Natural Beauty from St. Martins on the Bay of Fundy

... as seen from our windows up on the bluff,  

..  ever changing... ever awe inspiring...

there in the wide open sky and that amazing body of water...

Believe me when I say......   It takes my breath away...

***

By the Shore in St. Martins

 

There is Noise in this Solitude

Cool, clear, bright... very brisk...

Off to the left, past the harbours bouldered breakwater,

"The Caves", carved from ancient sandstone bluffs...

Far around the curving horseshoe beach to the right,

Quaco Head, protrudes into the Bay of Fundy...

The tide advances...  almost 6 hours, one way...

Seagulls  huddle in groups along the water line...

Watching...  waiting  ... shifting position...

Brilliant white foam on waves, loud and steel gray,

Whose powerful motion turn the beach from rocks to sand....

Seaweed pushed to the wrack lines...

The beach is empty otherwise...

Tourists have gone home...

It is left for us now...

.

The Concrete Floor

This week I have been on my hands and knees varnishing the kitchen floor... several coats worth...

...after having blocked the room off so the dogs needn't give me a hand..

... the counters and table were piled high with stuff that is usually on the floor... ahhh, much better ... but where did all this Stuff come from???

... first I gathered up as much dog hair as I possibly could.. sweeping, vacuuming and picking up bits of the sneaky stuff here and there..... how do any animals lose this much hair and not be bald, I haven't figured out!!!

 

A little background...

 If you have never lived with a concrete floor I would highly recommend it.. They are the most durable floors I have ever used...and the absolute most low maintenance...

...  this is simply our 4" concrete slab... gridded in 36 " squares  that John created using his circular saw set to cut into the floor about 1/16 of an inch... carefully keeping his lines straight with a "MacGyvered" weighted plank as a guide...

 ...then we stained it with an acid-etched terra-cotta stain,  rubbing it into the concrete.. we each took alternate squares so the rubbed pattern would look somewhat even over the whole floor....

...the  shade is rather like old leather...  little idiosyncrasies happen in the finishing of the concrete and the application of the stain, which is the way we like things.. not perfect and with its own character...  after that it only needs varnishing whenever you so desire... I think it has been 5 years...

 

... another feature of a concrete floor is its ability to act as a thermal mass...

Yes, we live in Canada, where it gets cold in the winter... but... generally...  we receive plenty of Sunshine during those months... hope it continues...  what with all the upheaval in the climatic environment, one would be hard to make a proper guess, but for now it works........

When we built our home, the first thing we considered was Orientation ...  We designed it facing  South, luckily that is also where the Bay of Fundy view is, so that worked out well... we are totally exposed to the elements on this bluff...  360 degrees across open to the sky ... and to the solar heat gain from the Sun... of course not as many windows on the North side...

All winter it beams in the East, South and West windows and sinks into that concrete... that's passive solar...  with the addition of the absorption of the radiant heat from our wood-stoves, we are pretty cozy...  and when you stand in the especially warm spots, the heat sinks right into your bones...    when your feet are warm, all of you is warm... 

 ...also not to forget in the summer when the sun is higher in the sky, the concrete floor keeps the house cool... double feature...

 

 ... should be good for another few years or so...

 

In the beginning...

 ...Underneath that durable floor is this wire mesh grid-work of steel rods that John is fastening together with wire ties...

...underneath the gridwork is 6mm. plastic vapor barrier... this shot is from when he was doing the garage... in the main structure of the house directly under the grid work  are many winding yards of hydronic tubes placed about 1 foot  apart covering the whole surface,  then  a layer of 2 inch tongue and groove rigid foam insulation ... then finally underneath it all is gravel tamped down very firmly to provide a good base structurally for the concrete floor and for drainage...

...We have the hydronic tubes installed in the concrete so they are there for the future, but we being the old fashioned frugal folks we are, only use our woodstoves for heat...  we like the way you live with a wood stove...

***

... and that old solid wood door with the fresh coat of paint just behind John,  we scrounged from the roadside... a fellow who was modernizing his very old house threw it away...  it still has original wavy glass... he bought one of those new foam doors..  I think we found the best deal...

***

  Note.... I used "Flecto, Varathane, Diamond Wood Finish, Semi-Gloss, for Floors"...  I have 4 layers of it on my wooden stair treads and it wears well there... here's hoping it is just as long lasting on the concrete ... after all once the first coat is sealed, I do not see what difference it would make what surface it was applied to...



*first photo...  floor is still wet.

***



I would also love to try an even lower maintenance  floor, somewhere, sometime and that is Concrete that is dyed previously to being poured and then finished with linseed oil...

... applications of oil are applied in a traditional manner, the same as is done to unfinished hardwood flooring, which I have done and can attest too... such as this... 
 ...once a day for a week,
once a week for a month, 
once a month for a year 
and thereafter when required... maybe once a year or once every 5 years depending on how casual you like to live... the floor becomes impermeable... it may seem like a lot of work in the beginning but it is so long-wearing and easy to care for and beautiful, it is worth it...  another good point about an oiled finish is that any scratches can be fixed at any time without doing the whole floor... just rub some oil on the scratch ... done.

Porcupine.... Skull, Quills, Bones

North American Porcupine... Rodentia... Erenthizontidae... Erethizon dorsatum...

Front-on view of Porcupine skull... showing its bright orange gnawing teeth...

...they prefer tree bark and needles, but during different seasons eats leaves, grass, berries, seeds, nuts and flowers... when I imagine a porcupine with a flower hanging out of its mouth, it makes me feel sentimental towards them... prickly untouchable critter nibbling on a delicate flower...




Bottom jaw as seen from above...

This is probably one of the most intact skulls in my collection... especially since it has all its teeth...



Top skull upper jaw as seen from beneath...

Their habitat is widespread throughout wooded areas of North America... they do not hibernate and are active all year... their habit of eating the bark on trees, which eventually kills the trees, is not looked on too fondly and for this they are considered pests... but we must realize they are just part of the ecosystem...



...size of this skull... 4" front to back... 3" top to bottom... 2½" wide...

Large male porcupines can grow to about 30" long... head to tip of tail... and weigh 12 lb. ... females are slightly smaller...



Their teeth are amazing... I slid one out to show the length of them... they are almost 3" long and slide far inside the skull... top and bottom teeth are the same size...



I am imagining rabbit's skulls and teeth are the same.. possibly all rodents teeth are, as they are continually growing... and need constantly honed...




Top of skull... from above... beautiful lines and texture...

Porcupines have a detrimental love of salt... leading them to roadsides and to death...

this love of salt has also lured them to chew the handles off garden tools, canoe paddles, axe handles and saddles... just for a taste of that salty sweat we leave behind... they are only doing what comes naturally...



Slow moving... short sighted... sleeps most of the day...second largest North American rodent, next to beavers... long sharp claws to climb trees..

Porcupines are excellent swimmers due to their hollow quills giving them buoyancy... Quills cover their tail, back, sides, neck and top of head... they are approx. 3 " long...




When fully grown, a Porcupine may have as many as 30,000 quills... plenty to go around and leave a few behind when needed.... The quills are covered with many tiny backward facing barbs at the ends... ... he does not throw or shoot his quills as is commonly thought..

When the Porcupine is threatened, he turns his back... stamps his little feet... and raises and shakes his lightly fixed quills as a warning... just a matter of self-defense.... No, there are no Attack Porcupines...... there are mostly, curious would-be predators, who sniff around them, get just a bit too close and stick their noses where they don't belong.... The only true predators of the porcupine are the Fisher and Humans... The fisher grabs it by the nose, flips it on its back and attacks its unprotected chest and belly...




Our dogs have had a few unfortunate interactions with these creatures.. ending up with quills in their noses... lots of yelping...

...we even got quills stuck into us when we were moving our firewood around... a porcupine had taken up residence in the woodshed for a while and unknowingly left his calling cards after he was gone... they really stick in! ...now we know what the dogs or any other inquisitive creature feels like, when they come in contact with them...

...painful and difficult to remove... but if not removed, they have the ability to continue working their way into the victim... ... better not to let this happen... we have found it easiest to pull out the quills with pliers... first cover the dogs eyes so they don't see the pliers coming and grab the quill or quills close to the dog's skin...




When we discovered the skull in the forest, there were quite a few skeletal bones remaining with it... so we gathered them up too...




I cut the small hollow leg bones into bead size lengths with a jewelers saw ... they were easily threaded (here combined with black glass) to make a rather delicate primitive bracelet... I like the soft hue of the bone... on the ends are closures I created from brass...

...just a note.. bone has a rather unpleasant odor when sawn or drilled... any type of bone dust should not be breathed...




The male porcupine is a solitary animal for most of the year... in late fall he uses his sharp hearing and keen sense of smell to find a partner... after mating the female drives the male away... interesting, hummm... a single offspring is born 7 months later... can walk at once... climb in a week... and are quite playful... they take 4 years to become fully grown...

... maligned and misunderstood... Really not such a bad creature... they just like to chew...

...oh and remember ... Handle with care!!



...porcupine and quill drawings... ink and wash... from my sketchbook...

The "Gras" Knife

Recently, after posting about "Asparagus", I received a lovely letter detailing several interesting facts and this wonderful picture of an Asparagus knife. They came from Annette who lives in the Vale of Evesham, which I was excited to learn is famous for growing Asparagus. As a matter of fact, this was her husband's grandfather's actual asparagus knife, used in the field for cutting the lovely delicacy... at least 100 years old!!... and still going...

She tells of the wooden handle being worn smooth and serving its owner very well for many years... that it has a hand shape at the end of the blade... and that over there across the ocean, asparagus is known as 'gras...

I like that this tool was designed to do a particular job and that it did it well... That is good design and must have been a pleasure to use. How wonderful that it had been treasured enough to be handed down the family line... quite a functional artifact!!






Annette said that the 'gras has a season from late April to mid June, depending on the weather... and on warm nights she has heard it said that you could watch it grow, several inches a night!!!.... oh, don't I wish we had that kind of weather here!

The asparagus is cut, carefully by hand and tied with string into bundles, called "rounds".

During this season, all around the Vale, roadside stands spring up ready to sell the 'gras, which in her area has a distinctive, almost sweet, earthy taste and some people reckon that they can tell where each "round" was grown...


There is even a local pub called "The Round of Gras" which serves Asparagus suppers.... I can only imagine the lucky people attending them....




Annette shared that they love to eat it with grilled bacon and baby new potatoes with liberal dots of butter!! Although she says her favourite way is to put hot asparagus, straight from the pan, onto a plate with thinly sliced brown bread and butter, then go into the garden and sit on the grass and have Hot Asparagus sandwiches!.... Heaven!!!

Wish I could join her!..........Thank-you Annette!!




Next year I'll be having the first harvest of "gras" from my garden.... Now I can't wait!!

.