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Two Unexpected Appearances

9 Jul

There are few things cheerier than the color orange. In the garden, one of my favorite orange flowers is Butterfly Weed, which as its name suggests, is just as attractive to butterflies as it is to me. Here is a close up from early June:

Now, most of the blooms are gone, and the Butterfly Weed is creating seeds, housed in the pods you can see here:

The pods dry out and crack open, and the seeds disburse in search of new homes.  [Note: People who know about these things (ie, real gardeners) collect the pods and keep the seeds for the following year instead of letting them blow all over the neighborhood. Now that I have finally figured this out, I will attempt to do the same.]

Last year, the seeds I neglected to harvest went their merry ways. One of them floated across the yard and over the fence, where it softly descended into a small patch of mulched earth near our garage. And there, it settled in for the winter, popping up unexpectedly as a new plant this year. I just discovered it a few weeks ago — a very nice surprise indeed. So this evening, I went to take a photo of it, and what did I find? A second unexpected appearance–in this case, a baby rabbit.

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Feathered, Furry, and Ferrous

26 Jun

The other day I very quietly sat on our front stoop overlooking the yard, and within about half an hour discovered our yard was teeming with activity. I also discovered something about the personalities of these visitors:

Blue Jays pick out sunflower seeds from the bird feeder, hold them against the post, and then crack them open with a few pecks.

   

Cardinals are shy…

… Catbirds are not; this one keeps an eye on all activity in and out of our yard.

Woodpeckers fly under the radar; this was the first and only time I’ve seen one in our yard, and of course, it chose the bird feeder with collapsible perches, so it’s likely to be the last time….

Chipmunks run with their tails straight in the air.

And, finally,  sheep make excellent guards; they maintain their vigil in all weather.

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Cheeky Buggers: Squirrels

23 Jun

In this war I wage with squirrels, I have won most battles, aided originally by some chicken wire, but now mostly by my trusty sidekicks: Schnauzer 1 and Schnauzer 2 —  in front of whom we have to spell the word s-q-u-i-r-r-e-l, as saying the word out loud propels them to the back door in hot pursuit. Schnauzer 1 has yet to learn she cannot climb trees, despite 7 years of trying.

But squirrels are intrepid souls. What are a couple of earth-bound dogs when there are bird feeders full of seeds at arms length? Ok, not at arms length, but squirrels are nothing if not optimistic.

Today, I put up a second bird feeder…

… and then waited to see what would happen.  Sure enough, along came one cheeky little bugger:

…who then considered a leap of faith:

He ran across the top of the fence, gauged the distance for a jump (too far), went up the tree near the bird feeder to see if that got him any closer  (no), went down the tree in the hopes that a different direction would have closed the gap  (no), and appeared to give up. Until he realized the birds were knocking seeds onto the ground.  So maybe this battle was a tie.

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2011: Lessons Learned from the Garden

21 Jun

When it comes to gardening, I learn as I go. In 2011, I learned some valuable lessons:

  1. Yarrow gets big and bushy and then it starts to fall open, exposing its barer, unattractive core. Of course, this could be due to the fact that perhaps one is supposed to stake Yarrow. But I am not about to start staking my plants. Harsh, I know — but when you don’t have a lot of time to garden, it comes down to survival of the fittest, not support for the floppiest. For this reason, Yarrow was on my do-not-resuscitate list. Actually, it earned a spot on my get-rid-of list, not only because of its spineless character, but also because when it fades, it doesn’t fade nicely. When I could no longer bear to look at it, I leveled it. And lo and behold, it bloomed again. For that act of bravery, it earned a reprieve. But I have my eye on it.
  2. Some plants, such as Asters, are space hogs.  Of course, had I paid more attention to info about plant spread, rather than just plant height, I might have realized this beforehand. This oversight on my part has caused some problems elsewhere in the garden, and I suspect I will be trimming or moving (or removing) plants in years to come for this very reason. As an example, Montauk Daisy is also a remarkable grower, and within one year, the two daisies I planted completely overtook the poor Asiatic Lilies in front of them, like a mother hen atop her eggs. The lilies did not survive the experience. The daisies are now on my watch list. As for the Asters, two of them had to go, and they did, in Spring 2012.
  3. Gaura (Belleza Dark Pink) did not survive the winter. All six plants died. I was willing to give them one more chance and plant them again, but I couldn’t find the same variety. Instead, I’ve planted Gaura (Passionate Rainbow), which caught my eye because of its wonderful foliage; you can see it here in the foreground (note the bushy green Montauk Daisy in the back). If this new Gaura does not survive, that’s it — I will move on to something hardier.
  4. Beware of hubris. A couple of my tulips did not come up in 2012. Those miserable squirrels (see the bottom of this post) must have figured out how to get them. But my squirrel-proof bird feeder gives them pause. Actually, it doesn’t; they just get the seeds that fall to the ground. Miserable squirrels.
  5. Marc Chagall said, “All colors are the friends of their neighbors and the lovers of their opposites.” But some flowers in my garden in 2011 just did not go well with their neighbors. They may have been friends, but they weren’t a love match. So I moved them. This is a lesson I learned a while ago — if you aren’t happy with a particular combination of flowers, if the colors don’t sing together, move things around. If the plants are hardy, they will be back next year. Otherwise, they shouldn’t be in the garden.
  6. Final lesson is one concerning dogs and gardens, but as there are as of yet no solutions to that particular problem, I will simply leave you with a photo of the two culprits:

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