The Flowers of Fall
After our long, hot, and dry summer, I was not expecting to have an abundance of native flowers and great numbers of butterflies. I am happy to say that this fall is a flower fall. But first, let's start out with the veggie garden. You are still in the planting zone for some seeds and garlic bulbs.
“I am worn out by my worries.” That is the way the Good News Bible translates David's lament in the second verse of the 55th Psalm. Stress and tension are obvious problems of contemporary society. And that cry of the Psalmist reminds us this is nothing new. The struggle with stress has been around from the very beginning.
I am so blessed. After a hard week, my son Scott and daughter-in-law Crystal came over Sunday afternoon and put my plants in the greenhouse. This is an annual chore that seems to get harder each year. I am ready for winter.
Daylight Savings Time is one of my least favorite subjects.
When Vice President Dick Cheney shot Harry Whittington with a shotgun fifteen years ago, reporters from the northeastern United States were frantic to get details about the incident. It happened on a quail hunt near Riviera, in south Texas, which is a pretty long way from the headquarters of the New York Times and Wall Street Journal.
On October 19, the Mason Lions Club met at Nacho’s for their weekly meeting.
Lion Mark Lehmberg introduced Alicia Cummings, Tiffany Ake, and Debra Norman as his guests
Coach Cummings is head coach for Cowgirls basketball and cross-country, assisted by assistant coaches Tiffany Ake and Debra Norman. Coach Cummings spoke effectively and proudly about the Cowgirl basketball and cross-country teams and their positive expectations for this school year.
When I was in primary school, my mother returned to college to finish her degree. I recall having a great time one year helping her collect samples for her zoology class. One week, her class assignment was to look for microscopic aquatic animals. I knew lots of promising water holes where all kinds of life likely thrived, so my mom went to class that week loaded with many vials of water samples to examine under the microscope.
I have written before about the more common Hill Country trees and shrubs. Here are some that are not rare, but certainly not very common either.
Carolina Basswood, or Linden tree (Tilia caroliniana) can be a rather large tree of rich, deep, moist soils. It is fairly common throughout the whole eastern half of the US, into east Texas.
On Halloween Night, the library will pass out candy from 6:00 to 8:00. Our theme for this year will be Harry Potter, so stop by to see our decorations on October 31. Our Friends of the Library Book and Bake Sale will be on October 28, 29, and 30 at the Mason Community Building.
Beyond our garden, there are many people working together to bring biological diversity and food production together to supply food to our table and integrate native forests and plants for a truly sustainable, healthy growing practice.
For example, here in Texas farmer/ranchers plant Daikon radishes as cover crops between seasons. Many employ ‘no-till’ practices by using a seed drill to plant.
If you've followed my column for long, you've noticed that I publish a lot of biscuit recipes. There are two reasons for this. 1)I love biscuits with butter, with gravy, or under a nice fried egg; maybe with a piece of sausage wedged into the mix. 2)The number of recipes available to play around with seems limitless.
