Laurel festival and flora

I am embarrassed to see that it has been twelve days since I posted anything to my blog. Things have been busy and hot. The mountain laurel festival was last weekend and I went into town for the first time to see it. It is pretty much a craft, carnival, parade thing and I didn't see any mountain laurel. So I went to the top of our mountain and took some pictures for you.

The mountain laurel took a big hit from a late cold frost in the 20's during May, so it is very sparse. But as you can see from the first two pictures the plants that made it through to bloom are beautiful.

The Mountain Laurel is a fairly ugly plant when it isn't blooming and you would never guess it could get dressed up so well. There is one disturbing note. The bush that is blooming the best now and is much more noticeable than the Mountain Laurel is in my last
picture and it is Multiflora Rose.

This plant was introduced to us courtesy of the State back in the 60's. My grandfather was told to plant it as great game cover. It is
wonderful game cover, but it is very aggressive and dominates the native plants. It is difficult to control and has climbed my apple trees and literally pulled them down. It seems the more you cut multiflora the faster it grows. Attacking it with a weed whacker is like flinging a wet noodle at a tiger. It claws back! It leaves nasty slashes in any flesh it manages to snag.

The first year we moved up here my dog, Jack chased rabbits right into the multiflora. He would come out bleeding and covered in thorns. He must be a slow learner because it took him two years to learn to stop at the edge of the multiflora. Well he figured out no amount of pain got him a rabbit. Now he hunts by hiding and trying the sneak fast attack. He has been much more successful with this approach and the rabbits that stray too far from the multiflora haven do not fair well. Leo the bigger of the two dogs never went into the multiflora. He is not as determined to catch a rabbit and only makes half-hearted attempts. I think he just likes to see them run.

Speaking of Jack and the things he attacks. No, not another porcupine. I had a Red Squirrel get into my storage van where I keep my sunflower seeds for the birds. It ate right through my plastic containers( I now have metal ones) in a night. I opened the van door and there the little devil was staring me in the face. Jack leaped in knocking over everything determined to catch the pest. The squirrel bounced from one side of the van to another then headed out toward me it jumped to the ground, Jack in close pursuit and then ran up my leg. I remember thinking, "don't let either one of these critters bite me." Jack circled my leg a couple times and fortunately before he took a bite at the squirrel it jumped off and ran. Nothing like a squirrel being chased up your leg by a Pit Bull to kick start your day. After all of that the squirrel got away to chew another day.

Post Script: The bear with the broken leg has managed to heal on its own without the aid of human intervention. It will probably always walk with a limp. Sort of like I would have if the squirrel had tarried on my leg too long. That is all for now. I promise not to be so delinquent with new stories. Mountain girl, Paula , Logging Out!