Category: Latest From High Reaches

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Forever Mullein

In 1849 a professor at Mishigan State University got curious. Farmers kept asking him how long weed seeds remained viable in the soil. Little did he suspect his long acquaintance with forever mullein.

In my own garden weeds are a constant battle. I can pull every one in a given area, come back in a couple of weeks to find weeds covering the same area.

forever mullein plants
Mullein is a biennial. The first year a rosette of hairy gray-green leaves tries to hide down in the grass. The second year the leaves get huge as the spire rises up, sometimes branching to make a candelabra up to six feet tall. The flower spike opens flowers more-or-less in circular arrays moving from the base to the top.

Weed Seed Bank

Whenever a weed succeeds in producing and dropping seeds, they join others hiding in the soil. These wait, sometimes for years, for conditions to be right. Then they germinate.

Desert wildflowers are a good example of this. For years an area of desert may go without rain. No wildflowers grow.

Right after a rain, the desert blooms as seeds hiding in the soil germinate. People come for miles to see the array of flowers covering what is usually bare dirt.

Longevity Experiment

This professor devised an experiment to find out how long weed seeds would survive in the soil. He put damp soil in over twenty glass bottles. Seeds from twenty-three different common weeds were collected and fifty of each were added to this soil. Then he buried them in a container outside.

For several years the professor took out one bottle and germinated the weed seeds. Another professor took over the experiment leaving years between when a bottle would be dug up.

Fewer and fewer kinds of weed seeds germinated. After 142 years, a bottle was dug up. The seeds were coddled in an attempt to germinate them. Only one kind still does, the forever mullein.

forever mullein flowers
Called a weed, the forever mullein has lovely yellow flowers overnight into the morning. They are primarily moth pollinated to produce those long lived seeds.

Weed Free Hopes

Most of the common weed seeds only survived a few years. If I can keep any new weed seeds from being added to my soil for five years, most of my weeding problems would be over.

One weed would remain, the forever mullein.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

My Carduan World

Sitting at my computer now I am being serenaded by gray tree frogs. In the distance are several different birds settling on their roosts. Later on the whip-poor-will will call. This will be the Carduan world.

A thunderstorm went through earlier this evening. Storms are common during an Ozark spring. Ice and snow fall in February, maybe March. Rain in March and April. Thunderstorms mark the change from spring to summer in late April and May. This will be the Carduan world.

Being Complacent

There are lots of interactions going on between the nine Carduans. It is easy to focus my writing on these and toss in a storm now and then. But that isn’t real. It’s being lazy, being complacent, not thinking about the natural world.

Putting the natural world into the Carduan world will take outlining the various weeks. They do have approximate dates assigned in the outline I already have. Now I need to do a second outline with the weather, plant blooming, animal appearances, sounds that might occur during each of those weeks.

Dandelions food on Carduan world
One of the first edible plants easy to find in the spring is the dandelion. Although it is an import from Europe and occasional near creeks and pasture edges, it could be found by the Carduans. Both the flowers and leaves are edible. The root can be roasted and used for a coffee substitute.

How do I Know These?

That is the good thing about setting Cardua in an Ozark ravine. I’ve walked ravines, pastures, explored creeks, watched various storms and their aftermaths for thirty years.

No, I don’t know everything that happens. No one does. But I can add enough of these to make the Carduan world seem real. And that matters to me and, I hope, to readers of this massive work once it gets done.

When will “The Carduan Chronicles” be done?

I am impatient to see this story finally get written. It has been several years in the planning, drafting, rewriting and editing. I want to move on to other projects.

However, I want these books, and I find there will be four of them, to be right. That takes time. I’m hoping the first one about Ship Nineteen will be done and out this fall. The one on Ship Eighteen should be ready about the same time.

This depends on my writing time and getting the Carduan world right.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Purple Milkweed Blooming

Missouri is home to a wide variety of milkweeds that spread their blooms over the warm months. The purple milkweed blooming along the roads and in the edges of the woods is the first of the milkweed parade.

No Milkweeds Means No Monarchs

This is what the Missouri Conservation Department keeps saying. And it is true as milkweeds are the only plants their caterpillars feed on.

Those milkweeds are fewer in number every year as the places where they grow are plowed under, sprayed and mowed. They have no modern economic value, so they are destroyed with little thought for the consequences.

butterflies love purple milkweed blooming
Butterfly gardens, especially those with milkweeds are popular for monarch butterflies. Purple milkweed, Asclepias purpurescens, is a good choice for semi shade. It is a lovely plant and very popular with butterflies, wasps, bumblebees. clearwing hawkmoths and more.

Valuable Milkweeds

Although the big push to grow milkweeds is for the monarchs, there are other reasons too. An easy dozen kinds of insects visit the flowers.

Purple milkweed blooming is a magnet. Frittilary butterflies were tromping around drinking nectar. Dodging their feet were wasps, bumblebees and bees. Another visitor is the clearwing hawkmoth that hovers like an hummingbird.

Flower or crab spiders ambush prey on the flowers. Various beetles move in. The plants attract aphids and milkweed bugs.

Perennials

Because milkweeds are perennials, they are great for erosion control. Some are very showy like the popular butterfly weed. Others need lots of space like the common milkweed that spreads into a patch. Most like lots of sun.

A huge patch of purple milkweed blooming is gorgeous. The clouds of orange, brown, yellow, white, purple, black and more butterflies shifting between the upright umbels add to the beauty.

cover for "Missouri's Milkweeds, Milkvines and Pipevines" by Dr. Richard E. Rintz
A guidebook and more to the milkweeds, milkvines and pipevines known to grow in Missouri.

Growing Places

I see purple milkweed blooming in places with some shade and moisture. The common milkweed does well in road ditches, sometimes reaching six feet fall or more. Butterfly weed likes it drier and sunnier. It is rarely over two feet tall. Water gardens or the edges of ponds and lakes is favored by pink swamp milkweed.

Green, whorled and spider milkweeds are easy to grow too. They like dry and sunny places.

Butterfly gardens need milkweeds.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Storm Reports

Lately the news has lots of storm reports. One of my latest reading books was “A Storm Too Soon” by Michael J. Tougias about a storm to rival the reports.

This excellent nonfiction thriller follows three sailors on a sailboat crossing the Atlantic. They left a month before hurricane season, but two low pressures joined forces to create a hurricane.

When the sailboat sinks, the Coast Guard rescue units attempt to find the life raft and rescue the sailors. There are photographs in the book of the monstrous eighty foot tall waves.

Local Storm Reports

Storms much tamer than the one in the book have been passing through the Ozarks lately. One caused a flash flood. Most drop an inch or less of rain, maybe have some lightning and thunder and big winds.

The frequency can be a nuisance. The grass loves the rain and warm weather. The mower doesn’t mind the warm weather, but doesn’t like the rain or resulting wet grass. Barn cleaning is no fun in wet weather either, especially rain as the goats are in the way.

I’ve written about Ozark storms in both “Exploring the Ozark Hills” and “My Ozark Home”. The ones in recent years are different as they are usually small rains or big downpours.

cover for "Exploring the Ozark Hills" by Karen GoatKeeper
Several of the nature essays in this book concern storms, rain, ice and snow, and the results of those storms.

Gardens and Rain

With summer plants and seeds going into the garden, the frequent small rains are very helpful. I put in the squash seeds, let the rain water them in and watch the seedlings appear a few days later. Tomatoes and peppers love the rain too.

One problem has come up. The flash flood filled in the creek pool I use for water during dry times with gravel.

That is another aspect of the new weather patterns. A wet time is followed by a dry one that borders on drought before the next wet cycle begins.

The gravel problem is one of many to solve. For the present I will watch the storm reports.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

My Favorite Tree

While browsing through the picture book shelves, I came across “My Favorite Tree” by Diane Iverson. This isn’t really a picture book for young children, but a book about trees for older children.

Each two page spread has one picture book side with something about why the children in the picture like that particular kind of tree. The other page gives the name, description, range map, trivia and champion tree.

Looking at Trees

Now, I like trees. They have lovely shapes. Their shade is very welcome on hot days. Some have beautiful flowers and great fruit.

My problem with trees is how big they are. I can’t even reach the lowest branches of most trees. Climbing them has never been something I want to do.

My favorite tree in late spring is the dogwood
After the wild plums turn white with flowers and the redbuds don their pink slippers, the dogwood spreads its white clouds in the woods.

Tree Appreciation

A newspaper article in the St. Louis Post Dispatch reiterated something I also read about in Science News. Trees are very valuable in the city.

Trees cut noise, absorb pollution, cool hot temperatures and make people feel better. Cities should find ways to plant more trees. The suggestion for St. Louis was to plant trees on some of the abandoned house lots after removing the condemned structures. Most cities have such places and a small neighborhood park would increase property values for surrounding houses.

Which is My Favorite Tree?

As I read through “My Favorite Tree”, I asked this question. So many of the trees listed were ones I was familiar with. The pages brought back many memories.

Standing in the midst of a redwood grove. Sniffing pine trees for the scent of vanilla as Ponderosa Pines smell of vanilla and Jeffery Pines don’t. Fir forests looking like Christmas in a blanket of snow. Saguaros standing like sentries across the desert. Stopping under a Joshua Tree to take a picture of it and my new car.

Other trees are familiar ones around my home. Redbuds with their pink slippers that taste nutty. Dogwoods spreading white clouds in the woods. Persimmons and sycamores giving fruit and leaves to tempt the goats. Gathering black walnuts.

My answer really was that it depends on which tree I am focusing on at that time. In spite of their great height towering over me, I like trees.

white oak in winter
One of the interesting sights in winter are the shapes of the various trees now bereft of leaves. Different kinds of trees have different shapes. Trees growing close together change their shapes to compliment each other.

Using This Book

The trees listed are from many places and no one will see them all close to home. But the book offers a way to entice children outdoors to take a look at these mighty neighbors, learn their names and find out more about them.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Noisy Country

There is a mistaken belief that the country is quiet and peaceful. Maybe it is at some times. Right now the noisy country is in full swing.

tree frog waiting for dark
Easily mistaken for a lump of mud and hoping to be ignored, this gray tree frog sat near my trays of seedlings all day. I would prefer that it was a bit more active in the bug eating realm. It was resting up for a night calling from the neighboring rain barrel.

Tree Frogs

The house is ringed with rain barrels. We use the water for plants inside and outside the house.

Looking around the house there are these gray mottled lumps tucked into nooks. Closer inspection shows these are frogs, gray tree frogs. They don’t seem to do anything all day. It would be nice if they would snack on some of the flying insects zipping by them.

As evening approaches, these frogs migrate to the rain barrels. They think the barrels are there just for them. One or more line up along the top edges. By dark the chorus is in full voice, almost loud enough to drown out any converstaion or other noise near them.

City people find this annoying. Noisy country frogs make sleeping impossible.

Whip Poor Will

One lone whip poor will still comes to the valley. He claims the valley as his own, moving from place to place calling whip poor will over and over.

This year the bird begins calling at eight thirty and continues until dawn. I can listen while I milk. Some nights he sits just outside the milk room to serenade me.

noisy country culprit: red-eyed cicada
Every year the green annual cicadas announce summer’s arrival in the Ozarks in June to July. The red-eyed cicadas appear in their thousands only rarely. They are earlier than the annual invasion. Last time they hung on bushes and trees all over the hills. This year they fly up into the trees where they are heard, but not seen. This one stuck around long enough for a couple of pictures, then flew off to join the chorus.

Cicadas

This year the cicadas are already buzzing from the time the sun lights up the trees to sunset every day. These are the ones that emerge every thirteen or seventeen years.

Usually the annual cicadas don’t start emerging and calling until June or July. Their chorus is louder.

People

I’ve heard people complain about the noisy country sounds. Then they drive down the road with their radios blaring. I can hear them laughing and shouting for a quarter mile as they pass the house. Then the four wheelers and side-by-sides with no mufflers come roaring by.

Given the option, I far prefer my noisy country filled with cicadas, tree frogs and birds to the noise people make.

More of the wildlife is featured in essays in “Exploring the Ozark Hills“.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Flash Flood Aftermath

The big storm srrived in the Ozarks and left use ith a good two inches. It seemed to be over until we got up in the morning to find the flash flood aftermath staring at us out the window.

How both of us managed to sleep through what must have been a downpour, puzzles us. Perhaps we were more tired than we realized.

flash flood aftermath damages fences
The main part of the flood had gone by morning. The debris line on the road indicated the water was at least 18 inches deep where it crossed the road. Water still flowed down over half the road as it sought to get to the creek. This area of fence has a place for the water to get through. However the water brought down leaves and small branches which caught in the fence. Road gravel piled up with the leaves. The water pushed hard and the posts leaned over as the water topped the debris to get into the pasture.

The Road

A small wet weather flow comes down along the yard. It was still running in the morning, but the debris indicated it had been over a foot deep overnight.

The water carried mulch left by the electric company, leaves and small branches down across the road, down the road, covering most of the road. Some of the water diverted down an old creek bed into the buck’s small pasture.

Field fence is great fencing for goats. It’s a disaster in a flood.

The flash flood aftermath at the fence was a heap of small branches, leaves and shredded wood piled up against the fence. The only way to clear this mess is to wade in, pull up armloads and dump it over the fence.

flash flood aftermath debris on bridge
Weather changes have made flash floods more the rule than the exception for several years here in the Ozarks. These rise quickly, tear out the creek banks and subside fast. This latest one didn’t top what remains of the bridge, only topped it enough to pile it with branches, leaves and whatever is tangled in these. Such floods used to carry off the bridge planks, but there are several old railroad ties on one side now to hold them in place. So far, these are working.

The Bridge

After the previous two inches of rain, the creek was flowing strongly. The more than two inch downpour brought the creek up over the edges of the bridge where it piled up branches and leaves.

This means working my way across the bridge one pile at a time. The leaves and small stuff can be shoved off into the creek with a hoe. Larger branches and small pieces of trees must be pulled up, shoved across and into the creek to lodge somewhere else doesn the way.

Animals

The flash flood aftermath was almost tragic for the Canada geese. Their nest is down in the creek floodplain. The flood waters came within a foot of sweeping it away.

I found a few creatures in the debris on the bridge. A snail was tossed over onto the grass across the creek. A spider ran off. A small midland brown snake was carried up to a brush pile and turned loose.

How many other creatures were swept away? There’s no way of knowing. A flash flood aftermath may mean lots of cleaning up for us, but it’s a disaster for small creatures.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Baby Chicks and Weather

The year 2012 brought a terrible drought and the beginning of weather upheaval. I’ve always started with baby chicks in April with its relatively settled weather. Now I’m juggling baby chicks and weather every year.

Baby Chick Requirements

Other than the obvious food purchased from the feed store and water from the well, baby chicks require a warm, not too hot, temperature. a heat lamp with a light bulb worked quite well as the wattage could be increased or decreased as necessary.

Now LED bulbs give off no heat. This necessitates purchasing a heat bulb. They come in two sizes: 250W which is much too hot for my little chick house and old heat lamp or 150W which works most of the time.

baby chicks and weather must be balanced
At a week old, these baby chicks are growing tails and wings. They still like it warm with plenty of food and water available. This is a mixed bunch from eggs set in an incubator.

Setting Up

As the heat lamp won’t heat the entire chick house, there are several things I do ahead of the chick arrival day. One is to put down paper, enough layers to last ten to fourteen days, on the back half of the house.

Some sources discourage using paper. The print on newspaper can confuse baby chicks looking for food. Paper is slick making walking harder.

I still use paper and haven’t seen much of either problem. What I appreciate is the ease of cleaning, another important aspect of raising chicks. When the paper gets dirty (usually every day), I move the food and water containers out for refilling, roll up the top paper layer making sure the chicks move off of it as I roll and end up with clean paper to put the food and water containers back on.

Then I divide the house with a cardboard barrier. The back half of the house is plenty big enough for twenty chicks for two weeks, about the time it takes for them to mostly feather out.

Baby Chicks and Weather

The chick house has two windows and a door, all closed. The heat lamp is suspended from a roost over the back section and turned on. Chicks are turned loose in the section.

On warm days the chicks wander around the section. They eat, drink and sleep. they move under the light or out as they need to.

On hot days a window or both plus the door on really hot days are opened. The light is not turned off, but the heat leaves. The barrier can be moved over to give the chicks more room to escape the direct heat.

Cold days are another matter. Blankets are draped over the roost. This is safe as the lamp is below the roost. They can even be placed to surround the section.

Balancing these conditions wasn’t too hard for years. Things have changed. Now conditions can change from one day to another or even from day to night. Occasionally conditions change during the day.

Baby chicks and weather may be challenging now. Still, those fresh pullet eggs next winter are worth the time and trouble.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Summer Birds Return

Last night, as I came in from milking, I heard him. The lone whip-o-will remaining in our valley has returned. His call reminds me that the summer birds return this month banishing winter for now.

Watching the bird feeder, the titmice, juncos and sparrows are gone. They’ve been replaced by purple finches and goldfinches. The hummingbirds are back. The season has changed.

new summer birds return Canada geese
I was standing in the barn doorway waiting for some goats to finish eating when I first saw these birds off in the pasture. They had long necks like turkeys, but didn’t stand like turkeys. Binoculars showed the pair to be Canada geese. A week or so later, only the gander was still walking around in the pasture.

New Birds

For the first time a pair of Canada geese have decided to visit with us. The pastures are lush and green for them to enjoy grazing. The creek is flowing well.

Evidently the pair found our place to their liking. The goose has disappeared leaving the gander parading around. The crows have discovered they are no longer welcome in his stretch of the creek.

In several more weeks the goose will probably be back with little goslings following behind. We still don’t know why the pair decided to stay when there is only the creek for water.

goldfinch summer bird returns
Later in the summer the goldfinches hang on the chicory stalks eating the seeds. That is the time to get some good pictures of these wary birds.

Flashes of Yellow

When summer birds return, finches are among them. The purple finches have purple on their heads and necks. The goldfinches are drab greens.

Now the male goldfinches are dressed in their summer finery. Walking out the door this morning to do chores, a small flock flew up out of the yard. All fled to the bushes except one. He stopped on the wire around the persimmon tree to strut his stuff. His golden feathers and black cap were striking.

Plenty of Food

Although many birds do keep coming by the bird feeder, most are off eating the many insects now flying and crawling around in the plants. If the cicadas emerge here, that food supply will increase dramatically.

The one item I wish was more popular are the ticks. They are in great abundance this year.

A fairly dry winter became a fairly wet spring just in time for the summer birds return. Now the rain needs to keep coming to water my garden.

Categories
Latest From High Reaches

Disappearing Sun

Back in 2017 we were close to the total eclipse path. We drove over to watch the disappearing sun as the moon slid across it. The area got dark, mostly. We saw some shadows.

This year the magazines, the news, everything seemed to be talking about the eclipse. And we were again close to the path of totality.

To Go or Not To Go

The 2017 eclipse was interesting, but not really awesome. We saw many of the things the media listed. We spent a day driving and standing around.

This time the area of near totality went right over us, some 99% +. Wouldn’t this be good enough? We could stay home, get things done and see the eclipse too.

A friend was thinking along the same lines. Somehow, as we talked about it, we decided to drive down into the path of totality. After all, the area of a minute and a half was a mere 30 miles away.

Watching the Disappearing Sun

Bunker was close, but Ellington with over two minutes was only another half hour’s drive away. We headed south expecting huge crowds.

Wherever the crowds were, they weren’t in Ellington. Still, we headed out to a nearby Conservation Area where we were the only people around.

The edge of the sun was just disappearing as the truck pulled into a parking area. We piled out, put out some chairs and watched.

disappearing sun darkens road
The Mark Twain Conservation Area road kept getting darker and darker as the sun disappeared behind the moon.

Totality

I’m used to being out around sunset. The gathering darkness wasn’t like that at all. Instead it had that eerie look as when a big storm is coming, when the air darkens and clears, the shadows darken.

The moon continued to slip across the sun. The disappearing sun had an orange tint.

Then it got dark, really dark. A couple of stars came out. There was a bright spot at the bottom of the hidden sun we later found out was a solar flare. A pastel reddish orange glow ran around the horizon.

disappearing sun light effects
These patches of light got noticed when the first chip of sun reappeared after the total eclipse.

Afterwards

When a smidgeon of the sun peeked out, the world started lighting up. The trees cast these strange rippled shadows.

By the time the sun was half clear, day had reappeared. We packed up and headed home.

later shadow effect from reappearing sun
As more of the sun reappeared after the eclipse, the light patches got bigger, but kept their odd arc shape effect. The shadows were from tall pine and oak trees.

At Home

The goats and chickens were out all day. They didn’t seem at all upset about the eclipse.

Now we have these sun gazing glasses left over. Although these were for viewing the eclipse, they can be used to look at the sun. Maybe I will hold on to them for a time.