looduskalender.ee

Alice, I promise, after this one all invading apples will be rolled over to - for instance Hectopod's sleeping General Conversation topic.

But about Johnny Appleseed's seedlings: surely he was hoping for something new, beuatiful, delicious. But he might also have sown seeds to get stock for grafting on. They didn't bother much about standardised stock varieties and heights in those days.
At an orchard where they also pressed apple juice they used to put down the press leftovers as fertiliser on the ground, 10-20 cm thick ... Wasps and fruit flies were overjoyed. But there was no little apple forest, yet.

Macdoum: about the Estonian Mnaors site - a follow-up at the Picnic Grounds

Since he was my Grandmother's hero I should do some investigating. And apples have been popping up recently. In a book I read recently there was a chapter on the apples of Kazakhstan -- probably where all apples originated, and I know there is a whole book on Apples that might get into Johnny Appleseed. Since he was planting nurseries and selling trees as he could, and since he returned to the nurseries every couple years -- he traveled his whole life -- it is very likely that he did work on the breeding and selecting good apples, and that the selections may have varied with local climates.

Fleur, I think they must have similar roles. And I think they both seem to sort of carry on in the garden ignoring people as best they can.
I think possums get quite a bit bigger and sometimes in winter you can see the possum train around my house in the grass. Every night they make the trip around the house looking for food. (Maybe when we get to winter I will be able to photograph their little path.)

More on baby possums. I do think I have three -- judging by the ears but of course I did not get photos of the ears all from the same angle.
(photobucket it still down so I am off to bed -- but I just saw three ravening huge raccoons in my backyard, digging right at the screen door. No wonder the baby possums are up in the daylight and try to sneak into the house whenever they can. Their momma is teaching them the proper way to be a raccoon.)

This one I noticed because Sam was staring at it across from my computer -- then I chased the poor thing all around the house. Eventually Sam chased it into the bathroom. Here it is trying to hide behind the paint can under the bathroom sink. The brown thing in the foreground is the paper bag trap.


I put cat food into a brown paper bag and eventually got it into the bag so I could carry it outside.


This one was hiding behind some metal sheets at the edge of the house foundation. He stayed there a long time (It is pretty much where I heard the raccoons they were jumping and growling at me -- and running away by the time I saw them)


This is the little guy I caught in the bucket (macdoum's idea). I thought maybe I heard one in the garage and so I set the trap. Then when I heard a noise I ran to the garage lifted the bucket to vertical using the handle. This guy was either the bravest or the hungriest. He did not freeze. He hissed and growled a little and ate all the food.


I am not sure but I think his ears might be different from the others.

Blackberries high up in the hedge (or anywhere else) a sure sign of late summer.

What cute little "pests," & I do think the ear patterns are distinct on each one & you do have three. They are certainly keeping you busy! And the raccoons, too. I had a pet raccoon when I was young & lived on our farm. What a fun pet he was, but full of mischief, as these little possums seem to be.

Ohhh, I am jealous! These look so beautiful & delicious. My husband's parents had a farm & there were blackberry & raspberry canes wild in the woods. So good & much better than store-bought. It was wonderful to just go for a drive in the countryside & stop to stand at the berry patches & eat right off the plants. The thorns weren't fun, but like bears, they didn't stop us!

It will be interesting to see if the raccoons come back. I think they must be from another block and the traffic is so terrible here it makes me very nervous. But my block has berries, apples and grapes so...

Alice you are living dangerously these days.. and having a lively time too.
Seems you have three,for now.!!
Good luck.. but they do seem cute too but,to me they are too rat-like to be endearing,seems they are extremely clever,though. Ha.. good luck with the hunt,seems you aren't finished yet..

So I have to admit that I often find rats to be cute -- I think it is mainly Black Rats, which are smaller than Norway Rats (which like black rats came from some place in the east - probably India). I occasionally see them climbing in the bushes -- not rooting around in human garbage. Anyhow they have amazing little feet -- but if there were rats in my house I would freak out! So I am counting on cats, possums and raccoons to keep the rats away.

Bonne chance..

I found a webcam from baby Opossums.

These baby opossums were rescued after the mother was killed by a car. The babies were found crawling over the body of the dead mother.

http://www.newyorkwild.org/osprey/BabyOpossums.htm

I finally found the babies up and about.

I am glad I only have 2 or 3. Eleven babies would be a large mess. I think these guys are at about the size of the two round here, neither of which have made it into my house for a couple of days!

Alice how is the opossum population recently ?
Hugs to Small.

edit;Sorry to hear you 'twisted' your back Alice ! Greatest relief I know of is to lie on the floor and let your back-muscles relax. Afterwards don't forget to roll on your tummy,then knees, to get up.
You will probably need an anti-inflammatory drug for a few days.
Take care.

Well today I was able to sit at the computer and download the images in my camera.

This is of the last possum I caught -- over a week ago I think -- I am hoping they will not enter the house again.

And here are a couple of images of Small playing in the sunshine last week (I hope the sun returns)







I think you can see that her eye is bad in the first of the images, but you can also see she is still enjoying her life.

Small certainly looks happy. Yes, it's possible to see something wrong with the eye, but she doesn't seem to bother about it.
Thanks for those happy pics.

One of the plants of late summer is the sunflower.

This one is growing in my parents front yard. I thought it is especially interesting because it shows a kind of magical aspect of nature. Originally it was a single or maybe double stalk sunflower -- then a deer came a long and munched off the top and then the plant sprouted multiple stalks and now there are lots of flowers -- first for the bees and later for the birds.

The bees really seem to enjoy the sunflowers.

This is another flower of late summer -- at least in my parents neighbourhood. It seems to be invasive as it is moving down the street and grows well actually in the street right next to the curb.