Season journal: the waters of February

From subzero highs to above freezing lows, February waters fall and flow.

This local roadside pattern mirrors a braided river bed: formed by slow water running over accumulated gravel.

The St. Croix froze over and the swans, geese, and other water birds fled. Here, a feeder creek opened, as did a small portion of the big river.

That same day I saw the swans had returned.

Later this past week the sun came out and began melting the trees, encouraging them to take a deep breath and swell.

This is a sign of spring here:: snow pocked by tree drops.

Ducks love muck. They muddle the snow, making puddles cupped by bowls of underlying ice.

The chickens venture out less, preferring dry feet. They lack down coats and carry their fat inside, instead of having a layer between them and winter earth.

Today we have snow again. The eyes say “winter” but the nose says “spring.”

We will work hard to have gardens and sprinklers to welcome the Grand Girl when she comes for a summertime visit. In the meantime, she practices putting on her own bathing suit, even if she grows in the desert, where water is scarce in all seasons.

Livestock journal: how Hector got his name

Our chicken flock suffers from too many roosters. This sorry state resulted from Lil’ Blackie becoming broody late in the season, which meant her chicks didn’t show secondary sex features until it was too cold to harvest them. Of her five chicks (all Giant White/Light Brahma mixes) three were male. We already had two roosters: the Giant White (named Mr. Whitey, because his only accomplishment was being a good caretaker) and a Barred Rock (named Roger, because that is who he is). A fox or bobcat relieved us of one extra GiWhAhma rooster, and the other two seemed to be getting along well enough with everyone else. As they all are somewhat indistinguishable, we’ve just been calling them the GiWhAhmas. Until yesterday.

Fallen feathers and what looked like blood, but was a bit of leaf.

Michael took advantage of the sunshine and 20° weather to open up the coops and clean them. That meant shooing out the birds. He noticed some real drops of blood on the ice that accumulated in the chicken coop and the absence of a GiWhAhma rooster. On his way to the used straw heap, he noticed the feathers in the snow. This is when he called me in to track down what happed to the rooster. Michael figured he got chased out of the coop and then eaten by a predator. The question really was: owl, eagle, bobcat or fox? I went to the last sign of feathers. No tracks. No blood. No trail. Then something caught the corner of my eye.

The poor boy ran away and found a place he couldn’t be attacked. He also couldn’t get out. How he got in upside down I’ll never know.

I tried kneeling next to him and easing him up and out, but didn’t have enough up space to make that possible. The next step was to dig him out.

These picket fence pieces got stored behind the pistol backstop long ago. Other boards got tossed on the ground back there as well. Digging out the fencing became a journey of discovery.

Finally, sufficient flexibility to free the chicken.

Here’s Hector!

Michael believes that chickens earn individual names through doing individual things. This no longer is an anonymous GiWhAhma, but Hector: he who was defeated in battle and dragged around the block. The classical Hector also died a violent death, which might happen to this guy as well, but not this day.

This day he got to sit in the sunshine and eat raisins until I was satisfied he hadn’t broken any bones and could get by on his own again. The fact that he let me hold him at all means he was pretty shaken up. The biddies raised by Lil’ Blackie are more skittish than our incubated chicks.

Hector went back into the coop last night. He seemed fine this morning. I do admit to being quite happy to have rescued him, as long as Michael doesn’t start calling me Hecuba. We may have to consider renaming Lil’ Blackie though. I credit her mothering skills with his survival. I do hope she raises another brood for us this year…just early enough to cull the excess roosters before they earn a name!

Style journal: comfort before beauty

In my prior post I mentioned having equipment to deal with the cold. There was also mention of fur and ashes. Let me elaborate.

Walking Zeke at 21 below. I don’t bother wearing glasses. That is frost on my hair wisps. My eyelashes sometimes ice up too.

From nose to toes I cover up as much as possible. I have long underwear from Cabela’s. Hunting clothes are great for warmth and wicking. My Sorrels are big and clunky, but paired with thick woolen socks, they do keep my toes toasty. They don’t breathe at all, so l take the liners out every several days to dry them out. I have baggy boy jeans to go over my long underwear. Hauling water and feed for the birds and wood for the stove can wear through a pair of girl jeans in half a day. A nice plaid shirt and my Carhart jacket keeps the top of me wind proof. Then I add an alpaca scarf under my “fake beard,” which allows me to create a nest that heats air before it hits my asthmatic lungs. A pair of lined goat skin gloves completes the ensemble.

Zeke is still eager to go on walkies, but I know it’s time to go back when he starts to try to hold all his feet off the ground.

The pavement shrank enough in the current cold to create cracks. Big ones. This doesn’t happen every winter.

We’ve gone through a bunch of wood. We have two more bins this size that are mostly full. Filling the wood bins before snow falls is a yearly priority. I’d feel worse about my carbon footprint except using the downed wood probably is more efficient than using oil shipped from Canada or Texas.

The wood burning stove lives in my office nook. This is the oldest part of the house and has no other source of heat. Wood heat is as cozy as it gets (smells good too), but spreads wood chips, dirt and fine ash. We haven’t finished the wallboard in this room as it will all get torn out again when we convert this area into a kitchen. Some day I shall have counter space!

We double plastic the two single pane windows that still live in my office nook. The stripe on the wall that continues along the ceiling is where we took out a wall so that the wood stove could more efficiently heat the rest of the un heated space. That is an awning you see outside the window. It keeps the window from leaking, but blocks any view. We will be installing all new windows in this area. Some day I shall see trees!

We have been here going on seven years. It seems we should have more done, except when you factor in that we do the work ourselves. This means we balance style and comfort. The part we have completed is fairly stylish, as well as comfy. My lust for counter space will overcome the inertia of having gotten used to dirt and ashes in my office nook. Just see if it doesn’t!

Weather journal: party like it’s 1996

We moved to the Frozen North in 1990. We had just finished a two-year stint in Alabama. Michael grew up here, so he knew how to deal with the below zero weather we had that winter. I remember having highs in the double-digits below zero for a couple of weeks every year, but the weather people now tell me that only happened in 1996. We are having highs in the single below digits this February. Not as bad here as the snow they just had in Houston. When you are equipped for cold and snow, it’s easier to withstand. There is something incredible about truly cold weather. I’ve come to love it.

The snow cover has encouraged the pheasant to hang out in the duck yard.

The deer have begun gathering at the chicken feeder. The chickens, on the other hand, mostly stay in their coop.

Michael occasionally rescues the “out hen” and puts her up on a roost. Chickens can be very hard at enforcing a pecking order, by pecking old or infirm birds. We have three who are going on six years old. We figured they might not last the winter, but we aren’t willing to have their final days marked with the cruelty of nature.

Irene insisted we make sure the suet feeder is filled these days. The pileated woodpeckers appreciate the extra calories. We put up an extra sunflower seed feeder outside her window. The cardinals brighten her day.

Zeke and I have cut our daily walks in half. His toes get cold.

The cold encourages us to tackle long overdue projects. Michael cleaned and reorganized my office nook, getting cords off the ground so it’s easier to sweep up ash and fur.

We have been meaning to hang these chicken prints for at least five years. Maybe longer. More things off the floor!

My accent wall amplifies the sunset. We’ll see if I still like the warm colors come summertime.

We ate the last of our home grown carrots. The last of the rutabagas are on the menu tonight.

The squash pile dwindles. We will return to baking them when the birds start to come out of their coops again. We eat some. The birds eat some. We are all happy…when they aren’t in the middle of the kitchen floor.

We need to order seeds and chicks, gather eggs for the incubator, and otherwise begin to prepare for springtime and visits from the Grand Girl and her folks.

In the meantime we will celebrate Michael getting older with Persephone and Nate tomorrow. So good to have children close by.

Injury journal: anatomy of an accident

Now that I’m fairly sure that I haven’t irreparably damaged my intellects, I’m sharing a dissection of how I came by the black eye I’ve sported in the last two posts. The story begins the evening of December 30th, when Michael shot his deer a few minutes before sunset.

The snow: knee deep, beautiful, and exhausting to wade through.

He asked for help retrieving his doe and I answered the call. Three hours later we had her safe in the dooryard. We ate muffins and fell asleep in a heap.

New Year’s Eve came dressed in frost. I walked Zeke and didn’t do much else, still exhausted from the deer rescue mission.

I start this story with these two days to emphasize how tired we both were heading into the new year. I believe we celebrated the end of 2020 and were tucked in by 7 PM.

Remember these behemoths? Michael’s New Years resolution was to cook one every week and feed it to the ducks if not also us. Plenty to share! He took out a 35 lb squash and left it in the middle of the kitchen floor to bake on New Year’s Day.

Of the squash he chose, only one half fit on this tray.

Michael, being tired, didn’t get around to baking the squash in the morning as planned, so he left it in the middle of the floor to remind him to bake it later on. Irene danced around the squash when she made her breakfast. I danced around it most of the day. Cue menacing music.

See these two wonderful aluminum pans? We use them for many things. Around 3 pm on New Year’s Day I decided to use the one without the bail to soak Irene’s feet. I am the designated pedicurist of the family. I was looking for an easy job. I would have used the one with the bail if I could reach it, but Michael had put it up in his tall-guy fashion for the holidays.

This is where circumstances created the perfect storm. I filled the pan with warm water in the kitchen sink with about 3 gallons of water and some Epsom salts. I held the pan in front of me (it now weighing about 25 lbs) and started walking towards Irene’s apartment. The next thing I knew I was on the floor, water everywhere, and sounds reminiscent of any movie battle scene coming from somewhere…oh, that was me. It took me a bit to realize I had tripped over the squash. It felt like a brick wall. A short one.
Irene couldn’t hear me because of distance, two doorways, and a television. Michael couldn’t hear me because he was out cleaning the duck coop. I felt my head. No blood. First good thing. I tried to stand. First bad thing.
It took me a minute or two to figure out I could crawl away from the water, roll on my side, and get my phone out of my back pocket. I texted Michael “Help. I fell.” No answer. I texted Irene “Beer not doing toes. I fell.” They both arrived about the same time.

I hit the edge of the pantry with the pan, then the right side of my head, then my right shoulder.

The pan ended up with a permanent dent.

My head ended up with a big lump. More than two weeks later I still have a small lump there.

My eye and shoulder got bruised; the entire right side was swollen.

I did not go to the doctor. My vision didn’t get blurry, my speech didn’t become slurred, my balance was not compromised. If I had gone to the doctor, she would have ordered an X-ray/MRI, and then told me it was too early to say whether I had a subdural hematoma and to watch for blurry vision, slurred speech, or dizziness. Those are symptoms of bleeding inside the skull, which can be fatal. I know this because I took Irene to the ER when she fell and hit her head and temporarily lost consciousness. My dad did have a subdural hematoma, for which he was hospitalized, after a bad fall. Two of my uncles died from subdural hematomas. Head injuries are nothing to ignore.
I still rely on ice packs on various parts of my body (head, shoulder, lower back) and take ibuprofen regularly to reduce swelling. I have begun exercising again, both to increase blood circulation (that’s what takes away the bruising) and combat inflammation in my joints (due to disuse…the bane of those with arthritis). I credit prior years of resistance training for not having any broken bones. Irene is still gloating that I was the one who fell this time.
Michael initially was angry that I was stupid enough not to use the pail with a bail, to call him when I couldn’t reach the pail with the bail, to fill the pan in the bathroom closer to Irene’s apartment, or to not remember that there was a huge squash sitting in the middle of the floor. Anger is his defensive mechanism against the fear that comes when I get hurt. Thankfully, just that morning there had been an article in our morning news about how the brain takes shortcuts, remembering usual patterns in speech, spaces, and other common things, in order to allow us to move through this world more efficiently. Having my visual path blocked by the pan meant that, to my brain, the squash disappeared. Unfortunately, my feet still found it. Because a science article confirmed that my brain was working as designed, Michael could accept that, perhaps, it is bad policy to leave things in the middle of the floor where they may create a trip hazard. He has been much better about moving things off to the side of walkways ever since.
This is not to say that we were not all complicit in creating the circumstances that resulted in my injurious event. We were all tired. I could have moved the squash myself any number of times that day. None of us were thinking well. This is when bad things usually happen.
The moral of this story is to take it really easy when you are super tired. If you can’t take it easy, take it as easy as you can. If you still get injured, pay attention to your body and look up symptoms and first aid measures. Keep fit and keep walkways as clear of giant squash as possible.

Charcuterie journal: venison kielbasa

We got to put The Beast back in his box, stored the stuffer, and have kielbasa simmering in beer for dinner.

The kielbasa started as all our other sausages, meat and fat and salt and spices ground together, then liquids kneaded in until it looks like it will both stick together and flow through the casing stuffer. The one important difference in this batch was the addition of curing salt to the mix.

We added curing salt due to our desire for smoked kielbasa. It tasted great before smoking, but superlative afterwards. Adding curing salt ensures that nothing untoward grows while held at a low temperature during this process.

We used a combination of applewood and hickory chips. Off to the left you can see some lighter lines where the links touch each other. Ideally, the sausages shouldn’t touch anything which allows the smoke to penetrate all over. The loops of links were too long for the smoker, so I had to bunch them to make them fit. Next year we will be smarter.

The links stayed in the smoker for about 5 hours, but were in smoke for about 4 hours. It took us a while to balance getting the smoke going but not cooking all the fat out of the kielbasa.

Our house smelled like a deli. A really good one.

One of the sites Michael found recommended poaching the kielbasa for 45 minutes at 165°. We aren’t sure if this suppresses undesirable pathogens or just hydrates the sausages.

Every recipe said to shock the sausages in ice water.

Several sites said to hang the sausages in a cool place for a couple of hours. We opened the window in the guest room and left them overnight.

Kielbasa for breakfast!

Kielbasa for dinner!

I hope the house smells like this for days and days. We knew we loved fires. We just didn’t know smoke could be so good.

Charcuterie journal: duck sausage

Last summer we harvested a number of our older ducks. After 2 years they stop laying eggs reliably and we can’t afford to support ever increasing numbers of retired ducks. We ended up with 20 pounds of boned duck meat. Old ducks are tough. In the past two days we have made sausages from those ducks.

Michael was in charge of feeding the frozen duck pieces through our new grinder. We burned out our KitchenAid last year. The new machine is wicked heavy, but it grinds meat like a beast.

This is a batch of bratwurst made with 10 pounds duck meat and 2 pounds duck skin and fat. Onions, seasoning, eggs, and beer complete the composition. Kneading the mix distributes everything and improves texture.

Everything we’ve read counsels keeping the mix as cold as possible. Luckily, we have tons of snow right handy.

After mixing we always need to fry up a bit to check seasonings. The bratwurst passed muster, even without mustard.

We invested in a sausage stuffer last year. It’s been a good investment! This is Michael being cranked.

This part of the process always embarrasses Irene.

Twelve pounds of duck meat and fat made 15 pounds of bratwurst.

The chest freezer, packed like a suitcase.

Today we made potato sausage. It is a Swedish type of sausage that usually features beef and pork, potatoes, onions, and seasonings. We made one batch with all duck meat and a second batch with duck and pork. Most of the potatoes are fed through The Beast along with the onions and meat. I chopped 20% of the potatoes into larger pieces, as that keeps the consistency from becoming too mushy.

Cold fingers fumble tying off the sausage rings.

Fifteen pounds of meat, fifteen pounds of potatoes, five pounds of onions, salt, thyme, allspice, cardamom, white and black pepper and milk made a mound of sausage. The tape measure helped me gauge how long to make the sausage loops into one pound quantities. No. We will not eat all this ourselves.

This has been a ton of work. Just good that Michael and I do this dance together, making physical exertion fun. Next week we hope to take some of our venison and make smoked kielbasa. Today, we are ready to take a shower and tuck into bed.

Blessings journal: thanks for all the help!

There is a lot of territory to cover to count all my blessings. I’ll concentrate on the blessings of help this season.

We had help exploring how fast our desk chairs can whirl.

Help decorating the tree.

Help making cookies.

Help inspecting the snowmobile trail before much snow fell.

Help shoveling after a lot of snow fell.

Help demonstrating advanced manual snow shovel techniques.

Help in exaggerating snowfall amounts.

Help in distributing the largesse of friends and family.

Help in appreciating atmospheric phenomena.

Help lighting the farolitos.

Help enjoying the farolitos (the only decorating we do for the holidays).

Help with the luminaria.

Help feasting.

Help saying “so long.”

Help celebrating the last day of hunting.

Help dragging Michael’s deer a half mile out of the woods through deep snow.

Help appreciating the design elements of chiaroscuro.

Help working out the kinks left from last night’s hike.

Help realizing the wonder that is this world in which we live.

Many are celebrating the end of this year as a time of “good riddance” or bemoaning the coming of change. Life always presents challenges and brings change. May we all have help in appreciating the blessings we are given.

Hunting journal: black powder

Eighteen days. One doe. We continue to hunt. We hope for one more. Black powder season ends with sunset, followed by a four day antlerless only gun season. Then we get to take a break from hunting and prepare for hosting the Grand Girl and her parents.

These are the implements needed to load a black powder rifle. Starting from front left: a bag for bullets, a .50 caliber bullet, a batch of caps loaded into a seating tool, a starter to get the bullet headed down the barrel, a powder measure, a powder flask, and lube. That’s a ramrod in the background, next to a “possibles bag” for carrying all this equipment.

The first step of loading is to pour powder from the flask into the measure. You can see the calibration plunger there below my thumb. Once you have settled on an appropriate charge, the plunger is screwed down so that you get the same quantity each time. The top of the measure scrapes off any excess when closed.

I pour the powder down the barrel.

I smear lube (a bees wax concoction) in the grooves of the bullet, keeping the bottom clean.

I started the bullet and then seated it on top of the powder with the ramrod.

Having a cap seating tool makes getting the cap on the nipple much easier.

The cap in place, the hammer cocked, the safety on.

During gun season, I hunt with a .38 caliber rifle. That designation means the bullet is .38 inches in diameter. The black powder rifle uses a .50 caliber bullet, which means it is a half inch in diameter. The narrower bullet comes out faster because powders that go into cartridge cases burn faster, creating more pressure to push the bullet out of the barrel. Although the black powder bullet goes slower, it delivers about the same amount of energy because it is bigger and heavier. Black powder sounds more muffled than a smokeless powder due to the pressure differential. An advantage of a rifle that shoots a pre-made cartridge is that it loads fast, which means you may get a second shot. With black powder, you had best be absolutely certain of your first shot.

I am now including a lovely pair of pileated woodpeckers so that anyone who does not care to see what happens to a deer harvested with a black powder rifle can stop reading/looking now.

A lovely sunset. Really, you can stop looking now if you don’t like to see the venison production process.

This girl stepped into the clearing 50 feet below my deer stand about 15 minutes before sundown. She was wandering down the hill away from me, which means my bullet went through her lungs and made a very large hole in the top of her heart before coming out the right side of her chest. I didn’t hear her coming but only saw her ghosting out of the brush. She ran about 30 feet before collapsing. The chest exit wound is why there is so much blood beyond her.

I thanked her for being such a beautiful and careless animal; for feeding me and my family this winter.

We had a quarter mile drag back to the house. Going over the disced field was the hardest part.

We got her in the walnut tree with a stick propping open her chest cavity to cool her overnight.

Michael helping her off with her coat the next day.

All of her legs (the quarters) went into the tractor shed, waiting to be boned out into edible bits.

I clean the sinks with a bleach wash to sanitize them before washing hair and dirt off the big pieces. The back haunches will give us roasts and stew meat. The front quarters will go towards burger and sausages.

I free the meat from as much fat as possible. This will become burger.

I render the fat on the stovetop, starting with raw fat covered with water, then slowly simmering until the water is gone and the fat cooks down into cracklings. The chickens love them. We strain the tallow to make soap.

The back straps made 6 lbs of medallions. Think a fat less equivalent of filet mignon.

We also eat the liver (I take the membrane off and slice it) and will add the heart to our sausage mix. Yes. That is a very large hole the bullet made. It went straight through, leaving no shards. It allowed me to leave the girl’s innards for the crows and eagles without worrying about poisoning the scavengers.

Having sharp knives makes me happy. We own an amazing array of knives. We use them all.

The doe’s hide will go to a collection bin run by a local charity. The bones will be burnt in our garden, adding calcium and charcoal to our soil. Having a midwinter bonfire helps clear our brush piles and is a good way of keeping diseases in check. Hunting takes a huge amount of energy on many levels. Doing anything worthwhile takes energy. We hope to be able to continue being top level predators for years to come.

Hunting journal: permission to be quiet

We live in the country. It would seem that every day is quiet. It is, until you sit in a hunting stand for hours and hours, listening.

Listening to squirrels raiding the bird feeder.

Followed by woodpeckers.

Followed by more squirrels.

With a break to walk the dog and listen to snow falling.

Then back to squirrels.

This is the view from the base of a very tall tree stand. I refuse to hunt from the top of this tree. I did see some deer here, eventually. They saw me too and disappeared back into the brush. It was a very exciting 30 seconds.

We’ve had sun and snow and sun and snow.

Listening to the wind reminds me of ocean surf, but not as regular. You can also hear a gust approach, see the trees bend, then feel it as it passes over.
The deer were scarce on our little area of woods this year. The farmer who rents our fields disced the soy bean remnants under two weeks before the season started. The fellow who usually hunts just north of us skipped coming out this year. This meant the deer had no cause to cross our fields or wander our woods. The squirrels and birds didn’t mind.
Black powder season arrived and so we will keep enjoying the noise that comprises quiet for a while longer, until we have completed our hunt and retreat into our normal noise of wood stoves creaking, ducks quacking, chickens crowing, dogs snuffling, electricity humming and, when we are lucky, loved ones snoring.

Light journal: celebrating a dwindling resource

After an early and lasting snow, warmth returned and gifted us a week of sunshine. As of yesterday, the one year anniversary of my little brother’s death, snow returned. Tonight we will have temps in the single digits. This is winter.

Snow softens light and sound.

It makes for wonderful sunsets.

Remnants of the corn harvest glow in the low light of winter.

It turns cattails into tiki torches.

Soft browns and deep blues predominate.

New snow reveals the wanderings of deer.

And mice.

And voles.

And big black dogs.

Until things fade to black and white and sleep comes to us all.

I feel so much anxiety around me. People worry about the election and what changes it will bring to their world. They worry about this pandemic and how to remain healthy in the midst of spreading illness. They worry about carbon and how to balance staying warm or cool and getting from place to place with not being drowned or burned or swept away. Here we are, in this tiny bubble of daily beauty, hoping to share whatever serenity we can. Deepening winter: a time for celebrating the light, any light, one can find in this world.

Ritual journal: visiting the dear departed

All Hallows Day is not as celebrated in this country as much as Halloween (All Hallows Eve). Tomorrow will be All Souls’ Day. We spent yesterday getting ready to go visiting today.

Our first stop was to visit Bucka. The snow is gone but the wind made it feel as if it were in the 20s.

Persephone and Nate joined us this year.

We made Bucka cookies and coffee. Summa told the story of how they met and how she chased him until he caught her. Nate hadn’t heard that one. It made him cry (or maybe that was the wind).

We enjoyed the stories and the sun.

Klink and Harriette are still in Grantsburg. The Kozy wasn’t open, so no fried cheese curds for Harriette to steal. We had a good chat about how they met and courted. Harriette was such a cutie. My niece Valarie reminds me a lot of her.

Here’s to all those Thanksgivings we spent together!

Marcella and Bun got rice crispy bars and orange nectar. She loved anything with marshmallows. He skied well into his 80s. Even though they built their lives in Grantsburg, they came home to Cushing to lay to rest.

Here’s to another strong union and great stories!

We finished our tour with Cleone and Ralph. Cleone loved to go fishing and Ralph loved Cleone. Michael would bring them bread and cookies when they lived in Elk River, as I would often need to go there to visit clients at the Sherburne County Jail.

We returned home to lift a beer to my brother John. We had beans and rice and more stories. Today, All Souls Day, seems more somber and empty. It is good to spend time telling tales and remembering those who shared so much of their lives and love.

We need more time to create those stories with the next generation.

Weather journal: record breaking snow!

Five inches of snow on October 20th set a new record. Seems the trees knew what they were doing turning early.

We had warning the storm would come. We scurried to get the last autumn chores done.

I scoured the carbon off the bottom of the pots used to render fat and scald birds before plucking.

We cleaned out the last of the gardens, mowed the pastures one last time, collected the leeks, and covered the carrots with straw. They will last until Christmas if left in the ground. The straw keeps them from freezing.

It started snowing at about 1:30 PM.

The snow lasted through today. So good to be having soup weather again!

Season journal: the bear necessities

Bear? Bare? Behr? Three days after my last post I accepted a paying (eventually) challenge. Whatever drives me to moonlight has taken over all my extra brain space, which explains why I haven’t posted in a while. I’m posting now to celebrate almost completing the first stage of that project.
This doesn’t mean things haven’t been rolling right along. It does mean Michael has been doing all the heavy lifting.

Michael harvested a number of downed trees, which now just (!) need to be split and stacked. We had our first sprinkle of snow today, so filling the wood bins has become the driving need.

Updates. So much happens so quickly here in fly-over country. Here goes:

We are not the only ones preparing for winter. In mid-September we noticed a hole next to our driveway. On close inspection we discovered a bear raided a ground bee nest for its honey. Who knew ground bees were there?

Michael harvested the rutabagas he planted end of July. A magnificent crop, some paraffined for later consumption.

Rutabaga is an essential ingredient of Finnish pasties, a Yupper (or UP-er, meaning a denizen of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan) staple.

Mashed rutabaga eats well. Clockwise from top: braised carrot and leek mash, Blue Hubbard mash, braised duck leg, and rutabaga mash. All from our gardens!

We ended up with 73 winter squash. We managed to distribute/barter about 40. The rest are in our basement. It feels good to share the garden wealth.

We bottled the rhubarb wine. Michael did the math and figures we have enough to drink a bottle a week for a year, with some left over to share. It’sa little raw, but Irene says it’s delightfully drinkable.

The leaves have been magnificent. Most are gone with the wind, rain and snow of the past week.

Ground cherries magically appeared in our garden this year. Think tiny, sweet tomatillos. They make a most amazing jam.

On the construction front, we have begun the process of creating a direct passage between the old house and the addition. A window used to reside in this hole. A doorway will go to the right of it someday.

The last of the ducks made it to Freezer Camp. Always good to get this done while we can still work outside. We love our ducks. I always have to stroke their breasts before and after the chopping block, to calm them and thank them for their lives.

Today’s snow did in most of the gardens. We have a small patch of leeks and carrots left.

A final photo of those marvelous rutabagas. Having cabbages and root crops stored away makes me feel rich indeed.

I can hardly wait to share the bounty with this wee wooly one.

Weather journal: racing winter

We had our first ripe tomato on September 1st. Our first hard frost came September 7th. We covered the tomatoes, but the squash are done for the year.

The reduction in foliage allowed a census: 58 squash.

Autumn brings morning fog.

Once we gather the squash from the field, I will be able to reach the last of the potatoes.

We are thinking of making potato sausage this year.

We began harvesting old ducks this week, despite their being in the middle of a molt. We have been skinning and boning them for sausage fodder. We processed 4 ducks before the rain started. We have 5 more old ducks to go. A predator got the one chicken that was on the sausage list. Then we have 7 new ducks that need to go before winter sets in. Our Duck Mansion is big, but does not have unlimited capacity.

One of our new duck hens started laying yesterday.

We had two days with highs in the 40s: time for a fire!

Before I could light that fire I had to clean out the chimney. This was a bluebird, but I doubt it was happy.

Michael and I pressed 4.5 gallons of cider in one day. Last year we pressed 8.5 gallons. The apples ripened three weeks earlier this year. My trees keep telling me “winter is coming.”

We took advantage of our one cold rainy day to walk the mushroom woods. No edibles, but always a lovely hike.

We encountered neither cows nor people on our walk.

The rhubarb survived the frost, but it is time to put some away for Christmas pies before it succumbs to cold.

The advantage of cooler weather is that it allows me to cook inside again, but with fresh tomatoes and herbs at my disposal. This was the first time I ever grated a fresh tomato. Simmered down with garlic and chile flakes, it made a wonderful base in which to finish cooking the pasta. Roasted eggplant and peppers were added afterwards, adding a nice texture to the dish.

Construction has taken a back seat for a while as we batten down the hatches for that first real snow. We need more wood in our woodpile. We need fewer birds in our flocks. We need to plant garlic. We need to walk in the woods and down the lane and breathe in the ripeness of autumn.

Harvest, Construction, Fishing and Farm journals: a walk through August into September

I last updated this continuing saga almost a month ago. So much happens this time of year: this post is a bit of everything.

At the beginning of August Mama was still guarding her chicks.

The Favored Five still hang together, but they left Mama one day about the third week of August.

At the beginning of August I soldiered on with sanding wallboard mud.

I completed my mudding job on August 21.

Michael completed the primer coat today. The temptation is to paint the walls and ceiling white. I’m still engineering the trap door into the attic.

We began August making elderberry jelly.

Mid-month the plums ripened and also became jelly fodder.

They were so beautiful this year. Sneaking bites between picking and pitting whirled me back to the plum tree I plundered as a child.

Our first pear harvest began at about the time the plums ripened, but they spread their bounty over a couple of weeks. I finished making pear butter yesterday.

The sunflowers and winter squash: battle of the Titans!

I had to commission Michael to reach these for me.

We discovered the first ripe tomatoes on September 1. We’ve had tomatoes at every meal ever since.

End of August and time to dig potatoes.

The Red Pontiacs are not too scabby. The Russets turned out well too. We will have about 200 pounds of potatoes by the time we are done. We will give many away and the rest will last us until next spring.

The monarchs have been traveling through. This one insisted on sampling our duck harvest. We found five that were pin feather free. The sixth made us realize why we wait for the feathers to emerge. The remaining 20 ducks we need to process earned a brief reprieve.

The sun sets earlier every day. We have so much we need to do before winter arrives. We had some 90° weather, but all of our rain has been cold. By the end of August we started having highs in the low 70s and upper 60s. The soy beans are ripening, Sandhills are gathering in fields, the deer are losing their red summer coats, the maples are turning: fall comes early this year.

Okay, that last photo was too dour. We did get to take the Young People out fishing a couple of weeks ago. They caught more fish than we did. Hope to take them out again this weekend.

Weather journal: the last warm rain

Sunday, August 9th, Michael took me fishing for catfish on the St. Croix.

The raindrops made little splashes that caught the light: sparkles!

The heron caught more fish than we did.

Trees are beginning to turn, even without a frost. The weather man says it will be a late autumn. The leaves say different.

We had a magnificent time in the warm rain, even though we caught no fish.

We did get to inspect the flora of the small islands in the stream.

We have been making time for fishing lately. Perhaps we, also, are feeling like this past Sunday was the last warm rain of summer. Today’s rain is cold.

The farmers are gathering a last crop of hay.

The popcorn has tasseled and the cobs are forming.

The winter squash climb and produce prolifically.

The tomatoes grow taller than me. We have yet to see a ripe tomato, but we direct seeded due to lack of space for starts. We could have bought starts, but we like the varieties we grow. They are highly acidic. We are always disappointed in the tame tasting tomatoes grown by others.

We have plenty of other vegetables with which to invent dinner.

The cabbages need to be harvested. We have 16 this size.

Think of it as a cabbage calzone, but with sour cream instead of cheese.

We race the birds for the elderberries. This year we use the apple pectin we canned last fall: a byproduct of making apple butter.

Just to reassure his adoring public, Michael does tend to catch fish whenever we go out.

Just to reassure my adoring public, I can fillet anything Michael catches. I hate bones in my fish.

We fed the sunfish I caught to Irene. Mung bean noodle and sautéed kale completed the meal.

I am hoping high summer continues long enough for me to build the cabinets for the addition. I am closing in on being ready to paint. In the meantime we hoard all the warmth and sunshine we can.

Harvest journal: garlic

Last October I planted 300 garlic cloves. By early August, we harvested about the same number of bulbs.

The garlic is ready to harvest when the tops start to brown.

We have been planting garlic for at least 15 years now. The beginner mistake is to plant in the springtime. Garlic needs to establish its root system in the fall so it can take off in early spring. We found that any time we had a number of freeze/thaw events in a season, our garlic would be stunted. Covering the cloves with a layer of straw not only keeps the weeds at bay, it also helps even out the ground temperature, preserving those precious little roots.

Look at those great roots!

The Rocambole clean and ready to dry in the sun.

As we pull each bulb, we use the straw mulch to wipe the dirt off the bulbs. Doing this while the dirt is still damp is much easier than waiting until it’s dry. For some reason, once the dirt dries on it becomes like cement. At that point you either have to wet the bulb to get the dirt off or take off a layer of outer covering. Both of these cleaning techniques is bad for your garlic, or it is if you want to store it for any length of time. The more paper you can preserve, the less your garlic will dehydrate over time.

We put the garlic out in the sun for several days to take moisture out of the stems, so it doesn’t get moldy once braided or bundled.

I rarely get a photo of the braiding/bundling process. My hands are usually busy and really dirty. I rub the roots (still full of dirt) off before braiding/bundling. Why do I keep using these two terms? We grow 2 types of garlic: hardneck and soft neck. The “neck” refers to the stem. Those with soft stems I can braid. Those with hard stems don’t bend, so instead I tie them together with cotton string.

We grow two kinds of hard neck: Siberian White and Rocambole. Our two kinds of soft neck are River Giant and French Germinador. The hard neck ( up there in the top of this photo) have lovely big cloves that peel easily. Flavor-wise, my favorite is the River Giant., a soft neck. The soft neck tend to have smaller cloves that are more difficult to peel. Why go through the trouble of growing them? They save WONDERFULLY! We had French Germinador that was still good when we started to harvest the new garlic. All other kinds had shriveled.

We eat a lot of garlic. Diced with fresh ginger, it adds zing to sautéed green beans or other vegetables. Sliced with fresh rosemary or thyme, with a dash of olive oil and kosher salt, it makes a wonderful marinade for grilling or roasting chicken or vegetables. You can dip a whole bulb in olive oil and bake until soft, then peel off the cloves and squeeze them onto slices of baguette for a taste treat. And pasta. Oh, garlic goes into so many pasta sauces. Red. White. Aglio e olio (garlic and oil and lemon juice and Parmesan). Sliced and fried in a bit of olive oil until golden crisp to top a salad. Toasted. Sautéed. Baked. Roasted. Eat more garlic!

Harvest journal: onions

Last year we planted 800 onion sets. This year we used more space and planted 500. Whether due to increased space or hot weather, the onions are much larger this year.

We braid the onions together, allowing us to finish drying them indoors and to hang them in the kitchen as we use them.

Three fifths of the onion harvest and one half of the garlic harvest (which we also braid or bunch and hang to dry).

The last of last year’s harvest. We started eating the imperfect new onions as they will not save.

Ten cups of onions sautéing in a bit of oil and butter.

An hour later the onions have reduced by half and now are a wonderful golden hue.

Viola! Onion quiche.

Paired with sautéed beet greens, it’s what’s for supper.

Having a bit of cooler weather (highs in the 80s) fortuitously let us bake and use those lovely onions before they dissolved. I never considered the impact of freshness on the flavor of an onion. Michael declared these “superlative.” Here’s hoping the huge onions save well.

Season journal: red

So many things that bring me joy. Here are ten of my favorite July reds (in no particular order).

One: onion harvest has begun! Onions. I love onions. I love Michael too.

Two: Beets. I love beets. The beets love hot weather, which we have this year.

Three: Jelly time inspires cake making….and eating.

Four: Currants. I love currants. I love how currants smell. Rich.

Five: E.B. Cresap, my great granddad, gave this geranium to Percy Meek Cresap, his wife. It may have been an anniversary gift. I love geraniums, but I particularly love this geranium.

Mama Hen with her five chicks make six! The feeders and waterers are red. So I’m cheating a bit, but I’m loving having a Mother Hen.

Seven: Agates. They shine red due to their iron content, derived from algae that lived in seas millennia past. Or maybe I’m just making that up and the iron comes from the basalt in which they formed. Agates. I love agates.

Eight: I find agates while walking Zeke on his red leash. Walkies. I love walkies.

Nine: The currant jelly shines as bright as an agate and will bring me the scent of summer in mid-January.

Ten: Tiny tomatoes, fresh washed, are the best.