Pangola...it was Daddy's pasture grass of choice as we were
growing up. It was propagated by spreading stems cut from 
established plants and "cutting" them in with a disk harrow. 
(See discussion of harrows on Wikipedia.)
(See pangola grass as defined by Merriam Webster.)
We had a pangola "seed" patch of an acre or two over toward 
the  north east corner of our property. From there, we would 
cut  the stems and then spread and cut them in at another 
location to create a pasture.
A bit further digression before I get to the real story. The 
pangola "seed" patch was located to the east of what we called
the "well field". It was called that because (at one time) it
had a dug well on its western side. That makes sense so far.
What I never understood was why there was a well there in the
first place. It was too far from the house to be used as a 
water source and trying to hand water crops from a dug well
would be a formidable task. One of life's unsolved mysteries,
I guess. Wayne thinks there might have been a vegetable garden
nearby. 
What I do know is the area around the well did a super
job of holding water. You'd get a tractor stuck there in a
hearbeat if you weren't careful. I did; more than once.
Now, on to the real story.
One day Wayne and I were cutting pangola in the "seed" patch.
I was driving the old John Deere tractor while Wayne was riding
on the sickle bar mower being pulled behind. 
See a modern sickle bar mower. Much fancier than the left over horse 
drawn one we had! Ours was more like this:


As we were mowing along, I ran over an old stump, straddling 
it with the tractor. Well, the mower behind was much lower 
than the tractor and Wayne, seated on it, was very low to
the ground. The result was the stump was further disturbed
by the mower and Wayne was extremely close to the bumble bees
that came boiling out. They weren't too happy at having thier
nest disturbed.
Now, there's no way the old John Deere tractor could outrun a
mad bumble bee. I didn't have to worry, though, as Wayne 
provided a quite sufficient diversion!
Neither of us remembers getting stung. I guess it's true: God
takes care of fools, drunks and little kids. Wayne thinks he 
stayed with the mower and rode it out. I'm not sure.
I'm surprised he didn't bail and run while I chugged away. Again,
ain't no way that old John Deere could outrun mad bumble 
bees..even  in its highest gear which wasn't easy to get into 
in a hurry.
Ah, yes, thems wuz the good ol' days.

James (with thanks to Wayne) 31 May 2009