French Broad Hollow Ramble

Remember! This blog displays best in a browser, not in your email or Facebook.

Today I saw a dozen or so butterflies (at least some Monarchs) migrating. Butterflies usually seem to flit around when I see them in the garden or on my rambles, but now they are flying with a purpose and are much closer to the treetops than earlier in the year (hence no photos).

The weather has finally cooled a bit. Friday’s high was 88, and yesterday’s was 68! (Historic average is 71.) Even the “experts” are wondering when/if the fall foliage will arrive. Most trees in the Hollow are still green, especially the oaks and hickories, although leaves on most of the poplars, sycamores, and box elders have turned brown and fallen off. The wind has picked up, and the ground is littered with leaves, twigs, sycamore balls (not as bad as sweet gum balls but still painful to step on in bare feet), acorns, black walnuts, and hickory nuts. (I think the squirrels are responsible for the nut litter.)

Work continues on the new house, and I have felt sorry for the crew working in the sun putting on the roof floor. They should finish in a few days, and the roofers will have cooler weather for their part.

That’s about all that’s been happening in the heat. I’ll let you know what this cooler weather brings. Tomorrow’s forecast calls for rain! 🙂

 

Remember! This blog displays best in a browser, not in your email or Facebook.

This is the deer I’ve been calling “Li’l Buck.” I mentioned in the last post that he is feeling his hormones; if you look closely, you can see why. The fawns are also maturing and have lost most of their spots.

Big Mama and her twins show up for breakfast and dinner almost daily. One of her twins walks right up to me, and sometimes I wonder if it is thinking about coming on in the house. The turkeys are beginning to form flocks, and they usually show up for feeding, too.

It continues to be dry in the Hollow, although it poured in Asheville yesterday. (You can see the difference in the river in the last photo below.)  We’ve had only a few small showers that helped settle the dust—briefly. Most of the drivers that see me on my ramble slow down to keep the dust down (one even stopped to apologize!), but the dust lingers in the air regardless. As in most parts of the South, the temperatures have continued to be way above average.

The persimmons are ripe, and I look for them when I pass the trees that are close to the road. I use a long stick knock the branches I can reach to see if any fall for me to eat. I pick up any I find already on the ground and take them to the turtle friend I wrote about in an earlier post. He seems to look back at me when I look for him on my way to the river, and today I was able to video hime on my way back, eating the persimmon.

I hope I’ll be able to tell you about more typical weather soon!

 

 

 

Fall is coming! Tomorrow is the Autumnal Equinox, at least according to the calendar. But it sure doesn’t feel like autumn; we continue to have above-average temperatures (and below-average rainfall).

The butterflies are still around, although I think some of them are migrating through. (It’s not only the Monarchs; read this: Do Butterflies Migrate? Where Do They Go?

The plants and animals respond to the days becoming shorter more than to the temperature. The autumn flowers continue to dominate; my rambles will be much less colorful once these fade. The sourwood trees are getting fall colors, but most trees are still green (although I already had to rake sycamore leaves that turned brown and dropped from the lack of rain).

The fawns are losing their spots and spending more time away from their moms, but here are some mamas and babies eating together and a cute fawn that watched me as I walked up towards my house.

The little buck seems to be feeling his hormones and chases others off from “his” feeding dish.

 

 

 

Construction on the new house is moving along,

and it’s time for me to be moving along, too. I’ll post again in the fall!

 

The Hollow is full of surprises, some pleasant and some not so much. Today I was so surprised to see this little raccoon that I laughed out loud! Here’s the back story…. There are lots of Black Walnut (Juglans nigra) trees in the Hollow, and this is the time of year when the walnuts are falling. The nuts themselves are a little smaller than a tennis ball, and I find them to be just the right size for throwing. (I played softball for many, many years and still enjoy throwing things.) I often find nuts on my walk down to the highway and carry them up to see if I can throw them into a hole in a certain tree along the creek. Today I had picked up four and was just sure that I could get at least one into the hole (although that would have been much better than my average). However, when I got to the “pitcher’s mound” I saw this raccoon watching me from the hole! I figured he didn’t want to play catch, so I left the nuts by the road and finished my walk. I grabbed my Nikon when I got home and headed down to see if I could get a better photo, but the hole was empty.

That surprise reminded me of another animal surprise a few days earlier. I had gone out to bring in the birdfeeders (a nightly chore to discourage bear activity) and saw a small shape shuffling away. I could tell from the way it ran that it wasn’t a cat, a rabbit, or a squirrel and followed it, thinking, “Oh no! Not a groundhog!” As I rounded the curve, I was relieved to see a small raccoon climbing up a hickory tree! I snapped some photos in the near-dark but didn’t want to scare it more than it already was; besides, it kept scooting around the tree to avoid me. 🙂 I’ve seen evidence of raccoons nearby previously and have photos of them in the meadow and elsewhere from the wildlife camera, but this is the first time I’d seen one.

Remember the surprise I had when I encountered bobcat chasing the fawn? That was exciting, but last week the surprise was to find the remains of a fawn that had not escaped. I won’t post photos, but the evidence showed that the predator had almost certainly been a bobcat. A neighbor helped me get the carcass over the bank (so I wouldn’t have to see it when I walked), but perhaps we needn’t have bothered. The next day the carcass was gone, and I saw the remains of two legs that had been carried off, most likely by coyotes. I know death is a necessary part of the circle of life, but this was the first time to see natural death, instead of animals killed by vehicle-driving humans. (I’ve found three turtles that were run over and killed in the Hollow so far this year.)

Other surprises? Maybe not a surprise considering the time of year, but the little buck has scraped the velvet off his antlers, the fawns are losing their spots, and the garden is petering out (with help from tobacco hornworms before a Braconid wasp took care of the problem). It was a pleasant surprise to have two fawns join me as I was weeding along the driveway. 🙂

Here’s hoping for more pleasant surprises! Maybe we’ll get a rainy afternoon, and I’ll post again soon!

 

It hasn’t rained in the Hollow for over a month. The roads are slippery where the dry gravel slides as I walk, and it’s like walking through powder where the heavy construction trucks have pulverized the clay. It’s hot, too, which means I often finish covered in a fine layer of dust. The high temperatures have been in the high 80s and even 90—not hot for Alabama, but I don’t live in Alabama any more. The ten-day forecast predicts continued above normal temps. Hard to believe that in a post from two years ago I wrote about morning temps in the 40s!

The deer and turkeys begin showing up in the early afternoon and wait for me to serve their dinner. As some of you have seen, some stare at the house until I emerge, and other come running when I call (or maybe when they hear the corn hit the metal pans). The doe I call “Big Mama” and her fawns stop by most mornings, and I can’t resist feeding them. One morning they were in the driveway, and one of the fawns decided to drink from one of the birdbaths. (I keep water in a large wash pan in the meadow, too.)

One morning I looked out the kitchen window saw another visitor in the driveway. Fortunately he rambled off after I sounded the air horn, but not without turning around to give me a dirty look.

There’s not much else happening in the Hollow; I’ll keep walking and watching and let you know what else I see.

 

This turtle has stayed in a puddle in the ditch along the road off and on for over a month. He sometimes goes to some unknown-to-me place for a few days, but so far he has always returned. I speak to him every time I see him (“Hello, friend! Be careful!”), and one of my biggest fears is that I will find him crushed in the road.

My deer “friends” continue to show up, too. The herd has about six does, one little buck (last year’s fawn), and four to six fawns. I think the buck and two of the does are offspring of matriarch doe I call “Big Mama”. When she brings her 2019 twins in the morning, I usually feed them a little; one of the fawns has begun eating apples from my hand (like his mama).

Fall is on the way (and the experts are predicting a colorful one!). Despite the dry weather, fall blossoms are making showy displays of purples and yellows, the milkweed pods are drying, and some of the leaves are beginning to turn.

Well, friends, that’s it for now. I will try to post again soon.

After my last post, I was relieved to have a visit from two sets of twins today, including the one who comes close for apples. (I do know that one of the does who is low on the totem pole—I call her “Spooky” because she keeps her distance when I feed—has lost one of her twins.)

It’s only been a couple of days since my last post, so I don’t have much to write. Here are some of the plants I’ve seen lately on my rambles.

That’s about it for today. Maybe I’ll have more to write next time; I’m thinking about photos from my trail camera. 🙂

Remember! This blog displays best in a browser, not in your email or Facebook.

See that critter in the circle? Bobcat! I saw it ahead, seemingly unaware of my presence, as it went around a curve. With my camera at the ready, I followed as quietly as I could, and when I came around the curve, there it was! I was able to get this photo before it disappeared into the brush. Later, a neighbor near the highway texted that a bobcat had just walked up her driveway. Considering visits from bears (which I am happy to say I’ve not had lately), it seems that the we have some new four-legged neighbors in the Hollow. As exciting as it is to see the bobcat. I have mixed feelings about its presence, as I think that some fawns have gone missing (although I keep hoping that they are laying low in the recent abnormally hot weather).

I promised butterflies in the last post; here are some that have been visiting my garden or keeping my company on my rambles.

I started writing this a few hours ago, but it takes me a while to identify the butterflies. Since then I have fed the deer (twice!) and was happy to see a couple of fawns. Sadly, no twins, and not the one that was eating apples last week. Here’s a quick video of one that came today:

And now it’s time to bring in laundry, feed cats, and think about my own supper. If the heat keeps up, I’ll be back posting in a few days.

It’s been a pretty quiet time, but I didn’t want to let too much time slip by without a new post. I thought this one was going to be a hodgepodge, but it turned out to be about deer.

The fawns are coming more now, and some of them are getting closer. The twins of the dominant doe (the one who eats apples from my hand) are getting bigger, and one of them is very curious about this creature who delivers the feed. He(?) has his mother’s love of apples, and today he was eating corn, too.

I’ve taken several videos of the fawns (so cute!) and also a couple showing how feeding time has been lately. I’m trying to figure out how you can subscribe to my channel without making it public; for now I just realized I could post them directly here! And you may be able to subscribe to the channel, too!

I’ll try to post again soon with butterflies and flowers.

It’s been quiet lately (which is probably good), but I didn’t want to let too much time get by without a post. The deer continue to bring their fawns, but they usually run into the woods or the meadow before I can get close enough for a good photo. The one above is a twin who was brave enough to get close and even tried a bit of apple.

It’s rained all around us, but we haven’t gotten enough to wet the deck, despite the thunder and lightning. Nothing has come of the 70% chance they called for today, so I guess I’ll be watering my vegetables tomorrow morning.

It does seem to be mushroom season, although I haven’t seen any sign of the chicken of the woods that has been so regular for years. Last year it was big by now.  I have seen other mushrooms, however. (I use iNaturalist for identification but am not confident of all of these.)

Remember the turtle from the last post, the one that seems to stay in the ditch? She was gone the next day, and this beautiful male has taken her place!

Construction on the new house continues. They’ve started the framing, and I hardly know what to expect from day to day.

Not much to write today. Maybe I’ll show you butterflies next time!