"At Least Our Percentage is Good"

The wry comments of one M. H. Dutch Salmon, after Ashley ran down this hapless hare in the tall cover, (with a little help from Sandia, and Dutch's dogs, but it was pretty much all Ashley's hare).

Things have improved only marginally since the previous post bemoaning the lack of jackrabbits in our area.. in about 6 trips, we've run 4, caught 2 for sure, and had one hole up on Ashley and Willow. 75%. Will we still be catching them at that rate when we've run a hundred? I'd really like to find out.

Novel Idea, This "WifeDay"..

My. . . . . Our. . . life is not this messed up .

(A great parody of MGoBlog.Com's weekly game previews)

Where Have All the JRs Gone..

Long time passing;

Where have all the JRs gone,

Long time ago;

Where have all the JRs gone,

Beats the shit outta me, every time...

And I'm getting tired of it.

Back in the Spring, when we ended our hunting for the Summer, we had no idea what the next season would bring. The Winter and Summer had been pretty wet, at least out in the areas where we hunt, if not in our yard, (but that's a whole 'nother story). Late Summer into September gave us greenery in the desert and mountains the likes of which we haven't seen in our short time here, and now that it's finally starting to be cool enough in the mornings, and the dogs are plenty antsy, we finally hit the dirt a couple weeks ago. The green is pretty much gone now, but the cover is unbelievably high. Cows! Do your job!

Option one is always option one- the big ranch between here and the Cruces. We started off in the north end, which has always been good. Not so much this time. We walked around for almost two hours without a sign of life. And when I say "sign", I mean no sign.. not a single pellet was seen in all the time we were out there, and the field looked like it had been submerged for much of the Summer.

We decided to head to the south end, where we finally jumped... and caught, our first hare of the Fall season. We managed to jump one more, but he was able to elude the hounds in the high cover. By then it had warmed up so that it would be a little dangerous to continue hunting, and we repaired back to Deming, and our old standby- the Campos restaurant.

Between then and now, I did some scouting around for some new fields, West-Southwest of Deming, and found a possible goldmine, (pictured above). Hundreds of sections of grazing land, and all public. About 2/3 BLM and 1/3 State, with no hidden private parcels to accidently stumble upon. It's mostly flat, and the walking is easy because there's no "bunch grass". Cover is moderately high. When Dutch Salmon saw it, and we began walking it, he called it just about perfect rabbit hunting land! But there's a problem.

We've been out twice now, in two different areas and have yet to even sniff a jackrabbit!

The irritating part is, we know they're out there. We've seen them from the road when we're driving in. It's a matter of time, and I know we're being impatient, but the dogs want to run one now! I saw one this morning when we went back to Option One. Dutch called to say he was running late, so Sandia and I just wandered around near the truck when I noticed a big one trying to sneak away, which was hard because he had to leap high in the air to see where he was going (the high cover effects everything!). If Sandia was looking north, he'd have seen it. He was looking east. It stopped, with its long ears standing out above the cover, but by the time I got Sandia pointed in the proper direction, it had fled the scene. It was the only jack I'd see the rest of the day.

Achtung!!

Just checking to see if anyone was still hanging around here. I've been time travelling, so I'm sorry to have left you for those 5 minutes.

We may ramp this bad boy back up if there's still interest. Leave a comment! Lots has happened in that 5 minutes! You wouldn't believe!

A (Windy) Day In The Life..

Poppies. Yeah, more poppies, but this time it's different. It's a day in the life of a clump of poppies in our yard. 10 hours reduced to a minute and twenty four seconds.. just for fun.

I'll do more of these; hopefully on a day less windy.

Wildflower Season

Wildflower season in the Desert Southwest is ramping up.  On Easter Sunday, we took a long drive into the hills, first to do some Geocaching Northeast of Deming.  The purpose of this was to work up an appetite for the huge buffet Albert Campos was laying out at his restaurant.  (It did not disappoint.. especially the Chicken Cordon Bleu with the surprise inside: Green Chiles).  The entire hillsides of the Goodsight mountains were yellow.. somewhat from the Mexican Poppies, but mostly the huge carpets of smaller yellow-green flowers which may or may not be mustardseed.

Following our huge dinner and desert, we needed more exercise, and drove the Mitsubishi up the power line "road" to a point about 3/4 mile from the big blankets of poppies.  Far from showing signs of fading away, new bunches of this beautiful flower are showing up every day.  Our yard is overrun!

In addition, we spotted many other flowers which are just beginning to pop up.  Most of them we've been unable to identify.  Some of them we think we've identified.  We're leaving it up to you, our loyal readers to look at the pictures in the slide show (below) and help us identify what we're seeing.  (It may be easier to click through to the album at Picasa Albums, and look at the larger versions).

Bubba's Story

A repost from 2007, (and one of my better efforts).  We had posted this picture of Bubba, and had a poll for people to guess his COO (Country of Origin):



The "Bubba Poll" is now closed. For those waiting breathlessly for the answer... It's Georgia. That's right, Georgia. And not the one over there in the old Soviet Union.. the one in the American South. Bubba is an
Appalachian Corn Hound;or rather he's descended from the Corn Hounds, which were first created in the North Georgia mountains at the turn of the last century by mountain men who needed sturdy guard animals to protect their "corn likker" stills. Borrowing heavily from the French Great Pyrenees, for size, American Pitbulls for tenacity, and an occasional greyhound for speed in pursuing the hated "Revenoors" out of the mountains, these ingenius mountain dwellers produced a hound whose only vice was a taste for fine French wines and cognacs. Alas, this was to lead to the ultimate demise of the breed, even though it guaranteed that they would stay out of the moonshine. Because of their expensive tastes, these poor hill folk were unable to afford to keep this handsome dog. Additionally, the Corn Hound was able to somehow maintain beautiful strong, white teeth throughout their lifespans, which led to poor self-esteem among the very people that created them.

The entire population was, therefore, shipped off to Texas during the Great Depression, where the somewhat-wealthy Sheep Barons were able employ them in their current capacity, as sheep guarding dogs. So that's Bubba's story.. so rare, you won't even find it in Wikipedia!

And not only that, but... what?
What's that?
What's today's date, you say?

Why.. It's April Fool's Day.

And Bubba's an Akbash. From Turkey.
Congratulations to all who got it right. Texas, Todd?? ;)