The recent droughts in Oklahoma has meant homeowners are concerned about water conservation. One way to save water is to landscape with native drought resistant plants or plants that are bred for the Oklahoma weather. As anyone who has lived through an Oklahoma summer knows, the afternoon summer sun can turn green garden into a burned-out brown weed plot. Summer shade can have a huge effect on your planting. Think of your house as having four micro-climates - east, west, north and south. A plant that does well on the north side of your home may not fare so well when planted to the south. … Continue reading...
Mangum Rattlesnake Roundup
I woke up on a Sunday morning and unexpectedly had the day free. What to do that costs very little and is fun? Mangum Rattlesnake Roundup! I have heard about this festival for many years and saw in the newspaper the previous day that it was going on this very weekend. Free day, 40 mpg BMW motorcycle, and rattlesnakes. Let's go! Unfortunately Kay wasn't able to go with me for this trip. I hit the superslab out of OKC. My GPS said to follow I-40 way out west, then turn south. But what fun was that? I have been to Mangum many times, both in my airplane and by car, so this time I cut … Continue reading...
Cloud Chief – Oklahoma Ghost Town
Cloud Chief - Oklahoma Ghost Town Cruising down Oklahoma State Highway 152 in western Oklahoma on my BMW enduro bike, a dot popped up on my Garmin GPS indicating one of my earlier marked Oklahoma ghost towns was nearby. I was on my way to the annual Mangum Rattlesnake Roundup but decided to make the slight detour and explore this long lost Oklahoma ghost town myself. As I rolled into former town I first noticed the historical marker placed along the road by the Oklahoma Historical Society. I love these granite markers. They provide a near permanent record of the history of the location. … Continue reading...
Carbo Oil Company
Just north of Guthrie on Highway 77 is a long abandoned oil refinery. It doesn't look like a typical oil refinery with rusted tanks, oil stand sand and weed covered roads. The former home of Carbo Oil Company Refinery matches the decor or turn-of-the-century Guthrie with red sandstone victorian style buildings. The property is now privately owned and fairly well maintained. You can stop in and visit the former oil refinery headquarters and if you are lucky, chat with the caretaker of the property. View Off the Beaten Path in a larger map … Continue reading...
Denoya – Ghost Towns of Oklahoma
Denoya - originally known as Whizbang - was a wild boomtown that rose quickly after the founding of the Burbank oil field. The local postmaster at the time thought the name Whizbang was undignified as a town, so instead named the new town Denoya after a prominent Osage Indian family. Denoya exploded onto the scene almost overnight when an oil drilled by E.W. Marland (later to be Governor of Oklahoma) hit paydirt, pumping out over 600 barrels of oil per day. Soon a second, third, and fourth wells were drilled, one which eventually produced over 2,500 barrels of oil per day. With an oil play … Continue reading...
Canola in Oklahoma
Kay and I were riding our motorcycles in western Oklahoma during the spring of 2012 and kept seeing these beautiful fields of yellow flowers. At first glance we thought "sunflowers" but quickly determined they were not sunflowers. It was a mystery until a few days later when Kay texted a picture to a friend and he told her the flowers were from the Canola plant. We knew about Canola oil used in cooking but I didn't know much about growing it in Oklahoma and how it had seemed to blossom overnight into these huge fields of beautiful yellow plants. I decided to dig a little deeper and do some … Continue reading...
Canola in Oklahoma
Kay and I were riding our bikes in the wonderful spring weather recently and kept coming across these huge fields of yellow flowers in central and western Oklahoma. At first I thought they might be sunflowers but on closer inspection they were not something I had seen before. Kay posted a picture from her phone on Facebook and within a few minutes a friend told her they were canola fields. Humm, I don't remember hearing about those as a crop in Oklahoma. So when I got back to our Edmond office I did a little Google research. It seems canola is a plant whose seeds can be used to make canola … Continue reading...