Acair Fearann

again! Happy April Fool’s Day or something.

Did get a bit of work done in the barn though. Dismantled the old kiln, salvaging much of the firebrick, the wiring harness and the top for alternative uses. Amazing how much space that freed up. Of course, we promptly put a fifth wheel hitch into some of that space, but that is a remarkably small and movable object. So space was actually gained!

Of course, it did require the front end loader to get the kiln out of the barn and onto the pick-up truck. And some hefty chain. But, progress here and there, little by little. And always pleasant to spend an afternoon Doing an actual project.

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(their bees actually)

The crocus tried to come up in February and got nailed back down through all of March, but they were up and blooming today* all along the fence. Mostly early species crocus, I’ve had a devil of the time with the rodents chewing their way through the area (which is daylilies later in the year). But some have survived.**

You could hear the bees from about ten feet away. Every single open flower (and some that weren’t, literally I watched one bee trying to pry a flower open!) hosted a bee, with others buzzing about. Pretty neat. And not just the neighbor’s honeybees, but a number of smaller pollinator types. The rodents may defeat me there; but it is so fun to see the bees, who were clearly so very hungry, that I am going to figure out a better location for the crocus.

*it might snow tomorrow….sigh. There are still snow patches in the very middle of the field, full sun!

** hundreds if I actually counted

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Happy Birthday to the original Big Red:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_o%27_War

And an interesting video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t704d8ARGrc

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me scrubbing stairs is hardly an exciting thing….

Here is a cartoon from a few years back, from the guest book, right now the ice on the pond in question is still there and rather rotten, no fishing parties yet:

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One hemlock: gone. One black cherry: gone. Three ashes: gone.  All little guys, no more than a generous eight to ten inches in diameter (the cherry was four). The hemlock was interfering with the power line rather badly, the ashes (and the cherry which had to go to get the ashes) were just simply in the wrong spot. And also either close to power lines or close to trees we didn’t want to squish. Which was why I hired the job out to a guy with a bucket truck.

Now to reassess the areas and figure out what is really best suited to be there. I should probably rebuild that fence again, which runs through one of the areas in question. It was a nice fake zig zag, but it was made with sugar maple poles some years ago, and has rather fallen apart. Sugar maple rots remarkably quickly, even in a fence where it isn’t touching the ground.

Something to contemplate while waiting for this snow to melt.

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Since the weather isn’t cooperating in the slightest. Contemplating the best way to deal with the walk up from the barn….it has to be something a good sized snow blower can deal with. Shovels are out. Something that isn’t slippery, something that works nicely in the informal landscape, but is a straight path (see snowblower).

Possibly poured concrete, maybe with brick headers set to break the monotony and to be decent expansion joints. Maybe with a brick or stone turnaround at the top? Poured concrete is the most cost effective, despite the challenge of pouring it, but getting it to look good…that requires thought.

Still the mud doesn’t work, and shoveling….well for a lot of reasons I’m aiming at long term, labor saving improvements that will let either older people, or one person, deal with the place sensibly. The upfront costs are probably less than the long term ones, and as long as the aesthetic trade-off is minimal it makes sense. (in this case it is a positive in any sense, since Mud) The visuals haven’t quite clicked yet, but I daresay they will.  Who knows, maybe we will even deal with the power lines at the same time!

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I always have a justification for never getting around to washing the windows: it cuts down on the number of bird strikes. Sadly, once in awhile they do happen.

Yesterday I found this guy splayed out beneath a window looking rather drunk. Sitting very quietly in my hand in a warm sunny spot, first with a hand over his eyes, than just wrapped up, and then perched on a finger, for about ten minutes did the trick. (I didn’t want to leave him in the snow since a) it was cold and damp, and b) the neighborhood cat had just been down at the barn.) He finally perked up and flew off to the peach tree looking vaguely puzzled but no worse for it. The trick to picking any bird up is to get over the wings and in front of the feet with most of your fingers. The feet are the tricky bit, ideally you want to end up with them correctly positioned in your hand so that they can cling comfortably. But first is to get the wings controlled. Using your other hand to shade the eyes is also a good thing.

One of our prettiest sparrows:

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Fox_Sparrow/id

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Old field stone wall, plowed to the uphill side, rough pasture to the down hill side.

This was taken in January….if I went to take this picture today, I would need snowshoes and the wall would be buried!

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Not much happening here! Waiting for spring mostly and being utterly consumed by work and an independent project.

Hopefully, that should even out next week in time for better weather and then we can see what is left of the gardens. Good thing we didn’t get ahead of ourselves and take any leaves off of things out there. March always takes longer than it ought. One gets impatient.

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Two feet, but close. And not melting anytime soon. March in New England can throw a wobbly with the best of them! It is awfully odd to see things looking and feeling like January, but with the wrong sun angle. We are awfully, awfully sensitive to that bright yellow thing up there in the sky!

May it all melt slowly and gently and at least take the edge off this persistent drought.

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