Homesteading Notes September 2005

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We hit 105 yesterday and broke a longstanding record. Today? Perhaps only 97. But by the middle of the week we should see cooler temps. Our local weather guy is pretty lame and best not to listen to all he says. Watch for a map and see what is moving. 

We have been enjoying crows, blackbirds, cowbirds, red-winged blackbirds and Blue Jays. The blackbirds won't be around long but I hope they will eat lots of grasshoppers. 

The wind is from the north but it is still very hot. We've gone from no chance of rain to a fair chance of thunderstorms later in the week. A nice cold front coming this way could cool us down nicely.

This is the slowest week ever for articles for the newsletter and it is a very strange feeling. I had sent out notes and got back just a few replies. I know everyone is busy and I could take a week off now and then but why start now. I just had a message from Dorothy Tweedt and she is home again and doing just fine. She had evacuated and it wasn't easy to find a place to go where she could take Mocha but I am so relieved that she is home again. I was just hearing a new report of a house where all the family had died from the exhaust fumes of a generator. So tragic for any loss. 

The work on well pumps was only that one day. The price of oil goes on up with an occasional drop but not by much. The latest Hurricane, Rita, will send the prices on everything up again. We won't be buying any building supplies for a good while. I will sure be glad when the season is over and things settle down again.

Our temps are still way above normal. This is actually what we call Indian Summer. It starts during the end of summer and the beginning of fall and ends when the highs start dropping. Our lows are finally back down to the mid 60s. Not quite cold but a lot better than the upper 70s. 

I will actually have plenty of seeds from our Trumpet Vines this year. Looks like the grasshoppers or squirrels are eating the very top of the vines (at the top of the trailer.) Still many seed pods to come yet. I have one plant still growing from the four seeds I planted from last year's blooms. Same with the blackeye peas. Lots of good peas to plant next year. Nothing else has done very well. There are a few tomatoes on Randy's tomato patch. Half of it is gone but the other part is actually growing and making new flowers. The mums are starting to bloom but they are barely staying ahead of the grasshoppers who seems to love the taste of mums.

Byron Tumlinson says he will have lots of luffa gourd seeds and I would like to try them. The birdhouse gourds did well a few years ago, I just had to grow them in the shade of a very big tree.

Realized today that I was hearing the sound of a pump rig working on a closeby oil well. Such horrible noise we could sure do without. You'd think with so much money for a barrel of oil, they could make this part work silently. It is so loud and so constant a noise that it is certainly irritating. 

The temps are so slowly beginning to drop. As the days grow shorter and make us hurry to get the chores done in the daylight, we worry about how to make it fit after the time change kicks in. 

Randy is still working on the foundation to the house but it is sure exciting to watch it take shape. I have had to hurry to clear space that has brush and trees in the way. I have cut out briar that has never been cleared since we've been here. It is actually quite pretty just seeing an actual yard. Grass and plants will come in time. Like after the grasshoppers are all gone. Guinea fowl and chickens on patrol will do the trick. 

My next project is to make a new compost bin. A bit of chicken wire and some stakes to hold it up. It needs to be close to the chicken yard and my time to keep filling it with the droppings from the chicken coop. I have a fine pile of shredded leaves for mixing so the first layer will be ready to begin cooking. As I have garden beds for next year ready, I will be putting old hay and manure directly into those beds. Saves lots of work later. Byron Tumlinson has lots of helpful ideas on making the gardening easier. He even had some great tips on controlling grasshoppers.

I had noticed lots of bigger birds at the hummingbird feeder. But the day I saw the feeder was lying on the ground was when I realized that some critter had pulled out the 3 little red flowers that were around the feeder bottom. I have trouble getting them out and there they were all together on the ground below. There is another feeder still out there but the flowers won't come out and the nectar is not fresh. It is a beautiful container but not very popular. I've not seen a hummer in about a week now. Wanda Lynch mentioned how it had been two weeks since the hummingbirds were at their feeders but they had a hard freeze about a week ago so the little guys are moving south. I will put the better feeder back out with fresh food and we might catch some migrants on the move. They would need some nourishment for their journey.

I had wondered why the cucumbers were not making more fruit. So I get to looking at one end and there is this GIANT of a fruit. Whew, probably way too big and old to eat but it sure kept the plant from making more. That will teach me to walk all the way around and search for stragglers that try to hide from me. Randy has had two small tomatoes from his little garden bed of fruit. Perhaps more soon. Lots of green ones and blooms as well. Gotta hope!

Slowly we are getting milder temperatures making us know that fall is just around the corner. It won't be officially fall until later in the month but this is nice. To have a chilly morning to start the day is delicious. So very sweet.

The garden is down to a few tomatoes and almost no cucumbers. The peas are drying for planting next year and that will be nice. I will work all through the winter to get better areas ready that will include protecting all the plants from the evil grasshoppers. 

We've not had rain in a month but with so many folks so long underwater, we don't complain. Just hope that they drain and dry out very soon. We can easily water what little is left. 

I laugh every time I read where someone talks about global warming and what it is doing to our lives. What a notion that we as humans are able to alter the working of the planet. There have been warming trends and cold freezes for millenniums of the past. We don't have records of those times but they were before man began polluting the atmosphere, long before. It is not possible they were caused by mankind. We are indeed gullible if we believe that the fault belongs to anything we've done or that not doing those things will correct the problem.

I was just reading an item about how it is time to start seeds for the fall and winter garden. It will be a while yet before we don't get over 85 for a high and it will be safe to plant spinach seeds. I have reserved space in the greenhouse for winter use. The baby trees and geraniums will just stay where they are. The mums will move back inside as well.