Facing down the Wild O'Possum

I had a scare this morning. Before 7 a.m., too. And fortunately before my husband left for work. I had gone up the hill just before 6 a.m. to let out and feed my chickens. I noticed last night that a hen stayed on one of the nests, so I thought I'd open the outside door to that nest to drive her off. I just don't want to deal with a broody hen. So, about forty minutes or so later, my chickens started making a horrible racket. Clucking, crowing, cackling--general chicken-calling-for-help noises. I thought at first that hen was upset with that open door to her nest, but the racket kept on. So, I told my husband that I'd brave that aggressive red rooster and go up there to see. Well, I had no more stepped through the gate when I saw a HUGE 'possum staring at me just about ten yards up the path. Okayyyy. I yelled for my knight, held my walking stick ready, and backed out of there. My knight came running with his stick and held off that possum while I checked on the chickens and that hen in the nest. (She had left it, so I closed the door.) Now, possums are dumb creatures, and it was obvious from the first glance that we were not dealing with a rabid animal, so it took a bit for this dumb creature to get the idea that he wasn't wanted. My knight kept after that possum and herded him away from the chickens. He never did run, just lumbered. Finally, he squeezed himself through the fence and disappeared.

I'd rather face a possum than a raccoon, because raccoons are really small bears and just as dangerous; and there's more of a possibility of rabies in a coon than a possum, too. But this early in the morning!! More than an hour after full daylight!! We're not in a drought, and I know there must be plenty of game around for that possum, but he was right up there getting in my chickens' grain. He was big, too. Maybe he was old and had bad teeth. Who knows. I guess I won't be so complacent from now on and go up there with just my walking stick. I'll take the extra few seconds to bring along a stronger "friend" at my side.

{Shudder} I hate having to face a wild animal. Gives me the shakes, but at least I've learned what's really a dangerous situation up on my hill and what's not. I've noticed for the past week or so that something has been getting into my storage shed up there and moving aside a heavy cement block to get into the metal garbage cans where I store the grain. I get good grain for my birds, not just that cracked corn scratch that's really "dead food." Right now I have one can of black sunflower seeds and the other can with a nine-grain mixture--no cracked, dead grains. I guess that's pretty attractive to coons and possums, but I feed my chickens as well as I can because I want good eggs, and they've scratched their yard up so much over the past eight or nine years, that it's like a desert up there. Not even the poison ivy that used to grow so lushly up there like a carpet has been gone for a few years now, so they need good food.

Life just gets interestinger and interestinger.

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ADDENDUM:
Question: Do opossums carry rabies?
Answer: Any mammal can get rabies. However, the chance of rabies in an opossum is EXTREMELY RARE. This may have something to do with the opossum’s low body temperature (94-97º F) making it difficult for the virus to survive in an opossum’s body.

How much does a smile mean?

Signs
Uploaded by mg02

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Hristos voskrse, radost donese! Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!



*Easter song performed by musical orchestra ''Stupovi'' and various Serbian singers and celebrities, dedicated to the resurrection of Christ, made as a part of an action of raising funds for reconstruction of medieval Serbian orthodox monastery ''Pillars of Saint George''

People rejoice, all nations listen:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!
Dance all ye stars and sing all ye mountains:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!

Whisper ye woods and blow all ye winds:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!
O seas proclaim and roar all ye beasts:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!

Buzz all ye bees and sing all ye birds:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!
O little lambs rejoice and be merry:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!

Nightengales joyous, lending your song:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!
Ring, O ye bells, let everyone hear:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!

All angels join us, singing this song:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!
Come down ye heavens, draw near the earth:
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!

Glory to Thee, God Almighty!
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!
Glory to Thee, God Almighty!
Christ God is risen! Let us rejoice!

*Credit

Morning Visitors

Today seems to be a day that I'm reaching for my camera. This is my second picture post on this site this morning. (If you click on the picture above, you will see a much larger version and you can see the deer better.) A little while ago I glanced out my front window and saw a family of deer crossing my front yard. They walked across the yard, the gravel driveway, and into the pine woods that surround my house. Now, having deer in your yard is really not something all that uncommon, but I think they are beautiful, and their appearance is always a Special Event for me. There are three of them, but this morning they never stood close enough together to get them all three in one shot. I think there is the mama doe and two younger ones. I have seen as many as five together with a young buck among them, but that's rare. If you'd like to see my other pictures of them, I added them to my Picasa WebAlbum "Animals Around My Place." When I saw them, I grabbed my camera, and stepped out my front door onto the porch, which is about 15' high off the ground and the deer were another 20' to 25' away, the original pictures contained a lot of surrounding, uninteresting yard, so I cropped them to get a better view of the deer themselves. This morning is a very bright, sunny day with morning temperatures in the upper 20's F warming to something like 66F this afternoon. I think the temperature at the time I saw the deer was something like 38F. These deer browse through my front yard and into the surrounding woods three or four times a week, usually during the mid-morning hours. What a treat to be living out here in the boonies!

As an experiment, I'm going to try to embed a slideshow of this "Animals around my place" Picasa album below.

Miner's Lettuce

Latin name: Claytonia perfoliata (syn. Montia perfoliata) It's common name "Miner's Lettuce" was given to it because miner's used to eat it as salad greens. It's an annual herb, and a dicot, which means (like a green pea) its seed has only one "storage compartment," or cotyledon. Some say it is native to California, but "also is found" outside of the state. One source says that it's a native of British Columbia, but other websites show it growing in abundance out in the wild as far north as Minnesota. Yet another site calls it an "eastern-North American wild flower." My husband, who is always thinking about and planning for the future, planted some Miner's Lettuce in a pot with garlic in our back yard. It's been back there for a few years, and I haven't paid any attention to it until this morning for some reason. It's also called Indian Lettuce and Winter Purslane. It has a round, disk-like, somewhat fleshy leaf through which the stem grows. A small, white, five-petaled flower grows on the stem coming through the leaf. I actually tasted some of our little clump, and my taste buds recognized the taste as very similar to raw spinach. I really liked it. Since it's reputed to be full of vitamin A and C and some trace minerals, I think I'll add some to our diet until it goes to seed. We'll have to spread this little tidbit around! Here's a nice little video describing this plant, harvesting technique, and a suggestion to add it to "green" smoothies. I think I'll be adding some to salads and sandwiches. Our little clump has small leaves, but other pictures and videos I've seen on the web show plants with much larger leaves. I suppose they grow larger out in the wild where they have more room to spread out.

Caution:
This plant contains nitrates/nitrites which could be toxic if you eat too much. However, this is more of a problem for grazing ruminants (cattle) than for humans. I'd still not give it to pregnant or lactating mothers, or young children.

Extra:
Really cool blog with videos embedded about a couple up in Minnesota who decided to eat only wild foods for a month.

More Morning Spider Webs

Last August I blogged about gigantic orb webs. It seems that "The Year of the Spiders" is continuing. This morning I awoke to the sight of dozens and dozens of sun-catching, sparkling, gossamer webs hanging from branches, tall grass, and some spread out like a counterpane on the surface of the grass. Some hung like delicate baskets from tree branches and tall grass, catching the early morning sun and sending it back in surprising sparkles. Others were spread like welcoming coverlets over the grass, thick and cottony sloping to a perfectly round opening in the center that is the door to the spider's home. I suspect that the webs on the grass belong to Hobo spiders and funnel spiders, both of which can leave a nasty bite if you get too close. I have no idea, however, what kind of spider weaves those delicate hanging baskets.