My Florida Destiny

[bigbendmarine]

Thanks, Eggman... not a great feeling when you zoom in on a projected hurricane path and see the line crossing your property... potential flying objects stowed, bath tub full of water, vehicles gassed up, and pure gas purchased for chainsaw work ahead as warranted. On the land management front can't help but wonder how many tree tubes I'll have standing in the morning.

 

[swat1018]

Thanks, Eggman... not a great feeling when you zoom in on a projected hurricane path and see the line crossing your property... potential flying objects stowed, bath tub full of water, vehicles gassed up, and pure gas purchased for chainsaw work ahead as warranted. On the land management front can't help but wonder how many tree tubes I'll have standing in the morning.

Hoping for the best for everyone down there. I have a little place in Okeechobee. First fall after buying it is when the 3 hurricanes went through there, what a nightmare.

 

[H20fwler]

Good luck the next day or two...hope it blows out before it hits you.

 

[bueller]

Best of luck.

 

[Eggman]

Checking in on you BigBend. I hope you survived with no damage. We had tornado damage at one farm but nothing major.

 

[bigbendmarine]

Alive and relatively well, all things considered. Actually kept power & satellite signal right up to midnight when winds finally knocked us out. Weird feeling watching college football with winds roaring outside. Thought Vandy might beat my home-state SC Gamecocks and was almost wanting the power to go out. Joking aside, woke up to downed pine blocking our driveway, small limbs down around house, pond dock intact, but with about 10 large trees in our woods downed along a line that looked like it might be tornado damage. Crazy thing is that less than 100 yards from several of the trees snapped in half I had about 90% of tree tubes holding dolgo crabapples standing tall. Power stayed out about 15 hours, and I feel crazy blessed on that one... lots of local friends have been warned they might be out for as many as 9 days. Only luxury we don't have at the moment is our hard-line phone / dsl. Will probably post a few pics once back fully online.

 

[bigbendmarine]

Line marks path of Hurricane Hermine / star marks our property just a few miles from the center path of the storm. Close enough to the center that we experienced the eye of the storm bringing quiet conditions to us about 1:30 a.m. before the back end of the storm came through. Went from absolutely howling to being able to hear a chorus of frogs chirping.





Only damage along our entry road was a pine blocking our driveway. Canopied driveway of Bradford pears known for being suspect to wind damage miraculously sustained very little damage.





Along the field edges in the middle section of our property we did have a few chinaberries knocked down (not crying on that count).



Near woods edge in the back of our property (house faces south so speaking of woods north of house) I found the most damage with trees the least bit hollow paying the price and one line of damage that looked like a small tornado might have run across.




Crazy thing is that just 100 yards or so from line of most severe damage I found all of my blue protex tree tubes housing dolgo crabapples upright. Across other fields I did find some tubes with tabs unhooked but none were completely detached or had blown away and trees inside tubes all looked ok as well.

Deer were back out browsing within 24 hours. Truly miraculous to me was the number of butterflies also out in full force. I found sitting out the storm in a well-framed home a scary-enough proposition... can't even begin to imagine what it was like for the local wildlife population.





All in all, still feeling mightily blessed we didn't have far, far more damage.

 

[wiscwhip]

Very fortunate bbm. Good to see everything mostly ok.

 

[bigbendmarine]

Stepped a few feet into the wood's edge this weekend to freshen up one of my mineral stumps and froze pretty quickly in place when I heard this...

 

[wiscwhip]

Eastern Diamondback or timber rattler? We have timber rattlers and eastern massasauga rattlesnakes(swamp rattlers), but no eastern diamondbacks this far north.

 

[bigbendmarine]

Eastern, Wiscwhip. Supposedly about 30 miles west of the range of the timblers in our neck of the woods and about 30 miles east of the copperhead range. We definitely make up for it with a healthy population of easterns and cottonmouths though. Supposedly do have pygmy rattlers and coral snakes too but I've never seen either to date. Darn scarlet kingsnakes give me a devil of a time though trying to remember the poem about coral snakes.

 

[wiscwhip]

We see most of our timber rattlers near the bluffs and along our spring creeks that run out of the valleys while we are trout fishing. The swamp rattlers are very seclusive and the only time I can remember seeing them is in early summer when they are breeding and they get hit by the big field mowers at the county park on the island in the Mississippi River near our house.

 

[wiscwhip]

Bigbend, how did your place fair in the face of Matthew?

 

[Turkey Creek]

Very nice camera work! I am like MO you can keep them snakes though!

 

[scott44]

Great pics and place you have!

 

[bigbendmarine]

Bigbend, how did your place fair in the face of Matthew?

A dry front that's been over us for over a week largely kept Matthew at bay and I suspect played a role in blessedly keeping it mostly 20 or miles or so off the east coast. Believe it or not we didn't get a SINGLE DROP of rain in Tallahassee though the outer bands did circle over us and brought a few gusts throughout the day that may have reached 30mph or so. Actually lost power for an hour or so at work, but almost sure that was due to a tree or limb compromised during Hermine falling when one of the mild gusts came through. No real impact to speak of over our way. Happy for friends along the east coast that the storm stayed just offshore... had it jogged even 15 miles or so more west the space coast up to Jacksonville would have taken a knockout punch versus getting winds about like those we saw with Hermine.

 

[bigbendmarine]

Attention is now turning to deer as I start to work on fall plots, but before Matthew hit I did get some late summer / early fall fishing in.

Shared a video of missed bass hits when I first started this post... for those that enjoy bass fishing, here's an updated video with some actual catches! :-)

Also got a good saltwater trip in this past weekend.

For all the straying from land management / "native habitat" I've done, hoping the next few weeks will allow me to get back on topic.

 

[Eggman]

You had a great on the water. Good job.

 

[bigbendmarine]

Pushing things back a bit closer to the subject of "native habitat", finished planting my food plots this past weekend and enjoyed three miracles of sorts.

First, after almost a month of being bone dry (last real rain we had was with Hurricane Hermine) it rained for an hour or so after I had seeded 75% of the area I had to work. Such a great feeling when that happens! :)

Second thing brought me even more joy than the rain -- almost gave me the same adrenaline rush as having game appear while hunting. Had just started broadcasting seed when out of the corner of my eye I saw something white on the ground and when I looked directly at it, this is what I found! Suspect it's a "South Prong Creek" point, making it likely human hands hadn't touched it for about 4,000 years or so. First point I've found on the place since we purchased it in 2013 and turned out to be the nicest point I've ever found.





Final miracle was avoiding a close brush with misfortune. Was hand broadcasting seed on my last plot when I thought to myself, "Man, sure a lot of honeybees flying in this one spot" only to stop in my tracks as I quickly realized they WEREN'T honeybees. Found myself standing still with the entry hole to a disturbed yellow jacket nest just 3 steps ahead of me. Was able to take this picture of a few of them trying to move dirt away from the hole but picture doesn't do justice to the number that were flying around. Guessing 100 or so. Somehow avoided a single sting.



Didn't have time to capture any shots of the plots as I rushed to finish work by dark but will try to take a few later this week before the plots fill in so I can do some before/after comparisons. Put lime down for the first time this year so eager to see how they turn out.

 

[Turkey Creek]

Cool arrowhead and glad the yellow jackets didnt find you.