This Place

I went fishing yesterday at this place that I would like to tell you about. It was a great day to be in the mountains, and one of the too infrequent trips that I got to make with my Uncle Greg. I know that sometimes I'm a little scarce with the details of where I fish, but this time I wanted to make an exception. This place is just too wonderful not to share. Sit back and let me tell you all about this place.

This Place

This place is a wonderful place to get away from the heat of a July day. It's not that hard to get to. Just drive a little further up the road, gaining elevation as you wind your way up the mountain. Cross over the Eastern Continental Divide, and under the Blue Ridge Parkway. Once you turn off the highway, follow the Forest Service gravel road as it leads you deeper into the mountains and farther from the black top. At the end, park the truck and walk past the locked gate and up the road until you find a spot to enter the river. As you make your way up the road, take the time to enjoy the rhododendron, bee balm, Turk's cap lily, and other wildflowers blooming along the way. Watch out for the stinging nettle though! Stinging nettle are one of the reasons I started wearing long pants to wet wade many years ago.

Turk's Cap Lily

After a short walk up the road, I entered the river. Greg and I decided to split up and each fish a section of river, then meet up in a couple hours and compare notes and decide if we wanted to move upstream, downstream, or head somewhere else entirely. After plans were made and a rendezvous point picked, Greg walked up river and I found a path down from the road to the river.

Budding Rhododendron

Let me tell you about the river at this place. It is a nice sized trout stream, big enough to hold lots of possibilities, but small enough to be able to read the water and pick out the majority of the good spots to fish. This river has always seemed to be clearer, and a little colder than some of the places I frequent, even in the heat of summer. The air is cooler up here at this place, and I hardly broke a sweat hiking in or out. The stream itself is very rocky, even for a mountain stream. There are impressive boulders strewn along it's length, and the rocks in the stream bed all seem to be tilted at different angles from each other. It can make for some interesting wading at times, especially if you aren't paying close enough attention to where your feet are. 

Wild Rainbow

Now that you've been introduced to the river, allow me to tell you about the fishing at this place. This place is not somewhere I would go if I wanted to catch a trout on every cast or two. This isn't that kind of place. This is the kind of place that you go if you want a nice day in a beautiful spot, and a stream full of wild rainbows, browns, and brook trout if you get high enough into the headwaters. This is the kind of place that can be a challenge to fish, with crystal clear water and spooky trout. It's the kind of place that you can fish all day with a size 12 Adams dry fly (I did yesterday) and expect to have success. It's also the kind of place where the trout seem a little bigger, fight a little harder, and can at times be pickier than some of the other wild streams I fish. 

Fungi

The trout in this place can also be particular, both about presentation and fly selection. I tried one of my go-to summer patterns that I catch a lot of fish on in other places, but these trout were having none of it. That particular pattern has calf tail wings and is a bulkier dry fly. Once I switched to the Adams with it's smaller profile, the fish seemed to approve. This is the kind of place that has plenty of deep pools that would be ideal for a dry-dropper rig or nymph fishing, but I seldom go subsurface here. I know I'm missing opportunities by staying on the surface, especially in the deeper pools, but the surface strikes were frequent enough yesterday to keep me from reaching for the nymph box. I fish it slowly and don't rush, but before I know it the two hours are up and it's time to check back in with Greg and see how his morning has gone. We meet up and compare notes, and decide to walk upstream from where we had been fishing and give it a couple more hours. We've both caught fish and want to continue on upstream.

Swallowtail Butterflies

This time it was my turn to walk upstream, and I tried to make sure and give Greg plenty of room to fish. As I walked, I took the time to observe the environment around me, seeing plenty of bee balm (thank you Greg for identifying it for me), Turk's cap lily, and rhododendron blooming. One of the stranger things about this place is that it seems like I always find some type of funky fungi growing on the trees. This time I saw two different types, and both were on live trees. This place is full of surprises, and it seems like every trip up here reveals something new. As I made my way back down to the river, I came upon a large group of Eastern Black Swallowtail butterflies, with a few Eastern Tiger Swallowtails mixed in. They were beside the river drinking at a small pool of water. I saw both species of butterfly all up and down the river today, along with some smaller butterflies that I couldn't identify. I didn't see any insects hatching on the stream, but from the size of trout that this place produces I feel certain that they are finding something to eat. 

Wild Brown

Once I made it back down to the river, I continued on upstream through a stretch that seemed to be shallower than the previous stretch I'd fished. There were still plenty of small pockets that were deep enough to hold fish, and I did catch a couple as I made my way farther up stream. I had quite a few refusals and short strikes, and a few of the fish I hooked managed to throw the hook after a second or two. The trout in this place seem to be wizards when it comes to escaping, or at least they did yesterday. Once again time seemed to slip by just as quickly as the waters of this place, and before I knew it I was heading back down the road to meet up with Greg and head back home. I didn't catch any of the brook trout that this place sometimes gives up, but I did manage a couple brown trout and several pretty rainbows. Several Adams were donated to various rocks and rhododendron, and now I will be back at the tying desk replacing them, anticipating my next trip to this place.

Bee Balm

There, just as I promised, are all the details about where I fished yesterday. There are also a lot more pictures from yesterday's trip to this place on the NC Outdoor Ramblings Facebook page. As far as the name and location of this place? Sorry, my lips are sealed.

- Joseph

The Neighbors

We have some strange neighbors around our house. Some of them like to steal the pears and apples from our small backyard orchard. Others are pretty slow at getting around. There's one neighbor that we normally see only after dark. Some are noisy, and others hardly make a sound. Several of the neighbors like to fly, while some love climbing trees. Others are perfectly content to stay on the ground. Some of the neighbors ensure that our garden produces every year, while others help themselves to the harvest without being invited. Some can be a real pain, especially if you make them mad. Another one likes to hang out around our carport and enclosed porch. One of the neighbors even decided to move in and build a house in one of our ferns!

Now I'm sure you've all figured out by now that I didn't decide to write a blog post talking all about our human neighbors, all of whom are fine folks that we are fortunate to live near. No, this post is all about our neighbors from the animal kingdom. For some reason, the past several days have been great ones for wildlife watching around our house. Thanks to modern technology, and the ever-present iPhone, I now have a camera handy and accessible when the opportunity arises to take a picture of one of the neighbors. At the same time, I'll go ahead and apologize if some of the pictures in this post are not of the very best quality. Most of the pictures were taken while I was outside doing something else, and often they were situations where I had to snap a picture quickly or not at all. With that being said, allow me to introduce some of the neighbors.

The Pear Thieves

Doe Under the Pear Tree

 These neighbors are fond of pears, but also green beans, tomatoes, sweet potato vines, and almost anything else that I attempted to grow in the garden this year. The only things that they left me were my peppers, and they even nibbled on the tops of those! Ever since we moved in to our house, we have seen deer fairly frequently. Sometimes we will see them at night in the headlights as we're pulling into the driveway. This time of year however, the old pear and apple trees in the back yard tend to draw them out during daylight hours. They also conducted regular nocturnal raids on our garden this year. In years past we've had a little bit of damage from deer, but this year they wiped the garden out. If anyone has any effective methods for keeping deer out of a garden, I would love to hear them!

The Pollinators

Bumble Bee on Zinnia

This next neighbor is always a welcome sight in the garden. Bumble bees and honey bees are a fairly common sight around our house, and since the garden has past its prime now they have moved from the garden to my wife's flower beds. I'm always happy to see healthy populations of pollinators, even though I do have a healthy respect for their stings. Most of the time, however, we tend to get along pretty well. I try not to disturb them, and they stay busy moving from one bloom to another. 

The Slow Poke

Eastern Box Turtle

This neighbor tends to be fairly slow getting around. Even though he sometimes likes to sample the cantaloupe in the garden, he's a fairly easygoing neighbor. He's also the state reptile of North Carolina, and the only land turtle we have in our state. This eastern box turtle, (or one of his relatives) is a fairly infrequent visitor to our yard. Yesterday was the first time I've seen him this year, but chances are he could have been around when I wasn't there to see him. A quick bit of research showed me that box turtles are extremely long lived reptiles, and this makes me wonder if this is the same turtle I sometimes saw around our house (my grandparents' house then) when I was a young boy. Either way, I don't mind sacrificing the occasional bite from the garden if it'll help keep this slow moving neighbor around.

The Short-Lived Neighbor

Luna Moth

This next neighbor was photographed just by chance. As a young boy, I used to say that I wanted to be an entomologist when I grew up. I wound up an agriculture teacher instead, but somewhere deep down that fascination with bugs stayed with me. Maybe that's why I get such a thrill out of fly fishing for trout? All those stream insects to identify and match! Anyway, back to the subject at hand, I still enjoy seeing and identifying insects, even when they're not potential trout food. I can remember when I was young seeing a luna moth at my other grandparents' house one night, and being thrilled at seeing an insect that I had never seen before. I've only seen a few of these in the years since, possibly because the adults only live about a week and are mainly nocturnal. I was working in the yard yesterday when I just happened to spot this one on one of our pecan trees. They're big, impressive moths and I had to stop and take a picture. Somewhere inside, that little five year old entomologist was smiling from ear to ear!

The Nighttime Noisemakers

Katydid on Hosta

For some reason, I've been seeing a fair number of these nocturnal neighbors during the day. However, every night I go to bed hearing their serenades outside the window. This must be a good year for katydids, because they do seem to be everywhere. These are another insect that reminds me of childhood, spending the night at my grandparents' house and sleeping with the windows open. Without fail, the katydids always provided a concert after the sun went down.

The Home Builder

This next neighbor is a next door neighbor, in this case living right next to our door. I'm not 100% confident on my bird identification, but as near as I can tell this nest belongs to a house sparrow. She is camera shy and doesn't want to hang around long enough to get a picture, but I did very carefully take a picture of the nest and eggs today. She always flies off the nest but only to the nearest perch, a crepe myrtle just a few feet away from our carport. It will be fun watching her and seeing her raise her babies. 

The Short Tempered Neighbors

Wasps on the Nest

These neighbors are the kind of neighbor most people avoid. They tend to build along the underside of our front porch roof, in the carport, and on the window sills. Every summer there are several wasp nests around our house, and as much as I try to have a live and let live attitude when it comes to the neighbors, these usually wind up getting evicted when they get too close to home. The only problem is it seems like when I get rid of a nest, a new one takes its place rather quickly. Evidently our house must be prime real estate for wasps!

The Camera Shy Neighbors

There are several more neighbors that didn't want to have their picture made for this blog post. We have an American toad that hangs out around our driveway at night. There is a five-lined skink that sometimes sneaks into our screen porch, and tends to give my wife a surprise from time to time. The yard is home to several gray squirrels, who love our pecan trees, and the last few days it seems the back yard is where the local crows are holding their morning meeting. With the exception of the damaged garden, I enjoy having all these neighbors around. For the most part, we all get along fairly well. 

- Joseph

Looking For Brookies

A few days ago, I decided to go fish a stream that I hadn't been to in a couple of years. This particular stream is managed under the NC Wildlife Resources Commission's Catch and Release Artificial Lures Only regulations, and as of the last time I fished it contained almost exclusively wild brook trout. Although it had been a while since I had fished this creek, I had fished the stream that this creek is a tributary of several times since I was last here. The main stream is mainly a wild rainbow trout fishery, with an occasional wild brown trout. This tributary had always been a brook trout stream, and I was in the mood to go try to find some of North Carolina's only native trout species.

NCWRC Regulations Sign

Brook Trout From the Last Trip Here

The last time I fished this stream, I didn't catch very many trout, but I did manage to catch my largest (and most colorful) wild brook trout to date. I had high hopes of trying to repeat that performance, but to be honest my biggest reason for fishing for brook trout is the sheer beauty of these fish and the places they live. I knew that this particular stream wouldn't disappoint in that regard, and fish or no fish, I was looking forward to exploring some pretty country.

The Start of the Journey

The journey began where the Forest Service road ended, and it was a short hike up the old roadbed to a little one lane bridge where I knew there was access down to the stream. The road up the mountain parallels the creek, although at times it is fairly high on the ridge above it. This road has been closed off for as long as I have been coming up here to fish, but the old roadbed serves as a handy trail to hike back to the truck after a day's fishing. I appreciated this open road hiking even more after a day spend climbing boulders and bushwhacking through rhododendron thickets in search of trout. I don't know if Forest Service personnel use the road, but it does seem fairly well maintained. I've never been all the way to the end or fished this stream up into the headwaters, but I would like to hike and fish my way further up the mountain one day just to see what's there.

First Trout of the Day

Once I reached the old bridge and entered the stream, it was like I was in an entirely different world. There was no cell phone signal, no noise from the highway, no TVs or radios. All I could hear was the sound of the stream and the noises of the mountains. I worked upstream, fishing a Thunderhead dry fly, and missed a few trout before I hooked up with the first one of the day. Imagine my surprise when a wild rainbow trout came to hand, instead of the brook trout I was expecting. This was a little bit of a shock, because there is a fish barrier well downstream from where I was fishing that was put in place to help preserve the brook trout population in this stream. I don't know if the rain and high water we have had this past winter and spring allowed the rainbows to migrate upstream, or if someone thought it would be a good idea to do some stocking of their own. This had me a little concerned, because I began to wonder if the rainbows had replaced the brook trout in the years since I had last visited this stream.

One of the many plunge pools on this creek

After catching that first rainbow, I decided to continue on upstream to see what other surprises this little creek might hold. It has some excellent looking trout habitat, with plunge pools that were surprising in their depth on a creek this size. It took some careful wading, and many times climbing out on the bank, to navigate my way upstream without getting in too deep. It was a little disappointing to fish so many good looking pools without seeing a fish, but I was fishing a dry fly the majority of the time. I wondered briefly if a dry and dropper or nymph pattern would have served me better in these deeper holes, but I decided to stick with the dry fly.

Wild Rainbow

After fishing several pools without a strike, and spooking one or two trout along the way, I hooked up with another wild rainbow trout in a large pool. This trout ate a Rio Grande Trude, another one of my favorite summer dry fly patterns for these small creeks. I had made the switch to this fly after donating the Thunderhead to the rhododendron. At this point, I was starting to wonder if my search for brook trout was becoming like looking for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. I was having a great time, and enjoying the challenge of fishing this small stream, but in the back of my mind I kept wondering what had happened to the brook trout that I remembered catching here. Had the rainbows displaced or out competed them? Were there any left in the creek at all? I knew the only way to answer these questions was to keep fishing.

Wild Brook Trout

Finally, after donating the Rio Grande to the rhododendron and switching back to another Thunderhead, I hooked what I had been searching for in the last pool of the day. It was a young brook trout, but I took it as a good sign for the future of these fish in this particular stream. I figured that where there are small trout, there must be bigger ones somewhere. I do think that at least a couple of the trout I missed were brook trout, because I thought I caught a flash of orange belly when the trout took a swipe at my fly. I can't say for certain that's what they were, but I'd like to think that there is still a thriving population in this creek.

One of the many millipedes

The hike back out was a lot easier than the trip upstream had been, once I found a place to climb back up onto the old road. I did see signs of some insect life along the creek, with a few Yellow Sallies and small mayflies flying around. I didn't see any rising fish, so I'm thinking that these must have been the remnants of an earlier hatch or the hatch was very sparse. Another thing that surprised me was the number of millipedes that I saw hiking into and out of the creek. There seemed to be a thriving population of them in the area along the creek.

I do know that this little creek holds some bigger secrets than the ones I was lucky enough to discover on this trip, due to some hints that the creek gave up from missed strikes. Now whether these secrets are brooks, browns, or rainbows, I'm not going to try to guess. I do know that I will be back to do some more exploring on this creek, and to enjoy the solitude that comes with small streams and wild fish. This little creek is a challenge, but one that is a lot of fun to try to figure out.

Thanks for stopping by!

- Joseph

The Spring in Pictures

Once again, my good intentions have run afoul of reality. Last time I posted, I mentioned that I intended to pick up the pace a little bit on this blog and try to do better than one post a month. Unfortunately, it hasn't exactly worked out that way. This spring has been a very busy time, and there are a bunch of blog posts that I meant to write, but somehow they never got done. Rather than write up a bunch of separate blog posts about things that have already happened, I figured that since a picture is worth a thousand words, I'd let the pictures from this spring do most of the talking for me. School is out for students on Monday, and for us teachers on Wednesday this coming week, so hopefully the fishing and blogging will both increase, but this time I've learned my lesson. I'm not making any promises. 

Anyway, on to the pictures! I've tried to put these in chronological order, more or less.

Rainbow Trout Triple Threat

I've done a little bit of fly tying off and on, but it seems to really have slacked off with the start of warm weather. I'm a little afraid that I'm going to be tying a half dozen here and a half dozen there before fishing trips this summer just to keep up with what I need.

The Front Yard Oak Tree

Early this spring, we had to have the big water oak in our front yard cut down. It had been lightning struck not long after we moved in to the house, and it made it another year or two but was starting to die and large limbs were falling out. I hated to cut this big tree, because my grandparents planted it around sixty years ago when they built our house. I hated to see it go, but at least the wood will help warm the house this coming winter.

Opening Day Tom

One of the blog posts that I fully intended to write that never got completed was about opening day of turkey season. I was lucky enough to harvest a nice tom around 2:00pm on opening day, and it was one of the more exciting hunts I've ever had for turkeys. 

Trent's Turkey

My hunting partner (and brother-in-law) Trent also had success on opening day, harvesting a nice tom late that afternoon.

The garden not long after planting

In between the craziness that is turkey season around our house, we managed to get our garden planted. This year we're trying potatoes for the first time, and it shouldn't be long before its time to dig them and see how we did. We also planted corn, squash, zucchini, sweet onions, cabbage, jalapenos, cayenne pepper, bell pepper, banana pepper, cauliflower, cantaloupe, tomatoes, cucumber, watermelon, and the sweet potatoes will be planted as soon as the ground dries out enough to plow one more time.

Trina with a bream

My wife Trina has gone fishing with me a few times so far this spring, and I'm ashamed to say tends to out fish me most of the time.

Monster Bream

Lots of rain and lack of time have conspired to keep me off of the trout and smallmouth streams these last few months, and what fishing I've done has mainly been at a small pond that is tough to fly fish because of it's size and location in the middle of the woods. I'm not going to complain about the rain, but it does seem like the rivers have been blown out any time I get a chance to go here lately. I'm itching to break out the long rod and chase some trout, and I'm hoping to make that happen one day soon. In the meantime, I'll take my fishing wherever and however I can.

Backyard Visitor

This deer has been an infrequent visitor to our backyard for the last three years. It's always amazing to see her, and it never ceases to amaze me what can be seen just outside our windows.

Dragonfly

This dragonfly thought my wife's fishing rod would make a good spot to rest on a warm afternoon at the pond.

The Garden

This is a more recent picture of the garden, and hopefully shows some progress. I can almost taste those fresh tomato sandwiches and fried squash! It won't be too much longer now!

Blueberries

And one last picture from our little backyard orchard. I would've liked to post a picture of our cherry tree hanging full of ripe cherries, but unfortunately the birds beat me to them this year. The apples, pears, and peaches are all coming along, and the new blueberry bushes I set out earlier this spring are putting on some new growth.

All things considered, its been a busy but rewarding spring around here so far. I've missed writing on the blog, and hopefully there will be some interesting things to blog about in the near future. I feel fortunate to be able to do all of these things, and I still find it amazing that other people occasionally stop by here to read my ramblings. If I can stay off the river and out of the garden long enough to sit in front of the computer, there should be some new blog posts up soon.

Thanks for stopping by!

- Joseph

Rambling Toward 2013

I figured that I would jump on the year-end post bandwagon and reflect back on my first six months as a blogger. I started this blog on June 28 with a post titled Here Goes Nothing!, and in that post I outlined my reasons for starting NC Outdoor Ramblings. Six months and 32 posts later, I'm still here rambling about my outdoor adventures. As I sit here on the last day of 2012, I'm humbled that people actually take the time to read my Internet ramblings. According to Google Analytics, this blog has had 452 unique visitors since I started it six months ago. I feel like I've made some connections in the outdoor blogging community, and have found some wonderful blogs that I enjoy reading by writers who are much more talented than I am, both through comments left on this blog and through the Outdoor Blogger Network.

For my year-end post, I thought I would write up a year-in-review of some of my favorite posts from this past year, starting with this past summer when I started the blog.

Broad River Bream

My first post of any substance when I began the blog was Warm Water Fly Fishing, a post about my new found love of warm water fly fishing, and why I enjoyed it.

Davidson River Brown

There were lots of posts about fly fishing for trout, including Summer's Last Cast.

From the garden

There were also a few about our vegetable garden and orchard, such as A Tasty Legacy.

Blue/Purple/White Triple Threat Streamer

There was a post or two on fly tying, including one about my favorite smallmouth fly the Triple Threat.

Bumblebee

Some of my writings weren't about hunting, fishing, or gardening, but nature in general, including my Backyard Ramblings.

2012 8pt Buck

Then as hunting season went into full swing, I found out that Patience Pays Off.

NW PA Snow

Last week, my wife and I were in Pennsylvania to visit her family and celebrate Christmas. Mother Nature helped out with a white Christmas and about 12" of snow! I had thought about trying to do a little trout fishing while we were there, as Oil Creek is close by and quickly becoming one of my favorite places to fish outside of NC. However, the below freezing temperatures changed my mind. As I move into 2013 as a blogger, I plan to continue to write about my outdoor experiences. I already have some posts written, and some of those will see the light next year. Deer season is over, and fishing will probably be slow for a few more months, but there are flies to tie, and small game seasons are still open through the end of February. Hopefully there will be some squirrel and rabbit hunting in the near future for me.

As we end this year and begin a new one, I hope that everyone has a safe, happy, and prosperous New Year!

Thanks for stopping by and reading my ramblings this past year!

-Joseph

Backyard Ramblings

As fall is getting into full swing here in North Carolina, I thought it would be a good time to reflect on the summer and share a few photos that I've been meaning to put up here on the blog for a while. I apologize for the lack of posts on here lately, a good bit of my time has been tied up working with the FFA chapter at school. I've really enjoyed it, but most of the activities don't really fit into the "outdoor" theme of this blog so I haven't done much writing. I have done a little deer hunting, but other than a debacle that occurred the last evening of muzzeloader season, there hasn't been much to write about. That particular day deserves its own post, if I can stand to write about it. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this last look at summer.

I may have mentioned this in an earlier post, but my wife and I purchased my grandparents' house after we were married. When I was young, our yard was one of my favorite places. It always seemed to have more lightning bugs (or fireflies) than almost anywhere else. In the summer there were also June bugs, and I used to love looking for the nymph shucks of cicadas on the old oak trees. I remember calling them cicada skins as a child, and I used to have a fair sized collection by the end of summer most years.

This is a collection of pictures that my wife and I made in our yard this summer, and I think it helps remind me why as a child I didn't need 1000 acres of woods to entertain myself. I loved the woods, and still do, but I always seemed to find adventure just out the back door. Nature has always been fascinating to me. I hope you enjoy these pictures as much as I do. 

Cicada nymph shuck

Black snake in the garden

It seems like I spend a good bit of time in the woods or on the water, sometimes within a five minute drive from home, and sometimes several hours away. However, it always amazes me to see what I can find in my own yard. I wish I knew more about mushroom identification, if anybody recognizes any of these I would love to know what they are.

Thanks for stopping by!

- Joseph

Summer Can Be A Pain

Let me start off by saying I love summer time. I enjoy getting outdoors, and all the fishing opportunities that come along with warm weather. Being a school teacher, I love summer because I'm fortunate enough to have summers off. Lately though, I've been reminded that summer brings along some added hazards that I don't have to worry about in cold weather.

It seems like everywhere I go in the woods, whether it's walking a trail down by the river or going to check a trail camera, I run into spider webs. Luckily, I'm not scared of spiders at all, but there's nothing quite like getting a face full of web on the way to the fishing hole. On the other hand, spiders and almost all insects have always fascinated me, even when I was little. My family loves to talk about how I would tell everyone that I was going to be an entomologist when I grew up. I used to collect bugs and tried to learn how to identify the insects that lived in our backyard. I still have that interest, although as I got older my focus tended more towards mayflies, caddis flies, stoneflies, and other trout food. With all that being said, I would rather observe spiders at arms length instead of face-to-face.

Nature's Booby Traps

Another summertime hazard involves all the various stinging insects. As a gardener, I love bees because without them, fruits and vegetables wouldn't get pollinated. Our garden is full of bumblebees in the summertime, busily going from one flower to another and spreading pollen along the way. Normally, they won't bother a thing. However, the other week as I was practicing with my bow a bumblebee decided my hat bill would make a good spot to rest. I didn't realize this, and when I grabbed my hat to wipe some sweat off my forehead, I accidentally grabbed the bee along with it. I'm sure you can guess what happened next. After my initial shock, I picked my hat up and decided to call it a day.

Bumblebee on Monkeygrass

That was the first time in a couple of years that I had been stung, because I'm usually careful to give bees plenty of room. It becomes a problem when I don't know they are there. This is what happened to me yesterday, and what prompted me to write this post. I was mowing grass down near the garden, and without realizing it I ran over a yellow jacket nest with the lawnmower. The yellow jackets didn't appreciate this one bit, and before I got 50 feet from the nest they had swarmed me and the lawnmower. I'm sure the neighbors must have thought I had lost my mind if they saw me jump off the mower, sling my hat, and run for the house swatting and dodging the whole way. I will have to say this about yellow jackets, they are persistent! I had one that followed me all the way into the screen porch of our house, where I finally lost him and ran inside.

The "House of Pain" - aka the nest

Seven or eight stings and several minutes later, I went back to get my hat and cell phone, which I had left on the mower. Luckily, I was far enough away from the nest that I was able to get the mower put away without stirring them up again. As I write this, there is still a patch of grass that needs to be cut down near the garden. I'm going to get it mowed, but not until I can get rid of that nest. All things considered, I wouldn't want a world without bees and spiders, no matter how much aggravation they can cause. However, if the yellow jackets wanted to find a new place to live other than my yard that would be fine with me!

Thanks for stopping by!

- Joseph