I Hate Fireants

I have never gotten fire ant bites on my hands. They usually get me around the ankles or feet depending on my footware. Yesterday after we returned home from Utah the grass needed mowing, and I had some time. Our nieghbor cut the front yard while we were gone but it needed it again and the back was really long. It takes about an hour and a half to cut the entire yard. The back half is mostly weeds and doesn't grow very much but this time the weeds were pretty tall so I cut the whole thing. It was close to eight pm when I finished so it was starting to get pretty dark. I decided to pull some weeds that had grown up in the cracks between the driveway sections. The second section had a fire ant hill in it and they got in 4 good bites before I brushed them all off. They are exceptionally quick little buggers. For those of you who have never had the pleasure, fire ant bites are kind of like a cross between a mosquito and a wasp. They are not exceptionally painful initially but right away they start to sting and itch. Then after a while they just itch, a lot. They make a little welt that oozes liquid when you scratch it, which is most of the time. They go away after about a week or so, but I swear that when you get a bite it re-activates every other bite you have ever gotten and you think they are biting you again. Or maybe it's just my imagination. They are truly miserable little critters and as far as I can tell serve absolutely no useful purpose in the ecology of the planet. I mean most bugs have some purpose like helping to decompose and break down other organic matter or serve as food for some other useful bug or animal. I am pretty sure nothing would eat a fire ant and I have never heard of anything useful that they do.

Cutting the grass on my litle riding lawn mower is really just a poor imitation of real farm work, with a real tractor. Just to prove I can do both I have posted these pictures of me loading one thousand lb. hay bales on a trailer last week at Mark's place. The top picture was taken just as I successfully droped the bale and stood it on it's side. (second try. the first time it rolled completely off the other side)