Drought, Rain, and Ranch Ponds

When we first visited The Ranch last spring, we were warned that there "may be a leak" in the lake. The water level had dropped more rapidly than the real estate agent/owner thought was normal. There was basically a sandbar across, creating two ponds instead of one lake. The last time it had been completely full was several years ago.  (We have a picture. It's glorious.)

As the drought continued, the water level dropped even lower. It broke my heart to see the narrow side almost completely gone.

We're still in a drought, but we've been getting rain. Quite a bit of it, in fact. I am super happy to report that we no longer have two ponds. We have one. Dare I even call it a lake? I'm so giddy about this, I don't care that I can no longer walk across the land bridge to get to the cabin. I'll have to drive. And before you scold me for not walking, I would if it was safe to. I have to always remember that we have bobcats, coyotes, racoons, deer, snakes, and bears on the property. Occasionally, we get neighbors' dogs roaming around, too. (One of them actually had a bell on his collar. It was kind of funny to hear it jingling as he and a buddy ran through the woods on the other side of the pond. He must roam a lot.)

Now I have to research how to get rid of green algae.

What a long, strange trip it's been

Years and years ago I attended a Grateful Dead concert with a friend I've known since 6th grade. It was quite the experience. I don't know many of their songs, but I sang along where I knew the lyrics. One line that I'll always remember is from Truckin'. This year has been quite the strange trip. I'm happy to say that the pond is filling back up. Fingers crossed we get more rain soon.

 Our first trip to tour the place. Little did we know we'd buy the only place we looked at.

 Springtime. Water down in the pond(s).

 The "Glade."

 Heartbreaking.

 Happy to see the water at this level.

 Got stuck in the mud on Christmas day. We were able to winch ourselves out.

 Yes, bears to sh*t in the woods.

 The Aussie, hard at work. Not easy on the grass because it's so soft, but better than a pickup truck dragging huge logs around.

 Beautiful Grandfather tree.

Praying these are deer and not hog tracks. Bottom may be deer, top hog. Hopefully they'll move on.

Please pass the (epsom) salt

The Friends and I were working over on the cabin side of the pond yesterday. I wanted to get the leaves and fallen limbs away from the cabin so that it's easier to walk around, so I spent a couple of hours raking. During a break, one of The Friends and I were wondering if we could get the big riding mower over to cut back some of the long grass. I called over to The Aussie on a two-way and asked if he could bring the mower over. He did something waaaay better. He used the land bridge and brought over the brush hog and started mowing. Man, that thing is awesome! It certainly is a beast.  When he asked if I wanted a go, I was a little hesitant because it is a serious piece of equipment. I am glad that thing is self-propelled. Mowing on a slope is not easy. If you're in to immediate gratification, this is the toy for you. It's quite the workout. Between the tree limb hauling, leaf raking, weed pulling and Beast driving, I am really sore today. Here are the before and after cabin yard pictures.

Cabin: Before

 

Cabin: After

Cool, huh? It no longer looks like a derelict house.

And just because they're adorable and photogenic, here are more puppy pictures.

 Buddies

 

My Beautiful Girl

 

And here's this week's obligatory wildlife picture. I call this one Turtle Conga Line.

 





Dreams of nature trails danced in my head

Back when The Aussie and I used to dream about having a property, I dreamed of strolling around the land with the dogs, enjoying the sunshine, peace and fresh air, maybe building a running trail. To these dreams I now say Bahahahahahaa. Good one. Mother Nature really likes to reclaim fields and woods. In a big way. Soon the vegetation will start to die back, I hope, and we'll be able to make some headway in to reclaiming our fields. In the meantime, you had to figure that a brush hog would be in our future. I was across the pond, cleaning at the cabin, when the boys took the brush hog, now named "The Beast" out for a spin. From how they described The Beast, Stephen King could write a horror story about it. You know, along the lines of The Mangler. This thing seriously chews up the brush. Which is a good thing, considering that's why The Aussie got it.

 Making headway in to the brush.

 You could do a non-corn maze in this stuff, it's so tall.

 This is the back side of the huge tree that was taken down last time.

 This is as far as they got. It's so thick here. They'll need to try to clear brush from the other side of the pond.

 Looking towards one of the hay fields.

Looking back towards the cabin where we were cleaning.

Practical use for pretty plant

This is the shrub Beautyberry, aka Callicarpa Americana. There are a large number of these shrubs on the property. I do know that birds eat the seeds, but as I've read, only after other food sources have been exhausted. Since I am interested in medicinal herbs, I kept reading about potential uses for this shrub. Imagine my surprise to read the following:

"UPDATE: One of my students, Fred, does a lot of foraging and has lived his life in mosquito-ladened Florida. He reports: [Beautyberry's]  “jelly is awesome but I really love the beautyberry for its insect repellent properties. After learning about this from a Green Deane class and being an avid forager myself I decided to use the beautyberry as a bug repellent so it wouldn’t slow down my summer foraging (Florida summer mosquitoes can be horrible). I pretty much chopped up a plant(leaves and stems) and boiled it in a pot and let it cool and strained the brown liquid into my blender, about 1 1/2 cups. In a separate pot I warmed some organic neem oil (1 cup) with 1 ounce of beeswax until melted. Then you turn the blender on and pour in the oil mixture very slowly and it becomes a cream. I have to say hands down the best insect repellent ever! Because its a creme on july/august days one application is all you need for the entire day even when your sweating.”"

Yes! I have no desire to make a jelly or wine from this shrub, but I really like the idea of making an insect repellent. Texas mosquitos will chase you down!

What a difference some rain makes

Over the last few months, I have been taking pictures, documenting if you will, the water levels of the "lake." I use quotes because the lake became two separate ponds, both shrinking. This could be all drought related, but we were told before we purchased the property that there *may* be a leak, because the water seemed to drop more rapidly than if it was just evaporating. When we were there a few weeks ago, I took the top picture. I have to tell you that it just about broke my heart seeing that side of the lake almost gone.

Since I took this picture, we have gotten some significant rain. I cannot describe how happy it made me to see the pond coming back, almost to where it was when we first saw the property.

 

 

I also managed to get a picture of one of the hummingbirds. Our friends say that there are even babies, half the size of the adults, that are coming to the second feeder we put up. It's really cool to sit outside and watch them. They dart around the yard, perching up in the trees, chittering at each other. Please excuse the crud on the window. The Aussie was mowing the lawn one day in the wrong direction and grass was flung up towards the house and stuck there. Just another thing that needs cleaning. ;)

 

 

We also had a larger avian visitor. I've seen one of the huge grey herons around the pond before, but it always took off as we arrived. We had a white heron visit this weekend. Very cool.

 

In less quiet moments, the guys were at it with the chainsaw again. While I like the look of many of the dead trees, it would be very dangerous to keep certain ones standing. This is one of them. When I drove up and saw what they'd been up to, I must admit that my jaw dropped, and some expletives came out of my mouth. It took them 4 hours to get this one down. I'm really glad we'll be able to haul the wood with Tigger and the trailer. Now if only we knew where to store to store the wood, since the log racks are already full. 

Lastly, just because he's my beautiful boy, I give you this picture for your viewing pleasure. :)

Cheers!

Kyra

 

 



A new toy for me

After quite a while researching and drooling over dSLRs, I actually own one! I took some time the other day and wandered the property, trying to take artsy photographs. Some of them, if I do say so myself, came out kind of neat!

"The Glade" at sunset. I call it a glade, but it's really just an overgrown area off to the side of the house. It's kind of cool and spooky when it's getting dark.

 

I love the texture of the bark on this tree.

 

 

Getting artsy with the logs in the wood pile.

 

And with the rusted metal drum.

And lastly, a zoomed in shot of little Bambi. I didn't have the longer lens on, so I got as close as I could. She's a pretty little thing.  Other than on the game camera, we haven't seen the males, but our friends who were there the night before us did. Clashing of antlers and lots of bugling.  Maybe we'll catch their show next visit.