Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Of Water and Worms

“A three year old child is a being who gets almost as much fun out of a fifty-six dollar set of swings as it does out of finding a small green worm.” - Bill Vaughn

It finally stopped raining just before dark yesterday. Thank HEAVENS. I hadn't been out at all over the weekend, but ventured out yesterday to go to the library. It was an adventure.

You see, from my house, there are two routes to get to the library (unless I want to go WAY around, which I almost thought I was going to have to do yesterday). One of those routes floods if there is high humidity, so they typically detour us around to the other one.

Yesterday, someone idiot hit-and-run truck driver tried to make the turn off a side road onto the alternate route, was too big and sheared a utility pole, causing it to fall and causing the road to close for pretty much the entire day. So we had to drive through the lake instead.

It's times like that I wish I was driving my 4Runner again -- I would have liked just a little more clearance. DD thought it was an adventure.

Hopefully now that the rain has stopped, things will settle down a bit. But I hope they catch the guy who hit the pole.

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DD had a science experiment assigned to her last fall: an invertebrate zoo. I told her we were NOT keeping an invertebrate zoo all winter ... they suggested spiders and other bugs that, while I don't hate them, I have little desire to keep as pets.

We compromised on earthworms. The problem was, of course, that our ground freezes here so if we kept worms, we'd have to keep them ALL winter. So, we prepared a huge glass jar, wrapped it with a dark towel (that could be lifted to see the worms and worm tracks) and studied up on how to keep the critters alive. And then, after every rainstorm in October, we gathered worms from the road.

The strangest occurrence happened when we used the last of our firewood in February. The bottom pieces had frozen to the driveway pavement and I had to hit them with the maul to loosen them -- and underneath one of them were a PILE of worms! I was so surprised to find them there, alive under the frozen wood. Thankfully we had a new house for them and added them to our jar.

Every couple of weeks when I made dog food, I minced up bits of vegetables to add to the jar for their food, and about every month or so, I microwaved an egg shell and crushed it (worms need calcium... who knew?). Every couple of months, I dumped out the dirt into a huge bowl and we sifted through it to count the worms.

All things considered, we did very well. We lost a few worms, but gained several babies (wow are they TINY). And now that the ground is thawing (and once it's not quite so muddy) we're going to put them out into our garden.

DD is sad. She wants to keep them inside forever.

What's the strangest thing you ever raised?

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You Scored an A



You got 10/10 questions correct.



It's pretty obvious that you don't make basic grammatical errors.

If anything, you're annoyed when people make simple mistakes on their blogs.

As far as people with bad grammar go, you know they're only human.

And it's humanity and its current condition that truly disturb you sometimes.



Actually, bad grammar drives me a little crazy...

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8 comments:

Ceri Hebert said...

I can't believe the idiot didn't even stop after knocking down a pole! As if you needed more of a mess! It was so nice to be able to go out last night and actually walk the dog.

Earthworms are much much better than spiders, in my opinion. Very cool experiment. I've "raised" tadpoles before from egg to the growth of legs then they were set free.

LASR Admin said...

I once thought to try vermiculture.
Bought books and all that because the soil that they have produced is AWESOME for starting seedlings and for fertilizing gardens. It's the best and if you try to buy it commercially, it's wicked expensive.
Congrats on a great experiement. Did you save the dirt in the jar for your seeds?

And bummer on the idiot driver. Hope they do find him.

Dru said...

I hope there is a way to track the driver and make him pay for the damage.

I did raise a spider but alas it died a week later.

re quiz: You Scored an A
You got 10/10 questions correct.


Have a great Tuesday.

Long and Short Reviews said...

Bad grammar drives you more than a little crazy... just sayin'

MomJane said...

I am really glad your rain has finally stopped. I worked in the garden yesterday for an hour and was exhausted. Boy am I out of shape.

Maria Zannini said...

I raised emu and rheas for years, but once I had to nurse a baby rhea in the house for about a month after a hawk grabbed him by the head and nearly scalped him.

We called him Scalp after that.

The baby was about two feet tall and he adapted pretty well for the few weeks he had to live with humans.

Brandy said...

I'm not one for bugs, so your earthworm section made me squirm a little. However, I remember trying to keep a Daddy-longlegs spider as a pet once. (I was about six years old.)
I received an A on my grammar, too.
I hope the sun stays out and they catch the moron who knocked the pole over.

Have a great day!

Tori Lennox said...

If I had to raise insects for a grade, I would just have to FAIL. No way, no how. I hate, loathe and despise bugs. If they stay outside where they belong, I don't mind them as much but there is no way I'd raise them. UGH!!!!

As for the idiot who hit the utility pole, he needs to have a bunch of bugs shoved down his collar. *eg*