Greetings and welcome!
The Fall colors continue to illuminate the forests. The earliest stuff is gone, mostly the maples that turn bright red, yellow, and purple. Not to worry, there is another wave of color coming right behind them.
We have a nice variety of tree species around here, and instead of an intense week or two of color, we get a stretched out fall color season as they come in waves.
Anyone remember that cut off low pressure area that had it raining on us off and on for two weeks? Meet the flip-side, the stalled high pressure area. In this case it is expected to bring us nice weather in the mid-70s for the next week or so. Our normal high temp is 60 for today, so this is a nice surprise.
Like the cut off low, this might get a little hard to predict. At the moment the GFS has the high pressure sticking around until about the 14th. There is a chance of a little rain on the 11th, and by the 14th we could see a real rain storm again. Can we believe it? Usually when things look too good to be true, they are, but that is the current forecast.
As with any warm stretch in October the Asian lady beetles are emerging. They just started yesterday afternoon, but it looks like they are coming in force. They were just starting to get a little irritating yesterday afternoon.
People have asked frequently how to control the lady beetles. My best concoction was a mix of permethrin and diazinon through a sprayer. A wall covered with the things would be clear in 5 minutes. Sprayed around windows and doors it has helped to keep the infestation outside.
Since you can’t get diazinon any more, permathrin or deltamethrin based insecticides would probably be my top choices. The permithrin is very toxic to cats, so the delta stuff might be my next choice to try out.
Also in the insect world, the bees and hornets are getting active. They always get a little aggressive at this time of year, and this nice weather has them out scouting the south side of the house.
I am still trying to establish where the hornets nests are this year. Some years they are 20 feet up in the trees, some years they are right in the ground. I just haven’t seen that many over the summer, and the usual population around my house hasn’t been obvious yet. My guess is that they are hanging pretty low, I saw two smashed by bears last week along a trail.
When I was out cutting firewood over the weekend I found two more paper wasp nests on the ground. I almost stepped right in one walking through the brush, resulting in a jump-back and some words Mom didn’t teach me. Those two were huge, about the size of a small beach ball. I am not sure if they were built on the ground or blew out of a tree in the high winds last week, but I am now definitely on watch for them when I am out cutting.
I am not afraid of much when I have my chain saw running in my hand, it is a pretty big one. Stepping into a beach ball sized hornet’s nest has moved up to number two behind falling trees and branches.
We have some events this weekend.
2-7 PM – Pig Roast, Liquid Refreshments, Meat Raffle, Hay Rides, Pumpkin Decorating, Craft Sale |
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| October 8-9 | High Falls & Caldron Falls Flowages | 24th Annual Fall Muskie Tournament Entry deadline is at pre-tourney meeting Oct 7th, at 8pm at Renes Dining. Tourney hours: 8am-4pm $60.00 per boat Tournament limited to 50 boats Cash Prizes – Registration forms available@ Popp’s |
I also got word that they will be out brushing trails on the Iron Snowshoe trail system Monday.
Curt posted a question on the bulliten board..
I heard rumor that the Oconto ATV trail/road routes are now connected to the ATV
trails/routes in Marinette County. Can anyone confirm ?
Yes I can. The Town of Lakewood, much to the chagrin of the USFS’s anti-ATV policy, established that many of the roads through the forest are town roads and not forest roads. They opened the town roads up between here and Lakewood/Mountain/Crooked Lake.
The Town of Stephenson recently opened Caldron Falls Road, Ranch Road, Landing 11 Road, and Thunder Mountain Rd to ATVs.
The Town of Silver Cliff opened Landing 11 Rd as far north as C, where it dead ends into the county highway.
The end result is that you can now access a lot of the flowages area and some Marinette County trails and roads. The Ranch Rd route goes to Parkway Inn and north a few places.
Marinette Co has also allowed ATVs on Parkway north (I) as a temporary bypass around some closed hunting land. Hopefully that works out and can happen more often. Those county roads have been a big blocker to a lot of trails that might need a stretch of highway to be complete.
They are still not up to speed on that like Michigan is. When you cross the big bridge on 141 heading into MI, one of the first signs that you see is one explaining that all county roads are open to ATVs and snowmobiles. Maybe someday we will get there.
I think that is about it for now. Have a good weekend and thank you for visiting!
RJB