A few years ago, the piece of land just north of the 80 acres went up for sale. I wanted it like anything because the “hump” at the upper end is higher than ours, has the only post oak nearby, some lovely wild plum trees along the highway, additional old trees and plants closely related Read More…
Tag: Nature
Waiting: Not My Favorite Game
It’s been a difficult couple of weeks for several reasons, but especially because…I haven’t heard anything back from Agent. I’m working, of course: the wildlife management report (in the process of which I discovered that my old printer no longer prints text…just pictures. And not very well…with thin orange striped across them.) Then there’s the Read More…
Water From the Sky Again (yay!)
The predicted storms started with a BOOOOOMMMMM! around midnight, followed by hard rain for maybe 20 minutes, and then off and on rain (some quite hard) through the night and into the morning. It’s dark. It’s much cooler (50sF, cold to us, esp. with rain). I went out between downpours this morning and hayed the Read More…
Rain Overnight
Almost 2 inches of rain yesterday and last night, which should have mostly soaked in (maybe not in the burn scar) since the grass coverage we’ve nurtured has increased resistance to flood and erosion. Grass is really good at holding the soil and slowing moderate flow to slow: it cleans water and prevents damage. So Read More…
Recovery In Progress
What you’re told, in the management books, is that after a planned fire, everything comes back just fine. Wild fires tend to be hotter, get out of control faster, and do more damage because they occur in the hottest weather when fire departments hope to goodness no fires start. There are enthusiasts for “prescribed fires.” Read More…
Replanting Starts and Coyote II
This morning before breakfast, I coiled up an old battered hose from the yard, gathered the heavy-duty rake, and headed for the burn scar to find the first place to start the replanting with the ten pounds of lovely, wonderful seed from Native American Seed Co. https://www.seedsource.com/ that arrived yesterday while I was in the Read More…
Miracle Rain: Recovery Starts
Ten days after the fire, and two days since any rain–but the 1.75 (approx) inches had a wonderful effect and revealed that for some of the burnt areas, the burn didn’t go below the surface. Image brightened to show the green bits more clearly Some areas are still all black, but some have little Read More…
Water From The Sky-edited 10/1
Yes, we needed water. It is POURING down. In the dark, so impossible to really judge, but we do have a metal roof and so do the poor horses, w/o insulation. Rags couldn’t care less, but Tigger hates loud noise. I put out hay in the barn, but dunno if he’ll stay in or not. Read More…
What Next After the Fire?
First, we were incredibly lucky to have lost only a small part of the vegetation (wildlife habitat) on the place–thanks to the skilled and hardworking firefighters from four different units, three in this county and one in the next. Nobody was hurt (not even R-, who came the closest the longest to the flames.) No Read More…
Wildfire
R-‘s little orange riding mower caught fire while he was mowing in the field today and started a grass fire that resulted in four different rural fire services responding. It was a tad frantic around here for several hours. Morning was cooler (and dryer) than yesterday, but it warmed up faster than anticipated, and the Read More…