Category: Pictures

My Surprise for the Day

You will never guess what I found yesterday!

I was out in the garden making my rounds.  I had just finished picking okra and cucumbers, and was on my way to the tomatoes, but I decided to make a stop off at the hen house to check on the ladies.

Lately I have made it a practice to open the nesting box door to see if there has been any interest in the nesting boxes.  It is about time for the Easter Eggers to start laying, if I am lucky, and each day I wonder if it is my lucky day.

A few weeks ago I put a store bought egg out there to encourage the ladies to check the boxes out, but the activity has been minimal.  Even so, sometimes the white egg appears to be gone, though it is always just buried in the leaves in the nesting box.

As I opened the nesting box door yesterday, the silly white egg was gone again.  I dug around in the leaves and found it, then carefully placed it back on top of the leaves.  As I was preparing to close the door, low and behold I noticed a chicken!  She was laying at the opposite end of the boxes and had burrowed out a nest.  I quickly closed the door and made my way to the house.

It wasn’t much longer until we heard cackling commencing!  One or more of the girls sounded as if she was having a total come apart.  🙂

We went on to church, expecting we might have a little surprise when we arrived home after church.  Sure enough, we did!  We all eagerly went to the hen house as soon as we arrived home, me with camera in hand.  🙂  Here’s what we found:

Our First Egg

Our First Egg

You will notice, perhaps, this is not an Easter Egger! That is right! One of the Rhode Island Reds was the first layer. Unfortunately, I can’t tell these birds apart, so it could have been any one of the four.

The Potential Winner

The Potential Winner

Here’s a couple of more shots: a better one of the egg, and a comparison shot vs. a store-bought, large, white egg.

Comparison: First Egg vs. Large Store EggComparison: First Egg vs. Large Store Egg

Comparison: First Egg vs. Large Store Egg

Our First Egg - A Better View

Our First Egg – A Better View

As mentioned earlier, this was a surpise.  I expected eggs any day now, but I expected them from one of the Easter Eggers.  The best I can understand it, the Easter Eggers are unpredictable on when they will lay their first egg, but with six of them, I am expecting one any day now.  The Rhode Island Reds are younger than the Easter Eggers though.  We bought the Easter Egger chicks on March 15 of this year, and we bought the Rhode Island Reds on March 29th.  Neither were more than a week old; probably just a few days old.  I don’t have the calculations now, but I expected the Easter Eggers to lay sometime between the end of July and the first of October (yes, unpredictable from what I can tell), and I expected the Rhode Island Reds to begin laying at the end of August.  I just checked though, and it seems the Rhode Island Reds should all start laying about right now.  SIGH.  How do I get so confused on this stuff??

With any luck, the Easter Eggers will be laying soon too, along with the rest of the Rhode Island Reds, and we will start having a beautiful mix of brown and blue/green eggs soon.

Those who raise chickens often say the first egg costs many hundred dollars, but those thereafter are inexpensive. I haven’t calculated the cost of this first egg, but I know why people say that. It wasn’t cheap getting to this point, but those are sunk costs. Now I just have healthy, inexpensive eggs that come from chicken who get time to free-range daily.

Rosy Maple Moth

Look at this amazing moth we saw on the mission trip!  I don’t believe I have ever seen a moth this colorful in my life.

Rosy Maple Moth

For those who are interested, the Latin name is Dryocampa rubicunda, and it is from the Saturniidae family.  If you want to read more, check out Wikipedia.

Ten Facts About Eyes

  1. Eye color was once thought to be determined by a single gene, which meant we thought brown eyes were dominant over blue eyes.  However, now we know that eye color is multiple gene trait, and we know that brown eyes aren’t always dominant.
  2. Many of us are mutants.  Yes, that’s right.  Multiple-colored eyes is a mutation, the neatest of which, in my opinion, is Central Heterochromia.  This is where the inner part of the iris is a different color than the outer part of the iris.  The out part is the true eye color.  All the genetic talk aside, it makes for some amazing macro eye pictures.  You can see some at the end of this post.
  3. People with lighter colored eyes are more prone to be sensitive to bright light.  This is because darker eyes have more pigment, which protects against the light.
  4. Your personality can be predicted by your eyes or as some say, your eyes are the window to your soul.  Just for fun, here is another description of eye color and personality.  It seems your eye color and the patterns in your eyes can be used to predict your personality.  You might have a read to see if you agree with what is said about your eye pattern.
  5. While 10% of Caucasians are color blind, only 1% of Eskimos are.  We don’t really know why.  Do you think you can see all colors?  Why not try a color blindness test?
  6. There is a term for those who have a fear of eyes: Ommetaphobia.
  7. If the eye were a camera, it would be 576 MP!  That’s right, the resolution of the human eye is 576 MP!
  8. While we are on the topic of cameras, have you ever wondered why our pictures have so many dark spots or spots that are too bright?  Why can we see so much more than our cameras can capture?  Don’t rush out and buy the biggest and the best camera hoping to fix this – it isn’t happening with today’s cameras.  There is something called dynamic range, which is the difference between the brightest and the darkest thing you see.  A camera can only see 8 stops of dynamic range, whereas the human eye can see 20 stops of dynamic range.
  9. 20/20 vision is not perfect vision.  It is simply being able to see at 20 feet what a normal person can see at 20 feet.  So if 20/20 is not perfect, what is?  It is believed that 20/8 is the best a human could see, though that has not been recorded.  Some US professional athletes have been recorded to have 20/8.9 vision, but a hawk is believed to have 20/2 vision!
  10. Human eyes are much bigger than you think!  Only a small portion of the eye is visible, and the eye is nearly an inch (24mm) deep!

Now, enjoy a few macro shots of the human eye, and who knows, you might learn something about their personality while you are at it.

Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro Eye Macro

a

Inglorious Fruits and Vegetables

As a home gardener, I am no stranger to funny looking fruits and vegetables.  In fact, many home crops look that way.  It doesn’t change the taste a bit though.  In fact, I am humored at how heirloom vegetables now sell for a premium, but no one minds the oddities that come along with those.  Even so, do you think all tomatoes that come off the commercial vine are round, perfectly red, and almost perfectly sized for a bun?  Of course not!  But do you know what happens to those imperfect tomatoes?  They are likely to be disposed of.  Sure, some may be sold to companies that use those less-than-perfect looking vegetables in their soups or other products, but many are just disposed of.

This video, Inglorious Fruits and Vegetables, does a good job at showing the ridiculousness of our decision making with regards to fruits and vegetables.

What about you?

Would you buy inglorious fruits and vegetables if there were no discount?

If not, would you buy them at a discount?

tomatoes

 

Yes, I know these aren’t as unlgorious looking as the ones at the link above, but apparently I don’t often take pictures of inglorious vegetables.

Chicken Eyes

It won’t be long, my friends. It won’t be long until some of the girls start laying. Perhaps a week, perhaps a month. If they are really late bloomers, sometime in October, but it won’t be long. I am checking their laying boxes daily even now though.

Check out this cute Easter Egger giving me the eye:

That look!

Are you Lookin’ at Me?

Did you know that chickens are near-sighted in one eye and far-sighted in the other? According to FreshEggsDaily.com:

Just before hatching, a chick turns in the shell so its right eye is next to the shell (and absorbs light through the shell) and its left eye is covered by its body. As a result the right eye develops near-sightedness to allow a chicken to search for food, while the left eye develops far-sightedness, to allow a chicken to search for predators from afar. That is why when a hawk flies overhead, you will notice your chickens tilt their heads with their left eye to the sky.

I suppose this means she was using her right eye so she could see me better. 🙂

Mission Complete

The title to this post is a bit misleading. Perhaps it would be said better if I just said, “WE ARE HOME!!!” That is a victory in itself, but that doesn’t mean that a huge part of me is not still in Bogue Chitto, Mississippi with my friends, both Choctaw and the mission team for the week.

I thought this might be a good post to give everyone an overview of the entire week. Some of the things we did included:

  • A four-day VBS program orchestrated by our new friend, Rachel.

IMG_8835

  • A five-day adult Bible study mostly led by our friend Jeanne, from Wellington, New Zealand (yes, our team is international!)
  • A evening at the Choctaw Fair, where we watched the first half of the stickball game where Bok Cito (Bogue Chitto) won against Pearl River. Go Bok Cito!

IMG_8786

  • A local Choctaw taught many on our team how to weave stickballs. Totally cool!

IMG_8797

  • Lots of impromptu stickball games in the front of the church where we stayed between locals and some kids on the mission team.
  • A gigantic slip and slide – what fun!

IMG_9064

  • Several visits to a local retirement home from which lots of great stories were told.
  • We helped a local pastor and his wife move.
  • Eyeball Pictures.  😀

IMG_9040

  • Prayer walks, where we pray for communities, services, leadership, etc. This was a great experience.
  • Covering prayer, where we covered the rest of our group in prayer as they went about their tasks.
  • An obstacle course.

IMG_8964

  • We spend most of a day cleaning a local church.
  • Fantastic Indian Tacos

IMG_8902

  • Old friends and new friendships

IMG_9163

  • And much, much more.

When we left this morning, and even last night before bed, hugs were exchanged, laughter happened, tears fell, and hearts were bonded. I love the folks in Bogue Chitto, and honestly, I miss them already. I would name names, but there are so many that touched me, so many relationships that were built, so many that I feel bonded to, I worry I would miss one. Each and every one is important to me.

Have you ever been on a mission trip? Have you ever devoted a significant amount of time making the difference in the life of another? If not, you really shouldn’t put it off any more. Consider partnering with a mission group, perhaps even a Native American mission group, and use what you have been blessed with to make the difference in the lives of others.

How to Waste Your Time Planting Corn

I have always had a fascination with gardening, but it wasn’t until the last ten years or so that I really got into it.  Even so, I am reminded how little I know year after year.

Last year I got the idea that I wanted to plant Landrace Popcorn.  I’ll probably tell more about that sometime in the future, but in essence it is open-pollinated popcorn from which seed is selectively saved year after year.  That is definitely an oversimplification, but it is enough for now.  Last year I also planted Glass Gem Popcorn, which is absolutely beautiful, but almost worthless as a popping corn.  Here, check this corn out!

Glass Gem Popcorn

Unfortunately, I didn’t time these crops very well and they cross pollinated, affecting the quality of my popping corn.

This year I tried again, but low and behold, my interests in other things were sparked again, and while I didn’t grow Glass Gem Corn, I did grow two ancient corns that are flour corns.  I meticulously planned the dates each would mature, and I was sure I would avoid cross pollination this year.  Wouldn’t you know it, one of the ancient corns matured at exactly the same time as the Landrace Popcorn.  GRRRRR!

In an effort to stem the damage, I have been attempting to hand pollinate the corns, though I found out last night that I am not really doing this the right way, so there is no telling what I will get.  My guess is the seeds from this corn will probably be useless next year, but I suppose I can consider myself fortunate because I learned something from it.  While the wind was low this morning I walked through the garden attempting to hand pollinate better and I shook the stalks, hoping to spread the pollen on the corn while it was less likely to cross with the other.  Only time will tell if I was successful.

Choctaw Stickball

Have you ever heard of Stickball?  No, I don’t mean baseball, and I don’t mean lacrosse.  The Choctaw Indians, as well as some other tribes, play a game called Stickball.  Though I am probably off a little on the specifics, it is roughly 100 people on a football sized field, each with two stick with a tiny basket on the end.  The players are attempting to get a ball about the size of a golfball from one end of the field to the other without using their hands: throwing, scooping, and carrying, though you wouldn’t want to carry the ball far.  You see, if you are carrying the ball, you are fair game for something like a tackle in football, though much more rough.

By the time this post goes live, my family, my home-based church, and several other folks will be watching the final game of the World Series of Stickball.  They don’t play the final game until late in the evening, so we may not stay to watch it all, though my plans are to do so.

Last year it was amazing to watch the teams come on the field.  There were so many players, and the teams were generally led by drummers who pounded on their war drums.  The players hit their sticks together in a most menacing way, letting out war cries as they took the field.  This is, to these young men, no game.  They are here to win.

This is a picture of a player from the winning team last year, which was Beaver Dam:

A player from Beaver Dam prior to the game.

A player from Beaver Dam prior to the game.

 

And last year’s runners up prior to the final game:

Koni Hata before the game

Koni Hata before the game

And finally, some action from the final game:

Beaver Dam vs. Koni Hata

Beaver Dam vs. Koni Hata

This year the final game is Saturday, July 12th, and will start sometime after this post goes live.  With any luck Bok Cito (Bogue Chitto) will be in the final match.  Lot’s of love to that team, which is the town where our mission trip is based. UPDATE: Bok Cito won in the semi-finals against last year’s champion, Beaver Dam. They will face Pearl River tonight in the finals.

If you would like to donate to help pay for our trip, it’s not too late.  Just head over to GoFundMe and see our page on Choctaw Mission 2014.

 

Loading...
X