Several dozen vultures circling over my property... Either they found a really great thermal to climb, or the end of the world is nigh.

I've never seen this many congregate before, it's actually a pretty awesome sight.

#farm #nature #wildlife #birds

This fuckin' guy... Fur like velcro, and he has to roll in leaves and grass clippings every damn day. He's lucky he's awesome enough to be worth it.

#dog #cute #dogstr

Let's talk about watering wands.

The one on the right is store-bought. It costs about $14, and after a season or two of moderate use, it will leak all over the place, and you will throw it away in a fit of unbridled rage. Its soft aluminum tube will bend if you raise your voice at it or use it in a strong breeze.

The one on the left is homemade from inexpensive plumbing parts. The aluminum rosette on the end costs about $5, the rest of the parts total another $5. It is sturdy and durable. If it doesn't get left out to freeze in the winter, it will last many years. It comes in infinite lengths and configurations, because you're making it yourself. If you make it using threaded connections, you can replace the valve if it ever wears out (but it won't wear out). Since both ends are garden hose connectors, it can also be used as an impromptu control valve between two hoses of you unscrew the rosette and attach another hose to that end (I do this when running a sprinkler, as it's easier to fine tune the flow with the ball valve on the wand).

Thanks for coming to my TED talk.



#garden #water #farm #diy #grownostr #tools

Yet another neat ectothermic creature hanging out in my composting area. This one is a Texas spiny lizard, and he's copping a little bit of an attitude with that look.



#lizard #texas #garden #wildlife #reptile

Planted sunn hemp for the first time this summer as a cover crop in some garden beds. I knew it would grow tall, but I didn't expect the flowers to be such a beautiful shade of yellow! The photo doesn't do it justice, in person, in the sunlight, they're almost luminous.

#garden #flowers #bloomscrolling

More than a year ago, we built some Johnson-Su bioreactor bins and filled them with wood chips. They've been cooking along quite nicely and breaking down into an awesome soil amendment. I was watering them last night and saw that they're full of wee tiny baby frogs! I counted at least a dozen of the little guys. Nobody told me that this was a possibility, so now I have to postpone harvesting from the bins until the wee tiny baby frogs are all grown up and moved out!



Unfortunately for the frogs, they live in a tough neighborhood. I've got snakes living in the leaf mold bins right next to the bioreactors. Good luck, wee tiny baby frogs!



#garden #snakes #frogs #farm #wildlife