Nature Lover and friends keep in touch

[vanbrat]

I like to bake coffee cake with fresh blueberries or blackberries or apple slices or......... but I make my favorite tea dark black tea and peach tea. If it is after 3pm then honey and Camomile tea. If it is cold out maybe hot cider. But I eat it mostly myself no man required. Though I have been known to bribe a neighbor auto mechanics work for apple pies. He usually gets the work done faster than I do the pies. His wife is my friend so not looking for his heart he is also the same age as my son sooooooo.......

 

[maki2]

^^^
There is what a good friend of mine described as “platter” love. It can be as basic as a cat or dog or farm animals or squirrels or pigeons in the park or humans too feeling affection because you feed them treats. It is typically a mutual exchange, feeding and being fed can both be rewarding.

 

[maki2]

Looking at the weather pattern in the Flagstaff and Tusayan AZ area Ican see that the daytime high temperatures have dropping off. Fall comes much earlier in the mountains so mid August here is more like mid September in many lower elevation locations. Here in the Flagstaff area there is only one day this next week that will get into the low 80s, the other days are all in the upper 70s.

No new wildlife sightings this week but yesterday I was visited by some domestic cows and their calves. They snuck up on my camp without making any mooing noise so I was surprised by them when I went outsiside. They are the first cattle I have seen doing free range grazing this summer. Previous years there have been lots of them around at this location.

 

[maki2]

Finally a bird sighting today foraging in the grass at my campsite. in a clearing in the Coconino forest near Flagstaff, AZ . I wanted to get a photo but it was close enough to my window that the movement of my hands startled it and it flew off.

It was a Mourning Dove! Not an unusual or rare bird but it is the first time I have seen one in Northern AZ. I just wish I could have heard it calling, I love that sound, so soothing and relaxing. Doves calling is forever more a trigger to happy memories of my 21 day camping trip to the Normandy area of France where there are many doves and I went to see several medieval “columbier”.

One year I built a 1:12 scale version of a half timbered dove cote that incorporated 2 bird boxes in it. (Photo below) It was quite popular with the birds who came to my yard. One year a pair of Violet Green Swallows occupied one nesting box and English Sparrows occupied the other. The swallow eggs hatched first and the sparrows quit sitting on their own eggs and began helping feed the swallow chick. Just one swallow chick made it to be a fledgling. Talk a very chubby, well fed baby! Almost too fat to fly. Those swallows are naturally very slim and sleek birds that feed on low calorie flying insects instead of high fat worms and grubs!

That bird house I made is now in an English Rose garden in California and it belongs to an actress who was in a popular sitcom. Her father was well known as “Mr. Whipple” in a now vintage history, toilet paper commercial.. “Don’t squeeze the Charmin”. Strange what seemed funny to people then falls pretty flat as humor now. But when that commercial was on I owned a hamster that peed if you held it too tight so I named the hamster Charmin as you definetly did not want to squeeze that small creature That birdhouse had a bit of its own fame and was featured in a number of magazine and newspaper articles, local and national and a few international as well as being borrowed for several major and local garden shows including in Canada.

 

[maki2]

^^^on my list of to-do income generating task is to create digital file measured drawings to sell for making that birdhouse and several others I built over the years. I had to quit building them as my back can no longer tolerate that much standing at table saws and work benches. I designed in CAD programs so I still have all the dimensions. But at that time this one was designed in 2D CAD. The 3D CAD will allow me to capture a lot better illustrated views for assembly instructions.

If I need a workshop and power tools to make new prototypes I will camp near Flagstaff and use the Coco-op Maker Space. The fee is $50 a month and they have all the tools I need for the tasks. Home Depot has most of the materials. I have a new back brace that hopefully will help keep me standing longer without too much pain.

 

[maki2]

There were hawks out this morning gliding open winged over the forest clearings using the thermals looking for their breakfast of mice. The small birds remained in hiding in the forest.

But this afternoon the hawks were gone and the little birds came out of the trees and began hopping around in the grass looking for lunch. One with blue wings came over by my camp.

 

[maki2]

The end of summer is getting closer. Here in the mountains near Flagstaff the temperatures are starting to cool down but are not yet cold. The monsoon rains are still active. It is mushroom foraging season as well as wearing fleece pullovers in the early morning and evenings.

I want to go camp over by the Grand Canyon but the weeks of late August and early September are prone to having intense thunderstorm events that create flash floods and lots of lightning strikes. Not knowing any better my first year visiting there I went to the Canyon area in late August and experienced one of those lightning events directly overhead, that was a very scary night! The Grand Canyon is right at the top of the list of the areas of highest lightning strikes in the USA! When you walk around in the forest there are a lot of lighting struck trees to be seen.

 

[nature lover]

HELLO FRIENDS, I have not been on the forum for some time -- Same old excuses so I won't repeat them. I am not getting notified when you guys post. I have had to reset it before so I will again today. We have had some extremely mild weather in august this year.

I got to the 98th annual reunion this year. (remember the pic I put up last year) I borrowed a minivan and drove myself. I can do that when the weather is good. and a minivan is easier to get in and out of and easier to stow the well chair. As usual I did some overeating but I was happy to have a sugar of 148 that eve and 106 the next am. Maybe after 70 years I have finialy got some sense, but I doubt that. I was sent home with pineapple upside-down cake, fudge and peach pie. I shared most of it with the neighbors. Hard to do but in my condition I dont have a choice.

I see my old van going up and down the road in front of our building and nearly weep every time. the friend who bought it took out all the cabinets ect I still think I could get back on the road it I had a van that I could get in and out of easier. If I would have got the one HOWA gave away, I might still be traveling???????? (yes, and if the Queen had ******* she would be the king)

I keep waiting for another shoe to fall with my health. I have been told that I should prepare for the end so often I almost feel disappointed when it does not happen. Maybe I can get the undertaker to put wheels on my casket or ern. I got be a nomad forever.

So since I can't be out there with you all. Please **** in a bucket for me.

 

[maki2]

Naturelover …to think we were all worried about you kicking the bucket. Then there you go telling us to take a poop in it!
Well what a rude way to treat your online friends

 

[bullfrog !]

Naturelover …to think we were all worried about you kicking the bucket. Then there you go telling us to take a poop in it!
Well what a rude way to treat your online friends

Just glad to hear from you! I’ll be thinking of your post next time I do! Lol!!!

 

[maki2]

I was just listening to an audio book novel. A phone call was made and the description was the person answering the call had the rusty voice of an old person. Check mark been there, got that! It started being interment about a year ago but is increasingly likely to happen. I need to make sure I have a drinking water on hand to “wet my whistle” if I am going to sit around in camp chairs talking. Not that it would be much of a problem anyway as the other person will happily talk for hours if you get them started on a topic they are interested in. Then there are the kinds who are happy just to sit without doing any talking.

 

[maki2]

Lovely, sunny and cool morning. Enjoying my coffee while looking out the window at a wildflower meadow with butterflies and lots little birds who are snacking on the seeds and the insects. The resident chipmunk even made a brief appearance before zooming away into the forest.

Fortunately no super noisy off-road vehicles with speed crazy humans have come by to disturb this peaceful morning at my campsite on this Monday, Labor Day holiday. But they will be here very soon making a ton of racket and creating great clouds of dust even after dark

 

[maki2]

Watched a tiny lizard moving around in my camp today Then it paused on an equal to his small size rock to soak up some heat from the sun. Always pleasant to pause what I am doing to enjoy a few minutes of wild life watching no matter how small the animal.

 

[maki2]

Wildlife sighting today! I was casually glancing out the window of my travel trailer and saw movements and there it was! A hairy tarantula wandering along the bare ground drive into my campsite. It was not huge in size but for sure the largest spider I have ever seen in person outside of an exhibit space.

Weatherwise this is a very unusually warm October which explains why my hairy spider campsite mate is not in hibernation. I have camped here in this immediate area in this week of October in three previous years and it was typically in the high 20s for early morning hours. But not this year, this year not even a frost has happened. The low temp this week is predicted to be in the mid to upper 50, and the high temp in the mid to upper 70s with lots of sunshine. Pretty much perfect camping weather!

 

[maki2]

Just spotted the one of the two squirrels that frquently this area climbing up into my engine compartment. I ran his bushy behind right out of there by yelling as well as banging on the hood. It ran away as fast as its legs could move. It is times like this I wish I was traveling with a rat terrier dog to persuade that squirrelly rascal to relocate or else become dinner! Even a lazy old terrier willing to snooze in the shade under my car engine would likely be a sufficient deterrent for rodents. But I am too lazy to have even a lazy dog so I will keep on getting what I am getting.

 

[maki2]

This morning the attemptedinsoection of my vehicles enginevompartment wasbri g attempted by a very small chipmunk. I just happened to be next to my trailer window and its movement inThe grind caught my eye. Of course I jumped up and ran out and pounded on the metal of the hood to make extra noise. Off it ran. Hopefully traumatized enough it won’t return. But those squirrels and chipmunks are very curious and mischievous critters who happily come out in the daylight and after dark too. They do not care about things such as hoods being open or flashing lights. I might need to try one of those ultrasonic noise emitting motion detectors. But I would want to run it off a solar charged battery if it’s own. I do not drive everyday and my starter battery is not a big one. I do not want to risk regularly draining it too low just to scare off pesky critters. I also do not want to set out snap traps for chipmunks and squirrels to get caught in.

 

[maki2]

^^^ I forgot to review my post for fat finger errors compounded by auto corrections before I posted that last message. What a bunch of gibberish that was

 

[maki2]

Happy Thanksgiving wishes to Nature Lover and Friends. Except for the …Turkeys which need to get stuffed!