Thursday, December 7th, 2006
Here’s a well-maintained adobe building co-habitating with the remains of an old adobe structure.
This kind of thing can be seen around Mesilla because most owners don’t want to demolish this historical heritage. In recognition of this preference, Mesilla has a city ordinance against removing old adobe structures.
This tree was undoubtedly alive when it was incorporated into this adobe wall.
So we have duple embeds: tree in wall, wall in building. Or do we have tree in building, building in wall?
Tags: Adobe, Mesilla, Duple Embeds
Monday, December 4th, 2006
The 2006 pecan harvest is almost finished.
The trees are ready for harvest when most of the protective shucks have split. You can see the open shucks and pecans here:
Pecan trees alternate between high yield and low yield years. This year is a low year for this area. Production in a low year can be as little as 1/3 of a high year.
Here is a tree from an orchard with an excellent yield this year, perhaps because the trees are younger and were recently transplanted.
The first step in harvesting is getting the nuts out of the tree. This is done with a shaker:
The trees are shook for about 2 or 3 seconds and you can feel the shaking in the ground 20 or 30 feet away. The going rate to get your trees shook if you don’t own a shaker is $5 a tree.
Sometimes it is necessary to shake several branches of a large tree.
Here you can see pecans falling as the tree shakes.
The shaker shakes out anything that will fall, including shucks, leaves, and twigs. All of this joins the leaves which have already fallen from the tree, so the second step is to use a windrow machine to rake this material into rows.
The last step in harvesting is to use a sweeper to pick up the leaves and debris and pecans and separate the pecans. Here’s a sweeper in action.
The sweeper stores the nuts in a bin and grinds the leaves and debris and returns it to the soil.
Here are what trees look like after harvest.
Doña Ana county produces more pecans than any similarly-sized area in the world.
Tags: Pecan Harvest, Pecan Shaker, Pecan Sweeper
Thursday, November 16th, 2006
Two of Mesilla’s tranquil lanes, reflecting the pleasant pace of life here.
Tags: Mesilla, New Mexico
Saturday, November 11th, 2006
The pecans trees are just beginning to yellow. This is later than usual, which will delay the harvest, which usually begins in late October.
The pecans are hard to see unless you look closely.
Tags: Pecan Harvest
Thursday, November 9th, 2006
The best place in the Mesilla Valley to get custom metal work.
You won’t find Ironworks Unlimited near the plaza. It’s on a side road, but people who have been here awhile know where to find it. The owner does the work himself, and has been at this location since 1972.
Tags: Ironwork
Sunday, November 5th, 2006
Sitting on a wall, daydreaming in the Mesilla sun…
Tags: Mesilla
Thursday, November 2nd, 2006
Adobe is still made in Mesilla just as it was 150 years ago, with the exception that a machine is used to help mix and pour the mud.
First the dirt for the adobe is shoveled into a pile and mixed with straw.
Next water is added to the center of the pile and roughly mixed.
The mud is then shoveled into the mixing machine and mixed to the right texture. You can see the adobe building being repaired here.
The mud is poured into wooden forms that make bricks 10 x 14 inches in size.
The forms are removed and the bricks are not moved until they are dry. The drying process may take days.
Mesilla ordinances forbid the demolition of an adobe structure.
Tags: Making Adobe
Tuesday, October 24th, 2006
We’ve had about 20 hours of slow rain. It’s welcome and very pleasant, but comes at a bad time for local farmers.
San Albino this morning:
The Fountain Theater:
Tags: San Albino, Fountain Theater, Mesilla
Tuesday, October 24th, 2006
Part of the myth of Billy the Kid is that he “somehow” escaped being killed by Pat Garrett in 1881 and lived out his life quietly and (mostly) honestly.
Not very likely.
One of the supposed Billy’s is a John Miller, who died March 12, 1937 at the Pioneers’ Retirement Home in Prescott, Arizona. It is said he never claimed publicly (except when drunk) to be Billy, but his friends identified him as such.
Here are Billy (left) and John.
On May 19, 2005, Tom Sullivan, former sheriff of Lincoln County, New Mexico, and Steve Sederwall, former mayor of Capitan, New Mexico, exhumed Tom Miller’s body from the cemetery at the Pioneers’ Home.
Miller’s grave was unmarked. When they dug it up, they found 2 skeletons. The second one was William Hudspeth, a cattleman who died 3 days before Miller.
They were given permission to dig up Miller’s grave by the former superintendent of the Pioneers’ Home, but not to remove the remains, which they did. Sullivan and Sederwall took the remains to get a DNA sample and to separate Miller’s remains from Hudspeth’s.
Arizona authorities had threatened to charge Sullivan and Sederwall with grave robbing, but announced today that the two would not be charged.
The results of the DNA tests are not known at this time.
See also:
Billy the Kid’s Grave
Did Billy the Kid Stay at La Posta in Mesilla?
Mesilla Museum Display
Billy the Kid Display – Mesilla
Saving the Pat Garrett Marker
Old Mesilla Courthouse
Billy the Kid
Sunday, October 22nd, 2006
In a pasture south of the plaza…
Tags: Cow
