Signs and Portents

My Sweet Sixteen Apple tree.

As the growing season slows to its end, I find myself watching for signs of what is to come. There is a lot of folklore associated with predicting what the approaching winter will be like. The Old Farmer’s Almanac, which claims to be 80% accurate, says “This winter, temperatures will be up and snowfall down throughout most of the United States.  …We’re predicting a temperate, uneventful winter—potentially a welcome reprieve from the extremes of recent years.  …There will be exceptions, of course. Winter rainstorms will leave Florida, the Deep South, and southern California soaked. Meanwhile, heavy snowfall is expected in central and southern Appalachia, the western Ohio Valley, and the Rockies.”

The Farmer’s Almanac, not to be confused with the Old Farmer’s Almanac, disagrees and says we should expect “a season of rapid-fire storms that will bring both rain and snow, with little downtime in between. The season’s coldest temperatures will be found from the Northern Plains to the Great Lakes region. But areas east of the Rockies into the Appalachians will also experience many periods of cold conditions. The coldest outbreak of the season will come during the final week of January into the beginning of February, when frigid Arctic air brings a sharp plunge in temperatures almost nationwide, but especially across the Northern Plains. As this very cold air blows across the Great Lakes, heavy snow showers and snow squalls will bring intense bursts of snow to the east of the Lakes.”

Their forecasts remind me of those horoscope readings in the newspapers that are vague enough to turn out right no matter what. I’m hoping the Old Farmer’s Almanac is right.

According to folklore, some of the indicators of what winter will bring include:
● A plentiful crop of berries or a heavy crop of acorns means a harsh winter ahead.
● Flowers that bloom a second time in the fall means a colder winter.
● Leaves falling early, indicates winter will be mild. Leaves falling late means a bad winter.
● Onion skins that are thicker than usual indicate a rough winter ahead.
● Apple skins that are tougher and thicker also tell us to expect a cold winter.
● Corn husks that are thicker and tighter than usual indicate a cold winter ahead.
● Squirrels with very bushy tails in the fall mean a colder winter.
● If beavers build larger and stronger lodges and large stockpiles of food, winter will be harsh.
● Birds migrating early means a severe winter.
● Wild turkeys perching high in trees means a lot of snow is coming.
● If bees build their nests inside a barn or shed, you can expect a hard winter.
● If the wooly bear caterpillars have a wider brown band in the middle, winter will be milder.

From that list I observe that we are having a plentiful crop of berries. There aren’t any oak trees around old enough to bear acorns. Some of my flowers are having a second bloom. The leaves seem to be falling early. Onion and apple skins and corn husks don’t seem any thicker than usual. The squirrels don’t seem to have abnormally bushy tails. Business down at the beaver pond seems normal. I think a lot of birds have migrated early. I haven’t seen any wild turkeys up any trees. Our friends did have a swarm of bees move into their garage wall. And I haven’t seen a single wooly bear caterpillar yet. So all the natural indicators are mixed, some say harsh, some say mild. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what happens. No matter what, my gut instinct is that winter will come way too soon and stay far too long and it will be cold.

Late summer sunrise.

Last week was a hard work week. On Monday I continued cutting the orchard grass and various overgrown parts of the yard with the borrowed brush hogs. I found out right away that I preferred the smaller of the two. The big one, appropriately named The Brush Beast, was tricky to maneuver and too powerful. One wrong move and it could take down a young tree. So I gave up on The Brush Beast and went back to the smaller machine. I worked all morning and into the afternoon. I stopped to take a break at chore time. Then the weather started to change and it looked like rain was coming, so I didn’t resume. The rain never came, but I was pretty tired out by then anyway. Oh for the days when I could work like that all day and not mind it! Or better yet, oh for the days when I had strong sons here to do such hard work for me! But alas.

The two brush hogs.

The rain finally arrived later that night. It wasn't much, but every little bit helps. I love it when it rains at night. Sometimes I wish it would only rain at night. Tuesday morning it looked like the rain might stay and ruin my plans for the day, but by 10:00 the sky had cleared and things had dried out and I went out to tackle another day of hard work. This time I used an electric hedge trimmer to cut down areas where the brush hogs wouldn’t work. That meant a lot of stooping and dragging long extension cords across the yard. I made it to lunch time and then switched to mowing the orchard. This time I gave it a close mow with the Cub Cadet. The apple harvest is underway and it’s easier to pick them when the grass under the trees is short. By then it was chore time and I gave up for the day. I have to take things in limited doses. If I go too hard, I’m no good the next day.

The mowed orchard.

The hard work continued on Wednesday. Using the hedge trimmer, I spent the morning and afternoon cutting down more sunchokes and wild raspberries. Sunchokes, as I have often mentioned, are a curse in our yard and it’s my own fault because I introduced them to the property. I’ve had an ongoing battle with them ever since. They have spread into so many places where I don’t want them to grow. This year they are especially hearty. They are over eight feet tall. They are blooming right now and they are pretty when they bloom, but I’m not letting that sway me. I’m cutting them down. And after that, I’m going to burn them and till the places they’ve infested and then cover the spots with heavy black tarp for a year to kill off the roots. The wild raspberries I tolerate, but this year they collapsed under their own weight and needed to be cleared away so they can regrow next year. Both the raspberries and the sunchokes are miserable to remove, but I persisted and made good progress on Wednesday.

Honeycrisp apples almost ready to harvest.

Out in the big garden, Kurt has been busy tilling the beds emptied after harvest. He also tilled the section of the orchard where we plan to plant grapes. I like the look of a newly tilled bed, so even and weed free and clean looking.

Kurt tilling a bed in the big garden.

The freshly till bed where we will plant grapes.

The weather was mild and dry all week. The days were warm, but there was a chilly edge to their beginnings and endings. The nights are very cool. Most mornings there is low ground fog over the beaver pond and the Genesee stream. The garden is in rapid decline, but there are still bits of loveliness here and there. The zinnias, marigolds, and helenium are still going strong. We planted gladious late this year and they are just now blooming. They aren’t as robust as they usually are, but they’re still pretty. The autumn anemones and the colchicums, the last new flowers of the season, have begun to bloom. The potted night-blooming jasmine is in full bloom. We can smell its delightful and powerful fragrance all over the yard in the evening and even inside the house – with the windows closed. One of the loveliest sights now are the apple trees laden with ripening fruit. And my pear trees, not always reliable producers, have fruit on them too. A blessing of bounty.

Helenium.

Autumn anemone.

Colchicums bursting from the earth.

Late glads to make me glad.

The wonderfully fragrant night-blooming jasmine.

I spent the first part of Thursday running around doing errands. I returned the two brush hogs I’d borrowed. I drove up to Wellsville and bought chicken feed. I drove to Ulysses and bought hog feed. That took me until noon. I had a special project to work on after that. Sarah and Tosh are moving to Potter County! Miriam, who has been at their house for a week, was arriving later in the day with their chickens. They will stay here until the Fosters have a coop ready for them at their new house. In preparation for that, I had to prepare the middle, sequestered part of my coop for them. I raked it out and put down fresh straw and installed some nesting boxes. The chickens arrived and have settled in to their new, temporary home. The Foster’s chickens are not like mine. The breeds might be the same, but their temperaments are very different. They are tame. They like and expect a treat every day, a job I’ve taken over while they are here. I grab a handful of dried mealworms and they gather around me and eat them out of my hands. My chickens won’t get very close to me. But the Fosters only have six hens that have always had a lot of attention. I have thirty-seven hens and two roosters and most of them don’t get individual attention from me. I like tame chickens.

Late summer evening.

So Miriam arrived home Thursday evening and we were glad to have her home again, but she didn’t stay long. She and Hannah left on Friday to spend the weekend at the Thayn’s house. They went with the Thayns to the Highland Festival in Latrobe on Saturday. They go every year. They will be home later this evening.

Thayns in their clan tartan.

At the Highland Festival.

One of the parts of harvest time that I like most is collecting seeds. Many of the flowers have set seed now and I go around with my cups and shake, pinch, and pop seeds into them. I don’t save many seeds from my vegetables, mostly tomatoes and peppers. When Miriam came home, she brought me a gift from Rachel – more seed caddies and a label printer. I spent Friday morning organizing my seed collection into the caddies and labeling them. It was great fun. It satisfied my love of saving seed and my love of organizing things.

My newly organized seed caddies.

Friday evening, with Miriam and Hannah gone, the house seemed extra empty. Stacey and I worked together through the evening. We picked more tomatoes. We pulled up basil and I picked the leaves off (a tedious task, but the results make it bearable). Stacey made it into pesto and froze it. Stacey started cooking down some tomatoes for sauce. It was a lovely late summer evening, cool and fragrant.

Picking basil leaves. Do I look thrilled about it?

Making tomato sauce.

We continued working on Saturday. We finished six quarts of tomato sauce and canned it. We peeled apples and Stacey canned seven quarts of pie filling. We picked more basil and this time Stacey had the tedious task of picking leaves. She made three more batches of pesto. Pesto in the wintertime, on pasta and spread on warm bread, is a wonderful treat, a reminder of high summer and all its delights.

Stacey picking basil. She's happier about it.

Apple pie filling and tomato sauce finished.

This Sabbath morning was beautiful. It was chilly and a low fog hovered over the fields. The rising sun, shining through the fog, cast a golden light across the world. We had a special church meeting today. The Pittsburgh Temple was dedicated. Our branch is in the Jamestown, NewYork Stake and that puts us in the Pittsburgh Temple District, so we got to participate in the dedication right in our own chapel. Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf presided and dedicated the temple. We participated via a Zoom link. It was a great experience.

The Pittsburgh Temple.

We will continue working with the harvest this week. It looks like some much needed rain will arrive midweek. Rachel and her children will also arrive midweek to spend five days with us. That will liven things up. I’m looking forward to having more helpers with the harvest. It’s going to be busy and a lot of fun.