Ed Nisley's Blog: Shop notes, electronics, firmware, machinery, 3D printing, laser cuttery, and curiosities. Contents: 100% human thinking, 0% AI slop.
A young Coopers Hawk swooped across the yard, landed on a branch, and proceeded to dismantle something yummy, scattering little bits on the driveway below. One piece fluttered down like a feather, but, after the hawk flew off, we found this:
Praying Mantis – wing
It wasn’t a feather, it was an entire wing!
A few feet away, we found another:
Praying Mantis – wing parts
Not that there was any doubt, but these parts clinched the identification:
Praying Mantis – foreleg and wing parts
Some days earlier, we admired eight Praying Mantises on the decorative grasses and bushes out front. Perhaps it was this one:
Praying Mantis – brown wing covers – in grass
Or this one, a few feet away:
Praying Mantis – brown wing covers – on bush
We don’t know what, if any, the difference between brown and green wing covers might indicate. Age? Gender? Attitude? Skill level?
A recent Amazon purchase of three 3 lb bags of walnuts from a known-good seller arrived with many damaged nuts:
Damaged walnuts – detail
The damage matches what I read about Walnut Husk Fly infestations: shriveled kernels and terrible taste.
In round numbers, I found 8 oz of damaged nuts in each 3 lb bag, enough to ruin the entire batch. The seller immediately refunded the purchase price for all three bags, so there’s that.
It’s definitely not one of the counterfeit products plaguing Amazon, but I wonder why that lot didn’t fail incoming inspection.
I’m loathe to buy more walnuts for a while, though.
Memo to Self: Always inspect incoming purchases, even from reputable sellers!
The Butterfly Bush in front of the house attracts all kinds of insects, including Monarch Butterflies (shown here on the Goldenrod planted in the garden):
Monarch on Goldenrod – left
This year, the bush also attracted a Praying Mantis:
Ordered 100 stainless steel M3 washers from a “US Seller”, received this:
M3 stainless steel washers – short count
Yeah, it looked a bit short to me, too.
The chopped and bent washers in the upper right corner suggest the seller got floor sweepings from his source, which is about what you’d expect for a bottom-dollar vendor.
The seller refunded half, which wasn’t particularly generous, but I wasn’t ready to go to the mat for two bucks.
NYS DOT Region 8 Dutchess South recently did enough over-the-rail clearcutting to make Rt 376 bicycle-able from Red Oaks Mill to Maloney Rd!
To the best of our memories and judging from the tree stumps along the rail, it’s been a decade since DOT last clearcut that section; the Japanese Knotweed has definitely taken over since then.
Here’s what the Knotweed looked like in June, just north of Maloney Rd, after a trimming in May:
Rt 376 at Maloney – knotweed overgrowth – 2019-06-07
Now, it’s not nearly so snug out there:
Rt 376 Clearcut – 20 – 2019-08-29
Here’s a slide show starting with Dutchess North’s routine grass mowing in Red Oaks Mill and ending with Dutchess South’s clearcut just north of Maloney Rd:
The Wappinger Creek bridge seems to be a no man’s land between the two Residencies, but we can generally take the lane:
Rt 376 Clearcut – 03 – 2019-08-29
We hope Dutchess South’s over-the-rail maintenance will become an annual event and prevent the brush from taking over again.
Verily, given the right tools, any job becomes do-able:
New Utility Pole – installing
It was fascinating for me and just another day at the office for everybody else:
New Utility Pole – wiring
They nailed the original pole tag to the new pole, complete with the original 1940 nail:
New Utility Pole – pole tag 144701
I expect this pole will outlive me, just as the original pole outlived the folks who built our house.
The most memorable comment came from the person doing the CHG&E damage assessment, who really really wanted this to not be their problem: “Anybody could steal a pole tag and nail it on that pole.” I asked what location their records showed for the pole tag, whereupon the conversation moved on.
Second-place award: no, we were not interested in trenching underground lines 300 feet along the property line, at our expense, to avoid an “unsightly” pole.
For unknown reasons, I was supposed to figure out which telecom utilities had wired the pole, notify them, and wait for them to tack their cables to the new pole. I called both Verizon and Altice / Optimum, got service tickets, and watched them close the tickets without further action. I tried re-opening the Verizon ticket and was told somebody would be there within 48 hours. An Optimum guy showed up, promised a quick return visit from a team with proper equipment, but nothing happened.
I suppose having no customer at the end of the cable removed any motivation to clear their hardware off our lawn, so, after two weeks, I deployed the bolt cutter, rolled up the cables, and scrapped ’em out.
The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning 