Our Pond

The pond has never been this high in September.  It has been overflowing all summer long.

When I was a boy we used to catch painted turtles at a little pond we called Hokey's Dam.    It contained huge turtle called Tugboat that my friends claimed to have seen.  I never saw it myself but it was exciting to think that such a turtle existed.  It was our equivalent to the Loch Ness monster.

Having this pond dug is literally throwing money down a hole, but I have never regretted it.  We swim in in, fish in it and skate on it, and attracts all sort of birds - kingfishers, swallows, herons and eagles.

Silphium, a prairie plant that Aldo Leopold wrote of in his Sand County Almanac.  I planted some seeds some years ago and a few plants sprung up.  This year I enclosed this one with chicken wire so the sheep would not graze it.

I plan to harvest the seeds and plant more of these.  I'm not much for house plants, but wildflowers intrigue me.

The farmhouse looks happy wearing its new red coat.