The weirder side of urban organic gardening with a smidgen of backyard chickens and danger
A half-assed attempt to build armor for my often bullied silkie. Sword training will commence at sunrise. Impulsive she is. Yet, not too old for training.
Prototype A: Death Proof Mark I
I’m still working on the attachment part, but she’s got full range of movement. This officially signals that I have too much time on my hands.
Here’s what I did:
Hello faithful readers. It’s been over a week since I’ve posted and I didn’t want you to feel lonely or sad. I’ve had a few requests to do a post on the best methods for “dealing” with gophers and I’ve succumb to the pressure to do just that.
The difference this time around is I really wanted to illustrate this post myself. I want you all to see the inner workings of the gophers lair and I would have a hell of a time getting my camera and lighting equipment down there. So this will be the next best thing.
And there in lies the rub. Drawing, inking and coloring these illustrations takes a wee bit longer than snapping a few pics on the Nikon. So I thought, “why not let your readers know that in the interim.” That way you don’t feel neglected. I’d never leave you guys, you know that right? Good!
So please bear with me over the next few days as I sketch away. I promise it’ll be worth the wait. Have I mentioned that I used to do illustrations for several newspapers? Political cartoons and EdOp pieces mostly. Although it’s off topic for this blog, maybe you’d like to see some of that?! Let me know in the comments if you would and I’ll post some. But not until after the gopher post!
In the meantime, I’m still posting some interesting articles and information on my Mind Your Dirt social media pages, so cruise on over to the Keep In Touch page to do just that.
I hope this tiny sneak peek will help keep you enticed and dripping with antici…
… pation.
Yours,
James
A couple weeks ago I was doing some research on how I could best maximize my yard to provide more milkweed varieties as well as nectar-producing flowers to attract more monarch butterflies and sustain the ones I already had milling about. You see, back in December I had about 8 monarch caterpillars on my single 2-foot-tall milkweed. Well, in no time at all they had stripped it bare of anything save stems. When I got home from work, I noticed that they had evacuated in search of new food sources.
The only problem was there were no other milkweed plants for miles around. In the fading light of that warm Tuesday I began a frantic search for the suicidal caterpillars. With a flashlight I scoured the yard in hopes of rescuing as many as I could find. That’s how I roll. You see, I felt guilty for having lured them in to provide only half of the food they needed to finish the deed. Continue reading “It's Official, I Have Become Ranger Rick!”