After non stop torrential downpours for a day and a half, every low place, slue, bog, ditch, rill, branch, creek and river were over run and flooded, and now the Leaf River and the Chickasawhay River are high and roiling with fast water and backed up into the woods and keeping the low places flooded.
With the water and heat, there are mosquitoes galore, worst I've seen in years. But the same conditions have carpeted the earth in green and all the flowers are blooming at once. The purple clover and sweet william and yellow flowers are blooming on the roadsides and medians--as is the Cogon grass.

The Cogon grows about 2 feet high with beautiful feathery white plumes that wave in the breeze. Pretty, but an invasive species. Last year the state took bulldozers and scraped up every patch of Cogon grass they found alongside highway 98. Did it help? Maybe a teeny amount, but this spring there it is again, thumbing its nose at efforts to erase it.
Then:
Just two days after the storm, while the ground is still boggy, I heard the sound of logging somewhere close to the house. I drove all over to find them. They were on the "hill" a high spot on Forest Lake Road, and were logging despite muddy conditions. Found out it is the Forest Service, having the timber logged out so they can plant longleaf pine.

I wrote a letter to the editor about it. Who oversees the Forest Service? How much authority do they have to do whatever they want with the forests in their custody? Where does the timber money go? Do they do ecological/environmental studies before they brutally tear up the land? Is the forest service nothing more than a tree farm and logging operation?
I phoned an employee and they were so reassuring--oh sure--anything to pacify the old lady. Sigh.

susil