July 2-8, 2023

Weather | 7/2, 1.28" rain, 67°, 81° | 7/3, 63°, 89° | 7/4, 67°, 92° | 7/5, 0.48" rain, 69°, 85° | 7/6, 60°, 76° | 7/7, 0.16" rain, 57°, 76° | 7/8, 60°, 77° | 

• Sunday, 7/2: Blackberry Picking in Full Swing
  
  • Mary handled the monthly bills and made a venison General Tso midday dinner.
  • She also walked around to all known berry patches on our property and picked blackberries. There is over a quart of berries in the freezer. Our main patch on Bramble Hill got too hot and dry. The plants are almost non-existent, there. We do have several red and turning ripe berries in other patches, though.
    
  • I used the tractor and smashed down berry picking paths while dumping fire blight branches below the Bass Pond dam.
    
  • I transplanted my three Antonovka apple rootstock trees into bigger pots. I retrieved the pots from the cow barn in the middle of our property.
    
  • We decided not to try to revive the strawberry plants that are looking terrible, due to intense heat and neglect. We'll buy new plants next spring.
  • I picked six green apples off the ground from under the Empire and Granny Smith apple trees. Strong winds came with the recent thunderstorms and knocked more apples to the ground.
    
  • Mary watched goldfinches trying to tear the middles out of blooming purple cone flowers.
  • With the large amount of overnight rain, we enjoyed another day free from watering gardens.
  • We watched the 2022 movie, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore.
    
    
• Monday, 7/3: Clipping Fire Blight & Picking Blackberries
  
  • I clipped fire blighted branches out of the Sargent crabapple tree. I also took one fire blighted branch out of the Granny Smith and Empire apple trees. Conditions must be perfect this year for the spread of that tree bacteria, because it's everywhere and plentiful.
  • Mary weeded peppers and melons in the far garden.
  • We saw a wood thrush hunting bugs in north lawn. It usually stays in the woods.
    
  • We both picked blackberries in the hot afternoon. Each blackberry search starts with a march to a patch at the far end of the north field, then between Bass and Dove Ponds, then Bramble Hill. Next we go to the west field, then Frog Pond, to the gully next to the woods and west of our house, then along the east side of the south woods. I took care of the gully, since it's filled with poison ivy, sometimes up to your chest. We filled two quarts, /We now have three in the freezer, which is not bad for two days of picking berries.
  • I picked 10 green apples off the ground underneath the Empire tree. I saw tiny deer tracks in the mulch. In an attempt to do something fast, I laid down flat strips of two-foot wide chicken wire surrounding that tree. Maybe walking on springy chicken wire will keep these fawns out from under the tree. Eventually, I need to install an electric fence. The Missouri Extension website highly recommends one strand of electric wire baited with four-inch squares of aluminum foil that are paper clipped to the wire with peanut butter applied to the inside of the folded foil. We've used it on big fences and know it works. Putting the peanut butter on the inside would save it from getting washed away by rain.
  • The two loads of clothes Mary washed and put out on the line dried very nicely in today's sun.
    
  • We tried a bottle of persimmon wine...YUCK, TOOWEE!!! It was three months old from bottling. The initial taste had hints of brown sugar, but additional sips gave me a feeling I was drinking whiskey. It wasn't good and hard to finish. We put part of the bottle in the fridge. I hope aging improves the taste. If not, this will not be a future wine to make.
  • No garden watering today, but that changes tomorrow with predicted heat into the lower 90s.
    
    
• Tuesday, 7/4: A Hot Fourth of July
  
  • Mary dusted Epsom salts and bone meal on squash, pumpkin, corn and some potato plants. Then, we watered all garden plants.
    
  • We picked blackberries, adding two and a quarter quarts to the freezer. The grand total is just over five quarts. Today, we divided up in order to pick fruit quicker.
  • I saw a monarch butterfly on a milkweed plant while picking berries. When we first arrived to this property in 2009, we saw lots of monarchs. Now, it's a rare event to see one.
    
  • Juan and Alma, our neighbors in the trailer across the gravel road from us, invited us to a party they are holding on July 6th to celebrate their daughter's first birthday.
  • Outside activities were tough in today's heat and humidity. Each time returning inside, we'd take our soaking wet clothes off, sit in front of the air conditioner, and drink huge quantities of cold iced tea.
    
  • I collected and wrote down my AM and PM glucose readings since April 1 in order to give them to my doctor during tomorrow morning's appointment.
  • We heard some Independence Day fireworks going off, but we stayed inside, instead of going out to view them. It's just too blasted hot!
    
    
• Wednesday, 7/5: Good Doctor Visit
  
  • Mary saw four deer in the west yard when she opened the living room curtains. Two does and two fawns were eating on vegetation. One was munching on the sweet cherry tree, so she waived the curtains. The deer stared and went back to eating. Then Mary knocked on the window glass. The deer stared at the demented woman. Then she opened the window and shouted, which made our dogs bark. The four deer shot out of the yard like they were pursued by demons from hell.
  • I checked the apple trees just south of the house and didn't see fallen apples under the trees. Obviously the chicken wire laying on the grass around the trees is working to keep deer from tearing apples out of the trees.
    
  • My visit to the Lewistown Clinic went well. My doctor likes my glucose numbers and is even concerned some of the readings are too low. The blood pressure check done by the nurse was a little high, at 148/78, so my doctor did a quick check and came up with better results of 110/75. That proves the blood pressure medication is working. If results from my blood and urine tests are good, my next visit is in six months. If the results are less than adequate, I return in three months.
    
  • I went blackberry picking while Mary watered the garden. There are a lot of big, ripe berries out there. I only received two hand wounds from blackberry brambles. I get into some weird yoga positions as I contort my body in and around berry plant spines to reach out and pluck berries. Move too fast and a spine will bite you real hard. Mary showed up midway through the big Bramble Hill berry patch, then started picking in the west field. I started near the Frog Pond until I was rained out. We put three quarts in the freezer, giving us a grand total eight.
  • We gained another half inch of rain which kicked on the sump pump for the first time in several weeks. The once deep cracks in our clay soil are disappearing.
    
    
• Thursday, 7/6: Great Medical News & Hispanic Party
  
  • The Lewistown Clinic nurse called this morning and gave me great news. My A1C is at 6.3, which is in the prediabetic range. This was a major drop from an A1C reading of 9.2 on Feb. 27th. My lipid levels were good, so the cholesterol medication is working. The nurse says Dr. Abueg is happy with the test results. I am to stay with the current medications and visit him in six months.
    
  • We picked a lot of blackberries and put six quarts into the freezer. Our grand total is 14 very stuffed quarts. We added a new spot to our picking routine, which is the southeast field. When I broke down a path to there with the tractor a few days ago, I didn't see berries, but they are showing now. We also found place where blackberry bushes expanded out across the field in that area.
    
  • We are finding lots of ticks and chiggers while berry picking. Mary had nine ticks on the back of her shirt after returning from one berry picking trip. I have about 12 chigger bites. I guess we need to bathe in bug spray.
    
  • In the late afternoon, while feeding pets, Mary spotted a buck deer in north yard, eating grass near the McIntosh apple tree. It had new antlers and one was about 15 inches long. The other antler was shorter. Obviously, deer antlers grow at different rates.
    
  • We attended Juan and Alma's party for their one-year old daughter. They are our neighbors across the gravel road. He works at the big dairy, about a mile west of us. Several Hispanic families attended. It was a crowd of about 35 people. They all spoke Spanish, although several also spoke English. Games they play are fun, especially when the kids whacked away at a piñata. They had three piñatas. A long cord tied to the piñata and looped over an oak tree branch was held by one of the fathers. He pulled it up and down as kids tried to smack it with a big stick. Everyone sang a specific song each time a designated child hit the piñata. At one point, a tall kid really swung hard and a mom yelled for the kids to stand back. She spoke in English at that point. It seemed as if a warning in English meant more to the kids than Spanish did. The night ended with an extremely (and I mean very extremely) sweet cake. I'm sure my blood glucose shot through the roof. It was fun. These people really know how to have fun. It's nice to go to a child's birthday party where you're offered a beer. It's a real family event. My only regret is that I don't know Spanish. If I did, I'd know what everyone was saying and singing.
    
    
• Friday, 7/7: Blackberries, Blackberries, & More Blackberries
  
  • I drove to Quincy for one of my meds, along with hen and dog food.
    
  • Mary picked blackberries while I was gone. She thought the south berry patch would produce very few, but she was wrong (see photo below). These berries are ripening each and every day.
    
  • I returned home to a thunderstorm. Lightning flashed to the west as I turned onto our driveway. We had a couple instant bangs after flashes of lightning. It resulted in a nice little rain.
    
  • We both went berry picking. I filled a medium stainless steel bowl. Today we put over five quarts into the freezer. It's a total of 19 quarts of this year's blackberries.
    
  • The number of ticks are unreal this summer. Mary disposed of 32 ticks she found on her clothing today. Anytime a dog goes outside, we have to do a thorough inspection. Wildlife must be filled with them.

  

  We picked several bowls of these blackberries.

• Saturday, 7/8: Last Planting & More Blackberries
  
  • Mary took a break from berry picking, weeded most of the near garden, and planted beans and some more potatoes. It's the last of garden planting until garlic goes in the ground in November. She also mowed what she needed to add mulch to the area where she put potatoes.
  • A baby hummingbird visited Mary while she worked in the garden. It would zing back and forth in U-shaped arcs in front of Mary. Finally, a larger hummingbird chased it away.
    
  • I went through the blackberry picking gulag again today. This year is turning out to be a great blackberry year. I added six more quarts to the freezer, giving us a grand total of 25. I ended the day at the big berry patch on Bramble Hill. There were ripe berries I didn't get, because my bowl was so full that berries were starting to fall out. The sun was close to setting when I called it a day. I didn't get to three patches.
  • I saw the buck I'm calling Long Horn Short Horn, who has a left antler longer than the right one. He ran off from the berry patch between Bass and Dove Ponds and stood at the entrance to the trail that goes down to the bottom of the Bass Pond dam and looked at me. When both sides of his antlers grow out, he will have a very nice rack.
  • We had relatively strong winds and the local crop duster was flying over our house while spraying fields with his poisons. His plane is without identification numbers on its wings. There are so many things wrong about how this guy operates.
  • We have a wood thrush that sits on the guide wire to the electric pole next to the house that chips at us, which probably means a nest is nearby, maybe in the cedar tree next to the woodshed. These birds are supposed to be timid, hiding in the timber. This one isn't shy at all.
    

June 25-July 1, 2023

Weather | 6/25, 71°, 83° | 6/26, 64°, 80° | 6/27, 58°, 86° | 6/28, 0.03" rain, 63°, 90° | 6/29, 0.21" rain, 71°, 89° | 6/30, 65°, 91° | 7/1, 0.35" rain, 65°, 83° | 

• Sunday, 6/25: At Long Last, Some Wind
  
  • We experienced west wind gusts at 40 mph, the first big wind we've noticed in over a month. A dozen green apples blew out of the Empire tree. The wind felt good while watering gardens. On past hot days, there was no wind at all. Today, I felt like an ancient sailor in a brisk sea after suffering through the duldrums.
    
  • Our growing 2-week old chicks are now flying up to the first rung of the roost.
    
  • Bill left for his apartment in St. Charles after getting a barbecue pork loin meal made by Mary. He also got the last of freshly picked snow peas. He loaded up his fishing pole and tackle that he's had stored here and took it with him, in case he gets a chance to go fishing on his future days off.
    
  • We performed our daily garden watering dance at noon and in the evening. 
  • We put bone meal on the sweet potato plants that look tough. Our clay soil binds up phosphorous and calcium. Hardwood ashes help, but we burned a bunch of willow, a softwood, last winter, so the ashes didn't help so much this year. Bone meal helps. By evening, sweet potato plants perked up.
  • Mary picked four blueberries. We looked online at the blueberry farm near Kirksville, MO. They changed to charging by volume, instead of by weight. A gallon is $29. We need more blueberry plants and a good deer/bunny fence. To heck with those prices.
    
  • I looked up and learned about various types of steel siding trim. I watched a set of YouTube videos by a builder in Ohio with a stiff southern drawl who called the bottom trim his "rat guard." I learned a lot by watching his videos.
    
  • We have very hot water, which might indicate a dying hot water heater. I'll look into it tomorrow.
    
    
• Monday, 6/26: Failing Hot Water Heater & Junking Buick Decision
  
  • A doe deer ran off to the north as we walked to the chicken coop this morning to let the hens out.
  • I called the Sam's Club pharmacy and got them going on meds I'm running out of, so we can pick them up tomorrow during our shopping trip.
  • I called the Lewis County Electric Co-op and asked about their hot water heater rebate.
  • I turned down the thermostat on our hot water heater. It was already set at about 120° and I turned it down to about 105°. Kicked it back on and it's staying on continuously. I suspect our hard water built calcium between the heat elements making them stay on permanently. The tag on the side of tank indicates it was made in February 2008. That was probably the same year Herman installed it, so it's 15 years old and warranted for six years. We decided to get a new hot water heater.
  • An online check shows that Menards sells relatively the same model for $399. The brand is Richmond, which is made by Rheem. The electric co-op's $250 rebate is for energy star units and they're in the $1200-$2000 range. We'll stay cheap and bypass the co-op's rebate. The plan is to look at it tomorrow and buy it on Wednesday, hauling it home in the pickup.
  • I tried to remove the tire that continues to go flat on the Buick. It's frozen on the axle. After several bouts of penetration oil and hitting the rim with a hammer buffered by a 2x4, it still wouldn't budge. The rubber on this tire has been flat so long, it's badly cracked, so the tire is shot. Mary and I discussed matters. The car needs new brake lines, a complete new wiring harness, new muffler and exhaust pipes. The AC leaks water inside the car. The engine leaks oil. The right rear lens is cracked and leaking water, corroding the light fixture and making the right signal blink fast. The entire driver's side is crunched, along with the hood, from when I hit a deer in Oct. of 2018. Plus, it's now a dance hall for mice. We decided to junk the car, because too many fixes are required.
  • While Bill was here, hot temperatures burned up the last of the black raspberries. Mary checked all of the blackberry patches on our property. She got two blackberries. Several red berries are out there. We need to check blackberries daily.
    
    
• Tuesday, 6/27: Canadian Smoke
  
  • Thick smoke from Quebec forest fires filled our skies and outside air with a heavy murkiness. We noticed bad air in and around Quincy, IL, on our shopping trip (see photo, below), but it was even worse on our Missouri property. The air quality index in Quincy was 78 and it reached 157 at home. Mary has a swollen throat from it.
  • We shopped in Quincy. We got good stuff at the Salvation Army store. I picked up a nice basket that I'll use to hold leather tools. I also got three ugly long-sleeved shirts. One is dull green, another is putrid blue and yellow, and another is white, black and blue. I wear long sleeves outside to cover arms, since one of my medications makes my skin get burn easily in the sun. Mary found jeans and two shirts. We found three DVDs. Using Mary's coupons, we got bought a nice pair of Gingher embroidery scissors I plan to use for fly-tying. We looked at the Menards hot water heater. They have 14 on hand. We'll get one on Thursday. Of course, we also picked up food staples, pet and chicken food.
  • While watering garden plants after arriving home, we watched a mama deer nursing her twin fawns while standing under the McIntosh apple tree. It didn't last long. Her teethy babies were too rough and she broke away after several seconds and told them to eat grass growing under the fruit tree. Our yard is her nursery.

  

  Smoke in the air across the Mississippi River,
  while looking at the Missouri shoreline.

• Wednesday, 6/28: More Smoke
  
  • Smoke was in the air, again, today. In the morning, our air quality was 151. By nighttime, it was 99, so it's getting better. Doctors in Quincy are telling everyone to stay indoors. We can't do that, because there are plants to water, which we worked on in the evening. This outside air is bad, but nowhere near as bad as the summer of 2003, when Glacier National Park fires put dense smoke into Circle, MT, where we lived at the time. That was really thick stuff.
    
  • A thunderstorm rolled through this morning, giving us a tiny bit of rain. Immediately after the rain, all paths were bone dry, again.
  • Japanese beetles fill the Virginia creeper leaves that have grown up and around our main door. After the morning rain, tiny black beetle poo was all over the porch boards. I gave them all a good spray of Dawn soap and water solution to kill just a few. I read someone on Facebook telling others not to kill these beetles, but to relocate them to other plants. Sorry, but I'm killing them. They're not native to this continent, so I say kill them. Some people are just too bunny huggery (a new word).
    
  • Mary heard the first of annual cicadas today.
  • She put Epsom salts on sweet potato and pepper plants to add magnesium to their diet. All plants are looking good. We have some tiny peppers and a few green sun gold tomatoes. Three hills of potatoes are showing new growth.
    
  • I pulled one lettuce plant from my tubs that Mary made into two huge salads. She added fresh snow peas and radish slices. It was a really big lettuce plant. We ate the salad with homemade chicken noodle soup.
    
  • During evening chores, Mary almost stepped on a tiny bunny that was three inches long.
    
    
• Thursday, 6/29: Much Needed Rain
  
  • In the morning sun, we spotted native green sweet bees swarming around Virginia creeper blossoms (see video, below). We read online that these are major pollinators that are diminishing in numbers. That's not happening on our acreage.
    
  • A thunderstorm blew through with rain and strong winds. We got a nice rain out of it. It also cleared smoke out of the outside air. The storm was even stronger north of us and 150 mph winds took out electrical power and toppled trees in Keokuk, Iowa. It developed into a huge bow front that progressed across Illinois and Indiana, eliminating power for many people. Bad storms seem to start here and grow bigger. This one was moving east at 50 mph. About 18 apples fell out of the Granny Smith and Empire trees. The top of a maple tree close to the northwest corner of the house got hung up in the roof eave. I crawled up there and freed the branch.
    
  • We drove to Quincy.
  • We saw a bald eagle being attacked by birds while we traveled on on Highway 61.
  • We picked up a new hot water heater at Menards. It traveled well on old pads that we once used as seats in a former tent trailer. The foam in these seats is wimpy and old, so we decided to toss them, since this is the first time we've used them in years.
  • Three long-sleeved white poly shirts came in today's mail that Bill ordered. They will work perfect for wearing outside and protecting my arms from the sun.
    
  • Mary and I unloaded the new water heater into the basement using a dolly we use to move the big garbage can down to the end of our lane. It worked very well. I'll install it tomorrow.
    
  • Mary checked plants and we didn't need to water...a first since we started the garden...YIPPEE!!! She added bone meal to tomato plants and discovered nibbles and rabbit poo. It's time to tighten up the chicken wire fence.
    
  • We saw the doe and her twin babies under the McIntosh apple tree at dusk.
  Green sweat (halictid) bees.
  

• Friday, 6/30: New Hot Water Heater
  
  • We have a new water heater. Draining water out of the old one took three hours. Since it was off for roughly 36 hours, the water was cool. I drained it out into watering cans that Mary used to water all garden plants. Mary and I moved the old one and lifted the new water heater into place. The old electrical connections were a rusty mess, a result of Mary's Uncle Herman always forgetting to turn off running water going into the kitchen sink during his dementia final days. It's amazing it even worked. I drove to Lewistown and bought appropriate fittings at Davis Hardware. Plumbing and electric work went fast. The new heater filled very quickly. Hot water faucets in the kitchen and bathroom hissed as air escaped during the fill up. Juliet, our ragdoll mix cat, looked at me as if to say, "What did you do?" We had hot water within 5-10 minutes after I turned the breaker switch on. I had to turn down the thermostat, because it started out at 130°. I got it down to 120°.
    
  • Mary worked on solidifying the far garden chicken wire fencing to keep bunnies out.
    
  • She also picked peas then pulled all of the pea plants. They filled the large wheelbarrow with a huge mound of greenery.
    
  • We experienced a really hot and humid day. It was a great day to work in the cool of the basement. Mary calls me names for being in there while she was out in the intense heat.
    
  • At night, we watched the 2016 movie, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. It's a good movie.
  • We went to sleep with a thunderstorm booming overhead. It rained into the early morning.
    
    
• Saturday, 7/1: Quiet Day
  
  • An overnight rain was enough to give us a break from watering the gardens.
  • Other than updating the checkbook, we really didn't do much for the day.
  • Mary did some cross stitching.
    
  • We wrapped up evening chores early and rain started falling. Rain fell all through the evening and night. On our last dog walk, we noticed that over an inch was in the rain gauge. Mary looked it up and the last time we saw over an inch of rain was on Feb. 22nd.
    
  • We watched the 2018 movie, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald. It's a good one.
    

June 18-24, 2023

Weather | 6/18, 0.05" rain, 63°, 77° | 6/19, 59°, 88° | 6/20, 61°, 89° | 6/21, 63°, 89° | 6/22, 59°, 90° | 6/23, 61°, 93° | 6/24, 65°, 96° |

• Sunday, 6/18: Father's Day
  
  • We relaxed today, while reading inside.
  • A small thunderstorm popped through, giving us a tiny bit of rain. We need a hurricane to barrel up the Mississippi River and give us a big dumping.
    
  • Mary and I watered all of the plants and seeds in both gardens.
  • Bill called, wishing me a happy father's day. He has Friday off, so Bill will be visiting us over the weekend.
  • Katie called, too. She was running (or more like hiking straight up a mountainside) at Girdwood, today.
  • Ansel & Zelma Marquette visited. His son, David, will be moving into the trailer on Ansel's property, which is to the south of us. His son-in-law, Rich, now owns the 20 acres adjacent to the southwest corner of our property. Ansel said his son will inherent his acreage to the south of us. This all came up while talking about Ben Woodruff, who annually asks everyone if their property is for sale. Ansel doesn't hunt, anymore. He fell, hurt his hip, and uses a cane. He's 91. When I asked how old he was, he said 94, then Zelma held up one finger and he said, "Oh, 91, I guess." He repeated things about 20 times, like a chicken coop that he and his dad built for his grandparents when they lived here.
    
  • We had an entire yard of fledgling bluebirds flying around our house in the morning. A cardinal was bathing in tree leaves after it rained. Mary saw the first eastern kingbird of the season.
    
    
• Monday, 6/19: Racking Pumpkin Wine
  
  • We watered seeds and plants early on. If we didn't water, garden plants would be crispy critters. I'm noticing several young trees on the edge of the west woods with brown leaves. This drought is killing young hardwood trees. On the positive side, wild prairie roses are blooming (see photos, below).
    
  • Mary watched two red-tailed hawks circling above us and to the west as they attacked one another.
  • I racked the pumpkin wine for the second time. It was overdue, with a good inch of fines in the bottom of two carboys. I transferred all liquid into the big brew bucket, getting exactly eight gallons. The specific gravity was 0.995 and the pH was still at 3.5. I added 1.4 grams of potassium metabisulfite. We sipped a bit of it. There's a strong odor and taste from the fines, but you can taste pumpkin and cinnamon. It's closer in taste to the first batch of pumpkin wine I made two years ago, which means it's very good. The liquid went into a 6.5-gallon carboy, a gallon jug, a half-gallon jug, and a 750-ml wine bottle.
    
  • Mary put more water on garden plants, then picked black raspberries and snow peas. Both the berries and peas are dwindling. She checked blackberries near the west woods and they're all green. One batch of blackberries is ripening in the chicken yard.

Wild rose blossoms just east of our lane.

Wild roses near Bluegill Pond.

• Tuesday, 6/20: Murky Air
  
  • We have very murky skies. Our air quality index, created by the U.S. Weather Service, went as high as 122, today, which isn't good for sensitive people.
  • Mary cooked up a wonderful venison General Tso meal.
    
  • She also picked raspberries and snow peas and watered garden plants and seeds. She put white row covers over the sweet potato plants to save them from the blazing sun.
    
  • I found an online calculator for determining angles and dimensions for constructing a gambrel shed building.
  • I thinned about 5 apples off the Granny Smith apple tree, then pruned off all of the fire blight branches (see photos, below). I put each cut branch in an old laundry basket and cleaned the shears after each cut, so that I wouldn't spread the fire blight bacteria. This meant climbing up and down the ladder with each cut I made, which is a good way to build leg muscles. The tree shows a better appearance, without brown leaves on it.
    
  • We're noticing that our chimney swifts are very quiet as they haul bugs in their beaks to waiting chicks in the chimney, so as not to attract attention to themselves. Later, when they're teaching young birds to fly, they're really loud. The birds that are loud right now are house wrens. They kick out a constant chatter, but especially if you get near their nest.

Pruning fire blight branches off Granny Smith.

Me, with a culled apple in hand.

• Wednesday, 6/21: Summer Solstice
  
  • We start backing away from the sun on the northern half of Planet Earth, which is fine by me. There's too much sun cooking the ground in our neck of the woods. Our clay soil is cracking.
  • I drove the tractor/trailer with dead fire blighted branches from the Granny Smith tree northeast to below the Bass Pond dam and dumped them out. I saw a lot of red-colored blackberries along the way. The plants look dry and really need rain. I thought I heard movement when I walked down below the dam. When I fired up the tractor to drive back home, there was a doe deer running away from me.
  • FedEx delivered a package from Katie. It is three mushroom growing kits that she gave me for Father's Day. Interesting!
    
  • Mary was on the garden watering and pea picking agenda for yet another day. She said it's the end of peas. We have enough and they're struggling.
  • A tree frog shows up inside the watering cans when they're stored in the woodshed (see photo, below). It took Mary a little time to coax the little guy out of the watering can's hollow handle and onto a bay tree leaf.
    
  • All seeds that we recently planted have sprouted. The only garden plant not through the ground yet is potato.
  • I nipped fire blighted branches out of the Empire apple tree. This tree has fewer areas of brown leaves, as compared to Granny Smith, but this tree has a wider growth pattern, so pruning took several hours. Next, I need to thin apples on Empire.
  • There is a strong floral essence in the air, because milk weed flowers are blooming. They smell amazing. We have several beyond the east yard.
    
  • After dark, we heard chimney swift chicks at the base of the chimney while we sat in the living room.
  • Each night, while walking the dogs, we marvel at the number of lightning bugs across the field and in oak tree tops, despite the dry weather we're experiencing. They really like our wild acreage.

  

  A tree frog that likes hiding in a watering can.

• Thursday, 6/22: Getting Ready for Bill
  
  • Mary cleaned the house, so Bill won't be frightened by giant dust bunnies upon his arrival, tomorrow.
  • I mowed the lane, so that Bill's car won't be required to climb Jack-in-the-beanstalk chicory stems. I mowed through the highest heat of the day...90°. It required two long pit stops, complete with 52-ounce drinks of iced tea. The most brutal mowing of our property is on the lane, because it's so hot. And the whirling dust kicked up by the mower at the end of the lane is an added touch.
    
  • We water garden plants at noon and then again around 8 p.m. Such a schedule seems to keep everything moist. This month's water bill ought to be a whopper!
  • Mary chased a big gray raccoon away that was visiting the mulberry tree in the middle of the west yard, just south of the chicken coop. It was too close to chickens, so she made sure it wasn't welcome.
  • Mary watched a hummingbird get chased out of the top of the big Bartlett pear tree by an Eastern bluebird.
  • As I got the mail, a doe watched me from the field west of the lane until I walked to close, then wheeled around and ran westerly.
    
    
• Friday, 6/23: Bill Visiting
  
  • It's my sister's birthday, today.
  • We watched a young fawn feeding on greenery in the north yard this morning.
    
  • Bill showed up around midday. He's here for today and the weekend.
    
  • Mary made pizza for our midday meal.
    
  • I fixed the outside sun and insect blocks on two air conditioners. The vinyl siding I used contains ridges to make it look like wood grain and that hinders aluminum tape from sticking. I used wider pieces of tape, then used my thumbnail to thoroughly adhere the tape to the vinyl siding. While fixing this, I watched several mud daubers drink water emerging from the AC coils.
    
  • I took the weedwhacker down to the mailbox and trimmed poison ivy, tall weeds, and grass away from around the mailbox. It was all getting too high. Poison ivy needs to be trimmed away from the edges of our quarter mile lane, but it was too hot, today, to do that job.
  • On drought maps, we're in a severe drought area. Some parts of Kansas are even dryer and in the extreme drought region.
    
  • We watered garden plants, like always. Everything is doing fine, despite the heat.
    
  • Bill picked out two movies that we watched...Must Love Dogs and French Kiss.
    
    
• Saturday, 6/24: High Outside Heat
  
  • Really hot temperatures kept us inside for most of the day.
  • Mary saw a robin carry a small snack down the lane, then it stopped near a fledgling, pecked away at the dead snake, and feed bits to a fledgling.
  • Bill washed two loads of clothes. With today's high heat, they baked to a fine crisp on the line.
  • Mary processed more snow peas, resulting in 10 more packages, for a grand total of 50. That's a big increase from last year's result of 22.
  • In the afternoon, we saw twin fawns eating grass and weeds under the McIntosh apple tree. They still have spots. About at that same time, a dozen swallows that were perched on the electric line going to our home took off and flew all over the east yard.
  • Outside heat was horrendous. We noticed a few rain drops, but developing thunderstorms grew bigger to the east of us and put a bunch of rain into Quincy and beyond. We're dryer than ever, here.
  • Due to watering two times a day, the garden plants look good.
  • We played a game of Rummy for several hours after dark. Bill and Mary enjoyed a couple IPA beers. I had apple cider and a jug of hot tea, followed by jalapeño wine. We ate copious amounts of popcorn. Mary won. Bill took second place. I brought up the rear. It was fun.
    

June 11-17, 2023

Weather | 6/11, 0.31" rain, 60°, 68° | 6/12, 45°, 74° | 6/13, 55°, 81° | 6/14, 57°, 88° | 6/15, 59°, 89° | 6/16, 59°, 84° | 6/17, 53°, 87° |

• Sunday, 6/11: Electric Fence Activated & Plants Transplanted
  
  • I woke around 4 a.m. and rain was dripping off our roof...yahoo! I went back to bed, happy.
  • We watched from the living room window as bluebird fledglings flew around the yard.
  • Mary picked snow peas and black raspberries. She's finished off one quart of raspberries and started a second bag.
    
  • I tightened all 11 wires of the electric fence around the far garden. Partway through the job, Mary asked if I would be able to get the electric fence going today. I said yes, so she started transplanting garden plants.
  • Mary transplanted 47 plants into three rows of the far garden. They were 15 pepper, four tomatillo, and 28 tomato plants. Now, she doesn't have to march them up and down the stairs every morning and evening while taking them out in the morning and bringing them back inside before dark. Most of them were over two-foot tall.
  • I weedwhacked under the far garden's electric fence. The first time always takes several hours, since weeds and grass are tall and established. While cleaning out a big comfrey plant, gobs of green goo splatted all over my face and glasses. Mixed in with tiny oil blobs from the trimmer's exhaust, I experienced interesting viewing through my glasses.
  • While Mary finished transplanting, I hooked up the electric feed wires from the near to the far gardens. A test of all hot wires showed a maximum electrical charge at the far reaches of the fence. We finished right as darkness fell, around 9 p.m.
  • As Mary walked the last cans of water to the tomato patch, she heard the sound of UNGH, UNGH with every step she took. It's the sound of this one cow that we hear every summer in the pasture north of our property. Mary was tired and thought that sound was coming from her footsteps, or maybe her back! She actually stopped walking to make sure it wasn't coming from her. We laughed about it, later.
    
  • Mary and I enjoyed a bottle of blackberry wine in celebration of getting the electric fence running on the far garden. Chore number one of 6,000 jobs to do is finished. CHEERS!!!
    
    
• Monday, 6/12: Snow Peas & Chicken Coop Prep
  
  • I have solid aches and pains from the extensive weedwhacking I did yesterday.
  • Mary and I watered droopy plants in the far garden. They were in shock from getting transplanted, followed by today's full sun. Thank goodness the temperatures were lower. Just minutes after watering, they were looking good, again.
    
  • Mary processed and froze 23 bags of snow peas, for a grand total of 31 bags in the freezer.
    
  • I got an email that our chick order shipped today from Cackle Hatchery in Lebanon, MO. These 25 chicks, known as the Frypan Special, should be in the Ewing Post Office Wednesday morning.
    
  • I tightened holes in the chicken coop. I screwed two pieces of old wooden lathe onto the west wall to cover an opening seam between two OSB wall boards. I bent a piece of tin waste cut from the end of a valley used on our roof and screwed it onto the lower northeast corner of the coop, where chickens pecked a hole through the wood so that daylight was showing on the inside. Cleaning the coop, putting up the wall dividing hens from chicks, and installing a heat lamp happens tomorrow.
    
    
• Tuesday, 6/13: Big Snow Peas & Chick-Ready Coop
  
  • Mary watered all of her transplants. They were sad, again, but showed less wilt than yesterday. Of course, they were great after a good drink.
  • She also picked snow peas. They're producing very well this year. One variety, Oregon Giant, is making pea pods that are three inches and growing (see photo, below).
    
  • I weedwhacked the area around the compost bins, where tall grass and weeds took over this spring.
    
  • Then, I cleaned the chicken coop, taking six big wheelbarrow loads of chicken manure and bits of hay to the compost pile. The final sweep of the coop floor was so dusty! I was glad to wear the new 3M respirator. It works wonderfully, but I need to add eye protection to what I wear while cleaning the coop. My right eye was badly infected from chicken manure dust this evening. Sheesh!!!
    
  • Mary helped me install the inside wall that separates hens from chicks in the coop. She added hay after I finished the wall. We put up the heat lamp light and threw in the chick feeders. The coop is ready for tomorrow's arrival of chicks.
  • After several long days of outside manual labor, my sore muscles and body parts are overwhelming. I plan on sitting on my ass and watching baby chicks all day tomorrow!

  

  Oregon Giant snow peas.

• Wednesday, 6/14: Healthy Chicks Arrive
  
  • While eating breakfast, I got a call that chicks arrived at the Ewing Post Office. I finished eating, drove to Ewing, and brought them home.
    
  • We got three extra for a grand total of 28 very healthy chicks (see photos, below). I watched them for a good part of the morning. Most are either Rhode Island Reds or Buff Orpingtons. It's too early to tell which variety. Two are nearly white and two are white and gray. There are two black ones that are probably Australorps. I spotted a pasty butt issue that Mary fixed in the mid-afternoon. All 28 chicks are eating, drinking, and running around like track stars.
    
  • Mary picked a big supply of black raspberries. She's onto the fourth quart bag in the freezer.
  • She also picked more snow peas. This happens to be Plato's favorite. He's always available if a pea pod gets away from Mary while she's processing them.
    
  • I called into the CVS pharmacy and the local clinic to get my doctor to forward info to the pharmacy so I can get glycometer strips paid for by Medicare. It took talking to a nurse to get action. Immediately after I called the clinic in Lewistown , a text came in from Sam's Club that meds were ready. Nearly a week after my CVS visit, there was no response to CVS from my doctor. Talk to a nurse if you want action.
    
  • We've discovered that popcorn tastes really good with meat rub spices sprinkled on top of the bowl. Our favorites include three we picked up at Sam's Club, which are Parmesan & herb by Elizabeth & Eleanor Premium Seasonings, Japanese BBQ with soy, ginger and garlic by Kinder's Premium Quality Rub, and smoked onion and jalapeno by the same company. Using these spices is cheaper than the normal popcorn additives, per shake, and much tastier.

New chicks after taking lid off shipping box.

Within the first hour, these chicks hit food & water, pronto.

• Thursday, 6/15: Trip for Meds
  
  • A morning check of the chicks showed that they were great, running all around, eating, drinking, and growing. We think they doubled in size overnight. We're even seeing wing feathers on a couple of them.
  • I called CVS and after hearing what seemed like hundreds of computer clicks over the phone, my prescription for glucometer test strips went through the Medicare system. It took a week, but at least CVS accepted it, unlike Sam's Club, who does cartwheels trying to dissuade a Medicare customer from ever purchasing the strips.
    
  • Mary watered all transplants. Only a couple plants showed wilted leaves. They're gaining roots enough to sustain leaves through daytime heat.
  • I went to Quincy, IL, via Lewistown, MO, so I could buy gas at the lowest-priced gas station around, which is in Lewistown, at $3.19 a gallon. I got two meds at Sam's Club, strips at CVS, bread at Walmart, and food to go at a Chinese restaurant called First Wok. It was Hunan chicken.
  • Mary started mowing the north yard while I was gone. After returning, we ate what was the best Chinese food we've ever bought from a restaurant in Quincy.
  • On the way home, I heard on the radio that ag experts say northeast Missouri is now under a severe drought. Crops look very stressed.
    
  • I finished mowing the north yard and continued into the west yard, almost finishing it before I ran out of gas in the mower right before sunset. While I mowed, Mary emptied wheelbarrow loads of grass clippings in the far garden rows, in between doing evening chores. All garden rows are now mulched.
  • The setting sun was bright red. Eastern Iowa is under a smoke advisory. It's probably affecting us, even though the meteorologists are not mentioning our area.
    
    
• Friday, 6/16: Several Seeds Planted
  
  • Mary saw a scarlet tanager while picking raspberries. HERE is what they look like. It jumped up on a branch in front of her and sat for awhile. These birds are really stunning. We hear their call all of the time, but it's rare to see them.
    
  • Mary picked another bunch of black raspberries. Her main patch at the west end of the west lawn is dwindling, while a couple other berry patches are picking up in ripe berries.
    
  • Mary and I planted muskmelon, watermelon, pumpkin, and acorn squash seeds. Since we are overrun with eggs, I placed one egg in each hole. Mary shoveled in compost. I followed up with wood ash. Mary mixed up all of that. We both added soil. I placed seeds in the ground and Mary covered the ground very lightly with bits of grass. We finishing three rows on the south end of the far garden.
    
  • We watered all seeds, transplants, and the rest of the garden.
    
  • I pulled radishes out of the last tub growing radish plants. Most were bolting, but I got several good radishes. I planted two tubs with red sails lettuce. Two other tubs of that same lettuce look great. The tubs are beyond the north end of the woodshed, so they're shaded for part of the day. I think that location helps to keep the lettuce from bolting.
  • On our nighttime dog walk, Venus was setting in the west. Smoke in the night sky turned Venus as red as a giant, flaming Mars. Every night we see several lightning bugs across the fields and in the trees, which is amazing, since we're experiencing a dry spring.
    
    
• Saturday, 6/17: Most of Gardens Planted
  
  • I balanced two months of bank statements.
  • Mary processed snow peas and put nine packages in the freezer, for a grand total of 40. We only froze 22 packages last year. There still are several pods developing, with blossoms throughout the pea patch.
    
  • Mary and I planted all of the rest of the two gardens that we can plant. That included 27 hills of sweet corn, 13 hills of sweet potatoes with at least two to three plants per hill, six hills of potatoes, three hills of zucchinis, and two hills of cucumbers. We're waiting to plant where the snow peas are located. They're still producing and growing. The Oregon giant snow peas I call pea trees, because they're so tall.
  • Mary has a catbird that's adopted her. She said it was sitting on the northeast fence post of the near garden, dropped down in about a foot from her shoes, snatched a moth that Mary kicked up, and flew off with it. That same bird follows Mary around the garden.
  • Our heat lamp bulb blew when we powered it on in the evening after four years of service. We always have a second bulb on hand. The new bulb is a lot brighter. All chicks are thriving.
  • I watched a video on Facebook of Mark Roehl, a high school classmate, running his boat in Kachemak Bay. It looked like he was on the Homer side of Yukon Island, heading home. It brought back memories of that area. A big difference now is the number of boats running all over the water.
    

June 4-10, 2023

Weather | 6/4, 0.09" rain, 61°, 90° | 6/5, 60°, 83° | 6/6, 52°, 86° | 6/7, 67°, 78° | 6/8, 55°, 80° | 6/9, 50°, 81° | 6/10, 61°, 82° |

• Sunday, 6/4: Rain, Cherries & Movies
  
  • I caught the checkbook up-to-date and then Mary figured savings and paid bills that go out in tomorrow's mail.
  • Mary's hand is still swollen from the bee sting she received two days ago. She stayed inside. Just going outside makes it blow up.
  • Motherwart plants filled with blossoms in the chicken run are loaded with bumblebees of all sizes. The same is true of the persimmon blossoms at the west end of our yard, but in these flowers we also see honey bees and butterflies.
    
  • I picked three more quarts of pie cherries from the big cherry tree. We now have 13 quarts of 2023 cherries in the freezer. A few more cherries came off the sweet cherry tree.
    
  • While stepping down off the step ladder from picking cherries, I heard a hen cluck, turned around and saw Sherbert, our orange barn cat, run from the west machine shed opening to the trees between there and the chicken run. That wild cat knows how to survive without becoming a wild thing's lunch.
    
  • A thunderstorm gave us some rain this evening. We needed it and could stand more rain. This rain gave us a reprieve from watering the garden.
  • On this day in 1940, the British rescued their army off the beaches of Dunkirk with a fleet of private fishing boats, so we watched Dunkirk (2017), followed by Darkest Hour (2017).
  • While watching the movies, we enjoyed popcorn and a bottle of 2022 apple wine. This wine has a wonderful smell and a good apple taste. It should improve even more with aging.
    
    
• Monday, 6/5: Winding Down Cherry Picking
  
  • I'm almost done with picking cherries. There was only enough picked today to add one more quart bag to the freezer to give us a total of 14 bags. A raccoon got into the top of the big cherry tree last night and cleaned several ripe cherries off the branches. It also mashed over a branch that I accidentally broke at the crotch and smashed down a thinner branch. I used the orchard ladder to get to the top of the tree and sawed those two branches off. It really opened up the center of that tree, which is probably a good thing. I started a 15th bag. There might be enough unripe cherries to ripen and fill that bag.
  • Fire blight killed several branches on the Esopus apple tree, along with the big Bartlett and Kieffer pear trees. All three of these trees might die from the disease. It's also in the Sargent and Prairie Fire crabapple trees, and the Granny Smith, Empire, and Gold Rush apple trees, but not as bad as in the first three mentioned earlier.
    
  • Pollinators are currently enjoying the sweet clover and swamp dogwood blossoms along our lane. We watched several great spangled fritillary butterflies in the dogwood flowers (see photos, below). Honey bees are going nuts in the sweet clover.
  • The bee sting on Mary's hand improved today. The swelling is going down. She was even able to wash dishes using hot water and go outside with laundry and water the near garden.

Mary took this photo of a great spangled fritillary.

Here are two on swamp dogwood blossoms.

• Tuesday, 6/6: Yes, More Cherries!
  
  • Last night on the final dog walk, the rising moon was blood red, probably due to Canadian fire smoke.
    
  • I picked another quart of pie cherries for a grand total of 15 bags, then started a 16th bag. There are still a few unripe cherries left to pick.
  • Mary picked the first snow peas. She said she's happy to get any peas, due to the recent heat.
    
  • Mary mowed the east yard and placed a final grass mulch around the onions and parsnips, which all look very good.
    
  • I nipped, whacked and mowed the west edge outside the far garden electric fence (see photos, below). Small persimmon trees invaded that area over the past few years, so I removed saplings and branches with the long-handled loppers and made three stacks to be hauled off. Then, I whacked the tall grass with the Stihl trimmer and mowed it all up with the bagger on the mower. Grass mulch went on old garlic beds in the far garden.
    
  • Mary killed her nemesis, a red paper wasp that stung her. Fold down the chicken door to close it during the past few days and there is a wasp building a nest. Tonight, Mary watched it carefully and it suddenly flew at her. She defended herself with a chicken waterer. Mary heard the wasp hit the bottom of the waterer with a hard thunk. A few days ago, that was her hand. She promptly got the Dawn/water solution, sprayed that wasp, and killed her, and took her nest down. Mary is now convinced that's what stung her. Red paper wasps are known for painful stings when defending nests.
    
  • Mary's sting still itches, but swelling is down enough that she can do activities outside.
    
  • I watched a raccoon rumbling away from the mulberry tree in the west yard after sunset. It's the same big raccoon I've seen before and probably the monster beast that smashed branches in the top of the big cherry tree.

Trimming encroaching persimmon trees.

Persimmon tree/branch piles. Compost bin in background.

• Wednesday, 6/7: Cherries & a Haircut
  
  • I gave Mary a haircut. For some reason, she refused to leave the property looking like a shaggy dog. I keep telling her to get a haircut like mine. She frowns on that idea.
  • There were more cherries to pick. I cleaned out almost everything on the big cherry tree and several sweet cherries to fill more than halfway into the 17th quart bag of cherries for the freezer.
  • Mary picked snow peas and processed eight packages for the freezer. Each bag of snow peas goes into one venison General Tso meal.
  • I cleaned out radishes in one of the winter greens bins and pulled some from a second bin. I thought they all were going to seed. Some were, but several had really big, nice radishes underneath the plants. I also weeded all of the tubs.
  • Mary worked up a shopping list for tomorrow's shopping trip to Quincy, IL.
    
    
• Thursday, 6/8: Shopping
  
  • Mary and I drove to Quincy, IL, for a shopping trip. We donated over 100 books to the Salvation Army. I switched to buying blood glucose testing strips from CVS, but I still need to wait for my doctor to get them the correct information. We thought the price for Granny Smith apples was high at Aldi until we visited County Market, where the price was $8 for a bag, compared to $4.59 a bag at Aldi. I went back to Aldi and bought a bag from them. 
  • We returned home around 6 p.m. to dogs jumping for joy upon entering the house.
  • Jeff Olsen sent copies of pages of the Roseau Times-Region that the article he wrote about me will appear in the June 10th issue. It's on the top of the front page. The article is okay...it needs editing, because Jeff repeats himself a couple times.
    
  • Mary picked a large batch of snow peas while I picked strawberries for tomorrow's waffle breakfast.
  • We watched a DVD we bought today at Salvation Army, the 2004 Disney movie, The Incredibles.
  • On the late night dog walk, the smell of skunk hit us like a ton of bricks as we stepped outside. We kept the puppies close in the near yard to let them piddle, then went right back inside.
    
    
• Friday, 6/9: Cleaning Brush & Picking 1st Raspberries
  
  • I used the tractor/trailer and hauled persimmon branches to the north edge of the dry pond, which is down the hill and east of the garden. Then I finished removing encroaching persimmon saplings and branches on the west side of the far garden, hauled them off, and mowed that area. Six of the saplings were too thick for the long-handled loppers, so I used the small Stihl chainsaw.
    
  • Mary picked the first of black raspberries and another batch of snow peas.
  • Katie texted that from a recent DNA test of her two dogs, they have a varied ancestry.
    
  • She also repotted an orchid given to her by Bill.
  • Bill called and we chatted for about an hour. He recently built a desktop computer.
    
    
• Saturday, 6/10: Picking Fruit & Fixing Garden Corner Posts
  
  • I sharpened the mower blade. It's amazing how fast this tin foil blade develops big nicks in it after mowing grass. Next time, I'm buying a mower blade from a dealer, not a cheap box store.
  • Mary picked a large batch of black raspberries, more snow peas, and strawberries.
    
  • I made waffles that we ate with lots of strawberries...delicious!
  • I worked on the four fence post corners of the far garden and got them all upright and solid. During a winter of deer feet tangling in fence wire, kicking, and yanking fence posts, followed by spring's soggy wet soil, all corner posts lean inward. After cutting out support wires, I pulled out support posts, pounded each corner post back upright, then pounded in support posts and applied new support wires. Now, I can tighten the wires around the far garden and turn on the electricity.
    
  • Mary mowed the lawn between the house and the lane, collected the grass and finished mulching a far garden row.
    
  • Mary also started new sweet potato slips. In about a week to 10 days, the slips will be ready to plant.
    
  • Several of Mary's birthday books arrived. We had fun previewing them.
    

May 28-June 3, 2023

Weather | 5/28, 50°, 81° | 5/29, 52°, 85° | 5/30, 53°, 86° | 5/31, 61°, 87° | 6/1, 62°, 90° | 6/2, 63°, 87° | 6/3, 60°, 90° |

• Sunday, 5/28: Garlic Harvest Begins
  
  • Mary cut scapes from the garlic. It's all drying out and ready for harvest.
    
  • She pulled the Music Pink and German Extra Hardy garlic varieties from the far garden. All of the bulbs look very good. These two varieties go bad early, so they're the ones I use to make garlic wine, which we use for cooking.
    
  • Later in the day, we hung the garlic in rafters of the machine shed, where they'll dry throughout the summer.
    
  • I whacked, mowed, and mulched really tall grass in the eight-foot wide strip east of the far garden. The grass mulch went into the newly dug row where Mary removed garlic, today (see photos, below). Sweet potatoes will go into that row.
    
  • Jeff Olsen keeps sending me editorials I wrote and letters to the editor attacking me when Marvin Windows tried to move the county seat from Roseau, MN to Warroad by offering $4 million to Roseau County to build a new courthouse. It's ancient history to me. Jeff seems enamored with it.
    
  • I found Uncle John's obituary online. I didn't realize he was in the military during World War II, but it makes sense, accounting for his age at that time.
    
  • Bill sent Mary a video link detailing LeVar Burton's Lifetime Achievement Award ceremony. It's quite good.

Area I mowed east of the far garden.

Mulch on row where Mary pulled garlic.

• Monday, 5/29: Memorial Day
  
  • Mary pulled two more garlic varieties...Siberian and Georgian Crystal. So far, not a single garlic bulb is bad and they're all bigger than they were last year. In the evening prior to sunset, we hung them from the rafters of the machine shed.
  • I whacked down grass/weeds around the Grimes and Esopus apple trees. New thistle plants are extremely juicy. They splattered my face with green goo dots.
    
  • I culled small fruit from the Grimes Golden apple tree, then sprayed it three times with kaolin clay. It's now very white. Mary says it looks like a fake white Christmas tree.
    
  • I finished whacking and mowing the east side of the far garden, while continuing to put grass mulch on a former garlic row.
    
  • The ratty pull cord on the mower finally broke, today. I repaired it with a stout piece of cord.
  • We watered the near garden plants and small apple trees ahead of heat into the 90s expected for later this week. The Illinois extension agent in the Quincy newspaper says the region is in a drought.
    
    
• Tuesday, 5/30: Spinach Harvest
  
  • When Mary opened the living room curtains for the morning, she saw a pair of fighting male hummingbirds.
  • Mary harvested spinach before it bolted and processed seven small bags for the freezer. She'll use it for minestrone soup. She said wasps were very friendly with her as she picked spinach leaves. They are probably the reason why cabbage worms aren't eating up leaves in the near garden.
    
  • I smashed aphids, aphid eggs, and a couple ants on the tip of emerging leaves on the Porter's Perfection apple tree.
  • My second tub of radishes are all leaf and not much root. It's too hot for them and they're starting to bolt.
    
  • I whacked, mowed, and put grass mulch on former garlic rows in the far garden. Today, I finished outside of the north end and started up the west side of the garden.
    
  • Mary pulled the last two garlic varieties, which were Samarkand and Shvelisi. These are the best tasting varieties and they store very well. In the evening, we hung these in the machine shed.
    
  • Jeff Olsen called and told me he screwed up. He delved too much into the Roseau County Courthouse battle in the 1990s in the story about me and the newspaper's owner, who gets a half-page ad every week from Marvin Windows, told him that she didn't want to print the article. He's going to take all of the Marvin Windows stuff out and redo the article. He sent me the longest text in history...copy of that entire write-up.
    
  • I sprayed the bottom third of the Granny Smith apple tree with three coats of kaolin clay. It looks odd (see photo, below).
  • Elderberry flowers are in bloom (see photo, below).
  • Mary picked five cherries. It's a sparse beginning, but many more will ripen, soon.
    
  • Mary and I watered the small cherry trees and near garden plants.

Elderberry flowers next to the lilac bush.

Kaolin clay on bottom third of Granny.

• Wednesday, 5/31: The Raccoons That Roared
  
  • I picked cherries and collected about a half of a quart bag for the freezer.
    
  • I can't reach the ripe cherries high on the big cherry tree. Remembering online directions I saw last year for making a fruit picker out of a plastic pop bottle attached to a long pole, I drove to Lewistown and bought two small diet Cokes for the bottles. I also bought two 5-gallon cans of mower gas.
  • We could use rain. The last rain we received was on May 16th. We only saw 1.64 inches, when we usually get 5-6 inches in May. Our ground is parched and the gravel road is very dusty. I watched rain fall southwest of us and even heard thunder from that small storm. But, the rain went on by us to the west, heading south to north.
  • We had an evening meal of a large salad featuring lettuce, spinach, and radishes from the garden and sliced up hard boiled eggs from our hens...a very economical meal. Afterwards, we enjoyed a bottle of blackberry wine bottled a year and a day ago. It's extremely good.
    
  • On the last dog walk, we heard a growl north of the house, so after putting the dogs inside, we investigated. As we walked to the chicken coop and I shined a flashlight about, snarling and growling came from the trees near Frog Pond. There were even loud grunts and sharp squeals that raised our hackles. It kind of reminded me of bear noises. We closed all chicken coop windows. I looked up the sound that fighting raccoons make and that's what we heard. They make over 50 vocalizations. I'm glad we have a stout chicken coop.
    
    
• Thursday, 6/1: Mowing & Cherry Picking
  
  • Mary mowed about half to two-thirds of the inside of the far garden. She finished mulching the near garden and worked on far garden mulching.
  • I carved out a hole and slices in a 12-ounce plastic pop bottle and taped it on the top of a peeled persimmon pole. Now, while on the eight-foot step ladder, I can reach to the top of the big cherry tree. At first, I sliced up a cherry while removing it from the tree. So, I taped all cut edges with black electrical tape, making it work much better.
  • I picked cherries all day. There are now three quart bags of pitted cherries in the freezer.
  • Mary and I heard chimney swifts all day.
  • HERE is a link to a WGEM story about how the Lewis County (where we live) ag community is concerned about the effect of our spring drought on crops.
    
    
• Friday, 6/2: The Sting
  
  • I made waffles, the first of which we enjoyed with strawberries. Prior to making waffles, I made a half pint of my syrup. It took 10 minutes. By making smaller batches of syrup, we avoid mold issues.
    
  • I spent all day picking more cherries, adding two and a third bags to the freezer total of a little over five bags. Bug-infested and bird-chewed cherries are fewer this year. At one point a woodpecker lit in the tree above me. I hollered, "Get out of my tree," and it flew away. My homemade cherry picker works well (see photos, below). I'm getting more fruit high on the tree with it.
  • I picked a handful of ripe cherries off the sweet cherry tree. Mary and I each tried one. It was marvelous.
    
  • Mary mowed in the far garden, but got rained out. The rain was unmeasurable, but enough to dampen the grass when it's collected in a lawn mower bag.
  • We had several thunderstorms all around us, but not much for us. Lewistown, just five miles north, received 0.6 inches of rain, but not us. We watched two storms dumping rain just north of us.
    
  • Mary stepped out of the chicken coop after putting chickens away this evening and got hit in her left hand with a bumblebee sting. She never saw the bee, but it left a big hole and felt like someone stabbed her with a knife and broke every bone in her ring finger. Her whole hand swelled up so much she couldn't bend it. She rushed inside, put baking soda paste on the sting, and took three Benadryl pills.
    
  • I finished cherry picking, then ran around to get all of the remaining chores done, which mainly involved watering garden plants and small cherry trees.

Reaching into the tree with my cherry picker.

The other end of the cherry picker at work.

Cut out of plastic bottle wrapped in electrical tape.

The result: a pie cherry and a safe body.

• Saturday, 6/3: Bees, Butterflies, & Cherries
  
  • Persimmon trees are blooming and their blossoms are full of bees and butterflies. Several butterflies visited me while I played monkey in the top of the big cherry tree.
    
  • Except for some evening chores, Mary stayed in for most of today. Her bee-stung hand swelled up into her forearm. Sometimes it itches. She's using Benadryl, Tylenol, and ice to keep it at bay. Get outside and use it while watering the garden and it swells back up. Online research this morning (6/4) revealed that the most painful bee sting in the world is from a female carpenter bee. We have lots of them. Mary thinks that might be the bee that stung her.
    
  • I built a shorter cherry picker, using my second plastic pop bottle and an old broom handle. It worked for a little while, until the electrical tape holding it on the handle gave way. I need to narrow the end where the bottle gets jammed onto the handle.
  • I picked and pitted five quarts of pie cherries. We now have 10 quarts and a third of 2023 cherries in the freezer. Today, I used the orchard ladder and got high inside the top of the big cherry tree. I broke a top branch at its crotch in the process...bo-o-o!
  • Mary ordered eight books for her birthday, which was May 27th. We held off for a month on buying anything other than basics, since there was a chance Social Security checks might not go out in June if a debt reduction deal wasn't worked out, but legislation went through and President Biden signed the bill today.
    

May 21-27, 2023

Weather | 5/21, 41°, 77° | 5/22, 49°, 79° | 5/23, 48°, 83° | 5/24, 55°, 83° | 5/25, 55°, 77° | 5/26, 45°, 75° | 5/27, 46°, 79° |

• Sunday, 5/21: Bill Leaves
  
  • Mary found the first monarch butterfly of this year on the morning dog walk.
  • We haven't seen our resident farm cat, Sherbert, for a couple weeks, but while Mary was checking Plato for ticks, he growled, Mary looked up, and there was that cat trotting across the lawn.
  • I found fire blight in the top of the Esopus apple, the Sargent crabapple, and in some new growth on the Granny Smith apple trees. It's always a struggle. I should have sprayed fruit trees today, but I was too tired for crawling up and down ladders.
    
  • Bill left around 2 p.m. for his apartment in St. Charles, MO. He still has to shop, clean up his apartment, then head to work early tomorrow morning to wade through the hundreds of emails he expects to see after a week away from work. I took the below photo of Bill before he left.
    
  • Mary picked scapes from the garlic. This year's garlic crop looks really great.
    
  • I helped Mary water all garden plants.
    
  • We read into the evening. I started reading Shelby Foote's The Civil War: A Narrative: Volume I: Fort Sumter to Perryville. I'm only in the Prologue and it's quite good at explaining details about Jefferson Davis and Abraham Lincoln.

  

  Bill, before leaving for his St. Charles apartment.

• Monday, 5/22: Quiet Southern Breezes
  • Weather is sunny, with southern breezes. High wispy clouds decorate the light blue sky.
    
  • We heard, then saw a Carolina wren fly from the forsythia bush to the near garden. We notice them in the winter, but not so much in the summer, even though they are with us year-round.
    
  • I did online research related to my toes. I have what's called Morton's toe, where the second toe next to the big toe is the longest. It's why the right ball of my foot hurts. Toe separators are the answer to solving my pain. I tried making some out of soft foam ear plugs cut lengthwise. They sort of work, but I need to hold them in place, somehow. I'll probably end up buying real toe separators from a drug store.
    
  • Mary cut scapes from the garlic. She figures garlic harvest will start next week.
    
  • I helped Mary water the near garden. Several parsnips are growing. Some sprouted well over a month after seeds were planted.
    
  • We read into the evening. Mary finished Sinbad and Me, a young adult book that see likes. I'm reading more of Shelby Foote's Civil War book. Lincoln's 1860 presidential inaugural speech was very eloquent.
    
    
• Tuesday, 5/23: 2023, The Year of The Fire Blight
  
  • I assessed all of my fruit trees. There is major fire blight damage on the big Bartlett and Kieffer pear trees. I thought Kieffer doesn't get fire blight, but a University of Missouri (MU) website indicates it's less susceptible, not immune, from the disease. Big sections of the Esopus Spitzenburg apple tree are infected with it, even on shoots coming off the trunk. That tree might be history. I'm seeing it on new sprouts on the Granny Smith apple tree. The MU website says Granny might get fire blight, but it doesn't harm it extensively. The streptomycin I sprayed this spring seems ineffective against this year's bout of fire blight.
    
  • I mowed inside, outside, and between the fences of the near garden, which was an adventure with all of the tall grass. Mulch went on the far garden.
    
  • We harvested all fully-grown radishes. I pulled them from a tub and Mary yanked them from the near garden, then cleaned them.
    
  • I cleaned cabbage worms out of lettuce growing in a tub, which was too bad, because it's ready to harvest. Somehow, a sulfur butterfly got under the tulle covering the tubs and I didn't discover the worms until today. They wiped out about 75% of the lettuce. Dumping worm-filled lettuce over the fence made for very happy chickens. Two buff Oprington hens learned quickly that my approaching footsteps meant good food. While other hens ran away, they rushed the gate to gobble up wiggly green worms.
    
  • Mary weeded part of the near garden, revealing several emerging onions and a lot of parsnips.
  • Gandalf and Mocha really liked the freshly dried towels, deciding that the clean laundry makes a great cat bed (see photo, below).

  

  Gandalf (left) & Mocha (right) in the laundry.

• Wednesday, 5/24: Weeding, Whacking & Spraying
  
  • Katie sent me some construction photos (see a couple of them, below), then I forwarded family photos to Jeff Olsen for his article about me in the Roseau Times-Region.
    
  • I weed whacked an area between the fences in the near garden that is too tight for a mower to venture. Then I took down tall grass growing in the chicken wire fence using the trimmer at a low rpm. Finally, I trimmed grass/weeds under the electric wire.
    
  • Mary finished weeding parts of the near garden she wanted to accomplish.
    
  • Earlier in the day, I spotted a squirrel next to the nearest pecan tree. Then, while checking the McIntosh apple tree in the late afternoon, a big fox squirrel jumped onto the trunk. I cornered it near the top edge next to an oak tree. I threw a stick at it. The squirrel tried to jump, missed, and hit the ground at my feet. I stomped and shouted while it scampered off. The little bastard is eating apples that are the size of marbles. It's legal to shoot squirrels on Saturday. Bwah, Ha, Ha!!!
    
  • Starting at sunset, I sprayed the following on these fruit trees:
    
    • Copper to battle fire blight on both Bartlett pear trees, Calville, Esopus, Granny, Grimes, and Sargent apple trees.
    • Captan for killing apple scab on Calville, Empire, Esopus, Granny, and Roxbury tree.
    • Immunox against cedar apple rust on Calville, Esopus, Gold Rush, Roxbury, and Prairie Fire apple trees.
    • Spinosad to kill bugs and worms on Calville, Empire, Esopus, Gold Rush, Granny Smith, Liberty, Porter's Perfection, Prairie Fire, and Roxbury.
      
  • While spraying, I heard whip-poor-wills, barred owls, Henslow's sparrows and something growling at me when I ran clean water through the sprayer when I was finished. I'm guessing the growling was from a nearby raccoon. They aren't the cuddly creatures some people like to think. I finished spraying fruit trees around midnight.

Katie (right) in a UIC photo.

Katie on a roof job in Alaska's Bush.

• Thursday, 5/25: The Quincy Heat Sink
  
  • We enjoyed our first strawberries of this year in our oatmeal breakfast.
  • I went shopping in Quincy, since I'm running out of one med this weekend. Quincy is a heat sink, with noticeably hotter temperatures on all of the asphalt and concrete. On the way in, I dropped off aluminum cans at the recycle joint and learned that if I dismantle air conditioners and hand in separate parts, I get paid more than if I just hand over whole AC units. Sam's Club Pharmacy still has me jumping through hoops to get prescription glucometer strips and lancets. I bought two 20-foot long by 3/8" thick rebar at Menards and hacksawed them into eight-foot lengths to fit in the pickup bed. They will become chicken wire reinforcement posts around the gardens.
  • I counted fewer cattle in our east neighbor's lot. He must have permanently lost some in their last flight through his single strand of electric fence wire. I almost ran over the neighbor's stupid lab pup that came out chasing the pickup as I drove by. I rolled down the window and hollered, "GO HOME!" and it instantly stopped and trotted back.
    
  • Back home, Mary mowed around vehicles and the east yard while carefully placing grass mulch around onions and parsnips in the near garden, along with piling it on an empty row.
    
  • We ate delicious taco salad with fresh lettuce. There were more worms in the lettuce, ruining what was left in the tub. Mary found worms in garden lettuce, too. It must be a bad cabbage worm year. I plan on spraying remaining lettuce with Bt, which nails worms.
    
    
• Friday, 5/26: Mowing, Cookies & Wine (Not at the Same Time)
  
  • Original plans were for me to make cookies for Mary's birthday, tomorrow, and for Mary to mow the lane. Poison ivy has really taken over the east side of the lane, where we mow, so I mowed it, instead.
    
  • Mary baked a nice batch of chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. Of course, we had to test a few to make sure they were good. They were delicious.
  • Jeff Olsen sent several pdf files of old Roseau Times-Region editorials and pro/con pieces that he and I authored from 1992-96, when I was editor of the paper. He called and we talked for 30 minutes. I didn't remember a lot of things that he remembers from that time frame.
    
  • In the evening, after putting the chickens to bed, I saw a big raccoon scampering its butt into the weeds just west of the chicken yard. Right after that, the chickens put up a fuss that lasted quite awhile. Silver, a silver Wyondotte hen, who is one of the survivors of the last time we had a raccoon attack inside the chicken coop, was the ring leader of all of the racket. I'm guessing the big raccoon I saw crawled on the outside of the hardware cloth covering chicken coop windows. Silver remembers the death and destruction of the last raccoon attack and started yelling. Mary closed all chicken coop windows and we did double checks to make sure all was clear inside the coop.
    
  • We cooked up some smoked scrambled eggs. This time, my outdoor fire was very smokey, making the eggs extremely tasty. Mary also make a lettuce/spinach/radish salad, which was amazing. All ingredients were homegrown.
  • Mary and I enjoyed a bottle of 2021 parsnip wine (see photo, below). It's extremely good. Upon opening the bottle, the cork has a wonderful floral aroma. There's an earthiness to the wine, that suggests a root vegetable, but it doesn't taste or smell like parsnip, at all. The taste is earthy and tangy, with a good floral flavor. It's supposed to age two years. This wine is 13 months out from when it was bottled and it's really good.

  

  The golden color of parsnip wine.

• Saturday, 5/27: Quiet Birthday
  
  • With it being Mary's 57th birthday, we took the day off.
  • I saw a doe running north just beyond our west yard near the edge of the woods. Then, I looked further north and there was another deer munching persimmon tree leaves and heading toward the blueberry bushes. I stepped outside and it ran off. We think we have several doe deer with fawns that are living close to our house.
  • Since we bought Mary's cell phone five years ago, it's been on the same iCloud link as mine. It means that every time one of us takes a photo, it shows up on both of our phones. When I load an app on my phone, it shows up on Mary's phone. When I'm driving in Quincy, Mary could look at her phone and see when the driving block occurs. I created a new iCloud account for Mary and changed her phone over to her own system.
  • Today is the first day of squirrel hunting. I took the .22 rifle to the McIntosh tree and into the woods, nearby, but saw nothing. I did, however, collect three seed ticks...UGH!!!
    
  • A quick check of fruit trees saw no change, but ants are populating aphids into the leaf buds on the Porter's Perfection apple tree.
  • We watched two movies that Mary selected...Young Victoria (2009), and Emma (1996 TV movie).