The Old Guitarist

The Old Guitarist, by Pablo Picasso, from his "blue period".  Gail prompted me to take part in the Getty Museum Challenge after finding The Old Guitarist. We had a good time using bedroom curtains, towel, and old clothes. I must say, Picasso greatly overestimated the flexibility of an Old Man's Neck!

River Song Photos

Below are some photos and trail cam videos from the past week from around the property.

 Trillium ovatum is making its spring appearance in deep shade areas.

 We have a large ornamental fruit tree of some type that is in bloom.

Trail cam video of a large steelhead trout crossing shallow water at 1:27 AM.

Trail cam video of a pair of Common Mergansers in breeding plumage.  They dive for fish.

Trail cam video of a pair of Mallards feeding dabbling style.

Spawning in the River

Yesterday evening, while we were walking along our river path to go check a camera, Gail spotted a large fish hovering in a shallow spot.  Then we saw a couple more.  The lighting was not great, but they sure looked like salmon.  This morning I went back down (Gail had Jury duty!) and I witnessed more large fish occasionally thrashing about  and chasing each other.  I found a good vantage point in the bushes at the edge of the bank, and watched what looked like spawning activity in shallow water over gravel. I was able to get some pictures, although the thin branches in the way caused focusing hassles. Upon examining the photos this evening, I'm now quite sure the fish are Steelhead Trout.  They are more closely related to salmon then trout, but unlike salmon, don't die right after spawning, and can return to the ocean or remain in freshwater.  When they swim to the ocean, they grow much larger than the ones that stay in the streams. These fish appeared to be at least 2 feet long.

 

                 Spawning activity?

I read that Steelhead can leap 11 feet out of the water to clear a waterfall, and can accelerate from zero to 25 mph in one second.

A pair of Mallard Ducks were in the area.

Steelhead that haven't gone to sea are Rainbow Trout.  This is a Steelhead.  It's hard to tell their size in these pictures, but they appeared to me to be disproportionately large for our little river.

River Song Sign

Last summer, while having a little happy hour from the back deck, we tossed around some ideas for a fitting name for this property.  Down the road there's Happy Hideaway, Forks Farm, and Starshine Ranch. Up the road there's Wind River Farm and Yachats Forest Farm.  There are others, I'm sure. Anyway, we came up with the name "River Song" as we listened to the burbling river accompanied by birds and the breeze in the trees.

Well, about eight months later, we have a sign.  Last fall, we bought a slab of myrtlewood from a shop in Reedsport. Then in the winter, we printed up some letters off of the computer to trace onto the wood, then I burned the letters into the wood with a little soldering pencil.  Last month, I varnished the the whole thing and made a frame to hang the sign from using old copper pipe that was left lying around the yard.  We thought the copper would tie in with the copper pipe railings that grace some of our trails.  On Sunday, I planted the structure in concrete, and Monday, we hung the sign.  It is subtle, and if the wood should darken, we'll probably have to paint the letters for a little more pop. Now we have to do something about that mailbox.

Daisy doing  a "balk" as Gail tried to walk her past the sign.

A Beautiful Week

The past few days have been sunny with temps reaching into the seventies.  I  have been busy tending seedlings in the greenhouse and repairing trails and steps that were damaged by our string of cow invasions. I also removed 7 chipmunks in 5 days from the greenhouse.  Well, actually 6 because Daisy nailed one and crunched it.  The others I took down the road and let loose. The Have A Heart Trap and peanut butter are a great combination! 

Gail, Daisy, and I usually do a 4 mile hike up the hill and back and we did do a beach walk on Wednesday.  I did a major food shopping journey to the Fred Meyer in Newport on Tuesday.  I was disheartened to see most of the checkers and stockers not wearing masks.  There were no plexiglass partitions separating the checkers from the customers, and no disinfecting going on. After leaving, I felt like I probably have about 2 weeks to live.  On the plus side, they had plenty of toilet paper!

 Well, we never saw another goldfish in our pond for months after the heron cleaned them out. Then last month while I was suctioning excess sediment from the bottom, I was surprised to see a small dark brown fish zoom by.  Then the past week we have noticed 3 swimming together.

 After doing some reading, I learned that goldfish can take a year or two to change from a silvery brown to gold.  They also need light, preferably 12 hours a day, to attain their bright colors, although some never do, or change to black.  I also learned that goldfish have acute vision and can see 4 primary colors, ultraviolet being the 4th.  They can distinguish between humans.  I suspect that these fish were small fry that the heron didn't eat last summer due to their then tiny size and drab color, and now they are larger and beginning the process of changing color. They take a year or two to become adults.

Also sharing the pond are a whole bunch of small bullfrogs.

 The swallows are circling around our yard grabbing insects.  This Violet-green Swallow is starting a nest in one of our birdhouses.  Good thing I recently cleaned out all the bird boxes.

 Goin' in.

Northern Flickers are beautiful birds, but I have terrible luck getting close enough to them for a good picture.  We've had one or two drilling on the side of our house early in the morning, lately.  It sounds like a machine gun.

This was from down by the river this morning from under our big spruce tree.

USS Theodore Roosevelt

It was Christmas Eve, 2006, and Dave took us on a tour of the USS Theodore Roosevelt, which he had been assigned to. It was undergoing maintenance in Norfolk, VA at the time.

I feel bad about the treatment of Captain Crozier and the resulting low morale of the crew.  The captain seems like a decent man.  Maybe he'll be reinstated?  I hope all of the stricken crew make full recoveries.

 Dave and Nora

 On the deck where the anchor chains are stored.

 Nick checking the size of those links.  Can you imagine the total weight of the chain and anchor?

On the flight deck.

We got to go up in the tower to the bridge. We also saw the berth areas, hangars, dining hall, and Dave's office.  We were struck by what a maze the ship is and how one could easily get lost.

Another Week of Isolation

 Something ate a opossum on our property this week.  Bobcat?

 While moving logs I saw several Oregon Ensatinas.  They can live 10-15 years in the wild, and if grabbed by the tail, will separate it from their body to escape, like a lizard.

 Another day at an isolated beach on Thursday.  This time, Strawberry Hill.

 Low tide allows for a lot of exploration.

 You can barely see Gail and Daisy.  We lazily sifted through little gravel patches to add a few agates to our collection.

The day was perfect, but the clouds on the horizon spelled rain for the days since. This coming week looks to be good weather for yard work and hikes in the area.