Apocalyptic Homesteading (Day 493)

Hello Everyone!

A stormy morning, A peculiar dream, Vine removal, Brush hauling, Grape vine pruning & Black locust plot ideas!

It is a stormy morning here and about to get more so as a large storm system moves through the area over the next few hours. The same storm system just spawned tornadoes in several states and more or less left a trail of destruction behind it so it is one of those ones that I have been watching closely and staying up to date about as it approaches.

I did not sleep in all that late this morning for a 'rain day' and woke up around nine o'clock from a rather bizarre dream about living in some very cold region where there was a very distinct 'hungry bear' problem.

Although I will not detail it all here suffice it to say that it was another post-apocalyptic landscape where there were a smattering of little homesteads, the few folks that lived at them, lots of snow everywhere and yup plenty of hungry bears and some of them were very interested in eating the people and/or their animals.

Unlike many dreams of late parts of that one keep vividly replaying in my mind this morning. The thing that stands out the most (aside from all the bear conflicts/confrontations/encounters) was the scarcity of what folks had available to them in regards to just about everything besides snow!

The bears themselves were I guess what I could call 'not normal' and they had a keen intellect along with an extra thick hide that acted more like armor than merely fur. They were also quite fearsome and the resounding response from most of the folks when encountering an aggressive one was to flee from them, barricade themselves indoors and hope for the best.

One massive bear in particular had been quite problematic to many of the homesteaders and most folks had lost all their livestock, poultry and guardian dogs to it years before my arrival in that icy and unforgiving region. That same bear was riddled with injuries it had received over the years but no one had actually succeeded in either frightening it off or dispatching it entirely.

To say that the critter was a nuisance would be a massive understatement because much like my own species there were not many bears (or anything else) left roaming the face of the earth. In other words it was 'The Nuisance' in that area and although all the folks had somehow managed to survive the apocalypse... very few had survived the bear.

Of course it was a gradual thing that had occurred over decades and not days weeks or months and although animals seldom strike fear in me in dreams... I was so terrified by that critter that when I accidentally came almost face to face with it (lets say ten meters away) I felt a heart stopping fright.

That is until I realized that it had not quite seen me yet and the wind was thankfully blowing towards me! In that moment of dawning realization that I had a second or two to respond I acted. I looked all around while keeping one eye on the bear's head and eventually saw this very tall and kind of rickety looking tower.

Now to get to that wooden tower I would have to run pretty close to the bear but even as I realized that its massive grizzled head began to ever so slowly turn towards me and I dropped all hesitation and frigging bolted for the ladder leading up the first tier of the tower's interior.

It is safe to say that it was a 'mad dash' but by the time the bear figured out what was going on I was a good four meters up the tower and climbing fast! Which was problematic because the higher I went the jankier the structure became and yeah I had to slow down a good bit so I did not break something and fall.

Once I was about twice as high up the ladder I finally saw below me what the bear had been focused on or to put it more aptly what it had been stalking. A few of my dogs had been in a little valley below and the bear had been more or less hiding behind the tower and peaking over the ridge at them and yup the wind was blowing its scent away from the dogs much like how it blew mine away from the bear.

What ensued afterwards is probably the part most etched in my memory (and my mind's eye this morning) and although I will spare you the extreme details I do want to acknowledge that there were many 'extreme details' and most were not very pleasant to say the least or heck even to say the most!

So, at that point in things I had already begun yelling at the bear in an effort to scare it away and while I was doing it I kept having all these memories of stories that I had heard (or somehow been a part of) where folks had used similar tactics and they had not only failed but done so in a very fatal way.

All my yelling did two things though which in hindsight is probably the crux of why I had to spell some of it out but that is another matter entirely. What happened was the bear positioned itself below me on the tower and began pawing at it to see if it could be climbed and off in the valley the dogs had spotted me (and maybe the bear) and were making a beeline towards the tower.

Now it was bad enough that half of what I was grabbing to climb was rotten, poorly fastened or both but at that point the entire structure was wobbling from the heavy pawing the bear was doing to it down below where the ladder did not quite reach the ground... and oh yeah the bear had begun to climb upwards just to make things a wee bit more dodgy!

But in that very moment of seeing those dogs run full tilt towards us my heart sank and again my mind was flooded with all these very clear memories of other instances and other stories... and all of them ending with just the bear walking away. Believe me when I say that I know when I am outmatched and all those memories just re-enforced that but what worried me was the dogs were not going to walk away either.

It was the kind of pit of the stomach realization that I knew that I would never and probably will never be the same afterwards for having had. There is no way that I can adequately describe that feeling but in that moment all hell broke lose below as the dogs arrived and caught the bear on its hind legs with its front paws gripping the ladder.

To say that the bear was in a vulnerable position would not do the hardiness of the bear's nearly armor-like hide justice but it was its under belly that was exposed, and it was at the moment focusing all its attention on lifting itself off the ground... and of course the dogs struck at its most tender of tender spots.

Again I am going to glaze over the details but just about the time the bear realized the dogs were upon it (and upon it in a very sensitive area) and that perhaps it was in actual danger... it shook it off and kept climbing towards me and began shaking the entire structure to the point where semi-rotten boards from above began raining down upon me.

In that moment I cannot rightly say what came over me because I began tearing off boards from the tower and chucking them down at the bear and once I had its full attention by hitting it in the snout a few times... well I drew something (I still do not know what it was) from my waist, leaped from the tower and landed not quite fully astraddle the bear's back.

I actually struck the critter at a pretty good clip but just enough off center that I bounced and slid off the side of the bear where yup I landed flat on my back in what was already quite the fray because the dogs were there chomping at the bear. As I struck the ground and bounced yet again (dropping whatever I was holding) I happened to see someone running towards me carrying exactly what I needed to deal with the bear.

Now I am far from a hero when it comes to a critter fight and will run, walk, crawl, jog away at any opportunity to not be turned into mincemeat or get seriously maimed and the person had what I needed so I scrambled to my feet and bolted in their direction. As I ran the sounds from behind me were changing and yeah my heart dropped further but I kept running.

The person's face told me everything that I needed to know about what was going on behind me by the time I reached them and I did not pause before receiving what they handed me, turning around and running right back into the fray. Lets just say by the time I got close enough to use what I had been given that it was just the bear standing.

I doubt that I will ever forget looking down its grimly gnarled fearsome muzzle as it began turning its full attention on me... just as I used what I was given and after a few halting steps the bear collapsed in a heap with what I can only describe as a sort of 'dawning realization' in its eyes which was a look accentuated by the visible relaxing of its grizzled visage.

Behind me there were more folks who had arrived and we all paused in brief wonder that this fearsome critter that had terrorized so much and so many for so long had been mortally wounded to the point of total collapse. It was truly unfathomable and even though I wanted to discard what I was carrying and run to the dogs... I approached slowly, steadily and with a watchful eye on the now immobile mountain of a form before me.

By the time that I got close enough to see what was going on I was mostly sure the critter had expired from its injuries and finally given up its own haunted ghost of a life where its only habitat was this bitter wasteland where the only life, food and shelter was where all our homesteads were.

I almost felt sorry for the critter before accepting that no it was a menacing terror of a thing and there were plenty of other bears that lived among this sole habitable patch of mostly frozen earth somewhere in time long after the world had changed and resources and habitat had become truly scarce... that were not terrors.

Understanding aside... I made sure the bear was dead before kneeling down and turning my back to it and putting my full attention on the dogs. Who definitely needed it but in short order folks had moved in to assist me and other folks began dressing down the bear and remarking upon how an entire generation would now survive another passing of time and the latest rationing could end... and so forth and so on.

We then began ushering the dogs indoors and on the way we encountered another bear around half the first one's size and although it was keenly interested in the scent of what we were carrying between us on makeshift litters... it was more interested in what the other folks were doing with the larger bear not all that far away.

This bear had a very different demeanor altogether and was often a welcome sight and even children were not afraid of it because it would often frighten other bears away from folks gardens and homes. It (and a few other bears) would perform tasks like rolling small boulders around for the 'treat' of wallering around in the big compost heaps.

That by the way nearly every homestead had and it saved the folks (myself included) from having to till and turn the often enormous compost that provided us with all our soil. The dynamics of it all were pretty astounding even for a dream but long story short this particular bear just ambled off the trail and into the bush with an almost pleased gait about the way it padded silently away.

There was assuredly more to the dream after all of that but for some reason I felt compelled to spell that portion of it out this morning and it is rapidly approaching noon! I guess long story short here, that dream has been echoing through my mind like crazy and I am glad that I took the time to spell some of it out in a coherent way.

As with most dreams there are always so many overlapping layers of detail that it is way too difficult to navigate all the micro-nuances of the various relations of one feeling, thought, environmental variable or another (or whatever) from another and detail it all out into the written word in a cohesive fashion.

I try not to read too much into it and put it forth in as simple of a consistent perspective as possible... but dreams are never that simple and I am merely human... so I am okay with the simplicity of not complicating it in a way that would impede me from sharing it. I guess that it could be said that I write it with the same grain of proverbial salt that I would read it (or anything) with.

Anyway, the weather took a plunge as expected and it has been raining on and off a good bit and there was a small thunderstorm that occurred just before dawn. The wind is pretty fierce and everywhere there are dark thunderheads but also blue skies and weird looking pinkish clouds so who knows what the day will bring.

Thus far this morning I have only gone on a short hike but did not see a lot of downed tree limbs or anything so that is nice because I am hoping to just do my routine chores today and maybe a few other things (if this storm blows over) and do not want to get off on a side quest of picking up branches and/or removing fallen trees from the roads or trails.

For now the storm seems to have broken and I am heavily leaning towards getting outdoors and working on something. I keep having these half-baked ideas of connecting a worm box directly to the chicken coop and having a chute that I could open between the two structures that gives the chickens access to the worms. Its still a very roughly thought out idea but I like where it is going and will continue exploring it.

Since it is too damp out for brush removal I might go ahead and figure out a better place for those black locust saplings that survived the winter. I am still up in the air on where to put them but it has to be super sunny because I want them to put on a meter or more of growth this year.

The thing is that with those three trees planted in the right conditions I could easily make a few more trees from them just from root suckers. It would not take all that long to create a small grove of them in that manner but once those root sucker saplings start popping up I want to be able to dig them up easily because they are rather fragile.

To achieve this without using pots I am considering making a large raised bed for them in the dog yard or even digging out a small area (say a few meters wide) where I can plant them. Doing so will make it much easier to transplant them than trying to dig them out of clay or other densely packed soils.

Once they get established they can really pop up a lot of new trees so it is worth doing it well and protecting the area with a fence until they get too tall for the chickens to pose a threat to them. Plus I have been thinking to wrap the trunks in yellow jasmine vines once the trees are a meter tall to shade them against the locust borer beetles destructive attention.

Like I have said before the yellow jasmine is toxic stuff so either way I want to keep it away from the dogs, chickens and even myself if I can help it given what all that sap did to me the other week. That being said, they will definitely work much better than the Japanese honeysuckle, wisteria and wild grape vines that I have done it with before so that is good.

Anyway, I should stop writing for the time being and get the work clothes on and see what I can achieve with the day now that things are clearing up and there is even a wee bit of sunshine. Whatever I do I have to do it before more storms approach later in the day and the wind picks up again.

Thankfully it is warm outside because if it was cold it would be downright dreary and twice as much so because I would be cooped up indoors. In short it is more about being able to do the stuff that I want to do (when feeling cooped up) and even halfway decent weather days like this one become all too appealing to utilize to their fullest.

I seldom even care if I get much done as long as I get something done aside from my routine chores which yeah are so hyper-monotonous that I am amazed that I continue to mention them in these entries. Some days are best spent just ambling around, looking things over and plotting the course for the days of work ahead.

I dunno there is something (for me) to mentally going through the motions of things, the steps involved, doing an amount of 'clearing the paths' (which is always necessary it seems) and more or less preparing for the actual physical work to be as efficient as possible. That just always seems like time well spent which humorously is how I spend all my outdoor time that I am not physically working on stuff so go figure!

Alright, the sun set not all that long ago so I guess that it is time to do the nightly writing portion of things and work on getting this entry finished. I awoke from a nap just before sundown so once again I at least do not have to struggle against fatigue to do the writing and editing which is always much better than the alternative.

Lets see here, early in the afternoon I got outdoors and took my hand-held pruners to that area below the dog yard where I have been working and trimmed back all the remaining vines off of the fruit trees located there. All of those little trees have started to shoot out greenery and once all the vines were gone I have to admit they are looking way better than they did last year.

I also finally cut the remaining large grape vines that were growing on the trees near that big mound of brush where the trellis is located. Those vines I cut off as high as I could reach and then wove the remaining sections onto the trellis or onto the brush mound itself so all the new growth should occur in those places now.

Once I was done doing all of that stuff (and some brush hauling) I was surprised that several hours had passed. Feeling a bit in need of a break I decided to get indoors without delay because the wind was picking up and another storm was blowing in... as expected.

By that time of the day I was feeling quite hungry but am proud of myself for my restraint on not gorging on my newly acquired groceries even though I did eat a relatively large meal. That particular meal knocked me out though and I spent the remainder of the afternoon napping.

At just one day into being stocked up on groceries I can already tell a massive difference in my overall mood and stress levels. There is something incredibly nice about having a full refrigerator and freezer (yeah they are both stuffed at the moment) and also having enough in the 'emergency larder' that I can set aside my food-insecurity thoughts and feelings for the immediate future.

Anyway, the day was much more productive than I thought that it was going to be but I never got any further on my worm farm idea nor did I do any brush clearing on the north side of the dog yard. I am sure that I will get to that stuff eventually and on such a weird weather day I am glad to have gotten done the stuff that I did.

Well, I am going to wrap this entry up and get on with the editing. It seems like no matter what I do I can never quite get these entries finished before late at night but at least I am still staying on a consistent posting routine and not slacking off even though I occasionally want to! I hope that everyone is doing well and has a nice day/night.