Pop trees

Today started out rainy, as forecast, and unexpectedly turned into a nice day.

Smukers provided fixins to celebrate the change in weather.

Everyone has heard of popcorn. Today we encountered a lot of poptrees on the Holmes county trail. These trees drop dark berries on bike trails. When you run over these berries, they make a pleasing popping noise, similar to the noise kids enjoy when walking on bubble wrap.

After the berries make their pleasing popping noise, they stick to your tires. Then they stick to leaves, twigs and other debris on the trail, which quickly gets jammed under your fender. Pay no attention to the racket, in a few seconds the gunk gets ground up and disappears.

Pop tree leaves, in case someone wants to identify the actual species of tree.

We were riding in Amish country today. Traffic on the Holmes county trail is separated onto the two sides of the trail. The separation is not based on the direction if travel, it's bicycles vs. buggies.

The trail is not without wildlife. We saw two kinds of bears.

We saw a book-mobile. Amish kids don't go to public schools and may not have easy access to libraries located in town. The book-mobile makes books more accessible to that community.

Local artists painted the outside of the book-mobile.

The inside is just as nice as the outside.

Gerber's chickens are worth crowing about.

Gerber also sells wood products. Why was I thinking they were in the baby food business?

We encountered a Smith Slurry Store tank. It was next to a family farm with cattle, but not a huge commercial operation. We didn't see anyone around to ask about the tank. Maybe someone from the farm belt can explain how these work. Does it produce methane? Fertilizer? Is it just a load of BS waiting to be disposed of?

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