Some Angels Don't Have Wings

When we go out on our daily walk, our happy rescue dog, Sienna, has to be kept on a relatively short leash because she eats everything, and I do mean everything. She is sneaky about this. Unless we keep our eyes on her at all times, she snarfs up doggy delicacies. Her favorite is small cones from the pine trees which grow around here. Second on her list are grass clumps that fall off lawn mowers and dry in the sun.

But there are sometimes other things, unknown things, and therein lies the problem.

Most of the treasures she eats don't harm her overall digestive health, but, alas, sometimes they do. On one occasion recently, she began - how can I say this delicately - running at both ends. She obviously didn't feel well; she wasn't hungry even for her dinner and was drinking a lot of water. She at least knew not to get dehydrated.

We waited one day to see if the situation wouldn't get better on its own. It didn't. In fact, she seemed to be worse. So Ed made an appointment with our vet, a great, tall bear of a guy with a heart to match.

He heard the symptoms, listened to her heart, looked in her ears, and did all the other things that an examination of the sick might require, all while squatting down at her level and finally said, "Sienna, did you eat a bad lizard?"  (Well, that definitely was a possibility, as our island is overrun with what are called "a-NO-lees." And these are known to make cats sick. Dogs, I'd never heard. We didn't see Sienna eat such a thing, but I suppose she could have, when we weren't looking.)

After checking a stool sample and finding no parasites, the vet prescribed a medication for each end of Sienna and an antibiotic, just in case. Then he squatted down at her level again, and she wagged her tail and nuzzled up close so he could pet her and love her and tell her everything was going to be okay. Then, in a soft voice, he asked her, "Will you forgive me for taking your temperature?"

It's wrenching when your baby gets sick, and thank heavens there are angels to help.

Not Your Mother's Fruitcake

I have just made eight fruitcakes to give as holiday gifts, and I wanted to share the recipe, which is different, probably, from anything you've ever tasted and so delicious. No marinating the cakes in booze for weeks. No heavy molasses taste.

A friend, who always writes a newsy run-down of her family's activities for the year, included the recipe, which I read and immediately said, "Wow, that's for me."

(So much easier than the cookies I used to make.)

Here goes:

2 cups sugar                                        1 tsp. soda

1 cup butter, softened                         1 tsp. vanilla

4 eggs                                                  2 cups chopped dates

3 1/2 cups flour                                   2 cups chopped nuts (I used walnuts.)

1/2 cup buttermilk

1 tsp.baking powder

14 oz. pkg. flaked coconut

1# candy orange slices (chopped)

1 cup red and green candied cherries (chopped)

Cream sugar and butter. Add eggs and mix well. Add remaining ingredients and blend. (I blended the "wet" ingredients with a mixer, then added the fruits and nuts and continued mixing with my hands.) Spoon the thick batter into greased and floured loaf pans Aluminum throw-aways are good. Alternatively, you could use one bundt pan. Bake at 250 degrees for 2-3 hours - less time if using loaf pans, more for a single bundt pan. The cakes are done when a toothpick comes out clean and the top is brown. My oven took 2 hours 20 minutes for four loaf pans.

Where in the World is Montserrat?

Right now, I'm reading page proofs for my book Goat Water Is Not What You Think: The Montserrat Island Life of Two Hoosiers and the Volcano That Ended It. The publication date will be sometime in the early spring of 2014! 

Several people have asked me where the island of Montserrat is located. Although it is relatively unknown as a vacation destination and sometimes is omitted altogether from maps of the Caribbean, Montserrat lies 27 miles southwest of Antigua, which is a well-known cruise ship stop-off. St. Kitts is about the same distance to the northwest. On a clear day, both can be seen from Montserrat.

All three of the above-mentioned islands are part of a long chain extending from Puerto Rico in the north and continuing south to the coast of Venezuela. A lot of these islands are ports of call for winter-weary North Americans.

Most Caribbean islands were formed by volcanic activity, either long since ended or at least quiet for now. A volcano on Montserrat, unfortunately, came to life in 1995 and over the intervening years has destroyed the southern two-thirds of the island. That substantial chunk of Montserrat remains a "no go zone."

Montserrat's volcano

How long will it remain so? Will it never be inhabited again? You can never say never, I suppose. This past summer, we visited Pompeii, which is in southern Italy near Naples and Sorrento. Over the years, people have moved back into the shadow of Mt. Vesuvius, which erupted and destroyed Pompeii and Herculaneum in 79 AD. Its last eruption was in 1944, but another "Big One" is expected.     

An October-November Surprise

It is fall in southwest Florida, which means that a few trees, like the bald cypress and the frangipani, are losing their needles/leaves and will remain naked all winter. They are in the minority, however, and most gardens remain green, which is one reason snowbirds like to congregate here. It isn't only the warm breezes and the blue skies that attract them.

We have another deciduous plant that also loses its leaves, but follows that phase almost immediately with extravagant blooms, all the better to ward off our version of winter. These flowers, in various shades of pink, will stay on the trees almost until it's time to leaf out again. Called the silk floss tree, this fall stunner is a relative of the kapok.

Next spring, the silk floss tree will sport, along with its new leaves, avocado-size pods containing silky threads, but they are not as good as kapok for stuffing. The silk floss tree has a couple of other strange characteristics. The trunk is bulbous at the bottom and is covered with nasty-looking thorns.

A similar, but unrelated, tree on St. John in the Virgin Islands is called the "monkey no climb tree."

After a Long Summer

I know I've not been blogging for a long time, and here is the reason: I have spent the last five months completely rewriting a book I've written - with the working title of Goat Water Is Not What You Think: The Montserrat life of two Hoosiers and the volcano that ended it.

The book will be out in the first half of 1914! I finished the fifth run-through of the manuscript Saturday and sent it off to the publisher. Next, I will help select what photos will be included, help with the cover design, go through the manuscript for errors, and help plan how the book will be marketed. I'll have a lot of work to do between now and publication day.

As you can imagine, this is a very exciting time for me.

Back in the early 1960s, I wrote a novel, which was turned down by about 25 publishers before I shelved it. I haven't looked at it since, but I can imagine it is really terrible -although I received several hopeful rejection letters. Later in the 1960s, I wrote a short book about our experiences in the U.S. Army; it too failed to find a publisher.

But I am not one to quit; I thought our lives on the island of Montserrat - including the build-up to the volcano - were so interesting I wanted to share what happened to us. From time to time between now and the Spring, I'll share some snippets of the Montserrat years with you.

I hope you are all well and happy!

Carol

No Palm Trees

In Indiana, we got no palm trees. We got no alligators. We got no "no see'ums." We got no osprey. We got no hibiscus. Well, then, what do we got?

Mustard or Catsup?

We got the "wienermobile." The famous vehicle travels around the country advertising the Oscar Mayer wiener, which is part of a line of meats that originated in Chicago more than 100 years ago. The yellow and orange wienermobile was in Indianapolis for festivities before and during the 500-mile race, which was last Sunday. In fact, the wienermobile's driver was staying in the same extended-stay motel we are.

What else do we got? We got this bunny, which has been living in the daylily patch just outside a nearby door. As it rained all day today - a bummer - the cotton tail hid herself away to stay dry. But at dinner time, she came out of hiding for a photo op.

Visiting friends in the area where Ed and I were born and grew up makes up for all the rain we've been having. Sienna, our rescue dog, is having a wonderful time, too. She especially loves the green grass and the chance to watch Canada Geese flying over and honking at each other.

Indiana is different from our home in Florida, that's for sure. But we have fun either place.

  

From There to Here

I haven't posted here for quite a while because we've been on the road. Let me explain: Every May we pack up our car with necessities, to include the dog crate, a stapler, scissors, file folders, laptop computers and, oh yes, some clothes, and drive 1,200 miles from our home in Florida to our temporary home in Indiana. That's where we were born, and that's where many of our friends still live.

We spend two months in Indiana, mostly visiting some of those friends. On many days, we meet somebody for lunch and somebody else for dinner. In addition, my husband plays clarinet in an "Old Geezers" band and takes private clarinet lessons. He's trying to unlearn some of the bad habits he learned back when he was in college!

As for me, I am editing a memoir I've written about our four-year experience living on a Caribbean island. The last year we spent the winter there, we watched as a volcano worked up to an eruption, or, I should say, a series of eruptions, which continue even today. In 1997, our house was incinerated by a pyroclastic flow of hot rocks and gases, and that was the end of that.

In Indianapolis, we stay in a little suite in an extended-stay motel. This is our fourth year here, and members of the staff call us by name when we walk in the door. The staff, including the women who clean and replenish the towels, the desk clerks and the maintenance engineers, have almost all stayed the same, attesting to the caliber of management.

Just like home 

The bromeliad in this picture - so reminiscent of our home in Florida - was given to us by the staff as a welcome gift.   

Taste of Florida

Anybody who has lived in Florida for a while becomes an expert on which restaurant serves the best key lime pie - unless other fruit pies or chocolate are preferred. Some fillings are too tart, or not tart enough, and some crusts lack mama's touch.

In weaker moments, we have been known to order a lunch-size salad for dinner to allow room for a key lime pie dessert.

The fruit of which I speak is only 1-2 inches in diameter, so it takes a fair number to make a pie, if you're doing this at home. When key limes are ripe, they are yellow, but the ones you buy in a bag at the grocery are green.

Although it is associated with the Florida Keys, a key lime tree can be grown quite well in southwest Florida. In fact, we had a tree until citrus canker broke out, and the Florida government, supposedly to protect citrus farmers, unilaterally cut down all citrus trees within 1,500 feet of one with the disease. As a result, while we were on vacation up north, nearly all the citrus trees on our street were cut down, including ours. When we returned, we couldn't even see where our trees had been.

Later, it was determined that canker was spread on the wind - especially when Hurricane Charley roared through in 2004.

Add whipped topping on top if you wish

But never mind all that. You can make something that approximates the taste of a restaurant or bakery key lime pie without needing to squeeze those tiny fruits. Here's a recipe:

Key Lime Pie

1 can (6 ounce) frozen lime juice concentrate, thawed

1 can sweetened condensed milk

1 container whipped topping (9 ounce)

3/4 cup sour cream

graham cracker crust of your choosing

Mix all ingredients until blended. Pour into crust and refrigerate at least six hours.

Around the Yard

Our "tree man" is coming tomorrow to prune our neighbors' mahogany trees and our carambola (starfruit), so I took a walk around our yard to see what else needs to be attended to.

While I was making notes, I also looked for the oddities which make Florida such a fun place to live. Here are two I found:

Epiphyte

This epiphyte or air plant has attached itself to our carambola tree. It is one of many varieties that can be found in warm and humid places; in the United States, that means the South. An air plant is not a parasite because it doesn't feed off the tree or bush host, but just finds a convenient place to live and grow and settles in. I've even seen epiphytes clutching telephone wires high above the ground. They are cousins to orchids and bromeliads.

Soaking up the sun on the trunk of a Christmas palm in our front yard was this nymph of an eastern lubber grasshopper. It is quite spectacular looking with its bright yellow stripes, and in addition to its menacing look, it hisses to discourage predators. The adult grasshopper can be orange or red or yellow or even black and can be as big as three inches long. The eastern lubber, too, is common in the South. In its black phase, it is sometimes called "Devil's Horse" or "Diablo." 

Eastern Lubber Grasshopper

We're going to ask the tree man to trim the bougainvillea, which is threatening to brush against the screened porch, and the white bird of paradise, which is touching the eaves in a front corner of the house. We have managed to control the size of everything else over the winter when there was little rain.

The rainy season in southwest Florida starts June 1, and that means showers, often with lightning and thunder, can be expected nearly every afternoon. In winter, our grass needs cutting only about once a month because of the lack of rain. We don't have a sprinkler system, and neither do most of the neighbors where we live. In summer, our grass may need cutting every five days.

If you leave town for even a week or two in the summer, you will be amazed at the growth of everything while you were away.

The End of "Season"

Easter and Passover are over, so, in Florida, it's time for snowbirds to head north to pay their taxes and to check in on the grandchildren. They are leaving our area in droves, making Interstate 75 a jammed-up mess of gargantuan motorhomes, sedans and vans with clothing on racks and the usual semi-tractor trailers.

Many of the motorhomes that are driven down from Michigan and Oho - or purchased in Florida - cost way over $100,000 when new, and drivers, when heading north, often have a car hitched to the back or an additional trailer, which was used for belongings that wouldn't fit into the motorhome. These may be the same people who rent storage units up north for their extra "stuff." Of course, a lot of snowbirds rent or own houses or condos in Florida. Motels and hotels do a brisk business, too.

Gone

Gone

Gone

This mass exodus has caused an interesting problem for one of our island's social service agencies. Through the one in which I volunteer, clients can borrow mobility aids at no charge and for as long as they are needed - to include canes, walkers with seats and without, crutches and wheelchairs. We also lend bedside potty chairs and shower seats, which are in high demand.

It may surprise northerners, but a lot of people come down and have their knees, hips and shoulders replaced while they're relaxing in the sun. That's because the doctors in Florida do so many of these "procedures" in any given six-month period they must know what they're doing.

Come April 1, the mobility aids that have been loaned out during the winter come back, and our equipment team is kept busy meeting clients at our storage unit or making pick-ups.

The food pantry, which depends on donations of money and cans during "season," asks people going north to bring left-over non-perishables to fill the shelves.The need is just as great, if not more so, in the summer when prospective donors are gone.

Those of us who live here most of the year love it when the roads are less crowded and restaurants don't have lines snaking out the door. Most of the eateries don't take reservations, making going out for dinner an unpleasant event during "season," especially on Friday nights, when it seems everyone wants to escape the kitchen. That applies, even, to those who hardly ever cook.

Departures are bitter sweet. In our church, for example, half the congregation disappears until about October when they come trickling back. We miss our friends. In addition to the lack of their camaraderie, departure can also mean a shrinking of the Sunday-morning "take," unless some constant fund-raising goes on. The minister's salary and the light and air conditioning bills have to be paid, no matter what.

We in southwest Florida are dependent on tourism. Businesses in the area take a terrible hit in the summer, and many go under because they didn't make enough money during "season" to tide them over. The restaurant we grew to like during "season" may not be there come fall.

In the meantime, we are enjoying the quiet and wishing the afternoon summer rains would come.    

Something New Every Day

Things are not always as they at first seemed. It turns out our rescue dog Sienna is probably not a Lab/Shar Pei mix at all. The man who was doing our annual A/C and furnace check-up this week mentioned that he had just purchased a rescue dog, a Southern Blackmouth Cur, which, he said, looks a lot like Sienna. I first thought this meant the inside of the dog's mouth was black, maybe like a chow-chow's, and that he was using the term "cur" as slang. After he left, my husband looked up "blackmouth cur" on Google.

Sienna, our rescue dog, has new ID 

There were pages and pages of pictures of these animals, and, hey, they all looked like Sienna. Upon checking Wikipedia, I discovered that there is an Alabama Blackmouth Cur, a Florida Blackmouth Cur, an American Blackmouth Cur, you get the idea. The dogs, which are bred principally in the South, are trained to hunt 'coons, 'possums, bears, feral pigs and squirrels. They also can be trained to herd cattle and to do search and rescue work. They are great family dogs, the article points out. And we say "amen" to that.

I do not believe the American Kennel Club certifies this breed, but another registering body, the United Kennel Club, does. It says that to be standard, the Blackmouth Cur's body may be as much as 10 percent white - on toes, tail, nose and chest. Sienna has a white strip on her chest and a little bit of white on her feet. The black, noted in the breed's name, is to be around the muzzle, but not necessarily inside the mouth. Sienna has black circles around her eyes, too.

Southern Blackmouth Cur

Wikipedia also said the active nature of this dog, which lives 12-16 years, makes it susceptible to torn ligaments and pulled muscles. We know all about that! Sienna limped when we first got her, and our vet told us, after an x-ray, that she had torn anterior cruciate ligaments in both hind legs. He prescribed fish oil, baby aspirin, glucosamine and a quiet life for a few months. Or, surgery might be indicated down the line. Our regimen worked, though, and the ACL's are in fine shape now.

These hybrids of the South seem not to be limited to Blackmouth Curs. Our neighbors up the street rescued a dog about the same time we did, and when asked what kind it was, they said it was a "Catahoula." I went looking up that odd name on Google after our introduction to their puppy. There is definitely a Catahoula Leopard Dog, or Catahoula Cur, which is a hunting dog with Louisiana origins. It has an illustrious past and perhaps was brought to this country by the explorer Hernando de Soto. Like the Blackmouth Cur, the Catahoula is being bred in various kennels, also mostly in the South.

You can check out pages of Catahoula photos on Google Images.

  

Farther South

Over the weekend, we drove to Islamorada, in the middle Florida Keys, to visit a couple we've known for nearly 60 years. As usual when driving over to Miami from the Ft. Myers area and then south toward Key West, we noticed how much more tropical it is there than here.

Partly, I guess, that's because of the Gulf Stream, the warm waters of which hug the south coast of Florida. And partly, it's because Islamorada is about 150 miles south of an imaginary line drawn between Ft. Myers and Palm Beach on the east coast of the peninsula.

house near our friends' rental

Of particular note was the frangipani, which is still bare where I live, and is beginning to put out a few blooms on Islamorada. And the coconut palms, which on my island turn brown after a prolonged cold snap, are green and lush farther south, despite brushes with hurricanes and tropical storms.

The bougainvillea, which grow in both places, seem to flourish especially well farther south. (They have wicked thorns, no matter where they're planted.)

Bougainvillea

Islamorada beach

Because it was windy, we old folks chose to eat dinner indoors overlooking the beach at sunset one evening and watched one couple's barefoot wedding. In a few minutes, after that tableaux had cleared away, another young man knelt on one knee and held up to a young woman a small box, whereupon he jumped up and they enthusiastically kissed. I believe she said "Yes!"

Between You and I

The old English teacher in me is on a tear. Excuse me, but I can't sit quietly by on this beautiful Florida afternoon and let another day go by without complaining about some rampant grammar no-no's.

I don't know about you, but I curdle inside when I hear somebody say "between you and I" or "him and I." These gaffes are coming from people who should know better - such as news anchors on television and newspaper reporters. My mother, who taught Latin, would be appalled.

Are grammar rules not taught in school any more? Are children no longer learning that only the objective case of pronouns, such as "him," "them," "us," "her" and "me," can follow prepositions such as "with," "for," "in," "between," "among" and "to"? And only the objective case of a pronoun can be the object of a verb, as in "I drove him to the mall."

Subjective case pronouns such as "I," "he" and "she" can only be subjects of sentences, as in "He and I went to the mall," but I often hear "Him and I went to the mall."  Ouch.

The big trouble comes when the subject of the sentence or the object is compound - as in "He and I" or "him and me." You wouldn't say, as I used to tell my college remedial English students, "Him went to the mall" or "Sally went to the mall with I."

There, I've said it. Time to calm down now.

Do you come across grammar goofs that bug you? Please drop me a comment or an e-mail.

A Continuum

tabebuia or golden poui tree

The seasons don't arrive in a clear-cut manner in southwest Florida. Rather, there are trees and plants blooming at all different times of the year, oozing through the seasons, one might say.

Mango trees bloom here in January and February, and now, at the beginning of March, sport fruits the size of a thumbnail. They will grow bigger and bigger and  ripen in June and July, depending on the variety. "MangoMania," a festival surrounding the fruit, is scheduled in our area in July.

Citrus trees bloom in February or March, and the fruits are ripe in November or December.

This week, it is the golden poui, also known as the tabebuia or trumpet tree, which has taken center stage. Tabebuia can also be pink, but yellow is the predominant variety around here. My impression is that the leaves fall just before the bright yellow flowers appear. These blooms last only a few days and fall from a tree all at one time, leaving a golden carpet underneath.

When friends up north ask if we miss the change of seasons living in a sub-tropical environment, we say, "no" because we have our seasons, depending on which plants are blooming at any given time. We can tell that it is April, for example, when the frangipani trees, which have been completely bare all winter, suddenly put out green leaves and yellow or pink flowers. In fact, some friends who live in Connecticut for half the year, say they time their trip northward by the eruption of frangipani flowers.

Just as trees up north are losing their leaves, in September and October, the silk floss tree  explodes with big pink flowers. This is neither here nor there, but interesting: its trunk is covered with nasty thorns.

Grandma's Cookies

My Grandma Fannie Mae Capel

Some friends of ours, both very good cooks, have been surprising each other with dishes made from their mothers' recipes. I recently went through my card file and found a recipe  from my grandmother, interesting to me because of the strange way the ingredients are listed. When she made them, these cookies always tasted the same, regardless of the imprecision. Probably, the trick was to use the same cup every time.

I love them. I hope you will, too.

                                 Chocolate Macaroons

Piece of butter the size of 2 eggs

2 T cocoa

2 coffee cups full of sugar

4 eggs

2 tsp. vanilla

3 cups flour

2 tsp. baking powder

Melt butter. Stir in the cocoa. Remove from the stove and stir in the remaining ingredients. Roll small balls in powdered sugar. Place them on buttered cookie sheets and bake 12 minutes at 325 degrees.

While the cookies are still warm, place them in an air-tight container; otherwise, they will get hard.

Do you have some of these recipes from your parents and grandparents? Please e-mail them to me at carolelrod1@gmail.com, and I'll print them in my blog.

Paradise East

My husband and I have been living the tropical lifestyle for more than 20 years now. It is strange how life has its twists and turns, and you end up where you never dreamed you would. In our case, forsaking the snow and sleet of the Midwest came about because my husband, Ed, was asked by a friend to go to Montserrat, a Caribbean island, and help rebuild houses after Hurricane Hugo in 1989.

Invited to return for a proper vacation the next year by the woman who had provided him housing during the hurricane trip, he - and I - spent a week with her. We did the same the following year - and began looking for a small house to buy for month-long getaways in the winter. I was still working as a newspaper reporter, but he could conduct his insurance business by phone and fax while we were "on island."

It wasn't only the weather that made up our minds to buy. The laid-back lifestyle appealed to us, and the people were so warm and friendly. In fact, a couple of people he met on his first trip, on seeing us the following year, said, "Welcome Home!" That was powerful.

Paradise East

The plan was to spend several months a year on Montserrat when we retired. That came about sooner than I thought possible when I discovered I was old enough and had been employed long enough to remain on my employer's health insurance as a retiree, and my husband could remain as my dependent. Neither of us was quite old enough for Social Security, but he would continue working.

And thus began our four winters on Montserrat.

The concrete block house had two bedrooms, one bath and a living/dining/kitchen combination. Plus, a big plus, it had a swimming pool. Because the house was located on the east side of the island, we named it "Paradise East."

Snakes Alive

An update on the great python hunt in the Everglades: As of this week, only 50 Burmese pythons have been killed by the 1,547 people who signed up to take part in the month-long hunt, which is sponsored by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation department. It ends Sunday, February 10.

How many pythons are out there in the swamps is anybody's guess. Estimates are from several hundred to several hundred thousand. What is known for sure is that the snakes are well camouflaged and growing bigger every day on a diet of just about everything that moves. The big ones - ranging to 15 feet and even larger - have no natural predators, so man is about the only way for the pythons, an invasive and non-native species, to be kept under control.

Several hundred people who signed up to participate in the state-sponsored hunt are professionals, but most have come out for a lark - from as far away as Canada. There's some prize money involved, including $1,000 for the biggest snake caught in both the amateur and professional categories.   

Some female pythons have been found with 50 eggs inside. So what are the chances, really, of decreasing the overall number of these creepy crawlies?

Rapt About Raptors

I've written once before on this blog about bald eagles, but today I'm focusing on another raptor that is more common in my neighborhood: the osprey, otherwise known as the fish hawk. Brown, with white crowns and chests, these big birds are incubating eggs now, having returned to nests they left last spring.

Nests are commonly built in the notches and crooks of dead trees or on platforms built especially for the ospreys atop tall poles. It's not unusual to see the adults flying down to the ground to pick up dead grass or vines and carrying them up to the nest. These will make a soft lining for the eggs. The outside structure of the nest is made of large sticks, which the ospreys carry in their talons. (They drop quite a few as they try to fly.)

Ospreys, which can have a six-foot wingspan, seem to use the same nest from year to year and just "redecorate" when it's time to start a new family.

I've heard the big birds can live to be 15 years old. Osprey mate for life - with maybe a little hanky-panky on the side - but generally they are loyal companions.

Mostly, ospreys eat fish. On the island where I live, meals are close by and easy to catch, so there are many ospreys. One of the adults of a pair, primarily the male, is the fisherman, providing dinner for his wife while she sits on the eggs. All the while he is out fishing, she hectors him with a loud, repetitive "cheereek."

Although a pelican plunges head-first into the water to catch his dinner, the osprey enters the water feet first, catching prey in his talons. He may be flying high in the air when he spots the fish he and his wife will eat for dinner. As he flies back to the nest, he orients the fish so it's carried headfirst for better aerodynamics. One of our friends observed that the male will then fly past the nest carrying the fish to see if his mate approves. After this display, he flies to another tree or pole where he filets his catch. There usually is a lot of squawking back and forth while this is going on.

Osprey parents are busy tending the eggs for five weeks and then the young chicks for 10 weeks after that. Partly, their care is supposed to assure that a bald eagle will not feast on their treasured babies.

Fledglings may not start their own families for several years. There is much to learn, including how to build one of the huge nests - which can be as big as an old-fashioned wicker laundry basket. One year, we watched some young osprey trying without success to construct a nest; despite many attempts, the sticks wouldn't stay put in the tree-top they had chosen. The next year, they or another pair about the same age, succeeded, but in a tree 100 feet away.

Rescued

Sienna

Rescue

An article in the local newspaper a day or so ago told about a dog rescued from an abusive home. She'd been tied up so tightly that her leather harness and chain cut all the way to the bone. Now she is the friend and helper of a man who has acute Parkinson's disease. The man says she is the child he never had.

Although the road can be bumpy, I have nothing but good things to say about rescuing a dog or cat that otherwise would be thrown on the trash heap. About 17 months ago, we also took in a rescue dog, a 50-pound Labrador Retriever/Shar-Pei mix named Sienna, who was found wandering somewhere in Pinellas County, Florida. She had four puppies in tow. The animal shelter to which she was taken weaned the puppies and fully intended to euthanize Sienna, who was big and could be wild when she was excited. But then, as now, she loved people, other dogs and even cats. An animal rescue group stepped in and said, "No way."

At first, our relationship was rocky. Sienna had been bounced around so much to this home and that and to more than one shelter that she had developed extreme separation anxiety. We tried to teach her to go into a dog crate so that we could go to church or a movie and not worry. She was having none of it and salivated so much when locked up that there were literally pools on the kitchen floor when we arrived home. Our previous dog, also a rescue, had readily gone into the crate, so what was wrong with this one?

Our vet said tranquilizers might help and gave us a prescription. They were to be used "as needed," which, for a while, was every time we left the house. We had a routine. We put soothing music on the radio. We tossed one of Ed's dirty t-shirts into the crate, along with a stuffed lamb we called "baby" and a bone to chew on. We also purchased one of those stretchy shirts, which, when strapped tightly in place with Velcro, is said to reduce anxiety. We bought a rubber toy, called a Kong, and put peanut butter inside.

All this made only a marginal difference in the puddles of saliva.

A friend who trained dogs for urban search and rescue teams suggested putting the crate in a bathroom, leaving the cage door open. He said to feed Sienna every meal in the crate, also with the door open, so she'd associate it with pleasure. When we got ready to go away, he suggested we lure Sienna into the bathroom and shut the door, saying, "We'll be back."

The first time we tried that she chewed off about two feet of the door frame in an effort to escape. Who knows what she would have done to the sofa had she been loose in the rest of the house. When we were at home, she never attempted to chew anything that wasn't one of her toys.

One night when we went to a movie, Sienna ripped the door through to its hollow core. Ed nailed up a metal sheet to cover the hole. We dreaded coming home, wondering how many wood chips and how much saliva we'd find in the hall outside the bathroom.

Our dog-trainer friend said to be persistent. We were, and we were generous too with praise when she deserved it and plenty of love. Gradually, over about eight months, the saliva became less, and the chewing stopped. We let the tranquilizer prescription run out and, finally, put away the stretchy shirt. We moved the crate back into the kitchen and began shutting the door with her in it when we left. Sienna was usually asleep when we returned home. There was no whining or barking, no chewing and no salivating.

We won, and we think she did, too.

Unintended Consequences

How they got there, nobody seems to know, but the fact is that Burmese Pythons have overtaken the Everglades. Some experts think there may be as many as 100,000, and they have no natural enemies. Instead, they are eating alligators, wading and songbirds, deer, raccoons, rats and mice - and changing the balance of nature.

The most popular theory is that several years ago a couple of people decided they could no longer cope with the snakes they were keeping as pets and turned them loose in the Everglades. When the two pythons found each other, the rest is history. I suspect that more than two people were involved and more than two snakes.

If south Florida had below freezing temperatures of some duration in winter, the pythons, which can grow to be more than 15 feet long, might die off. But temperatures less than 32 degrees typically occur only on a few winter nights and last only a few hours - not long enough to kill off large numbers of these huge snakes.

Attempts have been made in the past by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to conduct python hunts in the Everglades, but serious control won't happen if just a few uniformed guys hunt down and kill a few big snakes. The area where they can be hiding is vast, 1 1/2 million acres in Everglades National Park alone, and the snakes apparently are smart at eluding humans.

This weekend, a hunt for amateurs has been organized, with a prize of $1,500 going to whoever kills the most pythons. So far, 500 have signed up to take part. I hope they are alert enough to dodge the alligators. 

A New Taste

While living on Montserrat, we became acquainted with an unusual vegetable grown there, the "christophene." Pear-shaped with a bumpy, pale green or ivory-colored skin, the christophene is a member of the gourd family, like squash or melon. It is bland tasting and can be somewhat bitter unless cooked.

Christophene or Chayote

The christophene is a vegetable with many names: In the United States, when you can find them, christophenes are called "chayotes." Names in other parts of the world are "mirliton" or "cho-cho." Originally native to Mexico and Central America, christophenes are now grown in South America, Australia and New Zealand as well as Florida. A part-time neighbor of ours in southwest Florida grows them abundantly in the Orlando area and shares them with us when he and his wife drive down for a weekend of fishing.

These vegetables can grow sprawling on the ground like pumpkins or cantaloupe, or vertically on a fence or trellis.

Eating christophenes raw is rare, but here is a recipe I like. It is from the Montserrat Cookbook, published in 1973 to benefit the Montserrat Old People's Welfare Association.

Christophene Salad

2 raw christophenes, peeled, cored and grated

1/2 tsp. salt

1 medium carrot, grated

2 green onions, finely chopped

1 package lime gelatin

1 cup hot water

1 Tbsp. lime juice

1/2 cup cold water

Add salt to christophenes and let stand 1/2 hour. Drain. Dissolve gelatin in hot water. Add lime juice and cold water. When the gelatin is cool and just beginning to set, stir in the vegetables. Pour into a mold or pan and chill.