How suggestive this thistle down...which, as I sit by the open window, comes in and softly bushes my hand! The first snowflake tells of winter not more plainly than this driving down heralds the approach of fall. – John Burroughs

The Phases of the Moon

July 7: The Moon enters its final quarter.

July 14: The Katydid Moon is new.

July 21: The Moon enters its second quarter.

July 29: The Moon is full.

The Sun

This week, sunset finally gives way and loses its first minute since Dec. 2. Sunrise became three minutes later in the last days of June, and loses another five minutes this week.

The Stars

Before sunrise, the Pleiades and Taurus lead Orion out of the east. In the north, the Big Dipper lies against the horizon. Due south, the gangly formation of Sculptor lies between Fornax and Piscis Austrinus. In the west, summer’s Cygnus and Aquila dip toward the tree line.

Weather Trends

The Corn Tassel Rains, which typically begin at the end of June, often continue through the period, and temperatures, which cooled somewhat during the first days of July, begin to grow warmer. After the 7th, there is a full 90 percent chance that afternoon highs will reach 80 or above. July 7 through the 9th are some of the worst Dog Days of the year, all three bringing a 10 percent chance of heat above 100 degrees.

The Natural Calendar

Wild cherries are darkening. Thimble plants are setting their thimbles. Red cones of the staghorn sumac become prominent. Behavior of raccoons, opossums and groundhogs becomes erratic in the Dog Day heat.

Elderberry flowers turn to fruit, like the blossoms of pokeweed, poison ivy and the trilliums. August’s goldenrod is 6-feet tall now. Lupine pods break apart to spread their seeds. Early white snakeroot, ironweed, Joe Pye weed, boneset, wingstem and tall coneflowers are budding.

Katydids appear at your back porch light. Mold grows rapidly in the warm, wet weather.

Morning birdsong continues to diminish, making way for the increase of insect volume. Blackberries are August-size this week, but still green. Milkweed pods have emerged almost everywhere.

Sycamore trees shed their bark, marking the center of summer. Elderberry flowers fade; green berries take their place.

In the Field and Garden

By now winter wheat is often a fifth cut. At least 14 leaves have emerged on each stalk of field corn. The peak period of heat stress begins for summer crops.

The canola harvest gets underway. Fertilize asparagus and rhubarb as their seasons end.

Side-dress the corn and cut summer cabbage and broccoli. Pick all the remaining peas and compost the vines. Plant the latest sweet corn of the year as the moon waxes.

Some farmers are planting double-crop beans after the wheat harvest. Lunar position is superb for that activity. Greenhouse tomatoes seeded now could be producing by October.

Almanack Classics

A Blessing to Be Blind

By Larry Motel, Greenwich, Ohio

In 1946, when dad and mom bought a home on the bay side of the Marblehead Peninsula, I was so happy. I could walk to the woods, open fields and the water every day. I was 10 years old at the time.

There I met two brothers who became life-long friends. Tom was a year younger than me, and Jim was a year older. When we first met, I saw Jim’s one eye was half gone and scarred over. Then I found out he was completely blind.

Later I found out that when he was about 4 years old, he and an older boy were playing with sticks, as in sword fighting, and Jim got his eye badly damaged. By the time he was 6, the other eye got infected and he turned completely blind.

Well, Jim ended up going to the school for the blind in Columbus, but was home for three months in the summer. We all liked to swim, and Jim was really good at it as he was always physically active. During the last few years in the school for the blind, he took up wrestling. He was so good that when he graduated, he got a scholarship to Baldwin-Wallace College.

He did so well in wrestling there that he was offered a scholarship to Ohio State. He took it and this move changed his life for the better forever. He met a girl who had been blind from birth, and they fell in love. After Jim graduated, they got married.

He later told his brother Tom and me that maybe it was a blessing to be blind because he would never have met someone he loved so much.

Follow the summer with Bill Felker’s A Daybook for July in Yellow Springs, Ohio. These daybooks contain all the nature notes used to create Poor Will’s Almanack. Order yours from Amazon.

Copyright 2026: W. L. Felker