Targeted

 

Coopers Hawk, spruce tree behind the house

Birding....

What with the cost of every single thing being so much higher than it used to be and income not keeping up, we have been forced by circumstance to bird differently. We used to at least go down to the river almost every morning, year round.

Now we go out maybe once a week, and otherwise I bird at home. We also target exciting birds that other people find in the three-county area where we do most of our birding, and now and then hit places where we think we might find something good.

Broad-winged Hawk, bottom of the driveway

This hasn't been all bad. There are birds everywhere, including in and around grocery store parking lots (Gloversville Walmart has a view of an active Osprey nest, and I have found all kinds of interesting birds along the edge of the parking lot at Runnings, including Fish Crows on a routine basis and once a Peregrine Falcon.)

Over the past three or four days there has been a decent showing of migrants right here in the yard. Vireos are everywhere! They are ridiculously hard to count, always on the move, and blending in with the surroundings really well. 

Up until the day before yesterday warblers were like vitamins...one a day. However, now the trees are full of them. Alas, they always seem to be on the other side of the tree from me, and the lighting has been awful. Also....fall warblers... so some days I see forty and identify...you guessed it...one.

However, even with this targeted method of chasing birds, we are running ahead of 2020 for total number seen this year, and just behind 2021. Not terrible.

Chestnut-sided Warbler next to the clothesline

Also getting a Sandhill Crane yesterday in Montgomery County made up for a lot of non- chasing days. We got two in Schoharie County a couple of years ago, and there is that family up in Fulton that we have seen two years running now. However, until last night we couldn't find one here. Happy me.

I do miss those morning trips out into the wilds. However, after hauling all the way to the other side of Amsterdam last night, and what with the fog today, it's the backyard for me this morning. 

Wish me warblers...

...on the right side of the tree, in good light, and sitting still for more than 1/10 of a second.

Thanks!

Sandhill Crane from a targeted trip

It is a Given

That if drought-breaking rain shall fall, it shall be on the Fonda Fair

Usually on tractor pull night.

The boss went over to enjoy said event last night, but I hear tell they got rained out....not for the first time, and probably not for the last. Last week in August, first week of September are notorious for chancy weather around here.

Sorry guys, I could not believe it when, shortly after I came indoors from a lovely walk under gorgeous skies, I looked out and it was pouring

Wednesday, Thursday, Friday?  You cannot be serious.

He must have found something else to entertain him though, as I don't even know what time he got home. We introverts, Becky and I, stayed home and read books and reveled in the silence.

Anyhow, I wish that it had been otherwise for those who love the sport. (I actually really like seeing the big rigs go, all that thunderous power and smoke and glory. However, I also love peaceful, quiet and calm, and guess which is easier to come by....LOL...just call me lazy.)

Of course, it is lovely outside now, although still dripping. Pastel skies are turning bright and the Carolina Wrens are going nuts, singing and whirring their warning rattles.

 Perhaps I should go join them. Have a great day.

Here is a pony, hope it helps you feel better.

See the Hole?

Neither did I until I dragged myself up off the ground and looked around to see why I face planted next to the bike path this morning.

Crash.

I did see the woodchuck that dug it though, scurrying away just before I found his back door.

 We don't need no stinking rodents!

There was a nice lady walking on the bike path nearby and she was sure I must be injured, but, nope, I was fine. Only my dignity was damaged. (Well, all right, I am too old to be slamming into the ground like that and am a little shaken up. Nothing a good night's sleep won't cure).

Maybe I should stick to the paved part of the trail.

However, I often walk beside the path so as not to impede cyclists and people who walk  faster and in a much straighter line than a birder....a lot of time is spent standing still, looking up, or peering through binoculars.

Anyhow, after I cleaned all the water off all my lenses...heavy rains last night and all...I went looking for a way to mark the hole so it doesn't claim any other victims.

Hope this works.

Scarlet Tanager from the backyard this morning
Not one photo of one in red plumage this year, alas

Lake Love

 Matt and Lisa took me up to Peck's yesterday for a visit. They have their camper there this week.

The lake did not disappoint...nor did the company. Some of my favorite peeps.

Not to mention, Loons calling, their wild yodels echoing over the water. Birds singing in the trees all around. A boat ride in pursuit of wily water swimmers, since I purchased my lifetime hunting and fishing license last week. They made themselves scarce though.

I don't think you need a license for the big 'un I hauled in over the side, although it took both hands and a heated struggle. Nothing like a nice anchor rope to fill the frying pan if you are skunked on bass and perch.

Got to see a pair of cousin families, which was extra nice, and check the lake for ducks from their docks. Hi cousins! It was great to see you. Thanks for the lake views.

Matt fried bagels on a cast iron griddle over an open fire. Really good! I would eat them again.

Anyhow, I love the kids...Matt is my baby brother...I love the lake, the cousins, the birds, the scent of wonderful wild water and the clean blue sky over that water, so thanks guys.

It was great. 

Not Again

 

Not the chicken culprit, but the scourge of the garden

He's back! That smug and self-satisfied stalker of the skies, Orion the Hunter.

I couldn't believe it when I went out this morning. It's way too early, but there he was, not up to full strength yet...instead of standing tall, dancing down the heifer barn roof, he was sprawled, all long and lazy, across the top of the mulberry trees in the side yard.

Looked as if some shield maiden might have been hand feeding him from a bunch of grapes, although with the dangerous dry I don't think there is going to be much of a wild crop this year.

I am NOT ready for any of the things Orion signifies, except perhaps the absence of Yellow Jackets, with which I have been waging...and mostly losing...a prolonged battle this summer.

I know he's really there though, evidenced by the fluffy show lamb and the shiny pony being readied for the fair every afternoon. Summer is done! Toast. You can stick a fork in it. Fall can be nice, but next in the seasonal sequence comes my nemesis....I won't mention it but you know of what I speak.

Oh, and about whatever is killing the hens, Ralph and I have both seen a black thing out in the yard in broad daylight. This morning when I awoke at 4, Jill was barking her head off and there was a faint scent of wild out in the yard. Skunky, but not skunk.

I don't like it.

Curses, Foiled Again

 

NY Congressional districts

ger·ry·man·der

/ˈjerēˌmandər/

manipulate the boundaries of (an electoral constituency) so as to favor one party or class.

achieve (a result) by manipulating the boundaries of an electoral constituency.

For the past several weeks the phone has blown up with calls from candidates for yesterday's primary election. They were from obvious local numbers so I answered them. Monday night I even got sucked into a town hall supporting one purported candidate for Congress.

He seemed to speak in a stilted, scripted, manner, and although he said things I liked he did not say them well. However, when I did a bit of research into his background and that of his opponent, I discovered that he is a businessman, while his competition went straight into politics from college.

Nuff said.

I went down yesterday to vote my conscience only to find, (much to the laughter of myself and the bored poll staff) that there was no primary for my party in our district.

Wednesday, Thursday, Friday! I even got my brother to come down from camp to vote. He lives just  few miles west of us and actually had somebody to vote for, only not the guys who have been pestering me.

Repeat epithet above only with more exclamation marks,

Turns out, which I knew, but didn't really understand how it affected me, NY has been redistricted not once but twice...once by the powers that be, and once by the courts when those powers overstepped.

The county where we reside was not only cut in half by this action, but was chopped in an interestingly jagged line. Thus, I am sure that even the politicians who have been plaguing us didn't know which side of that line we live on.

No worries. After peering at a number of maps we figured it out...I think....

Meanwhile, I'll bet the weeks between now and November will be interesting telephone-wise. We will probably get calls from every congressional district in the state, just to be sure we don't get missed.

Nevertheless, it is always nice to visit the poll workers around here...pleasant local folks we much enjoy.

Stay strong, my friends, The worst best is yet to  come.

Cut 'er up, buttercup

Predator

 

Jill the Border Collie has to wait for first light to go outside. She knows it, and although she barks when I take Mack out into the darkness, after that she waits patiently. 

The reason for the delay is the proximity of creatures of a predatory nature. 

There are beasts out there in the darkness of this northern jungle and she is just a little girl. Mack is actually even smaller, but he has his any port/any ocean master's license since he can never be outdoors without a leash. Because...chickens....Jack Russell Terrier...etc. He will, (and did once) take on a bull, let alone a tiny bird. 

Thus today as the sky faded to grey I sat in my outdoor office waiting for her to tend to nature. In an unusually short time she trotted glibly past me, head down and bent on business. I spoke her name quietly, because hey, what was going on here?

She dropped the reason at my feet and looked up at me all guilty and apologetic, but kind of proud too.

Half a cottontail, the latter portion, entrails dangling, spine bitten clean in half. Treasure indeed if you are a little canine scavenger.

O-o-o-kay then...

We knew there was something bold and bad around. If you are my pal on Facebook you probably saw that cute pic of the little silver hen and her chickies the other day. She took to coming up to the house for corn, and although I don't like the hens scratching up the garden, I got a big kick out of her cut-cut-cutting to her little ones when she found a goodie.

The day after I took that photo she was by the back door when I took out some laundry to hang up. I walked back inside for probably about five minutes then went out again. 

Feathers everywhere right on the back doorstep. Broad daylight! In fact along about noon. I hoped it wasn't her. I hoped she had escaped. But no, she was gone and within days so were the chickies, several of the other hens, and possibly the Black East Indies female duck. Actually I haven't seen the drakes in a couple days either. 

The Call Ducks seem to be fairly well protected, but they were going nuts when I took the Mackster out this AM. They are well-named and can be heard on the moon when they really get going. I went over with my headlamp but didn't see anything. There is a lot of dark out there.

We used to free range dozens of hens and seventy or eighty guinea fowl hereabouts. Not so much anymore. I hope whatever is out there moves along pretty soon or meets up with the twenty-cent solution. I like having the birds around, although the creep feeding lawn lambs were banished to the barnyard when they gnawed on my banana tree....

So, anyhow, I slipped a baling twine noose around the bunny's hinder paws and hauled it away, no doubt spoiling Jill's plans for future culinary delight. I gave her a garlic bread stick from our spaghetti dinner from Romana's the other night as a consolation prize...I know I would certainly prefer one to that gnawed up rabbit carcass....

I guess we will be keeping the headlamps charged and the predator control devices handy now...and also go out with Jill every single time. 

This is getting plumb annoying.

Well, Hi There

 

Been a long time since I posted here, I see...Real life keeps me busy these days, although at the end of the day I often wonder just what I did with my time.

Mostly take pictures, grow stuff, care for Peggy and chase birds I guess. And cook, because my peeps like to eat. 

The Amish farm stands abound with great vegetables for excellent prices, so didn't the big freezer STB? Why, yes, yes it did.

So we distributed the food among the other freezers, leaving no room atall for either me or Liz to freeze for winter. I think all it really needs is to be moved where there is more air circulation, but that is a pretty major project. We grabbed some corn from Logan Beck's farm the other day and I sneaked three quarts into the house freezer. Somebody eat those freeze pops so I can fit more!

Because of the freezer situation we eat all the tomatoes rather than freezing them as sauce, which is not entirely a bad thing. I made spaghetti and meatballs with Alan's homegrown beef and our own maters the other night and it was a win and a half. And they just keep coming...

Personal jungle, anyone?

Our yard and garden messy are by most standards, but I just can't resist a volunteer. Orange mint and golden lemon balm sprawl all over everything. I lost all my orange mint entirely a couple of years ago and had to find more, which was a real challenge. It is not terribly common. If you are local and would like some, just holler. I use it for almost everything, so I just let 'er rip and there is plenty.

 Then I accidentally missed an entire bulb of garlic when I dug it last year. To my surprise and delight it sprouted and grew SEVEN bulbs of the nicest garlic I have ever grown. We are eating that up quick, but I am buying Amish garlic to hold in abeyance and to plant for next year.

Then there is the whole gourd thing. Several years ago I bought some decorative gourds and set them by the back door to look pretty. The next year they sprouted and grew more gourds. Rinse and repeat this year. Thus there is a huge mountain of gourd leaves taking over that whole corner of the yard. Bright green and yellow gourds dangle from plant hangers, flower pots, and the big saw that decorates the wall there. I like them, but I have to keep breaking branches back so we can get out the back door.

So there it is, summer on the farm, even if retired.

I like that too..

Also I am writing, not one, but two books. That may sound like a lot, but in fact it is very, very, very slow going. This is partly because I am dog lazy and can find dozens of other things to do, and partly because of endless, relentless, never-ending interruptions that take me out of the story every time I get going. Fun though, I always loved to tell stories.

See the little gourd? A lot bigger now

Summertime

 

I was eight when we moved to a now-demolished farm house right down the road from here. I loved it from the minute we moved in, until the day we had to move away. What's not to like about first time country living?

Except in the coldest days of winter, when we kids all piled in together under down comforters and carriage robes....

And...dum, da, dum, dum.....July and August.

Mom and Dad had a bookstore and an antique store on Main Street in Fonda. The buildings faced south (arsonists burned them down a couple years ago) and they were HOT. (Winter was the cold equivalent. I remember sitting at the coal stove, melting the toes of a particularly hated pair of white rubber boots. Hey, the white lines on the firebox looked kinda cool, and man did they stink!).

The folks took all three kids to work with them most summer days, although sometimes they left us older kids home to wreak havoc and turn feral. 

By the time we got home at night we were weary from hours on the sunbaked school playground a couple of blocks away, and queasy from too many grape popsicles, plus gallons and gallons of metallic-tasting village water straight out of the tap in the boarding house upstairs over the antique store.

That old farm house was as hot as Hell's attic. Sleep was slow to come to whiny, heat-soaked kids. We were too young to appreciate the few hours of cool that came most mornings, so we were miserable whether we were trying to hoe the sunbaked clay of the folks' garden, or begging for nickels at The Shop as we called it.

Oh, how we lusted for visits to Caroga Lake where we could pester Mom for trips to the ECLIPA beach to get cool and wet. And also to blow up tiny structures in Grandma and Grandpa's cabin yard. (I have an amazing uncle just a few years older than Mike and I...we spent hours upon hours building tiny edifices of sticks and twigs and fine, flat, rocks, out among the roots of the pines and balsam firs in the cabin yard. We then played with them for a while with my toy horses and Mike's toy trucks until we became a bit bored. Then we kids watched from inside the cabin while Uncle Larry blew them up with firecrackers. A good time was had by all.)

However, it was hard to sleep there in summer too. Along with the nagging heat came the mosquitoes of the evening hours. I think...nay, I know...that I was the worst whiner of all, whether over hot sleepless nights, or the need for immersion in good, cold lake water. (After all, the cold water soothed the skeeter bites for a while.)

Fast forward sixty years or so. I have been struck, over and over, by just how much this summer has resembled those years. Same kind of heat going on and on. Same rough nights, although now I have my own personal fan, which is a big improvement. 

This is just normal weather for Upstate NY in summer...all those monsoons we have experienced in the past couple of decades were not normal...this is!

Meanwhile, another thing that hasn't changed much...I am still whining. Somebody find me a beach!

Hunting Banjoli Rammi

A long, long time ago I was helping someone study for college biology, learning the binomial nomenclature for New York birds and wildlife. I've done that a couple of times now, taking in a singular amount of bastard Latin myself. This was particularly useless for someone of my station, but a lot of fun for a word person just the same. (I am still teaching myself bird names....)

Anyhow that person thought that the above name would fit much better for a Green Frog than the actual name at the time, Rana Clamitans. 

And I agree...to the point of thinking of them that way, lo, these many years later. (Good thing too, since the powers that be changed the name from Rana to Lithobates a few years back.)

Bloater Bob...or Bolster Betty...
I can't remember whether the tympanum larger
than the eye means girl or boy
and am too lazy to look it up.

Seriously though, have you ever heard one on a cool clear summer morning, plonking away out in the pond? Dueling Banjos comes instantly to mind....

This morning, as i walked out with Mack the Jack, the sun not quite up yet, but already painting the sky rich butter yellow, one of the garden pond Banjolis let out a "Kronk"

He froze in mid-sniff and rose on hinder paws to stare.

"What was that!"

Another honk...

From goofy little brown-and-white terrier noodling around checking bushes to shark-attack-Mack in an instant.

At each croak he became more intense, more eager, more ready to do battle. Alas his partner wanted...nay, needed....first-morning-coffee so he was dragged ignominiously up to the kennel, still perking and jerking at every frog call, and deposited therein.

Drat!

Dagnabbit!

In case I ever forget how ferocious terriers can be he is quick to remind me. The garden pond frogs are always a good time though, whether they show up uninvited and simply appear in the pond one fine summer day, or like this year's set, are rescued from the duck pond, which is drained and cleaned regularly, and deposited up here where the water is calm and steady all summer long.

Meanwhile I am working on learning Cyanocitta cristata.

For the Win

Slightly broken storage tote planted to green beans,
and an accidental canna, which must have been in the dirt

 

Container gardening.....

About Last Night

 

The first inkling we had was Matt calling me to see if we were all okay. He had seen a post on Facebook about a bad accident down on the corner.

Quick roll call...everybody accounted for, although Liz had just gotten back a couple of minutes before.

We talked about how that Godawful power pole has obscured the view up the hill ever since the road was done over many years ago and how the job engineer didn't want it there, but the powers that be said it had to be placed so. You always had to creepy creep to see around it , with the nose of your car almost sticking into the intersection.

We saw photos online soon after. That pole was toast. It was a very bad crash and we can only pray for those involved. Not good.

Then the lights...and the fans...went out.

We ate the last of supper in the dark and hot, and sat around substituting phones for laptops until it became clear that power wasn't coming back anytime soon.

Off to bed, perchance to not sleep at all. We have no air conditioning in this place, but fans do a pretty decent job of making the hot days bearable. Except when they don't 

All night I kept getting texts pushing the restoration time back more and more. It was easy to understand as the photos showed a terrible mess, but too hot to sleep. Then the thunderstorm rolled in. Cooled things off enough for sleep, but I still worried about the freezers. They are all running full out now, and hopefully everything is okay. I am not going to check until later. We depend on them to keep our food in edible condition. Things we grow, beef from Alan's steer, things that we really couldn't replace.

Anyhow, 16 minutes before four my little fan stuttered to life and the clock started blinking. It was a long night. I wish the best for the people in the crash and wish with all my heart that the state would fix that terrible intersection. It has been the scene of more crashes than I can count, many of them serious and dozens of close calls every single day.

Like little Minnows

 

All green and silver, hummingbirds swim through the bee balm.

This Dog

 

I was boiling brine for refrigerator dills. Found some nice cukes at an Amish farm in Otsego County yesterday and I wanted to get the dill before the caterpillars did.

The girls were swapping yarns and nibbling French fries

Suddenly there were lambs on the lawn.

The three big lambs have what amounts to a gigantic, three-hundred acre, creep feeder at their disposal. They found a bent bar on a six-bar gate and they can just squeeze through. The ewes don't fit, or at least don't try, but the lambs are out every day. They don't seem to wander far so we let it go on.

I don't begrudge them a single nettle, all the burdocks on the place, or the all-you-can-eat weed buffet they have been sampling since the sheep went out in the spring. In fact I welcome their attention to things I would otherwise have to address with the string trimmer.

However...and it's a big however...the garden, especially the beautiful potted navy blue lobelia on my garden table is off limits.

Guess what they tasted first the last time they came to the house...

Thus Liz headed for the door, Jill at heel. However she had just gotten off a challenging shift at work, and hey, working a Border Collie and all, so I chimed in, "I'll go."

When Jill saw the sheep she looked at me for the okay then immediately swept off, Away to Me, which seems to be her favorite side.

That was not what I needed, so I told her, "Walk up".

That's when I realized that she probably has not been trained to drive, or if she was there hasn't been a lot of practice. Driving is when the dog is moving the sheep away from the handler rather than gathering them in, which is quite against their instinct.

She did it though. By a combination of her name, a few corrective sounds, and a couple of nos when she tried to bring them to me, she got them moving toward the barnyard.

Then the guy pictured above decided to choose things up with her. Up on his tippy toes, chin tucked, horns all spikey, he went. I thought she was a timid dog, especially when I said, "Get 'im" and she didn't. A lot of dogs love an excuse to dive at a sheep. Heck, Mike loved to swing off the nose of a recalcitrant cow...or even a bull on the prod once...and never had to be asked twice.

However, once again, she just didn't know what I wanted. As soon as I went Sshh, sshh, sshh at her in she dove, all bristle and sass. She never laid a tooth on him, but I do believe that as of today he should qualify for "dog broke".

Shamelessly stolen from Liz's Facebook page.
Like most BCs she hates the camera so I don't have any good 
ones of her.

Most fun I've had all week. What a sweet, biddable, lovely little dog Jill is.

Shadows

 

A long, long time ago some wanna be friends ditched the boss at a ball game. It was way below zero and he was a long way from home. His best friend was on a date and had his girl along, but he still came to the rescue and brought him to the bottom of the driveway.

They talked for an hour down there in the cold. Bob was headed for Viet Nam and was leaving right away.

He predicted that they would never meet again.

They didn't.

Two weeks later Bob was another casualty on the terrible lists that were printed every day in local and national newspapers.

Fast forward through a long lifetime here in the states, a family, a farm, plenty of heartbreak and beaucoup de joie..we had the life that Bob was denied and are grateful for it.

We try to visit Bob's grave up in Ephrata at least once every summer. It is a beautiful and solemn place and it means a lot to Ralph to go there.

Knowing this, two young people spent two whole years making a memorial to give Ralph for Father's Day this year. They went to The Wall in Washington, found Bob's name, made rubbings, took photos and saved them all. It took a lot of rubbings to get it right.

They acquired a special flag and had family members fold it appropriately. They got Bob's photo off the Internet, plus the correct badges and patches to honor his sacrifice.

Then they put it all together in a tasteful and beautiful shadow box, which now resides on our mantel.

It moved the boss to helpless tears when they presented it to him, and even though I knew about it all along and followed their progress with my heart, I can say the same right now as I type this. What kind and caring young folks they are!

So thank-you Alan and Amber for the memorial.

And thank-you Robert Smith for your service...you are not forgotten.

And also many thanks for that long ago ride home in the awful cold of a northern winter. It was never forgotten either.

Don't try this at Home, Part Two

Somewhere near the closing of a busy day yesterday my younger brother contacted me looking for a little company. His wife is away and he was lonesome.

I would have gone anyhow, as we are close and always have been, but the carrot-on-a-stick of a little birding was thrown in, so I was downright eager.

We had intended to perhaps head into the 'Dacks, but time got short so we opted instead to look for Cline Road Marsh, a Fulton County hotspot of which I had been unaware until recently. Folks have been finding REALLY good birds there so I was ready.

First we indulged in a bit of navigational failure. I had looked at maps, but not paid a lot of attention, as I didn't think I was likely to get to go anytime soon....and there is no service out there. However we wandered down into St. Johnsville, got the GPS running and soon found one half of the place. 

It more than lived up to expectations. We had no more than stopped the truck when Marsh Wrens started chattering from the cattails. A Great Blue Heron perched above. Wandering watery leads led off into the grasses like temptation itself.

I birded my heart out for a bit until Toad started getting hot (canine companion of the French Bulldog persuasion.) With the air conditioning improving his comfort level we went looking for the other half.

I mistakenly (no navigational devices functioning) thought we were in the western part. Nope, eastern. However we set out looking for the other part...to the east...

And ended up off-roading up and down on the fateful and always to be remembered Schulenberg Road.

Schulenberg Road is not actually a road. It is a mountain moose path. It somewhat reminded me of Tom's Tiny Torture Trails of years gone by, although this was done in a big ol' Ford and not on horseback. At least the thousands of voracious deerflies were limited to only trying to eat the mirrors off the truck and couldn't get to us.

Said road is a genuine corduroy road, with gnarled and lumpy logs making up much of its creeping path through swamps and over (large!) rocks and ridges.

I soon discovered what popcorn feels like as we traversed much of its ever-narrowing, ever-wilder, and ever-rockier length. I hereby apologize to every single kernel that has ever bounced around a red-hot pan on my behalf.

I shot a few seconds of video of the ordeal adventure but had to stop for fear of breaking my camera on the dashboard or wresting my head from my neck if I didn't hang on.

But we made it. And now I know where the marsh is and can perhaps coerce coax the boss into an early morning run up that way someday soon. 

Swamp Thang, photo by Matt

It was well worth the headache, whiplash, and general leftover malaise from the trip to have experienced such a journey...put me in mind of both the Golden Road in Maine ("Where does this road lead?" "Canada") or field cars with the Aesch boys BITD. (As a mere girl I always had to ride in the backseat and always came away wrecked, but delighted that the boys let me join the mayhem.)

Anyhow, enjoy the little video...

***Also, a very Happy Birthday to my other brother, Michael, who is back in the 518 for a little bit of Upstate summer. Love you, big guy, hope you have a wonderful day!