|
|
|
|
|
|
| Wild berries and leaves good protein sources for livestock |
|
|
|
Poor Will’s Almanack
By Bill Felker
Aug. 2-8, 2010
Hear her singing in the shade -
Caty-did, Caty-did, Caty-did!
-Philip Freneau
Lunar phase and lore
The Lily Moon, entering its final quarter on Aug. 2, wanes throughout the period, becoming the Wild Plum Moon on Aug. 9 at 11:08 p.m. The new moon on Aug. 9 is expected to strengthen the cool front that typically arrives near Aug. 10.
Lilies fade as middle summer comes to a close, but wild plums ripen in the heat and humidity of late summer, forecasting autumn apples and fall raspberries.
Rising after midnight and setting in the early evening, the waning moon is high in the center of the southern sky in the middle of the day. Tidal and lunar influences have been shown to be greater at full moon and new moon times. Consequently, you might expect more trouble with your flock, herd, spouse, parents or children on or about Aug. 9 and 24.
Since the moon may exert less influence on ocean tides and on human and animal behavior when it comes into its second and fourth quarters, it might make more sense to transport your animals or perform routine maintenance as close as possible to Aug. 2 and 16.
Mornings to midday will be the best lunar times for fishing this week (since the moon will be overhead then). As the cool fronts of Aug. 4 and 10 approach, hunger in all creatures, including dieters, should increase.
Venus moves retrograde into Virgo this month, remaining the evening star in the far west after sundown, joining Saturn, which has stayed in Virgo throughout the year. Mars also moves back into Virgo, accompanying Venus and Saturn.
Jupiter keeps its position in Pisces, rising in the east as Venus, Saturn and Mars follow the sun into the Pacific Ocean. By sunrise, Jupiter will be the brightest light in the western half of the sky.
Starting Aug. 12, the Perseid meteors appear in the east at the rate of one shooting star a second. The shower takes place an hour or so after midnight below the Milky Way in Perseus. At this point in the night, Perseus will have moved well away from the northern edge of the horizon and lie in the eastern sky.
Weather patterns
Tornadoes, hurricanes, floods or prolonged periods of soggy pasture are most likely to occur between Aug. 8-13 and between Aug. 27-30. Frost is most likely, of course, as summer ends, and the Aug. 27-30 window often burns tender plants all along the northern border with Canada, as well as at higher elevations in the East and West.
New moon on Aug. 9 and full moon on Aug. 24 increase the likelihood of storms around those dates. Aug. 10 is one of the most decisive days in the decline of late summer. The chance for 90-degree temperatures, which remained fairly steady between 30-45 percent since the beginning of July, abruptly falls to between 15-20 percent.
Daybook
Aug. 2: The moon enters its final quarter today, its weakest point since July 18. Trim the feet on the goats and sheep. Check everyone for fleas and ticks. Take your show animals to the fair or home again because lunar stress will not get this low again until the middle of August.
As for the other stuff in your life, act now while your head is clear. Buy the tractor or car you need. Ask your significant other to marry you. Decide to go back to school.
Aug. 3: When honeysuckle berries ripen and hickory nuts and black walnuts drop into the undergrowth, then dig your potatoes. When you hear robins make their clucking migration calls, then make corrective lime and fertilizer applications for August and September seeding.
Aug. 4: After the Aug. 4 weather system moves across the land, the likelihood for highs in the 90s begins a steady decline across the northern tier of states, and the possibility for a high only in the 60s increases.
Aug. 5: Feed thyme, mint and clover to your does and ewes to enhance their summer and fall breeding. Let the animals trim back your wild black raspberries, too. Grass hay can be a good substitute for legume hay at this time of year, but be sure to supplement it with grain and minerals.
Honeysuckle leaves and buds contain more crude protein for your animals than most fescue, alfalfa or Bermuda hay. Other good sources of protein are hackberry and persimmons.
Aug. 6: Keep carrots, oats, bran, iodized salt and good greens on hand to invigorate bucks as the breeding season opens. But keep male goats away from the legumes later in the season; that form of feed may cut down on fertility.
Aug. 7: In the mornings, cardinals and doves still sing half an hour before dawn. Blue jays still care for their young, whining and flitting through the bushes. Bullfrogs still call in the local ponds.
But by the end of the week, the tree line is turning ever so slightly, a hint of tan and yellow appearing in the black walnuts, buckeyes, locusts and cottonwoods.
Aug. 8: Butterflies become more common this week of the year, another generation of cabbage moths, swallowtails, and skippers arriving in your garden. Sometimes, giant imperial moths appear in the night. Tiny alypias, shiny black moths with white spots on their wings, may find their way indoors.
Countdown to late summer
On July 28 the stability of middle summer begins to deteriorate throughout the whole nation as average temperatures fall 1 degree from the Canadian border to the Deep South.
This breakdown is seen first in slightly lower nighttime temperatures, and then, not long afterward, in lower daytime highs.
In the second week of August, averages start to drop between 1-2 degrees per week until Sept. 10, when they decline about a degree every three days into January. Although declines are more rapid in the North, almost every region of the country experiences a temperature shift this month.
Living with the seasons
The day’s length, which shortened at the rate of approximately a minute a day one month ago, now accelerates up to two minutes a day. As the number of hours available for outside work declines, the state of the weather becomes all the more important to farmers and gardeners. The lengthening night and gradually increasing cloud cover presage seasonal affective disorders in the months to come.
Almanac literature
Watch Out for Sloth and Apathy!
By Jeffery Goss Jr.
Billings, Mo.
It’s midsummer now. Around this time begins the “slump” period of an Ozarks summer, which deepens in the latter half of the Dog Days. It’s a time when one’s “get-up-and-go” can seem to have “got up and gone,” and even the simplest chores (such as rinsing out buckets) can seem laborious.
In my observation and experience, the time of year seems to have more physiological and emotional effect than the lunar cycle does.
Certain times of year can be counted according to “virtues and vices;” each season has certain virtues that tend to be more easily practiced therein, and certain vices of which to beware. For the Dog Days, it is particularly important to guard against the vices of apathy and sloth. |
| 7/28/2010 |
|
|
