Beware of Lee freezer: You never know what you’ll find

Well, if we wasn’t wet enough before, it sure is now. I measured over four inches of rain in my rain guage as of noon Sunday, August 28.

We traveled to Rochester for grandson Nathan’s eighth birthday party yesterday (8/27). If it had been today he would have had his entire NASCAR cake to himself.

Nathan is a big NASCAR fan and he watches the roundie-rounders (NASCAR races) every weekend. He’s a man after my brother’s heart. He got a couple of race cars, a race T-shirt, baseballs, ball glove, some books and a rollercoaster track with over 600 pieces as gifts. His dad was putting it together when we left on Saturday. He’s probably still at it.

But his best present was a new lawn sprinkler. It’s the second one he’s received, but this one is much improved over the first. That boy is going to be in the lawn care business for sure.

Nevermind the toys, he had that sprinkler out of the box and hooked up to the hose in a couple of minutes. When he came back in he and I put together the rollercoaster track. We had the car running back and forth across the living room while his dad worked on a super structure that was going to hold the track up.

Granddaughter Rachel came from her new job at JC Penny to catch the end of the party. We hadn’t seen her since Christmas so it was nice to see her. We didn’t make her college graduation from Philadelphia University. She’s growing up very fast in the real world.

This week I went looking for fresh Moose poop for Heidi Kretser of Wildlife Conservation Society who needed some. I thought for sure I would find some around Helldiver Pond where the Moose had been seen for five weeks.

I searched for five hours and all I found was about fifty piles of Bear poop. I believe I spooked the Bear as I heard him crashing around in the brush. The Bear had been eating blueberries, blackberries and lots of greenery.

There was evidence that a Moose had been eating from patch to patch, but no poop. I followed every Moose path around the pond but still came up empty-handed. When I came out to the campsite at the trailhead I ran into a fella who told me he had photographed some the day before.

The next day he collected what he had found and brought it to the Inlet Town Hall, as he didn’t know where I lived. He got directions to my house and when I came home that evening there was a bag of fresh Moose poop on my doorstep. Karen didn’t open the bag as she never knows what might show up on our porch.

Thanks Jerry. It’s safe in the freezer as I await further instructions. (Note: Karen doesn’t go into my freezer for the same reason she doesn’t peek into the bags!)

The pink pond lilies in my pond have been putting out flowers all summer. This week there were three in a cluster not more than a foot apart. They close up at night and come out the next day when the sun hits them.

This wet weather will cause a setback for the Monarch caterpillars that were chomping on the milkweeds. They have gone through periods like this before so I’m sure they will make it through. They just hang on the underside of a milkweed leaf until it’s over, then they come out and start chomping again.

The caterpillars, which have gone into chrysalis, should also be okay as they just wait for some more sunshine before emerging as beautiful butterflies. I haven’t seen as many caterpillars in the area as I have in past summers. However, in other areas I’ve seen several munching on the milkweed leaves.

Many times a female will lay several eggs on a single plant. If I find one of these plants I move some of these caterpillars to other plants to give them a chance. If they run out of leaves to eat they will munch on the pods, if there are any.

Many of the flowers didn’t get pollinated as I haven’t seen many pods on the plants. If the caterpillars run out of food they will climb down and search for some at a nearby plant.

Birds are migrating south, but that’s another story. See ya.