Everything frosted over in the morning, no breeze, but silence. Just me and my new landscape.
The slightest breeze starts picking up, and like a domino effect, the frost shatters and falls to the ground.
Center of Attention
As normal, January is covered in snow. This is the view in the windbreak.
Evergreens feel like a natural fit during our wintery, snowy months. Their branches help stop snow and wind, and their green gives us a dabble of life in the dreary and otherwise dead season.
Ice Party
Some years it happens more than once, sometimes not at all, but this year the ice party has begun.
We had some freezing rain that glazed everything in its path. This actually makes the evergreen trees quite beautiful, even though I have to worry about whether this will break some branches. Definitely don’t want wind during these ice storm events, just makes it a lot worse.
Mosquito Netting
I think I have finally found something more annoying than a mosquito buzzing around my head, the actual mosquito netting itself!
When mosquitoes are at their worst is when it is the hottest time of the year usually. This netting over my head only makes it that much hotter. This thing is going to give me claustrophobia.
Goat Drought
We have stumbled into August. The pastures are drying up as the clouds have closed up any rain falling down onto us.
The goats look for what little grass blades they can find. This is a good example of cool season grasses that are not really appropriate for this climate. Most of the established trees are still looking deep green and attractive in the landscape.
Look to the Sky
Taking photos of the ever-changing sky is rewarding. It is fun to look back and see what sky images I captured forever, that was only there for an instant in real time.
Here is a collection of some this year:
Escape the Heat
Finding places to escape the heat of summer can be difficult. For a cat, hiding in an old watering can may do the trick.
She wasn’t able to answer whether it was cooler in there or not.
Lightning Fuel
Hay bales march across the open grassland, quickly meeting the forest. It creates quite a contrast between the two features in the landscape. The deer and other wildlife around seem to not mind these stark contrasts.
While not common, there is a possibility for these large hay bales to fall victim to lightning strikes. This summer was that occasion.
Last of the Giants
Most of the large American Elms(Ulmus americana) have died decades ago. There has been one of these elms growing along a fenceline that is very large. It has a circumference over 10 feet. This summer I started noticing the Dutch Elm Disease signs in the canopy of this large elm tree, so soon it will be dead, too.
This is my last American Elm over 10′ feet in circumference. I still have a couple Red Elms that are in that large size range that appear healthy.
Maple Valley
Few years back I planted a lot of Silver Maples(Acer saccharinum) down in a valley. I fenced out this area from the cattle and removed barbed wire from an old fence. This is what it looks like currently:
There are a few other types of trees, including a Northern Catalpa(Catalpa speciosa). It has started flowering after a short few years grown from seed that I had collected in town.
