There are places that need water, so why does all of it fall here?

Written by Christer.

Now I know how effective that anti tick spray is, it is very much so. It had been raining all morning and I thought that since Malkolm would be so wet while walking around most of it would drop off pretty fast so I skipped it since he actually hate that smell. It’s a long time since I’ve picked so many ticks of any of the dogs who has lived here. Nova was the only one that didn’t have any and I guess it is because she walked after us all  after we just had walked there, so no more walks without it, no matter how awful it smells 🙂 🙂 🙂

     

My shoes hadn’t dried at all since yesterday so today I had to wear my winter boots 🙂 🙂 They are light brown but by the time we came home all the water had made them dark brown 🙂 My feet were dry though so 🙂 I placed my shoes towards the south heading wall and even after a day with at least some sunshine they still aren’t dry. I guess it doesn’t help when the humidity stays at 100% or just below 🙂 There will be even more rain tomorrow and much of the week. There are places on this planet that desperately need rain so why does it all have to fall here 🙂

Lots of Rowan berries this year, perhaps I should make some yelly or ade when it is time. They need a couple of frost nights to become less tart and then putting some honey in it will make them rather yummy 🙂

This is a rather unusual flower, it is a parasite and has no chlorophyll of its own. The Swedish name for it would be Pine wort in English.

I haven’t done much today, I was going to bake some bread but then I found two packages with hard bread I had forgotten so I skipped the baking 🙂 We did have our nap, I realized we napped for almost two hours but I can already say that it will not keep me awake after the usual bet time 🙂 Oh I forgot I also now potted some of the Quince seedlings. I must admit that I mostly had forgotten about them, so some have grown in a 90 degree angle, I’ll need to find some sticks so I can direct them in the right position again 🙂 Two more Giant Sequoia seeds have germinated as well but unfortunately none of the Dawn redwood seeds. Well they might need one more winter before they wake up, they do look ok when I check if they still exists.

Lots of lingonberries this year.

This one is rather delicious and it looks like it has a thick layer of clear coat put on it. It’s actually a thick layer of slime that protects it from pests, easily removed though and I usually pick lots of it.

It is time to go and look at at least the beginning of which team will be the European champions in football (soccer) England or Spain. I always hope for England but they have a tendency to never win when it really matters 🙂

I’ll get at least two pink poppies this year and if You look at the top of the photo You can see the leafs from the Californian poppy, no summer here without it 🙂
I wonder if he will continue to have that quilted fur in his neck when he gets older?

   

Have a great day!

12 thoughts on “There are places that need water, so why does all of it fall here?”

  1. I’m sorry for all the rain, here in France we have rain almost everyday and we never know how the weather is going to be.

    Every morning I drink my coffee on my terrace and say hello to the many snails that live there 🙂

    I can’t believe how tall Malkolm is now ! He doesn’t look like a puppy any more !

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    1. Hi Poppy_Celeste!

      It’s the same here and I don’t think I would have mind if we at least had temperatures at or slightly above 20C, both cold and rain is one thing too much 🙂 🙂

      I have surprisingly few snails and slugs despite this weather that should be prefect for them. I’m not complaining about that though 🙂 🙂 🙂

      I feel just the same and now he’s dropping his baby teeth as well 🙂 He will continue to grow higher until he’s around 12 months and he still has unusually big feet so who knows how big he’ll be 🙂 🙂

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  2. Sometimes when it’s damp my yard is full of mushrooms of all kinds, some extremely huge. They pop up overnight. I know orange ones with white spots are poisonous, and I do get those, so I would never dare to pick a mushroom from my yard and eat it. Some of the big ones when they start to rot smell terrible, too.

    The cats never go outside so they don’t get ticks. But a few weeks ago for the first time ever, I came in from the yard and found a tick walking around in my hair. And I was visiting a friend, sitting on her patio, and suddenly a tick out of nowhere climbed up my glass of lemonade. When we looked around, they were everywhere so we had to go inside. That’s summertime around here in Virginia.

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      1. Hi nduggar!

        I checked Indian pipe and it seems to be a close relative to our Pine wort 🙂 I can’t say that this is a common flower in any way here but they seems to love the more open forest we have now after all the thinning they’ve done here.. Thanks for the suggestion!

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    2. Hi catsworking!

      I used to have lots of mushrooms in my garden but these last years they’ve become rare. I guess You’re talking about the Red Toadstool, it is beautiful and it was actually recommended as a nice mushroom to eat here if one boiled it and poured out the water twice 🙂 🙂 It usually doesn’t kill people but it is one of those mushrooms that can give hallucinations 🙂

      Suddenly I think we actually have very few ticks 🙂 🙂 🙂 I’m not sure if I ever would have been able to enjoy nature if I had seen something like that 🙂 🙂 🙂

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      1. I’ve been in my house 37 years. I have a lot of oak trees and have never gotten a tick on me. I was shocked to find one in my hair after only a few minutes outside. I think we have good years and bad years for them. We’ve just had a downpour and it’s hot and humid, so my yard may be full of mushrooms soon. Thanks for the recipe, but I still don’t think I’ll be eating the red ones with with spots, or any of the others!

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      2. Hi catsworking!

        I’m glad You won’t eat those mushrooms 🙂 Toad stoles often contains other toxins that instead of killing You immediately instead sort of is stored in Your liver and if one would eat one too many of them one can dies several years after eating the first one. The most deadly is the white one, people who has eaten it and been saved by doctors says it’s quite delicious.

        The best for us humans when it comes to ticks is if the ground start to freeze long before the snow arrives because that kills the ticks, if it comes snow first the ground will be too warm to kill them, last winter was like that here so we have fewer even if I still think that one living tick is one too many 🙂

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  3. Your pine wort is very interesting to see. We have two parasitic species in North America that have this drooping growth and lack of pigment: Monotropa uniflora and Monotropa hypopitys. I have seen both of these species growing in New England.

    I tend to think your species is uniflora because of the lack of pigment, but uniflora does not have clustered growth like yours appears to show in the photo.

    Hypopitys looks more like the cluster growth of your pine wort, but it has a pink or reddish hue in its earlier growth, though it looks white when it is mature. Which makes me also think yours is possibly hypopitys.

    Monotropa uniflora, also known as ghost plant, ghost pipe, or Indian pipe

    https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/beauty/mycotrophic/monotropa_uniflora.shtml

    Monotropa hypopitys, also known as Dutchman’s pipe, false beech-drops, pinesap, or yellow bird’s-nest,

    https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/beauty/mycotrophic/monotropa_hypopitys.shtml

    I am very interested to hear your thoughts on this.

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    1. Hi Denali Sam!

      It is actually Monotropa hypopitus and I’ve only seen it in white but found photos of it with white flowers to orange and almost red flowers. I can also tell You that I’ve seen single flowers here and there as well, I guess it depends on if they can find the right fungi to connect to, I thought it was the pines themselves they attached to but now I read that it is actually a fungus they need to survive. We have , from what I could find, three parasitic flowers here. Monotropa hypopitus, Lathraea squamaria and an orchid Epipogium aphyllum. There are of course half parasites as well but that’s another thing.
      Nature is truly amazing don’t You think!

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