My Texas friends, ol’ Deft Stepper and his sidekick Harley, just sent me a cute story about one of those sweet, genteel, elderly Texas ladies that every loves.
One day, a Texas lady of that very description was driving across a high bridge in Bridgeport. As she neared the top of the bridge, she noticed a young man fixin’ to jump. (“fixin” in Texas means: getting ready to take some action.) She stopped her car, rolled down the window and said, “Please don’t jump! Think of your dear mother and father.”
He replied, “My mom and dad are both dead. I’m going to jump.”
She said, “Well, think of your sweet wife and precious children.”
He replied, “I’m not married, and I don’t have any kids.”
She said, “Well, then you just remember the Alamo.”
He replied, ”What’s the Alamo?”
She replied, “Well, bless your little pea pickin’ Texan-imposter heart! You just go ahead and jump .You’re holdin’ up traffic!”
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I noticed the other day that the Kansas deer tags for this fall’s hunting season are available.
I haven’t bought mine yet, but in light of recent happenings in California, I’ve got a question for the licensing folks. Here’s the question:
If I shoot a buck this deer season and I only have tags for a doe, can I claim that the buck really wasn’t a buck?
I mean, maybe he’d always wanted to be a doe, but through no choice of his own, he was born to grow antlers. Yet on the inside, he’d always known he was truly a doe.
I’m just wondering what the answer to that question will be or if the game wardens will buy it this fall? They should. After all, California is known as the bellwether of change in America.
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We’ve had another soggy week in the Flint Hills. Damphewmore
Acres received a short five inches of rain. Thankfully, on one of the cool days between rains, I braved the mud and dug the rest of my spuds and I picked the first cutting of sweet corn.
Next up on the garden-harvest schedule are the first ripe tomatoes and more green beans.
All the wet weather put a stop to all hay baling in the area for a few days.
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I’m getting my chicken flock rebuilt after the recent hen decimation. One old setting hen pulled off the perfect brood — 10 chicks from 10 eggs — a feat that rarely happens.
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I recently received an email with an unusual topic. It’s about using trained rats in Africa to find unexploded land-mines. Everyone’s least favorite rodent has been tasked with cleaning up the lethal leftovers of war — land mines.
Land mines kill thousands of innocent Africans every year, but these rats have been trained to save lives by sniffing out the scent of explosives. The group responsible for training the rodents is the Anti-Personnel Landmines Detection Product Development organization.
Using positive reinforcement like pieces of fruit, these African pouched rats are taught to identify explosives and then alert their handler. They’re perfect for the job – they’re highly intelligent and have a keen sense of smell. They are small enough not to trigger mines, yet large enough to be easily identifiable in the field.
No rat has been killed in a minefield.
The rats and their handlers can clear two hundred square meters in just 20 minutes. It would take humans with metal detectors five days to cover the same area.
Since 2000, the rats have found over 9,000 buried land mines and bombs all across Tanzania and Mozambique. They’ve also found thousands of small arms and ammunitions stashed in the ground.
The rats normally live for up to eight years, but are retired when they turn six. They live out the rest of their days as hero’s, munching on avocados, apples and bananas, and being loved and cared for by their handlers.
Now that’s a strange, but really good, piece of news. But, it raises a question. How long before trained African pouched rats replace German Shepherds and Labrador Retrievers in U.S. airports sniffing out explosives? Or, wonder if we’ll see police officers in all our major urban centers with trained rats on leashes to sniff out all the illegal firearms possessed by criminals and gang members?
Hum-m-m? I wonder if those rats could be trained to sniff out and eat all the unwanted sericea lespedeza growing in our Flint Hills rangeland?
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While on the subject of rats, how about a few words of wisdom about them? Tom Wilson said, “I wouldn’t mind the rat race — if the rats would lose once in a while.” And, Harry E. Fosdick said, “Hating people is like burning down your own house a get rid of a rat.” And, lastly, good ol’ Lilly Tomlin said, “The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you’re still a rat.”
Have a good ‘un and don’t forget to attend the Four State Farm Show near Pittsburg this Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
