Critters

 I don’t know about you but since Elsa paid us a visit on July 7th, I have had an over-abundance of wildlife critters in and around my yard and sometimes in my house. The entrance to my subdivision, including three homes, were flooded by Elsa’s heavy torrential rains. I was shanghaied and unable to partake of the “outside” world for four days as I watched the water slowly recede into a super-saturated earth. Thankfully, my home was high enough, farther up the street, and outside the inundation of water.

But back to the critters. My first notice of a slight change in my own little ecosystem involved some herbs I had planted in pots near my back porch, dill to be specific. Each day I puzzled how instead of getting bushier, they were getting thinner so I at last took a closer look and discovered caterpillars on three of the stems, eastern black swallowtails, a friend in the know told me.

After they devoured every last feathery green leaf of the dill, they went on to my parsley but were sated before the plant was stripped. This was on July 10th.

And then, on August 28th, I managed to snap a phone shot of this little guy on my 

penta plant. I think it posed just for me.

As I understand it, most people plant butterfly gardens especially for this process but my butterflies came by chance of Elsa I think.

I also have had sightings of two black racers (snakes). One caught me by surprise as I opened my porch door to step outside. It “raced” under my foot trying to get away from the huge thing coming at it! Now I am careful to rattle the door before opening it. Before I was widowed all these wildlife problems would have been out of my range of responsibility, but now I have had to “brave up” and take care of things myself. Snakes always scared me and I would be lying to say they do not scare me now, but it is a different level of scared and with a little reading and understanding, I realize I need to share this planet whenever possible. My mantra has become “if you don’t bother me, I won’t bother you”.

Wasps also have invaded my space more than usual since Elsa, the paper kind and maybe some yellow jackets. I have tried to dissuade them from coming into my porch by spraying peppermint (a web thing) but they are diligent and keep hanging around. I have decided to wait for cold weather. Again, my mantra.

Yesterday, another critter came to visit. As I made my way to the kitchen to start breakfast, my eyes lit on the intruder sitting below a rocking chair in my family room, not a frog but a toad, and how he got in is a mystery. I got my broom and thought I might herd him out the door but he was too fast and scooted under another chair out of sight. I went to the web and discovered an upside down bucket with a cover slid under it (I used a pan splatter screen) was the solution but it took me almost two hours to catch the little devil. It did work though and he is happily back to roaming the outside world again.

Don’t let anyone tell you days of retirement are uneventful. Each morning brings a new surprise and keeps me on my toes for which I am very thankful. All creatures are here for a reason and have as much right to be here as I do. Taking the life of any creature is a thing I desperately try not to do...except mosquitoes, that is.

How Do You Feel About Trees

 

How do you feel about trees? Love them, hate them, indifferent to them? I have thirteen pines, big ones, in my backyard. Yes, an unlucky number, but I don’t believe in that stuff, although one is giving me some cause for concern.

A few years ago I had three backyard pines cut down which were too close to the house for peace of mind, and one had water inside (found after the fact). All of them were over ninety feet tall and over forty years old. My fence had to be taken down for access and huge equipment invaded my property leaving their marks of intrusion for months to come. For a few days I was as the cliche says, “a nervous wreck.” It was not a happy time and not something I will lightly agree to again.

But back to my problem tree. It also is nearing one hundred feet to its tippy top, curving and twisting its way to the heavens, and that is one of the causes of my concern. Pine trees like mine should not curve. It does have plenty of luxurious healthy-looking pine needles on the heavy branches of its uppermost parts. Woodpeckers, however, have been attracted to it, and a wiggly line of their drilling is marking its lower third. That worries me, too.

But I am a lover of trees and wildlife, and I am wrestling with the first step of calling a tree service because I know what they will say, “Cut it down.” How many living things will that displace? Thousands, maybe millions. Is it really necessary? Will I regret not having it cut down later, later when the frenzy of Hurricane what’s its name is raging all around me and the upper part of the trunk is swaying to and fro in the fierce winds and rain? Probably.

I wouldn’t call myself a tree hugger but I do have a special love and respect for trees, having been known to take photos of leafless winter trees, lonely trees, trees in fall colors and spring greens, trees heavy with pecans, and trees that have fallen in storms whose upended roots reminded me of wild hairdos. So many trees, forests even, have been sacrificed to civilization right here in our own fair town that the thought of cutting down another for my own benefit seems so selfish.

Trees seem so dispensable nowadays. They used to be much more important. I am thinking of the turpentine industry in the very early 1900s. It could be that the seed from which my “problem” pine grew is a relative of one of those early pines, and that story that I wrote years ago about my mom putting turpentine on a lump on my head when I fell down the stairs, well, suppose that turpentine came from a tree that grew right in my backyard. I know, silly, but possible.

And so, I am thinking more than twice about removing my twisting pine. Maybe its destiny is to fall or snap during a storm and do some damage, but how would I know that for certain, and is it my call anyway?

Wakulla Springs

I went on a bus trip with other seniors a few weeks ago to Wakulla Springs near Tallahassee, Florida. As soon as I heard the words “boat ride included”, I was ready to go. And the mention of Wakulla Springs brought back the memory of a book I had read, Murder at Wakulla Springs by a local author and environmentalist, M. D. Abrams. My curiosity was peaked.

We pulled out of Gainesville around 8:30 and traveled via 441and I-10 for most of the trip, weaving and winding through little back roads to reach our final destination. We arrived at the springs, which is a State-owned park, just in time for lunch, mine to be a tasty vegetable and pasta alfredo with garlic bread, a tossed salad with balsamic vinaigrette dressing, and key lime pie for dessert. A ranger familiarized us with the history and layout of the springs as our food settled. I learned Wakulla was originally made famous through the writings of John Muir in 1867. The Lodge where we ate was a sort of hotel, restaurant, and gift shop combination with beautiful old-style Spanish architecture, lots of marble, mosaics, arches, a 16-foot Cyprus beamed ceiling, and a red-tiled roofline, truly beautiful in its natural woodsy setting.

As I ate, if I looked out the lovely arched windows across the green lawn, I could see the springs where several people were swimming and sun bathing. There were two huge wooden decks in the water for sunning or jumping off and another two-tier deck for diving into the now tannin-colored river. We were told the water temperature of the springs was a consistent 68-70 degrees and although normally crystal-clear, it was tea-colored now because of recent rainfall.

The Wakulla River which originates at the springs and where we would have our 45-minute boat ride was the best part of the trip. Forty-three of us split up into two covered and flat-bottomed slow-moving tour boats. We leisurely made our way a few miles downstream as our pilot, actually another park ranger, pointed out all kinds of wildlife. We saw anhingas, egrets, ibis, all kinds of ducks, herons, bitterns, limpkins, turtles and so many others I can't remember them all. Florida alligators rested or slept on every little sandbar sticking above the waterline and a rather rowdy one swam directly across the path of our boat. The literature boasted 182 different seasonal birds and I believe them. It was truly a nature-lovers paradise.

As our ride neared its end, we circled the springs and were surprised to see a gator gliding along the edge of the roped-off swimming area. Our ranger navigated our boat so we were behind the wily creature and he successfully "herded" him back out into the river as we and the divers watching from the deck breathed a sigh of relief, I think, or maybe it was "old hat" to them. I don't think I'd want to go swimming there, but what a beautiful place it was.

A thunderstorm came up as we docked and the second boat's ride was cut short, coming in right behind us. The swimming area was closed and the lightning drove all of us inside just as the rain began...on to the gift shop where there was an old-fashioned soda fountain in back of a long marble bar. Candies of yesteryear festooned the top and I overheard many talking about sugar daddies and candy cigarettes. We spent the rest of our trip there parting with a few dollars and enjoying homemade scoops of ice cream, one with the unusual name of “muddy shoes”. I hesitated to try that one opting instead for my old favorite of mint chocolate chip.

Our driver escorted each and every one of us to the bus via a big black umbrella when it was time to head back home. It continued to rain as we pulled out, and we didn't see sunshine again until we got back to Gainesville around 6:30, everyone eager to get up and out and stretch. At home Mopsy greeted me at the door with her chastising expression like she was ready to read me the riot act...or maybe not. I think she had just wakened from a long nap, but soon she realized she was hungry and everything was back to normal again.