Late last year Stew and Félix checked our beehives and were alarmed. One hive was doing great, a second not so well and the third was totally kaput. A few weeks ago they checked again and found two hives buzzing with bees making honey, but the third was still empty.So last week we took off …
Category: Uncategorized
Call me by my (weird) name
At San Miguel's spay-and-neuter campaignsyou can find some peculiar monikersAfter volunteering for spay-and-neuter campaigns or "blitzes" for dogs and cats in San Miguel for eight or nine years, Stew and I have inherited the weigh-in station as our permanent post. After registration, each animal has to be weighed so that the vets down the line …
A Friday the 13th miracle
One way to dinner late yesterday afternoon, barely three hours after uploading my previous post, Stew and I spotted a grayish dog on the opposite side of the road who was panting, exhausted but determinedly trudging somewhere. It was Benji returning home.We called her name, she answered, and I loaded her into the car. She didn't …
A not-so-bad Friday the 13th, after all
This Friday the 13th dawned fully intending, it seemed, to live up to its bad-luck reputation. Benji, one of the stray dogs that live outside our gate—and whom we thought had been adopted—ran away from its new owner and disappeared somewhere in San Miguel late Thursday. We woke up worried that some horrible thing would happen …
Let it rain. Let it . . . Hey, it's raining!
I've always believed in the power of the written word but I had no idea. Since posting my yearly epistle a week ago about the lack of rain, we've had an inch of precipitation over two nights.Late Tuesday afternoon the southeast skies had darkened—auspiciously or ominously depending on one's point of view—and lightning sliced the …
Continue reading Let it rain. Let it . . . Hey, it's raining!
This mellow "fellow" urgently needs a safe haven
To a stranger's eyes the six to nine dogs that gather outside the gate of our ranch likely looks like an indistinct, motley gang. But after you've fed them several years, the differences in their appearance and personalities are unmistakable. Also, we can readily tell if someone's missing. Negro, a big black dog, disappeared for two …
Continue reading This mellow "fellow" urgently needs a safe haven
Let it rain. Let it rain. Let it rain.
Very rapid housing development and dwindling water resources may soon become San Miguel's next challenge Conscious that water is a scarce commodity in this semi-arid part of the world, when we built our house we included three cisterns to collect rainwater from our roofs. The side-by-side cisterns are located in the back of the house, in the space created by …
When is it time to say goodbye to my old cat?
Some time ago, while Stew was lying in bed trying to read, our sixteen-year-old cat Paco sat on his chest to demand his nightly dose of head-rubbing and general coochee-coochee. Paco doesn't quit easily: He'll purr, meow, shove his head against whatever you're reading, climb on your head if all else fails. No point in …
Continue reading When is it time to say goodbye to my old cat?
Trumpophobia: Rare, medium or apoplectic?
Exile in Mexico has a number of advantages, chief among them that you could, theoretically, try to preserve some peace of mind by setting some distance from the jarring avalanche of political news coming from the U.S.Erik Hagerman, was so upset at Donald Trump's election that he swore that he would avoid learning about anything …
Spring arrives early at the ranch and succulents and cacti lead the festivities
The spring solstice won't arrive until Tuesday at 10:15 a.m. but at the ranch we've been enjoying a spring greening since late February, thanks to the succulents, cacti and other xeric plants already blooming even though not a drop of rain is expected for several months.Longer days and warmer temperatures spur this spring hubbub. Shallow-rooted …
Continue reading Spring arrives early at the ranch and succulents and cacti lead the festivities
El Rancho Santa Clara 