DeeDee Andrews's Blog, page 2
August 15, 2013
Cherry Tree Update 2013
For those of you who read about my love/hate relationship with my cherry tree, I have an update.
This year, because of the late storms, the tree produced no fruit! And we were spared the horrible, sticky clean-up detail!
I'm sure it will make-up for it. I believe it is plotting some kind of sinister plan for next year!
This year, because of the late storms, the tree produced no fruit! And we were spared the horrible, sticky clean-up detail!
I'm sure it will make-up for it. I believe it is plotting some kind of sinister plan for next year!
May 31, 2013
My Cherry Tree
By: DeeDee Andrews
When I was a little girl, I had the same dream over and over again. I dreamt that the big trees in front of our house were cherry trees, and I could climb up into their branches and eat my fill of cherries. Bing cherries have always been expensive and I guess I never got enough of them, which explains the dream.
Be careful about dreaming, because my dream came true. For the past 22 years I have had the tree of my dreams. It was about 35 years old when I bought the house. It sits 5 feet from my back door, and it is huge (The trunk is 8 feet around) and it produces vast amount of cherries. They are sweet cherries and taste like Bing cherries. Oh, I do love the cherries. But, I have a love - hate relationship with the tree.
First it blooms and attracts swarms of bees. The bees don’t really bother us, as they are so busy with the blossoms. But then the blossoms drop their leaves and those little white leaves actually blow into drifts against my back door. There they sit ready to be tracked into the house.
Then comes the crunchy phase, that’s the phase we’re in right now. All of the blossoms that didn’t get pollinated fall to the ground, and they too drift against my back door.
The cherries will be ripe by the 4th of July. The tree will be full of squirrels and I swear they target us with their cherry pits.
The falling fruit is the biggest mess of all. I can’t even explain how bad that gets. Just think about 10,000 over-ripe cherries being smashed in the ground, by your back door. We can sweep and hose off the deck and sidewalk, but we have to crawl around and pick their rotting little corpses out of the grass.
I sit under it every day of the year, when I take the dog out. Its vast size attracts so many birds and squirrels, to my great delight. It shades the back of the house. I have nursed it through several bad seasons and cut off many dead branches. I’ve watched huge branches fall in bad storms, and crash into my deck, house or garage. A few years ago I paid a tree trimmer $800. to cut it to half its height, because it looked like high winds were about to rip it in half. It has cost me untold hours of vacuuming and scrubbing. Yet, I still love that tree.
Now, I sit here picking some crunchy dead cherry blossoms out of my hair and I hope for a poor cherry season. I hope that the late snow storm killed the blossoms before the bees had much of a chance. I hope that I will have to buy my cherries this year.
When I was a little girl, I had the same dream over and over again. I dreamt that the big trees in front of our house were cherry trees, and I could climb up into their branches and eat my fill of cherries. Bing cherries have always been expensive and I guess I never got enough of them, which explains the dream.
Be careful about dreaming, because my dream came true. For the past 22 years I have had the tree of my dreams. It was about 35 years old when I bought the house. It sits 5 feet from my back door, and it is huge (The trunk is 8 feet around) and it produces vast amount of cherries. They are sweet cherries and taste like Bing cherries. Oh, I do love the cherries. But, I have a love - hate relationship with the tree.
First it blooms and attracts swarms of bees. The bees don’t really bother us, as they are so busy with the blossoms. But then the blossoms drop their leaves and those little white leaves actually blow into drifts against my back door. There they sit ready to be tracked into the house.
Then comes the crunchy phase, that’s the phase we’re in right now. All of the blossoms that didn’t get pollinated fall to the ground, and they too drift against my back door.
The cherries will be ripe by the 4th of July. The tree will be full of squirrels and I swear they target us with their cherry pits.
The falling fruit is the biggest mess of all. I can’t even explain how bad that gets. Just think about 10,000 over-ripe cherries being smashed in the ground, by your back door. We can sweep and hose off the deck and sidewalk, but we have to crawl around and pick their rotting little corpses out of the grass.
I sit under it every day of the year, when I take the dog out. Its vast size attracts so many birds and squirrels, to my great delight. It shades the back of the house. I have nursed it through several bad seasons and cut off many dead branches. I’ve watched huge branches fall in bad storms, and crash into my deck, house or garage. A few years ago I paid a tree trimmer $800. to cut it to half its height, because it looked like high winds were about to rip it in half. It has cost me untold hours of vacuuming and scrubbing. Yet, I still love that tree.
Now, I sit here picking some crunchy dead cherry blossoms out of my hair and I hope for a poor cherry season. I hope that the late snow storm killed the blossoms before the bees had much of a chance. I hope that I will have to buy my cherries this year.
April 30, 2013
When I Was a Tomboy I Had a Pet Crow
by: DeeDee Andrews
It’s illegal these days to raise a Crow, even if you find one with a broken wing. These days you have to call someone to take it away, or let it die, according to the federal laws protecting migratory birds. But this was the 70s and life was far less regulated. Also, there was nobody to call. The choices then were nurse it back to health yourself, or let it die.
When we found the baby crow, with the broken wing, Dad called the closest zoo. Armed with a list of instructions, my sisters and I dove into our rolls as angels of mercy for a scared little crow. That summer I was about 9 and my sisters were 11 and 6.
I’m pretty sure Mom and Dad set the wing and taped it tight to his body, because I don’t remember how that was accomplished. Then we got to force feed the little guy soaked, mushy Dog Chow. We had to hold him tight, pry his beak open, shove the food to the back of his throat and rub his neck to get it to go down. Luckily crows are really smart, and he figured out that resistance was futile and he better just eat the food. Within a couple of weeks he was putting all of the dog’s food in the dog’s water dish and eating as much as he wanted.
Dad came up with the name Saidrick Rackadew. I’m not sure where that name came from, but I still really like it. So, off I went tromping through the forests with my best friend, Saidrick, on my shoulder and poop on my back. After a while you just get used to having poop on your back every day. My prissy older sister had a low tolerance for the poop, and my little sister’s shoulder was too small, so I usually had Saidrick on my shoulder. I still think a little poop on your back is a small price to pay for the joy of having a friendly crow on your shoulder. Above us in the trees his parents followed our every move and called to him day after day.
We made an attempt to teach Saidrick to be a Crow. We took him out and stirred up the grasshoppers in the fields for him to chase and devour with glee.
When the bandages came off, we had to exercise the wing. This meant sitting the bird on the end of a broom handle and raising it up and down, which made him flap his wings. Eventually, he gave into the urging of his parents and took off, flying up to join them in the trees. At that point it was their turn to teach him to be a crow. Once Saidrick was in the trees, he never came down to us again. That was a little hard because it came without warning. One day he was sitting on my shoulder, and the next day he was gone.
Saidrick and his parents stayed close by, until it was time to migrate south. I’m pretty sure he came back the following summer and called to us from the trees. The summer after that we had to move away and I never heard his voice again.
So why do I write about ravens in the “Domino Park Comics”, instead of crows? Because, where I live now we have lots of ravens and no crows, so I watch ravens every day. I appreciate their existence and pay more attention to them than most people, because a long time ago when I was a tomboy I had a pet crow named Saidrick.
It’s illegal these days to raise a Crow, even if you find one with a broken wing. These days you have to call someone to take it away, or let it die, according to the federal laws protecting migratory birds. But this was the 70s and life was far less regulated. Also, there was nobody to call. The choices then were nurse it back to health yourself, or let it die.
When we found the baby crow, with the broken wing, Dad called the closest zoo. Armed with a list of instructions, my sisters and I dove into our rolls as angels of mercy for a scared little crow. That summer I was about 9 and my sisters were 11 and 6.
I’m pretty sure Mom and Dad set the wing and taped it tight to his body, because I don’t remember how that was accomplished. Then we got to force feed the little guy soaked, mushy Dog Chow. We had to hold him tight, pry his beak open, shove the food to the back of his throat and rub his neck to get it to go down. Luckily crows are really smart, and he figured out that resistance was futile and he better just eat the food. Within a couple of weeks he was putting all of the dog’s food in the dog’s water dish and eating as much as he wanted.
Dad came up with the name Saidrick Rackadew. I’m not sure where that name came from, but I still really like it. So, off I went tromping through the forests with my best friend, Saidrick, on my shoulder and poop on my back. After a while you just get used to having poop on your back every day. My prissy older sister had a low tolerance for the poop, and my little sister’s shoulder was too small, so I usually had Saidrick on my shoulder. I still think a little poop on your back is a small price to pay for the joy of having a friendly crow on your shoulder. Above us in the trees his parents followed our every move and called to him day after day.
We made an attempt to teach Saidrick to be a Crow. We took him out and stirred up the grasshoppers in the fields for him to chase and devour with glee.
When the bandages came off, we had to exercise the wing. This meant sitting the bird on the end of a broom handle and raising it up and down, which made him flap his wings. Eventually, he gave into the urging of his parents and took off, flying up to join them in the trees. At that point it was their turn to teach him to be a crow. Once Saidrick was in the trees, he never came down to us again. That was a little hard because it came without warning. One day he was sitting on my shoulder, and the next day he was gone.
Saidrick and his parents stayed close by, until it was time to migrate south. I’m pretty sure he came back the following summer and called to us from the trees. The summer after that we had to move away and I never heard his voice again.
So why do I write about ravens in the “Domino Park Comics”, instead of crows? Because, where I live now we have lots of ravens and no crows, so I watch ravens every day. I appreciate their existence and pay more attention to them than most people, because a long time ago when I was a tomboy I had a pet crow named Saidrick.
