Happy Harvest Blog
The bird breakfast buffet
It’s the Great Backyard Bird Count weekend, this weekend. Right now. You can watch the map pinging with bird checklists being submitted. I had something cool happen. I was using the eBird lists to see if I could identify this one bird that’s around almost every day, only ever one by itself, and I glanced out and it was here! I feel like it can only be a pine warbler, although he looks much more orangey than yellow. Not a pine grosbeak, though, bc he has the delicate beak.
Highest winds ever, worse than Dorian
Friday night we had a heck of a storm. It was strange that it was all over so fast, from onset to back to complete calm in 12 hours, with the storm blast lasting about four hours long. However, it was the highest winds we’ve ever experienced here, stronger gusts than Hurricane Dorian brought not too long ago. I know, because it blew over a beehive, and that’s never happened before.
Greenhouse goings-on
Earlier this year in the greenhouse. Now it’s a little wilder. Even at this point, though, the guineas were getting lost. The “aisles” have kind of disappeared. I went to open the far doors, and there was a white guinea in the melons. Chirp chirp. Her boyfriend came back in for her, bushwhacking towards her to lead her out. I have a theory that the guineas have kept down the beetles this year. I don’t have a problem this year, although I saw eggs on the leaves earlier.
chicken drill bit
The Silkies have picked a spot to dig a hole, and are digging the hole with their bodies, removing the dirt in their feathers and shaking it out elsewhere. Slow and steady. They take turns, and now they have the hole twice as deep as this so that they are fully below ground level. Odd little birds. Sidewinder unwinding in the pool. I haven’t bought them a bag of the pro-mix outside of the greenhouse before because, in the greenhouse, they are doing the work of distributing it for me to amend the soil I will grow in, but hey.
Done with the dentist
I think my summer of dental hell is finally over. Root canal part 2 yesterday (hallelujah, the dental staff was at work with the power on Monday!), and the sudden end of “mild” dental “discomfort” in my mouth was like the lights coming on, or discovering you’ve been wearing sunglasses without noticing – energy re-surged into my life! I think the mouth stuff has been contributing to why I’ve been sick so much, and headaches, lately the past weeks. It just saps you, enduring it.
All over
Dorian has passed. The chickens are all fine, the pig house did not flip over, one beehive had an outer lid blown off, no cars or structures were damaged. Casualties: clothesline, woodshed roof has another rip, the big hazelnut tree outside my window is tipped over:( It may live, but it’s at 45° with the roots torn and heaved up. I don’t know how well nut trees adapt.
Dorian
What’s left of Dorian is about to hit us here. I don’t think the forecast is very catastrophic at all, but everything is canceled and dire warnings abound. Quite a lot of rain for one day, but we’ve had it before. I definitely expect that power will be knocked out everywhere; that happens with any stiff breeze. Perhaps the internet will go.
I've always wondered where all the helium balloons go
What goes up must come down. Turns out they do come down in the woods. I found this shredded remnant of a balloon hanging in a tree, randomly. Still tied with the gift ribbon. Actually, I’ve been told (by a marine biologist who’s seen them) that they much more often come down in the ocean. They rise, catch an air current, and are carried out over the ocean before the helium degrades and they come down.
It was very unpleasant
I got poison ivy on my face. As my friend asked, "Did you fall [face first] in it?"Well, nearly. We had a lost person search happen locally that eventually lasted days and involved teams from all over the province, but the first night, it was just a half dozen of us in the dark, and we built a fire, in the dark, while waiting for the go-ahead to launch our canoes.
Saturation point
It's been raining for almost ten days straight. It's just unbelievable. No more water can be absorbed. It's just puddles and standing water everywhere. The ground is so soft you can unexpectedly plunge in the ground over your ankle walking along. then it tries to pull your boot off. The chickens have had their coops outside for several days, but when the rain come hammering down, they run into the greenhouse, which remains empty, to shelter.
Rain day
What a day. Buckets of water coming down, starting out with slush on the ground, and wind, blowing the cold rain into your face and coat. All the chickens opted to stay in the greenhouse most of the day, only making brief forays out when the rain abated. The guineas took one step out in the morning before jumping back in, the chickens got several steps out before pulling their necks back, wheeling around and running back in. It's gross out there! I found it the perfect day for a nap, and that was glorious. Never enough sleep!
buttonholes
Awesome! A buttonholer on a Singer treadle sewing machine, making perfect buttonholes. This is amazing technology IMO, from the 40's. On a treadle sewing machine the needle is fixed. It can't move side to side like modern electrics so it can't do a zigzag stitch. How to get around that? Let's grab the fabric and move it side to side while the needle goes up and down- voila, zigzags and buttonholes!
One Year
After blogging since the early oughts, 2018 was the first year I posted every single day. It wasn't always first thing in the morning, and sometimes a scheduled post failed to post on schedule, but I posted every day. After a while, it was too good a streak to break. What else did I do this year? Caught my first swarm, made a more effective strike against the invasive Glossy-leaf Buckthorn species we're plagued with than I have before, had a slightly better garden and a bigger one.
bees snugged II
The bees are all wrapped now, after getting their insulation. This time I tried to wrap the tar paper so that it was sealed and went up under the flange of the beehive lid, so in theory the water sheds over the tar paper wrap, but I can still get the lid off anytime. We’ll see. I put a piece of tape on the corner before doing the fold so the paper doesn’t tear- that worked well. Like gift wrapping. The paper is all folded down tight and taped to the eke.
Ursa's chicks
Ursa and her four fluffballs are out in the world, bouncing around. Now she’s out of the bath and willing to be a tea cozy again. It seems like a moderate challenge to find their way under her.
We're goin' to China, kids
Ursa’s first day in the chickery: she celebrated her first day out of the broody box as the hens always do, with a vigorous dirt bath. I placed her in the former location of the peat bag (the overflow spot), for premium dirt bathing. The kids start to come around, Hey, I’m kinda cold, can I get under you? Stand back, kids, mama’s getting her bath on! She’s like a round fur tornado, spraying everything down with dirt. Evidently, it feels incredible.
not good very bad
My computer stopped working today in a way that seems forboding-ly final. It won't turn on and won't charge. No warning signs. The current suspicion is that some snow got into it. I'm already emotionally recovering. The blow is that my computer is my work, and there was quite a lot of data only on that computer. Now it is currently inaccessible in a deadline week, and I'm not exactly embracing having to re-record half of a book the week before Christmas!
Instagram.
I may not make a blog post every day, but at least I Insta.
Bite size.
