Clint and Corky
The End of Island Summer Is Near
Salutations from the island! I hope that all of you are doing well, and are as happy as I am to see the end in sight for this hot and humid weather. Yay!!
The first day of Fall, Sept. 22, cannot get here quickly enough for me. Not having air conditioning out here on the island, or even in my truck in town, the summer days can get pretty dang hot and miserable. I would like to think that after all of these years out here, I would be acclimated to the dreadfully hot and high humidity summers. . . have I survived them?, yes I have. . . have I enjoyed it?, umm, NO! But such is island life. I seem to recall an old saying, “what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger”. Well I sure as heck hope so.
As I sit here writing this on Sept. 10, typing away every single letter with my right index finger on my IPhone, the weather forecast shows some heavy rain coming in the next few days, and lasting throughout the week. Even though the island received 41” of rain from the end of April until July, a monsoon it seemed at the time, the island is once again dry and could use at least several inches. The one positive though to the dry conditions, and no standing water, is that the demon mosquitoes have been at the minimum the last few months. I’ll still feel a few at dusk and dawn, apparently their favorite times to go on their blood-sucking endeavors, but they haven’t been terrible. Unfortunately, this forecasted rain next week might put an unwelcome change to that.
The hummingbirds must have been sending out scouts last week, I saw one flying around the cabin looking for a feeder. I quickly cleaned one of mine and filled it with sugar water, (a 1/4 cup of sugar mixed with 1 cup of water), and hung it up, and within a few minutes the scout was back and feeding. I’m hoping for a lot of Fall hummers visiting the island, and I’ll hang up a second feeder when I begin seeing more than a few of them. Every Spring and Fall I’ll be blessed with 4-5 of the tiny fliers finding my feeders on their trek back and forth for the season. I’ve had as many as 10-12 a few years fighting over the sugar nectar. I enjoy sitting on the porch and watching them in the cool early mornings and late evenings.
The grass in my island yard is finally starting to come back, and showing its green color. It’s actually more weeds than grass, but I don’t care, it is better than a brown dead yard. Last year during the summer storm season my yard was completely covered in salt water on three separate occasions from the surges, eventually killing my St. Augustine grass. So I’m happy to see at least some type of greenery returning. And the chickens, ducks and guineas enjoy it as well.
Well that’s it from the island for now. Everyone take care and have a most wonderful day.
