Fun Things

The Stone People

Bottom of berry picker

 I found a set of strange tracks working near a camp in Cedar run. It seems some sort of stone family was out for a walk. Unfortunately, it appears that each stone person must hop on only one foot. I am imagining this is a difficult task since stone people are so heavy.
On another note, while at Sigman's Camp Cedar Pines they told me about their huckleberry picker and  let me borrow it. But alas all my huckleberries are gone, just blackberries to pick not sure if it will work on them, but I will give it a try. It is an interesting concept. The picker has a shelf on it a little way back to keep the berries in after you pick them. I am guessing you have to turn it over to get the berries out. They did say you had to sort some leaves and not so ripe ones out and it has a bit of a learning curve. But for the most part they said it works well.
The last item is not milk as you might think, but it is sugar. Lee went through 80lbs of sugar this last month and in order to save money we bought 20lb bags from Sam's Club. The 20lb bags are hard to work out of so Lee dried out some old gallon milk jugs and funneled the sugar into them. She said it pours out nicely and makes her job easier.
The hummingbirds are eating at a fast pace growing and getting ready to go South in the next month. The bears have been curbed by the electric

Top of Berry picker

 fence and I have had no more incidents since putting it up. Well, that is not quite true. Lee got shocked when she was unplugging it. That answered the question is it really on? The weather has cooled the last couple days and it has been nice to sleep and nicer to walk and work. I hope we are done with the horribly hot weather this year. We got rain with several storms, but it has had little affect on the level of the streams. The rain is keeping the forest and lawns green and that is about all. Mountain girl, Paula, logging out.

Is it Milk?

Wind damage

Spruce Snapped by storm

We've had several  storms during the last week. They are isolated and some  had some intense winds. I never want to be driving through the forest when one of these wind storms pop up. There is little place to run to when all around you are trees and debris is flying through the air.
I generally stay out of pine and poplar tree areas when the wind gets much above 25 mph. These trees seem to loose branches easily and they are so tall it can be hard to see a top breaking off and falling toward you until it is down. The last trees to break off are Oaks it takes a pretty bad wind to knock one of these guys down.

 So I started thinking what would I do if I got caught driving or walking in the woods and a windstorm hit? If I was in the car and it wasn't too bad I would probably continue down the road cautiously and try to reach the house. If it got real bad I would look for an area that had less trees to fall and stop or best yet  get under one of the little bridges for shelter.

Walking is another story. If I was able to find shelter that would be great. If I was in middle of pines I would try to move out of them or find the biggest tree to stand near. If the tree falls and you are close to the base of it you can rotate around it away from

View from top of our hill

 or use the tree as a shield against other falling trees. After hearing about a lady in Genesse area being killed by a falling tree it does make you think. If any of you have suggestions I would love to hear them.
On the less dramatic side the third picture I took from the top of our hill. It is partly cloudy today with a chance of storms. To the left of this picture is where that mother bear and her cubs were eating raspberries.
The raspberries and huckleberries are gone. The blackberries are still coming on and are very delicious when you pick a nice ripe one. If you have to pull to hard to get them off, chances are

Blackberries ripening

they are not ripe. They turn a dark black color when you should test them. My dogs seem to like them as much as I do and of course so do the bears. I noticed many bear trails made next to the bushes as they push their way close to them to eat.The rain we have gotten from the storms has done little to the creek levels and they are still quite low so tubing is a lost cause. The woods for the most part is staying green and safe from fires so far. Have a great Leetonia day and stay away from falling trees. Mountain girl, Paula, logging off.

Census for our township

2010 Census Interactive Population Search
The above link shows the breakdown of the population in Elk township for the 2010 census. There is only 49 of us.  The 2000 census showed a population of 51 so we are down 2. The area covered by the township is 72 sq miles, that is 1.46 sq miles per person. Leetonia is actually the only "town" within the borders of Elk township. As most of you know Leetonia is basically a ghost town; no food, unless you bring it, no gas, no bars, and no churches. Just a bunch of part-time camps lumped together. This map link shows you the outline of our county. Ninety percent of it is State-owned forest. Now I know why it can be so long to see someone in the middle of winter.

As isolated as it is up here there is something about living here that hooks you and makes it hard to even think of leaving. Maybe its the quiet walk through the forest listening to birds and seeing a deer, turkey or bear pop up. Maybe its the sound of the creek gurgling down towards the Atlantic Ocean or the tapping of the rain against the window after a long dry spell. Sometimes it is a blanket of white snow that silences everything and decorates the branches of the trees and bushes; so quiet you can hear each snowflake fall. This lack of sound scares some people and they rush back to their noisy cities and streets others feel like they are home and never want to leave. Which one are you?

Update on bear issue. Since electric fence no hummingbird feeders have been drank. We did see a bear coming down the road one night as we sat on the porch. Scooter ran it off. So if he had any thoughts of coming to check things out, he changed his mind.

Mountain girl, Paula, logging off.

Bear fun

My brother sent me this video. This is the reason no one around here leaves open dumpsters.This was posted on You Tube by Published on Jul 25, 2012 by AWESOMEOnaut
Three Baby bears got stuck in a dumpster over night. Mama bear sat by the dumpster all night listening to her cubs cry. Shirley and Tom Schenk, help three bear cubs escape from a dumpster in Ruidoso, N.M. Mountain girl, Paula, logging off.

Ravens of the woods

Double Ravens

Strange things happen when you least expect them in the woods of Tioga. I needed to go to town to pick up some lumber for a job I am working on. However, they have been hauling gravel in for some of Leetonia road and this involves heavy truck after truck coming down the road to dump gravel. It is difficult passing someone on these roads when I pull the trailer to pick up materials so   the thought of passing several dump trucks loaded with gravel did not appeal to me and I decided on an alternate route.
After I made it up to Wilson Point Road I turned right and headed to Ridge Road, which I would follow down to Schumaker and out to Elk Run therefore avoiding the trucks on the narrower part of Leetonia Road. This way is longer and the impatient part of me resisted, the cautious part of me won and I resigned myself to going slower way over the somewhat rougher and narrower road.
I decided rather than fighting this change I would look at it as an opportunity to see parts of the woods I don't usually travel on...sort of a mini-vacation.  The narrower road has its charm and as I passed the site of the old Lee Fire Tower, I remembered climbing up in it as a kid to see the Forest Ranger stationed there. It waved back and forth in the breeze as you got higher. My mother afraid of heights never climbed up the tower as she had a hard enough time just watching us go up.  I wished I had a picture of  the tower. I don't know why we never took any pictures. Now it is gone and so with it the chance for any pictures.
I now turned left on Ridge Road and noticed some black shapes on the road a head of me. Scooter noticed them too and watched closely as the shapes flapped their way into the air. Two beautiful Ravens now flew just above me down Ridge Road. They didn't seem in a hurry and flew almost in synchronicity. Down the narrow road they guided me not flying any faster than I was driving; not seeming at all worried about the noisy trailer I drug behind me that squeaked and popped over every pot-hole.
The longer they stayed in front of me the more I marveled at them. The Native American's view the Raven as  shapeshifter and magician of the woods. I wondered what kind of magic I would be seeing. They continued down the road so far I thought for sure they might take me all the way to town. But finally, one of them pulled up and sat on a limb watching me drive under then shortly after that the other followed suit.  Ravens and crows are some of the smartest birds on this planet able to use tools to get to food and figure out some pretty complex problems. Now I had been given a tour of Ridge Road through the eyes of the Raven all because of a detour that was the magic of the Ravens. Sometimes the best things in life come through its detours if you just look. Enjoy all your detours courtesy of the Ravens of the woods of Tioga Forest. Mountain girl, Paula,logging out.

Bear Problem continues

Front Electric Fence

 After being woke up night after night to dogs barking at one particular bear who has learned the art of draining hummingbird feeders, I put in an electric fence.

The fence runs far enough out the bear can't reach the feeders and goes on three sides of the house.  I decided this to be the safest alternative to retrain the bear. Shooting or spraying anything on the bear involves going outside as he is always next to house and I can't really get a good line on him from any windows. Of course the other solution of not having hummingbird feeders will be my last resort.

Side Electric Fence

The bear is getting braver and not listening to my yelling and the dogs barking inside their enclosed fence area. This concerns me as there is only one more step for him figuring out he is much stronger than any of us.

I am only charging the fence at night and I am placing a hot dog on it to entice him to grab it with him mouth. This will give him a better shock grabbing it with a wet mouth over hitting the line with lots of fur. One or two good shocks should keep him away and save me from the danger of a face to face confrontation. I used this fence to stop a bear from biting another cabin and it didn't take long for them to learn. I will update you as to the progress. He didn't show up the first night I had it up but maybe tonight I will get lucky. Mountain girl, logging out.

Another Surprise

The dogs were quiet yesterday until early evening as the temperature dropped and I opened the windows which made it easier for them to hear and smell all the wild things outside.  The hummers were busy getting their last feeding for the night and I was getting comfortable in my chair for a quiet evening of reading. 

All of a sudden the dogs went crazy barking and trying to see out the windows.  Well of course I had to look also.  I went to the kitchen window and looked up the hill but saw nothing.  The hummer feeders looked fine as I took inventory until I got to the living room.  The dogs were still barking and I looked out the little window above where I usually sit and there was a 300 pound bear standing while tipping the hummer feeder catching all the sugar water in his mouth.  He got almost every drop.

I ran out to the porch and yelled at the bear to go.  He looked at me and started running up the hill while still keeping his eye on me until he was out of site.  Upon further review he had drained a feeder on the side of the front porch also.  The one good part of this story is the bear found out how to drain the feeders without tearing them down and wrecking them.  I am thankful for that.  I still love watching the bears.  That was maybe a little too close for comfort.  I thought about grabbing my IPOD to take a picture but the sun was going down and I didn't have enough time.  If you have an IPOD you know they take forever to boot up unlike the bears who can move quickly.

Paula suggests we put an electric wire under the feeders to get the bears to leave them alone.  I would have to turn the electric off to fill the feeders.  Sounds like a lot of trouble.  Her other suggestion was to take the feeders inside for the night.  That's even more trouble since I have up to 16 feeders around the house.  Besides the bears have got into the feeders mostly during daylight hours.  I guess I will just have to keep a lookout for them.  With sugar prices so high we can't afford to feed the bears.  The hummers usually go through at least a gallon of sugar water a day as it is.  It will be even more once the babies start flying in.

Paula's twin nieces Abby and Hailey, in the picture above missed this adventure since they all went to NJ to see Paula's Great Aunt Pauline who is 97. They look scared like maybe they were chased by a big bear.  Paula and the gang will be back home tomorrow for more hummer and bear watching and driving me crazier.

Hope everyone is having a fun celebration today for July 4.
The other mountain girl (Lee Anne) logging off.