It Doesn't Take Much......

Ya know, it doesn't take much to get me a riled up some days......

Mr. Johnson's weekly edition of the Minnesota Outdoor News showed up in our mailbox today. I generally try to avoid posting about controversial subjects on my blog, but I've put colored boxes around the 2 headlines that bugged the shit out of me as I was reading and walking back from the mailbox.
Here's a link for you to click on if you'd like to read both of these articles.

I'm sure I'll get some comments I won't like for posting my opinions here in my blog, but I'm going to do it anyway (because I'm just so bugged by both of these decisions!) In the article about the sandhill crane season, I found this statement particularly interesting:
"They are plentiful and they are doing well," said Dennis Simon, DNR Wildlife Section chief, who will make the pitch to the councils next week. "We just think it's an opportunity that we should take advantage of for a fairly small cost."
Cost to who? The State of Minnesota or the Sandhill Cranes?? Give me a freakin' break!!

If this hunting season passes, Minnesota would become the first state of the northern Mississippi Flyway to allow hunting of these cranes (it's already allowed in every state of the Central Flyway except Nebraska). Maybe if it passes, the DNR should consider tacking on a short, lottery-only season for Tundra Swans too. Everyone know there's a ton of them migrating through the state in the fall, and think of all the extra revenue that would generate -- especially for non-resident permits! Hell, let's just shoot em all!

Farther down in the article Steve Cordts, the waterfowl specialist for the DNR says the following, "It's hard to say how much interest there would be in Minnesota in crane hunting." There are hunters in the state who travel elsewhere to hunt cranes, and he figures the number of hunters who participate might be in the hundreds. In defense of the cranes, Steve Cordts also says, "Cranes wise up pretty quickly to hunting pressure, so if we opened it and there was some interest, I would think they would wise up to it pretty quick." That's a profound statement, don't you think? Does that somehow justify selling bunches of licenses to shoot these cranes? Because after the first day of the season, they will just "wise up" and fly somewhere else? I'm sure that hundreds of years of migratory flight patterns aren't going to change because these birds will now be getting shot at. If that were the case, there would be no cranes to hunt in the Central Flyway either.

Well, there, I've gotten that rant out of my system for today...... I don't think I'm even going to delve into the wolf de-listing issue, I'm sure my blood pressure is already sky high. I'm just going to sit back and see where this post goes in the blogosphere and see what types of comments it generates.

Sunday Deer Hunting

SUNSET FROM MY DEERSTAND

Today I watched sunrise and sunset from my deerstand. If you've never done it, believe me it's something pretty special. I wasn't outside all day, but most of it. This morning I heard a pheasant cackling in the nearby corn field and a turkey gobbling from his roost in a tree directly behind me. It's pretty cool to be out in the woods and hear the bald eagles and pileated woodpeckers waking up and beginning another day. The only thing missing from this whole day was deer -- again!! I did not see a single deer from either of the stands I sat in this morning or afternoon. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that once the farmers start getting the corn picked my odds of arrowing a deer will increase dramatically.

Today also marked the final day of the first firearms deer season in Minnesota. Remember last week when I said I was going to stay out of the woods until firearms season was over? Well, I should have stuck to that promise. As we were packing up and walking out of the woods this afternoon, we heard some gunshots nearby. (Now keep in mind that it's legal to shoot 1/2 hour before sunrise and after sunset and our sunset tonight was around 4:45.) I heard the first couple shots just up the road right around 5 PM. Then around 5:10 as we were walking toward the road, we heard a shot from the road almost right in front of us. I stopped and then heard the slug breaking branches in the woods just off to our left. Stupid A-holes!! This is precisely why I hate gun season -- there was no way the guy shooting out by the road could even see what he was shooting at because of the thick woods there. It's also posted private property. When we got up to the road and almost back to the truck, we could see them parked in a field drive almost directly across from us. They decided it was time to leave as we got closer, but not before Mr. Johnson stopped them and told those 2 stupid jerks that he didn't appreciate listening to their lead flying through the woods we were walking out of. "Wasn't me man, we weren't even over there!" was the response. If there's one thing I can absolutely not tolerate, it's idiots walking around with loaded firearms!

Can This Garden Be Salvaged? (A Dirt Rant)

The vegetable seeds I planted a couple weeks ago are starting to sprout, so I decided that I'd better get my other raised bed put together so I can get the last of my garden planted this coming Memorial Day Weekend. This newest raised bed is where I'm going to put out the individual plants: squash, zucchini, tomatoes, etc. and by Memorial weekend, our danger of frost is (usually) past.

So Mr. Johnson helped me assemble the boards on Tuesday and I called to order my dirt for delivery on Wednesday. Here's where the disaster begins. I had 3 choices of places to get black dirt, mixed with compost and delivered, but because I had a budget, I went with the cheapest place (black dirt = $19 per yard and I needed 4 yards). When I called the garden place and gave my order to Wendy, she asked me what I planned to use the dirt for and when I said a vegetable garden, Wendy said the black dirt I was ordering did have some chunks in it and she would advise that I use the pulverized dirt instead (at $11 more per yard). I told her it just wasn't in my budget and I could probably break the chunks up (because I assumed they would just be chunks of black dirt) and that was pretty much the end of that discussion.

So the dump truck finally came about 6 PM on Wednesday and what he dropped on my driveway was awful. The chunks were HUGE! (we used Penny as a comparison with one of the chunks here--since she's a pretty full-figured kitty, I think you can get an idea of how big this chunk is, and there were many chunks larger than this!)

I tried breaking a chunk with a rake--couldn't be done. Then I tried it with my hands and this is what was inside:

A solid clay core!

Well, I'll tell you what.....I was SO disappointed I could have cried. Mr. Johnson helped me by loading the wheelbarrow and trying to pick out as many of the big lumps as he could. As he dumped it into the raised bed, I continued trying to break up chunks so I would have something usable to plant in. Finally after 2 hours, I was satisfied with the amount of dirt we had in there. I added a couple blocks of peat moss to the bed and started trying to till it and break things up more. Here is the final result.

Still quite a few lumps but I think it will work for the planting. I don't think the way this is now would work for planting any seeds in row crops, would it? Any advice from the garden bloggers? Would adding some sand and trying to till it into this mix help me at all? What about compost? Or am I just screwed?

I called Wendy back the next day to express my disappointment and she pretty much said I'm just stuck with what I've got. She said she told me on the phone that their black dirt had chunks in it -- which I heard her say and acknowledged that I would just try to break up the bigger chunks (I had no idea the chunks would be the size of a small schnauzer!) She said she tried to emphasize to me that this dirt had a lot of clay mixed in with it and that it would be hard to use for a garden and that it was more suited for filling holes. I never heard her say that during our phone call and told her that, so it becomes a matter of "she said -- she said." She told me we could bring the big chunks back some time if we were headed out their way and I said I would be happier if they would just come and take back what was left since I was going to have to throw the rest away into the ditch. She apologized again that I didn't fully understand what kind of dirt I was getting and the reason she hadn't been more forceful in trying to discourage me from getting this dirt was that she was trying to be polite and didn't want to make me mad (so mad after the delivery and not before is a better thing??) I advised her that if this situation ever came up with another customer she definitely should be more forceful in telling the customer that this dirt should only be used for filling holes!

This whole situation makes me so mad (mostly at myself) I could just cry. Mostly because I wasted over $200 on this crappy dirt and because I made a mistake. Mr. Johnson and I spent another 2 hours yesterday afternoon loading up the remainder of this dirt from the driveway and dumping it out in the nether regions of our yard. I'm telling you this whole pathetic story not to make you feel sorry for me, but for two reasons: 1) if anyone has any solutions to help me fix up the dirt in this garden, I would really appreciate the help, and 2) to get this "off my chest" and get on with my life--I don't want to put any more bad mojo on my new garden this year!