Thursday, December 15, 2005

The Deer and the Locusts


Tulasi is home from college so we are temporarily reprieved from empty nesting. He rode home from WVU with Advaita, who timed his trip so he left after the temperature rose above the freezing mark so the black ice on the roads was melted, and then made it back before the storm that is expected to roll in this evening. It has been averaging 10 degrees F below normal since the beginning of December, so the wood pile is shrinking faster than we would like and if this keeps up all winter we may not have enough to make it to spring.

Suddenly some of those long locust posts I have put aside to do some deer fencing start looking like they might be prettier in short pieces than as 11 footers. Still, knowing that we really need to put up a tall fence next spring to have even a token sized garden will probably keep the chain saw in the shed. Deer pressure keeps getting worse every year so arrangements that used to work don't anymore. Anything much shorter than an 8 foot high fence they can jump if they really want to. Add the 3 feet of post that needs to go into the ground, 11 footers are minimal. They are harder to get than the 7 or 8 footers needed for a cow fence. Locust will twist as it grows so not every tree will yield an 11 footer.

Have to see what happens, no power to do anything about the weather or the deer in the short term.

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