Bright Ideas

My husband had just edited my Bright Idea for August 11 and sent it to the Eagle when a flock of grackles descended on our front yard and began pecking. We knew it would be only minutes before they moved to our heavily fruited Harrelson apple tree.

The apples aren’t ready to pick until late September, but already show red on a side, especially apples on top, exposed to more sun. They’re also the largest, especially if only single apples cling to a branch. These birds were on apples everywhere on the tree. Our small Frostbite trees also had apples, not yet ripe, but heavy on thin branches.

Brice ran for the large, plastic owl, to frighten birds away. It needs batteries to make the head turn and proclaim a hoot, but batteries have a short life. Even without them, it works on migrating flocks. Local birds know differently.

Are these birds flocking earlier? They usually wait for the corn to ripen, so they can start with apples and finish with corn. Brice picked an ear of corn with dried tassels, but the kernels were very small, and needed at least two or more weeks to fill out.

What do the birds know that we don’t? Even robins have disappeared. Will frost come early and kill tomatoes and peppers before ready to pick? What apples will be left? I know some people pick them early and think they can ripen inside. I have never been impressed with those results.

Underground crops would survive. Years ago Brice and Reed dug potatoes insulated by snow. Would beets, onions and carrots keep underground? Onions sometimes push up, leaving the tops of globes vulnerable.

At least with the fence and gates, deer won’t eat any of the vegetables, or paw out underground treasures. A reader left me flower-like spinners to frighten deer; I’ll use them at spots deer have dug out iris tubers. In spring they go near first blooms. The deer ate first daffodils in my south garden, and tulip blossoms along front ramp. Both will have large, rotating, pink flowers to frighten away deer.

Don’t the deer have enough to eat in the rural areas, or forests? Do these deer ever leave urban area? Just to reproduce? One doe in our yard has twin fawns, still with spots. Bushes overproduce blooms to make more seeds, expecting drought or floods. What do these multiple births mean, if anything?

We are left with one choice — just wait and see.