Hummingbird Moth

Last fall I wrote an entry about Four O'Clocks.  See the following link:  

 http://windyacresnaturalfarm.blogspot.com/2010/09/4-oclocks.html

As it turns out, they were just getting started last fall.  And this fall, they have been spectacular!  They have also attracted what I have always called "hummingbird moths".  These are huge moths that are about the size of hummingbirds.  They don't come out until early evening and appear to be attracted by the heavenly scent that the Four O'Clock flowers produce at night.

Here is a picture of one of them.

Notice the pretty pink patches on its wings.

It is really quite pretty and I got to wondering what kind of moth it really was and what type of caterpillar it came from.   I found out that there is a large group of moths that are generally referred to as "hummingbird" moths.   But they are also called Sphinx or Hawk moths.

This one is a White-lined Sphinx Moth.  I've heard people at work say that these are the moths of the tomato hornworm.  But, that is not true.  They appearently make a large caterpillar similar to the tomato hornworm, but they are not the same thing.

At any rate, it was quite challenging to try to get good pictures of this moth.  They dart around pretty quickly and don't stay in one place very long.  But, I did get several good pictures of it and am sharing them here with you.



Dried Basil

My basil has perked up now that the weather has cooled a bit.   Basil likes hot weather and a couple of really cool nights will make it turn black.  But, even it could not hold up to the days and days of 100-plus degree temperatures, like we had this summer.

During most of the summer, I barely had enough to meet demand and rarely brought any home from our Farmers' Market.  However, last Saturday I had a couple of bags left over and decided to dry it for use this winter.

I have a dehydrator, but it is fairly large and I didn't want to get it out for such a small amount of basil.  Several years ago, I had pretty good results drying it by simply laying it on sheets of newspaper on the dining room table.  So, I decided to go that route.  I stripped the leaves from the stems and laid it on a paper towel in an out-of-the-way place on my kitchen counter.

Here is what it looked like this afternoon.

I put it in a zip-lock snack bag just like this.  I may have even more left after tomorrow's market.  If so, I may end up drying some more.

Food Additives and Tom's Toothpaste

For a several years, I  have been reading the labels on things.  I have a grandson who has a health condition which is irritated by corn products.  As a result, he has to avoid anything containing high fructose corn syrup (HFCS).  So, at first, I just started reading food labels trying to avoid buying anything with HFCS in it.  I was shocked at the number of manufactured foods that contain it!  I challenge you to try to find any non-diet soda pop or kid's cereals you see advertised on TV that does not contain HFCS.

Then I started noticing all the other "non-food" ingredients that were in the food I was buying.  A package of taco shells has something called TBHQ listed in the ingredients with (preservative) beside it.  A can of ripe olives has "ferrous gluconate" listed "to stabilize color".  And, a can of blackeyed peas has "disodium EDTA" added for "color retention".  No wonder we are all getting cancer with these artificial ingredients in all our food!

As a result of all this, I've begun to get a little paranoid about what I put in my mouth.  So, the other day, I needed to buy toothpaste and I'm at the store looking at all the different kinds of toothpaste.  Just for Crest alone, there's Crest Pro-Health Enamel Shield, Crest Pro-Health Gel, Crest Multi-Benefit Tartar Control, Crest 3D White Vivid, Crest Cavity Protection Gel and on and on and on.

Then I saw this brand:

There was only one kind of this brand on the shelf and it contains no artificial colors, flavors, fragrances or preservatives.   Its website  http://www.tomsofmaine.com/business-practices
states that they use no animal testing and are devoted to sustainable manufacturing practices and recycling.  They even donate 10% of their profits to human and environmental goodness.

Guess which brand of toothpaste I bought. 

Companion Animal Assistance Program

I am a member of a non-profit organization called the Companion Animal Assistance Program, CAAP for short.  We are dedicated to helping to reduce the numbers of unwanted and abandoned pets in our community by offering low-cost spay/neuter programs for those who need help in getting their pets sterilized. 

If you check our web site  www.caapok.org, you'll see that one of the ways we accomplish our mission is by offering "mobile clinics".   These are normally held four times a year at our county fair grounds on Saturdays.  We work with a veterinarian who has a mobile surgical unit that is housed in a large trailer which he pulls behind his pickup truck.  CAAP advertises, organizes and provides volunteers for the clinics. 

Our most recent clinic was held this past Saturday and I thought it would be nice to share some pictures and stories from it with you.

"Bessie"

Bessie is one of the dogs that was spayed at the clinic.  She was brought in by the father of an American soldier currently stationed in Afghanistan.  He said his daughter had found a litter of 5 puppies in the road, picked them up & found homes for 4 of them, keeping the "runt" Bessie.  His daughter who is 20 had enlisted, gone through boot camp and was part of a big deployment from this area earlier this year.  After he left, several of us conspired to have CAAP pick up the entire cost for the surgery.  When he came back to get Bessie in the afternoon, he said they had gotten some bad news.  The humvee his daughter was riding in ran over an IED and the humvee was split in two.  Fortunately, no one was killed, but his daughter was hit in the head by a big chunk of concrete.   They had talked to her and she will be okay.   When we handed him his check and said that we'd like to waive all fees for Bessie, in honor of his daughter's service to our country,  he was shocked and very appreciative.

"Cimarron Sisters"

Cushing is a small town about 30 miles from here.  Cushing has a pound with 6 bays.  It operates as a hold & kill facility, with the holding period being 72 hours.  The Cimarron Valley Humane Society in Cushing is a shelter without a building.  In other words, it is comprised solely of people that foster the dogs at their own homes.  They try to rescue as many from the pound as possible.  Right now there are only 3 people providing foster homes.  Even though they are a small organization have placed 135 dogs since May of last year!  Right now they have 17 that are all female puppies - labs, lab/mastiff, doberman, boxer, schnauzer, etc.  Normally, they are able to work through the Oklahoma State University Vet College to get their animals spayed, but the OSU program is currently unavailable for 12 weeks.  So, CAAP stepped in to help get the puppies fixed. The above picture shows 4 of these dogs.

These stories and many more like them make me happy to be a part of such a wonderful organization.  Virtually all of the animals we help were given to their owners, were adopted from shelters or were strays that someone took pity on and took into their home.  So, I often joke that my dedication to recycling does not stop at glass, paper and cans, but goes as far as recycled pets as well!

Toads and Lizards and Frogs, Oh MY!

We have a variety of reptiles and amphibians here on the farm.  When we lived in town, I don't think I ever saw a frog, but out here we see them ever so often.  Here are pictures of a couple of different varieties of frogs I've seen.

This little guy was sitting outside on our window sill one day.  I call him "camo-frog" because it sure looks like he is dressed in camouflage.  As best I can tell, this is a Gray Tree Frog, although he looks more green than gray.

This frog is quite a bit bigger than camo-frog.  I found him in a tub of water that was sitting out on our deck. He had apparently hopped in there and could not get out.  I think this one is a Southern Leopard Frog. 

Toads are much more common than frogs, but they invariably startle me every time I find one.  In the fall, they burrow into the soil to find places to hibernate and spend the winter.  Last year, I brought some pots of aloe vera inside for the winter and was trying to arrange them by a window.  I picked one up and suddenly a toad stuck his head up through the soil and looked at me.   I almost dropped the pot!  I rarely move very fast any more, but you can bet I got that pot back outside pronto!  I also recall several years ago how I dug one up while digging in my garden in the early spring.  Scared the life out of me for an instant!  Poor toad.......I'm sure it was a rude awakening for him, too.

My granddaughters are NOT afraid of toads, though, and will pick them up with their bare hands.  They found one outside under the carport one evening this summer.  Both of them had to hold the poor toad before we let it go.  Here's how brave they are.

I think this is a Great Plains Toad.

We have several types of reptiles ..... turtles, lizards and snakes to be specific.  I'm sorry that I don't have any pictures of snakes, save for the one in my blog entry of April 30, 2010 called "Yikes! Snake!".  That one is a Rough Earth Snake.  I'm not sure if it were much bigger that I could have talked myself into getting close enough to take a picture of it.  So, you'll have to be content with the following pictures of reptiles.

This is an Ornate Box Turtle.  Notice the beautiful markings on his shell.  They look like star bursts.  And, he has yellow spots on his legs and head.

Finally, I have this picture of a lizard that I found the other day.  Like the, frog above, he had fallen in a deep tub on the deck and could not get out.  That is the only way I was ever able to get a picture of him.  Most times, when I see a lizard outside, they are gone before I can blink twice.

I was not able to identify this lizard, but I love his blue tail!  I found several similar ones on the internet, but could not decide for sure what kind it was.  In fact, I was surprised at the many different varieties of frogs, toads, turtles and lizards that I found while trying to identify the animals above.  It is truly amazing the wonderful variety of creatures with which we share our world.

New Wildlife Pictures

It has finally cooled off and I am loving it!  A hint of autumn is in the air.  It is about time since the first day of fall is next week!  With the cooler weather, Tom decided to start putting out corn for the deer again.  He buys the corn at our local Atwoods store which is a chain that specializes in products for farmers.  They have everything from cow udder ointment to toys for kids.  I love to go there and look around.  But I digress.....

The corn is dried and comes in big bags like dog food.  Hunters buy it and put out for the deer in hopes they can entice them to come to the same place each day in order to shoot them.  Of course, the only "shooting" we'll be doing is picture shooting!

Anyway, so Tom puts the corn out a ways from the house and rigs up our wildlife camera to point toward it.  This summer we used the camera mostly to take pictures of the wildlife that was eating our cat's food at night.  See the "Thief in the Night" post on June 19.

I was not expecting to see much action at the corn feeder for several weeks.  However, the first night the corn was out there we caught the following animals checking out the corn.

I was surprised to see the coyote appears to be eating the corn.  I wonder if that means the drought has taken its toll on the small game animals that are usually its prey.

The deer appear to be a mother and her fawn who was probably born this spring.  And, the crows are cleaning up what the deer and coyote left behind.  I like crows.  They are amazing birds and I could write a whole blog entry on them alone!  

We still have not had much rain to speak of, even with the cooler temperatures, but at least we are not suffering with high temps in the 100s now.  Life is good and I feel rejuvenated.

Repurposed Computer Diskette Storage Box

Do you remember those old 5.25 inch floppy disks that computers used to use?  I'm sure a lot of younger folks don't remember them.  After these big floppy diskettes, external computer storage evolved to 3.5 inch diskettes that had hard covers, then to CDs and finally to flash drives that fit in any USB port.  It's pretty amazing how quickly computer technology changes.

But, back to those old floppy disks.  There were plastic storage boxes especially made for them.  The boxes generally had a clear plastic lid (so you could see what was inside).  The lid was hinged at the back and lifted up so you could get at the floppy disks easily.  Eventually, these old floppy disk storage boxes became obsolete as other storage media came along. 

I ended up with several of these boxes and, as usual, hated to throw them away.  So, I looked for other ways to use them.  One of the best ideas I came up with was for recipes.  Here's my recipe box made from an old floppy disk box.

These days I tend to look on the internet for recipes more than I do in my cookbooks.  But, I still keep special recipes on cards and store them in this box.