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Late Spring and Summer banter thread

Damage In Tolland

By Damage In Tolland,
in New England

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dryslot

dryslot

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Ran into a wolf spider while splitting wood yesterday--he settled for a bit on the splitter in the picture.  Scary bugger (no pun intended).  Body was the size of a quarter and fast as hell.

 

Wiz--can you help split some wood?  :)

 

No snakes? They luv woodpiles

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CoastalWx

CoastalWx

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Ehh spiders don't bother me too much. HATE snakes though, with a passion.

Two slithered out from under the lawn mower when I was mowing the lawn, I almost jumped off the mower lol. Hate them

Big black water moccasins like to sun themselves on the pool deck, also not welcome

 

Those might be either black racers or your typical water snake. I don't think we have moccasins here.

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moneypitmike

moneypitmike

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No snakes? They luv woodpiles

 

Didn't see any  snakes.  To be sure, as I split logs, I always give them a roll to be sure all is clear of any worrisome insect, reptile, or mammal.  I'm pulling from a pile of 5-15" diameter logs so I'm keeping my eyes peeled for anything smaller than a fox.  I figure they would have hightailed it out, but I continue to be worried that a skunk might be cowering somewhere in a nook someplace ready to unload.

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dryslot

dryslot

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Didn't see any  snakes.  To be sure, as I split logs, I always give them a roll to be sure all is clear of any worrisome insect, reptile, or mammal.  I'm pulling from a pile of 5-15" diameter logs so I'm keeping my eyes peeled for anything smaller than a fox.  I figure they would have hightailed it out, but I continue to be worried that a skunk might be cowering somewhere in a nook someplace ready to unload.

 

lol, I would worry also...

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tamarack

tamarack

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Didn't see any  snakes.  To be sure, as I split logs, I always give them a roll to be sure all is clear of any worrisome insect, reptile, or mammal.  I'm pulling from a pile of 5-15" diameter logs so I'm keeping my eyes peeled for anything smaller than a fox.  I figure they would have hightailed it out, but I continue to be worried that a skunk might be cowering somewhere in a nook someplace ready to unload.

 

My chief concern when moving wood that's been piled for some weeks is that wasps/yellowjackets have set up housekeeping there.  It's bad enough the at the yellowjackets are drawn to frshly split wood - always half a dozen or so buzzing about the pile as I toss more pieces onto it, though I've yet to be stung that way.

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TauntonBlizzard2013

TauntonBlizzard2013

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I saw a racer before. Those things look menacing, but they're really harmless. The only really venomous snakes we have are scattered in the Blue Hills. Just rattlers.

 

yeah, i just did a bit of research and pretty much all the snakes around here are harmless, except for the ones you just mentioned in the blue hills.

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tamarack

tamarack

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The last timber rattlers were extirpated from Maine about a century ago, and there are apparently no venomous snakes in the wild at present, unless some collector/pet owner were to turn one loose. Probably 95% of slitherers in my area are garter snakes, which are common and indeed love woodpiles, with the odd milk snake noted.

In my 20+ years in NNJ, I probably looked into a couple dozen "copperhead" sightings. Most were water snakes with new skin, some were bull snakes. Only three times were they genuine (and none alive when I saw them), all in the hot dry summer of 1966 when drought brought them down off the cliffs.

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dryslot

dryslot

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The last timber rattlers were extirpated from Maine about a century ago, and there are apparently no venomous snakes in the wild at present, unless some collector/pet owner were to turn one loose. Probably 95% of slitherers in my area are garter snakes, which are common and indeed love woodpiles, with the odd milk snake noted.

In my 20+ years in NNJ, I probably looked into a couple dozen "copperhead" sightings. Most were water snakes with new skin, some were bull snakes. Only three times were they genuine (and none alive when I saw them), all in the hot dry summer of 1966 when drought brought them down off the cliffs.

 

Yes, Have seen plenty of them over the years and use to scare the girls chasing them down with one growing up...............lol

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tamarack

tamarack

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Bad news for sure, and you're taking the right course, IMO.  I hope it's as correctable (or moreso) as my experience early in 2011.  My cordination and function began to deteriorate in late Feb, and within a month I found it very difficult to walk on uneven terrain, and my shoe-tying skill had regressed to that of a 4-yr-old.  An MRI revealed spinal stenosis at C-4 due to a herniated disc, and my PCP added that one wrong landing from a simple fall could mean quadriplegia.  The neurosurgeon to whom he referred me added that the site was probably high enough that breathing would also be affected.  He also said he had an opening the next afternoon in which he could perform fusion surgery, and "I highly recommend that you take it."  Sold!!  He cautioned that while the surgery was essentially 100% successful at halting further degradation, only about half the patients with this condition and resulting nerve damage gained back significant function, though he felt confident I'd be in that half.  He said that the trigger for the herniation probably occurred years before, and that my spinal cord had "hidden" in the channel but had finally run out of room.  Thirty years before, I was in a pickup that ran head-on into a fully loaded logging truck (2 tons vs 70, +25 mph to -20 in a fraction fo a second) and I think that may have begun the process.

 

My operation was two-level fusion, with the front of C-4 removed along with the discs above and below, and a piece of cadaver bone (they used to take it from patient's hip, which meant ++pain and no better outcome) put in place between C-3 and C-5, then anchored with a plate and four screws.  (Trivia:  Same location as Peyton's surgery, though his was one level. Thus the only significant difference between us was 30 yr and $100 million.)  Surgery was Friday afternoon, and by luchtime Saturday I could feel an increase in function, enough so I was allowed to go home that afternoon.  Post-op I feel that I've regained about 80% of the lost strength but only about 60% of coordination, so I need to be careful when bushwhacking thru the woods.  That recovery occurred over a 6-9 month period, as is the usual.  The plate/screws were proven to be strong, as 8 months post-op I tripped over a log while rapidly walking downhill in the woods and did a solid faceplant that produced a neck stinger.  Some residual stiff neck pains on occasion, which I'm confident are related only to the fall and not to the previous issue.

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