Baja St. Martin

Today it was hot! We need some rain. Late in the afternoon it thundered, the sky grew dark and about 10 drops of water fell. That was it! Forecast for tomorrow is 60 percent so I hope that amount is for here.
If you’re a lover of insects, forgive me for saying I’ve been squashing a lot of those horrible black grasshoppers lately. The ones with the red under their wings and which eat amaryllis. It seems to be mating season so usually I can get two at a time.
As much as I dislike them, I felt I should research them a little lest I might be destroying a creature important to nature in some way. Well, as far as I could find, Eastern lubber grasshoppers don’t do anything useful, but they do indeed eat a lot of amaryllis and amaryllis-type plants, plus they excrete a toxic foam which deters predators. My dog used to catch them but she only played with them, never ate them and now I know why.
A fisherman came to the house last week who is still fishing crawfish! He said he is fishing in the swamp which means inside the levee and that the crawfish he was catching were a bit small but sort of green and tender. I believe he said he was getting $1.50 per pound so he was making a decent day. Apparently the crawfish weren’t eating the bait so that expense was minimized.
I doubt if there are many fishermen such as this one and to be honest, he didn’t have the appearance of being a “big” fisherman. (I don’t know what that would be exactly.)
Right now, if you could make $100 clear a day, that would be pretty good, assuming you don’t bang up your boat, or ruin your motor or get hurt. Any one of those happenings can pretty much take the profit out of a good day!
The recreation board met last week in the Belle River meeting room for the usual monthly meeting. Other than pay bills, we did sort of come up with a “wish” list for both Belle River and Stephensville sites.
In Belle River, we would like to expand the parking lot toward the building so people don’t have to walk so far from their cars. Many of the seniors who come for commodities and now for COA events use walkers or canes and it’s a trek getting from their vehicles to the building in good weather and pretty awful in rain. One of the board members is going to check on how to improve the acoustics in the building. There is a dreadful echo inside, making it hard to hear one another. We’d love to have a playground in front of the building, but first have to fill in the area to get it above high water level. And of course, finish the walking trail. Maybe some exercise stations.
One member is looking into getting memorial benches to put around the walking trail for people to sit upon and rest. We did have a very nice memorial event where trees were planted in both parks, but that may be a one-time thing. We really don’t need trees, but benches would be nice, ones with a plaque on the back.
A resident mentioned how much they like our existing walking trail – that it was so much better than another because ours has shady patches, not in full sun all the time. That does make it pleasant when walking. I personally like the woods alongside the trail where I can see birds and maybe a frog plopping into the water. Once I saw an otter galumping along in the woody area between the walking trail and Belle River. It was beautiful!

Teche News’ Lower St. Martin correspondent, Linda Cooke, can be emailed at lindacooke1939@gmail.com.