British-Irish Ice Sheet in Northeast Ireland - AntarcticGlaciers.org
By Dr Alex Clark Why Ireland? Ice sheets provide valuable clues on how they behaved thousands of years in the past through the dramatic landscapes they create. And you may struggle to find a more elab...
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Plattenbau Berlin @plattenbauberlin.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Harmonised with the sky.
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Plattenbau Berlin @plattenbauberlin.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Sunflower point block.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Rain and red oak acorns are both pounding on our roof.
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Gustav Klimt @klimtgustav.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Houses at Unterach on the Attersee botfrens.com/collections/109/conten…
Gustav Klimt's "Houses at Unterach on the Attersee" captures the vibrant and serene beauty of the Austrian lakeside with rich colors and distinctive brushwork. Known for his symbolic and sensual style, Klimt departs from his iconic golden phase, showcasing his versatility and love for landscape in this vivid portrayal.
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Chris Dunker @chrisdunker.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Crazy scenes in central #LNK tonight
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Burned and unburned areas in a small part of the area affected by the Morrill Fire this spring, in April soon after the fire (left) and on September 4. Some recovery of the grass cover but maybe less in the first year than I've seen for earlier fires. Sentinel 2 images.
A satellite image of the part of the Nebraska Sandhills with a wedge shaped area of very light-color (almost bare sand) that burned in the Morrill Fire. This image is from April, 2026, not long after the fire.Same area as in the other image, but in September after a summer of grass growth. The wedge-shaped burned area has many small patches of green but is still much lighter than the unburned area.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
I was trying to imagine what my uncle would think of Hegseth. My uncle who hated war, enlisted right out of high school, and was severely injured in the Huertgen Forest in the last winter of WWII. But he'd probably say don't bother with that kid from Forest Lake who went terribly wrong somehow.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Always worth listening to Ellen Wohl, especially about rivers. blog.oup.com/2018/10/50th...
blog.oup.com
Of gutters and ecosystems: the 50th anniversary of the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act
“Rivers are the gutters down which flow the ruins of continents.” – Luna B. Leopold Luna Leopold understood that rivers are far more than gutters. In a
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Pilgrim @mountains-rivers.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
blog.oup.com/2018/10/50th... This engineering provides an illusion of control.
blog.oup.com
Of gutters and ecosystems: the 50th anniversary of the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act
“Rivers are the gutters down which flow the ruins of continents.” – Luna B. Leopold Luna Leopold understood that rivers are far more than gutters. In a
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Good for Senator Baldwin
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Dylan Schwilk @schwilk.org · 30/09/2026
My car went rogue when i forgot to set the parking brake, left in drive, and exited it.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
While I may have made other mistakes in my career, at least I did not become an academic Stakhanovist.
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authodizer @doktrock.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
#Quartz var. Flint - school children promoted the idea Knife River Flint should be the state rock of North Dakota. It was approved! Historically widely used and traded by indigenous peoples.
A dark brown vitreous rock, approximately 7 x 8 cm, with light yellow weathering surface. It shows conchoidal fracture. My photo.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Hello from Professor Beardo
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
The Great Unconformity was a few meters below our basement floor in Stevens Point, Wisconsin, based on excavations there and down the street.
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Andy Snyder @wxandbiscuits.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Amarillo as recently as last week (prior to all the rain the last 7 days) was still in the worst possible drought category.
US drought monitor for sept 22 showing d4 drought in dark red over parts of northwest and north Texas.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Look at the gradient of seven day rainfall going east from Amarillo
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Very obscure topic no one is interested in: Townships in the public land survey system are mostly square, 6 by 6 miles. Civil townships, units of local government, correspond to the PLSS townships in more populated agricultural areas (SW part of this map of NW Wisconsin) but pull together multiple
A map of part of northwestern Wisconsin showing civil township, village, and city boundaries on a plain blue background. The civil township boundaries are square toward the southwest, rectangular or other shapes toward the northeast.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
No, I guess I won't try to get a copy of the New Yorker article that seems to be about property, the Public Land Survey grid, and land distribution here in the US of A. Might be good! Might irritate me somehow. By the way I'm walking students through interpreting land survey notes today.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
1937 air photo showing mining waste deposited in a fan along Ellis Branch, Galena River, with a DEM close-up of the fan remnants today. Note the corn in shocks in a field just south of the fan in the air photo.
Air photo showing mining debris around an old mine with a fine of sediment washed down into the adjacent stream valley. The mining debris is much lighter than surrounding areas.Shaded relief map covering part of the area of the air photo but zoomed in more. The fan of mining debris is still evident, though dissected.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Bordner Survey map of late 1930s to early 1940s land use near New Diggings, Wisconsin, showing old lead mines mixed with cropland (C) and permanent (PP), though many areas of mined land are apparently not marked. Close-up of one of the mined areas that are marked, as seen with 1-m lidar DEM.
Map of land use from the 1930s, showing roads and many land parcels labeled with letter codes for land use or the word "mine."Lidar-based DEM showing a mined area with piles of debris and gullies.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Posture adjusted to better posture that hurts
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Something I wonder about: How many Americans don't personally know *anyone* affected by the new rules forcing millions of people off Medicaid? I am a well-paid professor in a relatively wealthy community, and I know people who are affected (and I'm worried about them).
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Stream discharge, baseflow, overbank flow, using a drainage ditch in DeKalb County, Illinois.
A ditch between two fields with water flowing, but the water surface is well below the top of the banks.There are some trees in the distance.Same ditch with the same trees in the background, water now spilling over the banks and flooding adjacent fields.
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Paul Bachmann @bachmann-farm.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
How would someone from Missouri know about the Hawkeyes?
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Cheryl Lynn Eaton @cheryllynneaton.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
GoFundMe was a lot more effective when it was called taxes.
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Joe Mason @moreorloess.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Adjusting for inflation, I think that's almost exactly what I was paid as a janitor for the state of Wisconsin in 1989. On the other hand, we had excellent health care with few if any out of pocket costs and lived in a house we bought for $29,000 in 1985.
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Lorena Fernández Álvarez @loretahur.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Estudio publicado en Nature analizó 1,4 millones de imágenes y vídeos (de Google, Wikipedia, IMDb, Flickr y YouTube) + 9 LLM y encontró que las mujeres se presentan sistemáticamente más jóvenes que los hombres en 3.495 categorías ocupacionales y sociales. Chorprecha 🤬 www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
Age and gender distortion in online media and large language models - Nature
Stereotypes of age-related gender bias are socially distorted, as evidenced by the age gap in the representations of women and men across various media and algorithms, despite no systematic age differ...
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Rural Indexing Project @ruralindexing.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Herky the Hawk Red Oak, IA
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