Consider The Larch

They’re late this fall for some reason; so from our walk this afternoon is the last hurrah of fall color in our woods. 

I cannot get enough of my favorite tree.  The tamarack or larch - Larix laricina.  Also called the hackmatack.

The larch can tolerate cold temperatures better than any tree in North America which is why you'll find it in the northernmost tree-line regions of the continent.  Rot-resistant they make excellent shingles and fence posts.  Historically, the bark was used in the leather-tanning industry.  It's a damn useful tree.

I suppose I'm biased since we've nurtured several nice stands of tamarack here.  They're well-suited to some of the soil types and as evidenced by seedlings and saplings popping-up here and there they are thriving.

They sport some crazy branches that would almost make you think they belong in a Dr. Seuss story but the part I like best is the fall color found in this species.

The needles turn a blazing golden color - then they drop.  It's done.  In the spring the tree grows an entire new set of needles and begins the process all over again.

Functional and good-looking; and as Monty Python once said, “Consider the Larch.”

                

Friday Music

Good morning reader-listener.  Today, and for the fourth time, I bring forth a disco tune; all 122 beats per minute of it.

Composed by George Young and Harry Vanda this song was recorded and performed by fellow Australian John Paul Young in 1977.  The song became a worldwide hit in 1978, peaking at No. 3 on the Australian charts and No. 5 on the UK Singles Chart.  In the States it peaked at No. 7 on the pop chart and spend a couple of weeks at the No. 1 slot on the Adult Contemporary Chart; his only US top 40 hit.  Yes a One Hit Wonder.

This is a rather fun cover from the Australian music trivia show RocKwiz; featuring Julia Zemiro who introduces and joins in on the performance, Isabella Manfredi sings portions in Italian and Helen Croome (also known as Gossling) an Australian indie-pop singer known for her distinct vocal style.

Turn-up the volume for Love Is In The Air... 

Let's Hear It For The Boys

By the time this post is published the rut should be beginning to kick it into high gear.  Signs of pre-rut activity materialized by the middle of October including the start of scrapes and rubs.  Everywhere you walk you can find evidence of this out in the woods.

Plenty of the trail camera photos and video captures have been of nocturnal buck movement; and as the rut continues there is going to be more daytime activity.  Time will tell.

Meanwhile, and apologies for the data dump, here is a selection of digital imagery collected on October 24.

 

 

 

Stay-tuned as I shall endeavor to refresh the imagery at a two week interval.

There's room at the inn for any of you deer camp guys looking to unlimber your vertical bow or crossbow.  You know how to reach me.

Raising a toast to the boys.  Cheers!   

Quote Of The Day

 "If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed.......and we will deserve it."

 - South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, May 3, 2016  

Election Day

  

The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. With that same certainty, Trump will interfere with the election. It is an absolute given. 

 

Except for a win on his team he will reject the outcome. 

He will claim it was rigged. He will claim that millions of votes are bad. He will spew out the lies at a machine gun pace. He will use every tool in his power and others that are not to delay the seating of the newly elected officials. He will violate the laws that protect us. He will tie everything up in the courts. 

He will drag this out as long as he can. That is his strategy. The longer he drags it out, the longer he survives in power. 

 

Count on it.

And be prepared for January 6th 2.0

Passing The Smell Test

I don't mean to be picky but what's with Donald Trump's affection for dictators and bad dudes?  Serious, he gets off the phone following a call to Vladimir Putin and almost instantaneously fawning over the Russian autocrat.  And then it bleeds-over to the war in Ukraine; that Russia started.

Recently Mr. Trump told Newsmax that Zelensky is "not a good guy for us to deal with" and "more difficult" than Putin.

Then he goes off running at the mouth and exaggerating the amount of aid the U.S. has given to Ukraine.  Factually, it is more like $195 billion, not $350 billion, with much of it going directly to U.S. defense contractors.

Mr. Trump also claimed that the U.S. had provided "massive amounts" of Tomahawks to Ukraine, therefore depleting our own arsenal.  The Pentagon has provided no such cruise missiles.

Add it all up and it smells bad.  

Putin Trump - photo Japan Times

So what is the explanation for Mr. Trump's affection for a Russian war criminal?  There are all sorts of wild conspiracy theories about Trump being a Russian plant or sympathizer.  Or that Putin has dirt on Trump that has compromised him.  

President Zelensky has a simple and compelling theory; and like Occam's Razor suggests that the explanation that requires the fewest assumptions is usually best.  Zelensky believes that Trump has a fondness for totalitarian authority and wealthy individuals. He speaks about it openly and is likely a wee bit envious of Putin's station in life.  Trump has likely padded his balance sheet since the start of his second term by roughly $2 billion.  That pales by comparison with Putin's estimated $70 to $200 billion; but it's a start.  Besides, the master manipulator has been in power much longer.

Anyway, Trump's willingness to do the former Soviet Intelligence officer's bidding is troubling.  Hopefully, Europe's willingness to step-up and fill the void will save Ukrainian civilian lives.  Having fallen under Putin's thrall I'm not entirely convinced Trump is an honest broker in bringing this war to an end.  It doesn't pass the smell test.  And more women and children will die as a consequence.

Fall Colors

Autumn foliage would not be complete until I posted a photo of my favorite power company tree.

It's a shame it has to suffer the indignity of a pruning job like this as it's otherwise a handsome maple.

Bury your power lines folks or plant a sufficient distance from any overhead power lines.

Blast From The Past

Scrolling thru my online photo album at Google Photos I came across a collection of digital images dating from November 2007, a couple of decades and three dogs ago.  It even predates this forum by a couple of years.

Pictured here is my Inky.  A female Labrador retriever and all-around flusher and fetcher of upland game birds including grouse, woodcock and pheasant. We enjoyed a love affair; she was my girlfriend.

She's still a pup in these photos and this was our first trip to South Dakota to chase pheasants twenty years ago.

That last photo is precious as I thought it was lost.  Now it's found and will find its way to our powder room wall. 

 

Friday Music

Tonah "El Hombre Orquesta" - whose real name is  Tonatiuh Zamarrón is a Mexican street musician from Mexico City.  He's captured attention online with his one-man band featuring up to 11 instruments that can be played simultaneously.

He sings and plays covers of classic rock and pop tracks that have gone viral on TikTok, Facebook and YouTube including Paul McCartney's social media channel.

You've officially been sucked-in to this phenomenon.  Enjoy watching, it's a lot of fun... 

 

Ditch Tigers

Last weekend we observed kittens emerging from beneath the granary lean-to porch.  It would appear that mama cat decided to take up residence in a den at that location to birth her brood.  I suppose the good news is there aren't bunnies living under there; or worse yet, a groundhog.  But now we've got cats to deal with.  And somehow remove.

Coincidentally, on Saturday we ran the trail camera trapline and uploaded a batch of new images including a spike in cat photos.  Colloquially called ditch tigers.

Roaming cats are bad news for wildlife; particularly ground-nesting birds.  These animals are higher order predators of small prey that play an important roll in the natural world's food web.

What to do.  What to do... 

 

Fall Colors

Today's fall colors are brought to you courtesy of the trees you will find in our yard.  Yes, those we planted as part of our DIY landscaping.

20+ years ago they we little runts, 1-3 year-old bare root or potted stock, when we plugged them into the ground.  Most survived some did not.

Today they're all grown-up.  A nice mix of maples and oaks.

The tamaracks seem to be running late this year.

 

 

    

Timber Stand Improvement

When we got married we gave ourselves a Husqvarna chainsaw as a wedding gift. That tool has a pile of miles on it. 

 

That winter of 1997-98 Jill and I dropped 200 ancient and decrepit bigtooth aspen along a portion of the north property line. That disturbance caused this to happen. 

 

 

And a brand-new and vastly larger stand of healthy thriving trees materialized. Thousands of trees; free for nuth’n!

 

A golden stand of aspen in the autumn sunshine is easy on the eyes.

 

Without going full bible I’m mindful of Lazarus.

 

On This Day In History

My life experience includes being born of American parents on a U.S. Army installation in southern Germany.  Crailsheim, to be exact.  When we lived in Germany my family took a trip thru East Germany to Berlin.  

I still have my Soviet Visa authorizing my passage to the Russian Zone.  Yes, back then, the Communists required that even a child might have to produce their "papers" on demand.  

This was before the Soviets built a wall and before this cold war stand-off.  By the time these photos were snapped in 1961 we had already returned stateside.  

In 2023, accompanied by two additional couples, we traveled thru what had previously been East Germany and, while spending several days in Berlin, took some photos at Checkpoint Charlie.  

What a difference 62 years makes.

Earlier, on October 25, 1961, the U.S. deployed ten tanks to Checkpoint Charlie, marking a major escalation in the confrontation over Allied access to East Berlin. 

The immediate dispute involved East German border guards attempting to check the identification of American officials entering East Berlin.  The Americans insisted that only the Soviet authorities, not East German personnel, had jurisdiction over allied access rights. 

The sequence of events is important.  October 25 was the day the American tanks were deployed, yet the famous stand-off between American and Soviet tanks occurred on this day, October 27.  Three U.S. Army tanks were positioned at the crossing with an additional seven held nearby in reserve. 

In a tense showdown, ten Russian tanks moved into position opposite the American forces.  For hours the two superpower's armor faced one another at close range creating a dangerous setting for escalation.  The standoff ended peacefully the following day, October 28, when the Russian tanks began withdrawing followed by the American tanks.

The confrontation demonstrated that the dispute over Berlin was more than about identity papers for adults and children.  It was more about the postwar occupation arrangements, status of East Germany, and the rights of Western Allies to move freely through Berlin.

We all know the end of the story; communism is a colossal failed experiment.  

The communist's wall came down in November 1989 and East Germany (the German Democratic Republic) ceased to exist on October 3, 1990 when it officially reunited with West Germany.  Today Berlin and all of (former) East Germany is free and thriving.

In short order, and after it's constituent republics declared independence, the Soviet Union (USSR) collapsed.  It dissolved on December 26, 1991.

Nowadays, like many large European cities, Berlin is an excellent destination spot.  Safe, with the S-Bahn and U-Bahn cleaner than any public transportation system on the planet.  Museums, theater, entertainment, history and food.  If you're like me you will appreciate every last bit of it right down to the beer.  I recommend it.  Visitors are witness to the miscarriage of communism everywhere. 

As for any of you scaredy-cat holdouts doubting that communism is a failed ideology I direct your attention to the last photo for incontrovertible evidence.

KFC was invented by Colonel Sanders; not Vladimir Lenin.  The Colonel was an entrepreneur; a capitalist.  Comrade Vlad was a murderous dictator.  Good guys like the Colonel win hearts and minds with fried chicken.  Communist revanchists like Vladimir Putin invade their neighbors and wage war on civilians.

Get a grip people.  

A stake has been driven in the heart of the beast.  

Communism is dead.  

And the midterms are just around the corner. 

Quote Of The Day

“If Abdul and the Democrats win, they will open the floodgates and invite hordes of jihadis to our shores, creating a nightmare of violence and terror until you cannot even have a Christmas.”

 

                                                          - Donald Trump

New Resident In The Neighborhood

From time-to-time I have written about the common fox squirrels that inhabit  our woods.  Surprise, surprise, someone new has moved into the neighborhood; another squirrel that heretofore has not been personally observed by me or made a cameo appearance on one of the trail cameras.

Meet Tamiasciurus hudsonicus - the American Red Squirrel.

Last week my pal, Braumeister, reported that a red squirrel jumped on him while he was bow hunting.  In case you might be wondering why any self-respecting squirrel would jump on a person you should know that he was camouflaged in a ghille suit.  Consequently, the squirrel likely took him for another ordinary bush or large piece of foliage.  But I digress.

The bottom line is I didn't believe him.  My interrogation went something like this:

Tom:  Did the squirrel have a white belly?  

Brau:  Yes.

Tom:  Did it have white circles around the eyes?  

Brau:  Yes.

Tom:  Was it smaller than a gray squirrel?  

Brau:  Yes.

Tom:  Ruddy red pelt?  

Brau:  Yes.

Tom:  I've never seen one and I live here.  Must've been a fox squirrel.

Then the next day he took this picture.

Man, was I wrong.  That is most definitely a red squirrel.  A first around here.  And I'll be plucked!

Considerably smaller than gray or fox squirrels are easily identified by all the items I ticked-off in my interrogation (above).  Native throughout the United States and Canada they thrive in mixed hardwood and coniferous forests.  

Famously known as omnivorous hoarders their diet includes pine cones, pine nuts, seeds, berries, bird eggs and small insects.  They're quite territorial and will defend their feeding ground with sharp rattling chatter and scolding calls.

Unlike some mammals red squirrels do not over-winter in hibernation.  Instead they assemble large caches of pine cones underground or at the base of trees.  These middens sustain them over the winter. 

Breeding occurs February to March and while several males my chase a single female; the female is receptive to mating only once on a single day.  Gestation is 33-35 days yielding 2-5 offspring once during the months of March to May.  The young are weaned on on their own after 7-8 weeks.

On Saturday we fetched the memory cards from the trail camera trapline.  On the video cam where Brau was hunting there were two 15 second silent video shorts of a red squirrel.  No still photos yet; but this is a start.  Like I said; I'll be plucked.

 

Fun Fact:  This critter is a master mycologist.  They eat wild mushrooms including the Amanita.  Toxic to humans, red squirrels dine on this fungus with no ill-effects.  They hang their shrooms high in a tree to sun-dry before storing them in their midden for winter fare.

Another Door County Connection

When the bankrupt Seattle Pilots became the Milwaukee Brewers one week before Opening Day 1970, one pitcher on the roster was coming home to Wisconsin. Gene Brabender had led the Pilots with 13 wins in 1969, and when the move was announced, he told the Associated Press that playing in Milwaukee would be closer to home in Sturgeon Bay, and that his wife and family would like that.

Brabender was the first native-born Wisconsinite ever to play for the Brewers. Born in Madison and raised in Black Earth, he was Wisconsin through and through.

His teammates called him "Lurch" — 6-foot-6, 225 pounds. His Seattle teammates, per Jim Bouton's classic book Ball Four, heard the big guy could bend the metal spikes that anchor the bases in his bare hands and agreed: "We better call him 'Sir.'"

He was the clubhouse jokester who once nailed Bouton's shoes to the floor, and he liked to scare teammates half to death by firing darts from a homemade blowgun into the wall just above their heads.

He later auditioned for (but did not get) the TV sitcom version of Ball Four, based on the book about the Pilots. 

Before Milwaukee, he'd been part of the Orioles' 1966 World Series championship team, and the best game of his career was a four-hit, 12-strikeout shutout of Cleveland in 1967. 

As a member of the Brewers first roster, Brabender went 6-15 with a 6.02 earned-run average in 29 games (21 starts).  The Brewers traded him to the California Angels organization in January 1971 for outfielder Bill Voss.  Shoulder problems hampered his comeback and he never returned to the major leagues.

 
Steve Barber, his old teammate, summed him up best: "a hard-throwing right-handed country boy." He died in a Madison hospital in 1996 at age 55 after collapsing form a brain aneurysm.

The Door County thread never really left the franchise, either. The Brewers' 2026 City Connect uniforms feature an Accent Cream the team says represents "the beaches of Door County." And this year's signature ballpark cocktail,The Bobber, is made with Door County cherry syrup. Lurch would be proud. 

 

 

Brewers Baseball

After watching the first game of the World Series last evening I'm not sure I'm capable of surviving many more closing like that one.

It's game-on for the second game of the series and we're ready.

The brewers lights went out on the porch last evening just before the first pitch was thrown.

And even the bear is getting his game-on.