Dec. 15-21, 2025

Weather | 12/15, sunny, 7°, 39° | 12/16, sunny, 21°, 49° | 12/17, cloudy, 31°, 47° | 12/18, 0.19" rain, 21°, 51° | 12/19, sunny, 13°, 33° | 12/20, p. cloudy, 31°, 45° | 12/21, p. cloudy, 17°, 42° |

• Monday, 12/15: Chicks Ordered
  • A strong southwest wind this morning. It died down by sunset.
  • The forecast is for above freezing temperatures for the next several days. It ought to melt all snow, even on the north edges of the woods.
  • I ordered chicks that will arrive around June 10th. It's another group of 25 cockerels. That seems to be enough to keep us in chicken meat for a year.
  • I took down and put away all of the lights and extension cords that I had up in the machine shed for butchering deer. That's done for another year.
  • I miss life with a dog in the house, even though I don't miss the hairy dust bunnies bouncing along the floors, or climbing over the child barrier we put up at the door to the room where we store freezers that keeps dogs away from cat litter boxes. I've been looking at adopting from animal shelters, but several of them make it such a major chore that you'd think I was adopting a child from overseas.

• Tuesday, 12/16: Racking Apple Wine
  • I racked the apple wine for the fourth time. After losing some liquid in the racking process, I ended up with 300 ml of more wine than what I started with. The obvious reason is that the 3-gallon carboys made in Mexico hold more liquid than those built in Italy. The specific gravity was 0.998 and the pH was 3.1. I added 0.6 grams of Kmeta. Mary and I tasted the leftover wine. It's very tart and has a good, rich apple taste, which means this apple wine is the best I've made, so far. The wine is still cloudy, but who cares when it tastes this good.
  • We vacuumed bugs countless times, today. Mary emptied the vacuum and said that 90 percent of the bugs were flies. They're the bug of choice this year in our "hermetically sealed" house.
  • Canada geese aren't seen in our skies of late. We wonder if avian flu isn't killing off whole flocks of them. Mary saw 20 Canada geese fly over around noon, which is rare this winter.
  • We watched two movies. They were The Seeker (2007) and The Santa Clause (1994).

• Wednesday, 12/17: The Day of the Flies
  • We vacuumed bugs ALL DAY LONG!!! I'm amazed how many flies can emerge from the walls of this house. It seems as though every fly hatched from the dairy cow pooh a mile west of us and from pig dung a mile southeast of us came here to overwinter in our house walls. There are times when I'm sure 1,000 flies are buzzing around inside each window. The shop vac ran most of the day while Mary and I took turns sucking up bugs.
  • The reason for the influx of bugs is springlike temperatures. By bedtime, temperatures were close to 50°.
  • Mary noticed a small dandelion flower at the end of the lane, a blossom deceived by warm temperatures.
  • Deer have totally disappeared. We haven't seen any for several days.

• Thursday, 12/18: Deer Hide Tanning & Splitting Firewood
  • I took in a Missouri Department of Conservation virtual seminar on tanning deer hides with tree bark. It was fascinating and the best Webinar I've attended. It might be something I'll try, but I'm sure it must be done outside, or in an out building. The presenter was extremely knowledgeable and went over tanning hides to result in leather and hair-on hides. He had four different files sent out as part of the lesson...very thorough.
  • While I was involved with the webinar, I glanced up and saw deer eating vegetation under the Kieffer pear tree. Like magic, all I have to do is write in this blog that we aren't seeing deer and within an hour, deer appear.
  • I split four wheelbarrow loads of red oak firewood and moved it into the woodshed. I also moved about six wheelbarrow loads of firewood that dried in criss-cross stacks along the inside north wall of the machine shed to the woodshed.
  • Our high temperature was this morning. Temperatures dropped through the day.
  • We watched two movies that were The Man Who Invented Christmas (2017) and The Santa Clause 2 (2002).

• Friday, 12/19: Racking Parsnip Wine
  • I racked the parsnip wine for the third time. Instead of using an auto siphon, I used a long piece of clear hose. This doesn't always work, because the hose wants to curl up in the bottom of a carboy. To get around this problem, I used a thick hose inside the carboy. I only lost about 300 ml of fluid after racking three containers. The specific gravity was 1.000 and the pH was 3.5, readings that were the same as the last racking on Nov. 9th. The remaining liquid filled a 3-gallon carboy and a gallon jug. Mary and I tasted a tiny bit of the wine. WOW!!! It's remarkably good.
  • Mary cleaned a couple fans. One runs in our bedroom at night and the other Bill uses when he's visiting us. She also oiled them. They run much better.
  • We're not seeing many birds, except bluejays, and a few Canada geese that Mary saw during morning chores and I saw during evening chores.
  • Most of the snow is melted. The prediction is for a high of 68° for us on Christmas Day, which might break a record.

• Saturday, 12/20: Racking Pear Wine
  • We heard a goose cannon going off several times in the morning. That means someone has planted winter wheat southwest of us and there are enough geese to trigger the cannon. A goose cannon is powered by propane and lets off a loud booming explosive sound that scares the birds away, so they don't eat winter wheat leaves. Here is a LINK to a goose cannon.
  • I racked the pear wine for the third time. I tried using the same technique of moving the wine through a clear hose, but it didn't work. A five-gallon carboy is too high for gravity flowing through thin tubing to overcome. With nearly a quarter of liquid left in the carboy, flow stopped and I ended up using the auto siphon to finish the job. The specific gravity was 0.999 and the pH was 3.5, which was a 0.2 increase in pH from the last racking. The resulting liquid filled a 5-gallon carboy and a 1.5 liter bottle. Mary and I tasted the 10 ounces that was left after racking. The wine tasted somewhat like apple cider, with a kick. The pear taste, which is subtle, will probably shine through with aging.
  • We watched two movies, which were The Monuments Men (2014), and Auntie Mame (1958).

• Sunday, 12/21: Winter Solstice
  • Mary made a batch of lime zinger cookies. I helped a tiny bit by cracking hazelnuts. While I was doing that, Mary zested and juiced several limes...what a wonderful aroma! Lime zingers are rather so-so coming out of the oven. They have a much better flavor after they are frozen. We tested three, each, in the evening hours while reading books. YUM!
  • I split more red oak firewood and moved the last of the crisscrossed firewood that was drying to the woodshed. There are four wide trunk sections left next to the woodsplitter.
  • Mary heard trumpeter swans to the northeast. Their distinct call echoes way off into the distance.
  • Mary and I celebrated winter solstice with a bottle of 2022 dandelion wine. It's wonderful tasting liquid and very gold in color. Mary picked it out, because it's made from the epitome of spring flowers.

Dec. 8-14, 2025

Weather | 12/8, p. cloudy, 8°, 29° | 12/9, p. cloudy, 29°, 47° | 12/10, cloudy, 29°, 31° | 12/11, cloudy, 21°, 30° | 12/12, cloudy, 25°, 31° | 12/13, 1" snow, 11°, 23° | 12/14, sunny, -3°, 14° |

• Monday, 12/8: Firewood Hunting & Racking Jalapeño Wine
  • Mary saw a juvenile bald eagle fly south over her head as she attended to chickens this morning. It checked her out, then turned back north and headed on.
  • I split three chunks of firewood from a red oak tall stump and moved two wheelbarrow loads to the woodshed.
  • I walked north hunting for standing dead trees that we can cut up for more firewood. I found a few in the woods immediately north of the machine shed and then several more further north.
  • Mary made a food chart for 2026 that records all food stored in the freezers, plus bottles of wine stored in coolers in the upstairs north bedroom.
  • Blue jays are frequenting the spot in the east yard where we rinsed out the doe.
  • I racked jalapeño wine for the third time into a three-gallon carboy. The specific gravity was 0.992 and the pH was 3.5. Mary and I drank the remaining 8 ounces. It tasted really good. Obviously, a majority of red jalapeño peppers, combined with the dark raisins that we used for the first time, results in a milder jalapeño flavor.

• Tuesday, 12/9: Sawing Firewood
  • Mary uncovered the two layers of plastic and blankets off the tubs of greens and after 11 days in the dark and going through single digit outside temperatures, they all looked pretty good. The multiple coverings really work.
  • I greased the clutch bearing and changed the chain on the big chainsaw.
  • I cut down three trees in the north woods and sawed them up. One was a medium-sized ash. The second was a small red oak and the last one was a large red oak. All of the wood was very hard. I already need to sharpen the chain I put on the chainsaw just today. Mary helped me fill the first wagon load of firewood. I filled the second wagon load with 11 pieces of the base of the big red oak, some of which were two foot in diameter. They were heavy and a chore to hoof out of the woods to the wagon. All firewood was dry except for outer edges that fell into the snow.
  • I watched three deer run east as I backed the tractor and trailer to the edge of the north woods. 
  • We watched The Polar Express (2004) and the first Downton Abbey Christmas special (2011).

• Wednesday, 12/10: Online Discoveries
  • We had a major thaw overnight so that when we opened the bedroom curtains, what just yesterday was a lawn full of snow was now bare ground and slightly green grass.
  • Strong northwest wind gusts to 41 mph blew through the night and well into today. By evening, all was calm.
  • Blue jays enjoyed the wind once it started to wane in speed. They would turn themselves perpendicular to the ground and let the wind carry them across the lawn, then right themselves and go back and do it, again. 
  • After lugging monster red oak firewood chunks yesterday, I did absolutely no physical activity today.
  • I discovered a place in Ely, MN called Henry's Shoe Repair that will make chopper mittens out of moosehide based on a traced outline of your hand for $40. I might give them a try. The old chopper mitts that Mom & Dad gave Mary and I for Christmas in 1990 are finally wearing out.
  • I also found a place in Bloomfield, Iowa called AW Metal that sells everything related to building post frame buildings. It's 84 to 94 miles away, depending on which route you drive. It might be a good source for laminated posts, trusses, metal roofing and siding, and hardware for constructing a new home.
  • I like today's calendar image (see below). It reminds me of Clancy, my Basset Hound when I was a kid.

  

  This looks like Clancy, my pup when I was a pup.

• Thursday, 12/11: Antique Fly Tying
  • Mary heard a rifle shot from Rich's property this morning. He's next to our southwest property border. Deer are scarce now that we're near the end of the anterless hunting season. It ends on Sunday, 12/14/25.
  • I split firewood and moved four wheelbarrow loads of mostly red oak into the woodshed.
  • I took in a webinar about making antique flies. The first fly was one made in England by a Roman in 200 AD. The next four flies made came from a nun in England in 1492 who described making fly fishing line out of horse hair and dying it. Poles were 14 feet long. All of the flies that they made had a body made by wrapping black wool yarn around the hook shank. Chicken, duck, or goose feathers replicated bug wings. Using feathers off the tips of each opposing bird wing puts natural curves in the correct position to exactly reproduce the curl on the two wings of a bug. A book used as a reference for old fishing flies for this Missouri Department of Conservation webinar is Favorite Flies and Their History, by Mary Orvis Marbury. It's a book I want to get.
  • They closed schools in this county over a skiff of snow that fell this afternoon. It's hardly enough to cover the ground. Geesh!!!

• Friday, 12/12: Shopping
  • Right after I wrote in this blog that we weren't seeing deer, a doe and two fawns were eating grass next to the Empire apple tree, right outside our south living room window.
  • We went shopping in Quincy. Friday isn't the best day. I suspect that several factory workers do four day work weeks and take Friday, Saturday, and Sunday off. Also, weather predictions for the area indicate we're in for snow and cold temperatures. That's probably why there was no toilet paper in Sam's Club! Today, all of the stores were full of large crowds, so a few items on our list weren't on the store shelves...such as popcorn. Oh, popcorn exists, as long as you want popcorn seeds with all kinds of unnatural goo on them. We just want plain, unadulterated popcorn seeds. They were not to be had on this shopping trip. 
  • We did find 50-cent-a-pound frozen turkeys at Walmart. We picked up two. We would have bought three, but some guy has several pounds of frozen applesauce in the freezer that isn't converted to apple wine, yet!
  • Upon driving up the lane on returning home, we spotted three rabbits running across the area where we park the pickup. We are temporary residents in this wildlife sanctuary.
  • We watched two movies, which were A Christmas Story (1983) and While You Were Sleeping (1995).

• Saturday, 12/13: Homemade Minestrone Soup
  • Mary made a big pot of minestrone soup. She used a gallon bag of frozen ripe tomatoes from this year's garden in the soup. Wow! It tasted wonderful.
  • We watched eight deer walk by the south side of our house, through the south orchard. They were does and yearlings. Several sniffed the air as wind blew from the north. One doe had hair up on her back and walked by pounding her front hooves on the ground. A few minutes later, while doing chores, I noticed that I could smell minestrone soup at the front door. I bet that doe smelled the soup, thought it was an unfamiliar odor, and got upset.
  • I tried mailing Christmas cards, today, but the mail delivery person didn't deliver or pick up mail. I checked online and the U.S. Postal Service works Saturday. This isn't the first Saturday that I haven't seen mail. I suspect the woman who does our mail route is just lazy. She's the same one who can't bother to shut mailbox doors. I see them all hanging open along Highway 156. She leaves our's open all of the time.
  • Temperatures dropped to single digits prior to bedtime, so I stuffed rags in the cracks around our main door. I ought to adjust the door, but I'd have to make monthly adjustments, due to the constant shifting of this house on poor foundations over ever-changing clay soil. Old sock rags keep cold air out and keep the back porch area much warmer.

• Sunday, 12/14: Mitten Mending
  • Mary and I ordered coffee beans after we discovered that Sam's Club quit selling the variety we like. We both looked online and after a bit of searching, Mary found some on Amazon for a good price that I ordered.
  • Mary mended the thumbs of the wool liners in my leather chopper mittens. I sewed up the thumb in the right-hand mitten. The leather is worn enough that this is probably the last winter for these 35-year old mittens.
  • We started and ended with cool night with temperatures below zero and in the single digits.
  • We watched two movies, which were Green Book (2018) and Love Actually (2003).
  • Today was the last day of the anterless deer hunting season. I have a hunch that the number of deer harvested this year is going to be lower than in past years, due to the cooler winter weather. Shots from neighboring properties were a lot less, this year.

Dec. 1-7, 2025

Weather | 12/1, 2" snow, 20°, 25° | 12/2, sunny, 13°, 29° | 12/3, cloudy, 25°, 39° | 12/4, sunny, 3°, 25° | 12/5, cloudy, 10°, 35° | 12/6, p. cloudy, 21°, 42° | 12/7, cloudy, 25°, 30° |

• Monday, 12/1: More Snow
  • Light snow fell all day, adding up to about two inches.
  • A nice aspect about fresh snow on the ground is all of the wild animal tracks that you see. Based on the tracks, bunnies are very active and we have quite a collection of deer wondering through our lawns. Tracks show that one deer walked right up to the west living room window. Our normal collection of deer ate pears under the Kieffer tree at various times through the day.
  • We took the day off from doing much of anything.
  • We watched two movies, which were Miss Potter (2006) and Little Women (1994).
  • Mary and I realized that this is the first time we've been without a dog since 1993. There are some activities that become automatic with dog ownership for us, such as walking the puppy first thing in the morning and before going to bed. Walking outside at night is something I really miss. Each time an apple is sliced, the urge is to feed a piece of apple core, minus the seeds, to the dog (Plato loved apples).

• Tuesday, 12/2: A Deer Zoo
  • We noticed several robins and white-crowned sparrows flying about in the west yard this morning.
  • A very large deer hoof print showed up near the rain gauge on the lane. It was about the size of a cow's hoof print. We're guessing it was put there by a big buck. 
  • I fixed a 5-gallon gas can spout and then added Ethanol Shield to the gas. The additive works well at protecting small engines from the ill effects of ethanol in gasoline. All gas in Missouri now contains about 10 percent ethanol.
  • I split firewood from large logs we stacked next to the woodsplitter a few days ago. Three wheelbarrow loads were stacked in a crisscross fashion inside the north wall of the machine shed. Three loads that came off a tall red oak stump were dry enough to go into the woodshed. I have two more thick chunks to split.
  • Our lawns are a deer zoo. A herd of 5-6 deer spend extended dinner times under the Kieffer pear tree while pawing snow aside and munching on fallen pears. They're marching all over the place. Snow on the trail to the far garden is pounded down by the deer (see photo, below). They're wandering through the yard at all hours of the day. I had a young deer with a very dark coat peer around a black walnut tree at me while I walked to and from the compost bins at dusk. After I came inside, it walked with curiosity to the compost bins to check out what I was doing. This is an unusual year. In years past, you never saw deer for a couple months after the antlered firearms deer season ended. It's not the case this year.

  

  A young deer on path to the far garden.

• Wednesday, 12/3: Winterizing Chicken Coop
  • After Mary finished the morning chicken chores, she chased a murder of crows out of the north woods that were harassing a red-shouldered hawk.
  • She used a shop vac and a small brush to clean the coils of the refrigerator.
  • With single digit temperatures predicted for tonight, I spent that afternoon tightening the chicken coop. Two 10" x 25" pieces of chicken food bags went into the north coop windows to deflect cold air. I put old dog bed stuffing in the north chicken door and screwed a piece of lauan to the inside. Another piece of stuffing went into a crack on the northeast corner. I stapled a piece of feed bag over that. I put several long screws at the outside base of walls to close up cracks showing on the inside where the walls and the floor meet. I folded up pieces of feed bag and put them between the lower sash of two windows and their sills to fill air gaps. I stuck a piece of foam on the inside of the chicken door to seal off air gaps and hung the oil-filled electric radiant heater in the center of the coop.
  • Our normal herd of deer appeared at dusk to munch on pears under the Kieffer pear tree. 
  • We watched two movies and they were The Book Thief (2013) and The Big Year (2011).

• Thursday, 12/4: Deer, Deer, and More Deer
  • I did more work at tightening up the chicken coop by stuffing pieces of feed bag in cracks where the south wall meets the floor. My efforts at keeping out air leaks is working. After the sun shined through the windows, the temperature in the coop was 42°, which is good considering outside temperatures were cooler.
  • Our resident deer herd enjoying pear snacks keeps increasing. This morning, we watched an eight-point buck (see photo, below) walk to the Kieffer pear tree, eat a pear, then walk north to follow a young doe. As I was finishing up chores at dusk, I counted eight deer walking through the south orchard after having dessert under the pear tree (see photo, below). We're starting to call them deer lice, because we see them everywhere.
  • Mary and I noticed several Bob White quail tracks across the lane when we walked down to get the mail.
  • Mary saw a red-breasted nuthatch perched on the south porch. These birds are usually further north in the winter.

An 8-point buck walking to the Kieffer pear tree.

3 deer (one's behind the other) SW of our house.

• Friday, 12/5: Deer Hunting Prep
  • I walked around to all three of my deer blinds to check for deer tracks. On the way to the Boys' Fort Deer Blind north of the machine shed, I spotted two deer that looked at me for quite some time, then ran west when I left the blind. A barred owl that was in an overhead treetop swooped ahead of me as I walked out of the woods and looked at me, before flying away. There aren't many deer tracks at the Wood Duck Deer Blind. Wood Duck Pond is frozen and deer aren't visiting it. There was a mess of deer tracks all around the East Woods Deer Blind, but pulling a deer out of there would be tough. My best bet for tomorrow's start of anterless season will be the Boy's Fort Deer Blind, since it's the closest to the house.
  • I got hunting stuff ready, including all of the items I need with me when I go out in the morning. I checked that I had enough gas in the tractor and started it to make sure it ran fine. I sharpened knives needed for butchering a deer. I even made eight Ritz cracker with peanut butter sandwiches for a quick bite before I go out in the morning.

• Saturday, 12/6: Second Deer in the Freezer
  • We got up at 5:30 a.m. I got dressed while eating my cracker/peanut butter breakfast snack and was sitting in the Boy's Fort Deer Blind by 6:15. The moon was so bright that I saw everything clearly while walking to the blind. A half hour later, daylight emerged as did lots of squirrels. They're really thick in the woods.
  • Around 7:30, I saw a deer at the edge of the field south of me. It was blocked from my view for a few minutes by a cedar tree. Then it ventured east. Any further and it would be too close to the machine shed, so I squeezed off a right-hand shot and instantly downed the deer. It was just north of the north end of the chicken run.
  • I walked back home, then walked to the deer to discover it was a doe. After driving the tractor with the wagon to near the deer, Mary and I field dressed it. That doe ate all night and had a bulging stomach. I drug it over the snow about 30 feet to the trailer. Mary and I hoisted it in. I'm glad the tractor had chains on the rear tires. I got stuck once while making a left turn near the large Bartlett pear tree. I backed it up a few inches, went forward again and moved right  on through on the second attempt as the rear wheels churned snow. We washed out the body cavity with a garden hose (a very cold job), then hung the deer in the cold machine shed. We then went inside and ate breakfast while the deer cooled.
  • After breakfast, I skinned the deer. Normally, we let venison hang overnight in the machine shed, but the weather prediction called for overnight rain, followed by strong northerly winds, tomorrow, so we decided to process the deer today. The Missouri Department of Conservation asks when you telecheck a doe in via a cell phone for the measurement between the eye and the edge of the nostril. It's a young doe if that distance is 4.5 inches, or less. Even though this doe was young, it measured five inches. My shot entered the top of the neck just above the shoulders. I found the bullet in the pelt outside of the lower stomach. It somehow didn't touch any of the stomach, which was amazing! This girl ate well. There was lots of fat, the fattest doe we've ever butchered. We got 32 packages of meat, but two large roasts were held out of that count. They will be used to make crock pot venison sandwiches at Christmas. The grand total of venison packages in the freezer is at 101, which includes leftover venison from last year. We're in splendid shape with enough meat in the freezer for another year.
  • Since I didn't want a chance of getting the tractor stuck in snow, I loaded the plastic toboggan with the carcass, hide, and fat scraps, and made two trips to the north woods pulling the sled by hand. This was a younger deer, but it had big bones, making the carcass heavy. When that was done, I turned the tractor around inside the machine shed. My hunting days are finished for another year...two bullets and two deer...that's the way I like to hunt.
  • While I was out in the machine shed working on the deer, I heard trumpeter swans east and southeast of us. There's no mistaking that sound.
  • After cleanup and washing dishes, we watched four deer in the dark out our sunroom windows as they moved through the south orchard. The white snow makes it easy to see them after dark. Mary used the binoculars to see them even better, since the glasses amplify the minimal light. We discovered that Gandalf was watching the deer, too.
  • We celebrated the end of our deer season with a bottle of blackberry wine, which tasted really nice. I also cleaned up two Goldrush apples that we ate. They get better with storage and are an excellent apple.
  • We watched two DVDs, which were Christmas Vacation (1989) and A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965).

• Sunday, 12/7: Hibernation Day
  • Our deer herd was back eating snow-covered pears under the Keiffer tree.
  • We hibernated in the house, today.
  • I caught up on three monthly bank statements and brought the checkbook to a balance on the first try, which is remarkable after three months of not looking at it.
  • After dark, on the last evening chore, I heard snow geese flying overhead.
  • I looked at a bunch of videos from a company in Hunnewell, MO, which is 35 miles south of us. They make a bunch of items for building pole barn structures that look interesting. The company is called Concrete Pier System. 

Nov. 24-30, 2025

Weather | 11/24, 0.05" rain, cloudy, 43°, 54° | 11/25, 0.31" rain, cloudy, 45°, 51° | 11/26, p. cloudy, 31°, 37° | 11/27, sunny, 21°, 39° | 11/28, cloudy, 14°, 37° | 11/29, 12" snow, 27°, 31° | 11/30, cloudy, 15°, 25° |

• Monday, 11/24: Autumn Chores
  • Coyotes were howling to the east and southeast during the morning hours.
  • Mary added hay to the chicken coop floor in preparation for cooler temperatures predicted later this week. She also moved a bag of chicken feed, some grit, and oyster shell to the coop.
  • When I drove the tractor yesterday I noticed vapor coming from the radiator and smelled antifreeze. This morning I checked the radiator and could see liquid, but I added a little over a gallon to fill it. I need to do a better job of regularly checking antifreeze levels in that tractor, because the 8N Ford's engine was obviously overheating, yesterday. 
  • Mary raked leaves and added four wheelbarrow loads to the compost bin.
  • When I walked down to the mailbox, several Bob White quail flew away from nearby cedar trees.  
  • I moved several loads of dry firewood from the machine shed to the woodshed. Then I split the ash firewood logs that were sitting next to the splitter and stacked the split pieces in the machine shed to dry.
  • We watched two movies, which were Trading Places (1983) and The Holiday (2006).

• Tuesday, 11/25: Shopping...Again
  • A young barred owl sat in a maple tree in the east yard in the early morning hours while we were outside. Blue jays harassed it.
  • I drove to Quincy and got fresh veggies for our Thanksgiving meal. I also picked up a kitchen faucet at Home Depot. Our current faucet is 10 years old and leaking. It's old enough that new cartridges for it are non-existent. Stores were pretty busy with shoppers. I also canceled the protection plans on our cell phones. It's just an added expense that make no sense for us. We keep phones on a shelf while we're home and look at them at breakfast and in the evenings. We're not hauling them around with us much at all. I gassed up the pickup at Lewistown on the way home. It was $2.55 a gallon.
  • I realized once I arrived home that I forgot to pick up a prescription at the pharmacy. Damn! 
  • Mary cleaned house while I was gone.
  • A cold front rolled in after dark and west wind gusts hit over 40 mph. I woke at 4 a.m. (11/26) with the house shaking on a huge wind blast.

• Wednesday, 11/26: Plato Died
  • Plato died at 3:07 a.m. (11/27/2025). He hasn't eaten for several days and hasn't accepted water for three days. Today, he would walk outside, but collapse. Two of us would carry him inside. We stayed with him in shifts after dark to comfort him. Plato was the best pup we've ever owned. He got along with all animals. Cats rubbed up against him all the time. Plato was easy to train and obeyed extremely well. He will be greatly missed.
  • Bill showed up around noon. He's maybe here for five days. Anywhere from 6 to 11 inches of snow is predicted this weekend, along with wind gusts over 20 mph. Bill might leave early for his home to avoid getting snowed in at our place.
  • I drove to Quincy and got a prescription and some winemaking ingredients. Shoppers were thicker than yesterday. Wind gusts over 40 mph blasted from the west/northwest, giving me a tailwind on the way to town and a headwind driving home.
  • We watched two movies that Bill selected. They were Grumpy Old Men (1993) and It's a Wonderful Life (1946). 
  • I left partway through the last movie to comfort Plato, who was at the other end of the house on his bed. He didn't like heat from the woodstove for the past couple days. When the movies were over, Mary and Bill joined me, so I went to bed around midnight and set the alarm for 4 a.m. to relieve Mary. Bill retired at 1:30 a.m. Mary woke me at 3:20 to have me help her move Plato after he died. We put him in the back of the pickup and locked it up. Bill and I will dig a grave tomorrow.

• Thursday, 11/27: Thanksgiving 2025
  • Bill and I dug a grave for Plato near where Mary and I buried Amber in January. I peeled out clay ground with a mattock and Bill dug out the lumps with a shovel. We finished within 30 minutes of eating turkey dinner. Bill and I were both sore and tired. I'm sure glad Bill was here to help. He mentioned it was the second time he dug a hole through the Thanksgiving holiday. The last time was when Bill helped dig out our waterline when it had a major leak.  
  • Mary fixed up a marvelous Thanksgiving meal with a big turkey that gave us several leftover meals of meat. All dishes tasted wonderful, including our homegrown sweet potatoes. We had a bottle of cherry wine with our meal.
  • Bill picked out the 1998 film, You've Got Mail for us to watch. Mary grabbed a Keeping Up Appearances Christmas show that we watched while eating pumpkin pie.

• Friday, 11/28: Collecting Firewood
  • A leftover from Thanksgiving Day is a photo (see below) of Mocha and Gandalf on the top of the fridge staring at Mary, who at that moment was carving a big turkey.
  • Bill, Mary, and I spent the day cutting and hauling firewood. Mary and Bill first looked for dry firewood to the west. Mary reported several pieces west of the house in the woods south of Frog Pond, so I drove the tractor to the edge of the woods. We took two wagon loads out and stacked most of the firewood in the woodshed. We were all very tired after a day of firewood work.
  • An immature bald eagle flew over us at one point. 
  • Mary gave the chickens more hay on the floor of the coop.

  

  Turkey vultures, Mocha & Gandalf, watching Mary carve a turkey.

   

• Saturday, 11/29: Foot of Snow and Christmas Decorating
  • We experienced heavy snow from the time we got up until about 2:30 p.m. At times, big wet snowflakes the size of golf balls fell to the ground (see video below). We're estimating that we got a foot of snow.
  • Bill wanted to get his car down to the end of our lane, so he and I first walked down the lane to the gravel road. A lone tire track in the snow on the gravel road showed that someone drove down it a couple hours earlier. Bill and I put chains on the rear tires of the tractor after unhooking the trailer and moving it aside. Installing chains on the big-lugged tires is not easy and takes over an hour. Meanwhile, Mary shoveled out all of the trails from the house to various buildings.
  • After we got chains on the tractor, I drove up and down the lane to mash down the wet snow. I drove four times up and down the lane. The tire chain connection on the inside of the left tire caught on a bolt sticking through the through the tractor's fender, so I stopped, got tools, and Bill and I removed that bolt and rewired the connection on the chains. I finished smashing all of the snow down.
  • Bill easily drove his car to the end of the lane and parked it next to the big cedar tree next to the gravel road.
  • After snow quit falling, huge flocks of robins filled our yard and area trees.
  • Mary made three pizzas that we devoured as we played several hands of Rummy. We also enjoyed the last of 2024 apple wine. It was a perfect pick by Bill to match the taste of pizza.
  • The three of us put up the Christmas tree and other decorations around the house as we listened to Christmas music.
  • Once decorations were up, we ate the last of the pumpkin pie and enjoyed a bottle of parsnip wine.
  Big snowflakes falling.
  The sounds are from the woodstove contracting in the heat.
  

• Sunday, 11/30: Bill Travels Safely
  • Bill decided he wanted to leave around 1:30 p.m. to give him plenty of daylight time to get to his St. Charles apartment. He and I walked down the lane and then east on the gravel road to beyond our neighbor's house. A couple tire tracks were in the snow on the gravel road. One was a vehicle with aggressive tread for tires, providing potentially good traction. Most importantly, snow levels dropped significantly since yesterday to about 4-5 inches deep. After a midday meal of turkey leftovers, Bill went to leave, but his car had no traction. We got out his shovel and dug out under his car, which was high centered on snow that froze into a chunk. He asked that I drive while he pushed and on the second attempt his car rolled free. He drove slowly out of sight. When he called from Lewistown to inform us that he made it, Bill said that the mile of driving on the gravel road was the scariest driving he's ever experienced. He was fishtailing the entire stretch. Later, when he texted from his apartment, he said the deepest snow was right at our house.
  • We hope future days off for Bill are a little bit more relaxing. In five days, he experienced a pet's death, digging a grave, trudging firewood out of the forest, digging out of a foot of snow, chaining up a tractor, and skiing in his car down a snow-covered road. 
  • In the afternoon we watch four deer pawing at the frozen snow under the Kieffer pear tree while munching away on yummy pears. The fruit must taste good. The deer were there for probably an hour.
  • One, or all of our pullets are laying little eggs. We're getting one egg a day and that started on Thanksgiving Day.
  • The regular mob of robins were in our yard before dark. They really like taking shelter in the big cedar trees. 

Nov. 17-23, 2025

Weather | 11/17, p. cloudy, 31°, 54° | 11/18, 0.05" rain, cloudy, 43°, 57° | 11/19, foggy cloudy, 42°, 51° | 11/20, 0.06" rain, foggy cloudy, 44°, 50° | 11/21, 0.46" rain, fog, 45°, 49° | 11/22, p. cloudy, 29°, 50° | 11/23, fog, sunny, 33°, 57° |

• Monday, 11/17: My First Deer Hunting Session
  • I went deer hunting from the Boys' Fort Deer Blind in the north woods. A deer stepped away from me as I walked the trail to the blind, then I heard a deer walking to the northwest of me that also snorted a couple times. I could tell by the loud foot falls that it was a large deer...probably a big buck. I caught glimpses of several other deer, but they were always covered partially by tree trunks or heavy brush, so I couldn't get off a good shot. No bullets were wasted this morning. Another deer snorted at me from the bottom of the hill west of the blind. I saw the head of that deer for only a second or two. Leaves were falling in the woods like snow with a strong southeast wind blowing my scent into the deer. Easterly winds make the Boys' Fort a poor choice, as I learned today.
  • Meanwhile, Mary took a photo (see below) through the storm door of our house of a young deer eating grass about 20 feet away.
  • Mary startled a barred owl in the lawn during predawn chores. I saw a barred owl fly across the lane in front of me while I was getting mail this evening. About that same time, Mary watched a juvenile barred owl chasing an adult barred owl. The young owl was screeching like they do when they're asking for food.
  • I took husks off 36 black walnuts, let them dry in the sun, then stored them in an old milk crate.
  • I split some ash firewood. It's not dry enough, so I stacked it in the machine shed. Some hickory firewood I stacked in the machine shed a couple weeks ago is now dry and I took a wheelbarrow load to the house. The inside north wall of the machine shed is an excellent location for drying wood. There's always a breeze through there that helps dry wood quickly.
  • Mary picked up more pecan nuts. It's hard to break that nut-picking habit when you hear them cascading out of trees and hitting the tin on top of the grain bins.
  • Today's high temperature was too hot and tomorrow morning low temperature will likewise be too warm for easily handling venison meat, so I didn't hunt this evening and I decided against hunting tomorrow morning. We're shopping on Wednesday, so no hunting tomorrow evening, either. A St. Louis TV station had a report that the opening weekend's deer hunting numbers were low, this year, due to temperatures averaging statewide at 70°, which is 20° warmer than the normal Nov. 15th temperature. Deer aren't moving around as much, plus hunters going after venison meat are concerned with high heat spoiling the deer carcass.
  • I finished the 14th book in Alexander Kent's nautical series entitled A Tradition of Victory.

  

  This young deer, a button buck, was feeding on grass
  just outside our door while I was hunting this morning.

• Tuesday, 11/18: 2nd Racking of Pear Wine
  • Mary heard three great horned owls hooting when she walked Plato this morning.
  • I cleaned up several winemaking items that were in the west room. I used alcohol to clean up several airlocks. A 5-gallon carboy with dried-on residue took a lot of elbow grease to remove the crud.
  • I racked the pear wine for the second time. The specific gravity was 0.999 and the pH was 3.3. A huge amount of fines were in the bottoms of the 5-gallon carboy and the 1-gallon jug. The remaining liquid went into a 5-gallon carboy, a half-gallon jugf, and a 12-ounce Jarritos bottle. I added one gram of Kmeta. The black raisins I used in this pear wine gives it more of a yellowish orange pear color. I used golden raisins in the past. The darker raisins add a nice flavor to this pear wine. Mary and I really liked the wine when we tasted the leftovers.
  • Mary and I picked over 100 pecan nuts off the ground under the pecan trees.
  • Mary worked up a shopping list for our visit to Quincy, IL, tomorrow.
  • Some idiot tied a dog to a post to the west of us. It barked from late afternoon until dark. Hopefully it wasn't a coyote snack. Mary heard six shots in succession north, northwest of us. Either a hunter missed the mark several times, or the result was a mass of venison hamburger.

• Wednesday, 11/19: Shopping
  • One of our four cats, I don't know which one, landed on the side of my face and the base of my right hand last night with claws fully extended. I woke up for a second, but immediately fell back asleep. When I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror first thing in the morning, I had dried blood down my face in several spots. I cleaned it off with running water and a wet paper towel. Then I thoroughly dabbed hydrogen peroxide on all of the wounds. Everything healed nicely. 
  • We went shopping in Quincy, today. The highlight of the day was purchasing three over-20 pound turkeys for 84 cents a pound. Our freezer now stores four turkeys to help with our yearly meat supply. Of course, one is destined for our Thanksgiving dinner.
  • Stores were real busy with shoppers. You'd swear it was a day before a major holiday.
  • We picked up five movies at two thrift stores.
  • After getting home, emptying the pickup, and doing evening chores, we worked up a big batch of popcorn and watched one of the movies we bought today. It was the 2007 film, The Jane Austen Book Club. This is a good movie.

• Thursday, 11/20: Foggy Grey Day
  • We had heavy fog all day. It was really thick during the mid- to late-afternoon. Right before darkness fell, I couldn't see the Kieffer pear tree from the west living room window.
  • We heard two flocks of snow geese flying overhead this morning. 
  • Mary cleaned the inside of the fridge.
  • I cleaned carboys and winemaking items. Two carboys that once held apple wine had dried residue near the top. They're made with ridges that indent the inside of the carboy and when these areas are filled with gunk, it's very hard to clean. I ended up using hot water and OxiClean and let the carboys lay on their sides with the dried junk sitting in the solution for several minutes, then scrubbing that same area with a bent bottle brush pushing a washcloth into the grooves. It took a long time.
  • I watched a Missouri Department of Conservation Webex on how to identify winter sparrows. It was excellently done.
  • Mary ran into a doe and two grown fawns at three different times while doing evening chores. Conditions continue to be poor for handling venison meat, so I haven't hunted except for one morning this deer hunting season.
  • I ordered a Carpathian walnut sapling from Fedco, along with a seed catalog and 50 strawberry plants.

• Friday, 11/21: Cleaning, Labeling, & Storing Wine
  • We received rain for most of the day. 
  • One of my two blood glucose monitors has a loose button battery that sometimes gives me an error message. Last night while trying to fix it, I lost the battery down the bathroom sink drain. This morning I fished the battery out of the S trap under the bathroom sink. I cleaned the trap with a bucket of water out on our lawn, put it back in place and cleaned the sink, counter and mirror.
  • Mary swept floors and cleaned the kitchen sink.
  • I put on rain gear and slogged down our lane in the rain to get the mail. Partway down the lane, a UPS truck met me and drove on up to the house to deliver a package, then left. Rain was really pouring while I was outside.
  • I made waffles for our midday meal.
  • We got evening chores done real early.
  • I labeled five pea pod wine bottles and 56 cherry wine bottles. I shuffled other full wine bottles into various coolers to free up space and gained three empty coolers that I used to store these new bottles of wine. While I did all this, I listening to music on the record player.

• Saturday, 11/22: Harvested a Button Buck
  • I hunted in the Boys' Fort Deer Blind, arriving at about 6:15 a.m. It was calm. Soon after getting settled, a pack of coyotes howled all around me. Some were just through the trees north in a field. About 15 minutes later, I saw the white flash of a tail as a deer ran away to the west of me. Immediately after that I watched an animal with a blunt nose run into the woods northwest of me. I think it was a bobcat. Finally, I caught glimpses of two deer walk north quite a ways west of me. I heard several flocks of snow geese flying overhead.
  • As we ate a late breakfast, we watched up to four deer eating rotten pears that are now under the Kieffer pear tree. They left and returned several times. Apparently slightly alcoholic pears are addictive to deer.
  • I hunted at the Wood Duck Deer Blind in the afternoon/evening, showing up around 3 p.m. A southwest wind blew right down the dry creek bed and out onto Wood Duck Pond. I noticed several big squirrels and often heard them chewing on nuts. About 15 minutes after the sun set, three deer walked out of the woods just a few feet south of me. I aimed, click, and no discharged bullet. I repeated two more times as the deer walked towards me, stamping their front hooves. Finally, I realized that the safety was on in my rifle. I turned off the safety, aimed, and shot a button buck in the heart. The other two deer didn't run off right away. I aimed at a second deer, but decided that one deer was enough to butcher in one session, and didn't shoot a second time. I texted Mary that I got a button buck and walked home. On the way home, several turkeys flew out of the tops of cedar trees next to Bramble Hill.
  • Mary was waiting for me when I got home. She'd already gathered knives, a saw, and several pairs of latex gloves. I changed to sloppy clothes while Mary walked down to the deer to help with field dressing. Her flashlight went dark as she first saw the blind. I told her the deer was just a few feet south of the blind, so she went to the blind, then moved south through the brush until she stumbled onto the deer. She said howling coyotes were approaching. Mary isn't frightened by them, but wanted to guard the deer from gnawing teeth, so that's why she hurried to it. They left with the sound of me approaching on the tractor.
  • After field dressing the button buck, Mary and I hauled him through the east woods and loaded him in the wagon behind the tractor parked at the bottom of Bramble Hill. At a resting spot while hauling the deer, I pointed out a buck rub that was on a 10-inch diameter cedar trunk. A huge buck must have rubbed his rack against that tree. With a lit hat light, I walked Mary through the cut in the fence next to the north field where she could make it home, then walked back to the tractor and drove it home. We wash out the deer's cavity with a garden hose and hung the deer in the machine shed. A lone coyote was howling west of us. We'll be busy tomorrow handling venison meat.
  • After eating a late supper, we enjoyed a bottle of 2024 cherry wine. It has a beautiful red color and tastes great.

• Sunday, 11/23: Processing Venison
  • We noticed a great blue heron flying overhead when we were outside with Plato.
  • Mary and I processed venison meat from the button buck deer that I got yesterday. Overnight temperatures were perfect at just above freezing. I skinned off the hide and noticed that my shot entered the deer's right shoulder and existed higher the deer's neck. So, one shoulder was no good. This was a deer with a long body and patches of black hair. The meat seemed quit tender as we deboned it. We froze 36 packages of venison, which is very good for a yearling deer. We decided that I'll try to get another small deer. I can foresee the text now..."I got a deer and it's kind of big!"
  • Rain is predicted tomorrow and the next day, with a chance of snow in the forecast. We decided to wait until after Thanksgiving before considering going hunting, again. 
  • When I drove the deer carcass and hide to the north woods in the wagon behind the tractor, I saw three deer bounding away. Our property is messy with deer, especially yearlings. I think it was an excellent year for baby deer.
  • There is reduced hunting pressure from nearby properties. The nephew of the owner of the land east of us isn't there anymore. His cinch straps that were permanently holding the stand to a honey locust tree killed the tree. When the tree fell down it took the stand down with it and bent the stand up in a rusted heap. I never hear shots from the trailer parked just north of our property line, nor do I ever hear guns going off from the stand just west of our west property line. Rich, who owns land adjacent to our southwest property corner, didn't hunt this year. I think most everyone is hunting for racks instead of meat and does and young deer aren't hunted at all. I saw a recent survey that in 2008, over half of Missouri hunters sought meat. Today, only 17 percent hunt for food. That explains why deer don't run after a gun goes off. They're unfamiliar to the sound of a rifle.

Nov. 10-16, 2025

Weather | 11/10, cloudy, 17°, 35° | 11/11, cloudy, 25°, 51° | 11/12, sunny, 35°, 62° | 11/13, sunny, 35°, 64° | 11/14, sunny, 47°, 74° | 11/15, p. cloudy, 58°, 71° | 11/16, sunny, 30°, 53° |

• Monday, 11/10: Wood Duck Blind is Ready & Bottling Peapod Wine
  • We had a real hard overnight freeze. Leaves dropped off most of the trees, except the oaks. Whole collections of leaves tumbled out of the pecan trees at almost every second.
  • Mary picked a lot of pecans off the tree nearest the house. Those pecans are larger and possess thicker husks, which squirted juice with every squeeze. "Man, was that messy!" exclaimed Mary.
  • I weedwhacked the rest of the Wood Duck Trail, cleaned leaves out of the Wood Duck Blind, stuffed grass in gaps in the hog fence surrounding the blind, wired a lauan wood roof to the blind, and put several oak branches with leaves over the roof and weighed them down with heavy sticks. That blind is ready for deer hunting season.
  • On the way to the blind, I saw eight wild turkeys walking on the trail near the north field. They flew in several directions once I got too close to them.
  • At twilight, three deer were looking over the south orchard apple trees while smacking their lips. I ran outside and clapped loudly to send them running.
  • I racked the peapod wine for the fifth time and bottled it. The wine is still a little hazy. The specific gravity was 0.990 and the pH was 3.2. The alcohol content is 12.445, which is rather high, caused by the very low final specific gravity level. I corked five bottles. Mary and I tasted the remaining wine. This wine needs a lot of aging. Right now it has a strong alcohol flavor. It's actually a complex taste. It's flowery, with a citrus accent, along with an essence of grape Kool-Aid, which is odd! The color is yellow/green (see photo, below). I'll hide it for a year and then give it another taste.

  

  2025 peapod wine in a clear bottle.

• Tuesday, 11/11: Bottling Cherry Wine
  • A strong southwest wind blasted through most of the day.
  • Mary picked pecans from on the ground and off the tree nearest to the house. She used a ladder to get up higher on limbs of the tree. She said she's officially done picking pecans.
  • I racked and bottled 11 gallons of cherry wine. It amounted to seven hours of work, ultimately corking 56 bottles. The specific gravity was 0.995 and the pH was 3.0. The alcohol content is 10.15 percent. I added 1.1 grams of Kmeta to the wine from the 6-gallon carboy and 1 gram to the wine from the 5-gallon carboy and the 750-ml bottle. Mary and I drank the leftovers, which was an amount just shy of 750 ml. It has the strongest cherry flavor of any cherry wine I've ever made. It's also very smooth, which is amazing for a newly bottled wine. This will be a great wine, well worth the effort of picking all those cherries and making the wine.
  • Bill called with dates of when he's visiting us for the two upcoming holidays, which are Nov. 26-28, and Dec. 24-26.
  • Katie and Mary sent texts back and forth in the nighttime hours. Katie showed several photos of the aurora dancing above Anchorage.

• Wednesday, 11/12: Pears, Begone, & Cleaning Guns
  • Mary tossed all of the remaining Bartlett pears out of two drawers in the chest of drawers on the upstairs landing. It was just too many pears for us to eat before they went bad. Fortunately, Mary put plastic down on the bottom of each drawer.
  • Mary raked mulberry leaves near the entrance to the chicken yard and put 12 wheelbarrow loads into the compost bin, covering rotten pears.
  • Mary watered the dry rows of garlic in the far garden.
  • She also poured a 40-pound bag of sunflowers into buckets that stay inside the chicken coop.
  • I used the loppers to clip tree branches and autumn olive saplings along the gravel road that were hiding purple paint, which indicates no trespassing to hunters. The Asian ladybugs were so thick that on some tree trunks, I counted 100 bugs in a one foot area.
  • I cleaned the two 30-30 rifles. In the process, I broke my cleaning rod and bent the 30 caliber gun cleaning brush. It's an aluminum cleaning rod I got from Mary for Christmas back in the 1990s when we lived in Roseau, MN, so it lasted a long time. Fortunately, I cleaned the rifle with the longest barrel first before it broke. The two remaining sections of the rod were long enough for me to clean the rifle with the shorter barrel.
  • I measured from the corner of the trail to the ponds where it first turns east and then whacked tall grass and weeds for just over 100 feet to get me the total 100 yards I need for sighting in the two 30-30 rifles.
  • In the evening, I finalized my Christmas wish list and sent it to Katie and Bill. I also ordered a gun cleaning kit for myself for Christmas. I just can't look at it or open the package until Dec. 25th. 
  • We heard flying squirrels talking to each other in the pecan trees when we walked Plato on his last outing before bed. They sound like squeaky birds.

• Thursday, 11/13: Sighting in Rifles
  • Mary mowed part of the front yard and mulched a row and a half of garlic in the far garden.
  • I used a 100-foot measuring tape to accurately measure 100 yards on the trail to the ponds. Yesterday's measuring was nine feet off, so I whacked down another 10-12 feet of tall weeds. Then, I set up a target clamped to a saw horse at the 100 yard mark and my rifle rest on a Workmate portable work bench. I loaded the rifle rest with several boxes of shotgun shells. The lead in these old shells gives the rest plenty of weight to keep it from moving. I sighted in both 30-30 rifles. The adjustments of the scope on the short barreled rifle doesn't seem to change the end result. I made no adjustments on the long barreled rifle...it was spot-on.
  • I watched a fly tying Webex detailing scuds and midges. Scuds are tiny freshwater crustaceans and midges are tiny flies, but spend most of their life in water. They had a camera that needed an update which was discovered immediately prior to going live, so they tried using a cell phone's camera to show tying details. It didn't work very well, so they verbally described how to tie the fly. Interestingly enough, two hairs from moose mane are the best material for making these tiny flies. They will present a series of beginning fly tying classes starting in January. Sign up starts on Nov. 17th and they limit it to 20 participants. I'm going to attempt to get in that online class.
  • Mary and I got Santa's elves lined up to make presents for Christmas.

• Friday, 11/14: Making Salsa & Finishing Deer Blind Prep
  • Mary made salsa, canning 14 quarts. One pint of unprocessed salsa went into the fridge. I tried a little of it and it's quite yummy. With warmer outside temperatures, she had some windows open to let out the moist air from steam coming off the the canner, that boils water for 90 minutes.
  • I took the small chainsaw east to the dry creek bed and cut out several willow trees that fell over and blocked the way. It helps open up a walking area for deer. There are a ton of deer tracks in the sand of the dry creek bed.
  • After whipping up waffles so Mary didn't have to cook a meal, I took the trimmer east and cleaned up a trail to the dry creek bed, then walked south on that bed and cleaned up a trail from it to the East Woods Deer Blind. I wired some chunks of wood into the east wall of that blind and replaced old cedar branches at its entrance with oak branches with leaves attached that I cut a few days ago on the Wood Duck Trail. The East Woods Deer Blind is now ready for the deer season, thereby finishing all deer blind preparations.
  • Tomorrow is the start of the main rifle deer hunting season. I noticed a bunch of traffic on the gravel road at twilight. The head hunters (those who are only after a big rack to hang on their wall) have arrived. 
  • I watched a Webex session on identifying waterfowl in Missouri. It involved extremely basic information. Again, a software update made things difficult for the presenters.
  • Mary and I did more encouragement to Santa's elves during nighttime hours. They're getting slightly testy with us.

• Saturday, 11/15: Salsa Batch #2 & Tractor Maintenance
  • Mary made the second batch of salsa, resulting in another 14 quarts. The push is on to finish three batches prior to my deer hunting, when spending all day whipping up a batch of salsa is out of the question. Three salsa batches is enough to keep us supplied for one year.
  • I did maintenance on the 8N Ford tractor. First, I cleaned up battery clamps with a wire brush, then attached the clamps and tested starting the tractor. The new battery spins the motor over quicker than the last battery. Next, I cleaned the four spark plugs and reset their gaps. I was startled to discover three of the four plugs weren't tight. I'm sure that decreased engine compression. Again, on the test start up, the engine ran much better. Tractor engine maintenance at this time of the year helps it start when it's needed to help move a deer and the temperatures are colder.
  • I set up lights in the machine shed in preparation to butchering deer.
  • Today was the first day of the main rifle deer hunting season and it was extremely quiet in the morning. We heard three shots right after sunset. One involved four shot, three of which were quick shots to the northwest. That usually indicates someone trying to shoot a running deer, which usually doesn't work. 
  • Mary and I watered the garlic. We're hoping the rain predicted for us in the next couple days results in actual moisture.
  • I called Mom on her 91st birthday. Hank drove in from Glasgow, MT, to help her celebrate with a nice cake. She and three other November birthday folks celebrated birthdays at the Circle Senior Center. Hank took her out for dinner before leaving for his home due to snow mixed with rain coming down on the highways. Mom and some other friends were off in the evening to a Glendive Community Concert.
  • Mary and I ordered the final Christmas presents. We like to get it done early enough for items to arrive before the Christmas shipping rush.

• Sunday, 11/16: Salsa Making is Finished
  • We must be home to hundreds of blue jays. We saw a continuous supply of them out all of our living room windows this morning.
  • Mary finished making salsa by cooking up another 14-quart batch. This time, one quart jar didn't seal, so it went in the fridge to be eaten, soon. She was very happy to be done with this chore.
  • Mary also finished mulching all of the garlic by mowing the rest of the front lawn and moving grass clippings to the far garden.
  • I sharpened eight knives that we'll use for field dressing and butchering deer.
  • I collected 85 black walnuts to add to our supply. The nuts under walnut trees between the gardens grew to a very large size this year.
  • The spider balloonists were plentiful while we were outside, today. 
  • I got items, such as outdoor garments, ready for hunting deer tomorrow morning.
  • We enjoyed a bottle of spiced apple wine.

Nov. 3-11, 2025

Weather | 11/3, p.cloudy, 34°, 61° | 11/4, p. cloudy, 39°, 68° | 11/5, sunny, 49°, 60° | 11/6, sunny to T-storm, 0.02" rain, 30°, 62° | 11/7, sunny, 46°, 67° | 11/8, cloudy, 0.06" rain, 36°, 52° | 11/9, sunny to cloudy, 25°, 33° |

• Monday, 11/3: Ladybug Invasion Begins
  • We picked more pecan nuts. Mary gathered several in the morning and in the evening. I grabbed some from above the first bin roof during our morning collection.
  • I cut down a medium-sized hickory that had bark shedding, so I knew it was dead. The big Stihl chainsaw did fast work at sawing it up. Six pieces went into the machine shed next to the woodsplitter. The rest went into the woodshed. It amounted to two wheelbarrow loads.
  • Mary finished popping the last two varieties of garlic in preparation to planting it.
  • The Asian ladybug invasion of our house began (see video, below). It's a yearly event that starts on the first warm day in autumn after a killing frost. 
  • I moved tall cut grass with a wheelbarrow to the Boys' Fort deer blind and filled holes in the hog fence surrounding it with handfuls of grass to block a deer's view of me.
  • Mary spread compost on the three future rows of garlic in the far garden and turned all of the soil in the western first row. 
  • I used a pitchfork to move weeds I cut yesterday off the trail between the ponds and weedwhacked head-height lespedeza weeds on the Wood Duck Trail. I got to Bramble Hill.
  • I checked the pear wine and squeezed the nylon mesh bags. The specific gravity was 1.048.
  • We saw the twin deer that hang around the house on the lane during our evening walk with Plato. Several minutes later, while walking to the compost bins, I heard deer thundering away on the other side of the cedar trees. That was probably those same two deer.
   
  Asian ladybugs on the south living room window.
  

• Tuesday, 11/4: Planting Garlic & Racking Apple Wine
  • Mary picked pecan nuts off the ground in the morning and evening.
  • I racked the apple wine for the third time. It had a specific gravity of 0.998 and a pH of 3.0. I lost a wine bottle's worth of liquid and put the must into a 3-gallon carboy and a half-gallon jug. Mary and I tasted the leftovers. It had a lemon flavor and was very tart. The apple taste will come out with aging.
  • Mary planted the Siberian and Georgian Chrystal garlic varieties in the first row of the far garden and turned over the third row's soil.
  • The battery was dead, again, on the 8N Ford tractor. I set up the charger, then marched east with the big chainsaw and eventually reached the cedar forest prior to what Mary calls the Banana Field, a clear cut area just west of the dry creek bed. Dead trees I thought were there have all decayed, so I walked north, then west along a gully. Finally, close to the old cow barn, I found and cut a dead cherry tree. I walked back, started the tractor, then drove it to the cherry tree, loaded the trailer with firewood, hauled it home, unloading seven trunk pieces next to the woodsplitter, with the rest in the woodshed. I NEED TO BUY A NEW BATTERY!
  • I saw an American kestrel fly overhead as I was at the cherry tree. It eyeballed me, then flew on. 
  • Mary vacuumed Asian ladybugs from inside the house for the second day in a row.
  • I moved downed weeds out of Wood Duck Trail that I cut yesterday.
  • While I was near Dove Pond, I heard whistling sounds from duck wing beats as they took off. Mary looked it up and that's probably the sound of common goldeneye ducks that are migrating through here. 
  • I checked the pear wine. The specific gravity was 1.039, so it's brewing along, slowly. This is good. Slow brewing produces a better taste.

• Wednesday, 11/5: Firewood & Garlic Planting
  • Mary picked up more pecans with morning and evening nut searches.
  • I removed the air conditioner in the upstairs north bedroom.
  • The oven baking element came via UPS and I installed it. The old element really looked fried where it burst into flames.
  • Mary planted two more garlic varieties. They were Music Pink and German Extra Hardy.
  • I drove the tractor and trailer to just east of the old cow barn where a large dead ash tree stands that has six trunks and cut down one of the trunks. After loading the firewood, I ended up with a three-quarters full trailer of wood. Several big pieces went to near the woodsplitter in the machine shed, while the rest was stacked in the woodshed.
  • Today, the 8N Ford tractor started, probably because I never shut the engine off once I got it running yesterday, thereby fully charging the battery. I'm still getting a new battery, so I can depend on starting it when I need to when cold temperatures arrive.
  • The rising full moon was huge this evening. Mary took a nice photo of it (see below).

  

  A large full moon viewed from our east yard.

• Thursday, 11/6: Eye Exam & All is Well!
  • I went to Quincy for an annual eye checkup. I have 20:20 vision in my right eye and 20:25 vision in my left eye. After a thorough look, the doctor said there are no signs of macular degeneration or glaucoma, so how I'm dealing with diabetes is working. It was a quick visit.
  • Mary found more pecans, several of which are falling as husks open in the trees.
  • She turned the soil over in the last garlic row of the far garden and planted garlic cloves. Today the Samarkand and Shvelisi varieties went into the ground, finishing all garlic planting.
  • Mary threw out the Halloween pumpkin. She usually cooks the meat up and freezes it, but due to the oven mishap, cooking pumpkin meat was delayed several days and it was too late, even with the pumpkin stored in the refrigerator.
  • After my eye checkup, I bought a new battery for the tractor from Farm & Home, a 2.5 gallon jug of glysophate for killing autumn olives and lespedeza, and a few other food items, such as a turkey for 89 cents a pound.
  • A check of the pear wine gave me a specific gravity of 1.026. This is a slow brewing batch of wine.
  • Mary and I enjoyed a bottle of 2022 blackberry wine. It's very good.
  • We had a brief heavy rain from a small thunderstorm that rolled through right after we walked Plato for his last outing before bedtime.
    

• Friday, 11/7: Pickled Jalapeños & Clearing a Trail
  • Mary made four quarts of refrigerated pickled jalapeños. 
  • She also did a bit of mowing under the maple tree next to the woodshed to clean up leaves.
  • Mary picked pecans off the ground under the trees.
  • I removed the last air conditioner, which was in our bedroom. There were lots of bugs that emerged from it...both Asian ladybugs and flies.
  • I used a full gas tank in the Stihl trimmer and whacked weeds and grass from the Wood Duck Trail. I also mowed where I'd whacked weeds on the trail in order to catch pieces sticking up. Finally, I trimmed overhanging branches so I don't have to duck while driving the 8N Ford on the trail. Any autumn olive saplings were left standing. I want to hit them with glyphosate weed killer this year, so I don't have to continue trimming them out every single year. I reached the cut through the fence just prior to entering the east forest.
  • We covered the tubs of autumn greens with blankets before going to bed. We noticed that a north wind dropped temperatures when we walked Plato, so we figured it best to cover the plants.
  • Katie was visiting Mekoryuk, a native village on Nunivak Island, near Bethel. While watching the Native Youth Olympics at the school, Katie texted about various achievements by winners in specific events. It was fun to read how well the athletes performed and to look up the different events.
    

• Saturday, 11/8: First Racking of Pear Wine
  • Mary picked up another nice batch of pecans off the ground. She got several off the tree nearest to the house, which is more of a commercial tree, as compared to the others that are native Missouri pecan trees.
  • I racked the pear wine for the first time. The specific gravity was 1.013 and the pH was 3.4. I got just under 6 gallons after I squeezed juice out of the two nylon mesh bags. Liquid went into a 5-gallon carboy and a 1-gallon jug with an ample amount of room at the tops of both containers to handle foam expansion. We didn't taste any, but the aroma is marvelous.
  • I split firewood and stacked four wheelbarrow loads into the woodshed. The splitter's engine runs very nicely, now that I updated a few things on it.
  • I cut a new sheet of plastic to cover the greens. Mary helped me anchor it down over the tubs of greens with bricks and a couple large chunks of old firewood.
  • A brief bit of rain swept through in the afternoon. After dark, a strong northwest wind started blowing. 
  • We watched the first half of the Ken Burns' documentary on Mark Twain while we enjoyed two pots, each, of hot cinnamon spice tea, made by Harney & Sons.
    

• Sunday, 11/9: Winemaking Day
  • We woke to colder temperatures and witnessed a couple snow flurries today. We kept chickens in the coop with a strong northwest wind blowing and subfreezing temperatures prevailing. We also kept the greens covered with plastic.
  • While dumping ashes this morning, I heard quiet honking sounds, looked up and watched six trumpeter swans fly overhead, heading south.
  • I racked two wines for the second time today, which were jalapeño and parsnip:
    
    • Jalapeño - The specific gravity was 0.992 and the pH was 3.1. I added 0.6 grams of Kmeta. Made from mainly ripe red peppers, the fines had an orange pumpkin moon crater look to them. The liquid filled a 3-gallon carboy and a 750-ml bottle. Mary and I tasted leftovers. It's warm, but not overwhelming. This will be a good drinking wine.
    • Parsnip - The specific gravity was 1.000 and the pH was 3.5. Fines were quite flowable and the racked liquid is cloudy. I added 0.8 grams of Kmeta. I filled a 3-gallon carboy, a gallon jug and a 375-ml half bottle. Mary and I tasted leftovers. It is amazingly good, considering how young it is, with an earthy, citrus flavor.
  • Mary and I picked pecan nuts off the ground in the morning and she did another collection in the evening prior to darkness. Several nuts are falling from husks left in the trees.
  • Mary added blankets to the outside of the plastic covering the greens, then put the old plastic cover over the blankets. It sort of gives them a double pane effect of plastic, plus insulation. We'll see how well it keeps the greens warm in subfreezing weather. 
  • One of our two white hens met its demise today after Mary witnessed it landing on top of a young pullet and ripping at the pullet's comb. This has been an ongoing issue. We can't have a hen that we didn't order, which was an extra from last year's chicken shipment, trying to kill young pullets that we ordered and paid for this year. Mary killed that chicken tonight. Instantly, the coop was settled down without so much fussing. 
  • We watched the second half of the Ken Burns' documentary on Mark Twain.