Everywhere you Go

Skylines

I wrote from camp the other day of the micro burst that took out a couple of our Blue Spruce trees along the driveway. 

Turns out that a lot more than a couple were laid completely flat, all in, all done.  at least 8 or 10 are gone, maybe more. Tall vegetation hides the stumps, but nothing will hide the gaps. The row looks like meth teeth, although thankfully, the biggest, strongest, favoritest trees survived.

Then when I was walking Mack this morning I realized that the something-not-quite-right feeling I had been having was not just because limbs from the honey locust flat wrecked a bunch of my flower beds....no, it was more.

The wind also took down the ancient dead elm that towered behind the heifer barn. I am most glad that it must have fallen into the creek and not onto the barn...no damage done.

But I will miss it so much. It was the first place I looked on bird hunts as its high bare branches provided a perch for Bald Eagles, crows, grackles, assorted vultures, hawks, and all the big guys of the air. Plus all the little passerines used it as a sound stage for love songs and threats of territorial vengeance. 

I have no right to complain. This farm is home to hundreds of trees.....three woodlands, many hedgerows, and bits and bunches of them everywhere. And nothing is static in nature...nothing.

Still, I miss them....gonna to take a while to get used to the new skylines. 

Just Loonie

Red-throated Loon, Pecks Lake NY

We enjoyed the company of at least four Common Loons all week at camp. They were tame enough to come right up to the porch of the cabin...which sits out over the water....as well as parading by out on the lake every day.

This morning however, things were pretty quiet. It was move out day and Beck so I got up early and got right at it. The porch was bare of our belongings long before the boss arrived to haul us home, except for our two camp chairs, which we were occupying.

Not even a pair of binoculars had survived the packing frenzy.

Great Blue Heron spent two hours perched on a branch near the porch yesterday

As we sat waiting for transpo I noticed a swimming bird way out on the lake. At first I dismissed it as just another duck, as it was way too small for a Common Loon. However, after a while I forced myself to traipse inside and get my toys.

Hmmm....not a duck. Still way too small for a COLO.

Fledgling Song Sparrow that wanted me to kick up bugs for it.

I took lots of photos and made an eBird list but did not submit it. Once home photos were uploaded to the computer and the identity of the bird was revealed....although I did put it up on What's this Bird? for confirmation.

It was a Red-throated Loon, the second I have ever seen and the first one for me for Fulton County. What a thrill. I much enjoyed chasing the wood warblers, waterfowl, and mountain birds all week but that little loon was one of the best birds of the year....for anywhere. List has now been submitted and the loon has already made the state rare bird alert for today.

What a nice send-off the lake gave us as we returned to our sweltering valley home.

Common Loon

Companions

Fishing off the porch early AM. Heard a muffled "gronk" call from just west....a Great Blue Heron had stopped by to preen and fluff wet morning feathers.     Then a Common Loon sailed briefly by only to vanish into the deeps in hot pursuit.   Next a Belted Kingfisher rattled past looking to make a splash.     Good compaions who don't have wait for a bite.

Chop

After yesterday's storms a short east wind is winding up a vigorous chop. It is almost getcher hoodie chilly but not quite.               I was saddened to discover yesterday that the microburst that down home night before last sheared off several of our Colorado blue spruces. The year before we married the boss and I rented the county tree planter and put in four hundred six-inch seedlings. It was a drought year and we had no way to get water to them so only a few made it.      However I loved those trees. Chipping Sparrows and Purple Finches nested in them...they were lovely, broke the wind and drifting snow for the driveway, and muted noise from the interstate.        I will miss them.

Monsoon in our Lagoon

Rain on th lake like dimpled grey denim. Fish were biting good for two days...not so much now. Baby birds everywhere...

Starts Today

Nuff said.....

Technology

The old town seal, which still works just fine.

As long as you are as strong as the Terminator

FYI the state huntin' and fishin' license system is down today. As I mostly fish at camp, which falls on about the same date every year, and since a license lasts a calendar year, I usually wait until the last minute to buy a new one.

While we waited for our dear, sweet, helpful, and infinitely patient town clerk to attempt to get connected and get me my get out of jail card from the state, we chatted.

The boss remarked on the old town clerk sign hanging above the office door. It long predates the modern office building, and no one knows just how old it is.

Then Roxanne showed us the old town seal. It is a massive hunk of metal, heavy enough that you might want to bring along an extra pack pony if you took it on the road.

Amazingly, although it took some muscle to activate it, it made a perfectly nice stamp. No way to know how long it has been around, but I'll bet it's a lot longer than the new one is going to last. Thanks, Roxanne....

And the new one.
They don't make 'em like they used to, do they?

That's Farming

Not our corn, but isn't it purdy?

The day started before five yesterday and the last of the hay was barely unloaded before 10 PM. However, it was a very good day in that after all the awful weather we have experienced in recent months, Ralph and Liz put around 800 bales in the mow.

Fueling the Mulberry Express

They worked stupid hard to do it and it was really hot. I am kinda proud of them. There are a couple of small windrows to catch up today, tedder tires to fix, and a few other odds and ends, ....for now at least...hopefully before the rain. Well done, guys.

The Gentle Curve of Summer

After endless rain the dry is downright welcome. Things are simmering right along, summer style....goldfish in the garden pond, laundry on the line, day lilies coming in golden, corn lilies glowing in the ditches along the road.

Wild chicory proving that Chicken Little was right all along. Is there a bluer blue in any natural thing? I don't think so.

Bee balm riotous red in bloom, seducing Ruby-throated Hummingbirds one and all. 

Long days, quiet nights sparkling with fireflies, hay crisping in the fields, rustling under the rake, and thumping up into the mow. Ah, summer....

Idyllic indeed.

Try to ignore the plugged mow elevator, flat tedder tires, and other assorted ills and annoyances. 

It is not snowing. The wind when it blows is a welcome cooling agent, summer vegetables are readily available, and there is more green than any other color.

Summer is good. I am most thankful for it.

Kidnapped

I was snatched away in a pickup truck last Wednesday afternoon and taken far from home.

My captors tortured me all week. At night I was imprisoned in an air conditioned room...they bought an AC just for my stay....and slept on a bed as soft and fluffy as a summer cloud. They spent the daytime hours showing me around the Finger Lakes region and feeding me. 

This included the older pirate's amazing cooking while the younger pirate supplied triple berry crisp that was to die for. She makes a mean dessert I gotta tell you.

Somewhere along the way, the older pirate became an inventive, and clever cook. From sammiches piled with amazing deli meats to ribs he smoked personally and at great length, there were tempting treats every day. A good thing I was released without ransom or I would not be able to get out of this chair.

And the coffee was outstanding. I am not a fan of perked coffee, but they get it right. A big step down going back to instant this morning....

Sam

Cam

Thor

There were dogs. The kids' dogs are friendly and funny....not to mention gorgeous. I love them and miss them already.

Skulldoggery being planned here I'll bet.

The pirate crew took me to the Windmill on my birthday, the Fourth, and bought me a banana plant, along with a really nice lunch/breakfast.  Hope I can keep it alive for a while, as I have killed a couple of other bananas over the years. ***Montgomery County needs to pay attention and establish such an enterprise. We have plenty of Amish craftsmen and gardeners and lots of English farm product entrepreneurs as well. We could do that here for sure.

There were birds...birds everywhere. They took me out to Mossy Bank (and never once threatened to throw me off even though I had been driving them nuts for days) where we heard Blackburnian and Black-throated Green Warblers and saw Hermit Thrushes and a Red-breasted Nuthatch.

We ventured out on Canandaigua Lake on their boat, the Goblin, where we fished and looked at birds and houses on cliffs with elevators down to the water and staircases built right into the cliffs and found Purple Martins too. I found the stairs and trams fascinating. Talk about going to great lengths to get to the water! The trams are especially cool. Cabin 1 at Pecks could use one of these, although I don't see it happening any time soon.

They took me to Wegmans. Why is there no Wegmans closer than Syracuse? Why? 

Then there was a nice party, where I learned the delights of playing corn hole. Who knew? The kids have talked to me about it since the first time the older pirate met the younger pirate, but I just didn't get it. 

I get it now. I laughed a lot and had a go at tossing the bean bags a couple times. Didn't get any on the board, and nearly hit the Camaro once, but I am sure I will get better with practice.

They are planning on bringing their boards down so everyone here at Northview can play. I can't wait. The boss is going to love it and will prolly play like a pro. All that baseball he played when younger and that awful, deadly arm he always had ain't gonna hurt him any.

Anyhow, if you missed me over the past five days or so, I was busy having a great time with Alan and Amber and her family and their lovely and lovable doggos, Cam, Sam and Thor.

A small part of the view from Mossy Bank Park

The kids were so kind to me and entertained me with so much fun that I am still grinning.... and I have a heck of a lot of photos to edit yet.

There are two downsides though. Having spent so much time enjoying their company, I miss them more than ever. Usually I just accept that video chat and lots of texts and phone calls are a pretty good way to keep in touch. However, there is simply nothing that will replace real hugs and face-to-face talking and listening. With their schedule the way it is, especially Alan's work, I am afraid it is going to be a while before I get to enjoy the real deal again.

And while I was gone the House Wrens took over the sitting porch and the ornamental bird house there and I am no longer welcome. Maybe I will just go back to Amber and Alan's pleasant porch. They make S'mores there. 

Thanks kids, for a wonderful weekend...you can kidnap me any time you want to. I love you guys.

Thanks also to the girls and their dad who kept things going at home while I was otherwise occupied. Came home to a cleaner house than I left, laundry all done up, and a generally welcoming situation.....good deal....

Color my World

Indigo Bunting

Viper's Bugloss.......I think

Vetches

Everlasting Pea? Showed up for the first time
ever on the side of the barn driveway. Weird but pretty

Bug Porn...Six-spotted Tiger Beetle

Brown Thrasher

Dill

Stable Boy to Star

I always loved harness racing and much admired Billy Haughton, one of the greatest drivers and trainers of all time.

He was born in the same town as I was and worked down here in Fonda and Fultonville as a boy.....went to the same school as the kids too.

 "For Haughton himself—a onetime $7-a-week stableboy from Fultonville, N.Y.—it is the good life: "..From An Emperor in Harness...

And from a 1986 Hoofbeats, "Billy Haughton was born November 2, 1923, in Gloversville, NY, the son of William F. and Edith Greene Haughton, and grew up in the nearby, small community of Fultonville. His love for horses was said to have come from one of his ancestors who emigrated to the United States from Ireland. Unofficially, Haughton's love affair with horses began with a pony named Betty which his father bought when Billy was five years old. Betty was hitched to a makeshift sulky fabricated from a basket cart, with Mrs. Haughton's pantry-shelf brackets serving as stirrups.

A few years later, Mr. Haughton bought a used, standard sulky, enabling Billy and his pony to imitate the full-sized horses and drivers racing at the Fonda, NY Fair, across the Mohawk River from Fultonville. In his early teens, Haughton groomed horses at the fairgrounds. Ironically, however, his first racing experience was as a thoroughbred jockey at the Fonda Fair. During his high school years, Haughton continued to work as a groom, then entered Cobleskill Agricultural College near Schenectady, NY, where he obtained a degree in animal husbandry."

He went on to do great things. A lot of them. Nice to think that this area produced such a great horseman.

The boss remembers him coming back to town to visit his mother, and has a plethora of stories about him growing up as his mom and dad knew him then.

Curses Foiled Again

Guess that is as close.....

We were just offered an opportunity to not only possibly win Moose Quest, but also to document said success...not to mention get to visit and enjoy one of our dearest friends in the most amazing setting you could imagine... 


and then the car got cranky.

We have been looking, albeit perhaps not quite as enthusiastically as we should have been, for a replacement since the Outer Banks trip. However, used vehicles of similar vintage, make, and model, or even anything close seem to be in short supply around here. There are plenty of Durangos for sale for uncomfortable five-figure prices, but we like to eat regularly and all, so we are not eager to buy one of those. Even though they are real shiny and all. Plus it wasn't all that bad.

Then night before last when we went out scouting for Eastern Screech Owl Quest it had a little mechanical emergency. Or maybe even a big one. Decided that it didn't really want to climb hills any more.

So we called a local dealer about potential repair. Um, no. The cost of the work would be about twice what the car is worth. And that was a baseline estimate. 

The kids have suggested another guy who has done some work for them a lot cheaper than that. I guess we will let him take a look. Mebbe. I would kinda like to keep this car as opposed to taking on any debt. It has the grand virtue of being paid for and it has heated seats, which will henceforth be one of the main features, along with 4-wheel drive, that I will be looking for in a car or truck.

But alas, no Moose Quest, much to my dismay. And it is raining...very lightly...but raining...on the first hay that has been mowed here this year. The boss put a few test rows down yesterday to the tune of a forecast that only called for widely scattered thundershowers the whole weekend. Then we woke up to drizzle. It isn't wet enough to have to wipe your glasses when you come inside from outside, and if it dries off it won't do any harm at all, but dagnabbit!

Anyhow, hopefully we can find something reliable to drive and tough enough to tackle our driveway or else find someone to repair the car so we can at least get to camp, which is coming up in a couple of weeks.

Meanwhile, whoever is doing all that rain dancing, stop already. Thanks.