Drought

It has been 46 days since we had rain. One front after another shows up on the radar, seemingly headed for us, then dodges to the east or west. MCC’s meteorology instructor told me that this is the first time he’s seen a whole month go by without rain in the 20 years he’s been here. Maybe, maybe, there will be rain Wednesday. We can only hope.

When it gets very dry, the grass dies over the drain field. I assume because the soil is shallow over the pipes. It’s a paradox, really. You would think the drain field would be wetter. Probably the wastewater doesn’t get out that far.

Dead grass over the pipes in the drain field

The ground has developed huge cracks. I checked yesterday to see if they went all the way to hell, but in fact, they are only 4.5”

Cracks in the ground 4.5" deep

As long as it is so very dry, I began taking up the landscape cloth between the rows of corn. It’s a right messy job in the mud, let me tell you. At least the dust will shake off. If I wear a dust mask, it’s not too bad on the respiratory tract. Also, I did not have to pick off any slugs or earthworms clinging to the underside. Perhaps the slug population has been knocked back by the prolonged drought.

Corn with the landscape cloth removed

In order to pull up the landscape cloth, I had to pry up the earth staples. In moister soil, one can just tug on the cloth and the staples will slide right out of the ground. Under current conditions, however, the cloth would rip around the staples. One at a time, I pulled them out with the tool shown below. This is the only thing we’ve ever found that could do the task without bending. Sadly, there are no identifying marks on it whatsoever. If it breaks, we are at a loss to find another.

Best earth staple puller ever

This is what an earth staple looks like

I sat on a small rolling garden stool, working close to the ground. The crab grass by this time was way over my head from this position. I got a load of seeds down my neck as I scooted along. In fact, I had seeds everywhere before I was done Crab grass seeds are pricklier than I imagined. Obviously designed for dispersal on fur or, in my case, socks.

Hilda took all the cages off the tomatoes, which had gone senescent. Terry moved the cages to his trees to keep the deer from rubbing on them as the rut begins. One season follows another.

Sad, sad tomato carcasses

My butterfly garden continues to produce new blooms. Here is the largest Echinacea I’ve ever seen along with some yellow coneflowers.

Coneflowers in the butterfly garden

The yellow flower is sneezeweed. It is flanked by some very healthy New England aster.

Sneezeweed and New England aster

My lisianthus are finally looking really good, just in time for the frost (although last week was in the 90’s and following a brief cool down over the weekend, we are headed for the 80s again). Hilda started them from tiny seeds sometime around last Christmas. Tiny seeds produced tiny plants. We potted them up at the beginning of summer, but something was odd about them, and the stems refused to elongate. Finally, a shoot went up from each rosette. The flowers started to form. And then the damned ground squirrels chewed off every damned bud. I moved the pots off the ground and waited for the stems to grow again. Here they are, at long last.

Lisianthus blooming at last

I didn’t think I would like the peach-colored ones (or was it apricot?) but they are lovely.

Peach-colored lisianthus

Saturday night, we once again used our human secret weapon of night vision to put leg bands on the pullets and transfer them to Coop 1. Chickens don’t see well at night, which makes them relatively easy to catch and work with. When we looked in before going inside, Juanita and Idalis, the two boldest of the bunch, were at the top of the ladder. The other four were still milling about the floor.

We were up early Sunday moving the fence back where it usually is. I was relieved when we let the girls out that the pullets did not try to walk through the fence to get back to Coop 2. They walked right up to the fence, but stopped there. They were, perhaps, a bit wistful.

The fence repositioned, cutting off Coop 2 from the Coop 1 run.

With the run secured, I went in to have my tea and warm up. When I went back out after breakfast to take down the chick fence, I didn’t see the pullets outside. I found them all on the roost as if they needed to make up for not roosting the night before.

Pullets on the roost in the middle of the day

Hilda said they all seem to be getting along fine today. Now if the pullets would just start laying, but no signs of maturity yet.