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Post by chrysanthemum on Oct 10, 2021 15:42:14 GMT -6
Couple hours Southeast of Dallas. I grew up visiting Jacksonville just about every Christmas vacation when my grandmother lived there with my aunt and uncle and cousins. After my grandmother died, and I grew up, I hadn’t been back in many, many years. Living now on the edge of Texas Hill Country, my immediate family thinks of Texas as limestone crags, gnarly live oak and lots of scrubby cedar, and beautiful wildflowers and butterflies. A couple of years after moving here, though, we drove back to Jacksonville to visit with my aunt and cousin, and it was just astounding to see the land change. It was flatter, and there were ponds. We could see red clay or black soil where the ground was disturbed, and there were pine trees. It reminded my kids of Virginia where they had all been born. Some time we’d like to visit the Big Bend area to see another part of this diverse state.
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Post by hmoosek on Oct 10, 2021 17:54:41 GMT -6
Absolutely, go a couple hours in any direction and the landscape changes are amazing!
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Post by chrysanthemum on Oct 13, 2021 15:08:15 GMT -6
Thanks for the update, Bon. I’m so glad that Bill’s surgery was less intense than was possible, and I hope that will give him a faster recovery, though I’m sure it will still be hard. It sounds as though you’ve been very busy outside. It can be so invigorating and exhausting at the same time.
We may be in for some heavy rain from Tropical Storm Pamela later on this evening. I was shoveling some compost earlier just trying to get things done, and I think a yellow jacket got me on the end of the pinky finger. (I saw it fly away, and it looked like a yellow jacket, but it flew away and only stung once instead of going after me again, so I’m not sure). I’m not allergic to stings but am “sensitive,” so I’m having a break right now and icing the finger just a bit. I harvested a bunch of peppers yesterday and a bunch more tomatoes this morning to beat the rain. I also did something that I’ve never done before and took the lids off all my ollas to see how it works for rain water to fill them directly. My one concern is soil splashing inside them, but we’ll see.
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Post by macmex on Oct 13, 2021 15:24:33 GMT -6
Yellow jackets don't always repeat on their stings. I can tell the difference between their stings and that of a honey bee by the feel. The yellow jacket burns more. Been stung by them many times, growing up in NJ. Out East yellow jackets are a lot more aggressive than in this neck of the woods. Hope the reaction calms down quickly!
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Post by chrysanthemum on Oct 13, 2021 15:45:40 GMT -6
Wow. I had no idea that there was a difference in aggression, but this was my first experience with a yellow jacket sting in Texas as opposed to in Virginia where those things are just plain mean! My finger isn’t actually swelling up much yet, but it sure does still sting like the dickens.
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Post by macmex on Oct 14, 2021 7:00:00 GMT -6
Red wasps have the same basic venom as a hornet. That really packs a wallop! Will be praying for Bill's recovery.
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Post by hmoosek on Oct 14, 2021 11:29:57 GMT -6
Boy, I’ve been hit by yellow jackets many a time! The most memorable time was the first day of school going into the 6th grade. We lived on the tallest hill in the area. I could see the school bus for a good ways before I had to run down the hill to the road. My Uncle had a garden fenced off. There was a bucket flipped over a post. Y’all see where this is going? Like always I was half bored waiting and I reached up and slapped that bucket! They come out of there after me like you never saw! I don’t remember how many times they popped me, but I remember it hurt like nobody’s business!
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Post by chrysanthemum on Oct 16, 2021 5:36:20 GMT -6
Bon, we are big users of baking soda paste around here. The sting was directly on the end of my pinky finger, and I kept it stuck in a little medicine cup of baking soda paste for a while. It didn’t really feel better at first, but it really didn’t swell, so I think it probably helped. Thankfully by the next day I didn’t have any trouble with the spot.
I’ve been stung by red wasps before. Not fun. Those were new to us when we moved to Texas. (As were scorpions. I got stung by one of those my first month here when I was getting cloth diapers off the clothes line as the sun was going down and a storm was moving in. I must have put my hand right on the scorpion. I never saw it, but it left a huge stinger right in the middle of my palm. I felt the pain, of course, but in the dark I didn’t realize there was a stinger there, so I continued to gather diapers to beat the rain. When I got inside, there was blood running down my arm, and the venom caused pain and redness all up my wrist to my elbow. I’ve been stung since, and it wasn’t as bad, but having that stinger come off and stay in my hand for a while must have made things worse.).
How is Bill doing?
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Post by macmex on Oct 16, 2021 7:10:43 GMT -6
Also, it's probable that your immune system adjusted to that venom a bit. I've never been stung by a scorpion, though we have them here.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Oct 17, 2021 13:41:35 GMT -6
We have lots of scorpions here. I've been stung by them many times. The first time I got stung by one was in my bed as a child. I felt a bug crawling on my chest and slapped it in the dark. It stung my chest, then stung my leg, as I jumped up to turn the light on. I've never slapped another bug in the dark again!
I never walk barefoot in our house at night in summer because of scorpions. We even had one fall off the ceiling once and land in a skillet full of hot grease while cooking supper. Over the years, we discovered that scorpions glow bright green when lit by a blacklight. We now have a 100 LED blacklight flashlight to use in summer to help find scorpions.
I also use the blacklight to find horned tomato worms at night. The tomato worms glow fairly bright when the blacklight hits them, but nowhere nearly as bright as scorpions do. So that blacklight flashlight turned out to be a very good investment.
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Post by macmex on Oct 22, 2021 5:39:33 GMT -6
We received a start of Night Crawlers (really large worms) from Glen and Dorothy Bowen, about 12 years ago. I released them into the garden and they kind of disapeared for a year or two. Then one spring I started seeing them... a lot. However, I only see them in the spring. The rest of the year they go really deep, where they have more moisture. Bet that's what's happening with your mud worms.
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Post by hmoosek on Nov 12, 2021 11:27:26 GMT -6
I was looking though my seeds just the other day. I found okra I never shelled from 2010. I didn’t write the variety, but at least I wrote the year. Hahahaaa!
I’m not positive of the variety, but just between me, you and a gate post , it looks like Louisiana Green Velvet.
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Post by macmex on Nov 13, 2021 19:51:17 GMT -6
Bon, I think it's alright as long as the ground isn't too wet and muddy.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Nov 13, 2021 20:54:03 GMT -6
Bon,
It's actually very good to till in the Autumn, to turn those bermuda roots upward to be exposed to freezing Winter weather.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Nov 20, 2021 18:45:03 GMT -6
Onions will bolt like that when it gets too cold in the Springtime. I've lost lots of onions to that problem in years past. When the temperature is below 45 degrees Fahrenheit for a prolonged period, the plant becomes dormant. When the temperature rises, the plant grows rapidly, if cold weather returns, the plant goes dormant again, and with returning warmth, it will grow again. Two or more dormant/growth cycles will likely result in bolting, causing the onions not to form a sturdy central bulb. I've had cabbage do similar things, not forming a proper central head, but rather mulitple, inferior heads. You can still eat them, they just ain't gonna be pretty.
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