Good News and Bad News...

Aaaah...a great rain and thunder storm this morning. I really enjoyed sitting on the front porch(not the deck!)with a cup of green tea while it stormed. As an UPS truck pulled up, I walked out to greet the driver...told him I was 'happy' to walk in the rain for once! We got over a quarter inch of much needed water...and it seems like it will continue off and on all day.

Just watched the local weather and we are set for record highs again next week...up or past the 100 mark again. Now they say the more moisture we have in the ground the less likely we are to reach 100...so let it rain. I'm a little tired of this heat. My garden is more tired of it than me.

Now for the good news.... we have no walnuts! We had a wind storm in the spring and it looks like it took care of all the black walnut buds...because none of my black walnut trees have any walnuts. I have over 8 black walnut trees and no walnuts. Now some say that the trees do this every couple of years...(and the previous owner of my farm said...oh don't worry...you will only have walnuts every couple of years...yeah right...) Anyway I've been on my farm for 17 years...and I can only think of 1 other year where we failed to have a 'bumper' crop of walnuts and that was due to a heavy wind storm in the spring...well it looks like the wind worked its magic this year....I am so happy not to have to pick them all up...or fall down ...slipping on one.

Now for the bad news...we have no walnuts! What are our squirrels to do? Our walnut trees provide food for the local squirrels for the long winter months. I've not seen any squirrels lately..so I am not sure if they have moved on to greener pastures...but it looks like I will have to put out a squirrel feeder this fall/winter. And that is a first for this farm.

While we are in the same vein as good news/bad news...remember you get what you pay for. Here are pictures of my wildflower meadow this summer of 2010. Seeds were purchased from Lowes.

Notice anything??? Yep, no flowers....









Now take a look at this picture same meadow summer of 2009


and this one...


So the good news is...you can purchase great wildflower seeds online from American Meadows They are a great company and very helpful. More expensive than the wildflower seeds at Lowes...but well worth it.The bad news...my wildflower meadow will be disked up this fall..and I will start over and replant with seeds from American Meadows.