Fishing, Food, Funstuff and Foodplots

Saturday evening was beautiful and the pond was looking inviting.  I took the fly rod down and fished poppers for panfish and bass.  I had some success on the panfish until I hooked the little house by the dock - I'm sure that panfish popper is up on that roof somewhere.

Here's the evidence of my success on the panfish.  When I lost that popper, I tied a larger bass popper on.  On the second cast I got a huge hit but I didn't hook him.  I got bold and cast into a brush pile where I promptly hooked a branch.  The bass popper is still on that branch in about 6' of water.  I went in to dinner.

Recently I re-learned how to spell zucchini (not zuchinni).  Anyway, that's what these are.  We've had pretty reliable production of them this year.

After Joan grated off some her fingernail, I was recruited to complete the task (and I did it without injury).  This grated zucchini (notice spelling) was the basis of several important vegetable dishes.  For example;

Cheesey zucchini squares.  Notice missing squares.

Zucchini bread - much of it currently missing.

Transitioning from good food to the following morning.  It was quite cool and nice so I decided to take the dogs out for a game of fetch.  Sydney absolutely loves to chase a thrown ball and I've got a launcher.  Chloe is a little less interested in fetch, she's really fast, and she likes to take off.  I put her on a 50' line and let her run.  She immediately ran away and found this dead possum carcass where she proceeded to roll in it. Lovely.  I then had to chase her down with an atv, catch her, drag her in and rinse her off (she goes to grooming this week).  Not sure who killed the possum.

We had a few storms in the two weeks that we were gone.  The rain gauge had 2" in it.

Although we had an exceptionally hot year, we did manage to get little dribs and drabs of rain throughout the growing season.

It's hard to tell from this picture but this is the soybean field by the orchard.  The deer have been hammering it.  I disked a few strips in it and planted some fall food plots - oats and brassica.  With the recent rain, it's all up pretty well.

Some of the newly emerged brassica.

The oats look like grass.  I didn't really plant these seeds as deep as recommended so I was worried about it but it came up fairly well.

At the driveway stand there are soybeans, brassica and clover.

I'm surprised how many acorns have already dropped.  This is a fall and winter staple for the deer.

Acorns on the ground by the driveway stand.

The storms blew the tape down around the sunflowers and the deer invaded.  There's not one seed head left in the whole field.

Absolutely chomped off.

And also used for bedding.