Pandora Ohio

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Never met a fake runner

Mosaic

Mosaic

Llamas can reach speeds up to 35 mph. No humans kept that pace during The Quarry Farm 3rd Annual 5K on October 6. Chablis and Mosaic, llama dams who arrived at the farm animal sanctuary the night before the run/walk, didn’t run that fast either. Instead, the matronly camelids watched people trot past on the south leg of the course (more to come about the llamas in The Quarry Farm 2018-2019 Newsletter.)

I woke before dawn on Saturday to the sound of a torrential downpour, lightning and thunder. My alarm went off a few minutes later. I pulled the covers up and over, sure that we would be cancelling the 5K. The clouds lifted briefly so I set off for my own run at 7 a.m. and got drenched for my efforts. By 8:30, blue sky peeked through gray clouds, cleared by a breeze from the west. Remembering that Gran always said to look out for wind from the east (attributed to “When the wind is in the east, ’tis neither good for man nor beast”) we set up parking signs, registration, coffee and cookies.

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Upstream view from Mallaham Bridge, October 6, 2018, 10:15 a.m.

The west wind remained true. By 11 a.m., 21 participants had passed the first tree in the Road 7L catalpa corridor, crossed over the historic Mallaham Bridge (and smiled for my camera), turned around at Bridenbaugh Schoolhouse and crossed the finish line in front of Red Fox Cabin.

By noon, we had coffee dregs, three lemon cookies and plenty of photos to help us remember. We had our four first finishers: Jeremy Haselman, Christine Meeker, Martha Erchenbrecher (5K Birthday Award) and (under 12) Asher Haselman. We also had three lessons for the 4th Annual 5K:

  • Keep the color run option, but don’t use the little gel paint balls. They don’t break unless you really bean your target (not a good idea.)
  • Ask Steve to make more French macaron with blueberry, lemon and raspberry curd.
  • Get the word out early (mark Saturday, October 5, 10 a.m. start on your calendar—spread the word.)

Thank you to everyone who turned out and to anyone who crosses their own finish line to raise funds in support of what we do here and in educational settings in Northwest Ohio.

 

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Finding the bees’ knees

DSC_1009This is a year of dragons. Saddlebags, skimmers, twelve-spots and white tales dive-bomb the farm animal sanctuary yard, plucking mosquitoes before they latch onto exposed skin. It has been stupid-hot of late, enough to keep the dragonflies under cover at mid-day. But in the evening, their wings shimmer position for hovering and steep dives.

Rain came today. No dot-com could have predicted this more accurately that the four bats that wheeled over the paddock at dusk; three more than we usually see when the chickens, turkeys and ducks are tucked in for the hungry night. Tonight, leopard frogs dive into Nemo’s mud wallow, skitter across the surface and churn the depths.

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In Leipsic, making 59 bush honeysuckle hiking staffs with Boy Scouts

The Putnam County Master Gardeners were onsite before the rains came. I was across county, talking folklore to Boy Scouts and helping them to make hiking staff of plants that shouldn’t be in Ohio. The Master Gardeners were here, tending to plants that should be, in their pollinator garden on the chimney-facing side of Red Fox Cabin. They set fencing as a deterrent to wild yearlings in search of fresh greens among the yellowing grass. Bee balm, indigo, milkweeds and Joe Pye weed have grown tall enough to attract them. More importantly, they call to pollinators.

As Joe Kinsella wrote, “If you build it, they will come.” Maybe ‘build’ isn’t the correct word. But since Red Doud and Joe Hovest moved large boulders into place, Phyllis Macke ID’d plants with ingenious signs she created and everyone moved soil, mulch and a purple tricycle in place, let’s go with that. In any case, they came: swallowtail, fritillary, monarch and skipper butterflies; honey, bumble and other wild bees moved from blossom to blossom. A hummingbird moth whirred in, unfurling and curling its proboscis as a nectar drinking straw. A widow skimmer dragonfly paused on the plant next door, pausing just long enough for me to click another blurry photo.

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With the scent of sun-warmed monarda in my nose, I picked a handful of mint on my way home and boiled it up with three bags of Earl Grey. The last of the chilled brew is at my elbow now. The mint is in bloom and off limits, waiting for whomever can make their way across the desert to save us all.

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Hiking with goats and lemonade

Saturday was a full Family Day. For a sunlit August 5, it was cool enough to hike from cabin to chickens without breaking a heavy sweat. Even the mosquitoes hatched from recent heavy rains were relatively scarce.

Thanks to all who joined us for the 2017 Family Day on The Quarry Farm. Much bush honeysuckle was repurposed for walking and hiking sticks, birdhouse gourds were polished, shirts were imprinted with unique leaf patterns, Red Fox Cabin was toured and the farm animals were enriched with gentle human interaction (except for Nemo who refused to break her afternoon nap routine.) As was expected, this gentle giant was up at 5 p.m., grazing on the grass so recently imprinted by visiting feet.

Next up: The 4th Annual Quarry Farm Jam

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Winter 2016 newsletter

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Prepping the back field for the Bee Buffer Project is one of the items in the latest issue of The Quarry Farm Newsletter. Click here to read all about it and what’s happening here as the snow flies and the seeds sleep.

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Flowing back in time through two townships

Quarry and CreekThere’s a lot of history in and around The Quarry Farm, not to mention up the road.

On the opposite side of the block stands a log home constructed by Tom McCullough. Like our Red Fox Cabin, McCullough’s place isn’t a Putnam County native, but did stand in the United States during the country’s first 100 years. The 2.5-story building started out in Reading, Pennsylvania, was relocated here in 2008 and reconstructed by a professional antique cabin firm and kitted out with local 19th century furniture.

Bridenbaugh OrganistNorth on the same road and across Riley Creek is Bridenbaugh Schoolhouse. Imagine a one-room schoolhouse on every country mile and you will picture the education system as it once was in rural Ohio. In 1997, Dale Bridenbaugh restored the schoolhouse on his farm to what could have been its original 1889 glory.Peggy Bridenbaugh

RC with signCross the Riley on the c. 1876 M-6 bridge, itself listed in the Historic American Engineer Record as an example of “Morrison’s Patent Wrought Iron Arch Truss Bridge,” travel about a mile and a half north on 7L and sit in the stillness and peace of Riley Creek United Methodist Church. The church was founded in 1850 and is still active in one large, lofted room. Sun and moonlight filter through etched and stain-glass windows to pool on handmade wooden pews. The long upright-backed benches glow with the hand polish and years of congregational sitting, but the names of former youth break the smooth surfaces here and there.

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Cabin MomSaturday broke records for December warmth and, although we could use some rain or snow to soften the dry bed of the quarry, the weather was perfect for the first Old Time Riley Creek Christmas Tour. All of the above were stops on the route. All were decorated for the holidays, most as they may have been long ago. Riley and Pleasant Township saw plenty of driving tourists as a result. One of the visitors was Pandora’s Dr. Darrell Garmon. He walked up the path through the Red Fox Cabin gardens and introduced himself as Dr. Garmon and as the person who poses as Sea Captain James Riley.

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Fox StatueNext door, Carlton, Beatrice and the other potbellies, a speckling of chickens and Johnny Goose gathered at the farm animal sanctuary fence corner closest to the hubbub. Lucy’s foghorn bray paused more than one conversation. Two tourists left the cabin and stopped at the gate where the turkeys were on full display. Buddy took issue with the attention the boys were getting, so he grabbed a mouthful of tail feathers, spit them out and smiled. True story – the couple took a photo and promised to share it with us.

For now, the images above will do.

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A New Year’s Day walk below the wind

IMG_2737This new year looks bleak, with harsh, cold wind and an absence of snow. Thursday afternoon, I walked down the lane and had to fight to open the gate against bluster, feeling the cold bite of the latch’s surface through my work gloves. No one followed me to the gate in hopes of treats. I’m sure no apple slices could beat shelter on the sunny side of any outbuilding.

I made it just about 50 yards down the road before ducking down into the lowland along Cranberry Run, where the drop behind Red Fox Cabin blocked the wind. So cold were the trees that they hummed, except for Osage orange trees. These woven, thorny trees make sort of a whirring whine in frigid wind chill (truly exhilarating when one is walking on the trail at night…alone.)

IMG_2736Winter came on so suddenly that many of the Osage fruits are green and whole, their sticky white latex ooze flash-frozen to the ground. The fruit is not poisonous to us mammals, but I hear it’s not much to taste. Further on down the creek, on the east side of the footbridge, I saw something, maybe a fox squirrel, made use of an orange as a food source.

The sun is cold and farther away at the start of the year, a white sun in gray blue sky. Even the bane of the understory, bush honeysuckle, is leafless this year without a snow blanket. No green, other than the Osage fruits, was visible on Jan. 1, 2015. This is a good thing, I know; maybe this will give the maples and oak seedlings a chance to fill in the spaces left where the 2012 derecho took out so many mature trees.

IMG_2739IMG_2734The wind was so high and wild above the creek valley that I saw few birds, not even on the old stone quarry. This winter it is full of water, frozen with reflections of rich, ruddy browns, gold, and sky. There are no breaks in the still quarry’s surface, but Cranberry Run’s riffles keep a brisk pace, leaving open holes here and there, especially below the high blue clay banks at the northwest point of the nature preserve. Two birds, so in shadow that I couldn’t identify the species more than to say they are large songbirds, dipped in the water below a bare root hackberry that has held the top of the bank for as long as I can remember.

IMG_2741The camera, a treasured Rebel of my dad’s, said ‘no more’ to the cold, so I tucked it inside my blanket coat and headed back the way I came. At the top of the hill near The Quarry Farm entrance sign, I tucked my chin closer to the camera, wrapped my scarf around my head and ran for the gate.

With my eyes so adjusted to discerning the different hues of browns, the greeting party under the apple tree was a shock to the senses. Wrapped in new thermal coats, Buddy and the boys were like presents under the tree.

What a happy sight to begin a new year. Rain is promised for Saturday. Luckily, these coats of many colors are waterproof. I think I’ll stay inside and watch.

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Just add paint

117Watercolor is too real painting. As a painter who prefers this two-dimensional medium to most others, I have been in the position to argue this point. My argument accuses oil snobs of decorating their walls with off-the-rack roadside numbers that match a couch.

Boyfriends are broken-up with because of statements like this. But that was providence, it turns out, and a long time ago.

118And painting in oils is fine, if that’s what you like. But don’t tell me that a water-based work, one which requires the painter to give a measure of control over to their chosen medium, allowing light and whims of water, air and pigment to have their way, isn’t real painting.

So, with 94 percent humidity and a forecast of sun, the second “Watercolor for Beginners” workshop took place today under the earth-red roof of the Seitz Family Pavilion. Heavy fog kept a few distant registrants away, but hot black coffee, herbed shortbread and apple oatmeal cookies revived those that took up a brush.

146I love it when watercolor novices tell me, “I have no artistic talent.” These are the ones that are the first to let go; to pool water on their paper and break the surface tension of that pool with a loaded brush. It’s the ones that have painted before, using slow-to-dry, opaque, malleable mediums, that are reluctant let go of control. Because, in my opinion, that’s what you have to do with watercolor. You have to let go and see what water, paint, paper texture and weight and gravity can create when kind of, sort of left to their own devices. Once you have witnessed that, you can begin to take the reins and shape your work.

The seven people who floated through this morning’s fog, included some of the above. They chose their subjects from the Red Fox Cabin gardens, vegetables, flowers and leaves. You can see in the photos the tentative steps, the light lines of paint on cold press paper (I wouldn’t let them sketch their subjects with pencil first). Two hours later, we had a marvelous body of work, each of them showing promise and more than one worthy of exhibition at any art festival.

Of course that, along with my thoughts on how to begin painting with watercolors, is my opinion. I could be wrong.

But I don’t think so.

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What’s Your Sign?

Group in Field

Alicia and Andrew Phillips review a winter star chart before leaving Red Fox Cabin for the trails.

Alicia and Andrew Phillips review a winter star chart before leaving Red Fox Cabin for the trails.

Astronomers have posited that if you were to count each and every grain of sand on all of the world’s beaches, you still wouldn’t come close to the number of stars in the sky. As a matter of fact, it’s suggested that you’d have to multiply that number by ten before you’d even come close. So it should come as no surprise, then, that the human imagination has configured the stars into any number of shapes over the thousands of years that we’ve been staring skyward. This past Saturday night, a group of participants in The Quarry Farm’s first Star Walk had the opportunity to view a few of these constellations.

It was nearly a perfect night for such an event. Although cloud cover had made star-gazing next to impossible for most of the week, a cold front moved in late Saturday afternoon and swept the sky clear. And while still chilly, the woods that surround the big back field provided a windbreak and pulled the teeth of the worst of the cold. While the wind howled outside the preserve, some stargazers even removed an outer layer.

Mike Erchenbrecher looks to the stars

Mike Erchenbrecher looks to the stars

Mike Erchenbrecher, an award-winning retired Franklin County science teacher and avid amateur astronomist, escorted more than a dozen people through the woods and back to the big eleven-acre field where we all turned our faces up. Mike immediately pointed out the Hunter’s two dogs, Canis Major, the big dog, and Procyon, the little dog, and then the Hunter himself, Orion, with his belt of three stars. His finger traced a giant W as he talked about Cassiopeia, the Queen, who is forever chased by Cepheus, the King. And then, of course, there were the zodiacal constellations. At this time of year, the most readily recognizable of such is Gemini, with its two bright stars, Castor and Pollux. Taurus is also recognizable, as well as Cancer.

Some closeups of what we saw:

  • The constellation Cygnus the Swan, which contains Cygnus X-1, the first object identified as a probable black hole
  • jupmoon4Jupiter and its moons*…we could make out a moon on either side of bright Jupiter overhead.
  • Orion NebulaThe Orion Nebula** below Orion’s Belt appeared to us as a hazy spot.
  • Core of Andromeda GalaxyOur Milky Way was outshown by the half moon, but the Andromeda galaxy** was visible to the north.

 

 

Mike handed out star charts and independent-study over hot chocolate and cookies. Here are satellite passes for the next few days:

International Space Station

Brightness                 Start                 Highest point                 End                 Pass type
                [Mag]                 Time                 Alt.                 Az.                 Time                 Alt.                 Az.                 Time                 Alt.                 Az.
20 Jan -0.8 06:11:53 13° N 06:11:53 13° N 06:13:03 10° NNE Visible
21 Jan -0.9 06:56:32 10° NNW 06:58:23 14° N 07:00:13 10° NE Visible
22 Jan -0.8 06:08:04 13° N 06:08:04 13° N 06:09:28 10° NNE Visible
23 Jan -1.2 06:52:31 11° NNW 06:54:49 18° NNE 06:57:12 10° ENE Visible
24 Jan -0.9 06:04:09 15° N 06:04:14 15° N 06:06:16 10° NE Visible
25 Jan -1.8 06:48:34 13° NNW 06:51:01 29° NNE 06:53:57 10° E Visible
26 Jan -1.4 06:00:13 21° NNE 06:00:27 21° NNE 06:03:04 10° ENE Visible
27 Jan 0.1 05:11:53 11° NE 05:11:53 11° NE 05:12:04 10° ENE Visible
27 Jan -3.0 06:44:40 18° NW 06:46:56 62° NNE 06:50:11 10° ESE Visible
28 Jan -2.2 05:56:22 37° NNE 05:56:25 37° NNE 05:59:30 10° E Visible
29 Jan 0.0 05:08:06 13° ENE 05:08:06 13° ENE 05:08:37 10° E Visible
29 Jan -3.0 06:40:53 24° WNW 06:42:33 50° SW 06:45:44 10° SE Visible

Iridium Flares
OK, so what’s an iridium flare? Iridium flares are relatively new ultra bright objects in the sky, produced by the glancing reflection of the sun’s rays off a particular type of satellite–the Iridium satellite. Because the main mission antenna are pointing towards Earth, at predictable points in their orbit, they pickup the sun’s glare and direct it towards the Earth, producing the “flash”. Because they flash so quickly, here are the dates and times to look fast:

Time                     Brightness                     Altitude                     Azimuth                 Satellite                 Distance to flare centre                 Brightness at flare centre                 Sun altitude
Jan 22, 18:18:55 -0.5 31° 198° (SSW) Iridium 46 33 km (W) -7.0 -7°
Jan 23, 18:12:57 -2.6 31° 200° (SSW) Iridium 49 17 km (W) -6.9 -6°
Jan 23, 19:48:44 -0.9 34° 155° (SSE) Iridium 58 34 km (W) -7.6 -24°
Jan 24, 19:42:42 -3.7 35° 156° (SSE) Iridium 55 14 km (W) -7.6 -22°
Jan 25, 19:36:36 -0.1 34° 155° (SSE) Iridium 31 40 km (E) -7.6 -21°

For these and other updates realted to satellites (natural and human-made): http://www.heavens-above.com/?lat=40.94806&lng=-83.96111&loc=Pandora&alt=227&tz=EST

To find out where the International Space Station is in relation to you, enroll at http://spotthestation.nasa.gov/ to get alerts for your specific area

Find yourself looking at the night sky with your cell phone in hand? Use to “GoogleSky” to help you navigate the view.

* Michael Stegina/Adam Block/NOAO/AURA/NSF

** Satellite images taken by the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) aboard NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope

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Pig in a Blanket

The newest resident of the conservation farm is in recovery as I type. Beatrice the pygmy pot-bellied pig was spayed this afternoon by Dr. Kathleen Babbitt of Lima Animal Hospital. Vet Tech Kaylie called with the news that Beatrice came through surgery with flying colors. Dr. Babbitt took lots of photos with her cell phone, including the image posted here.

Although Beatrice has only been with us for several days, our research led us to the conclusion that it would best for her health (and our collective sanity) to have her spayed as soon as possible. Seems that as they age, intact female pigs are prone to fibroids and abdominal tumors.

This morning this sweet pig thoroughly explored the back rooms and surgery of the hospital before I left for work. Although she squealed lustily (quite piercingly, actually) when I picked her up to put her back in the carrier, Dr. Babbitt exclaimed, “I love her!” Lord love her, that woman is a joy and a godsend to our sanctuary as she is the only vet in a five-county radius willing and able to take on The Quarry Farm pigs, crows, and Johnny the Canada goose.

More about Beatrice later. In the meantime, you just have to love this little face.

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The Buzz

I’ve been struggling to find some clever way to start this post, to write the hook I need to pull you in and I’m failing miserably. Miserably. So, because my brain is fogged with the ridiculous heat we’re dealing with, I’ll just say that it’s about bees. Yeah. Bees. The kind that make honey, that bumble flower to flower, that kamikaze in defense of their homes, that, in conjunction with birds, create a happy little euphemism for sex. And sex is sexy, so maybe that’s all the hook I really need.

Clever me.

So, the bees. We set up a hive in mid April. Anne’s cousin, Brian, made all the arrangements for the bees and we took care of the materials: the hive body, the supers, the frames, the feeding troughs. We provided them a steady diet of syrup (sugar and water) and we’d pull off the hive cover and the inner cover on a nearly daily basis and ogle them from a distance. Yesterday, we got up close and personal. Brian came up from Columbus and he and Anne cracked the hive, pulled out the frames and checked out the action. The news could have been better.

Brian Erchenbrecher examining a frame from The Quarry Farm hive.

While the bees had developed new comb on the frames, there wasn’t nearly enough. And, again, while there were eggs and signs of developing brood, there wasn’t much and indications are that the developing brood are mostly drones. What are drones, you ask? They’re ne’er-do-well playboys, eating the nectar and giving back nearly nothing. They have no stinger, so they can’t protect the hive. They have no pollen sacs, so they can’t gather food. Their idea of work is chasing virgin queens.

Think Bruce Wayne, but no Batman. There you have it. Drones.

So what’s the big deal? So what if the hive’s Bohemian, populated with lotus eaters? If there are  only drones and no workers, there’s no comb. Without comb, there’s no honey. Without honey, the bees starve come winter. In fact, come late autumn the worker bees force the drones from the hive. They have to. Driving them out could well mean the difference between starving to death and surviving until spring.

It’s been suggested by scientists who study bees that a bee hive operates very much like a human brain. I mean, there’s no higher cognitive function, but otherwise, scientists have posited that their operations are very similar. If that’s the case, then our hive brain is more like Forrest Gump’s than Stephen Hawking’s. Which is not to say that it can’t improve. There is still hope, albeit one akin to the Flowers for Algernon variety. Realistically? Odds are, based on what we saw yesterday, that the hive will fail, the brain will die and we’ll have to start fresh next spring. That’s not what we wanted to hear, but there’s still good news.

And here it is.

The catalpa hive

Down the road from us, near the intersection of Roads 7-L and O, there’s a line of catalpa trees. In one of those trees is a hive of feral bees. This is a very cool thing, particularly when you understand that the hive has survived and thrived for roughly four years. With the population of bees dwindling as a consequence of a host of issues, to find a succesful wild hive is seriously cool. Why? Bees are our primary pollinators. Without them, plants that reproduce through pollination, and that’s the vast majority of our fruits and vegetables, simply don’t reproduce. No reproduction = No food.

So cheer on the bees, both wild and domestic. We’ll keep you posted on their progress.