A Week in Wildlife

Flower longhorn on the oregano which is always loaded with bumblebees. I counted 5 on a single flower this day.

Water striders devouring a beautiful, iridescent bee that had the misfortune to fall into our pond. The striders don't actually walk on water, but instead skate about on the water's film.


Dragonfly by the pond. There have been several around dipping their bums in the water which I assume means their laying eggs.

Millipede on the front step. Bedtime was delayed until I found my camera and took a couple of shots. I was never sure if they stung or not, but apparently they don't. Instead, they'll only curl up in a ball. Think of this though, according to the Virginia Cooporative Extension, "There were several locations in which the numbers of millipedes were so excessive that they swarmed over mulched flower beds and invaded basements and other ground level rooms in houses. At times there can be thousands of millipedes moving across lawn areas and into houses." Can you imagine? That's the stuff nightmares are made of.


The daddy (I think) bluebird peeking at the world.


I give up! I've been looking and looking for this one. I think it's some kind of skipper, but I'm just not sure. Any ideas out there?



A painted lady on lavender flowers.

This guy was floating in the lily pads. I love that you can see his webbed foot floating to the surface.

Tomato Trellis and Floating Row Covers

I had read I should avoid the standard tomato cages so I decided to create something in the fashion of a trellis I saw on The Victory Garden. Using some stakes I already had, I bought some cobalt blue outdoor paint for color and, using twine for the sides, installed the trellis. Two mistakes were immediately apparent, the stakes are too short and I placed the front and rear ones too far apart! The 2nd part is easy enough to fix, but the taller stakes will have to wait until next year. So far they're doing an okay job of holding up the 'San Marzano' roma tomatoes (the other tomatoes aren't big enough yet to need the trellis.) The white flowers mixed in are cilantro that self-seeded from last year; they small yellow flowers front, right are 'Lemon Gem' marigolds.

Once my 'Sugar Baby' watermelon, 'Earlisweet' muskmelon and 'Gold Rush' yellow squash seeds began to turn into plants, Simon and I dug out the floating row cover recommended by Sally Jean Cunningham in Great Garden Companions and Edward Smith in The Vegetable Gardener's Bible. Of course, I forgot that Smith had detailed directions on how to install your row covers; the picture above is NOT what he recommended. Instead, I tried to find something for support in my local box store, struck out and in the interest of time, cut the pieces what I hoped would be extra large. I used landscape fabric pins (these resemble pins my mother used with her hot rollers when I was a child--I wonder if she still has those? The pins that is, not the curlers) and rocks to hold it down. After my weekend away I returned to see the plants bulging up under the row cover. Here's what I saw when I peeked!

No flowers yet! So I let them breathe for a moment, then bunched up the row cover so that it would "grow" along with the plants. Hopefully, I didn't let a bunch of thug insects in at the same time!

Next year, I think I'll actually follow his advice to use wire to raise the pieces and wrap two thin slats of wood in the sides to hold it down. Much more attractive then my little shrouds! I'll keep checking for flowers and, as soon as they appear, take off the covers so pollination can occur!

This is my "control subject." An acorn squash that I decided to leave uncovered (read was too hot and lazy to cover.) So far it hasn't been invaded yet either. I bought this already growing from a big box and planted it the same weekend as my seeds. Notice that their size is almost the same!

You may have noticed in some of these pictures, my next big project to tackle in the kitchen garden. The grass.

I thought it would be nice,and just fine, to have grass paths until I was able to install brick ones. Unfortunately, that just made me naive twice! There is no brick in my immediate future and the grass grows quickly. My husband kindly trims it, but that just spits grass pieces into the beds which quickly grow into weeds; and it's only a matter of time before he hits a plant. It's also messy! Now, I can stand a little bit of messy in the garden (I have a bed to prove it), but this is ridiculous. You can barely tell where the beds begin and end in the above picture. So I've decided I will remove the grass and cover the paths with pine needles. I love walking on pine needles and they're the same color as bricks so if I only get bricks a little at a time, I could install them in sections and the difference wouldn't be glaring.

Hey, Guess What's in the House?

He knew he didn't belong inside at 10:30 p.m.!

With the promise of freedom, he took himself out of the corner.

He was so grateful to be back where he belonged he didn't even pee on me!

Another Batch of Bluebirds is on the way!

The bluebirds have just laid their 2nd clutch of eggs (the first was born in early May.) I think they still have a fledgling around helping them., but I'm not 100% sure.

Ironically, Kathy at Skippy's Vegetable Garden blogged about the bluebirds at her community garden today too. She has a link to a great Web site where I learned that if I had cleaned the first nest out of the house they may have rebuilt sooner.

This afternoon, I worked outside on the screened porch much to the dismay of the local birds. My worktable is right next to the mahonia with their fully ripened berries. A variety of birds would fly pell mell towards the shrubs, sense me and make sharper u-turns than I make with my Civic on my best day, heading in the opposite direction at an even faster speed than they arrived. Sometimes there were several of them flying in at a time as if they were playing tag. Occasionally, I stopped typing long enough that they felt comfortable eating a berry or two. but that never lasted long. One bird actually hit the screen in its excitement.

They all headed for the hills though when a group of crows arrived. They must have known what I only just learned a group of crows is called a murder. Ominous isn't it? They were huge so it's no wonder the smaller birds fled. Here's a picture I took of one of them in the bird tree. It's through the screen so it's not very good I'm afraid.

A Weekend Away

The first thing I did when I arrived home from a weekend out of town was take a walk through the garden and see what changed. Here's what I discovered.

If there was an order to which hosta the deer ate next, I missed my chance to see it. They're all gone! Keep in mind this is the same hosta I showed in my Some Firsts post on the 16th! This is only six days later.

A couple of sunflowers from the cutting garden were sampled as well

The oregano bloomed

and the squash are attempting to escape from the floating row cover! I know I'm supposed to leave it on until I see flowers, but there's at least one bent stem under there. I guess I need to spend some time pulling it in some so that they have more room to grown up instead of out.

Eat More Dirt by Ellen Sandbeck

The subtitle here is "Diverting and Instructive Tips for Growing and Tending an Organic Garden" which pretty accurately describes the book. This is a quick read because most entries are short, some only a paragraph long, and the longest are only a page or two. The organic gardening information was fine, but not my favorite part. That honor belongs instead to the chapters on tools and gardening as exercise. Sandbeck revolutionized how I will use my pruners from here on out. No longer, will I crouch to one side of a sapling, supporting the pruners against my chest and pulling as if on an oar. Instead I will use them as if they were a thighmaster! She suggests crouching in front, pruners between your knees, arms inside them. You then use your thighs (and arms) to close the pruners. I tried it and it worked! Once I got the awkwardness of the position down (knees wide) I could feel the burn AND it was much easier for me to use this tool!

Seedlings

As much as I love gardening I'm not a coddler, so growing seeds indoors in little pots that require watering and sometimes transplanting in even bigger pots, was out of the question. It was direct sow or nothing, a method which offered no guarantees and great risk. I'm usually not much of a risk taker, but it was worth it not to have to coddle and it worked! I've already mentioned the peas, but here are a few other seed successes.

Sunflowers in the cutting garden. Last year the crows got all of the seeds, but not this year! I love the way you can see the actual seeds for a while after the plant begins to grow!

Cosmos in the cutting garden

Zinnias planted just last weekend! Also in the cutting garden.

Larkspur I planted last Fall. Guess where?

Dill. I hate to say use this word, but aren't they cute?



I bet you can guess this one! Basil

Borage

This is my favorite kind of seedling; the unidentified one! Unfortunately, that's happened all too often this year. I have a feeling that I've pulled some seedlings as weeds and left some weeds as seedlings. I'm pretty sure this is definitely NOT a weed though since there are eight of them in a fairly straight row which screams human, not nature!

Some Firsts

Neither of this weekends firsts are positive I'm afraid. First, there was Sunday's discovery of Japanese beetles on the lavender, on the bean plants, on the hydrangea and mating on my camera bag. I have never been one to kill insects. There's even a spider that lives in a basket on my kitchen counter, but Japanese beetles bring out the worst in me. I crushed as many of them as I could, but some escaped.

The 2nd first is deer related; the first time we've had any deer damage in our yard. We had a doe May 30th, we had footprints in one of my herb beds June 12th, but it wasn't until June 14th that they began to dine. Not in the kitchen garden thank goodness! The victims: the green hosta, and the flowers on all of them. It's interesting because there was A Gardener's Diary where a woman said the deer ate her hosta in the following order: the green, the variegated, then the blue. Our deer had all three to choose from in various places of the yard and only devoured the green ones. It will be interesting to see which color goes next.

The last first was the most delicious for us, not the deer! Blackberries!

Last Week's Destruction

The heat last week resulted in several severe thunderstorms. Wednesday night's storm was particularly bad and the next morning trees were down everywhere. Our home is surrounded by three different roads and returning that evening I could see a tree had fallen across one of them; neighbors had cut their way out. Heading into the woods I discovered with horror which tree had fallen.

We had two remarkable trees on our property; one for its size and the other for its character. The one with character had grown right on the edge of the creek; half its roots in the dirt behind it and half creeping down towards the water. Some of the roots had wrapped themselves over a large, oval shaped boulder as if they were eagle talons clutching an egg; below that a small boulder, stood on its edge. It is one of the few places the creek usually runs free with the soothing sound of rushing water. We have a decaying cedar bench facing this tree and visited occassionally to enjoy the cool shade. Of course, it was this beautiful, precariously balanced sculpure that had blown over taking several smaller trees with it. I never took a picture of it in its glory, but you can see some of the root work in the shot below.

The oval boulder now looks a little silly balanced on the smaller one. I hope it's steady enough to last though.

Yummy Peas!

Vegetables are my favorite food group, but I hate peas; pea pods are okay in a heavy Chinese food sauce, but that's it!

They're a favorite of Mike and Simon's, however, so I took the plunge. Easter weekend I planted "Sugar Snap" peas and wonder of wonders they grew! Their flowers were beautiful and reward enough, but May 31st we had our first pods. I had family over and we each had half of a pod at dinner. Everyone was polite, but I spoke what everyone was thinking, "ooh, bitter!" After that I snacked on them whenever I was in the garden and quickly realized that the smaller pods were sweeter. The recent heat has kept me inside and pretty much killed the plants. The above harvest, too fat to eat as pods, is probably the last for the season and was delicious raw.

Did I mention I hate peas? It's hard to tell if the homegrown variety truly can't compare with those sold in the stores or if I'm just so enamored of the fact that I grew these. It's probably a little of both. One other lesson I learned, I didn't plant nearly enough seeds. I only had six plants and it would have taken probably 4 times that to ever get a meal, even if one of the people hates peas!

The New Camera Arrived!

What do you think?

Geranium 'New Hampshire'

Feverfew



Rue







Twelve-spot skimmer?

Lavender, not the typical 'Grosso' that survives so well here, but a well-sheltered finer leaved variety

I'm happy!

Insects Galore!

I was weeding my way around the kitchen garden beds when I arrived at my asparagus. One of the plants had lost almost all of its beautiful, ferny leaves and another was on its way with many of them brown and broken. Looking closer I saw fat little gray larvae with black heads on several of the plants. I knew they were bad, probably asparagus beetle larva, and rushed to my computer to confirm and learn how to destroy. This site told me everything I needed to know and showed pictures of the eggs. When I went back outside with my glass of soapy water, I found them on the plants as well. I was carefully inspecting my asparagus, continuing my way through its beds, when I found three black and orange stink bugs. Back inside where I learned from this site that they needed to go as well because they sucked the juice from tender, young plants. Unfortunately, by the time I finished, they had moved on, but I did find six of them mating in pairs on my soon-to-be lavender flowers. Let's just say their moment was ruined.

After all of that excitement, I saw several strange bee-like creatures: hairy, with very long proboscis ,flying around, occassionally landing on the ground for a second or two wriggling their bottoms and then taking off again. They didn't seem to mind me, and frequently landed pretty close. This time, my book, Audobon's Insect Guide, had the answer. It's a Large Bee Fly. I found some pictures on this site although none look exactly like mine. Apparently, they are important pollinators and lay their eggs, which become parasitic larva, in the entry to the homes of solitary bees. When my new camera arrives, that's right new camera I will no longer inflict bad smartphone images on you, I'll try to get some shots. Hopefully, they'll stick around.

If only seedlings grew like kudzu...

One of my new favorite gardening activities is to check and see if my seeds have sprouted. Usually they have not because it is well under their germination time, like three hours after I planted them or only three days. I'm a pragmatist, but I do have hope and there's just something about the first glimpse of a something hard and round becoming something pointed and green that I find irristable. So if you'll excuse me, it rained and I just want to see if the melon seeds I planted at this morning performed a miracle.