A Dedicated Fungus, First Fruits, and Other Unusual Things in the Yard

It has been unusually wet this summer. So much so that this morning several large mushrooms had erupted in the front yard.

It takes a very dedicated mushroom to grow here in Dodge City.

The weather took a turn toward the more unusual this afternoon, as it even made the national map on the weather channel. Finally a big red dot in the middle of the Wyoming map. (Unfortunately, it was not a new Ikea location.) It was a large severe thunderstorm complete with half dollar sized hail and tornado warnings headed right for us. As a respecter of tornado warnings from our days in Alabama, we headed to the basement.

The storm passed just to the north of us and all we got was a little rain, a lot of wind and a few sizable hailstones.

See where this one left a small crater in the ground? I think it was significantly bigger than a half dollar, but I only had a quarter to use for comparison.

Also, while we are outside I took a picture of the one and only tomato in my 'garden'. I think it the largest tomato I have ever grown. I was thankful it did not get beaten to death by hailstones.

It is, however, still significantly smaller than a quarter. Now if I can just keep it from getting tomato rot fungus. I hear that is a problem in unusually wet years.