MeInMaine Blog

Category: Living in Maine

  • Maybe Maine Black Flies And Mosquitoes Won’t Come This Year.

    Maybe Maine Black Flies And Mosquitoes Won’t Come This Year.

        The little black yard and deep woods varmits may be more determined than ever to tap your blood this year.

    I always figure the intensity of the black flies and mosquito was directly tied to the severity of a Maine winter and whether there were breeding pools from an above average wet spring. How many extra buzzing flies will be here to take part in your BBQ? Not sure what the farmers almanac says on the subject. But I do know for about two weeks in late May, the black flies and state bird, the mosquito, come into action quickly and then after those two weeks things settle down.

    Black flies, mosquitoes die down and you and I get used to them. It is a bit of both. The birds that eat them kick into gear and are home from southern climates by spring.  Plus the life expectancy of a black fly is about a day! Fish harvest the bugs too. So do dragon flies that look scary but do a lot of good.

    In the open areas, not bad for this transition period but in the deep deep woods, you better keep moving.

    What's That Whining, Buzzing Sound That's Getting Louder?
    What’s That Whining, Buzzing Sound That’s Getting Louder?

    They can drive some animals crazy and many car accidents in Northern Maine happen  during hunting season, mating season or bug season.  All the above get the animal population riled up and moving out on to the highways and byways of Maine!

    If buying land, something with a little elevation and breeze will keep them down wind…but too good a view and elevation and hey..where are my roof shingles going in December (whiz whiz)?  There is a happy medium.  Actually with mosquito’s my research shows the males don’t take blood and nibble instead on plant nectar. The females  blood feed to obtain a protein source for their eggs.

    Every real estate broker is asked often in the spring…How are the black flies?  If a broker says, no problem, no black flies or bugs in his/her part of Maine he is fibbing. Or next to something with drums and skull / cross bones that also with further research shows he/she does not have birds, bees or any other wildlife now that you mention it!

    The bugs exist but not half as bad as the Maine humorists and fly repellent people would lead you to believe. 

    If you search the internet often the problem is blown way way out of proportion and then the kicker is the site brings up a new super duper eighteen letter product that knocks them six ways into next Sunday.  These articles and products create a need that a bottle of Avon’s skin so soft will cure anyway!

    Some folks are just sweeter or more aromatic or magnetic or something…some folks are bug magnets.  The population sector that gets it the worst?  Little kids playing while black flies dive bomb for the tender spots on the back of their neck under their hair while parents realize later at tub time that night “Oh Oh…” the first time out with the new born.  Once is all it takes to fortify for the next trip outdoor. Visit link for black fly news in Maine, for lots more on the pesky subject.

    Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers 

    207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com  | 

    MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

  • Picking Maine Potatoes, My First Entry Level Job As A Kid.

    Picking Maine Potatoes, My First Entry Level Job As A Kid.

         Everything I apply to life I learned in the Maine potato field. Sort of.

     

    Where I grew up, a 300 acre Maine potato farm that I still own.
    The 300 acre Maine farm I grew up on and now own.
    Maine kids pick potatoes during fall harvest.
    Maine youth help area potato farmers get the spuds into winter storage during school fall break.

    Seriously, you start each  morning, listening to the radio to see what time the Maine potato farmer is going to dig today.

    A little frost or rain over night means a delay, or no picking. A reprieve from above in the food chain. But when you do get to the spud field after a big breakfast and carrying your lunch and water jug, you have to pick out a section.

    A section is basically, how long a responsibility in the field can you handle?

    If the rows are long, and one digger proceeds at a slow pace back and forth uncovering spuds to pick, you have to judge what is doable. To still stay caught up. You don’t want to be waiting for the digger. You need to avoid being hopeless behind, rows and rows out of uncovered potatoes waiting to be picked. That is discouraging but so is life sometimes. The best lessons are mistakes or miscalculations. Taking ownership, responsibility and stopping them from happening over and over. And wondering why.

    Four baskets fill a 165 pound Maine farm potato barrel.

    You put your ticket on the barrel and it gets plucked. Placed in a can as the barrel is hoisted onto a flatbed farm truck. The potatoes head to storage, your ticket to be counted that night. Sixty cents a barrel was the pay when my four kids picked a few years back. Before graduating to work in the potato house or on the harvester for an hourly wage. Where they thought now we are cooking. Have really arrived.

    Kids spend the money if they think the item is worth six barrels of potatoes or whatever the exchange is as they contemplate a purchase. I have seen my kids pick something up, put it back on the store shelf and utter the word’s “Dad, that’s not worth six barrels of potatoes”. They worked too hard to part with their hard earned proceeds for something deemed an unfair exchange or quality for the work required to buy it. Maine potato picking video I posted.

    No one leaves the Maine potato field until everyone is picked up.

    No one left high and dry. If you find yourself behind due to poor section selection or the hot sun slowing down your production, others will show up to pick up your section. To add to their daily barrel tally. If you run out of barrels, you pick tops off the rows you get behind so when you get barrels, you can pick your section faster.

    Digger pulled by the tractor breaks down? You head to the woods to do your business, make a nature call. Or have a snack and enjoy the break. Put it to good use to rest up. Or if hustling for a new bike, you trot down to a section that is behind that has barrels. You pick one or two barrels to tag with your ticket. You stay busy. You make good use of your time.

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    Being outside in the Maine fall scenic foliage is exciting and beautiful. Blue skies, cold mornings, blistering hot afternoons. That’s a lesson in picking potatoes, my entry level job that was the blue print for every other job after that.

    Growing up on a Maine farm was a valuable experience. And you are needed by the grower, shipper. You and he both are at the mercy of the biggest unknown, the Maine weather. Your section may grow or shorten too depending on the division marker of your neighboring picker. Who may be an ambitious little red hen or become lazy in the afternoon sun like a slug.

    The field section markers may mysteriously re-adjust between where you end and your neighbor starts too.

    End rows also can grow as the field lengthens. You find grass, tough picking, sods on the ends as a rule. Those are the picking ABC’s of mastering a Maine potato field. Watch the operation first hand with this Maine potato picking video .

    Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers  

    207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

    MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA