A Partridge in a Pear Tree

I hope your Christmas season has been blessed. We finally seem to be inching out of the drought here in Oklahoma, with inch by inch of rain over the last month or two. I have missed posting here, but seriously, everything burned up and died over the long drought, so my posts would have been highly repetitive. Just photos of dead stuff. Just read my last post and repeat. I didn't bother with a garden last summer. But... the ponds have actual water again, and the ground is spongy with moisture. So there is hope for growing beautiful and yummy things again. My pear trees did great this year, however.

The deer loved to eat the 10 or 12 that fell off the tree every day in the Okie wind. The ground around the trees would be littered with fallen pears at dusk, but by morning the ground was clean. The dogs thought they were tasty too, and brought a daily pear snack to the back porch to eat. But for human consumption, you have to be patient. The pears have to sit for 10 to 14 days or so, until they are soft and juicy. You can't eat them right off the tree, no matter how long you wait to pick them. They ripened sitting on my counter top in the kitchen. Or you can wrap them in newspaper and stash them somewhere dry, and dig them out a few at a time. Delicious.

Partridges, turkeys, and many deer wander by. But none actually IN the pear tree.