The Welcome Wagon

Cole and I returned late from work tonight, to find this guy waiting for us.

Tree frog clinging to the dining room screen.

I sat at my dining table eating my supper, midnight snack, whatever it should be called and watched him dine along with me.  

What a groovy way to end a long day.  Thanks little buddy, same time tomorrow?  
I'll leave the light on again to attract more bugs for you!

Under Assault

Earlier this Summer, it was discovered that I had a vole infestation.  

Voles, not moles.  Not cute, tiny, velvety bug eaters, but nasty rat sized vegans, who travel in tunnels, erupting at night to treat your landscaping as their personal salad bar.

Jamie's Most Wanted

They've obliterated all my beets, twice razed 20' rows of lima beans,desecrated all but 6 bean plants, ravaged my hostas, assault my sweet potato vines daily -- well, you get the picture!

The protective netting I had placed over the original remaining sweet potato plants confounded them only temporarily.  Only four healthy plants still exist.

They are the ones planted around my single tomato plant.  Maybe voles hate tomatoes -- I second that emotion!

Team Smith is losing, in spite of Jinx catching and eating one and Cole bringing me two live but dazed voles.  I've trapped two, perhaps more.  Apparently they're too big for ordinary mouse traps and they've made off with a few of mine.  

I've since switched to rat traps, with still no luck.

All this warring hasn't been without casualties. Amphibians are precious to me, they are my canaries in the coal mine. A backyard full of toads, frogs, skinks and lizards is a sign that I'm doing a good job as steward of my land.

So, it was a bad night when I accidentally crushed a toad while skulking around the yard checking traps. Further upsetting was the next morning's emergency amputation to save the life of a big mama toad whose front limb was mangled by my trap.
The icing on the cake was the bird, who had to fly off obscenely bare breasted, after getting stuck to one of my Super Sticky Trap Pads.

New tactics are required. I found exactly what I need online. Greatest 30 second video:

Dear Santa, I need one of these! 

Pity all the vole tunnels are primarily under my home and the old farmhouse. Somehow, me thinks Dr. P would not be amused.

The Canadian Contingency

July 30th, for a brief day, I was rewarded with visitors from Canada. Several times now, my cousin and her family have made this monumental detour during their return trip to Ontario from their vacation home in Florida. We made the most of our 12 hours together.

Fasten your seat belts.

9 AM, cousins arrive, we stick the youngest one down in the storm shelter mostly for my amusement.

 Then we head to the Uchee Rifle Range in Tuskegee National Forest.  Nothing like a few miles on those ill maintained dirt roads to make them start hearing banjo music in their heads.  
I'd been collecting an assortment of targets:  gourds from my compost pile, Perrier bottles, frying pans and, of course, regular paper targets.  I'm a creative Redneck.

After the jolt from the first shot, Mona, adjusts her stance and proceeds on to take care of business.  RCMP looking for new recruits?...

Rolly is brave enough to try the 300 Win. Mag that kicks like a mule.  Most folks give her back to me after the first shot.  He efficiently plucks off all the gourds his first time around.  The quiet ones always surprise you.

His daughter, Sarah, shows us the bear gun's ammo.

A fellow next to us had been firing at our frying pan and felt obliged to offer me a chance to shoot his AR-15.  Like I'd turn him down.

Fun, no recoil and an amazing scope, but not my cup of tea.  I'm too much of a traditionalist, I prefer something Daniel Boone would be proud to carry.  Besides, the AR-15 holds 10 rounds, if you can't hit a deer after 10 rounds, you deserve to become a vegetarian.

Fast forward to lunch.  The cousins go to downtown Auburn and I return to the farm to fight with the oxen who refuse to load into the trailer.  Dr P  helps tip the scale in my favor, but we're still 10 minutes late for our appointment at the vet school.  
One of my little cousins had a notion at one point of becoming a veterinarian and I thought a behind the scenes tour of Auburn University Vet School would be educational.  The feral Angus cows being treated before my oxen could turn anyone off the profession. Kicking, charging, snorting, bleeding, I hadn't planned on this X-rated version of large animal medicine.  
The plan was for Family Rated fun.  Like watching Tommy get a manicure.

Next stop:  Small Animal Clinic's Physiotherapy Lab, to watch a demonstration of the new equipment...starring my favorite rock star.

I load up my dog and oxen at 4:30 and rush back home to get ready for Tommy and Mack's birthday party.  With less than an hour before my cousins return and four other guests to arrive, I should calmly prepare myself to be a proper hostess... that would be so out of character.  Instead, my cousins return to find me in my Wellies spraying the manure out of the horse trailer.  Busted.
We walk to the barn to see the new kids.

Both cute as a button!
Sadly, we stumble upon a goatlet clinging to life by a thread.  I call Dr. P to tell him of his animal's plight and I leave my cousins with instructions to stand over it, protecting it from trampling, and I head back to finish washing my trailer.  Five minutes pass, I look out to see the sentinels still standing over the goat.  That's when it dawns on me that these metropolitan folks are not seasoned farmers and this may be sensory overload for them.  Oops. I shuffle back as quickly as my Wellies can take me.  
Dr. P shows up, I pick up the baby and we head to the shop to decide on a course of action.  Along the way, the goatlet dispenses the foulest diarrhea all down the side of my shirt, my shorts and into one boot.  
Two seconds later, the last of my dinner guests show up.  Welcome to my world.  I had forewarned them all that I would be casually dressed...the toxic sludge was an added bonus.
After a good decontaminating, the festivities resume.  Carter had made party hats for the oxen.

Happy Birthday to Tommy, the #2 love of my life (Cole is unopposed as #1).  
Mack doesn't give me a chance to finish tying his hat.

The hat slips off to one side and he puts in his best rendition of a rodeo bull in full flight.  As he is neither #3 nor 4 love of my life, I find hilarity in his reaction.

Supper goes off without any major calamity. Time's up, we have to say farewell for now to my family.

Horsing Around

Firstly, the non-news:  I'm trying to get my weekly mileage over double digits, but it's not been working out for me.  I ran 6 miles a week ago and my back protested for 3 days.  I'm a hostage in my own body.

Cole isn't faring any better.  His surgically altered back leg is fully rehabilitated.  Dummy's recently injured front leg isn't as cooperative.  He has a support bandage he's supposed to wear all the time.

This is what happens when he's been without it:

The other cripple at the farm opted to fare worse before showing signs of improvement.  Axel sprained his deep flexor tendon.

Exhibit A

This would be best resolved with icing, bandaging and stall rest.  But, there's no room in the barn.  Spring has sprung late at the farm this year:  the nanny goats have begun kidding.

Precious baby goatlets don't mix well with a neurotic horse.

Goatlet:  n. a Smitty-ism, should be used instead of 'kid', suits them better.

Therefore, the best I can do, is to ice Axel daily, give him Bute (anti-inflammatory), wrap the leg for the first two weeks and hope for the best.  
Oh, and turn my backyard into a convalescence stall.

Axel mowed the lawn all day while I worked on my horse trailer a couple Saturdays ago.

His lameness has altered his gait, causing him to strike the back of his front foot with his back foot.  Prolonged bruising of the hoof bulb caused a coronary band abscess this week.  Bad blowout:

More soaking required, this time with warm a Epsom salt solution.  Axel can be a temperamental diva.  Twice now, he's arbitrarily decided that the soaking procedure was life threatening and should be ceased by rearing up and flying off backwards.  Princess almost ended up on the hood of my car the last time.  Now, he gets lassoed to a tree with no more than 2"  play in the rope.  Bad patient...

versus...

Good patient:

Sweet Bella.  She has a chronic skin condition that required clipping, scab cleansing, all sorts of un-pleasantries, yet she rarely fusses.  

My draft horses have spoiled me, so I try to return the favor.  I bought a watermelon to share with the chickens.  The horses attempted to steal the half I was carrying out to the chicken coop.

The hens were mildly offended by the big bite marks taken out of their prize.

Instead of eating the other half, I served it up to Angus.  You've never lived unless you've watched 2000 lbs slobber over watermelon.

From the Penalty Box

I've seriously reprimanded myself.  During the past few weeks, I've been recuperating from a back injury curled up in bed with my laptop.  For three years, my pledge to myself was that for every four documentaries, I could watch one show purely for entertainment.  Most times, I hold on to a DVD for a month before I have a chance to watch it.  But, with the mail-in center  for Netflix in Birmingham,  a DVD mailed in one morning results in a new one by the next day... causing me to seriously overindulge the last two weeks.


Therefore, the diet has begun:  restrictions on my online time and I cancelled my Netflix plan. Take that you bad girl!


I hadn't posted anything on my blog in a couple of weeks because the Blogger site has decided to block me from uploading pictures.  Technology is dastardly. Two weeks of upgrading operating systems, defragging, compatibility view changes... to no avail.  My amateur techie work will probably end up costing me double the usual shop fee when I bring my laptop to my repair guy today!


Before I lose my laptop, let me highly recommend a documentary and a TV series.
What Plants Talk About is a Nature documentary that is absolutely fascinating.  Did you know that big daddy trees in the forest help feed their own offspring?  I'm not telling you how, you'll have to watch.  I might not be able to use my chainsaw for a while...


The 12 part TV show is a political drama/police mystery called Salamander.  It's set in Brussels and is in Dutch and French with subtitles.  Spine tingling suspense and beautiful streetscapes.  I've been to Brussels twice, but almost a decade ago.  Watching the show, I felt like I had my backpack on again and I was marching through town trying to see every inch of it, every embassy, every statue.  Ahhh memories, if that's all I have left when I get old, at least they'll be good ones.

Lucky Number Seven

July 3rd, Cole hit a milestone:  the big 50!

Or to look at it on the bright side:  lucky number 7.  After the year he's had, he's due a better fortune.
It's tradition that on his and my birthdays, we're on a trail somewhere.  As I'm working through the long weekend to catch up on work, my grand plans to take Cole to Roosevelt State Park were canned.
I think he was just as happy with an hour of squirrel hunting this evening.

We came back to meatloaf straight out of the oven.

"Define share".

Snouts in the trough.

If you think about it, Cole ages 1 year for every 2 chronological months.  Time together is precious.

The occasion called for a trip to the ice cream parlor, with all four dogs.
I only wanted one good picture of us. Is that too much to ask? With the 10 second delay on my cell phone camera, you never know what the picture will end up looking like.  Out on the deck, Cole was preoccupied scanning for squirrels in the trees.

Still focused, he's assuming I'm giving him a boost up the tree.

Moved inside.  Things got goofy.

A little drunk off my second glass of chocolate milk!

"Ma, I farted".

"You're making my eyes water, Kid".

"You're staring at me.  I can feel it".

 

Never got the good picture I wanted, but had too much fun trying!

 

Ended the evening by bringing Wilbur his beetles.

 



Do I know how to party, or what? 

My Countries

I have cause to celebrate twice this week.

Happy Canada Day to my Canadian family and friends!

 

I was belting out some off key renditions of O Canada at work yesterday.  I even met a fellow Ottawan at Earth Fare.  Hard to mistake her for anything but a proud Canuck with Canada on her T-shirt, even her baby's pacifier had a maple leaf on it. 

Reconnecting with my roots has been a theme these days.  Through the magic of Facebook, I recently found my childhood best friend, Anne-Marie.

Her passion in high school was ballet.  My bet was that she would end up dancing with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet. We lost track of each other right after high school.  She thought I was heading to Carleton U for Architecture.  Instead, I headed to the States to study agriculture and she went about her business getting an MBA.  After being a stockbroker, Anne-Marie decided to begin the second act of her career and became a chef and a college culinary instructor.

Always driven and disciplined, I bet she has a third act up her sleeve.
This Fall will be my first time back to Canada in four years, only fitting that best buddies (even after a 27 year hiatus) will be together again.  Serendipity!

It's been said that the person you should become is the one you were at 15 when your passions were clear.  For me, it's always been about animals and books.  Seeing this photo that Anne-Marie had of us at 15 made me laugh. Everyone else on the bus is chatting and we're engrossed in our books.

 

In honour (notice Canadian spelling) of Canada Day, I want to recommend a fine Canadian author.  Louise Penny has written a series of detective mystery books set in Canada. 

 

 

Bury Your Dead is a contemporary novel set in Old Quebec City.  A fabulous read.  I could spend the rest of the Summer cradling her other ten books...

 

In honor of my adopted country, I present two books from an Auburn University entomologist, Dr. Mullen, both books concern Phillip Henry Gosse's year in Alabama in 1838.  Gosse was an Englishman who had worked in Canada before moving to Alabama to become a school master. One book is of his watercolors Entomologia Alabamensis.

 

 

The other is a collection of letters he wrote detailing the flora and fauna he discovered over the course of 8 months in Dallas county, only two counties from my Lee county.  Written 176 years ago, I could be standing there beside him when he describes his euphoria at the discovery of Actias luna (Luna moth), he even compares back to his explorations in Canada.  All these strange southern bugs and plants that I've delighted in studying, he had the same adventure two centuries ago.

 

 

It would seem he did more exploring than school teaching, using his pupils to gather specimens for his entomological collection.  He had minions!  Gosse's descriptions of agricultural practices make me shudder.  Rather than clear cutting forests for the preparation of fields, the cotton farmers girdled trees, killing them within a year, but also wasting the wood.  The following season, the slaves planted cotton in the devastated wasteland.  Gosse describes the danger involved for the slaves working among thousands of dead standing trees. 

One experience that I can only live through his eyes is of hunting on horseback in a virgin forest.  Gosse was able to pursue deer at a gallop through the forest. He goes on to explain that second cut forests are choked by brush and terrible vines.  You don't say, that I have plenty of experience with! 

 

Happy July 4th to all my American friends and adopted family members!