Hmmmmmm the Killing Zone grows

Well living in the middle of the forest is really kind of a battle. You have to keep the brush and blackberries from taking over. Mice and rats think you have built wonderful places for them to live. Last year we spent over $ 700 on 2 car repairs from mice nesting in the heater fan area of the car - that was a drag.
So we got 2 cats and a new cat showed up so things improved with less mice damage. Of course, cats love to bring little trophies and deposit them around the outside of the house. Yuck. But it is a good thing to protect where we live.
Our beloved dog, Akita, passed away this last year - 2006.
While she was still with a us, we got Bast as a puppy. She is malamute, husky and wolf. We have spent alot of time and training with her. She has become a wonderful companion and her job is to defend the home, garden and land. Well.......... she is the most incredible hunter. I was thrilled to see her bring down those nasty rats.......... but unfortunately she also harvests anything else she can nab.
Living here for over 20 years, I have fed the wild birds. We have quite a few that come around the house. But now with this new animal squadron creating a kill zone around our house, we are left with only 2 kinds of wild creatures - The Quick and The Dead.
Bast is so proud of her work and our deck is her trophy case............ ewwwwwww.
I can only hope that the skunk you wanders down from the mountain in the spring has the good sense to avoid our place or our deck will really smell.

Snow Funnnnnnnnnn

Sadly the climate here in Oregon has been getting warmer and warmer. Finally today we were blessed with a wonderful bit of snow. It was wet and clung heavy to each little branch. My bamboo was bent almost to the ground. I had to shake it off so that it would not break if more snow fell. We worked furiously and took off for a nice time on the lake.

We used to get snow regularly in the winter. The old timers say they trudged knee deep in the snow to feed the livestock in the vallery - we have never seen that. The area is so warm now that some insects are killing off some of our trees - bark beetles in the white fir trees.

Our lake used to freeze over with a nice little crust of ice. We would load the kids up and play ice breaker crunching in the aliminum canoe around the lake. Slices of ice thrown frisbee style across the ice would tinkle like the chiming of fine cut glass.

Oh well we are witnesses to an amazing era on the planet.

Enjoy the pics and the break from the routine of your day.