Monday, April 10, 2006

A walk around the yard

I took a walk around the yard this evening, to see what I could find.

A praying mantis egg sac! I'm so glad...we got to watch about 100 baby mantis's hatch last year. I have to say, baby mantis's are the cutest bugs ever.

I don't know what this is. Thistle, maybe? I remember dumping old seed out here.

The woods across Rt. 48 behind our house. I like to think that "our" owl, woodpeckers and mammal visitors live in these woods.

And the moon rises over Williams manor...

This deer skull has rested here for 2 years. The deer was hit by a car, died under one of our trees, and Nellie was good enough to alert us. Geoff went to look, then came in the house and said, "Honey, there's a dead deer over the fence. And there's a watermelon next to it. "

Well, I knew what he was seeing, and tried to break it gently to my city-slicker husband. The deer's stomach had swollen with gas and protruded through the abdominal wall and skin, and would for all the world, look just like a watermelon.
Well, Geoff turned as green as the "watermelon".
I predicted that the stomach would blow in a day or two, and it did...we left the carcass where it was and all that is left is the skull, a few leg bones and the vertebrae.
Ah, life in the country.

7 comments:

LauraHinNJ said...

Think it's ground ivy.

Yuck on the watermelon story.

Anonymous said...

I have no memory of this watermelon story... not that I find it hard to believe that I would have thought that. Anyway, I agree: yuck.

Susan Gets Native said...

You know, I thought it was ground ivy at first. But this is the first time I have seen it, and these are all seperate plants, all growing in a group. And there are tiny white flowers popping up on the stems.
I'm going to let it grow and see what happens.
Yeah, I have to say "YUCK" too.
But it makes for a funny story. You have to know Geoff to really get the hilarity, I think. He's kind of squeamish about this sort of thing. That's a very diplomatic way to say it, anyway.
:-) Love you, Geoff!

Anonymous said...

Reminds me of the classic movie: "Bambi meets the Watermelon."

Anonymous said...

Wow, I didn't know that. Yuck.

Endment said...

I started out to say great walk... Hope you get to see the preying mantis hatch - the moon shot is lovely...
... Then words left me ...

Susan Gets Native said...

It seems that "watermelon" humor is falling short with this crowd...