Cleaning the Canebrake

   Most folks do not realize the work involved in growing bamboo.  While it looks nice when it is healthy and green, it can become quite unsightly if a freeze or storm damages the canes.  Our "canebrake" is actually bamboo.  Thankfully, we have the clumping sort and not the runners.  The clumpers simply expand outward in a larger clump each year.  There are no shoots coming up twenty or thirty feet from the original source.  Still, that clump can become a mess if not cleaned.

  Our canebrake is a good twenty feet across with the bamboo reaching upwards of 40 feet.  Over the past few years, we have had numerous storms in the fall and a few (very few) good freezes.  All of that was just enough to kill a good many of the original canes in the middle of the clump.  The new shoots were being forced to grow at odd angles since the old dead canes were falling atop them.  It was a MESS!

  Yesterday, Son decided it was time to "clean" the canebrake.  I was cutting grass when I saw him pulling out the dead canes.  The mower was stopped and I lent a hand with the chore.  He and I worked for several hours and pulled over 250 dead canes from the back section of the canebrake.  We finally had to stop.  Both of us were itching from the fibers being sifted down on us from the dead bamboo.  We are only about half finished.  Tomorrow, we will start again and hopefully get the chore completed.  It is not something for the squeamish as we have already found some pretty huge spiders, a couple of snakes, a rat nest, fire ants and some unidentified critters.  The canebrake will look mighty fine once cleared, though!

My Good Luck Charm!

   For the past few days it has been sunny and that meant yard work.  I am trying to reclaim all of the mulch that the torrential rains took from the gardens and put down near the marsh.  Hauling it back up the hill is proving to be my undoing as I live in a state of soreness now.  Old ladies are not supposed to push a wheelbarrow uphill twenty to thirty times a day.  I do. I am paying for the effort.  My body is telling me to stop but the weather says "Get it done now because I am going to take a turn for the worse come the weekend."  It is that old adage of "Make hay while the sun shines." at play here.  Good news is that I only have about forty more loads to haul.  Hopefully, I have it secure enough this time that the rain does not decide to mulch the marsh again.  If it does...it can stay...I do not care.  While doing all of that raking, loading and hauling of mulch, I discovered the "motherlode" of millipedes.  It seems that the critters are in mulch heaven under that stuff.  They are fat and happy!

  I was thinking about the millipedes and decided that was to be my research project for the evening.  (Learn something new and all that.)  Anyway, after finding out all the life-habits of the critters, there was an article on symbolism and life totems or spirit animals.  Ok, so that stirred a bit of interest!  It seems that millipedes are the symbols of good luck, energy and health.  Well, now!  I think I shall just have to adopt a millipede as my good luck charm! (Or all of them!)  I sure could use all three of those things.  If you follow my lead, just make sure to adopt a millipede and not a centipede.  First off, those critters can bite!  Millipedes just sort of musk you but centipedes can pack a wallop!  Also, while millipedes represent rather nice things, in most cultures the centipede is a symbol of evil or death.  Nope, don't want that following me.  So, millipedes are where it is at, folks.  Happy little campers there!  I will keep them.

Making Lemonade?

   The old saying "When life hands you a basket of lemons, make lemonade" holds true for my chores of the day.  After enduring the stifling "don't do that" woes for months, I was just about resigned to the idea of staying "Queen of the Small Gardens" for the rest of my days.  Then, a doctor visit and a hurricane visit changed that drastically.  Just days prior Hurricane Zeta slammed us, I received the "ok" to resume a somewhat normal schedule.  Life was good.  Wham!  Hurricane Zeta.  Life is hard.

  With the mountains of debris left behind when Zeta left, there was nothing else to do other than push up the shirt sleeves and get to work.  I found that if I sorted a section of debris, cleared out anything large and spread it thinly, I could use the lawnmower to cut it to a fine mulch.  Great!  With a burn ban initiated, the mulching helped to eliminate a good bit of debris.  At least now I had huge mounds of powdery fine mulch instead of unsightly mounds of rough debris!  Still...what do you do with about two tons (yes, that is what I have cut already) of mulch?  Well, you take those lemons and make lemonade!  

  I took a few days to clear the limbs and roofing from the vegetable plot and found that the cabbages still looked relatively in good shape.  A brilliant idea popped in the head (the second...the first being transforming a lawnmower into a mulch grinder)!  Use a good bit of that mulch in the garden!  So...28 loads in a wheelbarrow were pushed up the hill and into the garden area.  Using some of the salvaged planks, a pathway was laid out and the garden started receiving the mulch.  It worked perfectly in the garden and I started seeing the mounds growing smaller and smaller. 

  Now the idea of mulching all the pathways is starting to run around in the brain.  Clearing the gardens is my "playtime" after doing debris cleanup.  Moving the loads of mulch and seeing the progress is good for the morale.  We still have tons of trees down that need to be cut for firewood, a roof and windows to be replaced in one of the out buildings and the entire pier to be rebuilt but progress is progress no matter how slow.  A glass of lemonade sounds good right about now.  

Every Little Bit Helps

   Cleanup after any storm is a slow, tedious process if you are wishing to salvage anything.  Stuff has to be pulled from the debris pile, checked for damage then sorted into "keep" or "toss".  We are trying to salvage our pier planks from 1100 ft of a debris line that is 4 ft deep in places.  It is not easy but every plank pulled, every section cleared is progress.  Slow progress but progress just the same.

  My main job is managing the burners so we can eliminate as much of the marsh waste as possible in as short of time as possible.  Son is pulling the pier planks and doing all of the "heavy" work.  I stack the boards to dry them,  It is a teamwork effort but we are working against the clock.  There is a good possibility that another hurricane could be in the Gulf in a few days and having that slam us with the debris still in place would mean devastation.  So, the race is on.  The work is exhausting but we cannot take a break.  

Welcome to Puddle Pond

  Four weeks....just four weeks ago, I was in the midst of creating Pebble Creek and renovating Puddle Pond.  These two features of the yard make use of the drains to capture water from the rooftop.  Instead of letting the runoff wash gullies in the yard, I dug a trench, laid in pond lining and filled it with gravel.  This I called Pebble Creek.  With the help of a pond pump located in Puddle Pond and a long hose running the length of the "creek" water is recycled to make it appear as if the creek is actually running.  Along about halfway, a small foot bridge crosses Pebble Creek and allows for passage into the Small Gardens.  Since falling on bad health just as I completed Pebble Creek, this area has become my new domain.  It is where I must do my healing and I am fully appreciative of the hard work that went in to creating my special place.  I had pushed myself to create the space so I figure that I have every right to call myself Queen of the Small Gardens.  It was my doing and now I shall take refuge here.  

  While basking in the sunshine this morning, I saw that the frogs and toads that visit the gardens nightly have been busy.  Hundreds upon hundreds of tiny tadpoles are in Puddle Pond.  This makes me happy as I know that the project can be considered a success if the critters feel at home in it.  Most folks would have dumped some fancy goldfish or tropical fish in the little pond but it suits me fine to have local critters here.  The frogs are just as adorable and they help out in the gardens by eating a lot of unwanted pests.

  Puddle Pond is a delightful place to watch my little tadpoles as they grow and change to froglets!  It is only about 18 inches deep so the clear waters allow me to view the babies with ease.  Ahh, a bit of hard work has paid off.  I feel rewarded.

Puddle Pond is Back!

  The hard work is paying off.  I am finally starting to see results from about a week of shoveling gravel, digging holes and running tubing.   I had decided to dig out the gutter drain and turn it into a "fake" creek with a small pool at the end.  Since we live on a hill, getting the water to run into the tiny pond was easy enough but digging the gravel drain to put in a liner was a ton of heavy work.  Old ladies should not be doing heavy work.  I found out this after just the first day!  Every muscle in my body was sore!  Even muscles that I did not know I had were sore!!  The days after that initial go were not too bad.  I guess I became used to hurting and did not feel it as bad. 

  All of this hard work came about because of a sweet friend.  Ann came by with a gift of a garden sign dubbing the place "Ruthie's Refuge".  Well, you cannot have a sign calling something a refuge without it at least being a soothing place to be.  I have long wanted my little "babbling brook" back ever since it stopped flowing several years ago.  The liner went bad in what I called "Puddle Pond" and I had no time nor energy to replace it.  Ann's encouragement kicked me in gear and things are getting accomplished finally.  

  Now, all that is needed is the aesthetic touches that will bring this part of the yard to life.  A bit of lighting, some flowering plants and maybe a pretty bird feeder are next on the list to find their way into the "Refuge".  Then, I can pull up my comfy wicker chair and enjoy being in my own little happy spot.

Only 190 Feet To Go!

  Son and I started doing the heavy repairs on the pier.  Of course, he is doing most of the work and I am there to simply lend a hand lifting the heavy planks or running back up the hillside to get a different tool.  First thing was to replace some of the long stringers on which the planks sit.  This is not an easy job as we have to first remove all of the planks, knock out the broken 3 x 12s then replace those and start anew with planking.  Needless to say, this is a time-consuming and now very hot job.  There is no shade and for the past few days, our temperatures have been in the mid 90s.   Hot and hard work, for sure!  It is times like this that make me want to put the pier completely off limits to those who wish to come  fishing.  All of the folks who have used the pier in the past are sure not coming around to lend a helping hand when it is needed.  But...we are used to that.  We will get it repaired.  After all, we only have about 190 feet left to rebuild!  Not too bad.

  Along about noontime, a loud splashing in the shallows alerted us to some critter making a quick escape.  We have yet to figure out just what darted, swam or fluttered through the small inlet cut and across the tidepool.  Whatever it was, it made a hasty retreat under the marsh mats left by the storm.  These mats are a good foot deep and some twenty to thirty feet across.  They are floating on about 10 inches of water making a nice covering for the critters.  During one water break, Son and I sat talking about those mats.  "You know, if we had some way of pouring resin on the mats, they would make a great outdoor rug." he said.  I stared at him and pondered if his musings were serious or simply a way of confusing his old mom.  He then went further..."We could actually put enough resin on them and make floating piers!"  Ok, with that, I knew that he was joking as I cannot imagine pouring that much resin on anything...but...maybe??  Floating piers may be easier to take care of during storms.  We could tie it off to the large oak trees in the yard and let it float right on up in the yard with the storm surge.  Getting it back out may be a problem but if the size of these mats is any indication, we could always just make new piers.  Whoa!  Ideas were flowing until Son started laughing and said "Back to work."

  The pier work started again and we finally got one section ripped up and the underparts repaired.  It is surprising how Cristobal, as a tropical storm, did so much damage to the piers in the area.  Ours has been racked from one side to the other, end platform broken loose and shattered and nigh on a hundred planks will need to be replaced.  We might as well be building a new pier.  (At least the posts are reasonably sound.) 

It Tried....

  A few years back, we had a very hard freeze for this far south.  Normally, the Deep South's winters are warm and to have a hard freeze for any a length of time is devastating.  This time, the temperatures nosedived to the low teens and stayed that way for 3 days.  It was hard.  Not so much hard for us as we have the two woodburning stoves to keep the Little Bayou House cozy but hard on the critters of the Bayou and on the plants.  Our citrus trees took a beating.  I was ready to call it quits and chop the whole grove out and use the trees as firewood.  The wise words of Son kept me from doing that.  The trees did come back and only a few had major problems.  Our lime trees and lemon trees came back as something between.  They were not limes.  They were not lemons.  We dubbed them "limons".   It fit as the taste was sort of a blend between the two. 

  The trees did well and produced heavily but not nearly so as this year.  This spring, the branches were snow white with blossoms!  Then, the small fruit appeared and the poor trees were overloaded.  Suddenly, every leaf on our limon trees dropped!  The fruit remained but nary a leaf was on the trees.  Finally, the fruit fell to the ground during a high wind.  The limons were knotty, heavily seeded and bitter.  Not a one was worth eating.

  This afternoon as I was out hiking, my path took me through the citrus grove.  The limon trees all have died.  The trees are dried and brittle.  This got me to pondering about all of those inedible fruits.  Obviously, the trees were laboring and knew that it was time to try reproducing.  By making so many seeds, the trees had a chance of at least a few sprouting.  These would replace the dead trees during that circle of life thing.  

  I will miss the limon trees but will take the opportunity to tidy up the grove a bit before replacing the trees.  All of the citrus trees need a good fertilizing and perhaps some pruning.  Now is a good time to get busy.  Son...this time, they've got to go.  There is no "willing" them back to life any more.

Being Old is Hard Work

  I am not accustomed to this "dog sitting".  No, I do not mean the normal type where you take care of someone's pet while they are away.  I am talking of literally sitting here with a dog.  Old Mr. PJ has had his surgery to remove a rather large tumor from his leg but, now, he does not want me more than ten feet from him.  If I move the least bit, he panics and tries to follow.  He is supposed to rest...I get no rest.  Well, maybe I am getting too much of sitting even though I do not find it restful.  I am not used to sitting for any length of time and it is driving me bonkers.  I realize this is not his fault but it is tiring.  During this sitting, I have to keep a constant watch on him so he does not pull at the staples in his leg. Yes, he does have that cone thing on his head but this dog is smart.  He has figured out that if he squirms enough to get the cone pushed back far enough on his neck and then contorts himself in almost a pretzel position...he can reach the wound!  Oh, my.  He is also smart enough to know when I doze off at night so he can start his maneuvers.  I think he plots this all day so he watches...watches and plots until I nod off.  Thankfully, the cone is made of plastic and I can hear when he starts his squirming.

  Like I said, I am not one to just sit around.  This sitting and my lifting the dog has given me a severe backache which does not want to go away.  Several times today, he collapsed as his legs just gave out from under him.  To keep him from hurting the bad leg any further, I always tried to catch him before he fell.  Sixty pounds of dead weight is not an easy catch for someone my age and it is starting to show.  There is not much I can do about it, however, as this has to continue for the next two weeks.  Hopefully by then, he will be well enough to do things for himself.  Hopefully, my back holds out.  It ain't easy being old!

Living on the Bayou

  The tropical system that went inland west of us did not do considerable damage to our place.  We did, however, wind up with a mess in the front yard.  As with any rough weather, debris from the marsh is washed ashore and our pier takes a beating.  Most of the time, the pier withstands the winds fine but, if you throw in a bit of high tide, the boards just cannot take the pounding.  Planks will lift off and go floating into the marsh.  Some can be retrieved and reused but others will never be seen again,  The marsh claims the boards and they soon become part of the "fill" as marsh shoots penetrate the boards and anchor them.  Birds use these boards as resting spots, otters will find them handy as "tables" to crack shells, snakes soak up a bit of sunshine while basking on them and fiddler crabs burrow deep beneath them.  This is our loss and we have to replace those missing planks but, in an odd way, is the marsh denizens gain.

  Although the pier only lost a small number of planks, the work involved in replacing them is a bit labor intensive.  It is not a problem as it come with living on the water in a place where hurricanes are a way of life.  In a way, this could be considered a blessing in disguise as we have been meaning to replace a good bit of the structural parts beneath the planking for some time now.  The wear and tear of waves requires a constant upkeep.  Replacing planking is the easy part.

  This afternoon as the waters receded, a number of planks could be seen lodged in the marsh.  These are just a reminder of what storms can do and how blessed we are that this one was not worse.  The next one?  Who knows?  We do know there will always be the "next" one and will always prepare accordingly.  It comes with the territory.  Its part of living on the Bayou.  I would not trade it for anything.

Was That Even A Compliment???

  After painting the screen doors, it was time to crank up the old lawnmower and head to the woods.  I was becoming bored with the same old hiking paths so it was my intentions to start a new one.  The underbrush was thick and pushing that old mower through was one tough job but I was relentless!  I figured if I wanted a hiking path so I could get exercise, creating the path would give me just as good of a workout.  It did!  I gnawed through that underbrush like it was no one's business! I pushed.  I pulled.  I walked a good 20,000+ steps.  (Yes.  I did wear a step counter...20,704 steps today.)  Almost 4 hours later, I was purely exhausted!  I figured I had done enough for one day.  In fact, I was rather proud of the whole effort.  My new path was looking good and the walking meter said it was a little over 7 miles.  Oh, I am good!  Oh, I feel great (tired but great!).  Oh, I accomplished something!

  Just after returning the push mower to its designated "parking" spot, Son stopped working on house repairs long enough to share a glass of water with me.  "You know, Mom.  You are not doing half bad for a woman your age." he deadpanned.  Ok.  I took that as a compliment...for a short moment.  Then, it hit me.  "For a woman your age"....was that an underhanded punch to the gut??  Am I THAT old that I have reached "woman of your age" status?    Hmmm.  I think he meant it as a compliment...right?  Ok, so I admit it.  I am old but did he have to remind me?  

  Aside from the conversation that left me perplexed, I still felt good about my work.  The new path is coming along nicely.  It will require a good bit more work with the mower and then a saw and snips will come into play.  There are a lot of low limbs that need to be cleared to make the path safe.  Hopefully, this old lady can keep the current burst of energy going for a bit longer.

Garden Varmints!

  Well, this is it.  This, my friends, shows the results of time and work.  The picture shows the entirety of green beans in the garden.  No, this is not all of the seeds that I planted.  In fact, the pole bean seeds were overcrowded in the two rows.  This, however, is the whole shebang.  What happened?  Did the seeds just not sprout?  Were they all duds?  Nope.  A fine, little friend decided to help himself to my seeds.  Ugh!  Varmints!  While I adore all of my critter friends, when they start eating my garden, they become varmints! 

  After patiently waiting nigh on two weeks for the seeds to sprout and only getting two plants, I started watching.  Nothing happened during the day.  Nothing happened in the late afternoon.  It was those early hours that found the culprit busy at work.  Even after cleaning the row, the little squirrel still dug frantically to find more seeds.  That rascal cleaned my bean row of every last seed except these two.  Two plants will never make a mess for supper and surely won't provide enough to home can!

  While this is bad news about the beans, it is only a harbinger of what is to come.  I can pretty much count on the same squirrel (and friends) to raid the garden once the tomatoes, peaches and figs ripen.  Since I am not much on killing critters, I will have to find other ways to divert their attention.  None of the scare tactics work.  The flashing, sparkly pans dangling in the tree limbs were ignored and the decoy snakes and owls were used as perches.  In fact, one rubber snake actually was used to line a nest!  I have tried to convince Ms. Nycto, the Bayou Princess (cat), to stay in the garden but she would rather snooze on the sofa.  The old dog, Mr. PJ, has no energy to chase squirrels, so he is not a help.  I am at wit's end searching for a solution.  In the meantime, the seeds will be replanted and perhaps some wire mesh placed over the rows.  Something has to help!