A harpsichord, chickens, and a hummingbird

We attended another of the Cooperstown Music Festival concerts on Wednesday night. The Sebastians is a quartet with 2 violins, a cello and a harpsichord. (How does one travel with a harpsichord?) Christ Episcopal Church was the perfect setting for baroque and classical music.

We are spending some cash to get the big chicken coop fixed to prevent more midnight raids by the mink. Then we can move the 5 older hens that we have in the plastic Omlet coop to their new home, and we can replace them with the 6 new chicks from the dog crate in the garage. 

I always intended for the Omlet to be a grow-out pen, but I am thankful that we had a safe place for these adult girls when we were losing all the others.

I set up the trail camera to keep an eye on those girls. So far we have caught Zelda, Otis, deer, a skunk, and this harmless little hummingbird. He used to come with his girlfriend to the cuphea plants we buy for them every year in the backyard, but this year she showed up without him. Now I see why.

Clouds and sun(flowers)

 

When the only sun you can find is in the sunflowers…that’s good too. We needed the rain. 

When the weather is changing, like now, the mountain disappears in the background. The creek water is almost always a different temperature than the air, so we get a lot of fog back there. 

And the 2 fawns were back again for a quick bath from mom (or aunty). I am convinced, but maybe wrong, that she only had one fawn. Then a doe was killed on the road out front and a second larger one appeared.

In my perfect world, Aunty rescued the other fawn.

XI in the sky, summer music, and macroinvertebrates

There's a title I don't have to worry about repeating!

The skywriters are back mucking up the sky again just after all the smoke from Canada went away. Momma deer is unconcerned, and just finished cleaning off 2 little ones who refused to wait for their picture to be taken.

We went to the second concert in the Cooperstown Summer Music Festival—Caroga Arts Ensemble. Eddie Barbash on saxophone, Kasa Quartet on strings, plus a guitarist, drummer and bass player.

Your first question would probably be "why am I doing this?"

And then there was the training for macroinvertebrate monitoring. As if the water testing I am doing in the creek with Charlie and Pam wasn't enough, now we are learning how to capture and identify macroinvertebrates as a further test of the health of our stream(s). Let's just say it is quite the challenge to learn the difference between a net-spinning caddisfly and a midge larva when they are both about the size of a fruit fly. The easy ones were the crayfish and scuds...

Where there's smoke

Canadian wildfires are sending their smoke to us just like they did in June 2023, only this time it's supposed to be so much worse, with numbers at the very top of the scale. The large photo is from 10:45 this morning when we were still in the ugly dried-blood-colored hazard zone at 500!

Where is the hazy orange sky that you can see if you click on the link from 2023? Where is the hazy gray sky with no sun to be seen that we had yesterday when it was only at 280 on the scale?

I do prefer the blue sky, but I am staying mostly inside today to avoid any nasty stuff in the air. How can it be so bad and look so good? At least the numbers came back down to around 200 this afternoon.

We escaped the house last night and went to the first of the Cooperstown Summer Music Festival concerts—a woodwind quintet called WindSync. It was a great performance in spite of the fact that those poor musicians had to breathe in our smoky air all day.

Expressions

Cool

Silly and scared silly

It's kind of odd that 92° is considered extreme heat up here—that was average summer heat in New Jersey. Zelda found a cool spot in my bug-eaten hostas to take a nap.

We had the heat for 2 or 3 days, and then we had some wicked thunderstorms and heavy rain to wash it all away. It's still hot, but not awful.

Jessie has not been appreciating the stormy weather, and Old Man Cyrus does not understand why she doesn't want to play his silly games. (Storms? We had storms?) At least he is still silly at age 13.

And the final photo is Layla wishing you all a Happy 4th. She was not impressed with the big celebration in DC. Our little hometown fireworks are just enough fun, thank you very much.

Super silly

Clouds and elderberries

Magnificent clouds mean stormy weather that makes the nervous dog more nervous than ever. (Gabapentin is our friend.) But they do make for great photos! 

And behind that fence to the right in the top photo, is our baby forest of (mostly, or maybe all) native trees and shrubs (smaller photo). The white blooms will all soon be beautiful elderberries which are nearly impossible to make into anything useful. I might try elderflower and elderberry liqueur this year, and possibly a dye from the berries. Maybe...

Fast Friends

The Husband has been busy playing mandolin and guitar with several different companions.

This photo was Fast Friends playing at the Hop House on Father's Day afternoon. Luckily the recent stormy weather gave way to some sunshine and lots of people came out to listen.

His better paying gigs (same $$$, less time playing) tend to be at the 2 local nursing homes. Those old folks love the Boomer music and Old-Timey stuff that he plays with 2 different groups.

Stormy weather

The weather was absolutely perfect for the 5 days that my sister was here, except it did get cloudy when I was driving her to the airport. Since then we have had a lot of predicted rain, but not a lot of actual rain. Just a few windy thunderstorms—barely enough to water the garden, more than enough to scare the scaredy girl.

Jessie was just getting used to the strange lady in the house. She was just starting to think maybe visitors are okay even if they do show up in mom's car, sleep in dad's basement, come outside to her private yard.

But then the stranger went away and all hell broke loose! Thunder, lightning, wind, rain—how's a girl supposed to eat her dinner? She wouldn't even touch the fried chicken with gluten-free turkey and cranberry cookies that she likes so much. And that was with me sitting on the floor right next to her.

Her big brother Cyrus, who is really too old to climb the stairs, came up anyway to check on his little sister. He also happens to be mostly deaf, unaware of the storm, and maybe just coming up to see where that fried chicken is headed. Nice try, big guy!

Sis visit, and a vet or 2

Jo, Harry, Julie, me

My Portlandia sister came to visit for a few short days and we had a fabulous time (and perfect weather!). We met with one of her old friends from Pennsylvania, and one of my not so old friends, Dr Julie, who happens to be a veterinarian. 

We had a picnic lunch on Julie's veranda, and a meet and greet with Harry and Milo and all the other critters on her farm.

That evening, we went to Oneonta to meet Jo's friend Jamie for dinner. While we were commenting on the message on the truck parked in front of us, the owner and his very friendly dog walked up. It was a real pleasure to shake his hand. 

Dandies and birdies

The day and the dandelions are almost done

No Mow May in the back fence only. Husband insists on mowing his favorite spaces early in the year so that he can get to it before it gets this crazy tall. He's got a good point, but I like the dandelions and daffodils to go their course before we mow them all down. Even the grass is reseeding.

Obviously I don't live in New Jersey anymore. My neighbors would hate me and I most likely would get a warning from the Borough about my untended yard.

I just took down the BirdBuddy feeder/camera for the summer. There is plenty of food for the birds elsewhere, and I was mostly getting Grackles, House Finches, and House Sparrows. The camera even caught an injured Grackle who looked like he was missing an eye, but the swelling went down and his eye and head feathers returned.

There were a few returning strangers this year—White-Crowned Sparrows (who look like they're wearing a bike helmet), and a pair of Rose-Breasted Grosbeaks. Not caught on camera was an Indigo Bunting. I have only ever seen one other one, and that was a few years ago.

I have also been using the Sound ID on the Merlin app. More than once it captured 16 varieties in just minute or 2. Most of them I have never seen, but it's nice knowing they are out there. 

New kids, new car

June the Goat Lady’s  kids are much better at posing than ours, partly because they are all wearing adorable handmade coats, and mostly because they are all together and can’t run away. 

I will get a suitable pic of our 15(!) cuties soon. 

In the meantime, here’s a pic of our new red car on its first day, before all the mud and salt paint it inside and out. Carvana was very helpful in taking away my sad little Kia Soul.