The turtle is still here

The Hibiscus are in full bloom right now with beautiful big flowers in shades of pink, red, deep pink and white. All of my Spring and early summer flowers have quit blooming and Jimmy is in the process of cutting down the old dried stocks now that they have reseeded themselves.

We had an early morning thunderstorm that lasted about as long as it took you to read this sentence. It came, it went and the lights went out...but only briefly. Everything is back to normal and the sun is drying the grass.

The turtle is still in the watergarden and it's a very small turtle. Jimmy saw it's head while it ate a waterlily blossom. In the picture to the left you can see the scattered remains of the blossom all shredded up. Jimmy stood there watching the turtle eat and I must have scared it away when I walked up. I haven't seen it.

I do remember the last time we had a turtle in our little pond and Jimmy told me that it was a tiny little thing. As he pointed the little turtle out to me, I told him that this wasn't no little tiny turtle but that he was only seeing the tip of the turtles tail, and that he needed a bigger net. He argued about the turtle's size with me, and then he dipped his little tiny green aquarium net down into the water after the turtle and quickly brought it back up and said, "I think we need a BIGGER NET!!!"

We're being lazy again today not doing much of anything but relaxing. I need to go to the grocery store but I don't know what to buy. I just may get a few essentials and wait to do the rest of the shopping after the weekend is over. I really hate to go shopping on the weekend when everyone else is out and the stores are so crowded.

Hope everyone is having a good day today and that you are keeping cool. Some of my grandchildren are at Kings Island today and some of the others are at a super-sized water park in Somerset keeping cool in the wave pools, waterfalls and water slides, but wherever you are whether it's traveling or just spending the day relaxed around the pool, be safe and enjoy yourself.

Cool Night by Paul Davis

Having a feast

There's one of these in the watergarden again.

I had just been out to the watergarden, and had thankfully used a stick to pull out some of the leaves that had fallen into it and then I came inside. Jimmy was busy picking up sticks in the yard that had fallen during the brief thunderstorm that had passed through here quickly. When he was finished with the sticks he went over to the watergarden, not knowing that I had already been there, and spotted a leaf that was submerged. He reached his hand down into the water, like he always does, and to his surprise, he got bit (picture below). Poor Jimmy. I bet he'll never stick his hand in that water again!

While I was out there picking out the leaves I noticed that more of my lily pads were torn apart and looked like they had been eaten and I was blaming the fish and also wondering about the whereabouts of all the snails that I just had bought. I also noticed a tiny fish hiding behind a flower pot and wondered why I haven't seen any of the other fish lately. Now I know why. We have another rogue turtle having a feast, eating my water plants, snails, fish and my poor little tadpoles. The turtle's got to go! and I suspect that Jimmy is out there right now figuring out a way to catch it and I bet this time it won't be 'catch & release' for this turtle, but 'catch and eat.'

It's back........

......and this time it drew blood.

T is for....

Yesterday morning, after a hard all night rain, Jimmy came into the house and asked me to come outside to see a cute little tarpon in the front yard.

See how small it is?

I found several once about the size, or maybe just a tad bitter than quarters, digging their way out of the mounds of our potato patch. They were still dragging their umbilical cords that's how young they were.

While I was rushing out the door to pick up the little tarpon, Jimmy was telling me to look over to the left in front of the flag pole.
My first thought was, today is a day for turtles. This was a larger turtle and one that likes to bite so that's why Jimmy is holding it by the tail.

Here's a closer look at the turtle.

"I see you found my shy little friend.
He lives back there in the vegetable garden," said Mr. Sycamore.

Of course I didn't take the tarpon to the tomato patch, but put him in a nice place among the hostas and flowers. The larger turtle was heading towards the creek behind our house, so Jimmy just carried him back there and turned him loose. We didn't want to leave the turtle in the yard because we were afraid that one of the cats might get hurt if they got too close to the turtle's mouth.

We need one of those road signs in front of our house that says, Turtle Crossing.

Mystery solved...

For the last two summers something has been wreaking havoc on our water plants, chewing up the waterlily flowers even before they open up to bloom and eating chunks from the nice green lily pads. At first we thought it was Jybow, Jimmy's cat, because we caught her pawing at one of the blooms, but now we know better.
Jimmy even got his finger bumped, as if something was trying to bite him, by some strange thing in the water, so this explained to us why the cats were no longer drinking from the pool. They were reluctant to stick their tongues down in the water to lap up water for fear of "the thing" beneath the water surface. Jimmy at first thought it might be a water snake, so he quit pulling up the dead plants and clipping them off. And I sure wasn't going to tempt fate and get bitten by some unknown creature from the black lagoon.

Time went by and we would notice the plants wiggle around as if something was bumping them from beneath the water. It remained a mystery until today when Jimmy passed by while mowing and thought he saw something. He got off the mower, but left it running so the thing in the water wouldn't hear him approach. He saw it and he came inside to tell me...

I was on the computer, of course, and he told me that he had spotted the head of a very tiny turtle about two inches in size in the water garden and this was what was eating the water plants and its size explained why it never bit Jimmy...it was just too small. He said that we could catch it with a small aquarium net. I ran outside to see it and when I got near, I saw the plants move so I knew where it was. Then I saw it...

But it wasn't as small as Jimmy as described it to be. He walked up and asked me if I had found it and I said that I had, but that what I was pointing to was only it's head and neck, and to put away that net and to get something bigger. Well- Jimmy came back with a large plastic Taco Bell soft drink cup and tried to fish it out while I'm saying that the cup is too small. Jimmy made his attempt to get the turtle and the turtle went down deeper and out of sight and so did I. I went inside thinking that this was it for today, cause a scared turtle is not coming back up.

A few minutes later Jimmy came inside and asked me to come out and look in the bucket and there it was. He had caught the turtle scooping it out with the bucket.

It's a little larger than 2 inches...or maybe I should say, a lot larger than 2 inches. Jimmy really wanted to eat it but I convinced him to put it back in the bucket and take it back to the creek and release it. He did and the little turtle loved it's new bigger home and quickly swam under a log.

Now it's just wait and see if things straighten up and the water lilies start to flourish again, or if there are any another turtles in there. Time will tell...