410 Growing Degree Days (B42)

Suncrisp apple.  A Rutger's University release.  Very late ripening.  Keeps well.  Some tendency to the seed cavity not fully sealing and moldy seeds.

Suncrisp is one of my later blooming apple cultivars.  It is a seedling of Golden Delicious and Cox Orange Pippin.  Neither of these cultivars is very hardy so this is also likely to be marginally hardy in the mid-West.

Nova Spy.  This is about where my Liberty trees are.  Flowers lose their petals after pollination so that is a good sign.

Lilac.  I assume this is Chas Joly.  It was given to me by a local gunsmith named Don Snap.

Yellow Rocket, aka wild mustard, aka Barbarea vulgaris

 

Dogs

I went for a walk with the dogs (on property) last night.  As often happens, the Boston Terrier chose to not keep up with the big dogs.

Coming back around the pasture about twenty minutes later I heard growling and barking.  I hollered at the big dogs, "Smuggles needs help."  Like a shot, they were on the way.  I hustled over to the garage to get an ax to bust through the roof and retrieve my little dog.

I did not need to bother.  Between the three of them they had the raccoon out in the open and had pretty much finished the job.

Smuggles did not want to share

Smuggles has been strutting around like a hero.  He KNOWS he held that raccoon for twenty minutes while the big dogs were off playing.  He is a little bit chewed up and is walking a little slower today.  Correction, he is strutting a little bit slower today.

Dogs part two
Herc likes digging.  He will find a woodchuck den and start trying to dig them out.  When he encounters a root he bites and tears it out.

It caught up with him today.  He got a stick caught in the roof of his mouth.

This looks like a segment of grape vine.  It is 0.54" in diameter (about 13.5mm).  As you can see, the ends are jagged.

I can state with a high degree of certainty that a German Shepherds upper palate is slightly less than 2.6" wide.

Herc was not a happy camper when I put him on his back and used a pair of vice grips to remove the stick.

Wildlife corridors

Three strips were mowed with a hand mower.  The strips are 40" wide.  I sprayed herbicide on the strips and will plant Switchgrass seeds and move the Maximilian Sunflower seedlings.  I needed to get this done today because we have more rain coming.

You can see how the strip on the left follows the "military crest" of the hill.  I paralleled and existing deer trail for the first strip.  Those deer are pretty smart.  Salamander wants the deer to be biased toward the right as they travel this parcel.

Looking back the other way.

A Praying Mantis egg sack?

A mullein plant looking all fat and sassy.  Mullein is a popular plant in herbal medicine.  Some folks call this plant "Wild Tobacco"

Besieged by Bunnies

They seem to favor dandelions and violet leaves.  We will have two or three of them in the yard at a time.  This does not bode well for the garden.