Birding with Jerry Hall: Learning the art of being persistent

Features

Related Photos

Milton Hershey knew about try, try, try again.

March 13, 2010

By Jerry Hall Daily Record Columnist The San Marcos Record Sat Mar 13, 2010, 01:31 PM CST

Birding teaches one to be persistent. For example, I barely missed seeing a resplendent quetzal on a trip to Costa Rica, but I persevered and finally saw the bird on a trip to Panama.

Similarly, I bought two topsy-turvy tomato planters last year and eagerly anticipated cascades of red, ripe tomatoes growing upside down on my backyard deck. Unfortunately, things did not work out and I harvested a sadly sparse crop.

But I recalled how perseverance pays off, not only in birding, but in other endeavors.

Thomas Edison had hundreds of failures before coming up with a workable electric light bulb. He said his tries weren’t failures, they were just ways not to do it.

Clyde Tombaugh, an American astronomer, looked at 20 million images before finally discovering Pluto.

Milton Hershey was a fourth-grade dropout who was fired from his job as a printer’s apprentice. He opened a candy business. It failed. He tried a second candy operation with the same result. Undeterred, he opened yet a third candy factory – which failed.

Did he say three strikes and I’m out? No, Milton, on his fourth try, founded the Lancaster Caramel Company. His caramel recipe was a big success and he later sold the company and started the Hershey Company. The rest is chocolate history.

So, inspired by others who shoved adversity aside and strolled on to success, I am prepared to try again. I will again plant tomatoes in my topsy-turvy containers, hoping for a bountiful harvest.

But of even greater import, I have discovered the Giant Tree Tomato.

This stunning development exceeds even the amazing tomato-potato plant which grows tomatoes above ground and tasty, plump red-skinned potatoes below.

Let me share a few of the amazing attributes of the tree tomato as outlined in my Gardeners’ Choice spring catalogue: “60 pounds of tomatoes from one single plant! Giant Tree Tomato zooms to an amazing 8 feet tall in just 3 months! Amazing super-species. Looks like a fruit tree — produces bushels of tomato clusters summer to fall. Basket after basket of juicy, mouth-watering beauties. Up to 2 pounds each — so delicious, so succulent, just one sliced-up tree tomato covers an entire slice of bread. A super-growing tree that zooms high as a man in just three months!

Wow. I guess you can see why I am so excited. (Dotty wondered why there is only an artist’s illustration of the Giant Tree Tomato and no photograph — but she tends to be skeptical on these things. She even thought the tomato-potato plant seemed odd.)

But as someone who has traveled the oceans and trekked over hill and dale to find the quetzal, and as someone who has been sorely tested by the topsy-turvy tomato planter, well, for me this is just another challenge. Another test of persistence.

I have ordered two plants.

Milton Hershey would understand.

Text Only

Features

Veggie Heaven
“Vegetables can be beautiful,” says Suzi Fields, and a case in point is her artfully landscaped curbside garden at 1013 Field Street (names Suzi Fields and Field Street are coincidental), which is Spring Lake Garden Club Yard of the Month.

February 12, 2012 1 Photo
HEB customers the big winners in Souper Bowl project
HEB customers throughout Kyle, Buda and San Marcos unanimously win MVP for this year's Souper Bowl of Caring, says local food bank community relations coordinator Jane Moore.

February 10, 2012
A Culinary Adventure
If the quickest way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, then true, long-lasting love exists through a pair of adventurous eaters.

February 10, 2012 1 Photo
Plenty of love going into TVM fundraiser
More than 200 volunteers, 30 flats of strawberries, 470 pounds of chocolate and immeasurable amounts of love go into True Vineyards Ministries annual valentine's chocolate-covered strawberry sale.

February 10, 2012
Food for Thought
Several Hays County youth participated in the District 10 4-H Food Challenge held recently at Texas State University.

February 8, 2012 1 Photo
Discover new, great reads with BookLetters website
“I was watching The Today Show and they reviewed Elizabeth the Queen by Sally Bedell Smith."

February 8, 2012
The Heat is On
It should come as no surprise that the next few months will be drier and warmer than normal.

February 7, 2012 1 Photo
Celebrating a Legend
Doug Lawrence was an up-and-coming tenor sax player, having played with Benny Goodman, Dizzy Gillespie and more, when he crossed paths with jazz pioneer — and San Marcos native — Eddie Durham in 1982.

February 3, 2012 1 Photo
‘Happy Birthday’ perfect antidote for winter blues
As the perfect antidote to winter blues, the Wimberley Players will open a rollicking farce, “Happy Birthday” by Marc Camoletti and adapted by Beverley Cross, today at the Wimberley Playhouse.

February 3, 2012
Counting down the many uses of corn
Nothing is more American than corn.

February 2, 2012
More Features Headlines

Features

Search Results

Related Photos

Birding with Jerry Hall: Learning the art of being persistent

Site Map

Contact Us