Fishing Opener 2026

 Remember to follow the rules.  Especially as the kid on the cover is extra cute.

A Few More Tales of the Bloomer Brewery

On my recent visit to the Bloomer Brewery building I heard a few stories of the place.  For some reason there are plenty of 'em.  Perhaps it makes sense.  This is the sort of small town where people remember things, and the physical survival of the place encourages that.  

It's early days were pretty much the usual tale of fires, ownership changes and so forth.  It's when Prohibition came along that things got interesting.

Jacob Breunig bought the brewery in 1915.  Four years later alcohol became illegal.  That did not seem to deter him, and the tales of Prohibition era moonshine are backed up by a raid by the "Revenuers" in 1928.  Bruenig sold the brewery to an A.L. Lipschulz of Saint Paul.  This was probably in 1934; the architectural drawings we saw last time are associated with the sale.  The new name "Bloomer Beverage Company" dates to this time.

After a few years he sold out to a man named Tankenoff.  Oddly the product line trended towards ales instead of lagers.  In this era their products were often named "Al's"after Mr. Lipschulz. 

Business was so-so.  This was not the sort of drink most rural Wisconsinites favored, and I've heard there was lingering resentment on the part of local authorities after the whole moonshining thing.  To be fair I've also heard that the Chippewa County sheriff of that era turned a blind eye to this sort of thing.

It was the US Army contract that kept the business going.  Shipping their ale, now rebranded as Buckingham Ale, to the UK was good business.  

After the war the brewery closed.  And the building was used for many things.  Storage, but that's boring.  How about a worm farm?

People like to fish in these parts.  Fish like worms.  Worms like a nice cool basement.  What could possibly go wrong?  Well, the place had rats.  Solution? Rat poison.  New problem?  Rats defecating on the worm beds left traces of poison that killed all the nightcrawlers.

OK, how about a fish farm?  The accounts I've heard vary a bit.  Sometimes the rats re-enter the story.  But the more detailed version is that they were trying to raise some sort of trout.  These are a finicky thing to aquaculture, and if someone forgets to turn on the circulating pump one day.......

At various times parts of the sprawling complex seem to have been vacant.  Our discussion at the bar turned to the issues of homelessness, and I was told that one time there was a guy living somewhere in the place.  He started a fire and died.  The fire department put out the smoldering fire and tossed his body rather unceremoniously onto a snow drift.

My revisit to look for the caves was prompted by a bar patron partly falling into a hole where one of the cave's vents finally washed down whatever it was filled with in the 1920's or so.  And as it happens, falling into things is a theme here.  One time when a guy renting out some space drove his truck in, a wheel sunk deeply into the ground.  They had found the original well from the brewery.

Delightfully it was excavated, cleaned up, and a new top put on it.  The above ground stonework in this picture is new, as of course is the sensible grate on the top.  The well goes down a long, long way.

The cheerful guy on the left has been associated with the building for a half century or more.  He still does maintenance, and had lots of tales of what state the place was in when he arrived on the scene in the early 1970's.  When the well was found they got a guy with climbing equipment to come over from the local creamery.  I guess tanks and chimneys there needed cleaning.  My bar pal put on the harness, lowered himself way down there and called to the people up top to take a look.  He'd gotten a box of iron pyrite - aka fools gold - and scattered it around.  Obviously there was brief but intense excitement.

I do hope he was wearing that green plaid shirt and hat, and that it was Saint Patrick's Day....

Forgotten Brewery Caves - The Bloomer Mystery Deepens....

I like historical mysteries.  Sometimes the lead me on a merry chase.  Such is the case with the cave associated with the Bloomer Brewery.  My first two posts on this are worth a read to get context.  Oh, TLDR?  Well here's the basic dates and data.  BLOOMER PART I.   and BLOOMER PART II.

1872 brewery established.  Presumably a lagering cave was created at that time.

1880's two fires damage or perhaps destroy the original brewery.  First of several rebuilds and additions begin.

1934 - We have a nice architectural drawing of the place.  New data!

1964 - a survey by the Department of Defense is taken of underground spaces in America.  Places where citizens might ride out a nuclear apocalpyse.  The caves of the Bloomer Brewery were rated for over 500 people!

mid 1970's.  My friends at the bar start working at the place.  

Just recently the cave area was showcased with nice new woodwork and framing.  I wish more caves were given this respect.

About those new friends.  I'd made arrangements to revisit the site after new owners bashed a hole in the wall exposing a cave I'd suspected was there but now, yes NOW I would get all the answers.  One of the folks I had lunch with had actually fallen into a hole out back of the building, tipping them off to an underground space!  That's what prompted them to have at the back wall of the known - but rather tiny - caves for a look see.  The hole is visible in the above photo.  Let's take a peek.

First, here's a look at the back wall today.

A ladder was helpfully obtained.  Looking at the newly created hole we can see that it went through some newer, definitely 20th century, materials that had been plastered over.  I'm thinking 1920s.

And what lies beyond?

Huh.  There's only about another 15 feet of cave back there.  With of course a vent hole that is just the right size to put a leg down into.  Glad nobody got hurt.  I see no plausible side passages.  The black material might be tar adhesive for cork, but given the state of disrepair is more likely nasty fungus stuff.

So how to put this all together?

Please consider this nothing more than educated speculation.  But I have had a chance to examine the brewery caves of enterprises large and small, old and new, successful and....otherwise.

I think what we are seeing here is the original 1870's lagering cave.  It's not big, but just maybe big enough.  The brewery put up around 500 barrels of beer in 1875, and if we assume it was not all in one batch you could almost manage it with this space.  Or a bit more, but we'll get to that part.  There have always been features of this cave that did not make sense.  For instance the rather formidable "ante chamber".  For a simple cave that lead into the nice convenient space of the brewery basement this engineering is rather over the top.

I wonder if this was actually a cave adjacent to the original brewery?  Fires in 1882 and 1883 did a lot of damage.  After the second fire the brewery was rebuilt on a larger scale.  Honestly this complex of buildings and additions is quite the architectural mess.

Let's tidy things up a bit.  Here's what the brewery looked like in 1915.

The cave we've been looking at is, of course, straight back from those big double doors.  The massive barn like structure on the left is certainly the 1880's rebuild.  Or part of it.  Now, in 1934 there was a detailed architectural study made of the structure.  

You can see the big wing off to the left.  That's the 1880's "barn" area.  Now full of ageing vats.  They would have had mechanical refrigeration by then.  You can also see up at the top, the little extension that is the two chambers of the "caves".  You do NOT see the space beyond the wall, so that was sealed off by the 1930's.  You also do not see any other caves coming off what looks like solid back walls.  But if they ignored one sealed off archway it is reasonable to assume they could ignore others.

The area to consider carefully is in that 1880's addition.  It was not open for a look on this visit, but last time I was there here's the back wall of it.

Drywall.  Or maybe just mostly dry.  This was installed during the memory of my friends up at the bar.  They spoke admiringly of the massive construction of the wall hidden behind it.  And told me that water seeping through was a big enough issue that they had to install drain pipes back there to divert it.  Oh, and it seemed to be particularly bad around some odd places that looked like sealed off doorways.....

Until some day when the moisture finally wins and the drywall is replaced, I'll just keep assuming that there are additional storage caves back there.  The output of the brewery in the 1880's was presumably more than the original cave could handle, and I deem it unlikely that they'd have gone early for the mechanical refrigeration.  It was not a successful enough operation to be an early adopter of expensive new technology.

That leaves one additional mystery.  How would you fit 500 plus nuclear refugees into this place?  Per the 1934 drawing there was no way they could have shown whoever came around for a look any caves that would come close.  So it must have been the basement space in my last photo.  And while this is cheating a bit I want to be fair.  The ceiling of this was supporting huge brew kettles and other heavy things.  It is supported by beams and girders, and has a ridiculous composition of thick layers of wood and three or four inches of honest to goodness concrete.  It would be a plausible fallout shelter despite having its front section be above ground.  A number of civil defense signs found in this area would seem to back this theory up.

Maybe when the inspector came around in the early 1960's he looked at the actual cave, shook his head sadly....and then got into a friendly discussion with the locals over a couple of beers.  "Ah, heck.  Close enough for Government work!"

I would be remiss if I did not mention that the Old Bloomer Brewery Bar and Grill  served up a great burger and fries, and although I was - due to other commitments - not able to enjoy a beer or two, that should not stop any of you from doing so!

Bumper Foam Productions

Exactly what I do on the robotics team is a fair question, and one I suspect gets asked on occasion.  Sometimes it is just necessary to have an extra adult around to keep an eye on things.  I'm also mostly in charge of the Farm System, as I have a level of comfort with the middle school world view that is either remarkable or worrisome.  Or both.  Other than that, and some janitorial duties, I guess I'm the Department of Odd Ideas.

Here's one.

I found out that a team that had been around for ten years was giving out tiaras to mark the occasion.  Not just for themselves, they were handing out tiaras to other teams in their tenth season.  Like us.  So, anticipating this I had the kids make a Congrats on Ten Years trophy to give in return.  The usual parameters, made of scrap parts from last years robot and mounted on a bit of bumper.  Complete with fabric of course.

Well, problem is...they forgot our tiaras.  

This was of course corrected when we were both at State.  I think they brought us some extra good ones.  So, who wore it best? (By the way, from my long expertise at test taking I can assure you that None of the Above is a valid answer...).

Yes, I am showing mostly the adult coaches hamming it up here.  Some students have the proper sense of fun.  Others tend to take themselves a bit too seriously.  As most of us did back in high school.

Big thanks to Team Ferradermis for the creative gesture.  One of several nice things about the new format this year is that we now compete "in state" and get to know our fellow Cheesehead teams much better.  

Oh, about the title of the post today.

At our last event we were tasked with putting together a "highlights" video on short notice.  It turned out well, thanks to our video editor, a conscripted camera person and the help of various other folks.  On completion I asked if the people who had worked on it wanted to be crediting by name.  They said, nah. So a silly production company name was used instead.

Well at the state event the highlights video was done by a different crew, so we got to do a sort of Promotional Video.  Something to show potential sponsors and so forth.  In typical Bumper Foam Productions fashion it was filmed within a wrench throw of our pit (no actual wrenches thrown) and edited into nice form in 90 minutes.  It's very satisfying to hand off a USB drive and say, "Here, five hours ahead of deadline and we made everyone look good".  At least that's how I see it...

And of course......

Back to The Land

No, haven't gone full organic hippy farmer or anything.  The Land is the unimaginative designation for the hunting property up north.  Which is also a huge Keep Busy project.  There will always be things to do.  Clear lanes near the established stands.  Plant tasty deer treats.  My son's family tapped maple trees and boiled down lots of syrup.  There's fire wood to cut.  A rickety garage structure that needs attention.  We should probably build an outhouse for occasional use.  My years of digging up old 19th century privies will at last have a practical use.

With robotics entering Rest Up phase its time to get to work.  There is a narrow window where some of these tasks are easier.  You really don't want to be doing heavy outdoor tasks in hot weather and with a cloud of mosquitos trying to carry you off.

Hank loves these work sessions.  He is the Happiest Dog in Wisconsin when he's up there.  Off leash, so many smells, so very many sticks....  He carried this one around for quite a while, clunking me in the back of the legs multiple times.

He's is not the only single minded life form to be out on a warm mid April day....

That little villain is a "deer tick".  Ixodes Scapularis if you prefer.  Yep, the ones that carry Lyme disease and various other cooties.  Hank is at least helpful there.  He gets a monthly dose of medication that ensures that tick bite him and die.  Wish they had that for humans.  I just have to take a shower immediately on return to civilization, and put all garments I had on right in the washing machine. I still find a few ingenious ones lurking around.  

FIRST Robotics 2026 - The Road Home from State

I'll have more on this down the road a bit.  It takes a while after a watershed sort of event to get perspective.  Did we Win it All and qualify for Worlds?  No, not even close.  But that's OK.

It was in some ways a surreal experience.  We drove down to the venue (outside of Milwaukee) running ahead of a storm front.  A few hours after we drove through some places along the way they were hit hard by tornadoes.  At the event proper all meaningful night before practice and field calibration was cancelled as we huddled in interior hallways while sirens blared.  I blame our friends from the next door town.  Their team name is STORM, which is some sort of acronym.  Their event give away buttons....

Our team of course has had experience with nasty weather curtailing practice time.  It bit us hard at our Lacrosse event, so we were well prepped and did not suffer too much from this latest schedule glitch.  I am however convinced that at some point someone on our team inadvertently offended an Old Gypsy Woman who put a curse on us.  I must relate a few stories along these lines one day...

We played well early.  Our design was simple and rugged.  This is good, we had no serious mechanical issues.  But there were a dozen or robots with seriously better designs, and as the event went on we encountered them with predictable results.

Still, we were an attractive second pick robot, and went into the playoff rounds feeling strong.  First match was against the alliance that eventually did Win it All.  Yikes, they deserve the trip to Houston.  Had we snuck in we'd have been even more outclassed there....

But what is class?  This is an outstanding group of students.  The core of the team are kids we've seen grow up and thrive over the last four to five years.  We'll miss these soon to graduate stars.  They are a big part of our success.  There's some new kids coming up as well.  Another tip of the cap to the students who, once again, were tasked with a complex video project on a tight time line and with insufficient instructions from the event organizers.  It is very satisfying to be able to hold up the USB drive and say: "Here ya go.  3:18 duration, done five hours ahead of deadline".  I'll get it posted here in the days ahead.

And we won the Quality Award.  Basically this is for the team that builds the most robust machine in the competitive field.  I think we mostly got it for the impressive THE MEG bar that anchored the front of our design.  It took some mighty hits as our driver gained confidence.  And throughout the entire event, heck the entire season, we never lost an intake component.

There are some good stories there, stories for another day...

On the way home we stopped for food.  The team wanted McDonalds.  We'd been to a Chick fil A a couple nights before.  Great food, but their Play Land had a sign saying you had to be under a certain height to Play.  McDonalds has a more lenient policy.

FIRST ROBOTICS 2026 - State Tournament

So the robotics team qualified to go to the State Tournament.  The top teams there - I think its 8 - get to go to Worlds at Houston.

It's been a good season.  Since we moved up to being a "two event team" in 2023 we've usually had one good event and one not so good one.  This season, despite some really weird luck with things like weather, we did well at both our events.  Placed 6th at one, 9th at the other.  

In a year where we were starting a major rebuild this is quite good.  Software in particular over performed.  And for once the kids started with a realistic design and just forged ahead building it and gradually optimizing it.  

How this will translate to the next level of competition is unclear.  We will be facing the top teams from all four of the qualifying District events.  I'd say at least ten of them have decidedly "better" robots.  But its more complicated than that.  

Matches are played between "alliances" of three robots on each side.  Sometimes there are a couple of major scoring robots....and a third member of the alliance that shuttles game pieces, plays a bit of defense, etc.  That third robot can be the difference when the Big Boys go head to head.

Well, that's the theory anyway.  

The robot has looked good in its final tune ups.  We discovered for instance that one of our four drive wheels was basically not working for part of the last event.  Now fixed.

If nothing else we'll go, have a good time.  Play Well With Others.

Details when available.

Merrill Wisconsin - an odd gun in the Park

 Seen in a Veteran's Memorial park, Merrill Wisconsin.

It is of course an artillery piece, but what an odd one.  Huge springs!  Let's look for additional clues.  Here's a view that shows more, although with light that is less good.

And some helpful markings around the business end of things:

These read: 7 inch No. 48 Wt. 1689 lbs.  JPF Insp. Watervliet Arsenal 1900.  Elsewhere on the gun it says Model 1892 Bethlehem Steel.  Although that might be the gun carriage, not the gun proper.  Finally, there is a bronze bit that has stamped on it: No. 48 Model of 1895 Watertown Arsenal.  I'm a bit confused now.  So what is this critter?

To start things off, Watertown Arsenal and Watervliet Arsenal are not the same outfit.  The former mostly made gun carriages.  The latter made the guns, and as in this case, the howitzers.  Howitzers are short, stubby, larger caliber weapons designed to fire shorter distances and at very high angles.

So far so good.  But this is a very odd bit of artillery.  Most of what you see in assorted war memorials are either WWII surplus stuff or captured items from I or II.  This is neither.

It appears to be an item of obsolete coastal artillery.  That's a much less common variety of monument, but you can see how they'd get surplused.  I've run into one or two in my travels.  But nothing like this critter.

Even without the dated plaques it has to be 1890's tech.  Earlier artillery pieces would usually have wheels and/or some means to solidly dig into the ground or be welded to the deck of a ship.  Every time you fired it the recoil would move the gun and you'd have to reposition it.  In 1897 that all changed, when the French unveiled their 75mm cannon with hydraulic recoil dampening.  This was the model for all artillery for the next hundred years.

Before that there must have been assorted experiments with springs and similar gadgetry.  I've nosed about here and there in sources and can find nothing specific on this "thing", perhaps the internet will toss me an answer.

Was this some low production run experiment?  Some boondoggle project right around the Spanish American War when somebody in the War Office bought the fantasy that the Spanish fleet might sail into Boston harbor some day?  Who knows.  

Can the Dog actually Read????

I am not particularly impressed with the intellectual prowess of my dog Hank.  But sometimes you have to wonder.  Two images from a recent spring time walk.

OK, not the most flattering image of Hank, but it is what you see from the human end of the leash...

But an example of canine literacy?  I'll spare you the action photo....

Mascots and Me

Because of course there were mascots at the recent robotics tournament.  And I show no signs of growing up...

An Illiterate Dog.

Walks with Hank have frequent interruptions.  Things need to be sniffed.  Things need to be moistened.  The other day we were doing a lap near the high school and came across this Post It note laying on the ground next to, well, to a post.....

It reads "Diuresis" and maybe was from a health class or some such.  Oddly this was one of the few times Hank did not opt to lift a leg.  Even his impressive capacity has limits.  Or maybe he just can't read.

Robotics Again

Off we went to an early April robotics tournament.  It was a nice short drive down to Lacrosse.  Heading south actually, so what's the odds weather would bite us this time?  Pretty good as it happens.

One of those late season storms that barges through and makes a mess happened to arrive at just the wrong time.  As school was cancelled - I'm sure an upcoming four day weekend had nothing to do with this - students were not allowed to travel.  Even though by the early afternoon departure time conditions were just fine.  Bureaucracy at its finest.

So our team had to get up darned early the next day and show up for the event with no practice time, no time to tune up the robot or really to do much else.  And it showed.

Well, sometimes you just get snake bit.  In one match BOTH of our alliance partners tipped over, leaving us in an unenviable 1 v 3 match.  Another time a robot crashed into the protective panel hard enough to knock our control laptop clear off the ledge and disconnect us.  Flukes.  At one point we were down to number 30 out of 34.

But we came back.  Eventually we clawed our way back to 9th place and were in the late event playoff rounds.  Sometimes called Elimination rounds.  And we were.

Oh well.  We did well enough to qualify for the upcoming State Tournament.  We won a Gracious Professionalism Award for an unprecedented third year in a row.  And late in the event we were tapped to put together an event highlights video.  

We ended up having to compress about 8 hours of work into half that time, with the main video editor student yawning and shaking his head.  Hey, he had been up since 4am to get there (see above).

The video turned out well, and a pretty good time was generally had by all.

Keeping an Eye on the Robots

I've been going through the world of FIRST robotics trying out every job.  Judge, Field Reset, Referee, at the lower levels I've done a bit of MC work.  At this event I'm a Robot Inspector.  You have to ensure that the teams comply with all sorts of rules.  I try to be supportive, yet steely eyed...

Mostly fun, I've not had to admonish anyone to any degree.  But after hours of digging around inside robots....

Not sure how my team will do.  There was an unfortunate storm system that came through and closed school for the day.  As a result the team was not allowed to travel even though by noon it was quite decent outside.  This puts us at a competitive disadvantage.   No practice rounds for us on Thursday night, no field calibration either.  We'll see how things go.....

Tree Shaped Tombstones - some Jewish examples from St. Paul. And from Vulcan.

 Tree Shaped Tombstones are not evenly distributed among different faiths.  From my extensive - if unscientific - study, I'd say they are more common in Catholic cemeteries and leas common in Protestant ones.  Jewish cemeteries are scarce in the Midwest, so I don't have a big sample, but today we'll visit three of them in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Due to a mix up in directions I started out at Mount Zion cemetery, it is the burial ground for the oldest Jewish community in the state.  The Temple goes back to Territorial days, but the cemetery has only been in this location since 1888, but had only a single "tree" and not a very interesting one at that.  But a few blocks away at the adjacent Sons of Jacob and Sons of Moses cemeteries it was a different story.  Despite having examples that were mostly from the latter days of Tree Shaped Tombstones, there was a lot to see.

Some features of the tombstones I saw here were unusual.  Many have details beyond the name of the deceased.  Beloved Daughter, even in abbreviated form, is poignant.  This low "book style" with Hebrew on the left side was pretty common.

Here's another one.  Note the interesting hands on the otherwise drab tombstone behind and to the right.  That will become important shortly.

The odd little niche down below also caught my eye.  What used to be there?

The cemeteries are in part on a hillside.  Scenic, but not ideal for tall, heavy tombstones!

This last picture was obviously taken on another day.  Even in the Midwest weather does not change that fast.

Notice the hands?  Those are Cohen Hands.  They indicate that the person, it has to be male btw, buried here is a descendent of Aaron, brother of Moses.  This illustrates the hand gestures made by Jewish priests (Cohens, or Kohanim).  While this indicates a priestly lineage it does not mean the person buried here was a priest.  Or even had the surname Cohen or its variants.

In a bit of trivia that I just learned writing this, the gesture - separation between ring and middle finger - inspired Mr. Spok's classic Vulcan salute.  Leonard Nimoy was of course Jewish, and made up this bit of Vulcan culture based on what he'd seen in Temple as a young child.

FIRST Robotics 2026 - The Meg 2.0. And interviews with people and inanimate objects....

Our robot, The Meg, got a lot of things right.  That's why we started our recent event running off a 9-0 streak.  But after that it got a little tougher.  So we had some things to fix...but not - as in years recent - a full rebuild on our plate.

Let's start with a new "nameplate".  It is also our main crash bar for front impacts.  It is now both stronger and scarier looking.

Various other tweaks all happened in rapid order.  The goal is to even out power draws. In our last event there were "brown outs" that in particular impacted vision targeting.  

Fun video from our last tournament.  A mix of Meet the Robots and Asking Odd Questions:

In keeping with the short deadlines, fast turn around of FIRST we are heading to another tournament later this week.  Much more on this in a few days.

Oh, I can't resist.  Here's a quick peek at the upgrades, which include teaching the robot to actively resist being budged by defending robots - or interfering humans - once the targeting cameras have the launcher spun up and ready to go....

Tree Shaped Tombstones - Merrill Wisconsin

Merrill Wisconsin has an odd history.  It was founded very early for our part of the world..late 1840's.  But it was basically just a logging camp at the time.  It did not turn into much of a community until the 1880's.  Still, plenty old for it to have the Tree Shaped Tombstones from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Earlier this year I was up there for a hockey tournament.  And I did find a couple. Both oddball specimens.

This thing is just plain ugly.  Drab color, which the drab winter day does not help.  Minimal structural features.  The surface texture is not the ridges made to look like tree bark.  I'm not sure what they were going for here.

I think this is some kind of low grade marble.

It really just has a bunch of poorly defined leaves and vines on it.

The next example is of a form I've seen many times.  The stump with two branches.  It usually is for a married couple, but only the man's name is on this one.  It also has a metal plaque.  This is more common in the southern US from what I've seen.  Odd ball up here.

Nice copper oxide leaching out from below the metal.  A reminder that archaeology is not far off, and that my eye must be tuned to this color spectrum.  

The Private Life of Beans

When I was gifted 30 pounds of dried beans for Christmas, my expectations were modest.  "Cool beans", I obviously said.  And hoped that perhaps they'd be of some use in our hunting land feed plots.  Deer will eat dried beans, tender green shoots, etc.  

So the basic plan was to just plant some in areas we turn over with the neighbor's tractor.  But it seems I had set my expectations too low.

Catching up from previous postings, I:

- Planted about 10 of each variety.  50%-70% survived my indifferent care

- Transplanted one of each...except for one variety where two were intertwined.

And the darn things kept growing.  This is a picture from March 11th.

They were supposed to be bush style beans, but weirdly turned into vine types and proceeded to climb 3 feet up the window blinds.  Had I known this in advance I would have added some stakes.  And perhaps set them up somewhere else.

But its nice to have a bit of greenery in late winter.  Sometimes I remember to water them.  Usually its when I finish a cup of coffee and use the empty cup to fetch their ration.  Caffeine traces might have something to do with their vigorous growth.

But something else is happening.  

I know very little about the sex life of plants.  I actually don't care to know more.  But I vaguely recall that in the whole "Birds and Bees" scenario there should be, you know, bees.  Or some other way to pollinate flowers.  Oh yes, there are flowers.  All three varieties of beans, with various small yellow and blue blossoms.

And there are beans.  Yes, I am officially a bean farmer now.  

This is unexpected.  Oh, we are only talking three that have reached the stage where actual beans should be forthcoming.  Several more adorable little mini pods may or may not develop.  But this shows a degree of resilience that I had not expected.

So how did this come to pass?  Well, some plants are rather ambiguous is such matters.  Male and female parts on the same plant?  I guess.  Pinto and Navy bean hybrids?  Sure, why not.  Heck, the hops that I planted years ago on the back fence just up and changed, one section of the hop producing female plants just throwing some sort of biochemical switch and converting to male hops.  The latter btw are not productive of anything useful to a home brewer.  And, to be frank, the female plants were plenty productive before this transition.  Probably there were bees involved.  Birds can't be entirely ruled out.

So now what?

It appears that free, dried beans can turn into deer pleasing snacks with a fair degree of success.  Oh, and with potting soil and an absence of rodents, turkeys and such to nip them in the bud.  Or in the pre-bud stage.  But it encourages me to try the mass approach.  Every week blast another 10 or 20 pounds of dried beans off into patches of recently cleared land.  See what happens.  Most will get eaten right away.  Some as soon as they dare show their tender little sprouts.  But evidently beans are scrappers, they'll give it their best try.  So I hope to be looking out across waving fields of tasty to deer plants.  At which point I'll tip my bean planter's hat and say "You guys/gals just do your own thing out there.  You be you."