April 29-May 5, 2024

Weather | 4/29, 0.09" rain, p. cloudy, 58°, 69° | 4/30, p. cloudy, 50°, 75° | 5/1, p. cloudy, 57°, 74° | 5/2, 0.25" rain, cloudy, 57°, 75° | 5/3, 0.23" rain overnight, sunny, 50°, 71° | 5/4, cloudy, 57°, 69° | 5/5, p. sunny, 44°, 69° |

• Monday, 4/29: Mowing in the Mud
  
  • Rain fell overnight, but a southwest wind dried some things out on a relatively sunny day.
  • When I took dogs for a walk, a carpenter bee buzzed Amber and she wanted inside, immediately. She hates buzzing insects. So, Plato and I walked on the east loop trail (see photo, below). I pulled 38 ticks off him upon returning home.
  • I picked the last of the winter greens. There were four lettuce plants, two that were relatively large. I also picked all good leaves off the kale plants, then fed the removed plants to the chickens. By evening, stalks were all that were left of the kale in the chicken yard. 
  • We had a midday meal of chimichangas with lots of greens on top.
    
  • Mary mowed the far north yard, which was tough, because most of the time the mower and her shoes were sinking into mud. Pushing an 83-pound mower through mud isn't easy. She says that's why we don't need a membership to a gym.
    
  • It was too windy to spray fruit trees, so I finished knocking down tall grass in the near garden with just over two tanks of gas in the Stihl trimmer.
    
  • Mary spotted a summer tanager and an eastern kingbird for the first time this season.
  • Mary saw a wild turkey fly across the east yard, heading north.
  • We watched the 2012 movie, The Avengers. This film's high volume chased Nick, our white and black cat, out of the room several times.

  

  Plato on east loop trail. He gets hot on long walks, lately.

• Tuesday, 4/30: Mowing, Raking & Hockey
  
  • A southwest wind kept me from spraying fruit trees and when it was calm, weather radar indicated that rain was arriving. It never did, despite an 80 percent prediction.
  • I saw the first hummingbird of the season as it zipped across the east lawn to the Sargent crabapple tree.
    
  • While Mary trimmed dog nails in the east yard, she heard a bobwhite quail.
  • Mary mowed the lane.
  • I raked the cut grass in the near garden and hauled away five wheelbarrow loads. Two went in the compost bin and three went around the Granny Smith apple tree.
    
  • I paid attention to four NHL playoff games in the evening...Toronto's overtime 2-1 win over Boston, Carolina's 6-3 win over the Islanders to win the series, Colorado's 6-3 win over Winnipeg to knock the Jets out, and Nashville's 2-1 win over Vancouver. One team I was rooting for won and that was Toronto. I tend to lean north on most of my hockey favorites.
    

• Wednesday, 5/1: Cookies and Spraying Trees
  
  • Mary heard a common yellowthroat, the first of the season. This bird's call sounds like "witchity, witchity, witchity."
    
  • At first, I saw a deer's head near the Kieffer pear tree. Then, I noticed a bouncing branch on that same tree. Finally, I spotted a large, lanky doe marching towards the blueberry bushes, so I ran outside to chase the deer away. Three deer ran off into the north woods.
    
  • Mary baked yummy chocolate chip and oatmeal cookies.
  • Northeast winds were light, so I sprayed Immunox on some of the fruit trees to battle both cedar-apple rust and apple scab. These trees included the two Bartlett pear trees (showing lots of orange cedar-apple rust spots), and the Empire, Granny Smith, Roxbury Russet, Calville, Gold Rush, Antonovka, and McIntosh apple trees, and the Prairie Fire crabapple tree.
  • I found about 10 instances of fire blight in the Granny Smith tree. I cut out the infected branches and covered the cuts with Tree Kote. I didn't see fire blight on any other tree.
  • There are too many tiny apples on the Empire, Granny Smith and McIntosh trees, so I'll be thinning them, soon. It won't be a big pear year, though.
  • I watched the Edmonton Oilers beat the L.A. Kings, 4-3, to advance in the playoffs. While watching ESPN, I listened to the Edmonton radio announcers, who pay attention to the game, instead of telling convoluted stories. It's always fun when the team you're rooting for, wins.
    

• Thursday, 5/2: Rain Means Green
  
  • We experienced sprinkles in morning, then rain set in with thunderstorms around 1:30 p.m.
  • We heard a catbird for the first time in the morning.
  • With all of our recent rains, we are so green that it almost hurts your eyes.
    
  • Mary replanted Asian hot pepper seeds in potting soil where past seeds never germinated. Her new seed came from some of our own dried peppers.
    
  • Mary made a very nice BBQ pork loin for our midday meal.
    
  • I tried getting the switchel jugs started as insect traps in the apple trees, but oncoming rain prevented me from finishing.
    
  • I listened to the last half of the NHL playoff game between Toronto and Boston. The Maple Leafs won, 2-1, to force a Game 7 in Boston in a couple days. The Toronto radio announcers are really good and sometimes quite funny.
  • We enjoyed a bottle of 2021 pear wine and it was extremely good.
    

• Friday, 5/3: Mailbox vs. Neighbor's Horses
  
  • When Mary and I walked bills to the mailbox, we discovered that it was dented here and there and the bent lid couldn't close. Horse hair all over it told us what happened. The neighbor's two horses, who are let out to wonder anywhere, used it as a rubbing post. We walked back home, got several sets of pliers, and worked the mailbox metal back in shape so the door would close. Then, I loaded the pickup with tools, a 3/4-inch thick piece of plywood and sawhorses, returned and put a more permanent fix on the mailbox.
  • When I installed this mailbox after the last one was smashed by pickup, I determined its support as wimpy. Eight tiny 1/8-inch bolts through the bottom of the mailbox held it to a metal plate. It wobbled in any wind. Today, I replaced those small bolts with quarter-inch bolts long enough to also go through 3/4-inch plywood. I added four lag bolts through the top of the plywood, countersunk with washers, to solidly secure the plywood to the top of the post. Using 10 roofing screws that have rubber washers, I secured the bottom sides of the mailbox to the edges of the plywood. I also added four more screws holding the metal plate to the post in the ground, increasing the total of those screws to eight. The mailbox's shape went back to normal with a solid structure under it and it doesn't wobble in the wind, now.
  • Once finished with the mailbox, it was 6:30 p.m. I drove to the neighbor's house with the horses. Several dogs greeted me. They're full of inflated ticks, so basic animal care is really lacking. I rang the doorbell and knocked on the door, but nobody answered. When I got back home, I called the Lewis County Sheriff's office about the constantly loose horses. A deputy left me a voice mail, later. I need to get back with them. This is year two of horses left to roam freely by this neighbor. The neighbors across the road tell me that these same horses are rubbing on their vehicles and the mobile home, doing damage and leaving manure everywhere. Alma, from across the road, forwarded a bill for the damages for them to pay and called the sheriff's office, since their mailbox has been knocked to the ground twice by these horses.
    
  • Mary planted tomato and tomatillo seeds in Styrofoam cups.
  • She also scythed the tall grass that was growing around the garlic beds. She put four big wheelbarrow loads of grass mulch around the Granny Smith and Empire apple trees.
    
  • When I got home and walked to the porch, Mary said she watched a hummingbird rush my back while I walked by the forsythia bush.
    
  • We had a pair of red-tailed hawks circling above us early in the day and Mary noticed a  pair of wood ducks flying overhead that landed into Wood Duck Pond in the evening.
  • A day of fixing the mailbox meant I missed Vancouver defeat Nashville and advance in the NHL playoffs. They now play Edmonton. I like both teams in the upcoming series, so I'll root for whomever wins between the Canucks and the Oilers.
    

• Saturday, 5/4: No Rain, No Horses
  
  • An 80 percent chance of rain turned to nothing, but clouds. We got a couple drops in the morning, but rain systems dried up before getting to us throughout the day.
  • I wandered down the the gravel road several times, today. There were no signs of horses, even in the neighbor's fenced-in area. No one seems to be home at the neighbor's house, either.
    
  • I took the small chainsaw down to the ditch behind the mailbox and cut down four small autumn olive saplings. They grow to massive bushes if left to develop. I also cut down a dead rose bush that had poison ivy vines growing through it.
  • Mary did a bunch of house cleaning.
    
  • I listened to Game 7 between the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Boston Bruins. Boston won, 2-1, in overtime. According to CBC, Toronto has lost six straight game 7s.
    
  • I discovered four seed ticks biting me on a check prior to going to bed. It's my fault. I didn't spray myself with bug dope prior to doing outside work. I should know better!
    

• Sunday, 5/5: Mushrooms, Deer Traffic, & Switchel
  
  • I sharpened the blade on the old lawnmower. I also changed the oil in the new mower. The manual says to change oil after 10 hours of runtime on the first oil change, which I'm sure we've surpassed.
    
  • Mary made pizza for our midday meal.
    
  • She also mowed the west yard and the grass between the woodshed and the machine shed. Mulch went around the Porter's Perfection and Liberty apple trees, along with one blueberry bush.
  • Mary discovered huge mushrooms along an elm log (see photos, below). She tentatively identified them as false chanterelle mushrooms, but exact identification is still iffy.
    
  • We heard a continuous and exactly repetitious fake turkey hen call. Today is the last day of spring turkey hunting season, so we're guessing hunters were throughout the woods. Real turkey hens vary their call. Dumb hunters seem not to understand the variability of turkey calls and scratch on their slates forever, something that the real animal never does.
    
  • We watched a pregnant doe walk by through the north yard, then through the west yard and into the south woods.
    
  • I saw seven deer cross the lane near Bluegill Pond. We think heavy weekend turkey hunting activity pushed deer onto our acreage.
    
  • I watched a hummingbird eating from comfrey flowers near the basement door.
  • I cleaned out one-gallon jugs and filled them with switchel, which consists of molasses, vinegar, and water. The recipe involves a glug of this and a glug of that...not to exacting. Wires stuffed through a piece of old water hose, or electric fence tubing were used to hang the jugs off tree branches. I put one jug in Granny Smith, two in Empire, and one in the McIntosh tree. The switchel saves the fruit from harmful fruit bugs, such as apple maggots, coddling moths, plum curculios, and fruit flies. They drown in the concoction.

Mushrooms on a three-year old elm log.

ID ran from Jack-o-lantern to chanterelle to false chanterelle.