Definitely winter here.
We haven’t yet had a heavy snowfall, but we get regular light snows — an inch or so each time — and weeks of temperatures at or below freezing, or just slightly above.
The insulating of our attic, plus the other weatherization steps in the free program that served us well last spring, has made the house considerably less drafty and definitely warmer. I also set our thermostats two degrees higher (now 72F daytimes, down to 70F at night), which has amped up the coziness factor. It will cost us a bit more in oil and propane, but comfort outweighs frugality in this case. I’m thin-blooded, and chill easily.
•
The dead and/or dangerously overhanging trees we cut down in the fall of 2023 continue to provide us with fuel for our living-room fireplace. Jacky and Anna organized several cords’ worth of pre-cut firewood, neatly stacked up outside under a gazebo. We don’t keep a fire going all day long; that would consume humongous amounts of wood. Instead, we’ve taken to eating our dinner in front of the fireplace. A very atavistic experience.
Garden Variety Blues
Summer 2024 went by uneventfully — though, in a literal sense, unfruitfully.
Per my report from a year ago, we have rocky, dense, alkaline soil that lacks nutrients and will take considerable effort to enrich, a process that could take several years. Add to that the previously discussed presence of an assortment of pests, including moles, voles, and jumping worms. Throw in the predations of some other resident critters, plus a summer whose unhelpful wetness may become the new normal, and it becomes clear that gardening successfully here, though surrounded by nature, poses challenges we didn’t face in our outer-borough/suburban garden on Staten Island.
We’ve long since closed up the garden areas for the year. Disappointingly, of everything we planted this spring and from past plantings, we got substantial crops only of red and black currants. Just a few dozen tomatoes from three bushes, a few cupful of raspberries and blueberries, a handful of late figs from several trees, a few sweet and hot peppers. Sad, really.
Did I forget to mention last summer’s infestation of “gypsy moth” caterpillars? They denuded three young apple trees that haven’t yet borne fruit, three young peach trees that provided a bountiful harvest last year, and several mature oaks, potentially killing them all off. (We won’t know the long-term effects till next year.)
Anna with gypsy moths, summer 2024
This winter’s recurrent freezes may reduce or eliminate the gypsy moth infestation. For our part, there’s not much we can do about any of these unwanted natural incursions without doing harm to the environment. The situation requires rethinking our gardening strategy from the boom up. For next spring, that means:
- Setting up a greenhouse, so we can control (to some extent) the environment in which we plant and the critters that have access thereto.
- Trying container gardening, for the same reason.
- Enriching the soil we use more aggressively.
- Choosing to plant veggies, fruits, flowers, and shrubs that (a) will thrive under these growing conditions while (b) not appealing to the local fauna. That will require both research and testing.
Which brings me to …
•
Local Fauna Update
Turns out that what we mistook for a bobcat strolling up our driveway last spring, as reported in an earlier installment of these chronicles, instead may have been an extremely skittish stray cat with a damaged tail whom our neighbors feed regularly. On the other hand, we see feline paw prints in the snow clearly too large to have come from a domestic cat. So we may have both a feral stray and a bobcat in the area.
We rescued a rabbit that got stuck in the fencing around our little vegetable plot and injured its hind leg while struggling to get free. Fortunately, we managed to locate a wildlife rehabber nearby who took her in, named her Daisy, spend several months caring for her indoors, and then released her into a local sanctuary.
Daisy, the Stone Ridge rabbit, with bandage, 2024
•
Our neighborhood herd of deer made few appearances this summer, and in smaller numbers than usual. We haven’t seen any of them for awhile — perhaps they moved elsewhere.
We’ve heard an owl nearby.
We spotted a lone raccoon on our property for the first time. Also a lone coyote. Plus some rattlesnakes and copperheads, as well as harmless garter snakes.
And we had a short surprise visit from two llamas, who wandered onto our private lane after escaping from the nearby orchard, where they live full-time. Probably the most exotic creatures to ever grace our little acre.
Llamas on Lamberti Lane, summer 2024
•
No News is Good News
All has been calm on the local front. Our often-misbehaving neighbor, Stone Ridge Orchard, held concerts over the summer and fall whose sound levels did not intrude obnoxiously on the neighborhood’s normal peace and quiet. Nor did they abuse our private lane, to which they have a home-made connection, by illegally routing their event traffic along it.
The now-approved methadone clinic next door has begun renovations on its interior, as evidenced by the presence of on-site work crews and dumpsters. This involves a certain amount of noise, but they restrict it to daylight hours on weekdays, a courtesy we appreciate.
They have installed floodlights that illuminate their parking lot and entrance. These go on at dusk and off at dawn, so what we once saw as dark woods after sunset just south of our house now shines brightly all night long. That reduces the sense of seclusion here, even though we know the building has no occupants during those hours.
They have also constructed the promised privacy fence between their property and ours. It doesn’t really mitigate the visibility of their building from our property, nor, presumably, significantly obstruct the view of our house from their grounds. And it’s open at both ends, so anyone who wants to can simply walk around it and come over to our lane. But it does at least provide a visible symbolic demarcation; let’s hope that suffices to deter trespassing.
And the new cannabis dispensary just a short stroll away has opened for business, uneventfully.
Back Home Cannabis Dispensary opens in Stone Ridge, Shawangunk Journal, October 3,
In short, no new complaints about doings in our sector.
•
Not Doomsday Prepping (Yet)
Barring some unforeseen intervention, the inauguration of Mango Mussolini will take place today. He and his minions have committed themselves to upsetting the system from top to bottom. And, since none of them have demonstrated any competence at governance, the law of unintended consequences will prevail for the next few years at least.
Precious little we can do about that, and not many options for self-protection. However, with tariffs and mass deportations looming considerable disruption of the food supply seems likely if not inevitable.
I’d estimate that we have sufficient food on hand to create at least a month’s worth of meals for the three of us. We routinely keep enough bottled water on hand for several weeks’ drinking and cooking. As this suggests, our house has extensive storage space for canned and otherwise packaged foods. We also have two good-sized refrigerators.
So it’s a sign of the times that, when Trump got elected this fall, we sat down and seriously considered investing in a freezer. That would enable us to stockpile food to an extent we hadn’t previously considered necessary or even prudent. Simply contemplating this purchase doesn’t put us on the slippery slope heading downhill toward doomsday prepping. Yet. But it’s a small step in that direction.
•
•
Special offer: If you want me to either continue pursuing a particular subject or give you a break and (for one post) write on a topic — my choice — other than the current main story, make a donation of $50 via the PayPal widget below, indicating your preference in a note accompanying your donation. I’ll credit you as that new post’s sponsor, and link to a website of your choosing.
And, as a bonus, I’ll send you a signed copy of my new book, poetic license / poetic justice — published under my full name, Allan Douglass Coleman, which I use for my creative writing.
SPJ Research Award 2014
Straight Outta Stone Ridge: Small-Town Talk (3)
Definitely winter here.
We haven’t yet had a heavy snowfall, but we get regular light snows — an inch or so each time — and weeks of temperatures at or below freezing, or just slightly above.
The insulating of our attic, plus the other weatherization steps in the free program that served us well last spring, has made the house considerably less drafty and definitely warmer. I also set our thermostats two degrees higher (now 72F daytimes, down to 70F at night), which has amped up the coziness factor. It will cost us a bit more in oil and propane, but comfort outweighs frugality in this case. I’m thin-blooded, and chill easily.
•
The dead and/or dangerously overhanging trees we cut down in the fall of 2023 continue to provide us with fuel for our living-room fireplace. Jacky and Anna organized several cords’ worth of pre-cut firewood, neatly stacked up outside under a gazebo. We don’t keep a fire going all day long; that would consume humongous amounts of wood. Instead, we’ve taken to eating our dinner in front of the fireplace. A very atavistic experience.
Garden Variety Blues
Summer 2024 went by uneventfully — though, in a literal sense, unfruitfully.
Per my report from a year ago, we have rocky, dense, alkaline soil that lacks nutrients and will take considerable effort to enrich, a process that could take several years. Add to that the previously discussed presence of an assortment of pests, including moles, voles, and jumping worms. Throw in the predations of some other resident critters, plus a summer whose unhelpful wetness may become the new normal, and it becomes clear that gardening successfully here, though surrounded by nature, poses challenges we didn’t face in our outer-borough/suburban garden on Staten Island.
We’ve long since closed up the garden areas for the year. Disappointingly, of everything we planted this spring and from past plantings, we got substantial crops only of red and black currants. Just a few dozen tomatoes from three bushes, a few cupful of raspberries and blueberries, a handful of late figs from several trees, a few sweet and hot peppers. Sad, really.
Did I forget to mention last summer’s infestation of “gypsy moth” caterpillars? They denuded three young apple trees that haven’t yet borne fruit, three young peach trees that provided a bountiful harvest last year, and several mature oaks, potentially killing them all off. (We won’t know the long-term effects till next year.)
Anna with gypsy moths, summer 2024
This winter’s recurrent freezes may reduce or eliminate the gypsy moth infestation. For our part, there’s not much we can do about any of these unwanted natural incursions without doing harm to the environment. The situation requires rethinking our gardening strategy from the boom up. For next spring, that means:
Which brings me to …
•
Local Fauna Update
Turns out that what we mistook for a bobcat strolling up our driveway last spring, as reported in an earlier installment of these chronicles, instead may have been an extremely skittish stray cat with a damaged tail whom our neighbors feed regularly. On the other hand, we see feline paw prints in the snow clearly too large to have come from a domestic cat. So we may have both a feral stray and a bobcat in the area.
We rescued a rabbit that got stuck in the fencing around our little vegetable plot and injured its hind leg while struggling to get free. Fortunately, we managed to locate a wildlife rehabber nearby who took her in, named her Daisy, spend several months caring for her indoors, and then released her into a local sanctuary.
Daisy, the Stone Ridge rabbit, with bandage, 2024
•
Our neighborhood herd of deer made few appearances this summer, and in smaller numbers than usual. We haven’t seen any of them for awhile — perhaps they moved elsewhere.
We’ve heard an owl nearby.
We spotted a lone raccoon on our property for the first time. Also a lone coyote. Plus some rattlesnakes and copperheads, as well as harmless garter snakes.
And we had a short surprise visit from two llamas, who wandered onto our private lane after escaping from the nearby orchard, where they live full-time. Probably the most exotic creatures to ever grace our little acre.
Llamas on Lamberti Lane, summer 2024
•
No News is Good News
All has been calm on the local front. Our often-misbehaving neighbor, Stone Ridge Orchard, held concerts over the summer and fall whose sound levels did not intrude obnoxiously on the neighborhood’s normal peace and quiet. Nor did they abuse our private lane, to which they have a home-made connection, by illegally routing their event traffic along it.
The now-approved methadone clinic next door has begun renovations on its interior, as evidenced by the presence of on-site work crews and dumpsters. This involves a certain amount of noise, but they restrict it to daylight hours on weekdays, a courtesy we appreciate.
They have installed floodlights that illuminate their parking lot and entrance. These go on at dusk and off at dawn, so what we once saw as dark woods after sunset just south of our house now shines brightly all night long. That reduces the sense of seclusion here, even though we know the building has no occupants during those hours.
They have also constructed the promised privacy fence between their property and ours. It doesn’t really mitigate the visibility of their building from our property, nor, presumably, significantly obstruct the view of our house from their grounds. And it’s open at both ends, so anyone who wants to can simply walk around it and come over to our lane. But it does at least provide a visible symbolic demarcation; let’s hope that suffices to deter trespassing.
And the new cannabis dispensary just a short stroll away has opened for business, uneventfully.
Back Home Cannabis Dispensary opens in Stone Ridge, Shawangunk Journal, October 3,
In short, no new complaints about doings in our sector.
•
Not Doomsday Prepping (Yet)
Barring some unforeseen intervention, the inauguration of Mango Mussolini will take place today. He and his minions have committed themselves to upsetting the system from top to bottom. And, since none of them have demonstrated any competence at governance, the law of unintended consequences will prevail for the next few years at least.
Precious little we can do about that, and not many options for self-protection. However, with tariffs and mass deportations looming considerable disruption of the food supply seems likely if not inevitable.
I’d estimate that we have sufficient food on hand to create at least a month’s worth of meals for the three of us. We routinely keep enough bottled water on hand for several weeks’ drinking and cooking. As this suggests, our house has extensive storage space for canned and otherwise packaged foods. We also have two good-sized refrigerators.
So it’s a sign of the times that, when Trump got elected this fall, we sat down and seriously considered investing in a freezer. That would enable us to stockpile food to an extent we hadn’t previously considered necessary or even prudent. Simply contemplating this purchase doesn’t put us on the slippery slope heading downhill toward doomsday prepping. Yet. But it’s a small step in that direction.
•
•
Special offer: If you want me to either continue pursuing a particular subject or give you a break and (for one post) write on a topic — my choice — other than the current main story, make a donation of $50 via the PayPal widget below, indicating your preference in a note accompanying your donation. I’ll credit you as that new post’s sponsor, and link to a website of your choosing.
And, as a bonus, I’ll send you a signed copy of my new book, poetic license / poetic justice — published under my full name, Allan Douglass Coleman, which I use for my creative writing.