I just can't believe the amount of rain we've been getting. All day we had thunderstorms and tonight there was flooding in Park Falls where my sister lives. They are all right, thank goodness. 4" of rain and at least 2" more expected. Our front lawn is starting to look like a pond. If I wasn't surrounded by three natural marshes, didn't have 12-15' of good perk beneath the house, and wasn't 1,600' above sea level, I'd be worried. My biggest fear is that trees weakened by the tornado that blew through here the end of July will fall and cause more damage. I'm sure our logger is being held up by all the rain, too. I worry about the people that live along the Flowage though: The Turtle Flambeau Flowage was created by a dam. It is an old dam and I can't help but wonder how strong it is and how it is handling all the water. We are above the dam so if it should fail we would not be affected, but the situation would be disastrous for anyone living below the dam and near the shoreline. Turtles, snakes, and frogs are even coming up out of the marshes. The other night there were two little green frogs on Tom's hummingbird feeder! How they got there is beyond me. All I can think is that they got sucked up from the marsh by the wind and dropped on the feeder. Yesterday morning I went to crack Ed's bedroom window open to let in some fresh air and there was a snake on the ledge. You know me and snakes! In my haste to shut the window, the snake got pinched in it so I went and got Tom to take care of the matter. . . .
My uncle and some of his sons have been staying at Dad's all week working on repairing the farm house in between the rain spells. Yesterday I fixed them a big peach cobbler, a big pan of corn bread, and a big pot of chicken and dumplings. I haven't heard any complaints. It was a busy day because I awoke early and canned a bushel of sweet corn that lost its sweetness before cooking their meal. In the meantime, I worked on writing a statement I wanted to say at the Mercer Town Meeting about a proposed zoning amendment that OUTRAGEOUSLY wanted to change the current 2 acre limit for ownership of livestock to 35 acres. People would not be able to divide their property into 2 acre farmettes, and current owners of livestock with less than 35 acres of land (grandfathered in under the amendment) would be obligated to tell potential buyers of their property that they would not be able to own livestock. This information was based on an editorial I read in The Miner newspaper. Boy, I was hot under the collar!
I wasn't the only one either. A number of people showed up at the town meeting and the Town Board members came in back peddling about the amendment. They had been hearing from townspeople all week. The story is that the Northwest Regional Planning Commission is trying to force ridiculous zoning and other changes throughout northern Wisconsin and is pushing for agricultural land to be in big lots. The amendment, we were told, was their idea. (Typical agribusiness -- the bigger the better, and Wisconsin is notorious for goosestepping to whatever the Feds and agribusiness wants. I have been paying attention to the push in the southern part of the state allowing zoning changes for mega dairies to be located, too). They are also messing around with Forestry land. All I have to say is that I will not stand for an outside agency telling me what I may or may not do with my land when that land was acquired before the town even existed. And even if they couldn't do anything to me, I won't stand for the rights of my neighbors being infringed upon by unjust laws. I won't stand for it. Urban homesteading, back yard gardening, barter and local exchange will be a base of the new economy, and towns have to realize that and support those issues if they want to attract new residents and survive this Depression. People need to say, "No More". You back the bully up against the wall, you put your fist in his face, and you tell him to take a hike or else you proceed to bring down the wrath of God on him. The Town Board got an earful and I think they heard loud and clear what the people thought on the matter. I am still worried, however, because several people have told me that matters of this nature are frequently passed in small towns on the sly and over the objections of the citizens. If that happens here, I will get the names of the people responsible and put them on the Internet so that when the revolution starts to take this country back from the Banksters the freedom fighters will know who needs to be paid a visit.
Enough ranting -- I promise to be good. Talk to you soon!
Saturday, August 21, 2010
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
A Few Clear Days
My sister sent me this story and I thought it was good enough to pass on. If you have open pollinated non-GMO sugar beet seed, you could be very popular! http://home.ezezine.com/1636/1636-2010.08.17.15.30.archive.html
It's hard to decide what to do each day as there is so much to do!
Yesterday I worked in the field looking for something to harvest. A lot of the corn is knocked down from the tornado, but I did get a bushel of sweet corn that was ripe -- the Painted Mountain Indian corn and remaining sweet corn (old seed I'd gotten as a freebie some years ago and wanted to get rid of) have a few weeks to go before they are ready to pick -- some more Yellow Warted Summer Crookneck squash, enough various pickling cucmbers to make one batch of garlic kosher dill pickles, and a paltry handful of Provider green beans and Fava beans. I still have to wade through the weeds to find the Old Dutch Half-Runner beans. I'm hoping they escaped the deer. Alas, for my garden! There are loads of little New England Pie Pumpkins on the pumpkin vines that are hanging on despite the weather, but I'm not sure there is enough time left in the season for them to mature. There are a few sweet green peppers that are very small yet, and my okra while growing has no flowers. My hops bines are loaded with flowers, but the bines are still on the ground from the tornado. I decided to pick the cabbage, bug chewed as it is, and salvage what I can. I haven't been able to find anything that says you cannot make sauerkraut with red cabbage, so I think I will give red cabbage sauerkraut a try. I wish the heads were good enough to sell, but I had to trim so much off each head to reach good leaves that they look pathetic.
In the evenings I've been working on putting the chicken fence back up. It was a mess to clear away downed wood and untangle, reshape the crushed chicken wire, and remove it from the broken fence posts, but this evening after supper I managed to finish stapling the wire to all the reinserted posts. The new fence is much smaller and doesn't include any shade trees in the chicken run. What the heck -- the chickens never stay inside the coop area as it is unless they sense a predator. Now I have to build a new gate. With that much done I feel as if I'm actually making some headway recovering from the storm.
The builders came yesterday and fixed the holes in the roof. Thank goodness that's done!
And today while we were in the field digging potatoes, the logger stopped by to let us know that he wants to start the logging on our side of the farm and work his way to my sister's side of the farm instead of the other way around because he didn't realize the extent of the damage to the woods. You can't even walk in a lot of places let alone get equipment in. Since we had the heavy duty road ramp built to accommodate logging trucks as part of our eminent domaine settlement when the County raised the road a few years back, Joe (our logger) will use the small meadow (right where Tom's deer plot is that he planted this spring) as a staging area because of easy acces to the ramp and start the logging at that point. He also told us that as he was going through the woods he came across a bear feeding on two fawns. Yuck!
We managed to get three rows of potatoes dug and have three more to go. Many of the potatoes are small and some plants are rotted. A lot of plants are gone altogether, victims I suppose of the now demised garden deer. I'm not sure what a proper yield would be, but we dug three 100' rows and got one full bushel basket per row. Boy, am I glad I planted those potatoes in big hills because the ground is so wet.
Here and there among the weeds I can spy some the herbs and flowers I planted. I'm so glad they are growing! Before the ground freezes I'd like to build a permanent raised bed box and transplant all of those herbs into it. If I can't get it done, I'll mark the area with some sticks so it doesn't get accidentally tilled under and make the transplants next spring. Now that the logger will start sooner than we expected, I have to hustle and transplant all my remaining plants from the forest garden into pots and get them out of harm's way. I'll have to take down the fence (the one I just finished building) from around the forest garden, too. Not sure I'll be able to do that though because there is a big "widow maker" tree on top of it.
Say, I just had a great idea: I'll over winter the forest garden plants in one of the garden boxes in the back yard. That will be perfect.
Time to go. Talk to you soon!
It's hard to decide what to do each day as there is so much to do!
Yesterday I worked in the field looking for something to harvest. A lot of the corn is knocked down from the tornado, but I did get a bushel of sweet corn that was ripe -- the Painted Mountain Indian corn and remaining sweet corn (old seed I'd gotten as a freebie some years ago and wanted to get rid of) have a few weeks to go before they are ready to pick -- some more Yellow Warted Summer Crookneck squash, enough various pickling cucmbers to make one batch of garlic kosher dill pickles, and a paltry handful of Provider green beans and Fava beans. I still have to wade through the weeds to find the Old Dutch Half-Runner beans. I'm hoping they escaped the deer. Alas, for my garden! There are loads of little New England Pie Pumpkins on the pumpkin vines that are hanging on despite the weather, but I'm not sure there is enough time left in the season for them to mature. There are a few sweet green peppers that are very small yet, and my okra while growing has no flowers. My hops bines are loaded with flowers, but the bines are still on the ground from the tornado. I decided to pick the cabbage, bug chewed as it is, and salvage what I can. I haven't been able to find anything that says you cannot make sauerkraut with red cabbage, so I think I will give red cabbage sauerkraut a try. I wish the heads were good enough to sell, but I had to trim so much off each head to reach good leaves that they look pathetic.
In the evenings I've been working on putting the chicken fence back up. It was a mess to clear away downed wood and untangle, reshape the crushed chicken wire, and remove it from the broken fence posts, but this evening after supper I managed to finish stapling the wire to all the reinserted posts. The new fence is much smaller and doesn't include any shade trees in the chicken run. What the heck -- the chickens never stay inside the coop area as it is unless they sense a predator. Now I have to build a new gate. With that much done I feel as if I'm actually making some headway recovering from the storm.
The builders came yesterday and fixed the holes in the roof. Thank goodness that's done!
And today while we were in the field digging potatoes, the logger stopped by to let us know that he wants to start the logging on our side of the farm and work his way to my sister's side of the farm instead of the other way around because he didn't realize the extent of the damage to the woods. You can't even walk in a lot of places let alone get equipment in. Since we had the heavy duty road ramp built to accommodate logging trucks as part of our eminent domaine settlement when the County raised the road a few years back, Joe (our logger) will use the small meadow (right where Tom's deer plot is that he planted this spring) as a staging area because of easy acces to the ramp and start the logging at that point. He also told us that as he was going through the woods he came across a bear feeding on two fawns. Yuck!
We managed to get three rows of potatoes dug and have three more to go. Many of the potatoes are small and some plants are rotted. A lot of plants are gone altogether, victims I suppose of the now demised garden deer. I'm not sure what a proper yield would be, but we dug three 100' rows and got one full bushel basket per row. Boy, am I glad I planted those potatoes in big hills because the ground is so wet.
Here and there among the weeds I can spy some the herbs and flowers I planted. I'm so glad they are growing! Before the ground freezes I'd like to build a permanent raised bed box and transplant all of those herbs into it. If I can't get it done, I'll mark the area with some sticks so it doesn't get accidentally tilled under and make the transplants next spring. Now that the logger will start sooner than we expected, I have to hustle and transplant all my remaining plants from the forest garden into pots and get them out of harm's way. I'll have to take down the fence (the one I just finished building) from around the forest garden, too. Not sure I'll be able to do that though because there is a big "widow maker" tree on top of it.
Say, I just had a great idea: I'll over winter the forest garden plants in one of the garden boxes in the back yard. That will be perfect.
Time to go. Talk to you soon!
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Good and Bad
The good news is that Lara's doctor appointment went well. The bad news is that her blood sugar is high. Being her father's daughter, Lara obsessed with diet restrictions for the whole three hour drive back home. I had quite the headache! When we see Dr. Arguello at the end of this month, the doctor will probably recheck Lara's blood sugar. Until then, Lara is unhappily relegated to eating oatmeal with cinnamon for breakfast; she's not a happy camper.
The fun part of the day was when we looked for a store that I heard about and have been wanting to visit. The store is called Beaver Creek and it sells food in bulk. It took a bit longer to get to than I thought it would, but now that I've been there, I want to go again! The store is at 6428 Iron Bridge Road, Athens, WI 54411. It is a Mennonite store and the whole area must be Mennonites because as I drove down the roads I saw cows and horses in the lush fields of beautiful farms, women driving horse drawn carriages, and on-farm market stands all over managed by women in Mennonite dress. They are different from the Amish people I've seen; I think they are not as strict, and I saw men driving trucks and one woman at a farmstand using a cell phone. It was a most unusual area. I felt like I was visiting a treasure in some hidden valley. The store is open Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. - 5:30 p.m., and Saturday from 8:30 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. Be sure to take cash since they don't take credit cards or non-local checks. Having Lara with me was a bit cumbersome because I had a hard time maneuvering the wheelchair and a shopping cart so I really would like to go back without Lara and take a longer look at everything they offer. Since I am a "from scratch" cook, they had everything I could possibly want and use. This store is a real find!
The other good news is that Special Olympics bowling went well. Only Lara, Ed and Chris were there, but we had a good time. The bad news is that Feits' is going to close the bowling alley part of the establishment because it is costing them more to keep it than they receive in return. After 60 years of operating, Feit's is another victim of the crashing economy. How sad! If you go into Feit's you see pictures of the owner's father and various memorabilia on the walls. It just breaks my heart. I hope some part of the establishment can stay open. Maybe they can keep the bar and put a small dining area where the bowling alley is. The town could use a good place to eat, and Feit's is close enough to the paper mill to take advantage of employee shift changes there. Times are what they are. I most sincerely thank Feit's for letting our group of Special Olympians bowl there. I have to contact Tony, our Agency manager and let him know. I think we will need to have a dinner meeting with all the agency members to decide how we want to move forward.
When I went out to shut up the chickens I thought I heard wolf pups yipping on the south forty. Didn't quite sound like coyotes.
More storms are expected tomorrow. I hope I can get out in the field at some point to see if I have anything to harvest. Take care!
The fun part of the day was when we looked for a store that I heard about and have been wanting to visit. The store is called Beaver Creek and it sells food in bulk. It took a bit longer to get to than I thought it would, but now that I've been there, I want to go again! The store is at 6428 Iron Bridge Road, Athens, WI 54411. It is a Mennonite store and the whole area must be Mennonites because as I drove down the roads I saw cows and horses in the lush fields of beautiful farms, women driving horse drawn carriages, and on-farm market stands all over managed by women in Mennonite dress. They are different from the Amish people I've seen; I think they are not as strict, and I saw men driving trucks and one woman at a farmstand using a cell phone. It was a most unusual area. I felt like I was visiting a treasure in some hidden valley. The store is open Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. - 5:30 p.m., and Saturday from 8:30 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. Be sure to take cash since they don't take credit cards or non-local checks. Having Lara with me was a bit cumbersome because I had a hard time maneuvering the wheelchair and a shopping cart so I really would like to go back without Lara and take a longer look at everything they offer. Since I am a "from scratch" cook, they had everything I could possibly want and use. This store is a real find!
The other good news is that Special Olympics bowling went well. Only Lara, Ed and Chris were there, but we had a good time. The bad news is that Feits' is going to close the bowling alley part of the establishment because it is costing them more to keep it than they receive in return. After 60 years of operating, Feit's is another victim of the crashing economy. How sad! If you go into Feit's you see pictures of the owner's father and various memorabilia on the walls. It just breaks my heart. I hope some part of the establishment can stay open. Maybe they can keep the bar and put a small dining area where the bowling alley is. The town could use a good place to eat, and Feit's is close enough to the paper mill to take advantage of employee shift changes there. Times are what they are. I most sincerely thank Feit's for letting our group of Special Olympians bowl there. I have to contact Tony, our Agency manager and let him know. I think we will need to have a dinner meeting with all the agency members to decide how we want to move forward.
When I went out to shut up the chickens I thought I heard wolf pups yipping on the south forty. Didn't quite sound like coyotes.
More storms are expected tomorrow. I hope I can get out in the field at some point to see if I have anything to harvest. Take care!
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