you saw a snake suspended in a spider web?

Pulled into the garage and saw this tiny perfectly beautiful snake, no more than three and a half inches long, suspended in a spider web at the base of a stool. The web’s owner is just barely visible on the left side of the stool leg.

I was afraid the snake, a southern ringneck, would be already dead. But it wasn’t. I carefully pulled it out of the web and spent ten minutes trying to get the very sticky web unstuck from the miniature snake’s face. Now that’s a first for me. Have you ever had to despiderweb a snake?

P.S. The black salve worked brilliantly on my thorny finger. I kept it on, and covered, overnight. When I woke up and took off the covering, there were three minuscule open flaps in my finger skin where the thorns had been painlessly drawn out in the night. Amazing—two (thorn-free) thumbs up!

in my bathroom. Either it’s the amplified ghost of last night’s dead mouse, or a rat or a squirrel or a giant anaconda, but it’s huge. Two nights of fifty degree temperatures and suddenly my house has turned in to the last outpost in the Arctic.

I was sitting at my desk tonight and kept hearing scrobbling noises above my head in the master bathroom. I thought it was Grita, my cat, after a bug or maybe another mouse, but it just kept going. So I went upstairs and the bathroom door was shut, as it usually is, and Grita ran up the stairs from where she had been all this time in the living room. Knowing that whatever was making those noises wasn’t my cat, my heart sunk and I opened the bathroom door. SOMETHING was behind the curtains that cover the unfinished cubbies under the eaves, which are awaiting some custom-built doors. So “Psycho,” I know!

I steeled myself and removed the curtains. SOMETHING ran from one cubby to the next, through the wall, flopping around on top of the plastic that lines the cubbies. It sounded almost like a bird, flappy and panicked. I was waiting for it to burst out and claw off my face, but it got quiet, and then nothing.

So just what I need. Another, even bigger, unidentified creature in the only space that directly connects to the area of the house in which I am most likely to pad, barefoot and sightless in the night, to drop trou.

I am so over the creatures in the cubby holes.

I set two mouse traps, discovering that either last night’s mouse or this unidentified monster had eaten most of the vinyl off a bath pillow I had stashed in the cubbies. Vinyl for dinner? I mean, really? I am not sure mouse traps are heavy enough artillery for whatever’s in there now, and I totally expect to wake up to a furious raccoon, a snapped mousetrap dangling from its toe, flying at my face when I open the bathroom door. Of course, the racoon will have rabies and will maul me to death in my own home. If I don’t post in the next few days, call an ambulance, no need for the siren.

Nature always wins.

Until I figure this out, I am avoiding the upstairs bathroom during the night. Which probably means I will break my neck navigating the stairs in the dark, but at least I won’t die of rabies.

So at midnight tonight I lay down my magazine and got up to go to the bathroom. I was sitting on the toilet when I saw a mouse poke its head out from behind a basket in the corner of the room. You longtime readers know what that means: mouse rodeo!

Because I am a remarkably more ruthless rodent killer when I haven’t been just awoken from a dead sleep, I quickly scooped up my cat from where she was reclining, pasha-like, on the bed, and bounced her into the bathroom with a command to get to work, while I shut us both inside and stuffed a towel under the door. And then I picked up a foam flip-flop from A.T., a “career” clothing store much beloved by D.C.-area wonkettes.

My dog gets a lot of props on this blog, but tonight the cat got to shine. It took about two seconds for her to hone in on the mouse, and she drove it right into my path. One whack stunned it, but it jumped up and made for the back of the toilet. I changed weapons to a Brazilian beach-ready, much sturdier rubber flip-flop and struck again. The poor mouse quivered a bit and bled out on my floor, but died right next to the disinfecting wipes.

When I picked it up for disposal, I saw that a piece of the netting I use to keep the chickens out of the garden was stuck around its middle, grown into the flesh like a porpoise stuck in a plastic six-pack holder. For some reason that made me sad, and I can not tell you why.

Are gross.

On Saturday I was doing some cleanup in the garden and went to clip this dead branch out of the giant rosemary in the front garden.

As I was reaching toward the bush my spidey sense twinged, and in that instant I caught sight of a quarter inch of shiny black skin wound up around the plant.

And this guy came out to say hi. He (or she) is just a little black snake, probably one of the 16  born under the front sidewalk, yech. I know they’re good to have around, but I don’t want to reach into a plant and grab a snake instead of a stem. Needless to say I gave the rosemary a wide berth as I finished cleaning up the garden.

Then later that night I called Tuck in from his before-bed rounds. I had his topical tick medication all lined up to apply, and as I squirted it on the back of his neck I noticed he had what looked like cinnamon powder all over his head around his eyes. I brushed at it and instantly dozens of teeny tiny ticks started marching up my arm. Oh, the irony! There are few things I find grosser than seed ticks, so I ran for the office to grab my packing tape.

I deticked myself with the sticky side of the tape, and then set about pressing strips of tape to my poor dog’s eyeballs, trying to get the ticks out of his fur. He was a patient champ, but it was not a brilliant way to wind down before bed as I found my skin crawling all night with (hopefully) psychosomatic bloodsuckers.

It was one of those nights (which happen pretty often here, actually) when I felt like I’d had quite enough of country living, thank you very much.

The July full moon, shown below last night, is sometimes called the Buck Moon because it appears at the time that velvety new antlers grow on young bucks’ heads.

This young buck has been hanging around the farm lately, and he made an appearance at the wood’s edge right on schedule for his full moon, which rose last night over Buck Mountain and was so bright it kept me awake until 2:00 a.m.

I’m getting tired of writing about chicks, and you’re probably tired of reading about them. So let’s investigate this totally uninteresting gas tank, which sits by my chimney and powers my stove.

Hark, what’s this?

Let’s lift the lid and see.

Gah! More chicks! They’re everywhere!

These are little wren babies. The gig was up today when I saw their parent fly out of the tank. So many chicks, all over the place. I’m going crazy, hearing peeping noises inside my head. Yesterday the most recently fledged bluebirds were all in the birdbath with their dad, and I saw him up in the oak tree feeding one a worm. Another male bluebird keeps investigating the wellhouse eaves, which were only recently vacated by this spring’s starling fledglings, looking for a place to nest. And you thought we could take a break from chicks! It’s high summer in Virginia, and new life is inescapable.

I was walking with Tuck near here the other night and came across the most beautiful butterfly in the middle of a gravel road. It was one I didn’t recognize, which is always exciting.

It was dark in the woods so this butterfly’s colors are hard to see, but it was the most amazing shade of navy blue fading into bright, iridescent turquoise. I’d never seen a live butterfly in this particular color. True blue (not purple-blue) is such a rare color in the natural world that it doesn’t seem real when one sees it.

I very gently coaxed it on my hand so I could move it off the road, and saw its underside was equally beautiful. Sorry for the unintentional flip off—that was the finger it chose!

After taking these shots so I could ID the butterfly later, I put it on the bank and went on my way, very, very happy to have seen for just a few minutes something of such incredible beauty on my evening walk.

The trip was made even more joyful when I flushed a few quail out of a hedgerow beside the road. This was wonderful to see as quail are really in trouble in Virginia. The Department of Inland Game and Fisheries reports, in their Northern Bobwhite Quail Action Plan for Virginia:

Populations of northern bobwhite quail and other bird species with related habitat requirements have experienced severe long-term declines in Virginia over the past 50 years. In colonial times, farming created habitats that began to favor quail. As land was cleared and farmed, quail populations flourished. For perhaps 200 years or more, quail were one of the most common birds of the rural Virginia landscape. During the first half of the 20th century, as a shift from a rural-farm to urban-industrial economy began, idled and abandoned farms continued to support quail populations. However, since then major land use changes have taken place. Virginia’s agricultural landscape became dominated by large, intensively managed crop fields, fescue pastures, and hayfields.

Total farmland acres declined. In 1900, approximately 80% of Virginia’s landscape was in open agricultural land. Today agricultural lands make up only 34% of our landscape. Many of the formerly open farm fields are now dominated by intensively managed pine forests. While cut-over timber lands still provide some early-succession cover, plant diversity is low and productivity for quail is poor. The loss of early succession habitat, particularly nesting cover and brood range, has been identified as the most significant factor limiting quail populations. The bobwhite is a legacy species in Virginia and their decline has led to concerns about ecological, economic, and recreational impacts throughout rural Virginia.

Anytime you can spot a threatened species in the wild is encouraging. It makes me glad to live in an area that’s still suitable to sustaining important wildlife biodiversity.

But back to butterflies…at home I got out my field guide and opened right to the page with this butterfly on it. Weird. Anyway, it is a red-spotted purple, which is supposedly common in this area though I have never come across one until now. Strange name, too, for a blue butterfly with orange spots!

And then yesterday I was walking in the house and saw a red-spotted purple flying in my flower garden. Now that I know what it is, it’s easy to identify by its more rounded lower wings that lack the extended hind wings that identify swallowtails, below:

(Image source: http://www.edupic.net/lifecycle.htm)

And that’s your daily lepidoptery lesson, with a little quail digression!

I was vacuming near the laundry room today when I noticed a musty damp smell that I traced to the pocket door opening. I couldn’t figure out what it was until it suddenly hit me. I was smelling…summer crawlspace.

Which made me realize that it is that wonderful time of year when I get to enter the crawlspace and jiggle/threaten the dehumidifier into voiding into the sump pump tank instead of just filling up and turning off until I empty it of collected water. For three summers this dehumidifier has had a checkered past of sometimes behaving properly and draining on its own, and other times it just shuts off when filled with water, its red alert eye blinking in the dark. Meaning it’s not working as it should to help keep the crawlspace dry.

My crawlspace is supposedly conditioned space, which means that its air is maintained by my HVAC system just as the air is in my house. That, and a sump pump, work pretty well to keep things fresh and dry until summer sets in and the rain, heat and humidity gain the upper hand. Thus the supplemental dehumidifier.

I suited up in my usual home maintenance outfit of tall boots, work gloves, and a skirt, and opened the crawlspace door, flashlight in hand. Thanks to some hard labor with my dad, I have a really nice crawlspace entry. Every time I go in there I think of mixing and shoveling 1,000 pounds of concrete in a heat wave. Good times. At least this time I wasn’t chasing an angry black snake!

With my flashlight held out front like a sword, I took a deep breath and plunged across the threshold, wiping spider webs from my face. The crawlspace is deep enough that I don’t have to actually crawl—I can penguin walk most everywhere, ducking under ducts, trying not to touch anything. I made it to the dehumidifier, which as expected was sassing me with its “tank full” light.

I took out its tank and dumped the collected water in the sump pump tank close by. Then I replaced the tank and the dehumidifier started right up. All good. Then I had a flash of insight whilst feeding the drain hose from the dehumidifier into the sump pump tank. I think the reason why it occasionally wasn’t working had to do with the the lower end of the hose not being low enough to create enough drop to drain. It’s a close call, I could tell that much. So I did my best to create the greatest possible distance between the dehumidifier outlet and the end of the drain hose, and sat back to sweep the crawlspace with my flashlight, checking to see that the mouse poison trays were still filled and whatnot.

As the flashlight beam hit the bottom edge of one of my two water heaters, at left in the photo above, I saw an unmistakable dark shape. Growing up in the country you don’t need to see a red triangle to know a black widow. Once you learn it, her shape and inky gloss are unmistakable, and they trigger a dilute version of the feeling you get when surprised by a snake.

Closer, but not too close, inspection revealed that this widow was a mama, and was guarding an egg sack. Great! Because what’s better than one black widow? Hundreds, of course!

Now let me just stop here to say that I know that spiders (and snakes too) are important cogs in the ecological wheel. They have great value, and I was impressed by the boneyard underneath Ms. Widow’s web—made up mostly of desiccated stink bug carcasses. However, I have value too, as do my pets and livestock, and I don’t want poisonous spiders or snakes living in, or even right next to, my house.

So I beat it out of the crawlspace to gather supplies. I grabbed a can of wasp spray, reading on the back that it kills scorpions. I knew scorpions are arachnids, just like spiders, so I figured it couldn’t hurt. Plus it’s one defensive tool that can be applied from a distance, in case the spider should run! Then in the kitchen I grabbed a butter knife, because it was the first thing I could think of that was about the shape and size I judged I’d need to fit in this little crevice.

Outside, the thought crossed my mind that there were other things I’d rather be doing than heading back into a dark crawlspace to go head to head with a venomous spider. But the idea of her living down there and hatching tons of babies was more frightening than that of war, so with the pockets of my skirt stuffed with my weapons of choice, I headed back into the crawlspace.

Ms. Widow didn’t put up much of a fight. Upon being jabbed with the butter knife, she did fall out of her web and attempt to scramble amongst the folds of the black plastic lining the crawlspace. It’s always a heart-quickening moment when an undead, pissed-off poisonous spider makes a break for it, especially when one is squatting in a skirt in a dark crawlspace with nothing but a flashlight beam and a butter knife for defense. But I had anticipated her flight, and was able to act fast to smear her into oblivion.

Then there remained her future progeny. I prized the egg sack out of the widow’s characteristically sticky web, and examined it by flashlight. It was about a half an inch long, shaped like a teardrop, and had a texture and color similar to that of a praying mantis egg case.

When I squashed it, it exuded a surprising amount of liquid and the case itself took on the appearance of a golden raisin. At least no baby black widows poured out, which I was kind of expecting.

And with that done, I decided it was time to stop looking around the crawlspace. So, I scooted out, grateful to see this most pleasant sight waiting for me just outside the door.

Even though he wasn’t in the trenches, sometimes it’s nice to know I am not entirely alone in all the stupid shit I get into around here.

And, silver lining. Turns out this little guy had fallen into the crawlspace pit with no way out:

All because of a strange smell while vacuuming, I was able to pick him up, and send him safely on his way. (And not into Tucker’s maw, as this photo would suggest.)

But not before he peed all over my hand. As toads will do.

Thursday night I was putting the chickens to bed and looked up to see all five baby bluebirds from the first hatch sitting on the garden fence. It was pretty awesome. They stuck around long enough for me to grab my phone and take this shot, which isn’t great because it was almost dark. But they’re there, and still all together!

It was wonderful to see them all doing so well.

Then, as I was making my tea Friday morning I looked out to see blue feathers in the grass by the porch. My heart sank. It’s amazing to me how around here joy can turn to sorrow with just the sight of feathers on the ground.

I went outside and found this little gal (?) I think she flew into the glass panel at the bottom of the porch.

She wasn’t dead, but her legs looked a little crumpled. I picked her up to make sure they weren’t.

She did that thing birds do where she closed her eyes and deflated, a sign I know as shock and a leap toward death. So I quickly put her back down in the grass and ran in the house for some rescue remedy. I dribbled a few drops on her head and retreated to watch her through the window. In about a minute her closed eyes opened and she picked up her head to look around. It was a 180 degree turn. I was preparing a tiny bowl of water for her when she jumped up and flew off in the direction of her old nest box. Her dad flew out from attending to his second family. The little girl perched in the base of an evergreen, and when I checked back a few minutes later, she had flown away.

The garden tour continues with a pepper patch, in the foreground below, some dahlias, and giant volunteer pumpkin. I couldn’t figure out where all the pumpkins were coming from, as I’ve never successfully grown any in my garden. And then I remembered that all last winter I split my Halloween pumpkins open and fed them to the chickens as they were penned in the garden. A ha!

It was a tough call, but I just ripped out all the volunteer pumpkins. I’d love to grow them, but I just don’t have the space. It’s only June and the vines were already overtaking the garden, shading plants I actually am trying to cultivate (like the dahlias). So out they came.

You can also see my squash experiment, above, growing up a post. Ever since I’ve had this garden I’ve battled squash bugs, which have always killed my vines about the time they set their first fruit. This year I said no more squash—too much a waste of resources and space for something that’s bound to die and also cheap to buy in the grocery. Then I came across something that suggested growing squash vertically, as the squash bugs multiply more rapidly when hiding under leaves near the ground. So I used these volunteer squash plants as guinea pigs, tying them up the posts with strips of plastic bag and trimming off the leaves closest to the ground. Despite seeing (and killing) just a handful of squash bugs, the vine below has already succumbed to something. Le sigh. The vegetable that most people can’t give away fast enough eludes me. I think I will do a post-mortem and cut open the stem looking for squash vine borers.

My little “Glass Gem” corn patch is doing well. The stalks have about doubled in the days since taking this photo. The several inches of rain we’ve had in the last week are working wonders in the gardens. More caged dahlias, too, just budding out. The trick of starting them in pots in April has really worked—they are many weeks ahead of where they were last year when started in the ground.

One of my new favorite plants, borage, below. I don’t know why, but I am so drawn to this plant that it’s kind of nuts. It has wide, fuzzy leaves that taste just like cucumber. 

That was exciting enough for me, but then I planted it out and it pulled this trick—blooming with one of the most lovely flowers I’ve seen. There’s something magical about this plant for me. I am just waiting to learn from it.

A better shot of my new dahlia cages. They seem to be working extremely well—we’ll see how they do when the plants get five feet tall!

Since taking these photos, I ripped out the old spinach, took out the volunteer pumpkins, weeded, and mulched the entire garden with rotted straw. All the recent rain at the start of the growing season, and more on the way, helps put us in good shape heading in to summer. Up next, a tomato-only tour.