The summer gardening season begins

It's that time of year again, when I post about the garden and promise myself that I'll blog more often.  I guess time will tell if my resolution will stick this time.

Part of my reluctance to post too many pictures is that I always think I'll get around to making my garden "pretty".  You know, with nice walkways and cute art-y items placed here and there.  But I never seem to get around to that and I blame two things: 1) I hate to shop (and I'm cheap), so I never buy the art-y things and 2) I spend all my time fighting the woods back to hold onto my few gardening sunny spots.

In my mind, my garden will someday look like this, but in reality, this is what our land wants to look like:

View from the front door

It's beautiful, but all of those trees keep growing and making baby trees and sending out roots and suckers and making shade...  In other words, they really don't care that I want to have a garden.  In addition, we have all sorts of other things that want to grow in the sunny spots: crab grass, nut sedge, dewberries, dewberries and more dewberries... So, in an attempt to at least partially control the jungle, we put in raised beds this year. 

Two of them (including this one with the tomatoes) are experimental hugelkultur beds, with rotting logs underneath.  In case I haven't whined about mentioned it before, our "soil" is sugar sand for the first 6 to 8 feet.  That's a lotta sand.  On the bright side, I never have problems with standing water!

Blondkopfchen tomato blooms

We've been eating fairly well out of the spring garden: broccoli, snow/snap peas, spinach, radishes, carrots, onions, cabbage, potatoes and asparagus.  Great googley-moogley we've had a lot of asparagus this year!  This is year 5 for the crowns and we've had pounds and pounds of asparagus.  I'm beginning to wonder if it will ever slow down!

Asparagus bed with strawberries

We started with Jersey Knight and added some Mary Washington the next year.  The year after that we added what was labeled as Jersey Giant, but I'm guessing it was Mary Washington as well, since it contains a lot of female plants and they aren't nearly as big as Jersey Knight. 

My strawberries gave up and died during the heat wave last summer, but I found a couple packs of bare root strawberries late in the season.  I'm not expecting a ton of berries, but I'm hoping that they will spread and produce for next spring.  Since they've always spread to the asparagus bed on their own in the past, I decided to just plant them there this time to see what happens.

So there, I have at least one garden post for 2012.  Hopefully there will be more to follow!

For once laziness pays off!

My garden just gave up and died during our summer heat wave and drought (except for the crabgrass - I have a record crop of that). Since the onions never reached eating size before they shriveled, I just assumed they were dead and ignored them.

Well, when I finally got around to weeding a week or so ago - with the weed whacker - I noticed an oniony smell. Sure enough, my onions had send up nice baby onion plants! Since I need to till and plant cereal rye, I dug the baby onions up and planted them in the big raised bed, along with garlic, spinach, carrots, beets and dinosaur kale. I'm not sure I'll be able to eat any of these things over the winter, but it should give me a head start on the early spring garden.

The house is progressing, but the garden is toast

This summer has been absolutely brutal. We set records for the number of consecutive days over 100F as well as for the total number of days over 100F. In addition to that, we're also experiencing a severe drought.  I started losing most of the annual garden plants in July and now even some of the long-term plants have died off, including my beloved raspberries.  We're most likely going to lose some trees, too.  I really hope we break this drought soon.

But, despite all that, the house has come along nicely.  The outside is finished, aside from painting the doors and pouring the driveway, and we're currently getting ready to paint the interior.  The things we are currently lacking are the counter tops, the plumbing and electrical fixtures, the propane tank and the septic system.  But other than those minor issues, it's a house!  ;-) 

And we're FINALLY building our house!

We moved to the shed almost five years ago with the intention of building a house once we were settled.  Besides the fact that we tend to take our own sweet time in making decisions, life also threw a few roadblocks in our path along the way.  Add to that the fact that the shed is just comfortable enough that we didn't feel panicky about getting something built and it was four years before we even had a set of plans finished.    "Procrastination" is our word for the day, boys and girls.  :)

Here's the goal:

And our current progress:

Those leftover lumber bits are going to make great raised beds!

In an effort to marry our dreams to our finances, we're doing standard 2x4 construction and making it as energy efficient as possible, with foam insulation and low E windows.  We're also putting in a wood burning stove for supplemental heat, since we have an almost endless supply of dropped branches from the woods around here.  We'll also be doing a lot of the interior finish work ourselves, to save some labor costs.  In theory, the builder will be finished sometime in October, but we'll still have some work to do after that.

Neither of us have ever been involved in new construction before, so this is very exciting stuff!  

Solar baked blackberry cobbler

After being disappointed with my previous solar cooker, which didn't get hot enough for baking, I pounced when I found a good deal on a Sun Oven.  The Sun Oven is capable of temperatures up to 400F, allowing my baking addiction to live on through the summer months.  In theory, at least.

I did a few practice runs with meals with good results, so yesterday was going to be the big test for baking: a blackberry cobbler for the hubby.  I set the oven out to heat up, prepared my cobbler, placed it in the oven and... clouds.  It had been a bright, sunny day up until that point, so I was just sure it would be a good day for baking.  Alas, the clouds were here to stay, so the cobbler steamed along at about 250F. 

Pale and un-puffed shortcake crust

Since we're in drought conditions right now, I guess I should have tried to make those clouds rain by washing my car or hanging out some clothes. I did water the garden thoroughly beginning at 6:00 AM.  That really should have done it!

Ah well, the steamed blackberry cobbler wasn't exactly what I was trying to create, but it wasn't too bad.  I mean really, how bad could blackberry cobbler really be?

More on May gardening

We finally had some rain last night!  About 3/4", which made everything in the garden all cheerful and perky this morning.

I have one Mortgage Lifter tomato growing in a container.  It was languishing in the pot ghetto until I noticed that it was setting fruit, so I plopped it into a large pot I had been given.  The plant hasn't grown much and is now randomly turning yellow and dropping branches (which is exactly what happened to last year's ML), but it is loaded down with smallish tomatoes and they are beginning to ripen.  I have another ML planted in the ground and it is the tallest plant in the tomato patch.  I'll save seeds from that one, but in the meantime I'm going to enjoy munching on these:

Mortgage Lifter - first ripe 'maters!

This year's volunteer tomato crop has been pitiful, but I finally found one trying to move into the tomato patch.  It's from the area that had Sungold last year, so I'm curious to see what it turns into.  Now I just have to find a spot for it...

Volunteer #1

The squash plants are all growing nicely and beginning to bloom.  So far I have gray zucchini, yellow scallop, yellow straight neck (which I don't really like, so I'm not sure why I plant it every year) and Delicata growing and I planted some seeds for spaghetti squash and pie pumpkins in amongst the corn.  They are taking their own sweet time germinating, so we'll see if any of them come up.

Gray zucchini

Yellow scallop squash

Oh and the sneaky tomato plant (Blondkopfchen, aka "Little blonde girl") that forced itself into a pot by the door is now blooming.  According to what I've read, they are yellow cherries with a point on the bottom, similar to Riesentraube, but very sweet.  I bought the seeds just because I liked the name.  Just don't ask me to pronounce it.  :)

Blondkopfchen blooms

May garden report

I've been working really hard on reviving the garden this year after battling the drought and root-knot nematodes last year, along with the Invasion of the Giant Weeds.  According to what I could find, allowing the soil to dry completely (or even better, solarizing it), then adding copious amounts of organic matter can really help knock down the number of nematodes present in the soil.  I also read an article this past winter about an organic fungicide (Actinovate) that had been shown to work on nematodes in field trials, so I sprayed that on the soil this spring.  So far the garden is doing much, much better this year and I'm hopeful that we'll be enjoying lots of home grown produce this summer.

Lazy Wife and Kentucky Wonder pole beans

Eggplants, peppers and Christmas pole lima beans

Tomatoes

Inigo, included because he's so darned cute.  :)

It's tomato planting time!

It's amazing to me that a plant can go from a tiny seed to this in under two months and in a couple more months, these will be giant vines (hopefully) loaded with fruit.

My tomato obsession is reaching a peak right now and I'm looking forward to BLTs, salsa, pasta with fresh sauce, tomato and mozzarella salad, sliced tomatoes with S&P...  Essentially I think about tomatoes all day long and once and a while I even dream about them.  There is a slight chance that I have some sort of problem.  :)

I'm growing all open-pollinated varieties this year, some of which are saved seeds from last summer and some are new (to me) varieties. 

Varieties for 2011:

1. Aunt Ruby's German Green
2. Aunt Ruby's Yellow Cherry
3. Amish Paste
4. Mortgage Lifter
5. Pruden's Purple
6. Black Krim
7. Atkinson
8. Orange Oxheart
9. Arkansas Traveler
10. Great White
11. Pineapple
12. Ananas Noire
13. Riesentraube
14. large fruited cherry
15. German Pink
16. German Johnson
17. Green Zebra
18. Black Prince
19. Rutgers
20. Julia Child
21. Gary Ibsen's Gold
22. Cherokee Purple
23.Big Rainbow
24. Big Red
25. Clint Eastwood's Rowdy Red (not sure if this one will make it)
26. Old German


I think I'm forgetting a couple, but I'm drawing a blank right now.  Some of these will be single plants, just to see if we like them and others, such as Rutgers and Amish Paste, will be planted in groups to freeze for future use.  I will also plant extras in an attempt to thwart the tomato-stealing squirrels!  Grrrr!

I had hoped to start planting today, but it was so windy I was afraid they would all just be beaten to death.  Hopefully tomorrow the winds will be calmer and I can start getting these in the ground.

Edited to add:

I knew I forgot a couple!

27. Boxcar Willie
28. Mule Team (I think this one may have been blown to death by our 40 mph winds this week)

A playdate with Myra (aka Learning to sew)

Several months ago I decided I wanted to learn to sew, with a long term goal of making quilts.  After mentioning this to my father-in-law, I was given the sewing machine that belonged to my mother-in-law and I set out to find a cabinet for it.  I found a cabinet with a machine in it on craigslist and made arrangements to go look at it.  The machine wasn't working properly, but I liked the cabinet and made a lowball offer.  The seller accepted, so the machine and cabinet went to my mom's house for short term storage.

Well, it turned out that this machine, a Singer 500 "Rocketeer" was the sewing machine Mom coveted back in the early 1960s.  Mom called me daily with updates on what she had found in the cabinet, how she had cleaned it, what features the machine had and (most importantly) that I had to get the machine fixed.  When I didn't immediately run it to the shop, she started calling her friends to come over to look at it and get their opinions on whether I should take it to the shop ("Yes!" was the unanimous opinion - though that's not really fair, since Mom bribed them with cookies).
 
One of the items Mom found in the cabinet (and probably my favorite) is the original bill of sale.  A woman named Myra purchased the machine new on May 9, 1962.  It reads:

Machine: $299.50
Cabinet:       67.50
Trade-in:     -60.00
Total:       $307.00

Down payment: $100
Amount owed:    $207
24 payments of $10.12
For a total cost of $342.88

According to the DollarTimes Inflation Calculator, that would be $2,468.15 in 2010 terms.  That was quite an expensive purchase for 1962!

While Mom was poking through the cabinet, I discovered that my other sewing machine (a Singer 301A) is a 3/4 sized machine and won't fit in the cabinet unless I buy a special cradle.  I also read that many quilters like the 301A because it is lightweight and portable, so it can be carried to quilting groups.  So, I gave in to Mom's pressure and took the big machine in to be fixed.

Now Myra (in honor of her first person) is up and running and I am trying to figure out what's what on her.  It would probably make more sense to start on the simpler machine, but I haven't taken that one in for servicing yet (it's been sitting in a closet for a long time, I think).
 

Myra, in all her space age glory

For my first project, I decided to make a pillowcase for the queen-sized pillow I bought by mistake a few months ago.  The standard pillowcase I've been using didn't cover it completely.  The silly dachshund fabric I purchased to practice on doesn't match our sheets, but this pillow is always under the coverlet anyway, so why not? 

The completed pillowcase

In retrospect, I'm not sure a diagonal print was the best choice for a beginner, especially a beginner that discovered there were no straight pins amongst all the stuff in the sewing cabinet.  But I was determined to sew something, so I just managed with what I had on hand.  I'll worry about perfecting the next one.  :)

Detail of the fabric

Sourdough and seed starting

Obviously I've fallen off the blogging wagon, but I'm gettin' back on today! 

The fall garden is still producing at a trickle.  The collards are doing very well, as are the cabbages (no cabbage heads yet), spinach and tatsoi.  The broccoli has a little freeze burn, but we should be harvesting the first flowerets in the next week or so.  The broccoli rabe, lettuce and radishes froze, but the dinosaur kale, carrots and rutabagas are still slowly growing.  Corn salad is another one that has made it through the cold, but I don't care for it, so I've been feeding it to the rabbits.  Ironically, the snow peas were crushed by the snow and only one vine is alive.  I guess I'll have to plant some more.

I've been taking advantage of the cold weather to indulge my baking habit.  This year's obsession is sourdough and I think I've finally managed to get a good healthy starter going.  As a matter of fact, I have 2 healthy starters going: regular white flour and rye flour. 

White flour/whole wheat flour loaf baked under a metal bowl

Rye sourdough baked with steam at 425F.  It was a little over-proofed, so no real oven rise.  Very tasty, though!

 A close-up of the crumb of my first attempt at a sourdough baguette.

Even though it doesn't seem possible, it's time to start tomato plants.  I'm trying to use all open-pollinated varieties so I can save the seeds for future years.  I've heard that if you grow a variety for several years, saving the seeds and replanting, you'll develop a strain specific to your soil and growing conditions.  Sounds good to me!

Paper pots planted with tomato seeds.

First raised bed in the garden

I had intended to build raised beds last winter, but never got around to it. This year, after battling weeds, root knot nematodes, weeds, stink bugs, squash bugs and more weeds, I've decided to move my garden up a little higher. Maybe it won't help with the bugs, but at least I'll be able to run the mower between the beds if the weeds get out of control again.

Farm Boy and I (but mostly Farm Boy) spent the better part of Saturday building the first bed, which is 4'x15'. I filled it in with topsoil from around it, added some mineral sand, crushed eggshells and 150 pounds of composted cow manure, then crammed as many plants into it as possible, including broccoli, cabbage, collards, lettuce, corn salad, tatsoi, snow peas, beets, carrots, rutabaga, parsnips and spinach. It might be a little late for a good fall garden, but they weather was so nice I had to try. :)

Sorry for the bad photo. It was too bright out to see the screen.

We have chinquapins!

Or chinkapins or Allegheny chinquapins or dwarf chestnuts or more specifically, Castanea pumila. Whatever you want to call them, I am happy to have them growing here, especially since I was tempted to buy a couple this spring when I saw them on sale at Bob Wells Nursery.

Farm Boy and I noticed the funny spiky balls yesterday while walking the dogs. We actually walk past this spot every day (and have for four years!), but two small trees among 7 acres of big trees have to really work to stand out to us unobservant humans. I have to assume that this is the first year they have fruited, because I really don't think I could have missed this:





According to what I've read, the chinquapin is a great source of food and shelter for wildlife and the nuts were once extremely popular with people, as they are much sweeter than chestnuts. I'm not sure why they have fallen out of favor, except that they are so small and a little difficult to collect.

Originally we only noticed the one tree, but there are two trees a few feet apart. One is shorter with multiple small trunks and the other is a single trunk, about 4" in diameter at the base. They are mixed in with American beautyberry and some (annoying) rattan vine. We'll have to see if we can get that cleaned out a little bit to let the chinquapins form a nice thicket.


The foliage is dark green, glossy, toothed and...


apparently, very tasty. I noticed there were chunks were missing from many leaves, then spotted this guy. Another reason I'm happy to have chinquapins: they are a larval host plant to the orange-tipped oakworm moth.


I spent a few minutes liberating some nuts from the husks. Even when they are fully opened, it can be a painful operation. I've read that they are really good roasted, so we will have to try that with a few. The rest I'm going to try to propagate, since they are a fairly rare - and in many areas, endangered - species, due to chestnut blight. The chinquapin isn't as susceptible to the blight as the American chestnut was, but it can still be severely damaged by it.

Goodbye summer, hello fall.

Well, it was a rough summer around here, so let's hope the fall brings better things. On a positive note, though, we still have hummingbirds and I adore hummingbirds! They're beginning to head south for the winter, but at the peak I was putting out 16+ cups of sugar water a day. I'm not sure why they like this particular spot so much, but I'm glad they do!

Revenge against August (aka, solar cooking)

I've been interested in solar cooking for a couple of years now. Originally I had planned to make a solar cooker - or rather, I had intended for Farm Boy to make me a solar cooker! - but since that never made it to the top of the project list, I broke down and bought one this summer.

The one I purchased is the SOS Sport, which essentially functions as a slow cooker, except no electricity is required and it doesn't heat up the kitchen. When reading about the various models, I had assumed that this one could reach the higher baking temperatures that the Global Sun Oven achieves if the reflectors were used. But the instructions recommended that you don't use the reflectors during the summer because the higher temperatures could melt the lexan lid. Because I am a baking addict, baking bread without suffering heat exhaustion indoors was one of my goals with the solar cooker. Unfortunately, my attempts at bread so far in the Sport have yielded nicely risen, tender bread with a soft, pasty crust. Seriously pasty, like my legs in January (okay fine, they are the same shade in August!). I prefer dense, crusty, artisan breads, so I will primarily use the Sport for what it excels at, slow cooking. I am saving my pennies to buy a Sun Oven, though, to fulfill my baking desires during the heat of the Texas summers. Plus, it feels a little like I'm sticking it to the electric company when I use the sun to cook my meals.

To date I have made two loaves of bread, two batches of purple hull peas, green chile stew, a whole chicken (lemon scented) over rice, chicken legs over rice, a crustless quiche, creamed corn, eggplant dip, roasted eggplant and roasted spaghetti squash. Everything has turned out very well, except for the less-than-stellar bread, which required a few minutes in the toaster oven to improve the crust. I might try the bread again, but put it in the oven earlier in the day to see if that will let it brown.


The quiche, cooking in the sun, at 250F. The clamps are my own special addition. The clips that come with the Sport are really tight and hard to use.

Fig and Cornmeal Cake with Buttermilk Glaze

My sister gave me a sack of fresh figs the other day and after eating some of them, I started wondering if they would be good in cake form. I imagined a dense, moist cake with a sticky glaze, slightly spicy but not as potent as a true spice cake. After looking through a few cookbooks and doing a few web searches, I ended up making up my own hodgepodge recipe, based on the Fig and Cornmeal Cake recipe in the book, Cake Keeper Cakes. Here is what I came up with:

Cake:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup cornmeal
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon mace
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon grated lemon zest
scant 1/2 cup buttermilk
1 cup coarsely chopped fresh figs
1/3 cup chopped pecans

Preheat oven to 350F. Butter and flour a 9" round cake pan (I use Baker's Joy for this).

In a small mixing bowl, combine the flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and mace. Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, beat together the butter and sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. With the mixer on low, add the eggs, one at a time, and beat until incorporated. Stir in the lemon zest and buttermilk. Add the flour mixture in three additions, stirring until just incorporated each time. Stir in the figs and pecans.

Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top of the batter. Bake until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean, 35 to 40 minutes. Let the cake cool in the pan for a few minutes, then remove from the pan and cool right side up on a wire rack until completely cool.

Just before serving, transfer the cake onto a cake plate and poke holes over the entire surface of the cake with a skewer or fork. Pour the buttermilk glaze over the cake and let soak in briefly. Slice and serve.

Buttermilk Glaze

1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup buttermilk
1/2 tablespoon light corn syrup
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Combine all ingredients in a small sauce pan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and cook, stirring often, for 3 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool for 2 to 3 minutes. Pour over cake.

The results: It was quite nice! The buttermilk glaze really makes it, in my opinion. I'm also experimenting with mace, after learning that it was my grandfather's secret ingredient in many of his baked goods (he had a bakery). Spork's first bite yielded a garbled, "Ohmygod!" so I took that as a positive review, also. :)

My new addiction, Mexican White Rice

Normally I'm not a big rice eater, but I have become hooked on a recipe given by Patricia Jinich of Pati's Mexican Table on Paula Deen's show. I've made it several times now and someone always asks for the recipe. My version is slightly modified from the original, Mexican White Rice with Fried Plantains. I use butter in place of the oil and leave out the celery and plantains all together. I'm sure the fried plantains would be tasty, but they are hard to find here. Butter, of course, always trumps oil and honestly, I've never really seen the point of celery.

By the way, Pati appears to be a really nice person in addition to being a mighty fine cook. I sent her a question about a recipe on her website and she answered me within a few minutes on a Sunday afternoon.

Mexican White Rice
modified from a recipe by Patricia Jinich

Ingredients:
2 Cups long-grained rice
3 Tablespoon(s) butter
1/2 Cup finely chopped white onion
4 Cups chicken broth
5 sprigs fresh cilantro
1 Tablespoon lime juice
1 Teaspoon kosher salt
2 whole serrano chiles

Directions:
Heat the butter in a large saucepan, add the rice and fry over high heat, stirring softly for 1 to 2 minutes. Add the onion and stir, from time to time, until the rice begins to change its color to milky white and it sounds and feels heavier, as if it were grains of sand, about 5 more minutes.

Add the chicken stock, cilantro, lime juice, salt and chiles to the rice. When the mixture starts to boil, cover the pot, reduce the heat to lowest setting and cook, stirring occasionally, until the rice is cooked through and the liquid has been absorbed, about 20 minutes.

If the rice grains don't seem soft and cooked through, add a bit more chicken stock or water and let it cook for another 5 more minutes or so. Remove the pan from the heat and let it sit covered for 5 to 10 minutes. Remove the cilantro and chile. Fluff the rice with a fork and serve.


Notes:

I like to tie the cilantro in a bundle using kitchen string. It gives a pleasant cilantro taste to the rice, but you can remove the wilted cilantro after the rice is cooked.

I've also found that if you slit the serranos lengthwise they impart more flavor into the rice.

Scotch eggs for breakfast

I've had a hankerin' for scotch eggs lately, so I fired up the deep fryer this morning and whipped up a batch. I used this recipe, leaving the flour out of the sausage mix and using panko bread crumbs for the golden brown and delicious crunchy outer coating. I made a dipping sauce by mixing marmalade and spicy brown mustard because using marmalade made it feel all breakfasty.

The recipe made 4 eggs, but both Spork and I decided that one each was plenty for brekkie. Now we have leftovers just perfect for a cold snack with beer.

Nom, nom, nom!

More adventures with deep frying

My parents are from North Dakota, so deep frying is not in my genetic makeup. My mom makes homemade donuts, but everything else was made in the oven, even French fries. I've worked really hard to overcome this deficit and I'm slowly getting better. My ultimate goal is to be able to make some awesome fried chicken. I've seen some improvement in that area, but nothing I've deemed picture-worthy.

These little gems, on the other hand, were pretty darned fab!


Yes, that's right. Those are deep fried mashed potatoes! Spork had seen some on a blog and casually mentioned them about 47 times. I made some mashed taters the other day and when he casually mentioned them once again, I took pity on him and gave it a whirl.

I rolled the leftover potatoes into small balls and placed them in the freezer for a while (I left them in longer than I intended - I was aiming for 'firm' an ended up with 'frozen solid'). I dipped each ball in beaten egg, then rolled it in panko bread crumbs. I set the fryer for 360F and fried until GBD. They were wonderful! A crunchy, golden shell (panko crumbs are great - how did I live without these?) filled with warm, creamy mashed potatoes. Mmmmmm!

Turkish bread

For some reason I've been on a real flatbread kick lately, so when I found this super-easy recipe, I had to try it.

Turkish bread

Ingredients:
2 Cups flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder
1 Teaspoon salt
3/4 Cup plain yogurt

Directions:
Stir all the ingredients together, then knead until an elastic dough is formed. Place in a bowl, cover, and allow to rest for 30 minutes.

Divide into 8 rounds and let rest briefly. On a floured surface, roll out to 1/8" thickness and dry fry in a cast iron skillet or cook on a grill, allowing both sides to develop some dark brown spots.

NOTES: If the dough is too sticky, add a little flour. If it is too dry, add a little more yogurt.

Results: Excellent! The bread actually keeps well, stored in plastic, for a couple of days. It's not quite as pliable the second day, but I think a little experimenting on reheating methods would fix that.

Ellie May's spy cam

For my birthday, Spork gave me a really cool present: a Moultrie game camera. The camera is made to be mounted outside and can capture both still pictures and short video clips. In daylight, the images are color, while the nighttime ones use an infrared flash, yielding black and white images.

The camera is intended to be left in place for months at a time, but I can't stand to let it go for more than a day or two before I have to grab the images and see who has passed through. I've had it set up pointing at the bird baths, the bird feeders (thanks to the nifty clamp that Spork made) and at various places in the woods.

So far we've had lots of birds, raccoons and foxes. I'm hoping to add opossums, skunks and deer in the future. I've even set up a bribery station in the woods with a feeder block and a salt block. When I have some intriguing fruit leftovers, such as melon rinds, I put those out near the feeder block, for extra enticement.

Bathing cardinal family

Banditos!

Enthusiastic blue jay

Chickadee

Baby cardinal and wren

The camera makes a slight shutter sound. There were about 20 pictures of this baby cardinal giving the camera a suspicious stare.

Male red-bellied woodpecker

Downy woodpecker and wren

Firefox looking for some din-din

Firefox pounces