Foggy Mornings, Golden Sunsets

Sometimes a not-so-foggy morning

And, at the boat launch, a requiem for a woodchuck, complete with paper
plate gravestone. I think by the looks of the chewed up fur he met a dog
that took issue with his marmotiness. I feel kinda sorry for the park staff guys,
who have to clean stuff like this up every morning. They are real nice
fellows and deserve better.

To my Beautiful Mama

Happy Birthday, Mama....much love and admiration from all of us at Northview.....Hope you have a wonderful day and all your kids call you and may visit too.

Flavored Milk is not the Bogeyman

The beginning of this week's Farm Side is about apples. It is after all, time to pick and eat NY finest fruit delight...and this is where we bought some Honeycrisp yesterday. I am going to have a nice apple snack for breakfast today....

The middle of my weekly thousand word quota is about China dropping some of their retaliatory tariffs on soybeans and pork,

The rest is about the proposed NYC ban on flavored milk. Why is it that authorities in big cities are so often way behind on current dietary research? When it comes to getting off the fad diet bandwagon and actually reading current research they are frequently much less well informed than people who are closer to the land and their roots.

It's not like it's hard to find research from all over the world that concludes that flavored milk increases milk consumption (sooprise, sooprise) which results in higher intakes of vitamins, minerals, and healthy fats, not to mention more energy. 

From the USDA

From Australia

From ENVIRON International Corp

Milk beats traditional sports beverages as a recovery drink too.

There are plenty more studies of similar ilk and none of them are hard to find. At least one upstate legislator is on this like a JRT on a racing rat.

Assemblyman Brindisi

And NY Farm Bureau has addressed it as well. I hope the Big Apple Dept. of Ed reconsiders and continues to serve chocolate milk and maybe adds tasty NY apples as well. 

Cool Nights Flaming Days

Autumn paints the spider webs, turning each night's effort bright silver and pinpointing the hunting grounds of every tiny creature. 

 Lazy loops dangle from half-way up the tallest trees to end in funnel webs on burdock leaves. 

Shining strings form lacy tablecloths, high in the branches or low on the goldenrod. The temptation to reach for the camera pounces every time, but good photos are hard to find.

It is nice to see them though and to be able to duck without accidentally donning them like sticky garments, most unwanted, especially the hats and hair ribbons.

All the pines and hemlocks firs and spruces mutter in the chilling winds, virtue signaling to those flamboyant hardwoods, such a bunch of showoff these short autumn days, stripping and pole dancing to the tune of those same breezes.

Falling leaves bring dismal thoughts of months to come, but they make it easier to spot warblers, not that there are many around just yet.

It's still warm enough for shorts and open bedroom windows...barely...but a lap blanket is welcome of a too-soon-darkening evening. Sweatshirts and flannels have come out of hibernation, taming goosebumps day by day.

The sun, tamed by the movement of the earth, is gentle enough for morning porch sitting, even facing to the east as it is, and that is nice as well.

I like this time of year for the most part, although it is easy to fall prey to melancholy as the year winds down.

Reality Before Vaccines

Of course it could have been a mining disaster, but I don't think so. How horrible for this poor family.

Remember

Carl DiFranco

The Things you See

Are you brave enough to cross this bridge.......

Wood Duck art installation

Female Red-belling Woodpecker

Happy Anniversary Alan and Amber

I love these people. Just love them. I hope they have somewhere in the neighborhood of a bazillion more happy years together.

I made them a wedding blog last year.....

Men at Work

With our son and my brother and his son working in the construction industry...coast to coast and in Canada too.... I find myself most interested in how stuff gets built and repaired. 

Of course the drilling and grouting that they do is especially fascinating, but other aspects of the industry fascinate me as well. We humans are a clever lot and we have taken tool use to amazing levels.

Thus when the rig above pulled into the boat launch parking lot the other day when we were birding I stopped and watched from a comfy pick-a-nick table bench. It was awesome seeing them maneuver that great big boat and huge truck down to the launch and into the water.

How cool is it that the pontoons were up on top when it pulled in and down floating the boat when they launched? The boss says they were lowered hydraulically. I missed seeing that part as they were behind a tree from me.

The rig is designed for bridge repair and inspection and the company that runs it can be found here: Harcon Corp. Some go up 65 FEET! And the boat is described here: Bucket Boat

Didn't see too many great birds that morning, but I was sure glad we stopped. 

Bon Chance

This guy was nomming something extremely dead...so dead that it was stiff and dry
However, he really wanted it and didn't fly until we got closer as we had to go down the road he was on
He flew up onto a branch, which broke under him,
then sat on another branch cleaning dead stuff off his beak and waiting for us to leave.

Who says boys don't wear eyeliner?
Wood Ducks in eclipse plummage

Cooperative Green Heron. He went right on hunting no matter how close I got
or how many photos I snapped.

That's good luck in other words. We had some today in finding birds that were pretty and cooperative about photos. Alas, on the other hand I lost my wedding ring, probably while washing my hands at the Richfield Springs McDonald's. Not an expensive one, but I haz a sad about that for sure.

Happy Anniversary

To my dear mother and father. Congratulations on 68 years together and on all the adventures you have had. 

Also kudos for the amazing kids you raised not to mention your spectacular collection of grands and great grands. 

A magnum opus indeed! Well done!

Love,

Dotter

Spite Fight

Last week a mid-sized hawk blew into this exact cottonwood tree hollering like mad, then flew before I could get a decent look. 

This morning it was like deja vu all over again, except this time the bird stopped for a photo op. It was after a hundred or Red-winged Blackbirds that were busily hunting bugs up there. 

It missed by a mile and sat there glaring at me for a minute before swooping off across the river, pausing only to dive bomb a passing Ring-billed Gull, screaming all the while.

I actually don't think this is the same bird I saw last week. That one had a very distinctive call that I had never heard before. I believe it was a Red-shouldered Hawk. Sure would have been nice if it had stopped so I could be sure.

Anyhow, this one is a Cooper's Hawk, not a likely candidate for attacking something as big as a gull, but it sure was ticked off. There were probably a thousand or more Red-winged Blackbirds available in nearby trees and the cornfield, so it seems silly that it was so spiteful. 

Just in Case

I shamelessly stole this from Liz's Facebook page
Photo credit is hers

You get the local paper and read the Farm Side this Friday, the photo above is what kicked it off for me. I had been struggling to find an anchor for the annual Fonda Fair column, and this was it. Shazam! 

Lamb in the living room

Here is the original story of the little lamb with Peggy. My heart just skipped when I saw this shot of the two of them, wandering over at the Ag 2000 barn, no halter, no lead rope, just love to tie them together.

That kid has worked all summer with that little lamb that had such a rough start and it shows. I have many doubts that there will be any ribbons involved in this adventure, but who needs them anyhow when there is so much fun to be had?

Farm kid, right at the heart

And you know what they say about apples? Liz was six when this photo of her unloading her first show heifer, Sonora, at the fair, made the front page of the paper. Meanwhile, back to the keyboard. Deadline looms....

A few years later...

I'm Melting

We have experienced some new to us highway repair technology here on 5S the past couple of weeks. It is pretty cool.

Or, er, actually really hot.

Seems they melt the existing, but cracked and bumpy, pavement, remill it, and put it back down.

So far the new surface is a LOT smoother than the old, plus it is quick and efficient, and appears to be cheaper than the usual method of putting down new.

Large scale recycling right before our eyes. Hot in Place Recycling that is. Besides all the other advantages that the system seems to offer, traffic also can move past much easier than in traditional resurfacing wherein so darned many dump trucks are coming and going. Good deal.