Mourning Doves

I went to our barn this afternoon to do some woodworking and found these two mourning dove trapped inside the barn. For some reason birds will fly inside the barn through an open 12 foot wide door but try to use a closed window for an exit. It was very easy to catch these two doves as they flapped against the window.

Garlic Sprouts

The snow has melted, the ground has thawed and my garlic has sprouted.



I planted this garlic bed last fall soon after I harvested last year's crop.

Damn Bears !!!

The weather is getting warmer and I decided I better get my apple trees pruned before the buds get too big. As I started pruning I noticed several of the trees had broken limbs along the main trunk; I thought this may have been snow damage or raccoons...



Then I saw the claw marks and knew it was a bear(s). These claw marks are 10 to 12 feet off the ground. Note the size of the broken limb in the upper right of the photo.



I'm not sure when this happened, but most of the damaged trees were the late winter apples that stay on the trees during the winter.



This may explain why one of the apple trees had fallen over. I had blamed the wind for the fallen tree, but it may have been a bear in the tree.

Neighborhood Deer

The neighborhood deer have had a mild winter and with the warmer spring weather we are seeing more deer searching for the first green grass shoots.

Early Garden

Soon after New Years the gardening catalogs started arriving in the mail and racks of vegetable seeds started to appear in stores. For us in the northeast this is way too early to start gardening ... or is it too early???

Back in January I took a couple of plastic tubs, filled them with potting soil and placed them in a sunny location. In the one tub I scattered beet seeds and in the second tub I scattered two types of lettuce and some spinach.



The beets are now ready to thin out ...



The lettuce and spinach is also ready to thin and we had our first salad from the garden today.

Snow Geese

On our recent trip to Iowa, while traveling on I-29 near the Nebraska City exit, we got to see tens of thousands of snow geese staging for their spring migration north to their breeding grounds on the Arctic tundra.

Change of Command Ceremony

We recently traveled to Topeka, Kansas for the Change of Command ceremony at the 190th Air Refueling Wing of Kansas Air National Guard.



Lt. Col. Robert (Chuck) Beebe and son Henry.



Chuck's wife Nikki and Henry.



Mr. Henry will soon be 1 year old and is dressed for the occasion.



Almost show time...



Chuck presented his daughter Myra with some flowers...



And Myra had to let everyone know who her Daddy was ...



Start of the Change of Command ceremony



Outgoing commander, Lt. Col. Beebe, transfers the unit flag and authority.



Family photo



The official mascot of the 190th Air Refueling Wing, Willie Coyote.