Hobbies take up a lot of my time. I’m looking forward to retiring in about six years so I can devote all of my time to japanese maples, nishikigoi, vegetable gardening, and keeping the chickens away from the afore mentioned.

This year we dove into japanese maples. We had about twenty assorted maple trees (large and small) prior to this spring , then added another thirty. I have another ten trees arriving in about two weeks. My dream is to be able to have maple colors in the spring and in the fall. I can do my momijigari or leaf-peeping right outside my doors.

This fall I don’t think I’m going to see a lot of color. Our summer was quite hot and about one third of the newer trees struggled in the heat. Some of them seem to have just given up and are going dormant without any show. Others have a lackluster set of colorful leaves. I’m hoping a few will be pretty as the temperatures cool but not betting on it.

The maples around the pond seem to be doing the best. We will make a greater effort at landscaping since the pond pavilion cover is now completed. We are growing grass just to keep the area from turning into a mud zone. This has been a little difficult with the chickens picking at any newly seeded area.

We started working on the front side of the house this year since we lost two large eastern red cedar trees. Like the pond area, we are filling in with grass first before deciding on garden beds. We also have the little river run that has been “in progress” for months now. There are always several projects going on and not enough hours on the weekend to get to all of them.

Two weeks ago I attended the annual American Koi Judges Association seminar. This year it was held in conjunction with the Atlanta Koi Club annual show. We have some instructional presentations, go through some practice judging exercises, and discuss how we can help the hobby in America. We also judge the actual koi show together which is fun. Normally a team of two, maybe three judges would judge the entire show; but during the seminar the workload is divided. I always like team judging because everyone has a slightly different way of appreciating koi.

Back home the evenings are much cooler so the pond’s water temperature is dropping. Colder water always brings out more of the sumi (black) in the koi. My koi generally look better during the winter months when there are no koi shows. I will be starting to put up some clear, vinyl walls on the koi pavilion to reduce the heat loss and effects of cooling winds.

Fall is also the time when the japanese breeders are harvesting koi from their mud ponds (ikeage). The koi are brought back into the breeder houses after summering outdoors. The mud ponds are thought to improve growth and coloring of the koi. Koi hobbyists and koi dealers flock to Japan to watch or participate in ikeage…and to get first pick at buying some of the newly harvested koi. Many US dealers will start posting photos of koi they are looking to buy in Japan, trip photos, food photos (possibly my favorite), and photos of koi they think their customers may wish to buy.

This year I picked out an unusual koi called sumizakura. Tree planter and I like the traditional, standard varieties but we also like the unusual. In fact we may like the offbeat more than the standards. It’s like going to an art museum and choosing art nouveau/art deco over classicism. I decided to ask Shawn McHenry of Mystic Koi to go look for a quirky B koi for me this fall since he appears to have an artsy flair. This sumizakura comes from a breeder, Hideaki Oofuchi, who lives in the mountains somewhat more remote than all the other breeders. To view the koi, Shawn had to meet them somewhere in the middle of nowhere on the side of a mountain road. I really love the beni (red) peeking out under the semi near the eyes. It’s like traditional geisha eye makeup. I’m naming this koi “Geisha” and she will come home to me around Christmas or New Year’s depending on how long quarantine takes. I’m crossing my fingers that she will come home safely since Shawn mentioned only two breeders have been successful at creating this variety. Should something happen to her, not an easy variety to replace.

Chickens are pretty easy (and cheap) to replace. They are spending a little more time in their new home so that when they free range, they will return obediently. The six youngest chickens had us out chasing them for an extra forty five minutes getting them back to the coop. We ended up driving them into their old little house that they like and then hand carrying them back. In a few weeks we will start building a more permanent pavilion for the chickens.

Evenings inside the hen house is always the pecking order being reestablished. The older hens have no problem parking themselves on prime roost spots and the six youngest struggle. There is a white chicken who is low on the pecking order of the older hens who pecks at any of them who try to roost near her at night. I think the youngest are choosing the high bar which means they are probably pooping on the white chicken while they sleep…

We have been removing the old chicken area and will turn this back into grass/forest. The area was not the most aesthetically pleasing design. We tend to make a lot of work for ourselves creating something and then deciding that it wasn’t exactly what we wanted. “Re-do” is not a bad word around here but we’re trying to have fewer redo projects.

Winter is less than two months away but hobbies will still keep me busy. Winter is the time of the year where I plan for next year’s garden, plan for new maple gardens, and clean up any deadfall. Just when we thought we were getting ahead of annual deadfall cleanup, Hurricane Helene dropped at least fifteen trees inside our forest and onto pasture edges. It’s a lot of busy work around here but we love it.