July 27

Sarah purchased a new tube feeder, to replace the old one stolen by the bear last week. I’ve made several trips down the access road and around the berm, and have simply given up looking for the old one. The feeder was dark green, which matches perfectly to the low brush foliage, so for all my search it may be sitting camouflaged close by. Finding it can wait until autumn, when the living green has faded, as have the mosquitoes and deer flies.

The new feeder is evidently well received. As I write, there are six birds feeding (4 female finches and 2 male yellow finches), 2 birds in wait at the top of the shepherd’s crook, and a cardinal and male grosbeak on the ground below.

The grosbeak looks young, perhaps a fledgling that is beginning to molt. His black back and emergent red chest are pocked with tufts of grayish white fluff, and the color is faded. The cardinal is striking as ever.

July 26

Early corn has been ready for a little over a week, thought we’ve waited until now to enjoy the harvest. There has been a sign up in the store, just above the cash registers, that alerts customers to the fact that the “early ears are small,” something to which we’ve become accustomed through the years. Best to wait until the maturity of a week or so shows through.

Today we purchased our first ears, butter and sugar variety that is unshucked and freshly picked, with ears that are modest, though not of the size we will find in a month. It is a hallmark of our late July, to walk home in the summer sun down the farm driveway and left onto Grove, all the while slowly pulling away the husk and throwing the sepal coverings into the tall grass.

By the time we reach our driveway, the silks have been removed and the stalk stubble has been cut, broken clean by grabbing and yanking downward with a force.

Seven minutes in the pot and a few to cool. No butter or salt, thank you. This corn stands on its own, and we dream about it when the winter months set in.

July 25

The produce across the road is a bounty for area deer, much to the Cournoyer’s dismay, who are at wits end. Nothing seems to be immune, as peppers, peas, cucumbers, squash and beans have been notably affected.

Our access road is a natural corridor, as the deer come up from the lower woods to feed, usually around 10 or 11 pm and again in the early morning. I have rarely seen deer in my pre-dawn walks, so I suspect that they frequent the fields between 10 pm and 2 am.

Tonight may be such an evening, with the full Buck Moon rising late evening, and warm temperatures which will assuredly create a fog over the cooling fields.

We hear them occasionally, moving tentatively up the corridor through the grasses that have grown uncut in the two-track of the access road. On still nights, the rustle of their hooves and chittering calls of alarm signal their passage; we need only wait several minutes then look out the front window to see ghostly shapes making their way slowly up through the front yard, under the apple tree (a favorite respite in the autumn, when new apple falls occur), and across the road to the spruce line.

If the fog is just right, their evanescent shapes lose substance as they enter the fields, making their way to the lower rows beyond, melding into the mist.

Notes:

Rose of Sharon blooming

Sun Drops and Evening Primrose blooming

July 24

I opened the sunroom door this morning to discover that both bird feeder poles were bent straight over to the ground, and one feeder itself had gone missing entirely. The dogs padded out in my wake and immediately became curious of some foreign scent in the vicinity, both noses to the ground weaving about. Tag paused just once to look up with what appeared to be a quizzical expression, as if he were to exclaim “what in the world is that?”

I suspect there’s been a black bear come up from the lower woods, intent on easy pickings from the black sunflower seed and suet cakes, which we keep well stocked. There have been several sightings of bear in Paxton over the past couple of years, which isn’t too surprising given how the town sees fit to allow more woodland acreage to be cut over to development.

The same city folks who then move this way, desirous of life in the country, will undoubtedly complain about the intrusion of wildlife in their yards. Such is the hypocrisy of things.

We have town members who serve on committees charged with preserving the open space and agricultural heritage while at the same time they advocate for the destruction of such land to accommodate unnecessary senior housing complexes. Were it not so irreversible, it might be pathetically comical.

I put on tall muck boots and a mesh shirt designed to confuse the deer flies and headed down the access road toward the lower woods, intent on finding the feeder. No such luck, though the suet holder did turn up a hundred yards from the house.

How the bear managed to ferry that feeder across the berm, through the tall brush, and to Lord knows where I will never know.

Notes:

Pokeweed in bloom

July 23

Yesterday, I said to Sarah, “Have you seen any hummingbird moths yet?” for we normally have a few by now flittering above the knot garden. She hadn’t, and I was beginning to think we’d miss a year.

Today, I caught the movement of one out of the corner of my eye, flying quickly among our many pink phlox blossoms. The other appeared, and they shared time sampling phlox and white loosestrife, seemingly unconcerned with each other.

Rarely do they land, and the time spent at any one flower is ephemeral – a quick placement of proboscis and removal, as if merely having a brief taste of what nectar dwells within. The calyx of the phlox is rather disproportionately long (approximately 1 to 1.5”), and the moth must have quite a lengthy tongue itself to compensate.

The real wonder is its wings, for in one species they are transparent across a large portion, and for what purpose I can only guess. I photographed one sampling the phlox, and the image captured its wing in still, revealing the beauty of its mosaic design.

Notes:

Yellow Tansy in Bloom

July 22

In marshaling evidence in support of natural selection, Darwin writes of the prolific degree to which organisms of all kinds produce offspring. The argument claims that the world would soon be overrun should all the progeny and subsequent generations survive from a single parentage. Thus nature is daily scrutinizing and on balance selecting only those progeny, all things being equal, who have some advantage be it small or great.

Take the wild columbine as an example. The dried seed pods are brown now and pointed upright so that if you grasp the sere stalk and gently shake it, the sound of a rattle is made. I placed my hand underneath a single pod and bent it with the other so that the seeds fell into my palm in a neat pile. I counted nine coal-black seeds the size of small peppercorns. A little arithmetic assists the example. There were 18 total pods (in clusters of 3 or 4) from the entire plant. 18 times 9 equals 162 total seeds from this single columbine. If all the seeds were to successfully overwinter and germinate next spring, the knot garden would be overrun. Let’s assume that last year’s columbine also similarly produced 160 or so seeds. One evidently survived, making the likelihood of survival a meager 1 in 162.

Dandelions must assuredly be less, with their silken blowies everywhere in late May. I wonder about the maple keys or acorns, particularly in those mast years when production seems to be in the thousands.

It is a wonder we have columbines or dandelions or oaks at all.

Notes:

Bouncing Bet (Soapwort) on South Road in bloom.

July 21

We’ve had seven days of unrelenting heat and humidity to rival the record books, so it seems. Officially here, according to the meteorologists, a heat wave requires three consecutive 90 degree days, and our seven puts the emphasis to it.

It has taken its toll on the bluegrass and fescue, both looking burned and with the ground rock hard underneath. Only the witch and crab grasses seem happy, giving a mosaic appearance of light green patches amid the yellow lawn.

Overnight temperatures have remained in the 70s, and with the tropical air in place the yard dews with moisture early and remains through the night. Near the three oaks out front by the road, our yearly mushrooms have exploded in seeming delight at this weather, and there are caps of several colors and sizes dotting this area.

A front finally arrived late afternoon, bringing tropical downpours and violent discharges with gusty winds that hallmark the changing of air masses. Tomorrow is to be cooler and less humid, and we are thankful for a change; we New Englanders wilt easily in this southerly weather.

Notes:

Sunrise at 80 degrees (10 degrees N. of East)

July 20

The sumac candles have been flame red for several days, and they remind me of the holidays, where deep evergreen boughs are topped by ornamental balls of red or even the occasional cardinal perched up high and within.

There is a cluster by the barn that is now at full height, twelve feet or so, having several main branches that are remarkably straight with palmetto-shaped leaves that reside on top. A few years ago, I cut down a dozen of the stalks and stripped them to dry, using an old draw knife to remove the outer bark.

A month later, we used these stalks to make walking sticks for the scouts, covering the sanded surface with a coat of amber shellac. They were remarkably pretty.

Each year, new stalks grow, pliant through May and June, growing ever taller and hardening all the while.

July 19

Ascend a few thousand feet, and the relative rarity of the atmosphere helps with relief from the summer swelter. From the farm parking lot, you can just see the top third of Wachusett Mountain rising above the tree horizon of the lower fields. It is tempting to escape to the mountains today, ten miles as the crow flies or twenty via route 31 as it snakes its way through Holden and Princeton.

The view from the top is worth the trip, as much as the respite provided from the heat. We’ve stood at the summit and looked back toward home, trying to locate the farm fields as a reckoning mark by which we might know where home and friends remain. We even once jokingly asked Fred to wave to the mountain, knowing that we were to stand on its summit and send our own lofty tidings his way.

Our winter tendency is to draw within, to stay close to hearth and heat, where comforts of family and friends are less bountiful though more focused. Summer motivates its own scales, where the sights and sounds and smells of maturity invite us to sample all that envelops us. There are wonders here, both small and large – wonders from the intricate pattern of a spider’s web caught backlit in the morning dew, to those of a grander scale, of tall grass rippling in the midday breeze, with the mountain that rises overhead in the distance.

It is a comfort to know that as our scales broaden with our exploration of this maturing season, we still take stock in looking toward home, perhaps in measure to reassure ourselves of our familiar securities, but perhaps also to simply look for others whom we might encourage to celebrate in our experiences.

I am thinking particularly of these things today, for at 5:27 pm the Cassini Probe is scheduled to look back toward Earth from a point near Saturn’s rings. It is to take a photo of Earth from so very far away, and I plan to celebrate both my being here and its being there. I may even wave hello.

Notes:

Sweet Corn is ready