Log #0001: The Yard, The Critters, And Me

No, Not The Mower!

It's summer again. And the season of flowers, sunshine and birds is also the season of lawnmowers and scorching heat.

As far as the mowing goes, we don't just have grass up here in northwest Montana; we have mutant alien Speed-Gro grass. I've never seen anything like it. I swear it's already looking shaggy again by the end of the same day I've mowed it. The absolute longest time it's possible to go between mowing sessions is one week, and you still risk clogging your mower sometimes. About every four to five days now I don my "fight the yard" outfit and fire up the mower again. In addition to the old shirt and jeans I have a big, floppy-brimmed hat, various work gloves, and a pair of tall, black rubber boots. The fashion designers have nothing on me, right? I have a fairly good-sized yard, so these are fairly long sessions spent plodding round and round in those concentric perimeters. It's good exercise, I keep telling myself as I pant in the heat.

Then there's weed-whacking, which is kind of fun in its destructiveness, but I always get covered with plant bits and feel itchy for the rest of the day, even after I shower. I love nature, but sometimes I feel it's best appreciated when viewed through a window. In air conditioning.

If I owned the property I live on, I would be tempted to rip out every last blade of grass and put down gravel and mulch with the occasional tree or bush standing alone. I have considered getting a couple of sheep to keep the lawn down, but I'm afraid I would wake up some day to find a mountain lion had turned my yard into a snack bar. That's not the kind of mess I really want to deal with. So for now I'll keep mowing.

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Where Are The Birds?

I'm refilling my birdfeeders a lot lately. I have a birch tree next to one of the windows and have several birdfeeders hung for my cats' entertainment. (I will point out now that they are -indoor- cats so the Audubon people don't start yelling at me.) I have one of those cat window seats put up and they spend a lot of time sitting there, gazing out at the lawn. The finches and chickadees seem to elicit the most excitement and chattering, probably because they're so little and move so quickly. The jays catch their attention briefly, but not as intensely. The dim-witted robin hopping about on the lawn makes them very alert. You can almost see them thinking, I could catch that stupid bird, I bet I could... You should have seen their faces the first time my neighbor's free-range chickens wandered into the yard. If cats had eyebrows, they would have been raised high. They didn't know what to make of it. They're still undecided, I think, though the rooster's crowing under the window doesn't generate wide-eyed astonishment anymore. However, it does get my attention; when I've been deep in thought, it's the equivalent of a kid sneaking up behind me and yelling "boo!"

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