By the Tips of Their Tails!

  Recently I have been bemoaning the fact that the Cedar Waxwings have not made their yearly appearance on the Bayou.  I worried about them.  Usually, by this time of year, the birds have come and devoured every berry in sight and have filled the treetops with their whistling calls.  I have missed them.  But, then again, perhaps I am pushing the seasons once again and perhaps the birds are on time....I am not.  But I do not think so.  If I remember rightly, January is the month for these birds to grace the Bayou with their presence.  It is now late February and they are finally here.  This morning as I waited on Mark to join me for our morning hike, I heard the familiar calls high in the oak tree near the pier. Hundreds of the birds were filling every branch of the tall tree.  I had to sit right down and listen to them for a while.  It made me smile.  Having old friends return is good for the soul.

  Here's one for you!  A bit of bird trivia to lighten and brighten your day can be found right here! The Cedar Waxwings that were visiting today had yellow tips on their tails.  While there is nothing unusual about the yellow tips (Cedar Waxwings have yellow tipped tails), some birds have been seen with darker orange tips.  It seems that the change coloring is somewhat recent (in the study of ornithology anyway) appearing during the 1960s.  Scientists have discovered that the orange tips are a result of the birds eating red berries of a certain honeysuckle that was introduced to the United States during that time.  If a bird eats the berries while growing tail feathers, the feathers are tipped in orange.  Eating red berries changed their tail colors!  Imagine that!  I wonder if I ate those berries, it would cover some of the gray in my hair??  Maybe??

  Another bit of trivia....since the Cedar Waxwings are fruit eaters, they sometimes get into a batch of overripe berries.  This is not good. Overripe berries have a tendency to be fermenting thus creating alcohol. Let a flock of Cedar Waxwings devour a bunch of alcohol laden berries and you have drunk birds.  While that may not seem too very drastic, it can be. Some birds die from ingesting the rotten, fermenting berries.  

  The thought of intoxicated birds brings back a memory from my childhood on the farm.  Back behind Pop's big shed there was a huge mulberry tree.  My brother and I used to climb the tree to pick the berries for Mom.  One day while sitting in the tree, we noticed that the chickens below us were acting a mite strange.  They were wobbling and falling and clucking their fool heads off like a bunch of crazy birds.  Pop explained to us that the chickens were all drunk from eating the rotten mulberries that had fallen to the ground and we were warned never to eat any that "tasted strange" or we might act just like those drunk chickens.  That terrified me!  I did not want to go around falling and clucking.  Nope...no rotten mulberries for me!

  Back to the Cedar Waxwings....I am sure glad that they made an appearance on the Bayou.  It is only a matter of time before they will strip every berry dangling on any vine and then be off on their journey homeward to nest.  Thanks for stopping by, Birds! Safe travels!

All around the Mulberry Tree......

  A couple of years ago, I found a small mulberry sapling growing alongside of the driveway.  I assumed that this was "planted" by a bird that came to visit the yard after dining upon mulberries somewhere in the vicinity.  To say I was pleased would be putting it mildly.  I was simply ecstatic!  Having wild mulberries within easy picking range led to thoughts of all sorts of culinary possibilities.  Then I found another tiny sapling on the other side of the house!  Woohoo!  I was one happy camper!

   Both saplings grew like bad weeds!  Now they are a towering eighteen feet in the air and this morning, Mark and I saw blooms!  The larger of the two trees was covered with the spiky stems covered with tiny flowers.  This means my trees are healthy and are happy where they are planted.  Not that a tree has a whole lot of say where it is positioned but still having a happy fruit tree usually means bountiful fruit!  BUT!  I was told that my blooms are "male" blooms and will not produce the desired berrylike fruit.  Hmmm.  Hopefully, the smaller sapling is a female? Either way, I am quite sure that I can convince Mark to get me another tree if need be.  He loves mulberries about as much as I do!

  Mulberries can be used in the same way you use any other berry.  Pies, jams, jellies, juice or just plucked from the tree, it matters not.  It is sort of like have a huge berry patch but without all of the work or space. Since the tree grows up, not a lot of ground space is used.  Plus, that backbreaking job of picking berries close to the ground makes mulberries all the more enjoyable!

A Southern Girl Experiences Ice!

Day three of the mess of ice.  I say "mess of ice" because that is what it is now.  No more pretty white, snowlike stuff blankets the yard.  Now there are patches of slick, brickhard stuff that will make you fall in a moment.  I have learned quickly that it is far safer to step in the slush than to ever worry about keeping the moccasins dry.  Of course, that does have the downside of making the feet like little chunks of ice but at least I have held my balance throughout the course of this storm.  Today's much warmer temperature did indeed melt a bit of the ice but still much is to be found about the yard and on the board path.  I did not realize that in the backyard, the ground beneath the fruit trees is a good three inches thick still.  Mark and I ventured out back to check the trees only to be met with some good old fashioned slipping and sliding!  It was sort of fun! (Perhaps I would not say that had I fallen but a few hasty grips on low limbs helped tremendously!)

To show just how deep the sleet built up on the north side of the house, I took a picture of a small garden sign that one of the kids stuck in the ground years ago.  The thing is supposed to read "Secret Garden" underneath the pretty embossed flowers.  The letters are about two inches tall with a nice border going around that part.  From the picture, you can see that the "Secret Garden" must be quite secret!  Even the bottom six inches of the sign has become hidden!

 

And then there is my prized sapling!  Poor baby is covered with icicles almost as large as the tree itself!  I have had folks tell me in the past that coating a tree with ice intentionally will protect it from being damaged by the frigid temperature.  Well, I did not do this to my poor tree but Mother Nature must have thought it would be a fine thing to do.  The tiny tree bravely stands supporting the weight of icicles with a circumference the same size as its trunk!  I sure hope this little one survives.  I sure hope all of the fruit trees survive.  It definitely has been hard on them this year.

 

One of the things that struck me as being a tad weird was just how green the tiny mosses were even when subjected to temperatures down in the teens.  With everything else in the yard either coated in ice or burned by the cold, the moss stands out as a bit of loveliness.  Perhaps mosses have a built in antifreeze system or something but none were the least bit damaged by the cold.  I am now fully considering carpeting the yard with moss instead of grass!

By tomorrow, the ice should be gone and we can gather more firewood for the next winterlike weather to hit the Bayou.  Some kind folks are saying that this should be as soon as midweek.  Well, I will take it as it comes and remind myself to make sure to check the persimmon seeds this next fall. This years examination of the seeds is holding true.  The spoon shape inside predicted cold, snowy, icy weather and I must say the seven seeds are dead on track.  Persimmon seeds do not lie!

Mulberries!

Is it just me or does everyone get excited over trees? I was out and about between the rain showers when I found what I thought was a Mulberry Tree. Now, not having seen one since I was a child...and like most children, I was not overly observant...I was not certain that I was correct in my identification. I took pictures of the leaves and waltzed myself in to look it up on the computer. Yep...as far as I can tell..Mulberry! This makes me ecstatic..or at least mildly happy.. I now will have another fruit tree in the yard. Come this winter, I will dig up the small tree and transplant it somewhere in the yard as right now, it is growing right on the side of the driveway. This will at some point prove to be a tad unhealthy for the small tree..someone is sure to drive right over it and that would be the end of Mulberry time for me.

As a child, I can remember climbing up among the branches of a very large Mulberry Tree that grew behind my dad's shed. My brother and I would sit in those branches and eat the gooey black berries until we were literally sick! It mattered not to us that each berry we popped in our mouth had not been washed and more likely than not, contained a worm in its center! We picked and ate...and..dyed our shirts at the same time. I know Mom really must have appreciated the purple stains! Eventually, he and I would get the giggles over some inane thing and tumble from the tree. This was not entirely our fault..come to find out, the unripe fruit are purported to be mildly hallucinogenic! Not to mention, the older, overripe fruit ferment quickly. We were probably a bit "drunk" and didn't even know what it meant! We should have had some clue about this as our chickens would always wobble around a bit after eating all of the overripe berries that had dropped to the ground. But then, again, to children, chickens always wobble so it did not sink in our heads that it could possibly be an effect of the Mulberries! I just remember the super sweetness of the ripe fruit.

I am a bit perplexed at what I have read about the Mulberry Tree. Some sources tout the leaves of the tree as edible and that they actually can be used as a way to control blood sugar levels and hence Diabetes. On the other hand, other sources say the leaves are toxic! I have found recipes for "Stuffed Mulberry Leaves" and "Mulberry Leaf Tea". Both of these, I would love to try but not if I am going to get deathly ill! More research is to be done! Regardless of the edibility of the leaves, the tree will be transplanted to the yard for the use of the ripe berries.