Wildlife

I spent a few hours in the upper vineyard this morning doing some much needed weeding around the base of the vines. I got through 6 of the 10 rows… oh, and that weeding was by HAND. I actually expected to  be at that job for about a week, but it went way faster than I thought. During my evening stroll with Pepper, I came back up to the vineyard to inspect the vines and discovered Lady Bugs! This is great. Lady Bugs are natural pest eaters and they are always welcome on our property. I have not seen a ton of them out in the wild, but after a brief inspection, I counted 7 tonight. Breed, Lady Bugs, breed!

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It’s another cold, rainy, depressing day here at the vineyard but I was happy to see the hoop house temp climb up to 70º, even though the outside temps didn’t leave the 50s and there was no sun whatsoever. I entered the hoop house this morning to uncover all the plants from their evening fabric layers and was shocked… Something ate my cucurbits! It was most likely a mouse, maybe several mice; I’m not sure… but well over half of the 375 potted cucurbits were dug into and the beautiful, plump, just-sprouting seeds were methodically pulled from their casings. I brought a few of the less damaged trays inside tonight just to be safe and I left a nice, big, electronic mouse zapper, loaded with dog food and peanut butter, right in the middle of the rest of the trays. Maybe I can rent a barn cat for a few weeks while the seeds all germinate.

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Today was a cold, rainy day and I didn’t feel like farming. After some indoor business I needed to take care of, I took Pepper for a stroll through the woods. I’ve been walking through the woods here for the past three years, but this is the first time I’ve come across a Lady’s Slipper… and these were in full bloom. I found about 20 of them spread across about an acre of sloping, rocky, west-facing woodland. It was a nice lift to an otherwise dreary day.

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