Arachnid Terror

I’m down in Florida for a quick repair holiday – problems with the water pump – which turned out to be simple – it fixed itself. When I left last time, I brought the trash out to the shed before I left and I heard water running. It’s 4 AM and I’m up to get stuff ready for the airport and shutting down the house. So I rush back in and get a flashlight to see where the leak is and it is the big tank where the water from the submersible pump is sprayed to get rid of the smelly gases – it’s overflowing like a waterfall over the entire top. I try finding the fuse for the pump but don’t succeed so I just turn off the main supply valve shutting off all the house water and the big tank and said I’ll worry about it on the next trip. I figured it would be float valve inside the tank and that I’d just have to replace it.  Well this is the next trip and I open up the top of the big spray tank and find the float valve and move it a couple of times and all seems OK so I open the main valve and let water fill it back up – the spray arm starts turning around and the float starts to rise and shut off the water. The float arm seems to be hitting the support for the spray and is stopping it from shutting off the water completely – a little adjustment with a pair of pliers and it seems to fix the problem – it couldn’t be that simple could it – only time will tell.

So before I start my landscaping jobs, I walk around and enjoy all the new flowers – there’s Polly Hibiscus

Another pretty yellow one – in fact all the hibiscuses have flowers on them – too bad they only last a day.

These are Maui Ixias (or something like that) that we planted.

So everything looks OK – except what is this weaving a web in the corner of the pool screen house

It’ the biggest spider I’ve ever seen - a good 4 inches across

Just in this one corner there are two big ones and a half a dozen small ones.

And they aren’t alone; they have mates everywhere with huge webs across every walkway and every tree. The spider usually anchors one end of its web to the ground and the other to a tree so the webs could be 10 to 15 foot tall – and now comes the terror – I have to mow all the lawns and paths – spiders everywhere – webs being torn down by the tractor if I’m lucky or by my head if I’m not too lucky. After every bout of mowing, I strip down, shake out my cloths and jump in the pool and yes there is usually a floating spider after I’m done. Look on the good side – I guess they aren’t poisonous since I’m able to write this – ugh that was some tough mowing.

Florida in July

I took four grandchildren and a daughter–in-law to Florida for one week in the middle of July. The idea sounded great – we’d do some swimming in the pool, go to Busch Garden for rides, go to a water park and to the beach. And that’s what we did except the effective air temperature when you added the humidity was always over 100 and hit a high of 113 degrees. The kids didn’t seem to mind it but it sure sapped the energy out of me.

The pool was a great hit. They swam in it during the day and the hit was a night swim with the underwater lights on

I mentioned that it was humid and with the humidity came rain. This is our car parking area flooded. I took the garden tractor out to mow the lawns and got stuck in the back yard. Everyone had to come help push it out.

But they liked the pool.

This is one ride at Busch Gardens – they all seemed to have 30 – 60 minute waits – But Wendy and Kylie went on them all. Can you pick out Wendy and Kylie's feet - they are in one of those cars.

This is the peak of the summer and everything was in bloom. These are the Mexican Blue Bells.

This is a Bromeliad – just blooms once a year.

The Cactus we bought at a yard sale, a couple of years ago, was only a foot tall then. Now it has grown so much it collapsed. I replanted the two pieces that broke off – look on the bright side – now we have three cacti.

Several of the Citrus trees have fruit which will be ripening when we get down there in the fall.

The Citrus also have a problem called Citrus Leaf Miners. It’s a moth that lays its eggs on the new growth and as larva that eat the inside of the Citrus leaves. Got a spray and have now treated them – the heck with organic gardening.

When I was out pruning and spraying the citrus, I must have stepped in a red ant nest. They hurt when they bite but worst is the itching for the next week.

The bananas trees just keep on growing.

Oh, did I mention the kids liked the pool.

More Parking

The next door neighbor has put her property up for sale. There was a small wedge of land in between us that somebody else owned. Seeing that my neighbor had property across the street (not on the lake) and the buyer of her property might break that off and sell it and the little wedge of land could be used to provide lake access for that property - well you can see where I'm heading - to avoid anybody doing that we bought the little wedge of land. One of the first things we did was to increase the parking area next to our cottage. We got the guy who originally put in our tar and stone driveway to do the addition. He started in April saying he would have it done in a week. Two months later they come back to finish the job.

I gathered up every rock on the property and build this little retaining wall - I'm not proud of it but it serves its purpose.

They also dug a trench across the original driveway so we could run a wire for the invisible dog fence for Amy's dogs.

They put two layers of tar and stone in

and roll it in between each layer

Here it is all finished and it has room for three cars.

Now I mentioned that it was over two months ago that they started. At about the same time I had a guy come in and measure for a new glass shower enclosure that he said was going to take two weeks to get and I've been calling them for the last 10 weeks to see what was holding them up. So on the same day that the driveway guys were here doing the paving, who shows up but the shower enclosure guy - both late by 10 to 12 weeks and they show up on the same day.

Anyway the shower looks good especially when Polly is in it.

The Rope Swing

Dan and family were up the other week and he helped me put up a rope swing. I initially planned to use the boulders next to the lake for the take-off but we found, if you jumped from the upper boulder, the rope would swing downwards and would crash you into the lower boulder. So to fix that I built a platform off the upper boulder that gave you enough height to miss the lower one.

To do that I had to attach a 2x10 to two trees.

The 12 foot long beam was too heavy for me to hold in place so I rigged a rope to hold it.

I clamped it while I drilled and lag bolted it to the trees. Broke two bolts trying to get the 7" long lag bolts in - no problem except I had to run to Home depot each time to buy another.

But here it is all done. Nice view and it is high.

I also built a chicken plank and handrail to make getting out of the water a little easier.

I rigged up an old crab net to make a hook to catch the rope and pull it up to the platform.

I tried it and found that you had to hold your feet up so they didn't hit the water on the out swing and slow you down. I thought I was doing pretty good until Kylie and Bowen came up to use it - boy did they get some distance.

Kylie used it so much she got blisters on her hands.

Bowen got good distance too.

And had some great water entries. He got a 9.5 for this one.

Flowers, Flowers, Everywhere

Despite the heat, humidity and bugs, I went out and weeded all the flower beds. Here’s a typical batch of weeds growing up through the stones.

The plants just love the rain and heat – everything that flowers is flowering. Here’s my best shot. It’s a Firebush with a Zebra Butterfly coming in for a sip.

Polly brought down a Hibiscus from Connecticut and this is the second time it bloomed this year. In a mater of two days and the flower will be gone.

Here’s another Hibiscus that was planted by the previous owner and it’s the first time I’ve seen it bloom. Also notice that its leaves are variegated – Never seen that before on a Hibiscus, in fact, I didn't know it was a Hibiscus until it bloomed.

Two years ago, at a yard sale, we bought this little cactus that looked like Mickey Mouse – look at the size of it now. That yellow flowered bush beside it is a Thyallis.

We dug up these Mexican Bluebells out of the woods and planted them along one side of the pool – they have really taken to their new home.

This was planted by the previous owner – I think it’s some type of Jasmine or at least it smells like one.

We transplanted this Peace Lily from a sunny location to this more shaded one and it is showing its appreciation.

The Walking Iris is so named because after it blooms the seed pod still on the stem falls over and starts growing a new plant – thus it seems to be walking – they bloom throughout the year whenever they get enough water.

Here’s a bunch more flowers in bloom but I’m not sure of their names.