What a difference a year makes

A year ago, on March 24, I completed our lawn's first mowing of the season and felt like summer had arrived early.  This year, on March 24, we received 8 inches of snow.  I'm confident summer has not arrived yet.

This photo was taken after two days of melting and it should be obvious that the grass is a long way from its first cutting this season.  In fact, the grass is looking as dormant as it was in January.

On the bright side, the spring yard work looks like it can wait for a few more days.

Merry Christmas

Blessings from the Riggenbach Family

Beans in the backyard 2012, Harvest!

September 30

Although the top photo was taken on Sunday morning, the field was harvested two days earlier, on September 28.  The bottom picture shows a few pods that escaped the combine with one pod opened so you can see the beans.  When I spoke to Farmer Wagenbach the day before harvest, he was optimistic that the harvest could be good.  Even though we've had our worst drought in over 70 years and plenty of heat, God has blessed this field.

English postcard #8

Fountains Abbey, North Yorkshire

I hope you don't mind if I continue to "send postcards" from England even though we're home by now.  I also hope you don't mind another picture from Fountains Abbey.  I thought this view was interesting in that four arches could be lined up and captured at the same time.  I don't think I'll ever tire of arched window and doorways, perhaps because they're so rare in our part of the world.

Beans in the backyard 2012, weeks 19, 20, & 21

September 10

Thanks to my trusty assistant, Emil, we have photos to document the bean development in my absence.  These pictures for September 10 show quite a few more yellow leaves than our last photos of the field, but the fact that there were so many leaves visible means harvest is still weeks away.  Another sign of development was the coloring of the pods that were mostly brown instead of mostly green as they've been until these photos were taken.

September 18

Many more leaves had fallen by the time this photo was taken on September 18, but there was still enough green vegetation in the field to indicate that harvest was not imminent.  One can see a distinctive trait of mature beans in this photo: the nearly straight stalks with clearly visible pods, and a noticeable absence of leaves.  This phase in bean development always amazes me, that what looked like a bushy plant a few weeks ago can look like such a straight stick at this phase.

September 23

The beans appear nearly ready for harvest in these photos from September 23.  I believe any green leaves in these photos actually belong to weeds in the field, and not bean stalks.  The stick-like appearance of the stalks is evident again in this photo, and the stalks have clearly reached the R8, full maturity stage.

Even though we've had a pretty severe drought this summer, Farmer Wagenbach appears to have been blessed with beans that have a fair number of pods and seeds.  About the only thing that would reduce the harvest at this point would be storm damage that might make harvest difficult.