Author Archives: John S. Quarterman

Tis but a scratch 2025-11-26

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Whilst mowing up some privet that had grown up since Hurricane Helene, the 18-inch Ego electric chainsaw fell under the tractor mower.

[In a bucket]
In a bucket

Turns out if you shatter a lithium battery, the pieces get very hot.

After I put out the several grass fires, in the bucket is what we collected.

I think the black knight said it best:

“Tis but a scratch.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmInkxbvlCs Continue reading →

Banana plants after the freeze 2025-11-23

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Banana plants do this when frozen.

[Gretchen with her banana plants]
Gretchen with her banana plants

Not to worry. They’ll come back in the spring.

Meanwhile, Gretchen will lop their heads off with a machete. She says that makes them grow back better.

We did get some bananas to eat with breakfast.

-jsq

Cutting Sugar Cane 2025-11-09

A freeze is predicted for tonight, so yesterday we cut the sugarcane and bedded it down for the winter.

That means we buried it a few inches deep to keep it from freezing.

But we kept some cane for squeezing juice to boil to make cane syrup.

River helped. The other dogs thought it was boring.

[Cutting Sugar Cane, Some to squeeze and boil for syrup, Most to bed overwinter, to plant in the spring 2025-11-09]
Cutting Sugar Cane, Some to squeeze and boil for syrup, Most to bed overwinter, to plant in the spring 2025-11-09

Gretchen explains:
https://youtu.be/Pk1unm9K1nU?si=6R49ymVJQ-O4jEqf Continue reading →

Garter snake 2025-10-09

This small snake was in the front driveway.

You can tell by comparison with the pine straw that the snake is quite small, maybe 8 inches long.

[Snake with pine straw, sand, and pebbles]
Snake with pine straw, sand, and pebbles

I think it’s an Eastern Garter Snake, Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis.

What do you think?

-jsq

Two kinds of persimmons 2025-10-09

Evidently we’ve been mis-identifying our persimmons.

[Two kinds of persimmons]
Two kinds of persimmons

The prolific persimmon tree has acorn-shaped fruit like the red one here. Those are apparently Hachiya persimmons.

The younger tree with only a few fruit not yet ripe has flat-bottom persimmons like this yellow one. Those appear to be Fuyu persimmons.

See, for example, this GrubMarket blog post, Fuyu vs. Hachiya: How to Use California Persimmons.

They’re both varieties of the Oriental persimmon, Diospyros kaki.

-jsq