SNIPPETS - Yard Yarns and Ordinary Days

Ordinary days are made up of snippets of ordinary time. And when you measure ordinary time individually, you find a subtle mosaic of chaos and order that reflects the balance of life - and of a day.

The yard at the farm offers wonderful opportunities to eyeball the community of residential fauna and avifauna. This past winter a quail honoured us with a snowy stay for a while...

And the resident skunk, with den hole beneath the pile of branches at the perimeter of the yard, appreciates the bounty under the bird feeders...

watch the tail...

the chickadee - caught in a stalled moment of usually cheeky effervescence...

chickadee splitting a seed in a heavy wind 













the deconstruction of the barn even spurred the Hawk to help...

the ritual emptying of the Sherman traps holding misplaced raptor delicacies...

but Spring is upon all and the "blue heads" are trotting...

and the red-wings are flocking...

 

the finches are golding...their gatherings look like swarms of lemon drops with wings...

and the bird bath becomes the "water cooler" of the yard with random robin gatherings...and apparently with one Angry Bird...

nuthatches are daily attendees - flying in near the top of the tree - and spiraling their way down the tree head first toward the feeder...I love the black and grey...

woodpecker watching - this Downy woodpecker flew to the pillar and then just sat there - not moving at all for about ten minutes - I think he was napping - he then jumped up to the water for a quick sip and then away...

and these Downy 'peckers are pairing - the Downy on the right kept dogging the other - following up and down branches and tree to tree - and he kept chattering at her...

wonderful pattern of the American Tree Sparrows...

and blending camouflage of the Flicker...

daily bark investigations...these by red bellied woodpecker and downy 'pecker...notice balancing with feathers...

and a few days past brings a recent arrival of the wood thrush...

for some reason he cocked his head to pick up seeds - look like the junco in the corner finds this curious behaviour also...

a couple "here's looking at you" birds...red-bellied and female robin...

Ordinary - defined as "with no special or distinctive features" - I take deliberate issue with that definition!  Take full measure...of the ordinary!


AN EXPERIMENT OF PICKY EATERS:

I found a pomegranate in the bottom of my back pack.  Having been there an unknown amount of time, the tough outer skin was now exceptional tough. So I decided to "plant" it in the hill garden of the farm yard. The next day something/one had dug it up and left it next to the hole, apparently not being able to bite through the tough skin or just not wanting to. So I "replanted" it in the same hole only this time piercing the skin with the edge of my spade. The next day again something/one had dug it up...this time though having relished the gelatinous fleshy seeds.

 
I then decided to venture into other fruits and "planted" a very ripe avocado...this was devoured by licking out the flesh around the seed without removing it from the planting hole...

I then "planted" a ripe mango...this was the limit...it was dug up and "thrown" into the yard without being eaten.  A few bite marks showed a tasting but not an eating. So mango must be the limit.

The "night of the avocado" we set up the wildlife camera and watched a raccoon and skunk come back and forth to the appetizer hole over the course of several hours.  The next day when I pulled in to the farm a group of turkey vultures were feasting on something in the south pasture.  My approach forced them to the air and nearby tree.

  Going over to investigate...

I found a skunk! Now one has to ask the question...was the combination of pomegranate one night followed by avocado the next too much for the skunk...causing him to stagger into the pasture and keel over? Or is this just the food chain of how turkey vultures get to pomegranates and avocados?


HOW ABOUT A NUMBERS GAME:
1-pick a number between 1 and 10
2-double it
3-add 10
4-divide in half
5-subtract the original number
6-the answer is 5

PONDER THIS:
It takes approximately 10,000 hours to perfect a skill.

LASTLY
Gnomes Rule and they will ALWAYS Rule

TWKBFTTA and more

It’s Sunday and I remember someone said that when we say we are talking to God - we are said to be praying - but when we say God is talking to us - we are said to be crazy.  But what if the conversation is between me, myself, and I?  Which one is crazy?

What’s in a name?

 
New ferns recently named for Lady Gaga - Gaga germanotta in honour of her last name and Gaga monstra parva in honour of her fans whom she calls “little monsters.”  Other interesting tags - the Australian horse fly Scaptia beyonceae for Beyonce - the lichen in California with newly elected name of Caloplaca obamae after President Obama - the whirligig beetle Orectochilus orbisonorum after the late Roy Orbison (this beetle is black and white looking much like he is wearing a tuxedo) - and the trap door spider called MyrmeKiaphila neilyoungi after Neil Young...
 
 Spiders of the trapdoor genus are distinguished from one species to another on their differences in genitalia - the trick is getting them to show you their genitals...

trap doors of Western Australia

 

TWKBFTTA... (Things we know but forget to think about...)

 
--Three principals: 1. Energy flows; 2. Nutrients recycle; 3. Ecosystems change. So - energy passes through an ecosystem whereas nutrients cycle within an ecosystem - and ultimately ecosystems change.

--Ligules are like a shirt collar.

--Prairie sod rarely freezes.

--Stipa spartea (renamed Hesperostipa spartea) - Commonly called Porcupine grass, it has awns that are so stiff they were firmly bound into a bundle, from which the pointed grains were burned off, leaving a brush used for dressing the hair (Omaha-Ponca-Pawnee).  It also has unusual seed dispersal noted at echinaceaproject.org.  “The fruits can continue to move along the ground after falling from the culm. This movement is caused by the fluctuation of humidity throughout the day.”
 

--Amorpha canescens - Commonly called Leadplant - aka "buffalo bellow plant."  Its time of blooming is synchronous with the rutting season of the buffalo - and at that season it is the dominant blooming plant on the prairie of the loess plain.

--Silphium laciniatum - Commonly known as Compass plant. Children would gather chewing gum from the upper parts of the stem where a gummy, fragrant resin would exude forming large clumps. It was also said that where this plant abounds, lightning would be prevalent - so making camp in these areas would be avoided if possible.  And, hence the name, these plants orient themselves in north-south direction.

--Ecologically, a true Typha marsh is NOT homogeneous.

 
--When working with prairie restorations, do not expect instant results. Typically the first year is annual weeds followed by the second year of problems with sweet clover, thistles, etc. It is in the third year the fruits of the seeding labour will start to be evident. It follows the "SCL" process - 1st year is SLEEP, 2nd year is CREEP, and 3rd year is LEAP.

The Politics of Cats

 In our most recent election a cat named Hank ran for US Senate in Virginia. He received 7,000 write-in votes and came in 3rd place. The two human candidates were separated by about 180,000 votes so Hank's write-ins did not affect the outcome. Donations to Hank's campaign, however, raised about $60,000 for animal rescue charities. Hank lives in Springfield, VA, with his human attendant.

Sidetracks

--The Rolling Stones - Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Charlie Watts, Ronnie Wood - have an average age of 69 years...whereas the 9 members of the US Supreme Court have an average age of 67 years...I have no clue what this says about either group but it does sound significant!

--100 Years Old - The assembly line was invented 100 years ago in 1913 and developed at the Ford Motor Company for mass production of Model T cars.  

Post Harvest Fields

Looks like a load of corks rolled across the fields...

  Full Beaver Moon

This moon of November was so named as it was the time to set beaver traps before all the swamps would freeze.  I wonder if climate change will impact the naming of the full moons...

Lastly, A Gnomes Home

Gute nacht