The Big Lift

How do you raise a barn off of its foundation?

Very carefully.

A couple of inches at at time...

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History Mystery

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The old granary on The Platz has been lovingly restored over the years.  First it received some new perimeter timbers, a new roof and a lean-to.  Then it got new barn siding and windows.  Now it's getting a new foundation and floor.  A concrete foundation and floor.

stabilizing the building

Over the last couple of decades the building has been slowing but surely settling.  A consequence of age and the lack of a proper foundation.  Per the contractor a floating slab ought to put that to a halt and launch the old structure into the next century.  It's already probably double my age and going to outlive me some more.

just dirt under that old wooden floor

Speaking of which - how old is the structure?

The building is post and beam construction (see above) using only pegs - no nails or bolts.  The timbers are hand-hewed.

Yesterday one of the contractor's employees stopped by to pick-up some tools and he mentioned that any number of the timbers removed from under the wooden floor had evidence of scorching and burning on the surfaces that were not hewn.  He asked me if I knew they were likely salvaged from The Great Peshtigo Fire. I have long suspected as much as some of the exposed rafters upstairs also showed evidence of being burnt.  

Around here the fire that burned Peshtigo on the other side of Green Bay to the north also pretty much burned most of Southern Door County at the same time.  On this side of the bay the conflagration that caused such enormous property damage and loss of life is known as 'The Tornado'.  The fire storm roared and moved like a tornado.

Those old timbers are now in the yard and seeing the light of day for the first time in a long time.  The fires arrived in summer and exploded in October of 1871.  That would place the age of the barn somewhere post fire.  That's old.  

But something's not quite right.  My cursory research in the vault of the county courthouse a number of years ago traced the chain of custody for the farmstead back to February 25, 1888 when the eighty acres was sold to Eli Simon of Brussels for $300.  Prior to that the property was owned by John Leathem and Thomas H. Smith of Sturgeon Bay.  And before them - Charles and Maria Scofield.  

Was someone living here when the tornado swept through?  Was timber salvaged for many years following the fire?  Or other scorched building materials?  Sure wish I knew the answer.

If only the dead could talk...

scorched surface - evidence of fire

Pickle Avalanche!

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That's the end of it.

Those beauties have been converted into 20 pints of the infamous crunchy garlic dill pickles and an additional 7 pints of crispy, crunchy sweet pickles.

The cuke harvest was awesome this year but the plants in the garden are about played-out.  Pulling them-up today.  All that's left are a half-dozen 'eater' cucumbers in the fridge.

What The Flock?

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Ran to town on an errand yesterday and spied a flock of more than three dozen sandhill cranes.

Grus canadensis - the Sandhill Crane - is particularly easy to identify as it's one of the tallest birds in the world.  If you don't see one but hear their distinctive rattling croak of a call you know they're near.

This bird is capable of flying at great heights and migrates to the southern United States and Mexico.

Sunshine Flowers

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The giant bird feeder I planted earlier this year is doing fantastic!

Excellent germination (although a crowded planting) and ample rain has let to an explosion of flowering plants.

Raising a toast to meatball farming!

Schützenfest

The last photos of Schützenfest 2015 were taken by the trail cameras.  Mennonite has gone native, Braumeister is toting a big, 'ol bag of 19-19-19 fertilizer and Lawyer, New Guy and Diva Dog are hoofing it south at the crossroads...

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Porch Sitting

From last weekend's Schützenfest...

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Porch sitting with your friends, the dogs and a refreshing adult beverage is a totally reasonable and acceptable way of not doing very much except for the visiting.  Someone suggested that it is chillaxing - chilling-out and relaxing.

The evenings are beginning to arrive sooner now and the nights are growing cooler.  There is definitely a whiff of autumn in the air.  Nevertheless, when you catch a sunny day chillaxing on the porch is most definitely called-for.  

Fawns

Except for cutting-off the legs this is another nicely composed couple of early morning photos of a fawn.  Nice mix of dappled sunlight and shadows.

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Sunshine Flowers

The strip of sunflowers planted earlier this year is going, growing and now blooming.  The giant bird feeder is doing just fine.  These are oil sunflowers and unlike some of the giant sunflowers you see in a residential yard these are shorter and have smaller flowers that produce abundant numbers of seeds.

When these blooms complete their metamorphosis to seed heads the birds are going to go nuts! 

Schützenfest

The Schützenfest menu options are all very guy-centered.

We have our Bloody Mary Bar set-up with homemade Uncle Dick's tomato juice and my signature crispy, crunchy dill pickles...

  
And Six-Deuce made a great pile of ABTs (Atomic Buffalo Turds) - jalapeno peppers stuffed with cheese, wrapped in bacon and grilled until crispy...

And this fine selection of venison loins (grilled rare) along with pork tenderloins grilled medium rare... 

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Although we did eat Quiche Lorraine on Sunday morning.

Mama and the Kid

From four days ago - a nice morning pic of a doe and her fawn trailing her from the trail camera situated at the crossroads.

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I rather like the soft tomes of the early morning lighting and shadows and the rich roan coat of the whitetails....

Schützenfest

Schützenfest would not be complete without an accident of some sort.

Mennonite nicked is knee with a chainsaw (a VERY lucky close call) and he was doing fine until he knelt on the driveway opening the wound again.

Nice work, eh?

Wait until he gets my bill...

Crazy Labs

Oftentimes when I run the dogs with the four wheeler they'll grab a stick and run together with it like a team of horses.  Side by side, full-tilt with neither relinquishing control of the stick.  They are crazy dogs.

On rare occasions I've managed to stop and after fishing-out my smart phone take some video of this behavior while navigating the trails one-handed.  More often than not it is precisely at this moment that the dogs stop, drop the stick and look at me for direction.  

This afternoon I ran the dogs with the Polaris and sure as shit they grabbed a stick and did their team of horses shtick.  I momentarily thought of pausing and fetching the phone from my pocket to shoot some video but decided against it.  I figured they'd drop the stick as soon as I paused to do so.

Today they ran with their stick side by side for almost a half mile before giving-up on the game.  Fortunately one of the trail cameras caught an action shot...

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Schützenfest

Schützenfest 2015.  

Nine guys working on our deer stands, eating real well and enjoying some firearm competition.

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Love the smell of spent powder, barbecue and testosterone in the air...

Teenager

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This fawn has gotten larger over the past few months and has almost divested himselft of his spots.

Teenager.

Brood Flock

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A possible explanation for why this brood flock is only three birds and a mom might be the coyote that's been showing-up regularly around here.

Reince Priebus Asks Trump to Quit

Reince Priebus - Chairman the Republican National Committee - has had it with The Donald.

He has asked Trump to quit...

Scale

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The only reason I posted this photo is for purposes of scale.  It would appear that the digital images of the coyote from yesterday's post correspond nicely with this image.  Same camera and same location - taken one day apart.

The yote is about the same size as our blonde Lab.

Taken earlier you can see in this photo that the black Lab is a tad bigger and bulkier than the predator.

That said - now you know why I never walk the dogs off lead without a sidearm strapped to my hip.

Coyote on the Hunt!

Here's an absolutely fascinating sequence of photos taken with a trail camera set for burst photo mode (a fast three-shot sequence).  If you follow the time stamp on the photos the entire sequence of pictures spans an elapsed time of three minutes.  I can only speculate on what the camera missed during the one minute reset period between bursts.  If only it was set on video mode.

In the first photo is a close-up of a hen turkey.  In the background further southwest on the trail are a couple of additional wild turkeys.  They're the dark shapes in the center of the frame.

In the second and subsequent shots a coyote materializes on the scene stalking the remaining birds - which amazingly hang around as the coyote circles back for another run at them.

In the final sequence the coyote has completed the circle and advances in the direction of where the birds had been hanging out.

If you look carefully following the first photo you will see a primary wing feather on the turf to the left of center.  Wonder if the canine made a grab for the bird in the first photo and all she got was a mouthful of feathers?

Tough bird the wild turkey - earning a living in a dog eat bird world...

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Botched Shot?

This doe has shown-up several times on more than one of the trail cameras.  

 

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What is curious is the blemish just behind the right forequarter.  Haven't been able to obtain a close-up but it is an obvious deformation of the skin on the animal.

I cannot help but wonder if it might be the consequence of a botched bow-shot.  A wound caused by a deflected arrow or poor shot placement?  Is it healed or is it festering?  From all outward appearances the animal appears healthy.  She has been mothering a fawn.

Wounded animals have been know to survive with broad heads remaining embedded in the flesh after the arrow shaft has been busted-off.

I wonder...

Ghost Deer

Been moving cameras around The Platz and scored another one of those photos demonstrating the ethereal effect of the infrared setting in low light.  

A couple of ghost deer...

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It's All About the Youngsters

Fawn post.

Need I say more?

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Poults!

Finally!

At long last a picture of a mama hen turkey and some of her brood.  At least I hope that's not all of them.  The first-year class of newly-hatched birds are called poults.  And they're really rather self-sufficient from the day they are hatched.  This is my first trail camera sighting of the Turkey Class of 2015.

Looky there.  They are the size of chickens already...

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Bee Swarm

I've had bugs crawl across the lens of a trail camera from time-to-time.  It's annoying but bugs gotta do what bugs gotta do.

If you get an ant infestation in your trail camera all you have to do is disassemble and No Pest Trip and cut a chunk of the yellow strip and stuff in the case of the camera.

Viola!.  Bugs be gone. 

But this was different.  Anytime you fetch an SD card from a trail camera and there are 1287 photos on it you know something has gone terribly wrong.  These flying insects showed-up in the early afternoon in large numbers and stayed until dusk.  The next day they were gone.  Here's a sampling of the pics with the time stamps.  

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I call bee swarm.