BEAR in our driveway

Well, now we had a bear run up our driveway yesterday evening pass the house and into the woods at back of property. This was a first for us. Vince did see a bear a week or so ago now as he was driving to Walmart's. Now it is at our place. 

Workers on the upper deck said he has a male black bear that hangs at his place, and he lives about 15 min.'s up the street or hill from us. The deck will be finished today. He also told us there are lots of coyotes living around here, and we have seen foxes. 

Thank goodness I do not have a picture to show for the bear.

Love and Prayers,   

Margo

Yet another snake

Well, believe this or not. We went back out to see it, and ether it went back inside the hole OR this is another snake coming out of the tree. This live snake stuff is happening the same day. The SKIN happened a few weeks ago.  

Days later he or she is still in the tree, we believe it is the same snake. It is eating ants and other bugs that are on the tree. So, when he gets bigger, he or she will come down and get on with living.

Snake head out of hole in tree.

  Crazy weird this summer around here in W.V.

 

Love and Prayers, 

Margo

Another Snake in Tree

This time a LIVE snake coming out of the hole in the Pauline tree and just sitting on the old sewed off limb. We do not know if this snake belongs to the snake skin we first saw a few weeks ago. 

But here is the snake out of the tree limb with its tail still in the hole. 

Black snake out of hole on tree.

Crazy snake in a tree.

 

Love and Prayers, 

Margo

Snake Skin hanging out of Pauline Tree

Snake skin hanging our of our Pauline Tree. There is a old cut off limb and a small hole in the center, we found this snake skin hanging our of it. 

Snake Skin in Tree.

 Just have never seen this before. Snake skin just hanging from the hole.

 

Love and Prayers, 

Margo

Rain, humid, raccoons

Last two half grown raccoons.

The weather is terrible this summer so much rain, and humility. It seems to never stop and to that add all the heat that goes with it. We are living in the house mostly. 

It is taking the guy on the upper deck over a month to replace all the boards because of all the rain. I have never seen this much rain hitting this summer. He is using pressure treated yellow pine for the job. On the few boards that have been put down so far, I am seeing long splits (not deep) in the wood all over not just here and there. Makes me wonder if this is normal. I am sure I don't know but going to ask them the next time they come over. We are like a "fill in job" because he has a huge job they are working on. Some homeowner has sued the man who built it because of structural damage, part of the house and foundation had to be taken down and redone. This job has my handy man mostly tied up and I am thankful that he is working us in to get this done. 

 Well last night, the last two half grown raccoons come back and they were dispatched also. Now at least we can breathe a little easier and so can my chickens who are my pets. 

We had a problem in Ohio with a baby skunk and one raccoon. We scared the skunk away and never seen it again. We also had a baby possum in the garage, and we caught it and released it outside. Never seen him again. The raccoon was moved to another place miles away where there was a creek. Never seen him again. About 3 days later another raccoon walked through our backyard with 3 little ones following her. That was the rest of that family. Never saw them again. 

Love and Prayers, 

Margo

Another unwanted guest

Morning everyone, 

Yesterday evening we had 4 baby half grown raccoons come to our back door, in daylight, two of which were dispatched, The other two ran for the hills. So we sat the trap once again, surprise, another full grown raccoon was in the trap this morning. This has been 3 days since we caught the other one. Thinking this must have been a family of varmints. Here is a pic of the nasty thing. It tore up the ground all around the trap even though it does not show that much in the pic.

If this was a family of them we still have two more to deal with when they come back. I sure wish these things would just stay in the woods where they belong and stay away from our home. We do have chickens and dogs and I know these filthy things bring ticks, fleas, and disease with them. 

When we lived in Ohio, one was acting funny in our front yard, we call the police, they come and he followed it through our yard until it was in the back yard, then the cop "shot" it and left saying they get a call two to three times a week on them. He said it acted like it had distemper. I was thinking rabies, not the other. Any way Vince wearing gloves got the raccoon and put in trash, we did not leave it there for any other animal to come and check out and perhaps getting the disease from the raccoon.

Love and Prayers, 

Margo

Nita's Beauty Bush

Hello everyone, 

Today I have a pic I took earlier this summer of one of Nita's Beauty Bushes that she planted by the front of the house. It has never had this many flowers before or at least that I have seen. Has to be because of all the heat and rain this year. In fact everything around this place has grown and flowered this year and it is like a jungle out here and it is hard to just cut the grass when needed because of all the rain. It smells so sweet when in flower.

Beauty Bush

 There also is one by the back of the house and out in the front yard. This bush has several others along the fence that we have cut back some. The gate is hidden. This one is almost as high as the upper deck on the home. 

Love and Prayers, 

Margo

My Lemon Tree

 Hi to all, 

This is my lemon tree. I had a lemon tree that Nita gave me (she grew it from a seed) I grew it into a huge plant in which a robin made her nest one year in Ohio. That tree came back down to West Virginia and still did not produce any lemons, never even one flower. So I let it sit outside and freeze. It had 1 and 1/2 inch thorns on it also. Then two years ago I bought a small lemon tree. He was about 1/2 foot tall when I got it two years ago. Last summer it put on one flower and then let it fall off later on. So it is two years old now and next summer I expect a lot of lemons.

Then this early spring, it sat on 8 to 10 flowers, still so cold outside, he lives with me inside during winter, they smelled so good, then as summer got here he had lost some of the flowers and had set on about 3 different lemons. But slowly all of the little lemons dropped off but one. This is the pic of the one that stayed on the tree and keeps growing. Not sure if it will be any good or not but just the fun of having one grow on a small tree for me is wonderful.

 I do have to re-pot this thing and give him a larger root area. I think the letting it get too dry before I watered it may have caused the problems, so larger pot and less problems and perhaps next year I will have a few lemons. I love to eat them with salt sprinkled on them, love them in ice tea also. 

Here are a couple of pics and one with my glasses to show some size for lemon. 

 

 I let the lemon rest of the rail of the porch because it is pulling the lemon tree over side ways. Not bothered with huge thorns either. 

Watch your pets, I feed this tree in the spring with its citrus food and Kricket was caught eating the citrus from top of the pot. He is ok and it did not seem to make him sick either. thank God.

Love and Prayers, 

Margo