Wednesday, August 3, 2011

309 Good and Bad and Better......

They always face the east, every day all day long. My sunflowers don't follow the sun east to west like I thought they would. They just stand there facing east, which is fine with me. I planted them a couple months ago for bird seed this next winter...they will stand tall above the snow drifts and Quail, Cardinals and maybe Bluejays will be well fed if I should happen to be gone for a time now and then. I complained to the my Wildlife Biologist Dean Zimmerman about not being able to attract Pheasants to my 5 acre parcel of Native Grasses I have had for 14 years now. He said, "well if you want them I can tell you this you have to feed them". In other words have food available for them to eat all winter. Then and probably only then will they look your place over and maybe decide to "hang out".....so here is my effort I have about a quarter acre of these pretty sunflowers and even if I don't get the big birds it will be fun to watch the songbirds maybe enjoy these seeds. Thus the "good" of this story today.
For the bad we need to go no further than my corn fields. We have been very dry and very hot all through the month of July with exception of one half inch of rainfall about 10 days back. My corn crop is surely hurt pretty bad. It is stressful to say the least. Farmers have a natural tendancy to kind of take on a little stress when the crops are doing likewise....Until a month ago I truly thought I was headed to my very highest yield ever so far. In one short hot dry month I think I am looking at maybe no more than half a crop. And compared to say TEXAS well half a crop may well be better than no crop at all...notice the cracks in the soil, some places it does not crack open quite this much but the ground is dry and cracked everywhere to some extent...We really need a good rain of 2 inches or more to even start to help this crop. We got 2 tenths of an inch last night but I noticed that none of it reached the soil and was stopped by the corn foliage which maybe bought me another day or two who know. Rain now is going to be too late to increase yields back...but maybe a good one will at least stop the deterioration....
Now for the better of the all of this lets go to the beach...my little paradise right here at home. It has gotten lots of use this season. I have been able to control the algae this year maybe for several reasons, I am not sure. I have a circulation pump running 24/7 and along with my AC in the house has resulted in my first over 200 electric bill since I have lived here. Also we dipped a lot of silt out of the pond last fall and I think that also had an effect on my water quality this year...For whatever reason my fish seem to be very happy living in this water..And I too am very happy to share with family, catch and eat fish, evening swims and in general enjoying the better the best....

Please if you have not clicked on the title above and watched the next Ronald Reagan do yourself a favor and do so....Jack

3 comments:

Jane Polley said...

Hey I have an idea as to why your sunflowers face East all the time: I believe God's creation knows it is time for HIS return, so they are keeping their faces toward the East from where HE will be coming from! I also believe we should be doing the same because: OUR REDEMPTION IS DRAWING NIGH!!

Happy Hoosier said...

A couple others have shared that same thought Jane....I think you just could be right....Me and the Sunflowers are looking east....

Lorri said...
This comment has been removed by the author.