Tales from Pentoga

There's a cotton pickin' pea stealin' munchkin in the garden!

July 24, 2021 - Saturday morning

67 degrees/rain/calm winds

Pentoga Road

Hambone and his grandma are the main reasons I plant sugar peas. I've never seen two people who enjoy grazing in a pea patch as much as those two.

Hambone became a bit discouraged that he couldn't find any more pea pods. Grandma Sargie had a bird's eye view from the top and quickly came to the rescue.

Hey hey, look at this rain that's falling.

This summer's been a different one in the precipitation department. About the time it could become seriously dry, just enough rain comes through to keep the garden and lawn happy. We've had drier years, many more that have been wet, so we'll take what God gives us and be grateful.

Meanwhile, Mississippi Brother Garry says they are having a hard time turning off the water in the south while the drought continues in the west.

Returning home from my Friday morning walk with Yooper Brother Mark, I headed to the garden and finished weeding the west side.

Other than the peppers, both jalapeno and sweet, everything looks good. The aphids destroyed most the pepper plants and the prognosis for a crop of any kind is bleak.

I could have made a garden adult video yesterday when I assisted a giant male pumpkin blossom pollinate a female. Hopefully, the act will result in a baby giant pumpkin being formed. All that was needed yesterday was a a bit of nasally guitar music along with a slimy boom-chicka-chick background and I'd have had all the makings of an adult-only flick.

Since this is a family website, I didn't take any pictures.... wacka-wow-wow-boom-chicka-chick... baby.

Sargie and I finished cleaning the pond with two objectives in mind:

1. trim the underwater weeds

2. scrape off the long, stringy, algae that was clogging the gravel filters and growing on everything

At a loss of what to use to trim the water plants under the surface, I grabbed one of our kiddy kayaks and with a pair of old fashioned shears in hand, paddled out and got to work.

Sargie's leaf rake, with an added four feet of PVC pipe, was used to rake in the algae and gather the water plant clippings.

Sargie wasn't idle by any means. She was either emptying the moss from the rake as I handed it to her or raking the algae from those filters that she could reach from shore.

In the end, the pond was cleaned, the water returned to crystal clear, and is as good or better than ever.

Mission accomplished!

One other thing. There must be a thousand or more baby goldfish swimming all over the pond. No matter where you look, there's a herd of baby goldfish. (I know it's called a school, but the misuse of certain words just drives some I know up a wall. Ain't it fun?)

I assumed we'd lose quite a few babies when they first hatched, but all have doubled in size this past week and I don't believe we've lost nary a one.

Appears the pumpkins aren't the only ones practicing adult activities in our, otherwise, benign garden.

Sargie took off for Iron Mountain early in the afternoon. She had several items to either pick up or shop for and in the end, stopped and played with Cheeks for a while before bringing Hambone home for the weekend.

I mowed the yard while she was away. It's amazing how fast the grass grew during the week we were gone.

With the green jungle once again tamed, I turned my attentions to shoveling sand and gravel from the trailer into a low area by the barn.

The two yards of heavy fill about did me in and I was happy to call it a day.

Today, hmm. The rain has let up so I guess I ought to think about going for my morning stroll. I really wanted to get a load of gravel today and begin spreading it on the other side of the barn, but with the rain, I'll wait and see. Otherwise, it very well could be a movie and popcorn day.