Driving Around the County

I showed you this picture of flooded fields from Stranger Creek the other day. 

Here it is today: 

Hmmmm kind of a hazy picture.... 

but... you get the picture.  The water has receded. 

I actually drove out there after Jax's game tonight... and went all the way to the bridge. 

There is still a LOT of water in the creek, but we are not expecting rain for a week or so now. 

I know a lot of farmers who are happy about that. 

I took this the other day. 

Actually, there were three. 

I am trying to remember to check my settings before snapping that first picture! 

This absolutely GORGEOUS bird is a green heron, my first ever! 

I ran over to the Ag Hall on Monday to check on the chickens, and 

saw him.  I could not believe my eyes. 

The straw bales are doing... okay.  I am going to work on them tomorrow. 

I think I am not watering enough, and was depending on the rain. 

Tomorrow they get water and fertilizer. 

(The grass growing is okay) 

I have only lost two plants, a cucumber and a watermelon.  

Actually...

Even though it was bitten off.... it is regenerating.  See that hole????  Hmmmm. 

My faithful Jester is on mouse patrol.  Since I took this picture on Monday, 

I have removed more of these things from the patio.  We are trying to follow the 

mouse man's guidelines, and I am cleaning, cleaning, cleaning.  

I am VERY close to stopping feeding for a few days while I am 

gone to the Blogville Awesome Retreat in Indiana from the 8th thru 

the 12th. 

I had to run to the store on Monday afternoon, and I took the camera. 

I stopped at Angel Falls Trail and walked down to see how the creek 

was flowing since the rains. 

I could hear it before I saw it. 

(Holy cow, I have NEVER Had a video load on Blogger as fast as that one! 

Turn it up if you can, so you can hear it. 

So... we have hired a company to get the mouse situation under control here. 

I can't bear killing ANYTHING, let alone a mouse.  I told the young man we could not do sticky traps, I can't torture.  He is snap trapping and coming daily to empty them. 

We are not winning at the moment.  We ARE down about 20 mice in the last week. 

I took it outside.  I'm sure it's back in here somewhere tonight. 

Thank heavens I am plugging the drain and the garbage disposal at night, and 

now you see why. 

Rain, Rain and More Rain

We had a whopper thunderstorm this morning and got two inches of rain in short shrift. 

Lilly stayed out all night long... I thought I heard her at 1 asking to come in (she scrapes the door)... and when I went to the door, I didn't see her on the deck.  At 4, there was a definite scrape under my window for her to come in.  She hates storms.  I saw lightening in the distance at 1, and 

more at 4. 

The storm started at 5, and laid a swath through Leavenworth, doing big damage at Mount Muncie Cemetery and the National Cemetery, both of which I have shown you.  Mount Muncie has those gorgeous old trees, so I will go over there in a few days and take a look.

Can you tell that I am standing IN water in the back yard? 

Our back of the back yard.  It's a long story. 

Yes, we have a pond.  

That's the side yard, by the patio.  See that bare spot on the left?  It's a mound of bad 

birdseed that piled up all winter.  It's REEKING.  At some point, I need

to dig it up and haul it out. 

Yes, I know you aren't supposed to leave it in the bird feeding area. 

It will get hauled out at some point, I have quit trying to hurry to do everything. 

Yes, the sun did come out this afternoon! 

After I helped with tours at the Ag Hall this morning,  I took the dogs 

for a short walk, as the humidity was still high. 

This pretty slider girl was helped across the road, and I watched to make sure she was oriented and started off again.  

Check out behind the calf... the pasture pond is so very full! 

It's been a while since the water came up to the cow's chests. 

I couldn't help it... I wanted to be sure the babies were safe after the hail and strong winds. 

They were! 

So are these babies. 

Keith and I noticed something in a planter out in front yesterday. 

It's hiding under the heuchera. 

It grew while I was gone today. 

A few days ago, I put one of my sweet potato plants out on the porch. 

This morning, it blew over in the storm. 

I picked it up, and look what I found! 

Too wild.  I'm going to cook it tomorrow night. 

I tromped through the water to look at the SBG... the plants I planted on 

Saturday look great!   

I was so glad to see this, I am really looking forward to it this summer. 

Gratuitous picture of my boy.  

I think this will make you laugh... turn it up so you can hear it, 

and sorry for the shaky camera work. 

We expect sun tomorrow! 

After the Rainy Night

Yesterday morning, I snapped a few pictures of flowers still blooming at the old house. 

The gardens are terribly overgrown at this point. 

It's so odd that the sedum is blooming so early. 

Lilly and Jester got to go to the pond. 

They had a good time, despite the humidity. 

As the day wore on, the humidity got worse. 

As we drive home, I came across this scene, and got out of the car to take a better picture: 

I was being watched: 

See me in the rear view mirror? 

I went another two miles, and saw this ahead of me. 

I counted four little poults walking with her. 

At 3:30 the senior Yoders got here, to spend the night.  We had planned to meet Amber (Keith's daughter) and her sons for dinner.  However, Mother Nature intervened in a huge way. 

This is the juncture of four yards in our back yard. 

That's where the water was headed.  This is our neighbor-directly-behind us, and the blue building is his detached garage. 

See the pond?  All the water was headed there.  

His basement and the detached building flooded, and a major cleanup is underway over there tonight. 

There was also considerable flooding on the next street over, and a culvert collapsed under the street there.  

Flooding is all over Leavenworth County. 

Dinner out was cancelled and Amber stayed at home, safe with her boys. 

Look whom I ran into this morning on the way home. 

If it IS the same group (and it was the same vicinity), one poult was lost in last night's major storm. 

I was sorry to see that. 

I had horrid vibration in the car, but there was no getting out to get a clearer picture. 

She's keeping them in the high grass, but they struggle to get through it.  I'm crossing my fingers for them. 

This was a common scene in our county today! 

More Rain

Yes, we had more rain today. 

Crazy. 

It's thundering and lightening out there right now, 

and Leavenworth County Emergency Management 

just posted to stay out of Riverfront Park in Leavenworth, because

the Missouri is out of her banks.  

It's already raining again in Easton, part of which town 

floods regularly. 

Too much! 

See this bucolic creek? 

It's the one I showed you yesterday.  It's really getting a little scary. 

Here are the five little goslings I have been taking pictures of for the 

last three weeks.  I was so glad to see them this morning, and here's the reason. 

This was Monday.  The babies were no where in sight.  

This bird was moving it's wings a little, but did not lift it's head. 

I prayed and prayed it wasn't the mother goose, attacked by something. 

This goose was near, but I saw no babies anywhere that morning, 

I was relieved this morning. 

I came around a corner this morning and look who was sitting on the wood fence? 

Accompanied by six of his friends! 

Two days ago, I found a huge blood stain at this corner... as if it were a 

deer, or a cow, or a horse, all of which are in this vicinity.  I never saw a body. 

When the dogs and I came back 40 minutes later, all the birds were gone! 

This is what our skies looked like as I was getting ready to leave the old place. 

As I type this at 9:43, it is storming AGAIN.  

It's honestly getting tiresome and SCARY. 

The hawk's nest has been vacated... but I took this picture yesterday, because I knew the babies would be close and their parents feeding them.  Can you see the baby in the middle of the picture? 

I tried to find them today in the foliage, but could not. 

And last, these are the ponds at the foot of our pasture, on the Spehar's place. 

We have never seen them so full! 

Remember, there are two large ones, and another big one in the cow pasture. 

If these go over... they go across the next closest neighbor to the east, and thence across the bottomland fields... to Stranger Creek.  

We have a 90% chance of rain tomorrow, and I am listening right now to 

many frogs in our side - yard "pond" here. 

The weather bulletins say expect winds and more rain, and hail! 

Roadside Flowers and Rain and the Mystery Bird

This year has been wonderful for roadside flowers, and 

I am so happy seeing them.  

We had more rain today... there was supposedly only a 20% chance... but it poured and poured and poured. 

Corn is up, but many of the lower fields are under water, so we will see how it grows. 

concensus... 

Thank you, Donnell, Friend Jill and Old Friend Terry, 
that the mystery bird is 
the Western Meadowlark... you  know, the State Bird of Kansas! 

I had never seen one here... I had never seen one at the old house... but I see them all the time as I drive back and forth. 

That is, of course, not my picture, though I would love to capture one like that! 

Okay, I agree.  

The one I saw sure looked big, though. 

So, is this one?  (female) The beak does not look right... but maybe it's my foggy picture through the windshield tonight. 

Jes was ready to come home tonight, even though we made a very fast trip to the rain-sodden old house.  I can't go into the old henyard now without bug spray, it's ... buggy. 

Our side yard, as we got home. 

It has been full of water for three weeks, but it did go down enough that I was able to cut around it. 
Now, I'm afraid, we're back in the soup.