August 12-18, 2024

Weather | 8/12, 0.72" rain, cloudy, 63°, 67° | 8/13, cloudy, 63°, 77°| 8/14, 0.24" rain, cloudy, 64°, 77° | 8/15, 0.09" rain, p. cloudy, 68°, 87° | 8/16, 0.67" overnight rain, p. cloudy, 64°, 88° | 8/17, p. cloudy, 65°, 79° | 8/18, p. cloudy, 63°, 81° |

• Monday, 8/12: A Good Rain
  
  • We experienced a nice morning soaking rain. Garden plants were squeaking with joy (see photos of near garden, below).
  • Mary and I stayed inside and did mundane jobs, like balancing the checkbook and washing a ton of dishes.
  • I chased red-bellied woodpeckers out of the Granny Smith apple tree all day. Firecrackers send them flying in a hurry.
  • Every morning except Friday, we eat oatmeal topped with sliced Granny Smith apples, cut-up pecan nuts, blackberries, cinnamon and ground nutmeg. Friday mornings I make waffles. We've been buying nutmeg from Quincy's Farm & Home, but they switched brands recently, resulting in tiny containers for the same price that taste like bitter bark dipped in turpentine. Mary and I both looked online. Mary found a California company named The Spice Way that sells ground nutmeg in two-pound amounts, so I ordered some. We'll freeze what we don't initially use. That ought to last us for awhile. 
    

Peppers (left) & sweet potatoes (right).

Strawberries (near) & acorn squash (next).

• Tuesday, 8/13: Making Salsa
  
  • Mary thawed out produce frozen from last year's garden to make 14 quarts of salsa. Bags of tomatoes, tomatillos, and hot peppers were chopped, along with onions and cooked up in a four-gallon stock pot. Then she canned them in quart jars. Mary had just enough salsa to fill the 14th jar, with only a couple teaspoons left over at the end. All canning lids sealed. This equals 28 meals for the two of us. Mary has enough frozen ingredients for one more batch of salsa.
    
  • I whacked weeds and grass from under the lowest electric wire in the near garden. This was only the second trimming of the year, so it took a lot of time. Today was a good time for weedwhacking, because moist soil from recent rain meant I wasn't stirring up a dust storm with the trimmer. I also buzzed away grass encroaching along all rows of the garden and around the strawberry tubs and buckets. I knocked off heads of tall green foxtail grass that grows through the chicken wire fence. If I used the string trimmer to take out this grass, I'd cut up the chicken wire fence. So, I let it grow, but cut off the seed heads that spring up above the top of the fence.
  • Mary looked for hornworms and found one egg, that she destroyed. The recent rain really boosted dark green leaves and fast growth on garden plants.
  • While checking for worms, we watched a large group of dragonflies flit about over the weeds and grass east of the far garden. They were catching bugs. We also spotted a doe deer beyond the garden's north end. It peered at us for a couple minutes, then ran off down the hill to the east.
    

• Wednesday, 8/14: More Nice Rain
  
  • Rain and achy, overused arm muscles as a result of running a trimmer for hours, yesterday, kept me inside. The nice part was the rain, which turns green plants even greener.
    
  • I calculated needed spiced apple wine ingredients and added what I need on our shopping list.
    
  • I looked up hops wine recipes and watched a scary video of a British homebrewer while he made apple/hops sparkling wine. His airlock was black with mold. He started transferring liquid by sucking on the end of a hose...great hygiene! He constantly added sugar by saying, "I'll add just a little bit," and then dumped in a big gob. On the final taste test, he said, "It's surprisingly sweet." What a shock! I don't think I'll follow is goofy example.
  • Mary's hornworm search turned up the first one of the season. It was little and the only one in both gardens.
  • Acorn squash plants are expanding exponentially. I expect them to be knocking on our front door by the end of the growing season.
  • During evening chores, Mary and I watched as thunderclouds developed overhead while moving southeastward. At the same time, lower clouds zoomed to the northwest. Humidity levels were swimmable throughout the day.
    

• Thursday, 8/15: Flea Battle & Nighttime Thunderstorm
  
  • After the noon dog walk, we found two fleas on the dogs. Both puppies got a thorough going over with the flea comb. Mary poured baking soda on the carpet and on the dog blanket in the north bedroom, let it sit, then vacuumed it all up. The soda desiccates fleas and their eggs, plus it reduces old dog bed odor. We'll keep looking, but we haven't seen any fleas since then.
    
  • While Mary made a pizza for our midday meal, I worked up a "to do" list of items I need to accomplish prior to Oct. 1st, when I have my first cataract surgery. I can't lift heavy items for a few days after that, so some tasks must be done before that date.
    
  • I pulled weeds out of four of the six winter greens tubs and threw away the fine mesh that was covering those tubs, which is shot. The hardest weed to pull is lamb's quarter. It has wide and massive roots. Once finished, I'll add soil and plant leafy winter green seeds.
    
  • On Mary's daily check of tomato hornworms, she found three worm eggs. Mary noticed that some acorn squash female flowers bloomed today. There are more tomato blossoms and several mail cucumber flowers. She counted roughly 15-25 jalapeño peppers on each of the four plants, which means we should have more than enough to make jalapeño cooking wine.
    
  • After midnight, a thunderstorm, with high southwest winds and downpours of rain, went through our property. The house shook at one point. I jumped out of bed and looked outside to see the power line dancing and tree branches moving about. It was a fierce storm, but short lived. At 2 a.m., I woke with Plato going downstairs. I followed him and plugged in the fridge and freezers. Jupiter was shining brightly in the east sky and lightning was lighting up the east horizon over Illinois. Plato and I went back upstairs to bed. Plato sleeps on a blanket in the north bedroom.
    

• Friday, 8/16: Brake Assessment
  
  • We woke to small branches down all over the place from last night's storm. A maple tree growing too close to the northwest corner of the house has a top that's bent over. Two wood posts at the southeast corner of the chicken yard are leaning over more than before and will need straightening, soon. Mary noticed a tiny bit of hail damage in the easternmost row of the far garden. Trees helped protect most of the garden plants.
    
  • I looked at the pickup's brakes throughout today. We've recently noticed a grinding noise from the brakes. I discovered that lug nuts were tightened too much by some tire monkey with an air gun at Sam's Club three years ago when I had them change rims. The specifications are 140 foot pounds with a torque wrench. I turned my torque wrench to 150 and I exerted even more than that pressure to get them off. The front brakes are great. The back brakes are shot. The inside dust shields are rusted out and allowing water inside the brakes. The insides of the rear brake discs are grooved with metal rubbing. After looking at online videos, I realized the extent of rust in this pickup's rear brakes. It's severe. The big question...are these brakes beyond fixable? I might need to get a mechanic's assessment, first.
    
  • Mary dusted the living room bookshelves and found 15 spiders and one silverfish. I wonder how they got into this hermetically-sealed century old house...ha, ha, ha!
    
  • During Mary's daily garden check, she picked our first two strawberries, seven hornworm eggs, an army worm, and a very small hornworm.
    
  • We enjoyed a bottle of 2023 pumpkin wine that is a year old. Past tastings of this wine gave us a strong sulfur flavor. Tonight, it was better. We drank it iced. The pumpkin taste was prominent, without a sulfur aftertaste. A year of aging vastly improved this wine.
    

• Saturday, 8/17: Winter Greens Planted
  
  • We ate our first two strawberries from the garden with our oatmeal breakfast. They were tiny, but wonderful.
    
  • Mary mowed part of the north yard. She said she saw the remains of chewed nuts under the pecan trees, probably eaten by squirrels.
    
  • I pulled the rest of the weeds out of the winter greens tubs. One tub was splitting down the sides, so I replaced it with a tub out of the machine shed that I once cut holes in the bottom. I added compost originally made in 2019 to all of the tubs. Then I planted kale in the large tub, arugula in another tub, and three tubs with two varieties of lettuce. Last year, spinach seeds never germinated. We think it was due to high heat. So, with temperatures predicted to 90 for next Saturday, I decided to wait until the end of August before planting the spinach seeds. I covered the row of tubs with new tulle material and fastened it into place with clothes pins, then watered all newly planted seeds.
    

• Sunday, 8/18: Salsa & Tree Cages
  
  • Mary made up another batch of salsa from last year's frozen garden produce that equaled 15 quarts. She actually canned 14 quarts. The final quart went into two pint jars that are now in the refrigerator. She didn't want to take one final quart through the water bath process. All jars sealed.
    
  • I built tree cages (see photos, below) and put them around the two Antonovka rootstock saplings. Rabbits keep nibbling the tops emerging from these trees. Using quarter-inch hardware cloth and tar-coated twine, I tied a four foot by three foot piece into a column 16 inches in diameter. I attached these tree cages to a four foot rebar stake driven into the ground. Now those two saplings are protected by a cow panel from deer, a hardware column from rabbits, and a plastic tree guard from mice. Maybe they'll fare better, now.
    
  • While laying out pieces of hardware cloth, they coiled back up and the quarter-inch wires sticking out tattooed my wrist with a couple dozen holes. I had to go inside, rinse blood off my wrist with cold water, then dab the wounds with hydrogen peroxide. Good grief!
    
  • David Marquette visited while Mary checked garden plants for hornworms. He said Ben Woodruff, who owns land west of us and south of David's land, moved hunting huts from near his newly constructed fence. He was wondering if those huts went in opposite our property line. I told him I didn't know, since I haven't visited our west property line. I'll have to investigate. David was holding a half-smoked joint of pot while sitting on his three-wheeler, talking to me. He said that Rich, who owns land next to our southwest property corner, spotted David on a trail camera driving an ATV with a gun across the front on one of Rich's hunting trails. Rich brought in the game warden and a sheriff deputy to report someone was illegally hunting deer in the valley below his land. Rich told Ansel, David's father, to tell David to keep off his property. Rich is Ansel's stepson-in-law. Nice family feud that we'll stay out of, thank you very much.
    
  • We heard lots of bluebirds and nuthatches talking to one another, today. Mary said about eight nuthatches were sounding off around the yard as she walked waterers to the chickens first thing in the morning.

New tree cage around an Antonovka rootstock sapling.

Three layers of protection around second tree.