Nice crop of algae growing in the fields

The canoe that washed down the creek and ended up in our pasture is back home to its owner, but not without a little bit of drama.  I figured that I would head down to the neighbor's house this past weekend to let them know where their canoe ended up.  Then last Wednesday in the middle of the night it stormed and rained to the tuned of 1.25 inches.  When I got up Thursday morning, the creek was full and the canoe was gone.  So I started having pangs of guilt about not going down the neighbors sooner.  Canoes are not cheap after all.  All I could picture was the canoe traveling down little Peters Creek and into much larger Mill Creek and then to the Grand River and into Lake Erie.  It took until Friday for the water in the creek to go down enough, but then I took the dogs for a walk and went looking.  I found it hung up on a log sideways in the creek about 30 yards from our property line.  Whew!  I went straight down and told the neighbors who did not even realize it was missing because it has been raining so much that they had not been outside in their backyard.  The boys drove the truck over and went and rescued the canoe from the creek.  End of the canoe saga.

We have had almost 2 inches of rain this past week.  Just unbelievable.  As Mike said, the delay in planting crops is transitioning over from annoying to a little scary.  Hopefully we won't find out what a lot scary is like.  Again the USDA crop report that came out today shows just how bad things are in the entire state of Ohio.  Last week 11 % of the corn crop had been planted and this week it jumped to a whopping 19%.  Average is 93% planted.  See, it is getting scary.

So instead of working to make money, we spent the last week spending money.  It was determined that the tiller that broke was terminal.  Mike took a trip over to Pennsylvania and bought a brand new one.  Here it is all shiny and pretty.

Then on Sunday we went and picked up our tractor that just had the new front end loader installed on it.  Mike has been having a tremendous amount of fun driving it around and using it to lift heavy stuff (like the new tiller off the trailer).  I think he is in love with his new loader.  Here is the tractor with the loader and the new tiller on the back.  Ready to rock and roll as the saying goes.  As soon as the rain quits.

I finally got around to taking a garden progress report photograph.  The idea is to stand in the same location on the edge of the field and take a picture to show how the field changes over the course of the growing season.  Just to refresh memories, here is the photo I took on May 11th.

And the picture I took on May 30th

Pretty much the only difference is the trees in the background have more leaves on them and the standing water in the foreground has been there so long that there is quite the proliferation of algae.  I'm thinking though that algae is green and organic and it should add some nutrients to the soil right? 

On a much more happy note, the resident birds seem to be having a good nesting season.  I enjoy watching the wildlife on the farm so very very much. There is a hen turkey that has been hanging out in the front garden area almost every morning this week.  I see her when I go out to feed chickens every morning.  She must have a nest nearby.  And then here is a picture of one of our resident tree swallows that is using one of the nest boxes I put up.  Such beautiful and graceful little birds.