It's a joy each spring to see what creatures are out there. The usual suspects are often good for a candid pic: a deer very close up, a coyote taking a whizz, a gang of raccoon hoodlums striding through the scene. But as years click by I crave novelty: The Kingfisher leaving the water after making a strike.  A daylight photo of a bear that looks kinda extra disreputable. This fella knocked over a couple of bluebird houses (and didn't even find the jelly-bean-sized eggs). I suspect he will not be moving on to the next round of Survival.  And the arty photos, like the dinosaur-like vultures going at some leftovers.  Or a downpour setting off the motion detector on the beaver pond  Or the raven and the vulture sharing a snack alfresco.  A bobcat is always good for a second look. Handsome and crabby, I suspect.  Please note that the dates at the bottom margin of the photos are proof of time dilation in the real world. Or possibly evidence that we don't always set the clock correctly. And because they are our largest resident, some big beautiful bear action:  For scale, the lower corner of the cow sign clocks in at a bit under 4 feet, and the lens of the camera does foreshorten a LOT. So 300+ pounds of hair and hunger? Thank goodness their evolution strategy, it's theorized, leaned heavily on the Flight rather than Fight during the last Ice Age. According to the theory*, this is why we don't see American Lions, Sabertooth anythings, Direwolves and Cave bears. Those megafauna leaned into Fighting, which may have led them right into the firepower of a certain bipedal humanoid species. *https://bear.org/bear-facts/why-are-black-bears-so-timid/ https://phys.org/news/2024-07-evidence-mounting-humans-responsible-extinction.html  Yet arguably even more intimidating, and for sure more aggressive, I bring you a squirrel. 
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 The idea of a fierce Goth mouse that hunts on the wing has a certain appeal. To some. Or to me at least. Bats feature in some vivid childhood memories: my sister and me huddled under the dining room table, as the thump of footsteps circles us, punctuated by the whomp of a straw broom swatting the air and making contact with walls and pictures. The sweary battle-cries of our parents, whose bare white legs periodically flash past, and in counterpoint, the tiny high-pitched keening of a bat that has taken a seriously wrong turn in Albuquerque.  This is how scientists weigh bats. A tiny vest! Just look at those tiny fingertips! And that frowsy little frown! In college, bats kind of saved my life. My first year at Cornell, I was sitting in one of those enormous classrooms in Goldwin Smith Hall. My life was in tatters, with no money, a boyfriend off the rails, and the prospect of having to retreat home looming over me. I'd thought there were kind of a lot of bats in Ithaca, but that morning, I nudged the person next to me and had my index finger already pointing up at those flapping scraps of dark when some instinct of self-preservation shut my mouth. I realized, with sudden clarity, that there were, in truth, zero bats inside the classroom. That I was, in truth, hallucinating bats. That my subconscious, always a wag, was poking an elbow into my ribs and saying, "Girl, you're bats!" I did not ignore that message. I made some healthier life choices after that morning, though I have always since kept a weather eye out for warning flaps. So bats are all right by me. Knowing my penchant for the little insect-eaters, my favorite skipper constructed a couple of bat-houses and in the summer of '22, we performed the engineering marvel of hoisting one up on a pole high above the home orchard at the Would-Be Farm. The other went up on the south-facing peak of the barn. My favorite skipper has since kept up a steady stream of batty complaints. "We don't have any bats," he will tell anyone. "We have them, but he just doesn't see them," I will add to Jeff's declaration. "I built two bat houses. 100 bats per house and we don't have a single bat," he grouses. I make the correction with gritted teeth, "We don't have any YET." We're like old married people sometimes. But the truth is, I have an eye for bats, and Jeff seemingly does not.  This summer, however, has categorically refuted Jeff's hypothesis. Mr. Linton stepped into the cabin, and said, with restrained emotion of some sort. (Ire? Shock? Outrage?) "There was a BAT in my PANTS." Okay. What?! For a literal thinker, this kind of statement sets all circuits buzzing and causes a momentary freeze response. Jeff brought me up to speed: As is his wont, he'd removed his very wet and dirty trousers and tossed them over the porch railing to air out the day before. He went outside in the morning and, in preparation to folding them, he held up the trousers, gave them a brisk snap, and Voilá! a chunky brown bat tumbled out of a pantleg. And it was still on the porch. "Aww," I said, pulling on a pair of work gloves. "The poor thing is stunned." As I reached to lift the velvety creature, the bat looked up and opened its jaws like a nightmare and hissed. I drew back and it flapped unsteadily off. "Well we certainly have bats," I said to Jeff. (I didn't add that this should put an end to our perpetual wrangling about them, for pity's sake. But really, it should.)  Then, a few weeks later, I noticed a few mouse-like turds under the bat house at the barn. (The varieties of scat I contemplate on the regular here at the Farm surprises me. We like to refer to it as spoor, as if we are tracking big cats on the veldt.) A consult with the Goog, and then the careful use of telephoto revealed yet more proof: The bat house has an inhabitant! Whoohoo! If you build it, they WILL come. And, let's not lose this particular bit of Google gold: a bat's guano can be differentiated from mousey dung by the degree of sparkle. I kid you not. Bats cannot digest the crunchy outer shell and the iridescent wings of the insects they devour. Sparkle poop. It doesn't particularly show in the photos I took, but...Just another cool feature of die fledermaus.  Bonus Chiroptera (from the Greek for "hand-wing")-adjacent material: Did you know that as part of the Federal Works Progress Administration (WPA) program during the Great Depression, we spent around $6.5million across 4 years to support unemployed theater professionals? I love hearing that part of the FDR plan to help the country recover from the stock market crash and subsequent depression was to rebuild the cultural institutions of our society. How radical! Out-of-work actors, writers, directors, costumers, janitors, secretaries, and so forth, as made up the country's live theater found employment through the Federal Theater. For instance "The Bat," a Broadway hit that the Federal Theater staged in various non-Broadway-ish spots around the nation... Meanwhile, my grandfather enlisted in the Civilian Conservation Corps, another WPA program, where he lived in company with dozens of other young men in a camp, where they were fed, given the odd lecture, sometimes shown a play by the Federal Theater company, all the while building parks and roads.  Just hangin' out with the bats at Carlsbad Caverns. You want more bat content? Or WPA content? Here's a couple of links:
https://www.batcon.org/the-scoop-on-bat-poop/ http://www.amysmithlinton.com/blog/meanwhile-on-the-farm https://www.loc.gov/collections/federal-theatre-project-1935-to-1939/articles-and-essays/wpa-federal-theatre-project/  To be fair, it's mostly my favorite skipper who is finding things... because he is looking. I am meanwhile mostly playing with my electronic screen of paper dolls. Or staring moodily into the near distance while thinking about what misery my little paper people are going to endure next. But Jeff? Less moody and more duty. While using a manual post-hole digger last week, himself was contemplatively lifting and thunking the tool when he heard a non-dirt noise. It sounded a bit too musical to be a rock, though we are amply supplied with rocks at the Would-Be Farm. He gingerly applied fingers and Little Jack Hornered a beefy chunk of glass from the clay. When I saw it at first, I thought it might be antique automotive glass, but thank you Google, it turns out to be a honking piece of an orange drink jug from 1927-1937. https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/1927-35-nesbitts-orange-soda-jug-3880547348 I wonder how long it's been rusticating in this former cow pasture? Nearly 100 years? Did it slide down from the midden pile behind the old farmhouse?  the old farmhouse, slowly bowing to gravity The midden pile. Or, if you like, call it a trash heap, but I like the archeological flavor of "midden." And archeologically/anthropologically speaking, nearly every farm from before the middle of the 20th C usually had its very own spot for trash. Just like the Mesopotamians, chucking used plates and broken furniture over the edge of a rise. Out of sight, out of mind. A few years ago, I uncovered a treasure-trove of unbroken glass bottles that had somehow survived first the pitch out of the old farmhouse back door, second the minefield of granite chunks and previously pitched items, and third the 20, 30, 40 winters between then and now.  But Jeff has found a hand plough, wonderful old oil can/watering cans, stout tin chicken feeders—lovely rusty bits of history that we have festooned about the cabin.  A dabba-do car... My sister even found a grindstone. Which looks an awful lot like one of Fred Flintstone's car's wheels.
Here's a older blog about other archeological finds on the Farm http://www.amysmithlinton.com/blog/would-be-farm-rural-archeology  There are too few hours in the day, even as the days grow longer in leaps and bounds. When we arrived at the Would-Be Farm in early April--in time to spare for my sister's birthday and the total eclipse-- the sun was up from 6:30am to 7:34pm. On the day we left, the sun peeped up at 5:40 and lingered until 8:19. At midsummer, according to the 'webs, it'll be 5:30-8:45. At that latitude, twilight and pre-dawn last for ages. Every year is different, of course ("It's a planet, Jim, not a calendar."). This year Spring sprang extra early. The daffodils that I would hope to see the first week of May were blooming their faces off the second week of April.  Early spring meant that only a few plants that I treasured were nibbled into oblivion over the winter. It also, critically, meant an early fishing "bite," as they say.  I was grateful that Jeff and his fishing captain, Dan ("Captain Dan! Captain Dan!") stuck to the inland lakes and the little bitty tin boat, because early thaw or no, that water is co-co-cold.  Each year, I worry about pollinators showing up for the many feral apple trees, and for the handful of sturdy fruit that have survived our custodianship (looking at you, pear trees!). ...and was reassured again by the pastoral hmmmmmmm of a battalion of bees working the trees. It's one of the unexpected sensory pleasures, to stand among fruit trees in early spring, listening to the sound of insects at work, ensuring the annual miracle of fruit growing on trees. The bees are noisy, but there are other, quieter pollinators to observe: butterflies and moths, damselflies and wasps. Hummingbirds, orioles. We run an all-you-can-sip buffet out there.  In the past decade, I've grown accustomed to the sloth pace of the season: first bluebells and rock iris, a few days later, maybe a touch of snow, and then Dutchman's britches and early saxifrage, a few more days for the first hint of wake-robins and daffodils.  Buds will start to swell, and the hint of green will return to the putty-colored fields. Bluebirds and bright goldfinches will look like confetti scattered in the wind. These and less crayon-ish birds will be making a racket earlier and earlier in the morning.  Then maybe spring peepers will start up, along with the excited hooting of barred owls and the good-lord-that's-annoying-after-the-first-three-times sound of the whip-o-will. This spring, everything seemed telescoped into a couple of weeks. By the time we migrated south for our annual pilgrimage to the Florida Keys (fishing! friends! regatta!), new leaves the color of radiator fluid stippled the woods. Like an inverted dance of the seven veils: the naked rock bones and tree trunks covered by swirling layers of buds, blossom, tiny leaves, bigger leaves, a variegated canopy, dressing rather than undressing. Though, naturally, we hope not to begin (or end) with someone's head on a platter.
We are just the caretakers of the Would-Be Farm. Oh, we pay taxes and insure against disaster, but the land is its own, really. As the springtime photos reveal. Even the game cameras have some autonomy. For instance, the crossroads camera chose to take video this winter. Ooh, look, bobcat! A few new players appear on camera this year. Like Pekania pennanti, the second-largest member of the weasel family. Commonly known as a fisher-cat, this somewhat alarming creature goes about three feet long with retractable claws and sharp teeth. We are grateful to know they tend to be shy by nature.  Likely the same fisher on a different camera. The fisher, as I learned fifteen seconds ago, is the rare predator that feasts upon the porcupine. "Nature red in tooth and claw," as Tennyson wrote (I grant you, of the 133 cantos of In Memoriam, this single bit is all I retain). Our largest predator is Ursus americanus. The male Black bear has a range of something like 25-50 square miles, so it's not a surprise to see these big guys popping up on camera from time to time. Wish the camera had chosen to continue rolling film a bit longer. Around the corner, on a still camera, more than one bear showed up in the frame... The stars of the show for me this year are the pair of foxes that are frisking about all over the Farm. I suspect the shortage of coyotes this year (possibly the result of the natural 7-year cycle combined with the neighbors' willingness to speed that cycle along) has encouraged the foxes to be out and about.  I have high hopes for fox kits this spring. Love is in the air for others as well. There's more, but I have wood to cut and chapters to re-write (squee! the new book!).
Until next time... Why yes, I was briefly addicted to Days of Our Lives in the era of broadcast television. My grandmother and my sister used to gossip on the phone about the Hortons and Bradys of fictional soundstage Salem, and frankly, I wanted in. Plus the daytime drama fit perfectly in the timeslot between the noon and 2 pm shuttle runs when I was a cheerful first mate on Captain Alva's shellkeyshuttle.com in Pass-a-Grille.  I barely remember the storylines, engrossing as they seemed to be. One scene lingers, an uncomfortable bit with a stalker and a victim and the screen fading to black over an eerie recitation of Yeats' "When you are old and grey and full of sleep,/And nodding by the fire, take down this book,/ And slowly read..." When I consulted my sister, she remembers several literary moments during that era of the program. I imagine one of the show's writers gleefully setting gems she'd mined from her education into this lowbrow, La-Z-boy throne of American culture. Still, it's the tagline that really sings. I reference it frequently when looking at a calendar. We've already swooped past Midwinter Regatta season. A photo recap for your reading pleasure: Other sailing events have dropped over the horizon: we helped run an ACat regatta, Jeff sailed the Round the Point race, as well as squeezing in an IC37 regatta in Lauderdale and a full-moon race. The sands of time sure do hurry through that hourglass.  Which means, as tumbling grain follows tumbling grain, it's nearly time to check on the Would-Be Farm.
To each season its own joy. I'm fond of the Progressive ads in which Dr. Rick attempts to keep young homeowners from turning into their parents. They are subversive and sometimes thrum home like an arrow hitting the bullseye. But really, blue hair!  Porcupine. They eat wood and have zero fear of humans. Bit of background: we traveled to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan last summer, where I hoped to find yooperlite rocks. These are a UP specialty -- rocks that glow under UV light. I bought a flashlight that included a UV (blacklight, baby) setting. We didn't find a yooper, but we did have a neat-o-keen time discovering that spiders' eyes often glow in blacklight. Not to mention the CSI-style investigatory moments.  Young possum ready to hit a rave. This fall, however, I heard that opossums will fluoresce pink. It sounded cool, and since the Would-Be Farm comes very well supplied with possums, it was the work of one evening to track one of the dear creatures down and bother it with light. My experiment says: possums show pink-ISH anyhow. Then, because everything looks like a nail when you're holding a hammer, I went in search of other creatures to flash. Enter the porcupine.  Un-retouched photo of a porcupine under black light. Blue hair. We all see it.
 Farming is hard. From the time Mr. Linton and I started this experiment (ooh, here's the first dispatch from the Would-Be Farm), we expected challenges. We welcomed challenges. Neural plasticity, baby! And sure enough, we learned some new stuff. We knew that rust never sleeps, but we found out that weeds will pull all-nighters all summer long in the interest of world domination. Looking at you, burdock.  Burdock in the snow We discovered that even with zillions of established apple trees on the property, it's hard to get them to bear fruit larger than a golf ball. If the frost doesn't nip the bud, or caterpillars devour the leaves, or porcupine eat whole branches, well, then it's some other bug, some other mammal, some other weather phenomenon. And we have stuck by our decision to avoid toxic chemicals, regardless the wormy little apples.  So when we have success, it seems the sweeter, and also, paradoxically, the fruits do not seem to be from our labors. Instead, it's as if they show up as serendipity. A gift from the farm. Passive agriculture.  Our first plum. We put seedlings into the ground. Three or four years on, we see the first production of plums. Also, this year's single pear (yes: one fruit from the whole five trees), which has not been raided by raccoons yet. Does it count as work if we planted it so many years ago?  Safe from marauders. So far. Currents, aronia, and honey berries produced well this summer. For what it's worth. Tart, tart, and tarter. We have not, as my genteel mother-in-law puts it, developed a taste for them yet.  Pro grower's tip: if the description in the nursery catalogue suggests that a fruit is used in jam or compote, beware. Tomatoes and garlic and potatoes are standouts again this year. Likewise those leggy volunteer cousins: fennel and dill, one bronze, the other pale green, popping up everywhere.  Garlic harvest I picked a bumper crop of blackberries (was it the extra rain? it's a continual mystery why some years do and others don't) but after the first disappointing pie––So seedy! So very seedy!––I set my sights on a cordial. I muddled pint after pint into mason jars of moonshine, which now lurk, dark and powerful, like untested ordnance, in the fridge.  Cordial-yet-to-be. At this end of the summer, I tend to wander moodily around with a basket, swatting mosquitoes, marveling. It's a numbers game: we planted more than 25 modern apple trees, and only 5 are currently alive. And we have yet to see a single apple from those trees.  Hazelbert bush. We put in 20 hazelbert whips and though a dozen died for being planted in the wrong place, 30+ hazel shrubs flourish now. The eight elderberries I bought and nurtured over the past decade have yet to survive a third year, but the two newest? This year -- THIS YEAR! -- I will foil the deer.  A pocketful of hazels. The six basket willow are growing by leaps and bounds, and have doubled in number. Of the five hackberry, I know for sure three are still living. The other two might possibly have slunk into the night. It's easy to find them in the spring, but once summer gushes forth––! The abundance of uncultivated food astonishes me. Things we never did a lick of work to encourage. Nanny berries and hickory nuts, big puffball mushrooms and black walnuts, not to mention, though I do, the free-range non-vegan options. So many good fishes! And ruffled grouse bursting from the underbrush would be happy, I can see in their ruthless dinosaur eyes, to dine on me in the rather likely event that they SUCCEED in startling me to death.  And then there are chickadees, who chatter when the birdseed is running low. One or two of these lillies of the field are especially bold. They barely need coaxing to land on my hand, where they look me in the eye and take their time picking a seed.
I've really done nothing to earn chickadees. But I'm grateful that the Farm has provided them too. I'm keeping my head down this summer on the Would-Be Farm, trying to get that novel of mine out and about. Mr. Linton, on the other hand, has been getting stuff done around here. We just acquired one of the cooler bits of kit in the barn: a flame-thrower. No joke. It's a chemical-free means to a weed-free end.  Need I mention the anti-zombie potential? My favorite skipper built a woodshed (a structure that is both made of wood and designed to contain wood, okay, Lisa?) next to the sauna. We'd had a covered woodpile, but the amount of firewood that got burned since the implementation of the wood-powered sauna led to a step up in the firewood game at the Farm.  Constructing a shed sounds a blithe enough pastime, but with neither plan nor drawing?  Himself claims to be a rough carpenter, but he is adding skills with each project. I say so despite the sage advice of Sippie and Bonnie both... Between construction/destruction activities, plus the occasional sailboat race (go Team New Wave!), there's always lawn work. Meadow and woodlands surround us, but Mr. Linton keeps the trails and the lawn properly neat by the use of no less than two trimmers, two mowers, and a tractor. Not simultaneously. Yet.  Whenever the weather cooperates (growing grass, self-imposed deadlines, and encroaching thorn apples be danged!), we fish.  There's a theory about value called the "IKEA Effect," whereby people over-estimate the value of something they have themselves made.  We got to test it out this spring at the Would-Be Farm. From Estonia by way of New Jersey, thank you BZB Cabins for a pallet's worth of parts, 24 pages of instructions, and a very helpful expert only a phone-call away.  I grant you, we poured quite a bit of effort into this longer-than-any-danged-weekend project. If the value increases as a result of how long it took, and how many new neural pathways it encouraged, and what fresh language it encouraged (is that hangy-downy part of the roofing shingles called a "fang" or a "bump"?), well, all to the good. And the refresher on metric measurement? Nigh on priceless.  But regardless the IKEA effect. Fer reals –– this thing is hella neat-o.  And so toasty!  |
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