[The pictures here were taken last week when it was cooler and we enjoyed some interesting skies. They are not especially illustrative of this post.]
I
haven’t been telling you about the rattlesnakes for fear that someone would
ask, “Why don’t you move from that awful place?” Or, “why don’t you exterminate
those rattlers?”
We saw the first rattlesnake of the season on Sunday, May 10 (Mothers’ Day) – several weeks
earlier than usual, and it has proven to be a summer of “snakes aplenty.” Mike
encourages Bess to bark when she sees them, and then he makes much of keeping
her back and away. We hope she understands. Nellie doesn’t hear them and seems
oblivious to the danger.
 |
| The snake raced into the shed. |
Thursday’s
sighting (July 16), was #18 for this season and happened near the maple tree
where Mike had been lubing the chain of his dirt bike. From the house I heard
Bess’ sharp bark and looking out, I saw Mike marching to the woodshed for his
snake-getting tools with businesslike Bess marching along beside him. I joined
the party. Nellie watched from under the tree.
The
snake was noticed midway between the tree and Mike’s storage shed, and as luck
would have it, it raced into the little shed where it took shelter in the front
left corner under shelving. It was a trial getting it out. We couldn’t leave it
there, of course. We had to know the situation was resolved. But killing and/or
capturing it was problematic.
It
buzzed continuously. Finally, after repeated attempts, Mike was able to grab it
with his snake tongs. Bess and I took a couple of steps back while Mike
finagled it into his pail and put the lid on. He then drove it off for dumping.
Now
#17 was a different story altogether. We ran over it in the lane as we drove in
on Monday, July 13.
Well,
I’ve done some research on the matter of rattlesnakes. If you have them, you
just have to be careful. There’s no eliminating them. Personally, I think that
the lack of a good, hard winter doesn’t help the pest situation. People think
it’s wonderful when we escape without snow and cold temps, but we do pay a
price for that in pest population, lack of water, etc. – not that there’s
anything we can do about it.
The
girls got their anti-venom booster shots Friday afternoon – for what it’s worth.
Speaking
of pests, when we left the farmhouse on Friday, I insisted we re-set the
mousetraps. We’ve been a little lax with that lately, and it pays to be
vigilant. I watched as Mike placed a trap at the pocket door, and we remember discussing
that that was a good place to set one. Well, that trap is missing. KW
Your
Aunt Bertha and Uncle June will be with us, and Mr. and Mrs. Boehm have
promised faithfully to come. We have some left over candy boxes that we’re
going to fill with sugared popcorn, “old hard Christmas candy,” and the Orofino
Mercantile’s best assorted nuts. I had some chickens and eggs to trade at the
Merc, so I got supplies and some treats, and Lydia put in an extra pound of the
hard candy. June and Bertha felt unable to get treats, so in a way that makes
the tree loom larger. We promised to have a regular tree and we’ll all be
children and have a lot of fun out of it. – Ina,
Christmas 1932
We arose this morning to a low of 24. Checking into next week, we saw that it's going to be cold. Since we were on our way to Orofino today for Harry Cummings' funeral, we decided to go earlier and winterize the farmhouse. KW
