Nice weather

The storm we were expecting last weekend missed us to the south. No flood! Hurray! Two days later, the creek had dropped 18” and was running clear again.

Even without more rain, we have puddles that are large and persistent enough to attract the attention of a pair of geese. 

A pair of geese hanging around a puddle in the south field

We haven’t yet had any that were foolish enough to build a nest. There’s always a chance that these two will try it. It depends on how much rain we get in the next weeks. If the puddle dries, they will move along. If they nest before the puddle dries, it seems unlikely that they will be able to fledge chicks before the water disappears and the coyotes move in. No great loss. It’s not like there aren’t enough Canada geese in the world.

Wednesday, April 1 was a beautiful day. The chorus frogs and cardinals serenade us as we start doing a bit of work outside to get ready for summer. Terry cleaned out all the dead asparagus stalks from the bed earlier in the week. He put several muck buckets and bags of wood chips that he collected over the winter by the asparagus beds so I could mulch the rows. 

Mulch awaiting the asparagus bed

I was thinking of waiting until after the asparagus came up, but it became clear that Terry thought it was time. So I spread the mulch. Terry was careful not to include any wood chips from the chickens. Chicken manure is too “hot” to put directly on plants. I think this is about nitrogen content, which burns the plants if it’s too high. Also, we worry about bacterial contamination. Both of these problems go away with weathering or composting. Anyway, the muck buckets were filled with regular wood chip mulch that we used to winterize the strawberries and Terry’s nursery stock. The bags had chain saw sawdust from cutting wood for the stove in the Ag garage.

Mulch out of the buckets/bags and on the asparagus rows

It seemed like a lot of mulch, but when all was said and done, I was could have used a little more. It was hard to tell how thick I was getting it. I hope Terry is right about the asparagus being able to get through it.

Wednesday was also a nice day for a dust bath.

Hilda and I took a walk to the creek on Thursday. The newly deposited silt had duck prints in it.

Duck prints by the creek

There were also prints from a racoon. Long claw marks near the creek told me that the racoon had trouble getting up the bank.

Racoon prints (I think the deep ones are deer)

Thursday morning was cold. Frost was all over the grass, and the robins were looking grumpy. Their feathers were fluffed out so they looked twice as big.

Grumpy robin wondering why he flew north so early

It warmed up nicely, however. Much to my surprise, the garlic was up already. Hilda and I took off the row cover and rolled it up.

Hilda pulling out earth staples to release the row cover

Me shaking off the oak leaves before rolling up the row cover

Garlic sprouts

I also took my small clippers and got the dead strawberry leaves off the top of the sprouting crowns. If it gets very cold again, I’ll be sorry. I may have to put on some row cover. It looks like most of the plants that we bought survived the winter. The runners that crowded around the periphery did not fare so well. I left some of the leaves in the hope that they would discourage weeds. It will be easy enough to pull the weeds. The beds have the loosest soil of anywhere on the farm, and the surface is at a comfortable height. Easy peasy.

Strawberry bed before I cleaned it

And with much of the dead plant material removed

I heard the oddest bird call while I was out and about. It sounded more like a dripping faucet than a bird. Drip, drip, tweet. Drip, drip, tweet. I saw three birds in the second oak that were making the noise, but I couldn’t tell what they were. Hoping that they would hang around for a bit, I got my camera with the telephoto lens. They were still there! I was sure it was going to be some unusual, cool species that would make such a weird sound. I took the picture, enlarged it, and saw that the birds were...(drum roll, please)…brown-headed cowbirds.

Three brown-headed cowbirds

Shoot. Neither cool, nor unusual, nor even welcome. Cowbirds are nest parasites, laying their eggs in the nests of other birds and tricking them into raising cowbird chicks, often to the exclusion of their biological children. I suppose I shouldn’t begrudge them. It’s not only a successful strategy, but also self-limiting. If too many nests are parasitized, there would not be hosts for the cowbirds in the next generation.

The temperatures on Friday afternoon were in the 60’s. Terry expressed a willingness to grill. We had two thick ribeyes in the freezer, which I thawed, and a thinner steak I got for Hilda when I was shopping. I ate the thin steak and let Hilda have one of the thick ones because she likes her steak rare. I prefer medium. 

Grilling season arrives!

Terry did a great job with the grilling. We also had foil-pack potatoes and a cheesy cauliflower and broccoli casserole. And champagne to celebrate the beginning of grill season.