September surprises a-stir!

A couple of days ago the Better Half asked if I'd noticed the nibbling done to the pots of New England Asters on the front stoop. I hadn't until she mentioned it. The suspected perp is one Runny Babbit who, much of the time, lives under that self-same stoop and, a few evenings back, startled Franco, the border collie cross rescue dog, as we returned from a constitutional, by bursting out from under the bottom stoop step. We may need to see if the Better Half has a good recipe for rabbit stew.

notice the missing blooms on the  plants' left

Photo by J. Harrington

Although asters have become a favorite flower over the past several years, I may have developed some sort of blind spot toward them because, not only had I not noticed the missing blossoms, it was only today at mid-day that I noticed the aster blossoms near where the driveway meets the road. Two years ago I planted a couple of pots of asters there. They didn't seem to have survived the Winter so last year I planted a couple of others. They looked dead all Summer. In fact, a few days ago I would have sworn there were no blossoms to be noticed. Then, today, there's almost a dozen or so pinkish-lavender blooms. I feel blessed. We'll do some weeding around the asters this Autumn and next Spring.

where were they hiding all Summer?

Photo by J. Harrington

September by         Helen Hunt Jackson The golden-rod is yellow; The corn is turning brown; The trees in apple orchards With fruit are bending down. The gentian’s bluest fringes Are curling in the sun; In dusty pods the milkweed Its hidden silk has spun. The sedges flaunt their harvest, In every meadow nook; And asters by the brook-side Make asters in the brook. From dewy lanes at morning the grapes’ sweet odors rise; At noon the roads all flutter With yellow butterflies. By all these lovely tokens September days are here, With summer’s best of weather, And autumn’s best of cheer. But none of all this beauty Which floods the earth and air Is unto me the secret Which makes September fair. ‘T is a thing which I remember; To name it thrills me yet: One day of one September I never can forget.

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On Summer's downslope

The brush pile burn in honor of Lughnasadh (Loo-nah-sa) went well yesterday evening. The scattered thunderstorms passed to our North. There was no sign of a woodchuck bolting from under the brush pile so we now get to ponder where s/he went. In a day of so we'll start building a new brush pile, trimming the small, leafy branches from the oak that came down in a recent storm. That, plus continuing to pull buckthorn, should provide for a burn in honor of Alban Elfed or Light of the Water in the Druid tradition on the Autumn Equinox (Tuesday, September 22, 2020 at 8:30 am CDT, locally).

a brush pile bonfire

Photo by J. Harrington

There were several pickups and SUVs at one of the Carlos Avery Wildlife Management Area parking places today. I'm not sure why unless folks are scouting for archery deer season, which opens September 19. Or, I suppose it's possible foragers are becoming active as fruits and berries start to ripen. Speaking of foraging, I foolishly scattered grass seed yesterday on some areas that had been washed out by recent very heavy rains. I should have raked it in because the local bird flocks helped themselves and foraged about 99.9% of the grass seed despite all the sunflower seeds available nearby. Striking that balance of nature can be a real challenge some days. I'm trying a new approach and seeing if I can just count the grass seed debacle as a lesson learned rather than getting all perturbed about it. Plus, I want to include some white clover seeds. I appears as though the local rabbit population foraged most of the existing clover that the Better Half (and maybe the Daughter Person) planted some years ago.

We're looking forward to several days of cool, Septemberish weather with fewer clouds than normal before next weekend's heat and thunderstorms arrive. When we're outside picking away at getting the place more in shape we tend to not think very much about politics, viruses, climate breakdown and many other of this year's trials and tribulations. Instead, we ponder if we could have a barn cat to help control rodents or would that mean we have to stop feeding birds and would the local coyote pack find our  barn cat to be but a midnight snack and do we need to build a barn to have a barn cat. Country living keeps us from getting  bored.

Unlocking

By Alice B. Fogel

But it is not always quiet here.

Things go on while we sleep the sleep of soldiers.

Ancient branches crack and splinter into dust.

Large wings snap open in spring

like carpets splayed out over the railing.

Granite splits apart at the seams

and great animals cleave roads through woods.

Daily, in the density, there is life

on the edge of the knife that cuts the world

into hemispheres of sense and death.

Trees are born and die, bones turn to humus,

glaciers to meadowland. It is time

to turn yourself loose, like new leaves,

like big lakes on which swim enormous birds

at a distance deeper in breadth than the water's depth.

Their shadows pull you to the shore.

Their size fills your lungs with sky. It is time

to heave aside the boulders and the dams,

to come back out like a bear after the thaw, to be

ready for the forest, for the forage, for the full

and waning moons. You will get soaked in wet grass,

feel the insects pierce your skin. You will learn

to balance between gravity and light. There will be

hot and sticky nights, sharp songs at dawn,

long and bright ineffable days.

This is your chance to crash your way

through underbrush unlocking like so many doors.

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The reality of political economics

Last night and early this morning, the April full moon looked a lot like the (several year old) photo below. Broken cloud cover slightly diminished the effect of a super moon, but the overall portrait was impressive.

a full moon in April

Photo by J. Harrington

Easter is this  coming Sunday. That means it's time for the Easter Bunny to make the rounds. In light of the overall state of the world, I find I'm reverting Easter Bunny memories only back as far as Grace Slick and the Great Society's White Rabbit. (Yes, as a matter of fact I do still have the original vinyl LP.) It creates a strong sense of deja vu. We haven't yet reached a state in which protesters in Harvard Square hurl tear gas canisters back at riot police nor national guardsmen shoot unarmed college students, as happened at the Kent State massacre. We do have voter suppression in Wisconsin next door to the extent that two separate Republican dominated supreme courts (state and national) essentially mandated that voters must risk their lives to cast a vote in person during a pandemic in the midst of a presidential primary. Meanwhile, on the Democratic side Bernie Sanders has withdrawn from the contest for the party's presidential candidate nomination, leaving us faced with a choice between greater and lesser evils come November. Shades of 2016! That strongly suggests to me that it has become necessary to engage in a total reset of our corporate dominated political economy. Fortunately, there are a number of efforts underway to assist in that effort.

a rabbit in white is NOT A WHITE RABBIT

Photo by J. Harrington

We've previously mentioned this state's growing interest in Regenerative Agriculture. Minnesota also has a corporate-founded circular economy organization known as the Minnesota Sustainable Growth Coalition. The name is unfortunate since, as we all know, perpetual growth is unsustainable. Perhaps, though, it can help serve as a transition to enable Minnesota to create a new economy based on the concepts in doughnut economics. To our way of thinking, that would pair up nicely with the premise of One Minnesota brought to us by the Walz administration. It also aligns with the work being done by OneMN.org.

Take a look around. Our citizens are succumbing to a new out of control virus in dismaying numbers. Our economies are in as much trouble as our public health. We cannot afford to go back to things as they were and create more of the same. It's time to climb out of the rabbit hole we've fallen into through not paying as much attention to our civic responsibilities as we do to our individual conveniences. There are a number of better ways available to us but we must choose them and we would do well in making those choices to have evidence more telling than

The White Rabbit's Evidence

by Lewis Carroll

They told me you had been to her,

And mentioned me to him:

She gave me a good character,

But said I could not swim.

He sent them word I had not gone

(We know it to be true):

If she should push the matter on,

What would become of you?

I gave her one, they gave him two,

You gave us three or more;

They all returned from him to you,

Though they were mine before.

If I or she should chance to be involved in this affair,

He trusts to you to set them free,

Exactly as we were.

My notion was that you had been

(Before she had this fit)

An obstacle that came between him, and ourselves, and it.

Don't let him know she liked them best,

For this must ever be a secret,

Kept from all the rest,

Between yourself and me.

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Down the rabbit hole for Christmas?

While we were headed to Minneapolis this morning, a thought occurred to me that I intend to play with a little bit here over the next day or two. To begin, it appears that what we thought was an ancient Chinese curse, "May you live in interesting times." is neither ancient nor Chinese. Since the times we are living in are far more interesting than many of us would wish, it occurred to me an appropriate allusion might be found in Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, in which Alice goes "down the rabbit hole." I've seen many a mention of that type of trip in social media over a number of recent months. It has usually referred to some political occurrence or other. So, I began to ponder which contemporary politicians would be the equivalent of which characters in Alice. For example, would Alice herself be Hilary Clinton, or Elizabeth Warren?

is a rabbit in white the same as a White Rabbit?

Photo by J. Harrington

There is no doubt in my mind that The Queen of Hearts must be played by D. Trump. Would the Cheshire Cat be played by Mike Pence, or is the VP the King of Hearts? Is Rudy Giuliani the Mad Hatter? Who would be the White Rabbit? Just below is a list of other main characters. Think about who seems to fit as you watch or read about the impeachment hearings and the defense of POTUS.

• The Duchess


• The Caterpillar


• The Mad Hatter


• The March Hare


• The Dormouse


• The Dodo


• The Frog-Footman

There are other characters you can feel free to include. At the moment, I'm more interested in which political figures seem to be a "best fit" for the Wonderland characters. Have at it in the comments. Consider this an early Christmas present in the form or a puzzle. I'll take a look at Through the Looking Glass and see if anyone there needs to be added to the list tomorrow. Now, directly from a current POTUS press conference, here's

Jabberwocky

By Lewis Carroll

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves 

      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: 

All mimsy were the borogoves, 

      And the mome raths outgrabe. 

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son! 

      The jaws that bite, the claws that catch! 

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun 

      The frumious Bandersnatch!” 

He took his vorpal sword in hand; 

      Long time the manxome foe he sought— 

So rested he by the Tumtum tree 

      And stood awhile in thought. 

And, as in uffish thought he stood, 

      The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame, 

Came whiffling through the tulgey wood, 

      And burbled as it came! 

One, two! One, two! And through and through 

      The vorpal blade went snicker-snack! 

He left it dead, and with its head 

      He went galumphing back. 

“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock? 

      Come to my arms, my beamish boy! 

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!” 

      He chortled in his joy. 

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves 

      Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: 

All mimsy were the borogoves, 

      And the mome raths outgrabe.

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'Tis the season for "if you don't like it, wait a minute"

Gusts of Southerly wind are stripping oak branches of their remaining leaves and sending them sailing across rare, sunny, blue skies. Those that end up in the bird bath leave green stains, like the chalk lines that indicate where the body lay. The bird bath has been cleaned and refilled. The sunflower seed feeder has been refilled. The neighborhood's chickadees, nuthatches, goldfinches, red-bellied, hairy and downy woodpeckers all see happy as they frantically arrive, grab a seed and head for their caches. It looks like Runny Babbit has decided to spend this Winter ensconced under the front porch. We almost stepped on her/him the other day as we went to see if the mail had been delivered yet. S/he scooted out from under the bottom stair just as we stepped off of it. The dog, SiSi, that was with us to show the way to the mail box and back, never batted an eyelash. Clearly, SiSi doesn't associate live Runny Babbits with food or her reaction would have been entirely different. Looking over the pictures we've taken, it appears that we've provided homes to several generations of Runnys. We like it better when they live in the brush piles but they never ask before setting up house.

one of our Runny Babbits in Summer

Photo by J. Harrington

So far today we've seen two versions of weather forecasts for the day or so before Thanksgiving. One version  offers the possibility of a major storm with the prospect of significant snow, the other indicates relatively smooth sailing. The last time we checked, we were unable to affect or influence the weather (unless we're planning an outdoor activity that requires good weather) so we'll just wait and see what happens. Meanwhile, this weekend should have Christmas lights put up and, possibly, front porch greenery installed. We were pushing the Better Half today to pick out a Christmas tree but we may be a week or more early on that. Do you remember the song about "Christmas Don't Be Late" by The Chipmunks? That's kind of the mode we're in today. Even though there's weeks to get it all done, we feel as if there's no where near the time needed because "Holidays." Maybe a few more days of blue skies and sunshine will help. Maybe I need some Christmas cookies, or Thanksgiving cookies, or any cookies! Sugar = energy for the Holidays!

time yet for Christmas cookies?

Photo by J. Harrington

First Snow

Arthur Sze - 1950-

                A rabbit has stopped on the gravel driveway:
                           imbibing the silence,
                           you stare at spruce needles:
                                                  there’s no sound of a leaf blower,
                                                  no sign of a black bear;
                a few weeks ago, a buck scraped his rack
                           against an aspen trunk;
                           a carpenter scribed a plank along a curved stone                                                   wall.                 
                                       You only spot the rabbit’s ears and tail:
                when it moves, you locate it against speckled gravel,
                but when it stops, it blends in again;
                           the world of being is like this gravel:
                                      you think you own a car, a house,
                                      this blue-zigzagged shirt, but you just borrow                                                   these things.                 
                Yesterday, you constructed an aqueduct of dreams
                                      and stood at Gibraltar,
                                                             but you possess nothing.
                Snow melts into a pool of clear water;
                           and, in this stillness,
                                       starlight behind daylight wherever you gaze.

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A Full Summer's Day #phenology

On this first full day of Summer, we have discovered that we have, living under our front porch, not one, but at least two baby bunnies. For the first few weeks of June, we only saw one baby bunny at a time. To plagiarize Shel Silverstein, we had Runny Babbit, the presumed mother, living under that same porch all Winter, enjoying snack after snack from our Christmas greenery that was decorating the porch and steps.

Runny Babbit's Winter home

Photo by J. Harrington

Now that we're into full-fledged Summer, what with whitetails nibbling the tops of the bushes, and rabbits eating the lower branches and flowers, we're lucky there's any plants left to water. There is some good news emanating from out behind the house in the "wet spot." The blue flag iris we planted a few years back has come into bloom during the past few days and we think we noticed a couple of swamp milkweed plants growing nearby. We could have some happy butterflies sometime soon. Both plants seem to be a couple or three weeks later than usual coming into flower this year, as just about everything around here has been this year of the cool, wet Spring. Good thing those baby bunnies had a porch roof to help keep them dry and warm.

Runny Babbit eating Summer's clover

Photo by J. Harrington

The Funny Bamily

by Shel Silverstein

Runny fad a hamily,

Matter of fact, he had

A sother and two bristers,

A dummy and a mad. 

His mamma fed him marrot cilk

And parrot cie and such,

And all of them were happy

In their cozy hunny butch.

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Things seen and unseen this Spring day

We say the first appearance of a garter snake today. Well hidden under too many of Autumn's and Winter's perpetually falling oak leaves were a handful of flowers that had emerged and are now blooming in some sunshine. Day lilies have emerged to widely varying extents in locations with widely varying amounts of exposure to the sun. The offending leaves covering much of this activity have been, for the most part, hauled off to the leaf pile at the edge of the woods. Although we don't play golf, we suppose that makes us a duffer of a different kind, a forest duff-er. Light and variable Spring breezes and leaf collecting are not a great combination.

more and more day lilies have appeared

Photo by J. Harrington

The back blade on the tractor doesn't dig deep enough to clear out most of the small seedling brush we're trying to clean up. It helps though by making the seedings easier to pull through the loosened dirt. The three high bush cranberries (Viburnum edule) and two black chokeberry (Aronia sp.) bushes are now planted and watered. We've still to get the ground prepared for wildflower planting. Maybe tomorrow. Then we'll see what the rabbits and deer and turkeys and bear come and munch on.

it's scilla season

Photo by J. Harrington

No sign yet of a pasque flower bloom but we did see some tiny green stems and leaves that offer a glimmer of hope just North of the brush pile. Hopes for getting rid of that Winter brush pile any time soon disappeared today when MNDNR announced Spring burning restrictions. We'll pick up more of the small stuff and toss it into the burn pit we haven't used yet. Meanwhile, the sun is shining, we've made a little progress toward improving our little corner of the world. We mostly helped the Better Half and she did a little vice versa. Today made it pretty clear what we weren't cut out to be a landscape architect or a farmer. We keep falling into the hunter-fisher-gatherer bin instead. It's enough of a challenge to prepare ourselves, let alone seed beds etc.

In Perpetual Spring

By Amy Gerstler

Gardens are also good places

to sulk. You pass beds of

spiky voodoo lilies   

and trip over the roots   

of a sweet gum tree,   

in search of medieval   

plants whose leaves,   

when they drop off   

turn into birds

if they fall on land,

and colored carp if they   

plop into water.

Suddenly the archetypal   

human desire for peace   

with every other species   

wells up in you. The lion   

and the lamb cuddling up. 

The snake and the snail, kissing.

Even the prick of the thistle,   

queen of the weeds, revives   

your secret belief

in perpetual spring,

your faith that for every hurt   

there is a leaf to cure it.

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At the "bird" feeder, late February

It's been a tough Winter. Meteorologically, it ended with February. We've been going through lots of sunflower seeds and suet, but we haven't been feeding just birds. May March be a kinder, gentler month!

sunrise tangled up in snow

Photo by J. Harrington

a snowy dunce cap on the bluebird house

Photo by J. Harrington

the tall one knocks seeds down for the short one

Photo by J. Harrington

then helps herself

Photo by J. Harrington

and Runny Babbit gets some leftovers

Photo by J. Harrington

Late February

By Ted Kooser

The first warm day,

and by mid-afternoon

the snow is no more

than a washing

strewn over the yards,

the bedding rolled in knots

and leaking water,

the white shirts lying

under the evergreens.

Through the heaviest drifts

rise autumn’s fallen

bicycles, small carnivals

of paint and chrome,

the Octopus

and Tilt-A-Whirl

beginning to turn

in the sun. Now children,

stiffened by winter

and dressed, somehow,

like old men, mutter

and bend to the work

of building dams.

But such a spring is brief;

by five o’clock

the chill of sundown,

darkness, the blue TVs

flashing like storms

in the picture windows,

the yards gone gray,

the wet dogs barking

at nothing. Far off

across the cornfields

staked for streets and sewers,

the body of a farmer

missing since fall

will show up

in his garden tomorrow,

as unexpected

as a tulip.

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Crossing permaculture with #phenology?

Minnesota has several wildflowers of the Gentiana family. The Minnesota Wildflowers web site lists five Gentiana and three other "Gentians" that bloom in September. The plants in our front flower garden are, we think, bottle gentians, but don't hold us to that. Our listing of Chisago County wildflowers includes only two Gentianas, but also has two "gentians" from the Triostium family. This has possibly been a classic exercise in why scientists rely on Linnaean rather than common names.

bottle gentian(?) in September

Photo by J. Harrington

The leaves on the remnants of the black chokeberry bushes left by our local whitetail herd have started to change to bright orangey-yellow instead of the reddish-purple (purplish-red?) many cultivars are listed as producing. Perhaps it's the lack of full sun that's altered the color? We're now thinking that, instead of transplanting some of the existing bushes, maybe we should buy more and see if we can convince the deer to leave at least some of them alone? The photo shows a partial yield several years ago from one bush before the deer discovered them.

a rare harvest of black chokeberries

Photo by J. Harrington

We discovered on-line this morning a resource we'll check more thoroughly over the next few days. PERMACULTURE 101: AN INTRODUCTION TO REGENERATIVE DESIGN may, or may not, offer helpful suggestions on dealing with the pocket gophers, rabbits and whitetails that seem determined to help themselves to "our foods." Actually, the real problems is each of these critters, in their own way, tends to kill the geese that lay the golden eggs, if we may thoroughly mix our metaphors. Pocket gophers have eaten the roots of most of the fruit trees we've planted, and replanted. The results are dead trees. Rabbits and deer browse on the bushes to the point that few flowers and no fruit is produced, and several of the branches die from browsing. It's hard to share the yield of a dead or non-producing plant or tree. Mr. Frost, Robert, not Jack, certainly seems familiar with our trials and tribulations.

Good-bye, and Keep Cold

By Robert Frost

This saying good-bye on the edge of the dark

And cold to an orchard so young in the bark

Reminds me of all that can happen to harm

An orchard away at the end of the farm

All winter, cut off by a hill from the house.

I don't want it girdled by rabbit and mouse,

I don't want it dreamily nibbled for browse

By deer, and I don't want it budded by grouse.

(If certain it wouldn't be idle to call

I'd summon grouse, rabbit, and deer to the wall

And warn them away with a stick for a gun.)

I don't want it stirred by the heat of the sun.

(We made it secure against being, I hope,

By setting it out on a northerly slope.)

No orchard's the worse for the wintriest storm;

But one thing about it, it mustn't get warm.

"How often already you've had to be told,

Keep cold, young orchard. Good-bye and keep cold.

Dread fifty above more than fifty below."

I have to be gone for a season or so.

My business awhile is with different trees,

Less carefully nourished, less fruitful than these,

And such as is done to their wood with an axe—

Maples and birches and tamaracks.

I wish I could promise to lie in the night

And think of an orchard's arboreal plight

When slowly (and nobody comes with a light)

Its heart sinks lower under the sod.

But something has to be left to God.

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for some, the urge for going is growing? #phenology

We thought the hummingbirds might have departed, not for warmer, but for Southern climes. It's mid-80s headed toward 90 today. At least one hummer is still hanging around. She (most likely) just made a pass at the nectar feeder. We're pleased to still have her company. With high temperatures dropping into the sixty's this coming week, and thunderstorms in most daily forecasts, we won't be surprised to see her and any children go.

female ruby-throated hummingbird at feeder

Photo by J. Harrington

As near as we can tell, we have but one cottontail rabbit living here. S/he spent much of the Summer hunkered under the brush pile, until we finally got around to torching that pile. Losing a home must not have been too traumatic. Yesterday, we noticed the rabbit laying stretched out under the front feeder, nibbling the tops off sunflower plants that had germinated from seeds dropped by the birds.

Counting Birds

As a child, fresh out of the hospital 
with tape covering the left side
of my face, I began to count birds.
At age fifty the sum total is precise and astonishing, my only secret. 
Some men count women or cars
they've owned, their shirts --
long sleeved and short sleeved --
or shoes, but I have my birds,
excluding, of course, the extraordinary 
days: the twenty-one thousand
snow geese and sandhill cranes at 
Bosque del Apache, the sky blinded
by great frigate birds in the Pacific
off Anconcito, Ecuador; the twenty-one 
thousand pink flamingos an Ngorongoro Crater
in Tanzania; the vast flocks of sea birds
on the Seri coast of the Sea of Cortez
down in Sonora that left at nightfall, 
then reappearing, resuming 
their exact positions at dawn;
the one thousand cliff swallows nesting in he sand cliffs of Pyramid Point,
their small round burrows like eyes, 
really the souls of the Anasazi who flew 
here a thousand years ago
to wait the coming of the Manitou.

And then there were the usual, almost deadly
birds of the soul -- the crow with silver 
harness I rode one night as if she 
were a black, feathered angel.
the birds I became to escape unfortunate 
circumstances -- how the skin ached
as the feathers shot out toward the light;
the thousand birds the dogs helped 
me shoot to become a bird (grouse, woodcock,
duck, dove, snipe, pheasant, prairie chicken, etc.).

On my deathbed I'll write this secret 
number on a slip of paper and pass
it to my wife and two daughters.
It will be a hot evening in June
and they might be glancing out the window
at the thunderstorm's approach from the west.
Looking past their eyes and a dead fly
on the window screen I'll wonder
if there's a bird waiting for me in the onrushing clouds.
O birds, I'll sing to myself, you've carried
me along on this bloody voyage,
carry me now into that cloud 
into the marvel of this final night.

James Harrison (1990) - The Theory and Practice of Rivers and New Poems

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