It Is NOT Spring!

  Our winter has not been.  We are sitting at about 70 degrees here tonight and each day has been much the same.  We do have the occasional dip in the temperatures which puts us down into the 30s but those times have been far apart.  This unusually warm time has most of the critters around the Bayou in a state of confusion.  Birds are nesting, fur bearing critters are shedding their winter coats and snakes are out and about.  Today, I saw evidence of another bit of wannabe spring.  

  I opened the front door to be engulfed in a huge swarm of flying ants.  Ugh!  I immediately stepped back indoors, shut the doors tightly and raced to get the bug spray.  As much as I hate to use chemicals around the place, sometimes it is a necessity.  This was one of those times.  The ants were swarming on the east side of the house and were being wafted by the breeze right onto the french doors.  I do not need a swarm of ants inside the house!  My efforts killed a few but Mother Nature came to the rescue after a short while.

  Ants swarm during mating season and that should be anywhere from late spring until mid summer.  It should not be in January!  The ants supposedly need bright sunshine, little wind and warm temperatures.  They also prefer to swarm after several days of rain.  Well, that pretty much describes what has been happening around here lately.  That sunshine was a short lived thing, however.  Soon after I found the ants, a thunderstorm rolled through and then a heavy fog set in for the evening.  The ants may have been sorry that they were so hasty about swarming.  That rainstorm probably killed a good many of those wanting to start a new colony.  Way to go, Mother Nature!  Good job!  While we did not need more rain, that rainstorm was perfect timing!   

Alien Lifeforms???

  The other day, I saw something on social media that made me giggle.  A request was posted to "Describe 2018 in two words".  One answer was "It rained."  That, my friends, pretty much was the most accurate response that could have been made.  It rained.  And rained.  And rained.  So far, 2019 is starting out to be much the same.  This does not surprise me.  The sliced persimmon seeds predicted it.  Maybe those things are accurate...then again...maybe the rain caused the persimmon seeds to appear the way they did.  Still, to be honest, I find it great.  Rain is good no matter how you look at it.

  The copious amounts of rain has caused the ground to be a bit soggy and with the warm weather, this has caused profusion of fungi species to sprout up all over the place.  While some can be a bit smelly and others downright slimy, most are fascinatingly beautiful.  The hillside resembles some fantastical gnome kingdom.  Wandering the property, I keep waiting to find some happy little faerie sitting atop one of the 'srooms.  It just needs to be.  Not only are mushrooms taking over the place, mosses and lichens are flourishing, as well, in this warm. humid climate.  Down in the lower part of the front yard, an old oak tree is dropping a good many twigs that are covered with lichens of all kinds.  

  I am ever intrigued by the shapes and textures of lichens.  Some seriously remind me of an alien life form that has fallen to earth.  Contrary to what most folks believe, lichens are not parasitic plants that harm the host tree.  Instead they pretty much just use the tree for a place to anchor themselves.  They draw moisture and nutrients from the air.  They are often blamed for damaging trees since the lichens usually try to colonize on bark of twigs that are already dying.   They love damp areas with little air movement so the mugginess lately has been good to them.  Another thing that is good to know is that if you find a plethora of lichens in your trees, that usually means the air is rather clean and pure!  They prefer non-polluted areas and are rarely seen in places that cannot offer such.  Obviously, the Bayou and surrounding woods are blanketed with clean air as indicated by the overabundance of lichens!