New Upper Deck

Morning, 

Here is a pic of our new upper deck. They got it finished in July, just now getting a pic to post and show the new deck. I think they did a nice job. 

No longer looking at holes in my deck. LOL 

They used yellow pine for the wood. The darker 4x4's were left as they were in great shape, but the spindles and floor of the deck were bad. 

We are still thinking about adding a ROOF over the upper deck. 

New Upper Deck with Kricket and Truffles

Love and Prayers,

 Margo

Hummers

Morning everyone, 

Well, here we are in August already. Snake is still in the tree hole, comes out part way and goes back in again for a while. Chickens are all doing just fine, getting between 3 to5 eggs a day now. Our 5 hens are doing just fine. 

Dogs are all doing great now, keeping them inside because this year is BAD for ticks. I am back to grooming them also. Vince helps by blow drying them and I do the washing and grooming once dry. 

The new upper deck is nice, and we are thinking of adding a porch cover over it to help protect it. 

They say we have coyotes and foxes and bears around us, so far all we have seen was a black bear running up the side of our driveway to the woods in back of our house. Vince seen it I was inside and missed it. Neighbors up the way say they hear the coyotes howling and have seen them. So far, we have not. Vince said he saw a fox since we have been here. 

We are still going through a few boxes that are left and getting rid of lots of extra stuff. Getting more and more settled in. Still wishing for a smaller home and level yard though. 

We have hummers this year that are unreal, I am making a double batch of food for them, and it is gone in less than 3 days. Some days we are cleaning and filling the bird feeder twice a day. This summer has been crazy with them, love it. Tried to get a pic of them, but just too fast for me. There are 3 hummers sitting on the feeder and more around flying and in weeping willow next to porch. Truly God's little jewels. 

I have just hung a fresh mixture for them. They had many babies this year. It is a feeding frenzy of a morning and late evening and throughout the day every day.

Love and Prayers, 

 Margo

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