Hot o' the morning to ya!

What we have here, is a nice, hot, summer day. The kind where when the sun rises, it feels intense on your skin, your hair gets hot instantly, but in the shade it is still cool and damp. Until the sun hits that spot too!
We've put the horses out for a morning graze that will only last until about 9:30, when they will want to seek full shade. The trees we planted down the lane, oh, about 7 years ago, have started shading little patches of the middle pasture and the lane, so that is where the horses are camped this morning.
Unfortunately, it looks like some of the maples we planted are going to die. Several have split sagittally down their trunks and then the branches are slowly giving up the ghost.
The Yoshino Cherry trees planted in pairs alternately with the maples look pretty healthy, although we get variable blooming on those. Then again, we do as well on the sour cherries and apples in the orchard, so maybe that is just the nature of flowering trees. It does make some sense, as nature seems to do things in cycles. I think that is why humans started doing stuff like fertilizing, and spraying for bugs. Then the trees can go all out year after year and not deplete all their resources? Around here we are heavily into depletion.
Here's another thing about the heat of summer at Cowfeathers. Flies. Now, we do a pretty good job of manure control at the barn, and the flies are there, but not overwhelming the joint. I did put up fly paper this week to see if I can catch some. But, the mulberry trees have shed their berries and the rotting fruit attracts LOTS of flies. As I have stated before in this blog, I think if we ceased our efforts of "whacking back", the mulberries would own the place in months. They are proliferating fellows.
And then, due to the genetics of being my children, the doors stay wide open for much of a day. This allows the goose to come say "hello" if he's feeling lonely, and the barn cats to curl up on the white sofa. It also allows the flies have a look 'round. I don't like flies. I really don't like them in my kitchen. So, where do they end up? Certainly. So, add fly-killer to my naughty resume. I have to kill them when they land on the floor or other vertical surface, as I don't want to smack them on any counter tops. I think they sense this. They also sense when the swatter comes out and all but the most bold disappear until I've finished wiping up the carnage. Right now there are two who seem to think they are welcome to help me type.
They're wrong. Time for them to give up that ghost.....