The scurs beating on it wasn’t enough to keep the Weather Eye from dumping more rain in last week’s forecast. Will six consecutive days of measurable precip continue or will it taper off? Starting on Thursday, sunny with highs in the low 80’s and lows in the mid-60’s. Sunny on Friday with a slight chance of evening showers. Highs in the low 80’s with lows in the mid-60’s. Mostly sunny on Saturday with a slight chance of forenoon showers and thunderstorms. Highs in the mid-80’s with lows in the upper 60’s. Sunday, sunny with a slight chance of evening showers and thunderstorms. Highs in the upper 80’s with lows in the low 70’s. Mostly sunny on Monday with highs in the upper 80’s and lows in the upper 60’s. Tuesday, partly sunny with highs in the upper 70’s with lows in the low 60’s. Partly sunny on Wednesday with a good chance of showers and thunderstorms, highs in the upper 70’s and lows in the upper 50’s. On July 13th we’ve already lost over 18 minutes of daylight since the summer solstice, losing daylight at a minute and a half per day. The normal high for July 13th is 82 and the normal low is 62. The scurs will be hawking putty knives to scrape those Farm and City Day parade Tootsie Rolls off people’s soles.
More issues continue to arise in area corn and soybean fields. Some reports of urea being aerially applied to corn and as ground conditions allow, 32% being dropped into them as well. Even with the shallow root systems prevalent, rainfall will be needed to get the material to move into soil deep enough, so the plants will be able to utilize it. The other question becomes, even if it does rain, is there a sufficient corn crop there to justify the expense or are we helping the insurance company and throwing good money after bad? Time will tell. Some tassels starting to peek out of the whorl on early maturing hybrids in a local area plot as of Monday. Won’t be long and the smell of corn pollen will fill the air once again.
Not to be outdone, the soybeans that were looking good from the road have suddenly shown what over 24” of rain since May 1st can do. Soybeans don’t like wet feet either obviously. Signs of fungal diseases we haven’t seen for a while are becoming more evident, including fusarium and phytophthora. These organisms are present in the soil in every field and conditions must be favorable for them to infect the plants. The soybean plants need to be susceptible. Most soybean varieties have resistance to races of phytophthora, but there is growing evidence that the resistance is being overcome by new races. In the case of fusarium, seed companies don’t breed plants for resistance to it, so it can lead to some ugly spots in fields given our wet conditions.
The garden continues to flourish despite all the precipitation. There is something now in every vine crop hill sans one small decorative pumpkin variety. The peppers are still ugly, while the tomatoes actually appear to be fairly healthy. The string beans that went in the last day in June coming up like gang busters as are the decorative sunflowers on the opposite end of the garden. The four o’clocks I painstakingly transplanted exhibited no transplant shock with generous rains falling over the next several days on them. Weed control needs to take center stage soon. A breezy day would be preferable. The mosquitoes are almost unbearable otherwise. The big question is just how much of the garden will make it? Given the warm temperatures forecast and the abundance of moisture, it certainly improves the odds for much of it. Luckily, we still have some string beans and squash left in the freezer to tide us over until we see what transpires for this year’s edition.
We’re seeing more of this year’s new bird crop arriving at the feeders as our summer progresses. The young orioles in particular make daily appearances at the jelly feeders. They act almost dopey, sort of bumbling their way around the feeder, only to be put in place by the adults when they don’t follow the pecking order. It’s probably nesting time for some of the goldfinches. We seem to be seeing mostly males and fewer females. The males feed the females seeds on the nest, and when the young hatch, both take turns feeding them regurgitated seeds. This makes them unique in the bird world and also provides a mechanism that prevents cowbirds from becoming a nuisance should they lay eggs in a goldfinch nest. Since the goldfinch diet is made up of almost exclusively seeds, young cowbird hatchlings will starve to death after they hatch. Like most birds, their diet requires more protein in the form of insects, spiders, earthworms, etc.
Poppy had some separation anxiety this past week with Mrs. Cheviot being on the road. Knowing that was the case, I tried to give her some extra time once I was home. I even allowed her to sleep on the bed. I’d attempted that a couple times before only to find she wanted to jump on me and play rather than sleeping. This time went better. I’d worn her out following me around over the course of the days, so she was ready to sleep. Poppy curled up on the far corner of the bed and within minutes was sound asleep. The only time she moved was when it got cooler towards morning and snuggled up behind me. That sleeping arrangement lasted a couple days until she wanted to play ball about 4:30 a.m. Don’t know about you, but I’m not doing that. It sets a bad precedent for one and besides I usually have another hour or more of sleep to log. Once Mrs. Cheviot got home, it was game on and Poppy was banished to sleep in her kennel once again. Oh, well, it was fun while it lasted.
See you next week…real good then.