Spent the weekend mowing, weedeating, carrying off debris and (once again) changing the small waterflow to the garden area. The plants that I was complaining about in the last post have appeared and I am shocked. I have never grown anything from seed before and looking back, Camron and I may have put out far too many seeds - if you can overplant flowers. These are very thick.
They mentioned on the news to expect a bumper crop of snakes, and my brother said that he saw six last week out on the leases that he works. Three had been hit on the road, but the other three were alive and well. All of them were rattlesnakes. My entire family has ambivalent feelings about snakes. We aren't fond of them, but we don't go out of our way to kill them the way that most of our neighbors do. Most of the people who work in the oilfield carry guns and kill every snake they see (assuming that all of them are rattlesnakes). I have usually killed the rattlesnakes that I find near my house - although I do remember taking one live one to the Caprock and setting it free during my more intense "every creature deserves to live" days. My sister lives in one of the most snake infested areas of the Southwest and she and her pets have managed to adjust. Anyway, Kilo, Marty, and Shady are too old to have to deal with vipers, and Ratdog, Buddy and Cleo are too young. Since I work from home, as long as I keep the entire place mowed and occasionally check the perimeter, I should be able to keep them safe. Another good thing, the large grey owl, the red tailed hawk, and a pair of kestrels are still hunting the pond. I watched the kestrels yesterday and they seem to always be after something.