Lost in the Woods

Although I am at home in the woods, it is good that my present environs offer many clues to where I am. The sad fact is that I have a poor sense of direction.

Getting lost in a department store and not being able to find the way I came in is embarrassing enough.  However, it's in the woods where my lack of orienting skills are most noticeable.

Once, I went looking for morel mushrooms in a nearby state park.  I had a rather useless dog on a leash as we followed a deer trail.  Making careful note of a group of tall trees for a landmark, I conducted a thorough search of the ground for morels.  Coming back to the trees, I was astonished to find they were not the same group of trees at all. Impostor trees, who would have thought it?  That's a trick that trees do when you are otherwise engaged.

Of course, it would have to be an overcast day, so the sun was no help. When I realized that I didn't know which direction to go, my head started spinning. I had to fight the urge to start running, and probably would have, if I could have run in several directions at once. It was a Missouri woods completely devoid of bears, cougars or even squirrels. The reason for my panicky feelings was the sun, though hiding behind thick clouds, was edging toward the far horizon. Setting, in fact. There were many wild rose canes, thorny greenbriar and underbrush that I definitely did not want to meet in the dark.

Sitting down on a log to collect what remained of my thoughts, I heard some kids yelling off in the distance. The park was surrounded by farmland, which put the location of the noise in the park's picnic area. Trusting that they weren't lost, too, I realized I was 180 degrees out. Turning around, I followed the cries and reached my car before it got really dark.

When my son was little, a similar episode occurred when we lived in Washington State.  Chris and I had followed the path in the woods not far from our house. We were snacking on huckleberries when I realized I'd misplaced the trail.  It was a logged-over bit of woods littered with downed branches that offered no sure footing, unless you were a Sasquatch.  Darkness was closing in when I thought of Chris' little friend who lived nearby.

Stepping up on a big tree stump, I cupped my hands and yelled, "Robbie!" until a faint uncertain voice answered.  "It's Chris's mom," I hollered back.  "We're up in the woods and can't find the path.  Come up!" Shortly, he appeared, I got my bearings, found the elusive path and we were saved.

No boy likes to be accompanied by such a dim mother.  Although Chris was only seven, he was reluctant to ever go into the woods with me again.

So, this land is perfect for the bearings-challenged person.   It is only possible to walk upriver because the bank by the bridge is too steep.  Also, the bridge is a pretty big feature. Even a child couldn't get lost in the narrow strip of woods between the river and the fields.  The river stays obligingly in sight. Now, it's freezing over here at Clam Beach.

Occasionally, I do lose track of firewood that I've cut, but I eventually stumble upon it.

Even though I am dismal at getting my bearings,  my superior snow tracking skills revealed that two young children and a teen passed this way with their mother and grandmother. Apparently, they were looking at the beaver-cut young trees and the place where the beaver slid down the steep bank to the water before the river froze.

The same family, led by the shrieking grandmother, sledded down the steep hill.  "Scream," I told them.  "It's more fun when you yell."

On the day I retired from the library, four years ago, I bought this nifty sled.  The ride today was really fast because of the sleet that fell before the snow. As soon as I put my boots on the sled, I was was off and away. I screamed.

Kindling Skirmishes

Making a kindling run every few days is necessary for my morning fire-starting.  What should be a peaceful, quiet job for me and the  hand pruner winds up being another battle with the Briar family.

The blackcaps, while thorny, do have  redeeming tasty berries.  It's the wild roses that delight in luring me into battle.

Hickory kindling is a favorite of mine.  The rose thickets grow quite fiercely under the hickory trees.  They catch the fallen branches, keeping them off the damp ground.  They seem to taunt me with those choice limbs, daring me to come and get them.

While the rose thorns can't penetrate my canvas chore coat, they can only be handled by the long-handled pruner.  My extra-thick leather palms on my fence gloves are no match for those vicious canes. Consequently, I give the meanies as much respect as I would an unfriendly feral cat.

The bushes grow in clumps every few feet. They grow to a height of four feet, then arch over to protect their ankles from people armed with pruners. They have all the characteristics that the conservationists extol. I hear that they were once promoted as a way to hold banks around ponds.  While it's true that cattle  give them a wide berth, the line between beneficial cover and invasive species is easily crossed.

You would think that  huge, strapping bushes would at least develop big hips like the rugosa roses do. Unlike me, they have tiny hips. These little fruits do have lots of vitamin C, so I suck on a mouthful while cutting a swath to the kindling.  The taste is sweet and tart but the seeds must be spat out, probably planting more of the savage growth. Birds love those bird bite-sized bright red berries.

The conservation agent told me that RoundUp is effective on the wild roses.  He had no idea of the scope of the rose invasion I  face.  The growth under the hickories is scant compared with elsewhere.  There are places where nothing else grows. It's a scene right out of Sleeping Beauty.

The sharp thorny canes always manage to fall on me when I cut them at the base with the pruners.  The sad thing is roses actually benefit from heavy pruning.

While I am admittedly able to prevail over a very small percentage of these malicious bullies, I am aware of the precedent:  Cane always does away with Able.

It's About Time

The computer-generated digital voice on my weather radio says, "The current time is--"  Is that as opposed to the time an hour and twenty-seven minutes ago? Apparently, computers don't know when they have made themselves redundant.

Since retiring four years ago, my involvement with clocks has weakened considerably.

When I'm outside, the position of the sun gives me an idea of whether I can get projects done by sundown, which is now around five.  Yesterday, I cut  loads of big maple logs to to haul some distance through the woods to where I left Rosie.  My little wagon could carry five pieces at a time.  The ground is level but the wood, although it died from natural causes, was still wet and very heavy. Great stuff.  Pulling the wagon over the woodsy litter, I quickly reached my target heart rate.  By sundown, I had completed the hauling of five wagon loads, which became three Rosie carts to unload for splitting.  Adding gas and chain bar oil to my cute little chain saw, I finished by sundown.

Yes, I could wear a watch, but what's the fun in that?

It always seems to be later than I think.  In summer, when the days go on forever, I guess the time before looking at the clock when I come back inside.  Frequently, I ask, "How did that happen?"

However, time is relative, as they say.  One rainy summer afternoon, I was knitting in the living room.  I surely must have glanced at the clock occasionally. Finally, I felt hungry and went to rustle up a snack.  Looking at the kitchen clock, I was amazed to see it was three hours later than the clock in the living room, which had stopped.

                                                    Universal Time

Universal Time is used for astronomy, having replaced Greenwich Mean Time, which I believe was somewhat cruel.  What with our Daylight Savings Time, UT varies here.  Sometimes, we save daylight and during the dark months we squander it. No one likes getting off DST; we'd rather have it year 'round.

Being unable to wrap my largely right-brained thinking about Universal Time, I made this low-tech solution.UT is a twenty-four hour clock, but it never is 2400, because then it turns to zero hour.  So, using this fabulous system, I no longer have to count back however many hours, then convert that from 24-hour time.  At 6 p.m. here, it is tomorrow UT.  The wee hours of the night are all the same as this clock, but at 7 Central Standard Time in the morning, I read the outer numbers, 1300 and so on.


This is very helpful in knowing when Jupiter's Great Red Spot will be crossing the face of that big gas giant.

Since retirement, the real challenge is to know what day it is.  Last Wednesday, I was surprised to see the weekly weather radio test being conducted, since I thought it was Tuesday. Here is the solution to that problem. However, sometimes I forget to flip the card, in which case I have to look at the date on my cell phone and then check the calendar.
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Such is life without TV reception, peaceful and timeless.

Tamed with Tortillas

Two calves were on the road recently, having gone through the sagging barbed wire fence in the pasture across the road.  The four neighbor dogs were chasing them up the road.  Beau joined in and the calves scrambled through the fence to the pasture on my side.  The little bullock was out the next day and I was able to walk him down to the gate, where the neighbor helped me herd him through.

The heifer was left in the pasture with two cows who apparently didn't have the herd mentality to go with the others when they were moved across the road. She was skitty, as are all cows who are not regularly approached by humans.  I felt sorry for her because she was separated from her mother.  The boy cow who led her astray had fled the scene.

Not having a bag of milk replacer or a calf bottle, I looked for something to offer her.  Finding a package of corn tortillas with "best by May 5, 2012" in the fridge, I settled on that.  I sailed a few over the fence like Frisbees daily and found they were being eaten by something.  After some days, I saw her licking them up.

Slowly, she started coming closer, then my Jane Goodall moment arrived when she took one from my hand.

Now, she comes to the fence and moos for me to come out with the Mexican corn.  I named her Juanita.

While it's true that tortillas are not the usual cattle feed, I believe she comes because she lost her mother too soon.  So, I am foster mom to a calf.  Having raised three children, I have plenty of experience in the mom department.  When I had a herd of dairy goats, they followed me on long walks around my unfenced thirty-five acres.  Cars would stop.

Even the two cows left in the pasture are showing some interest in the ritual.  I trust they will all be relocated across the road soon, because the cow guys are feeding the rest of the herd round bales of hay over there.  Also, I'm going through many packages of tortillas.

Why I Cut Firewood

Even though my son cuts the big firewood, I feel the need to get out there and do my part.

Not only do I get to warm my buns by the fire, the cats and dog appreciate the toasty heat. My guests,too, all gather 'round the stove, making me seem the best hostess.  Sometimes, they too doze off, especially if wine is served. There's no need to be stingy with the wood if I have cut and hauled it.

Getting a chain saw that isn't too heavy to pick up results in settling for one that is not really built for everyday wood cutting.  A few days ago, yet another of the "for occasional use" ones suffered carburetor arrest.  My man at the small engine repair shop said it's the ethanol that does them in.

My daughter Lissa suggested that I merely buy some firewood with the money I'm spending on saws and repairs.  I've had two chain saws since I had the Buck Stove installed in 2008.  The answer is I'm into the whole woodcutting adventure.  Sure, I could call and get some wood delivered, but what's the fun in that?  "Boughten" firewood is usually cut from living trees, without their consent.

I get the satisfaction of using downed wood that would otherwise lie on the ground and slowly decompose. True, it's good for the soil, but sometimes the river comes and snatches it first.  It's my job to see that such wood gets a proper cremation.  When I put a piece into the stove, I recognize it and remember it when it was a whole tree; sort of a commemorative moment. I believe the wood knows how grateful I am for its warmth, burning all the brighter for my rapt attention.

Setting the furnace thermostat above sixty degrees makes me feel I am wasting the world's precious resources.  By burning wood, I am able to make one tank of propane last an entire year, while staying quite cozy in the process.  Nature has already finished with the wood that I burn.  It's found stuff, like the hickory nuts or wild sour dock greens.

Cutting wood has become sort of a hobby for me.  Otherwise, I fear I would become sedentary when the gardening season is past.  There is the initial scouting for wood, which is like hunting for treasure.  There is learning to identify trees by bark alone, or bite, as in case of the thorny honey locusts.  There is the challenge of hacking through the underbrush to reach the wood.  There is the power of wielding the chain saw, always a plus for a short woman.  There is the general lure of Nature to come outside and cover or uncover the wood pile.  Best of all, there's all that healthful exercise.

One summer, I decided to get a stash of little bundles of kindling.  Cutting the twigs with the pruner, I tied them with pink cotton yarn.  They were just darling.  But when I went to fetch them from the playhouse in the winter, I discovered that the mice had made off with all the yarns, leaving messy piles of twigs.  Those little rodents had found them ideal for nests.

Some of us women would rather lace up our steel-toed boots and head out into the woods than shop for or wear high heels.  It's just a matter of preference.  My lifestyle is such that I so rarely lose a diamond tennis bracelet when running the chain saw.

Rosie the Mower

If I had a donkey, I wouldn't expect it to work like a Clydesdale draft horse.

However, I do goad my ride-on mower to perform like a farm tractor.  It is billed as a Lawn Tractor, which gives me license to ask more and more of it.  People in the country don't have lawns; we have yards.  We try and keep the weeds mowed.

 This reproduction tin sign hangs in my workshop.

Because I  worked for a year as a riveter for United Airlines  in 1976 (not World War II!) I still consider myself a bit of a Rosie.
That's why I named my mower Rosie.  It's easier to say than ride-on lawn mower, too. I expect Rosie to do some jobs that my big Ford tractor did when I had the farm.  That requires a lot of coaxing. I did pick a lawn tractor that had the proper oiling system for hills.  Rosie's tires are big and smooth for not leaving tracks in the lawn, so they slip a lot on the steep hills.  Also there is the problem of honey locust thorns poking holes in them when I cut paths through the underbrush.

Rosie is now being pressed into service as a firewood hauler.  This wood is some I cut from the trees that the cottonwood brought down with it in April. So far this season, I've hauled and split a total of sixteen loads.

My son Chris cut up the walnut that was downed in the spring storm. He also cut up the big pieces of cottonwood. His chain saw is too big for me to even pick up. Here, he appears to be having yet another fun day at Mom's.

For days, Rosie and I hauled the heavy walnut up to the workshop, where I split the big pieces with my electric log splitter. Then we hauled it over to the wood rack I made between two fence posts.  It's looking good!  Just a few more small  pieces to cut with my chain saw and the walnut will be done. Next,  I'll be cutting more dead wood of a lesser quality.

The worst jam I got Rosie into was when I got stuck on a stump when going down a slope.  I couldn't push Rosie back up the hill, so I had to pound a fence post into the ground and use it to secure a winch to back Rosie up. A couple of weeks ago, a big anthill up in the hickory field stopped my path-mowing in the same way.  Faced with the need to hike back and get the heavy post pounder, a fence post and the winch, I really exerted myself and dragged Rosie back off the anthill.  It was possible because the ground was not so steep there.

"You can do it!" I tell Rosie frequently, when asking more than the equipment was designed to do.  Last week, I  broke down and changed Rosie's oil.  I also got her a new battery.  I had to check YouTube to see which terminal to do first.  I used to know all that stuff.

Rosie may be little but she is valiant. However,  I believe she is looking forward to snow, when I can't possibly ask her to work with those smooth tires.

How Does My Garden Grow

In essence, the fall garden is an exercise in denial of the season.  These last few days of chilly rain have been exactly what the veggies wanted.

As long as I can see these beautiful green spinaches, I can stave off the idea of winter.  These guys have been quite lovely in salads.  Nearby kohl rabi seemed to be wanting something more than encouraging words. What did they want, blood?  So, I gave everything leafy some blood meal.

Turning away from the turning tree leaves, I can still feel like a gardener. Although most welcome, the rains have left the soil too wet to work.  The last time I tried to turn over the soil in the old strawberry bed, the shovel would only go into the ground about an inch.  Now, it will be a race to see if the soil dries out enough to work before it freezes solid.  I am eager to turn under these choice cow pies.

The turnips have great leafy tops and have taken up more space than I gave them.  It was easy to thin them because they are not my favorite vegetable. The Merveille de Quatre Saisons lettuces, although not growing as quickly as some did in springtime, have held their own through a couple of hard frosts, bless their hearts.

Recently, I hauled up the remaining seven cement cylinders from the intermittent stream bed.  They were stuck fast in the dirt until the rains came.  When the soil can be worked, I'll continue this bed.  It will be fabulous.

The asparagus patch is in its fall plumage. Pretty soon, I'll cut it down and cover the bed with more manure.

We gardeners do not like to even hear about November being only ten days away.  Months of bleak withdrawal from our passion doesn't bear thinking about.  Meanwhile, I'm cutting firewood with my little chain saw.

Four Years Between Harvests

This was supposed to be a bearing year for the hickory nuts, but the long drought put a stop to that plan.

How the hickories know which is the year for the crop is a mystery to me.  Perhaps they circulate a newsletter so all the trees can have nuts and there won't be some sneaky hickory upsetting the market by being the only source some year.

In 2010, I discovered I had twenty-four bearing hickories on my land.  The clay soil and steep hills were great for hickories.  Learning that it could take as much as thirty-five years for a tree to bear, I realized I had a potential gold mine.  A buyer promised to come fetch the nuts.

It was great fun finding all the trees, some of which I named for the grandkids.  This bronze beauty  is Shelby.  I went out daily and brought back ten gallons.  Sometimes, I sat under the tree and popped off the thick hulls to save weight in carrying them home.  I was thinking that this surely was a suitable enterprise for me when I was bopped on the head by a falling nut.  It really hurt, and raised an immediate goose egg.  After that, I wore my hard hat when working under the tall trees.  I named that tree The Bonker.

Growing under the trees were wild roses, red cedar trees and other nasty underbrush that I cleared out as best as I could.  Identifying the trees by a Missouri Department of Conservation Field Guide, I discovered I had some shagbark and some shellbark.  Of course I got beaned by one of the bigger ones, the shellbark, about the size and heft of a hardball.

The record for most nuts went to a tall tree down by the river, giving a total of 48 gallons.  That one I named Bountiful.

The hulls popped off readily with the twist of a small screwdriver.  Then I put the nuts in a bucket of water.  The floaters had worms, so had to be discarded.  The next step was to spread the nuts out on screens to dry in the sunshine.  Then I put them in mesh bags to hang in the breeze during the day.  At night, I put them in galvanized cans to keep the mice from getting them.

Only when I had 150 pounds of choice nuts did the buyer flake out on me.  I put an ad on Craig's List but didn't get any response.  It must have been a great year for hickories because everyone had plenty.

    The hulls made a nice mulch in the border, weathering to a restful gray.

Reading  that the nuts would go bad in hot weather,  I took the precaution of  putting some in the freezer.  However, the ones stored in cans in the hot workshop are still good, so I guess I'm all set to wait for the next crop of nuts, in 2014.  Since I can't bear to waste food, this delay may be a blessing in disguise.

Barking Frenzy

My coon hound, Beau, is adding greatly to my health by ensuring that I get plenty of exercise.

He usually waits for me to take him on a long walk of an evening. He comes to the garden fence to give me that look that means finish up and let's go to the river.

Last night, a frost was on the way, which was a bummer after the extra-hot summer.  I was in the garden digging up these sweet potatoes. With the drought slowing their growth, it was amazing I got any sweet patooties at all.

Hearing Beau barking off in the direction of the river, I realized that he'd gone off without me and had something cornered.  Fetching the choke chain and leash, I headed toward the incessant yapping.  There is still enough poison ivy around that I can't just crash through the underbrush at will.  It has, however, turned a beautiful red, like warning flags.

He wasn't up at the old fishing shack, where a feral cat was once trapped, nor the old barn, ditto for yet another feral cat.  Beau lives with three cats, but regards any others as de trop and chases them.  There was a white cat on the back deck the other night, calmly eating from the cat food bowl.  Beau went berserk but was not allowed outside.

So, I thought maybe he had tracked it down.  Now I was above the sound but the bank was steep and full of  red flags.  That caused me to have to backtrack down to the path to Fishing Beach.  Coming from downriver was the unabated barking.

Beau was almost to the big bridge, circling the huge tree that had wound up there in the spring flood. He looked up when I shouted, "Leave it!" but was unable to tear himself away. He's a coon hound; that's what they do.

The shoreline is too steep for walking, so I had to go up through the sapling trees, then scramble down to the beach, then back up and over the driftwood to reach him.

As soon as  I slipped the chain around his neck, Beau switched off his frantic barking .  Whatever he was after had gone inside the tree; I never did see it.  The choke chain is not a thing I yank on to control him.  Just putting it on him calms him down and he doesn't tug on it.

It might have been possible for me to climb the steep bank above the tree, but trying to lead him seemed like a bad idea.  I envisioned us tumbling downhill together like a big six-legged snowball.

Petting  him and talking calmly, I led him down over some driftwood. Down at the water, I let him have a drink.  When he has something cornered, I fear he will never stop his frenzied barking and will pass out or worse.

Coming back was the real adventure, because we had to make our way through  stands of young maple trees growing close together on the steep bank.  It was tricky because we didn't always choose the same ones to go between, plus the branches were low and the footing unsure. I am always careful to hold the leash lightly so that it can't hurt my fingers.  Beau is not fond of my accordion playing, howling if I don't shut the bedroom door, but  he wouldn't deliberately seize the moment because he is a dog and can't think that far ahead.

Slipping on the dry silt, I landed on my side close to a five-inch sapling spike left by the beavers.  It's always fun until someone gets impaled on a spike.

We walked peacefully back up to the house.  My only discomfort was caused by wearing two sweatshirts, which had been a good choice before I got snared into a rescue operation. Despite the cool evening,  I was dripping sweat.

There was another time with yet another feral cat up in a tree in the field.  Beau apparently was too wild to notice me putting the chain on, because he suddenly ran.  For a few seconds, I had the exhilarating  experience of flying through the air.  As I landed on the mercifully soft long grass, I wondered how far I'd let him drag me before I let go.  He noticed the extra weight at that point, and that episode was over.

Sometimes, I see parallels in the outer things that are happening in my life.  An internet offer earlier in the day from one of my yarn sources offered FREE SHIPPING.  Loading up my online cart with enough yarn to qualify for the freebie, I found it hard to drag myself away from all the goodies.  Like Beau, I was transfixed and found it hard to Leave It!  Perhaps I can train him to gently tug me away from the computer when he sees me with a glazed expression triggered by wild offers.

A Thousand Pardons

Of course, I talk to my plants.  Mostly, I apologize. That's why I work on my knees.

When I dug up these daffodil bulbs last evening, I found the former owners had left a treasure trove of goodies.  "Look at all you beauties," I gushed.  "I had no idea there were so many of you here."

They snorted, "Well, we sent up plenty of leaves and NO flowers these last FOUR years!  Any fool could have seen--"

I mumbled something about too dry or too wet fall weather.  I said I was sorry. "I thought you'd be puny bulbs," I admitted.

SIZEIST!

Several hydrangea bushes were languishing leggily down by one of the outbuildings.  It was too shady for them down there, so I brought them to a choice location on the west side of the house.  There, they would get morning and afternoon shade.  They, at least, had the good grace to not scold their rescuer.

"You'll be so much happier here," I reassured them.  "Also, everyone can see your beautiful blooms in springtime here in your new home."

As I was watering them in with jugs of rainwater, the nearby hibiscus piped up.  WHAT ABOUT US?  WE'VE BEEN OUT HERE IN THE HOT SUN ALL SUMMER.

I understand this has been a shameful year for the hibiscus, but they never have been appreciative of all I've done for them.  I raised these Southern Belles from seed.  When I transplanted them from their too-shady original location I said I was sorry for choosing that spot.  Watering these wetlands shrubs all summer, I felt bad that these once proud beauties were so miserable.  Usually four feet tall and filled with jumbo flowers, they were reduced to these scrawny two foot tall specimens.  Not a word of thanks for their new location in full sun next to the downspout extension, nor the fortuitous water meter leak that gushed over them for several days in early spring.

They have started to recover from the drought.  They are experiencing great re-leaf.  They got this lovely grass mulch just as soon as some grew long enough to mow.  And yes, I watered them some more.

The Drought Dries Up

After I got the new tier in place, I rushed to sneak in a fall garden.  There is a brief moment when the soil is moist enough to till but not too wet.  To call it a window, in addition to using an overworked metaphor, would be a wild exaggeration.  No, it's more like the clicking of a camera shutter.  Too bad if you blinked and missed it.

                                                        The Fabled Fall Garden

The gamble with a fall garden is you plant things that do well in cool fall weather and can even stand a little frost.  Here in Missouri, we get a definite break from the heat in October, if we're lucky.

Although it will be too late to harvest beans planted now, I've found they make a good, cheap, ground cover for winter. Last year, I planted an ordinary package of dried beans.  They did a fine job holding the soil.  They had the good grace to not keep growing in the spring, unlike some oats I could mention.

With gathering dark clouds spurring me on, I tilled up three plots.  I had the seeds in ground before you could say Heatstroke.  Despite wearing my usual wet-frozen bandanna, the sweat dropped off my face like rain.  I believe sweat droplets falling on seeds are their greatest incentive to grow.  The seeds actually feel sorry for me and do their best to sprout.  After all, sweat is honest; tears may be faked.

The seeds were tucked in in the morning and in the early afternoon, it rained.  Did I mention it was a Blue Moon?

It was a lovely, gentle rain that continued overnight.  Raindrops on the windows were like a half-forgotten pleasant memory.  Two inches showed up in the rain gauge, a respectable total.

Three days later, we had yet another heat advisory.  Since the seedlings were too tiny to bolt, they had no choice but to grow out of the hot ground.

Since the end of this bed was still under construction, I blocked the soil with materials at hand. The wide row of turnips are up a week later, and some of the beans and lettuces.   In the foreground is the poor cantaloupe that tried so hard to grow all summer.

This plot was the site for some cabbages that were bitter about the drought.  However, there were some nice new potatoes and onions.  Two enthusiastic chard plants provided greens from last fall's planting.  They overwintered and bore me dinners all summer.  I made a chard quiche that was fabulous.  The big thing on the right is a Romanesco broccoli that I watered all summer. It's rather beautiful but shows no sign of producing the interesting head shown on the Burpee seed packet.  Behind that are some sweet potatoes that may or may not bear tubers.  The ground was too hard to dig them up earlier.  Now that we've had some rains, they have put on new leaves and may yet amount to something.  Here, I planted the beans to hold the fort and a few French Breakfast radishes.  Never actually to be eaten before noon, they do make a delicious radish sammy.

In this top tier, I did get a fairly good crop of Long Season beets.  Some scrawny carrots wound up in the compost. After tilling in more cow manure, I planted two rows of spinach, some kohl rabi, more carrots and the beans.  Still growing are some parsnips whose prognosis is not good.  We'll see, come spring.

The grasses, Gardener's Enemy Number One, revived with the rains.  I hate to admit it, but I was glad to see them greening up.

Vale of Tiers

Sometimes, a person has to accept less than ideal land.  Since I especially wanted a river of my own, one that would stay out of my house, I had to compromise with a hilly place.  Okay, it's steep.  The front yard is level but shallow.  The gravel road is so close I'd surely choke on road dust if I tried to have a vegetable garden there.

There was a fairly level spot that I planted with tomatoes, but this was not the right year for carrying water up there.  See A Remote Possibility.  Next summer promises to have lots of Sun activity, so I'm back to terracing the garden close to the water faucet.

Down at one of the intermittent stream beds, I found these odd cement cylinders.  Four a day was my limit for carrying them individually up the steep hill to Rosie, the garden tractor. I trust I burned plenty of calories.

Apparently, the cement was poured into plastic forms, which I found I could cut off.  Not a clue as to what they were originally used for, but I had an idea for another short tier at the end of the garden. It didn't seem like much of a slope there, but the precious dirt was slip-sliding away.

Yesterday, the soil was once again, after months of waiting, workable.  Yay!  Tillie seemed to suffer from lethargy, though.  The air filter was clean.  I thought if it was water in the gas, the little tiller would pass it, but it was dogging out.  Guiltily, I admitted that the gas/oil mixture was not the freshest.  Once I swapped it for a new batch, Tillie roared to life and tilled in some of those fabulous cow pies.

Always dictated to by the weather, I had to get the tier in place before rains forecast for tomorrow arrive.  Too much heat and sun made me wary of the enterprise, since I am a shade tree gardener.

The answer was this shade gizmo I rigged up.  The frame was from a Compost Tumbler that had rusted out. The gears that turned the tumbler are now the wheels for this portable shade unit.  A piece of steel siding is the top.

Although I started out doing precision work, leveling the cylinders in all directions, I soon lowered my standards.  Tight together and the same level as the preceding one seemed more than adequate.

There are more of these cement plugs to carry up and put in place, when the heat tapers off a bit. For now, it's a powerful  thirteen-cylinder barricade.  These foot-tall guys look like the tiny offspring of the enormous cement grain bins awaiting barges above the Missouri River in Kansas City.  Here, they look like they are in the garden nursery until they reach transplanting size.

Tonight, when it gets shady, I'll level the soil with Tillie and plant a cover crop for the fall and winter.  The cow pies under the tub can be worked in on the adjacent level, too.

I'm really proud of this dirt.  It started out with topsoil thin on the ground. I added manure, compost, bits of charcoal from the wood stove, egg shells, limestone granules, leaves, topsoil from down at the river and kitchen scraps to achieve this incredible loam.  It's beautiful, which explains why I don't want any of it washing away in the rain. It's mine now and I intend to keep it.

This spring, before the drought kicked in, this little 4x8 foot plot produced some delicious veggies. I got a nice harvest of snow peas, carrots, radishes and turnips.  Later in the summer, it had a bumper crop of deep cracks, but I've removed all traces of  the drought disaster, at least in this one little spot.  Now if it will only rain.

Cow Pies

When we finally got a few days with temperatures under ninety degrees, my spirits revived.  We gardeners have to be outside doing something besides measuring the depth of the cracks in the garden.  I did slide the steel tape measure down a few and got a reading of two feet deep, surely a record.  It looked like some of the cracks might go on to become crevasses.

The soil  was hard as a rock, so no digging, weeding or cultivating was possible.  For every season there is a purpose, so I decided the time was ripe for assembling soil enrichment materials.  However, the drought removed any growing vegetation.

                       The grass everywhere was in this state, gray and dismal.

All summer, I'd been looking at the vacated cow pasture, with an eye to slipping through the barbed wire fence and swiping some of the cow pies.  So when the weather turned from unbearably hot, over a hundred degrees, to just hot, I set out with my big rope tub and turning fork.  Finding a really big dried cow plop, I realized that if you are the sort of person who considers such a thing a treasure, you must accept it about yourself.  I have.

If questioned, I was prepared to argue that I was taking it in trade for all the huge tracks the cows left when they got out and wandered through my place.  I could show them exhibits.  Anyway, no one seemed to notice.  Over several days, I got rather a lot and spread it over the garden in anticipation of fall rains.

Who knows, maybe this dried cow stuff has lost all its nutrients, but it was lightweight and should provide some organic material to be tilled in.

In my gardening life, I've shoveled a lot of manure.  When I had the dairy goats, I could load the big manure spreader with goat droppings and straw bedding in a few hours.  Later, when I lost the farm, I gardened in the small town where I lived before finding this place.  I was not above begging horse manure, even llama toidies.

A few days ago, this area was blessed with two inches of rain, the most we'd had at once in a long while. I was actually able to pull a few weeds in the iris bed.  Soon, I'll be able to till in the cow pies.  Life is good.

Heard Through the Grapevine

Checking for ripe grapes, I tried to look nonchalant while actually hanging around, listening.

Summer sounds are so different from those in springtime, when all nature is the first blush of youth. Gone is all the twittering between the birds, perhaps for fear of litigation.

A field sparrow trilled its beautiful song, but gave out with only the first few bars and ignored the repeat sign. In springtime, it was the sound track of my life.  Gone now, like good radio stations.

Where are the robins? With the heat and drought, worms have vanished from their menu.  I believe the robins all met for iced tea at Denney's and decided to take advantage of the off-season migration specials. While I was hiding out in the AC, they slipped out of town.  Even now, they are having coffee in cool Newfoundland.  They do that disappearing act every year at this time.  We don't notice because they leave in small groups and fly under the radar.

Some mockingbirds are seen, but they, too, have stopped serenading for mates.  They used up their huge repertoire and are waiting for other songs to imitate. They do not fear copyright infringement litigation.

                                                        A Shriek in the Night
When I was out stargazing, the stillness was broken by an unidentified bird, not  a whippoorwill.  It sounded as if it had completely lost its mind.  Perhaps it was a form of heatstroke or heat-induced hysteria.  A person so rarely has the opportunity to hear a bird have a nervous breakdown.  Okay, it could have been a screech owl.

                                                                Spanish Frogs

Not being a nature photographer, this was the best shot I could get of a frog hopping over the milweed-covered pond.  The frogs only jump when I walk along the shore and it is hard for me to take the picture while walking, because then the camera would be moving.  I guess they are Spanish frogs because they sound like they are using castanets.

One evening at dusk, there was such a doleful sound coming from down by the pond that I almost rushed down to help someone in distress.  Then I heard it again.  Now I understand where the expression "croaked" came into being. It was pretty scary.

                                                   Shrill Voices
Then there are the insects that make me think my ears are ringing.  Or maybe they leave my ears ringing. These are the locusts and other emitters of high-pitched sounds.  The noise is just within the range of human hearing, unfortunately.  It seems I can hear them even after they've stopped piercing the air with all that shrill droning.

                                                Back to the Grapevine
I got to thinking about what they say about eavesdroppers, that they never hear anything good about themselves. I imagined a locust leading the chorus, saying, "You cicadas and crickets need to come in more on that last bit.  Louder!  I can still hear her playing Santa Lucia on her infernal accordion."

The Sun is Acting Up

With all the incessant heat this summer, the one bright spot is the Sun.

My interest in astronomy has led me to articles about our most important star.  Frankly, I had no idea that it could carry on so.  Looks like a source of global warming to me, but I'm no scientist.

NASA has lots of websites, so I don't have to invest in a solar telescope or a solar filter for the 'scope I have.  That's great, because as a shade tree person,  I can't see how I could manage it.

So, there are all these cool satellites orbiting the Sun, sending back fabulous pictures and videos.

There are even online tutorials for us Sun dummies to learn a thing or two.  Everything that I wanted to know but was afraid to ask about Coronal Mass Ejections has been carefully explained, with pictures.

The news is that the Sun is not only in an extremely active year for sunspots, zero days without one this year, but is "ramping up" for lots more next year.

Stuck inside in the endless heat advisory days, I've become addicted to spaceweather.com, checking every few hours to see the drama unfolding.  At night, excited by the solar activity, I go outside  and look  for auroras excited by the solar activity.

I believe that all those cameras orbiting  the Sun are contributing to the sunspots, solar flares and CME's. It's just like when young movie stars get surrounded with more press coverage than is good for them.  They can't handle all that public scrutiny and flip out.

Next, we'll have media polls tabulating which sunspot was the biggest disappointment, or the best fireworks display.  I don't see it going so far as a trend toward young mothers naming their babies AR-1520, but you never know.

Across the River and Around the Bend

All the heat has turned me into a lizard-like creature.  I come out in the early morning and then hide from the sun until evening.

The grandkids came for a few days and we all waded across the river.  I regret to say that I was not leading the pack, being a wimp where deep water is concerned.  I can swim, but only well enough to not drown immediately.

Carolyn, age fifteen, led the way and coaxed me and her mom, Izzy, to cross the Grand River.  Jason and Molly are good little swimmers. We all wore shoes for the rocky beach, which turned to lovely sand halfway across.

It was never deeper than my waist, and I am a short Grammie. Whale rock doesn't look so much like a whale when the water is this low.

The water was warm, with refreshing cool currents toward the far side, where it was shady.  Izzy and I walked upriver on the sandy shore, going around the bend. The kids appeared to be swimming in the deep middle of the river.

However, when we told them to stand on the bottom, to allay our fears that it was quite dangerous, we had to laugh.

It was getting dusk by then, so we took our sandy selves up to the house and had BBQ'd hamburgers.

When it got dark, I got out the telescope and showed them Saturn and M7, a beautiful open cluster of stars, above the Cat's Eyes in Scorpio.  They loved the Butterfly Cluster, M6. Now they can understand when I mention that I was stargazing until two in the morning.  Once some of the sky goodies are found, we stargazers want more and more.  They could see individual stars in the Milky Way, which was a big surprise for them.  Saturn's rings are a huge draw for getting people hooked on astronomy. People can only resist it until they look in a telescope, and then they are goners.

At the very least, I now have others who know what I'm talking about when I say M7.

Midsummer Blues

The same force that causes me to get into a gardening frenzy in December is at work now.  The Summer Solstice is the signal for me to rein in my wild planting excesses.

This year, however, I have been struggling for some time with dry conditions, devoting lots of energy to hauling water or dragging the hoses around.  The statistics just in reveal that this is the second driest April through June on record.  Also, we rarely get our first hundred degree days until late July, and we've had so many now I've lost count.  How it could be so hot and dry and still be humid is one of Nature's nasty secrets.

It's like when you feel kind of crummy and the doctor says you have pneumonia, you feel immediately much worse.

After that, I understood that the reason the Remote Garden has not grown properly is drought. I gave the plants water, fish fertilizer, water, cow manure tea and water.  I can't carry enough water up there to make a difference.  These tomatoes simply do not have enough leaf cover to protect the tomatoes from sun scald.  When corn tassels at two feet tall, it's the same thing; it's not going to make it. The word is unthrifty.

Many trees, like these honey locusts, have been forced to lay off half of their leaves.  My first ripe cucumber looked delicious but when I tasted it, it was so bitter that hours later my lips and tongue were still smarting.
My daughter Lissa raised some like that one year and she said even the chickens wouldn't eat them, and they have no lips.

The only sensible thing for me to do is to stop watering the lost causes and concentrate on things that have a chance of survival.  This is the first time I've ever seen a peony bush wilt.  They did perk up with some water. Veggies and perennials first is my plan.  Some of the annual flowers have already shriveled up in the hot wind.

Even the Grand River doesn't look so grand, and is dropping daily.  I was sitting here at Fishing Beach one evening, listening to some fish tumbling rocks nearby when a young deer appeared on the sandbar.  I held very still and it couldn't seem to figure me out for some time.  It finally trotted along the sand upriver.  My side of the river has no sandbars, just rock. It's on the outer bend of the river, so I must hang out with the rip-rap. The river can now be waded across, so I may see how far I can walk on the sandy side.  At least I can go around the bend, if I haven't already.

Meanwhile, I got an order of wool sock yarns and am knitting away while listening to a biography of Birdseye, inventor of frozen foods.  Also for entertainment, I'm watching Shackleton and reading Black Ice, set in Antarctica.  It all helps.

Small Victories on the Cottage Garden Front

It's good to have some success plans for the garden.  Sometimes, plants don't come out the victor in these skirmishes with invasive grasses, hot winds and little rain.

My idea for moving some of the husky types to the front Cottage Garden is coming along.  First of all, I dug up the Shasta Daisy that was hogging the space next to the Diana, Princess of Wales Rose.  The book said to gently pull the roots apart.  The book always says that, because people who write gardening advice are sadists.  All of the root masses I've come across, with the exception of irises,  make a Gordian Knot seem easy.  So I did what I usually do, and cut the plant with a shovel.  I planted the four pieces at various spots in the thick mat of grass and they have thrived and bloomed.  Amazing.  Next year, they will triumph over even more grass.

To the right and back is the recently sheared sage plant of some enormous proportions. Beyond that is the gone-to-seed coreopsis.

Out back, the rose thanked me by putting on quite a display and even now is into a second flush of bloom.

Back to the Cottage Garden.  The Coreopsis plants were their rambunctious selves, sprawling over everything around them.  Talk about elbows on the table.  I let them go to seed.  They are such rowdies that even tossing the pulled-up stalks starts a new patch, as was evidenced by some near the porch where I threw some last year.  I really love these guys.  They are so cheery.

The sage plant was an idea the former owners had.  I hack it back after it blooms but I think there's no getting rid of it, since it's too close to the house for explosives.  I don't really use that much sage.  We did try it as a steeped tea and it wasn't too bad, with lemon and sugar.  The bees and even tiny butterflies were all over it, having a feast.

After starting some datura seeds much too early and babying them along, I found dozens of volunteers where I had them last year.  I transplanted a few and they have made better growth than my pitiful specimens.  They have had a bit of a struggle but I've carried bowls of water to them.  The bowls have dirt in the water from rinsing veggies.  I don't want the dirt down the drains and so carry it to the daturas.

Due to the semi-drought, I haven't had to mow these last few weeks, which gave the chicory the opportunity to bloom.  They aren't really a candidate for the cottage garden because they  bloom beautifully in the mornings and look like stickery weeds in the afternoons.  Here, they are growing in the driveway, where they pester people getting out of their cars.  They are seen all along the roads here in summer, coming back even stronger after being mowed.  Unlike me, they like the dry rocky conditions.

Next, I will move some of the daylilies, seen above.  They are another plant that can hold its own against grasses.  Last fall, I dug up one beautiful yellow one and got 14 plants along the garden fence, using my hatchet technique with the shovel.  The fencing I added to the barbed wire to keep cows from munching on my side; they love daylilies.

Now, I'm turning my attention to the vegetable garden, where I'm discovering that a watched tomato doesn't turn red.