Obama/Biden '08?

I've been trying to stay away from the Presidential politics but I'm finding it more and more difficult.

Don Surber says that Fox News Channel won’t air this ad because it upsets people to consider who Barack Obama calls friends.



Perhaps it is time to start upsetting people. With friends like this, Obama shouldn’t even be in the Senate, let alone running for the Presidency.
(And that doesn’t even take into account Rev. Wright, Tony Rezko, or the rest of the Chicago machine and everyone under the bus.)


The McCain folks were quick to pick up on Obama’s choice of Biden for VP. And they played dirty. They used direct quotes from Biden.



Ed Morrisey on the timing of the text message announcement:

I’m not sure a political campaign could possibly screw up a running-mate announcement as badly as Team Obama. The e-mail message that the world awaited for days finally came — at 4:50 am ET.

Michelle Malkin says It’s Smarmy and Smirky ‘08!

If this was such a great choice, why announce it very late Friday night/early Saturday morning? This is the time when all bad news is usually announced because newsrooms are undermanned and because no one is going to be paying attention come Saturday morning.

Also, Peggy Noonan wrote this week in the Wall Street Journal about why Barack Obama seems to be falling in recent polls:
They're Paying Attention Now.


Oh, yeah, I nearly forgot. The man hasn’t been declared the official candidate yet. That might happen next week at the convention in Denver. Might not.

Marauders!

Well, the deer got all those rose buds I talked about the other day. Terry noticed they were nipped off this morning as she went to harvest more zucchini from the garden.

Monday night I thought I heard a deer huffing outside but couldn't spot one even with the million candle power light. Flower buds are like candy to deer. Concentrated energy.

*sigh*

At least I won't have to do much pruning. I will have to see about a small fence tall enough to prevent a repeat next year.

Company at the Aerie

Yesterday, Terry and I celebrated our 36th wedding anniversary and were lucky enough to have company to help us do so. My fishing/hunting buddy and Terry's cousin, Joe, and his wife, Pat, stopped by for the night as they made the circuit from NJ-Catskills-Niagara Falls-and back to NJ.

The two of them are great people and it's always a pleasure to just kick back and relax with them around. This being their first visit to the Aerie, however, we didn't relax much! After a tour of our home, we gave them an auto tour of the county as we went over to Wellsboro, Leonard Harris State Park (The Grand Canyon of PA), and up Route 287 to Hammond-Tioga Lakes and the Corps of Engineers facility before returning to the Aerie via Route 15 and Mansfield.

Joe was born on Terry's 5th birthday so they've always had a "connection" as she figured he was a present. He was into hunting long before I begged him to show me the ropes and help me get started. He and I have been going to Quebec to fish out of Ceasar's Lodge for over 15 years. They have three kids and our two are about the same age as their two oldest. They have become grandparents as their eldest has been married for two years and has a little girl. Joe will be retiring next June/July and they will then be looking to move out of NJ to southwest Virginia. Pat is an RN and will continue to work part time wherever they end up.

We ate and drank and talked for the balance of the night, generally enjoying the comfort that comes with being around good friends.

They just left and I miss them already.

Fay is coming to Disney World

I'm glad I don't have plans to be in Orlando this week...or Tampa or St. Pete or just about anywhere in Florida.



I've friends and family in the Tampa area and almost due east over near the Cape. Here's hoping they stay safe.

Fidgitty Frittelaries

Walking about the yard yesterday while snapping pictures, I spotted this one orange butterfly (one of the many frittilaries) sitting upon a flat stone sunning itself--or maybe it was advertising as a streetwalker does.



Moments after I took that picture of the frittilary flapping its wings and posturing upon the stone, a second one showed up and a short and--I imagine--suggestive dance took place with the first leading the second around the stone before taking off for the field of goldenrod and bergamont. It reminded me of the newsreels of Gypsy ROse Lee dancing for LBJ--lots of shaking and wagging and fan/wing waving.



I suppose they went off to make little fritillary caterpillars or something.

More Bird Pics from Sunday morning.

Sunday morning while standing on the deck getting buzzed by the Ruby-throated Hummingbirds, I also took pictures of some of the other visitors to the feeding area. Using the digiscoping equipment (Nikon Fieldscope ED III and Nikon Coolpix P1) I was able to capture some of the larger visitors who were willing to sit still long enough. The smaller ones (Tufted Titmouse, Chipping Sparrow, Black-capped Chickadee, White-breasted Nuthatch, Red-breasted Nuthatch, Dark-eyed Junco, Hairy Woodpecker, Downy Woodpecker) were either too quick for me--zooming in for a seed and disappearing into the trees before I could focus, or just too doggone jittery for a good picture. Others, like the American Robin and Eastern Towhee stayed too far afield for me to get them in the scope before they moved on.




An immature Northern Cardinal. You can tell it's an immature by the spikey, bright red Mohawk it is sporting. (Actually, the gray on the back and mottled white breast help too.) This is probably a male (again the Mohawk is prominent) and he'll be bright red in a couple of weeks.



Another immature bird. This time it's a Blue Jay. Man, that's a face only a mother could love! Lucky for this bird, it will sport much brighter and colorful facial feathers in a week or two. Male or female? Only a member of the opposite sex could be sure!



That immature Blue Jay was accompanied by at least one adult.



Several (okay, make that over a dozen) Mourning Doves have found the yard a good place to pick up a free meal from the spilled seed. Unfortunately, several have fallen prey to the local semi-feral cats who like to stake out our feeders for a (nearly) free meal.

A rose by any other name....

Last spring, Terry and I were down at the Agway when we noticed some Sub-Zero Roses on sale.

Well, we had already pounded some holes into our clay and rock mixture of a yard, but this plant didn't look like it need much more than a little hole so we bought it. It was only about $10 and Terry likes roses. It didn't take much to chisel out a one-and -a-half-gallon hole, pour in some peat moss and potting soil and plant the little twig of a rose bush in the sun.

Well, by golly, something went right. It started to grow! And then it started to put out flower buds. Three of them to be exact. And then in early July the roses opened. They were gorgeous but all too soon they were gone and I thought we would have to prune and wait till next year for more flowers.

Curiously, despite Japanese beetles all over the raspberry bushes and the blackberry canes (next year there will be traps!), there didn't seem to be any attacking our little rose bush. The leaves were unmarked and glossy green signs of a very healthy plant.

A little over a week ago we noticed another batch of blossoms appearing on the little bush which still stands less than 2 feet tall. There are now seven buds in various stages of maturity.

Goldenrod and Yellow Jackets

I mentioned that the goldenrod was about to burst into bloom a week or so ago. Well, some of it has.

This is one of the most undeservedly maligned plants out there. Everyone believes it is responsible for the hay fever (runny nose, itchy eyes, etc.) which really begins to affect people about the same time as these yellow flowers appear. In reality, it is not the goldenrod that is the cause. Another plant, one with non-descript green flower that blooms at the same time: ragweed.

I used to be terribly allergic to grass, tree and especially ragweed pollen. From mid-August to October I would be one messed up person. And then it would start all over in mid-April when the trees would start blooming. I have undergone desensitization shots to reduce the problem to almost nothing. Still, when it's time to pull ragweed from the garden up north, I don my long sleeve shirt and leather gloves because if any part of the plant touches bare skin....

I used to be allergic to bee and wasp stings, too, but a long series of shots fixed that problem and I no longer have to face the possibility of sudden death should I run into a yellow jacket (a type of wasp) or fifty.

The goldenrod flower blooms just when many flowers have faded and its many florets supply pollen and nectar for insects well into the fall. In fact, while milkweed plants and flowers may fuel the Monarch Butterfly's caterpillar and young adult, it is the goldenrod in one form or another that sees that it can migrate south in the fall.



These may not be my favorite insects (Yellow Jackets) but this is one of the busier fueling stations in the yard right now.

Ruby-throated Hummingbirds.

I wonder, has anyone has ever been gored to death by a hummingbird?

I could ask by friend Joyce out there in Colorado on the Front Range just north of the Air Force Academy. Last time we visited her, she had 8 large hummingbird feeders arranged on her deck rail. Each had 6 or so feeding stations and every one of them had a waiting line. Yeah, she has a hummingbird infestation every summer that sees her go through several hundreds of pounds of sugar. And some of her little friends will land on your finger to sup.

Last year I was thrilled to have a pair of Ruby-throated Hummingbirds nesting somewhere nearby and visiting the feeders every day. There was one male and a female whom he would not allow to feed. He just kept chasing her away from the feeders every time he spotted her there. So I put up two more feeders to keep them separated. And it worked. They would feed maybe ten yards apart.

This summer started off the same way. One male staking out a territory and a female who seemed happy enough to mate and take orders. Then there was at least one more male and one more female as the feeders were supplemented by the wild bergamont, raspberries, blackberries, roses, and the perennials we planted.



With 7 or 8 little hummers in the yard, I've only managed to spot one adult male. The rest, like this one, are either females or young of the year that have not attained adult plumage yet.

This afternoon, I took my life in my hands and sat on the deck to watch the aerial display as humming birds zipped here and there chasing one another away from the feeders either in territorial fights or just for the heck of it. There were at least 7 or 8 zooming back and forth from the front deck to the woods; perching on the electrical wire or the hanging baskets; hovering a foot in front of my face; and chattering all the while. I got exhausted just watching them.



Several times I thought a bird flew so close that it went between my face and my eyeglasses. Or, barring that, in one ear and out the other.



Even when eating they keep the engine revved up.

Every now and then a truce would be declared and they would stop at the feeders to refuel.



Truce or no truce, a bird's got to be on the lookout for a sneak attack!

Soon the little guys and gals will need all the muscle they are building and energy they are storing as they will make one of the great migrations to the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico and beyond to the Yucatan.

Blackberry Jam

I went up the hill this afternoon and picked blackberries. I had been out there last Friday for about an hour and picked about three pints. But I had been rushed and was keeping my eye on the time since I had to drive the Tundra in to get it serviced and inspected. Today I had all the time in the world and came back with two quarts of blackberries. That was more than enough to make four and a half pints of blackberry jam. Which I did.


I was a little afraid the stuff wouldn't set up properly as three of the pint jars were very, very liquid even after quite a time out of the water bath. I began to think the pectin might have been a tad too old. But then I recalled it had worked fine with the blueberries. Eventually, the jam set and solidified nicely once it reached room temperature. Unfortunately, the seeds from the crushed blackberries separated and floated toward the top so the first couple of tablespoons out of those slow setting pints will be chock full of small seeds. Maybe next time I'll go through the trouble of running the mash through a jelly bag and make jelly instead of jam.

I now have 8 pints of blueberry jam and 4 1/2 pints of blackberry jam in the larder. And that's not counting the quart bags of blueberries in the freezer or all those zucchini breads stacked up in there like so many bricks.

Now I go in search of fresh peaches. And tomatoes. And then apples!

The Birdchaser: BIADD

The Birdchaser: BIADD

The above site has a diagnosis for what ails many an avid birder. BIADD = Bird Induced Attention Deficit Disorder.

And I am a sufferer (?) of this ailment.