The O-Zone

Did anybody notice where they went?

This little bunny is wondering.  I think he must be a member of batch #6 from the local bunny population.  We haven’t seen any this small lately, so perhaps they are done making batches of baby bunnies.  He was sitting next to the sidewalk munching weeds.

They're starting to turn white now, starting with their back feet. The grass next to the sidewalk is no longer so long and green, and we rarely see the rabbits grazing, mostly they are just running through the yard at high speed.

The last time we had rainfall was a thunderstorm on August 11th.   A bolt hit the ground very near us, like flash/BANG! and then all was quiet except for a brief downpour.  After the storm passed by, this red pickup truck belonging to one of the local government agencies that fights forest fires drove into our property, turned around by the garage, and then honked their horn as they were driving away.  This was puzzling behavior, and the next day we found out he was alerting us to a fire about a mile from us, sparked by the thunderstorm.  It was a teeny fire, less than an acre, and was pounced upon by the fire fighting forces in the neighborhood.  How we were supposed to interpret the honking horn was interesting.  It could have meant, “Don’t shoot!” or “I’m so lost.”  or any number of things.  He could have stopped to talk but didn’t bother.

A rainfall now would be very welcome, and hopefully tomorrow we will see some without a  thunderstorm.  That sounds a little too exciting until the woods are all soggy again.  The grass and trees are extremely dry and fire danger is high.

August 14th we had a full moon, and a pretty moonset as the sun was coming up.

Because Dan woke me up in time to see the moon go down, I decided to make blueberry pancakes.  Not sure why that should have followed, but it seemed like a splendid idea at the time.

Pancakes with maple syrup, and a pot of tea.

We finished a project in the house during late August and early September.  Well two projects actually.  The most important project was to put the windowsills and casements around two new windows.  We had suspected that flies were able to get into the house around those windows, and evidently that was how they were invading the house.  Much nicer now!  And our favorite project was to put an island in the kitchen.  This is the first house we’ve ever had that has an island in the kitchen, and it is just so useful.

Standing in the doorway to the pantry, the island is right in the middle of the floor space in front of the other kitchen cabinets. On the other side of the island are two seats, and I've already gotten to try them out for working, while making breakfast on the cookstove. I'm so looking forward to winter! It's going to be a wonderful place for the computer.

A bowl full of Josta Berries. This is our new favorite berry, a cross between Gooseberry, and Black Currant. We planted some in the garden from cuttings, and hopefully they will survive until next spring. When we looked today there was a huge pocket gopher mound almost burying the one Josta Berry plant that looks alive.

I made a couple of pies from the Josta Berries we got from the same woman who gave us the plant cuttings, and two small jars of jam which we have yet to try.  That will be a treat some day during the winter.  I’ve been in a baking mood lately.

Brownies, with a vanilla frosting, and a dark unsweetened chocolate glaze. Yummy doesn't begin to describe this.

Yesterday was the Autumnal Equinox, the start of my favorite time of year.  Happy Fall!  To celebrate, I used the last of the summer peaches and baked a pie.  Today it is 86F and feels anything but fall-ish.  Tomorrow is supposed to be 15 degrees cooler.

This is what peach heaven looks like.

Two boxes of JH Hale peaches. They are supposed to be best for canning, but we love to eat them fresh or bake with them. I peeled and froze most of these two cases, so that we can have baked things all winter.

I've been practicing with making gluten free pie crusts and have finally found one that we like. It also makes the best pinwheel cookies with cinnamon and sugar from the leftover pie crust dough. It's almost worth just making the cookies.

Ward wanted me to send him a piece of pie. So, here you go, ET! Wish you were here.

This morning Dan and Mishkin had a mouse rodeo, the first mouse in the house in several months.  Mish had been keeping the mouse occupied in the sunroom until Dan woke up.  Teamwork!  Mish doesn’t even get perturbed any more when Dan evicts the mouse; he just walks around the house very pleased with himself, afterwards.

Here he is after evicting all his toys from the tunnel, reclaiming his ownership. We throw his toys inside and he yanks them out and spreads them around the house.

I have several knitting project that I’m ignoring at the moment.  I’ve just started working on a needlepoint kit I’ve had in a box for at least 12 years.  I will make a pillow out of it someday.  It’s nice and mindless, perfect for working on it when watching TV.

An old-fashioned map of the world. But now I'm in the mood for working on needlepoint and have other projects in mind now that I'm working on this one. There is always a danger in looking in boxes of stuff.

It’s been relatively uneventful around here since the middle of August.  We just had one bit of entertainment, that being a visit from friends who live on the west coast.  Now we’ll just settle in to getting ready for winter.  We stacked a cord of firewood this morning, bringing our woodshed up to roughly 2/3rds of the firewood we need for winter.

We have a new plan.

We built the arbors, a rose arbor at the gate into the garden, and a grape arbor for a shaded seating area.

Eventually we will put paving stones in the grape arbor to give us a flat surface for our chairs. It will take some of the thrill out of sitting down and wondering if the chair is going to fall over sideways, but progress does take thrills out of things.

The weeds are absolutely amazing, and trying to keep them in check is going to be impossible with the current garden plan. So, we are going to put landscape cloth all over the back half of the garden, and cover it with a few inches of bark mulch or sawdust, whichever we can get next spring in a truckload. Or maybe this fall… the weight limits on roads during the spring may be an issue. Have to think about that. That will let our fruit trees and bushes grow without having to compete with such aggressive weeds.

In the front half of the garden, we will have to bring in a rototiller and then build raised beds. Under each raised bed, we will put 1/4 inch wire mesh. That will thwart the pocket gophers and ground squirrels. In between the raised beds, we’ll put down more landscaping cloth and more bark mulch or sawdust.

These two things combined will help keep weeds down to a dull roar, and manageable. Plus it will make the garden look spiffy!

Inside the house, we have added a new dining room table and chairs to the sunroom

Without the center leaf, the table is round instead of oval. It's a solid wood table, black walnut, and the chairs are very comfortable and roll around. And no more wobbly table that threatens to tip over any cup or glass set upon it.

We moved the old antique table upstairs and now I have a place for working on a puzzle, or drawing or painting, or laying out any other project that I want to do.

In another couple of weeks we are adding an island to the kitchen. We picked up the top of the island from Spokane, and are waiting for the cabinets to arrive. More drawers for storing pans will be a very welcome addition. And it will be a great place to sit next to the wood stove in the winter, while I’m working.

Progress can be good!

Banff National Park is our most favorite place of all time, and we got to visit there for a few days last week.  It’s been at least six years since we were last there, and we were curious if the scenery would still blow us away as much as it had in the past.  Yep, it still is fantastic.  So much so, in fact, that we are already planning to visit the parks again next year.

We entered the parks at the Radium Hot Springs entrance, and immediately began climbing into the mountains.  On the main highway three adult female Bighorn Sheep, with two babies in tow, were walking down the middle of the road.  A bit further past them, a good size Black Bear was munching grass on the side of the road.  When we reached the first overlook, I took a series of pictures showing the mountains.  These aren’t the big magnificent mountains in the Bow River Valley that runs through the middle of Banff National Park, but they were a sign of good things to come.

Panoramic view from the first overlook in the provincial park that borders the national parks to the west. This looks north, and the following pictures go from north to south.

The sides of the mountains show their glacier-influenced past.

These lower mountains have trees that go all the way to the top. The bright green streaks are avalanche chutes, a common sight on all the Rocky Mountains ranges.

The clouds in the sky were starting to build, heading towards thunderstorms predicted for late afternoon and early evening.

Snowy peaks are peeking up over the ridges to the south.

One of many cirques in these mountain ranges, but most of the glaciers have melted.

Above tree line, sheer granite cliffs and remnants of snow from last winter. Waterfalls cascade off of virtually every peak in the parks.

Mountain goats love this country.

Our first glimpse into Banff National Park.

Castle Mountain is aptly named, and we were staying at a rustic cabin fairly close to this mountain.

The sheer cliffs are many hundreds of feet tall. One of the most interesting geologic features for many cliffs in the park is how the strata is bent and folded, or even standing vertical in places. For this particular mountain, most of the strata is horizontal.

Just another closer look at some of the mountain details.

View of the mountain from our cabin window.

Again, these vertical cliffs are each over 100 feet tall.

Heading into the canyon, vibrant green plants enjoy the moisture from the blue water.

In places the force of water striking the rocks can be felt in the metal railings.

The sheer canyon walls rise far above the water and far above the trail. The air is cool and moist.

Dan was looking down.

The water cools the air in the canyon. The stone walls are at least 100 feet straight up over the water.

A hard rock in the middle of the waterway may become a new waterfall of it's own someday.

The old trail, replaced by steel. This old path would have been extremely treacherous during any sort of thunderstorm, slick and steep with no guardrails.

The water color is created by dissolved rock from the glacial history of the region.

The water undercutting hard granite, eventually the wall will collapse and a new chapter in the creek will begin.

Dan pointed this out to me and asked me why I was writing on stone walls. I'm innocent, I tell ya'!

A Gold Mantle Squirrel, watching the tourist go by.

The next day we took a drive from Banff to Drumheller to visit another favorite place, the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Paleontology.  Driving through Calgary that morning was an adventure.  There was a torrential downpour, so much water that seeing a half a block ahead was almost impossible.  So much water was on the roadway, halfway submerging tires on vehicles in some stretches.  When they drove past us, they would throw up a wall of water, and zero visibility resulted.  It made for a very long drive.  Coming back again in the afternoon, the skies were only partly cloudy, and the drive was much less stressful.  That museum is absolutely fantastic, 100,000 square feet of dinosaurs.  It is a World Heritage site.  They always have something new going on.  The Triceratops is my favorite, it’s beautiful and amazing.

After we got home from our little trip, we went for a walk by our own river and located a woodpecker nest.  The babies pretty much yelled constantly for food, and their parents were constantly coming back to the nest with a fat juicy bug to stuff into whoever was yelling the loudest.  The noise was pretty amazing.

A Lewis Woodpecker nest, full of baby birds at the time this picture was taken. They are all out now raising hell around the river corridor. They are absolutely beautiful birds and complete lunatics.

A few weeks ago, we were heading out to the garage to go somewhere, and I caught a movement in the fence near the garage.  It was the baby fawn we had seen hiding in the bushes in front of the sunroom.  He had tried to go through the fence and had gotten his back legs well and truly tangled.  Just a week before he had fit through with no problems, but this week, no go.

We walked up to see if we could untangle him, and he was positive we were going to eat him.  He was screaming loudly (poor little thing), and trying to jump around, so we restrained him, and I managed to get his legs back out of the fence but he was still stuck.  Dan left me holding the fawn and went to the garage to get wire cutters.  His mother was snorting with alarm on the driveway above the fence, also sure I was planning to eat her baby.  That was when I discovered that a baby fawn’s head was harder than my lip, when he jumped up and smacked me in my mouth.

Dan returned with wire cutters, and moments later the fawn was free!  He scampered off to rejoin his mother, and we didn’t see either one of them again for over a week.  No doubt she wanted to stay away from the scary monsters.  Evidently they’ve both forgotten the trauma, because they are back, and he’s growing like a weed.  He was bouncing in the yard a couple of days ago, taking time out between bounces to munch on lilac leaves next to our bedroom windows, then more bouncing, and then marveling at the sidewalk.  He’s very cute.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....

Ok, so maybe not an over abundance of anything remotely resembling excitement.  Wouldn’t wanna disturb his nap!  He loves to sack out in the sun room.

The flower garden by the front door is in full bloom at the moment.

Iris, Bleeding Heart, Oriental Poppy, and the poor chewed upon Rhododenron. The Daffodils are done, as is the Daphne.

Vivid yellow Iris. No idea what variety this is, the blooms are less than half the size of the purple ones.

Purple Iris, multiple blooms on each stalk this time around. It's amazing what feeding the plants will accomplish.

Oriental Poppies, even in shadow these are a brilliant, deep color.

The Bleeding Heart is huge this year, almost covering the iris next to it.

This Columbine hasn't been munched flat yet. The bunnies sniff around it, but so far, no taste tests. It's really just a matter of time, though.

While the flowers are faring well, the vegetable garden can’t say the same thing.  First to go were the lettuce, swiss chard, and beet plants.  Left alone were the spinach and cabbage plants, and I joked with Dan about what that meant.

Evidently, they were saving those for the second course.

We bought some floating row covers and put them over the top of the remaining Chinese Cabbage plants, and the beans.  This seems to be helping so far, because they are still alive!

The weeds are ferocious though, and that is going to be a couple of years’ worth of work to get them under control.

The pocket gophers are starting work on the pepper plants.  Where once a pepper plant was, now a pile of dirt exists.  It will be interesting to see how long it takes them to eat all the peppers.

The other morning we had a new visitor running around on the sidewalk.  Our sidewalk is a huge hit with the Chipmunks.  They run races up and down.  Much more convenient and fun than trying to wade through the grass.  We couldn’t believe our eyes, though.

A baby Yellow-bellied Marmot! These guys live in the rocks, down the hill from us. He was standing on the sidewalk, "Wow, nobody told me the world was flat!" He kept running back and hiding under the deck outside the sun room.

This little guy has evidently been asked to find his own rocks for his home.  Note the bare spot on his back where somebody bit him, to encourage him to move along and find his own place to live.  These guys have one of the oddest lifestyles.  They are awake and moving around from mid April, going back to sleep in late July, beginning of August.  I told Dan I hoped he would find a home close by, and Dan’s comment was something along the lines of just what we needed was yet another rodent species in our yard.  This was a good point.

Oh well, he’s still cute in a rodent sort of way, and I hope he fares well.

Lots of babies running around these days.

A White-tail doe and her fawn. The fawn doesn't weigh as much as Mishkin, though his legs are longer.

The cement wall behind the fawn is twenty-four inches tall, so that gives a really good scale for this little guy.

There was a bit of drama revolving around this fawn yesterday.  We saw him in front of the sun room, creeping into the brush, and disappearing.  They have amazingly protective coloration when they are still and laying down. There was no sign of the doe at all, and this baby is way too young to be on its own.

A few hours later, a Raven was circling around the patch of bushes, evidently not fooled by the protective coloration for our little fawn buddy.  The Raven had a birds-eye-view of the baby hiding in the bushes.  I asked Dan if the Raven would attack the baby, and he said, yes, even kill it if more Ravens showed up.  I was ready to go do some protection duty, and asked Dan if he could chase the Raven away.  Dan figured the Raven would laugh long and hard at our feeble attempts to make it do anything.  The Raven did eventually leave,

Still no sign of the doe, and I fretted all afternoon.  Then, about 8 hours after we first saw the baby creeping into his hiding place, the doe and fawn crossed the yard, the doe was licking her baby, and re-assuring it.  Then they wandered off up the driveway.  It was nice to see them reunited.  We found it amazing that she would leave her baby alone that long, and that the baby would stay put where she told it to for so long.

Mish is now sleeping in my chair in the living room, so all is well up on the mountain.

Our first garden produce was, predictably enough, radishes.

Delicious, sweet and spicy.

This makes us very optimistic for the other things we have planted.  I over-did it a bit with the corn, and have a lot of thinning to do in the very near future.

We had a bear visitor the other evening,about a half hour before sunset.  Terry spotted the visitor first.  If we end up deaf someday, we can blame living in bear country as a contributing factor.

The concrete wall at the base of the garage is two feet tall. So this is a small bear, barely (bearly), peeking over the grass and looking at the house to see if they could spot the source of the loud sounds.

That is the way we see the bear.

A concerned bear.

That is the way Terry sees the bear.

A bear who paid attention to momma, "If it sounds like it could eat you, leave."

Terry was once again victorious at scaring away dangerous predators and protecting the flock.  Mish missed it as he ran upstairs to his bedroom at the first scream from the peanut gallery.

This morning Terry announced a bear was in the driveway.  Actually, the way she said it was ‘THERE IS A BEAR IN THE DRIVEWAY!!!” followed by scrambling around on her perch and generally carrying on.  Opal and Mishkin were both justifiably concerned by this announcement.

While the bear was frozen with shock at the unfamiliar sound coming from our house, I nabbed the camera.

"I'm outta here, that is loud and sounds scary!"

"Feet... don't fail me now"

Dan was a little miffed as he didn’t get to chase this very large black bear off with a well-placed bb-gun shot to his posterior.  Terry thought she had done a good job notifying her flock (and everybody within a mile of our house, no doubt), of the danger.  Opal thought the Raven that flew over later was scarier.  Mishkin wondered what all the noise was about, but he wondered from the top of the stairs where it was safe and he couldn’t see anything.  Oro just thinks Terry is hysterical sometimes.

The day has been full of excitement.  Dan woke me up early today, needing help removing a mouse from under the large speaker, where Mishkin had trapped it and was playing with it but not interested in actually catching his little buddy.  Mouse Rodeo first thing in the morning is one way to wake up, but a hot cup of tea is better 🙂

Another sunset.

Lots of drama in the skies around here, at times.

P.S.  We just added a Mallard to our yard list, which is a sure sign it’s raining too much!

Weather plays such a huge part in sunsets, and this time of year we have nothing if not weather around here.  Today the high temperature is +44F, and it has been raining heavily.

When this weather moved in, and before it socked in, misty rain was falling to the west.

Golden sunsets are my favorite, I think, until we get a rose color, and then that's my favorite.

Sizing the full sized picture gives a dramatic contrast between light and dark, above.  Looking closer gives a very different view.

Tiny drops of water catch and reflect the sunlight, and transform the hills from brilliant green to gold.

If it snows tonight, I won’t be amused.

There are two schools of thought on birding, and the lines are drawn between those who keep a life list and those who do not.  We are in both camps, listing and just being outside watching birds, listening to them and seeing what they are up to.  Our recent birding trip added a new life species to our list, a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher; a rare visitor to the refuge we were extremely lucky to see two of them in the same little tree.  This species proved elusive for the last 30 or so years, a very cute little bird flitting around in a small Juniper near our campsite.  We added fifty plus species to our annual list.

Dan teased me about all the things I packed for such a short camping trip, but I didn't bring the kitchen sink. I just thought about bringing it.

Brandon met us at Malheur, our most favorite place to go birding.  It was the first time she’s ever gone on a birding trip.  Mainly she was there to see us, and for the camping and to see the scenery.  I’m not sure if we have converted her to the dark side, but by the end of our trip she could identify a Robin.

Speaking of Robins, a pair was tending a nest full of babies in the large Juniper right behind our tent.

We had decided not to camp in our favorite campground as that campground had to be evacuated several nights in a row in the few days preceding our trip in the middle of the night due to flooding caused by heavy thunderstorms.  More storms were predicted for the weekend we visited and that sounded like too much potential for drama.  The storms materialized, but not as heavy as earlier in the week.  Water levels around the national wildlife refuge were already very high, and several of the roads into the refuge were closed, being underwater as they were.  Birding was limited to the fringes.  Even so, it was wonderful.

A Short-eared Owl, perched on a fence post. These gorgeous large owls flit across the landscape like giant moths, effortless and ethereal, clapping their wings underneath their bodies, applauding their own performance during their breeding flight.

The headquarters for the refuge is a birding oasis, the only trees for miles around, it acts like a magnet for tired migrating warblers, and all sorts of perching birds.  When we checked in on Friday afternoon, the trees were dripping with Townsend Warblers, Lazuli Buntings, Western Tanagers, Bullock Orioles, and all sorts of cool species.  The refuge has seen over 320 species of birds.

Taking a picture of a warbler is dependent on them staying put long enough for the millesecond it takes for the shutter to click. Alas, sometimes that isn't long enough. By Saturday morning, all the Townsend Warblers have continued their migration to the north, and a couple will end up in the Aspen grove behind our house.

The first time Dan ever took me to Malheur was in the fall, and one of my most vivid memories of that trip was the first time I ever saw Yellow-headed Blackbirds.  They were in a field of newly harvested corn, scrambling around in the stalks, and as we drove by several hundred of them rose into the air at once, filling the air with color and sound.  Dali would have loved the spectacle, it was so surreal.

These guys sound like a rusty gate when they sing, a loud very rusty gate.

A sleeply slightly fluffed Red-winged Blackbird, not displaying the vivid bright red wing patch which gave them their name.

Every year a pair of Great Horned Owls raises a brood in their next in the fire watch tower adjacent to refuge headquarters.  When their babies fledge, they move them to the tall trees by headquarters.

A baby owl pileup, cuddling and napping.

A watchful parent, in a Ponderosa Pine tree, near the Cottonwood where the babies were sleeping. Another baby was cuddled underneath the other parent, sheltering from the rain.

The Buena Vista Overlook is a great spot to visit to check out the lay of the land.  A spotting scope is useful for identifying small birds playing around in the reeds and cattails.

Overlooking a portion of the refuge, these large ponds are normally a lot smaller and usually host a couple pairs of Trumpeter Swans. The water was so high this spring, the swans were elsewhere, no doubt on the larger lake.

A pair of Canada Geese flying over the marsh.

Strong, graceful, these birds mate for life. We saw newly hatched babies accompanied by their proud parents. At least until they can find another set of parents to babysit their brood. Once we saw a pair of adults surrounded by 200 babies. "I don't remember the pile of eggs being this high, do you?"

The geology of this area is one of the most interesting aspects of visiting.  Multiple lava flows show the volcanic history.

The most recent lava flows cap buttes which rise above the marshes.

The Steens Mountains tower above the area. A fault uplift mountain range created 15 million years ago, the road that loops around this face is not open for travel until late June or early July, and we've never been up the road very far. The far side of these mountains is a mile high drop down to the Alvord Desert. Rumor has it the road will not be opened this year, due to the heavier than usual snowfall last winter.

Back to the car from the overlook, we drove down to road which skirted between the ponds we had just been viewing from above.

Now to some other bird pictures.

White-faced Ibis were fairly common in the marshes.

A Willet, one of the large wading birds common to the area. We also saw Long-billed Curlew but not close enough for a picture.

A Great Egret, and a successful hunt for breakfast. They are in breeding finery with long fancy feathers. These birds were severely endangered by hunting them for these very same fine feathers, for ladies' hats. Thank god that went out of style as people would have cheerfully killed every single bird for such a stupid reason, and not have given it a second thought.

Breakfast consists of a large frog which is midway between being tadpole and being a frog, most likely a Bullfrog based on the size.

A Sandhill Crane, one of our favorite species. They have the neatest call, very prehistoric. A couple hundred pairs of these nest on the refuge each year.

Popping up to take a peek.

And a second later, it looks like there is just one Crane in the tall grass.

A pair of Shovelers, paddling around in shallow water.

A male Redhead, keeping a watch on his girlfriend.

A Pied-billed Grebe, a small diving duck. We also saw Western Grebes, Clarks' Grebes, and Horned Grebe.

A Forester's Tern, flitting around over the pond near the Round Barn.

A goose in the background, admiring the flying skill of the tern.

The Round Barn, which is, strangely enough, round, is normally a long way from water.

We headed off to the Diamond Craters, an area of volcanic craters, since we could not walk around the barn without getting very wet.

This looked like a serious cloud to our eyes, and looks were not deceiving. Shortly after we returned to the car, the sky opened up and cleaned the bugs off the windshield and the front of our car. Thanks!

Protective coloration, onthe dark volcanic rocks at Diamond Craters, was this dark charcol gray lizard. I had been trying to catch a picture of a Marmot which was in the rocks, and discovered this lizard on the rocks in front of the Marmot.

Heading home, the water levels in Lake Roosevelt are as low as we’ve ever seen.  They have drawn down the water a lot, anticipating the snow melt in the mountains which is a bit behind from the lower than normal temperatures.  Probably we are going to pay for such a cool spring when summer finally arrives.

All the fruit plants and trees we ordered have arrived and that’s going to be our project for the day, getting them planted in the garden.  We are both not really in the mood, but the plants need to be tucked into their new homes sooner rather than later.

We’d seen evidence bears were up and around, but hadn’t seen one in our yard until yesterday.  We see bears around here, starting in May and this year is no exception.

Walking around in the fresh new grass growing next to the garden we are building.

A pretty small, probably two years old, black bear, cinnamon color. They have really thick fur.

We were watching from the window next to Oro’s cage.  Oro had been watching the bear warily but quietly, until we showed up to join the show.  Then Oro started yelling about the bear, very excited that we were watching too.

"Huh?"

The bear was 100 yards from the back of the house, down the hill, but when Oro started making commentary, it was noticed.

Looking around cautiously to see what was making that racket.

A mouth full of fresh yummy grass attests to what our bear neighbor was up to, down the hill from the house.

This is just the fellow we will want to keep out of the garden when things are growing and ripe.  We still need to figure out the electric fencing, but since nothing is growing, it is far down on the priority list.

Brandon, don’t show your boyfriend this post, or you’ll never talk him into visiting!

Spring Comes To Those Who Wait.   And wait.

A local Snowshoe Hare, patiently waiting for more green grass and the garden to be constructed. They are having bunny races around the yard, which can only mean one thing. Pretty soon we will have herds of babies grazing on the grass.

Our big project for this year is building a garden and a greenhouse.  The gravel pad for the greenhouse was the first step, since the heavy equipment operator would be here anyway removing some of the old garden posts and pulling out trees and bushes.

Snow falls and the heavy equipment operator calls to say, ehhh, will be there next week. Just wait.

Our friend Jack came over, chainsaw in hand, and cut down a few trees which were in the way of both the garden and greenhouse space.

The heavy equipment operator brings in a couple of loads of gravel and dirt with which to build the greenhouse pad.

Several dump trucks arrived and left piles of "work" near the garage. And then it snows again. Heavy equipment operator company calls and says, ehhhh, it's snowing, let's wait. Tomorrow, ok?

So the next morning dawns.

What's that we spy with our little eyes? 'Tis only a few mere snowflakes, which will surely disappear soon.

Or, maybe not. Swirling snow fills the sky, and the world turns fuzzy and out of focus. Or is that our eyes? Maybe we need more tea?

The phone rings. It is the fair weather heavy equipment operator saying, ehhhh, it's snowing, let's wait.

We are beginning to sense a theme.

A small backhoe and a very large guy, who barely fits in the cab. He's very talented, a deft touch, and if we have to have somebody here with this sort of equipment, he's the guy we want driving it.

The piles of dirt and gravel disappear and become a pad on which will (someday), grow a greenhouse.

Ran out of gravel, and while we are waiting for the dump truck to return with another pile of gravel, down to the garden site goes the heavy equipment, and out come the trees, bushes, and fence posts which we were not able to remove manually.  It takes a surprisingly short amount of time before all is cleared away.

Dan removing debris pulled up by the backhoe, and stacking it up to the east of the garden space.

Visualizing where to place the fence posts.

The dump truck delivers the last load of gravel. Progress!

At last, all the ground work is completed, and we can begin laying out the fence boundaries, and staking things.

Employing high math skills we staked out a garden space which is 50 feet by 50 feet square.  More or less square.  Nothing on our house is actually square except the two rooms we added so we don’t stress too much about having things totally square on our garden space.

At least it has stopped snowing.  Spring must be here!  The Daffodils are almost ready to bloom.

Daffodils have a good sense of humor, for a plant.

We woke up to a few inches of heavy wet snow. And this time it stuck to the ground, trees, bushes, sidewalk. All we could think of was, thank goodness the heavy equipment operator wasn't supposed to come today!

We took the opportunity for rest afforded by the snow and prepared a planned planting location for the various trees and bushes we have ordered.  The plants haven’t shipped yet.  More waiting.

The bottom of the picture faces south.

Walking into the garden through the fence, we will walk through a rose arbor.  We have planned some paving stone paths through the rose arbor, around a circular herb/flower bed, and into the seating area under a grape arbor, with more paths heading east and west, then bending around and heading south, along the front of the bramble beds.  We haven’t decided if we will actually get around to putting down the stone paths.  This garden is going to be a many years project to get to its final result.

A couple of days later, the snow has melted (again), and we head down to the garden space to begin the work of digging post holes for the posts to live in, and we discover relatively few really large rocks.  The garden space is blessed with at least two feet of dark black soil.  The deep soil explains the presence of so many pocket gophers, but that’s going to be another story.

Our Polaris Ranger finally has the snow plow attachment removed, and it has proven to be extremely useful for hauling heavy posts down to the garden space.

A few days of hard work, and all the post holes were dug, and posts set into their new homes, tilting a bit hither and yon waiting for dirt to prop them up straight.

As each post has dirt filled in and tamped down firmly, they stand straight up, theoretically. There's only so much we can accomplish with uneven ground, and me on the level.

Taking a break, sitting in the Ranger, and trying to visualize how it will all look once it is completed.

We set about half of the posts and called it a day.  We will have to finish that part of the project another day.

The gate will be here, someday soon. We just have to wait until we get all the upper and lower 1x6 pine boards affixed to the top and bottom of the set fence posts. But we're getting there!

Fast forward many days, the boards are attached to the fence posts, the wire fencing materials have been stapled in place, and a gate has been built and installed. Let the digging begin.

Sounds fast, but this took many days of hard work.  We built the garden fence in the garage and carried it down to the garden.  Disaster struck while we were carrying it down.  The ground was saturated with water, and muddy spaces were in our path, and last years’ grass is long, and laying closely on the ground, and is slick.  I fell, and the gate landed on my knee.  I was concerned when I could barely walk that night, with a knot on my knee which was swollen and tight, but it was a shortlived injury and already I’m back to normal.  A couple of weeks later, we have resumed our walks down along the river.

While I was laid up, we have employed the help of our neighbor’s son to help Dan with digging in the garden space.  The work is going to be hard and long, but eventually it will be completed.  Our trees and bushes haven’t shipped yet, but our seeds arrived, and this weekend we will plant some of the cool weather seeds, like cabbages, radishes, and spinach, and lettuce.  It will be exciting to have something planted.

Daffodils are blooming and this morning they were standing up straight.  Amazing what a few dry weather days can do to perk them up.

They didn't seem to mind a few weeks of freezing weather, snow and ice.

The forecast today is for thunderstorms.

The day started off with a rainbow. I missed it, but Dan took a picture for me.

I love it when the sky has that peculiar green tint, like being under water.