Category Archives: garden

Bunny March

This is my sea of daffodils when I look out into the backyard. Love this time of year — this view always makes me happy.

March has been hectic and I can’t seem to get back on top of things. I had my taxes 90% done for about 3 weeks. I finally sat down and finished those.

I have lots of clips — hopefully I will get around to posting them.

This is a red flowering currant that is a native plant that is supposed to be good for pollinators and hummingbirds. Last year it did not have a single flower and I was disappointed and figured I planted it in the wrong spot or something.

No — it is doing amazing and so pretty.

Here’s the bunny. Last week I went to do a lap around the yard to see how things looked and he hopped out of the daffodils and hung out in the yard with me.

The next time I went to work in the yard he was out in the garden nibbling on the clover that I planted as a cover-crop. I didn’t want to bother him. hehe.

I don’t understand how cover crops work. No matter what I do, it seems like I don’t get much cover. I already turned a lot of the clover under and planted something else but he was eating this little bit.

I know it is ridiculous to encourage the bunny to find food in my garden but I’m going to leave that little corner of clover for him. I’m also going to scope it out and make sure there aren’t any baby bunnies out there before the lawn mower takes a lap.

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Raised Beds and Pretty Dirt

This is a project that has lived in my head as an idea for many years and I would do a little bit here and a little bit there to prep but never took it seriously until last year I bought the raised beds.

Here is the dirt delivery. It’s a lot but not quite as scary as what I imagined.

I had only set up two raised beds and sort-of decided to sell the other two. But the minimum dirt order was so big, I started assembling the other two.

As I described when I got them they come in 12 pieces, each specially shrink wrapped in a kind of taped/plastic film and plus 60 (?) fasteners? It takes a couple of hours to put one together.

There is a lot going on right now. My weekdays are wall-to-wall and exhausting. My weekend days are differently wall-to-wall and busy. I was picking away at getting that last bed put together.

We enlisted help to get the dirt moved from the front to the back. If I did it by myself I wouldn’t be done until the end of the summer. Bob texted me on Friday morning that they were on their way.

I put my work clothes on and ran out to get that last one finished and ready.

Remember last year when I raked leaves and filled the beds? We transferred some of those leaves to the new beds and then spread the dirt on.

Look how pretty they look! Plus there was leftover dirt. I put a healthy layer on my berry patch (not pictured) and planted a couple of new berries I bought.

The rest is under a tarp for when I have time to deal with it later. I also planted a number of strawberry plants that I bought last year and just arrived.

Today I have a little time and hope to get a few more seeds in the ground. I love being outside in the dirt but it’s hard to balance with all the other things I have going on.

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A Little Spring in the Air

We had a couple of unseasonably warm weather this weekend and I jumped on the opportunity to get some work done in the yard. I came *this* close to asking colleague if I could grab the rototiller before he went on vacation and then I thought: It’s February. Don’t be ridiculous. Now I wish I did.

This is the current scene out there.

I cleaned up a bunch of old debris that’s been sitting there all winter. I put some of the bird feeders away.

Out front I cleaned up the roses.

I also went to the garden store to talk about getting some soil for my raised beds.

The minimum for delivery is a huge amount. I had talked myself out of putting up the other two raised beds but now that I have a mountain of soil being delivered I really need to get those set up. I’m also borrowing some wheelbarrows and we’ve recruited some helpers to get the soil moved to the backyard.

More photos when we’re on that project.

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Last Week’s News

I intended to post the obligatory snow photos while there was still snow on the ground but I had the other post scheduled and didn’t get organized in time.

It wasn’t much but more than I expected. We didn’t need to go anywhere and were able to enjoy it from the windows. We woke up on Day 4 and it was completely gone. The rain washed it away overnight.

This is from the deck.

There were lots of other fun animal prints to try to figure out. I had left prints going to the bird feeder and it looked like something had stepped in my footprints. I never got out there to study them.

There were also lots of bird prints.

Remember when we exposed the hardwood floor in our bedroom? I am amazed by how quickly the dust bunnies accumulate. Did the carpet hide the dust blobs? It seems like every time I drop a sock and get a glimpse under the bed, there are giant fluffy wads. I vacuum under there every weekend.

I am guessing it’s the flannel sheets since I don’t have issues with dust wads in other rooms. I wonder how long it takes flannel sheets to completely disintegrate into fuzz?

Does anyone remember there were always rumors the J.D. Salinger was still writing but throwing the writing in a vault? I can’t remember the exact story — maybe he was disenchanted with publishing so he wrote for himself but told his heirs they could do what they wanted when he was gone? I might have made some-to-all of that up but whatever happened to that? Was there a vault filled with manuscripts? Are there no manuscripts?

It seems like the story is that something is coming out. But is that real?

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Animal Cam: Opossum Edition

Here’s an opossum in the rain. That black planting pot is right at the opening of the spot where he crawls under the shed. He looks unhappy about it and then tears off across the yard.

I think in my earlier post I said the white one was smaller and the brown one was the big one but I had it backwards.

Here they are waddling around the garden together. Are baby possums in the future?

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Who’s Been Brawling?

In January, on the weekdays, it’s dark when I leave the house and dark when I get home so I don’t see what’s happening in the yard until the weekend.

I looked out there and saw white fluff in the garden.

I figured it was a poor little deconstructed bird although I was surprised by how white the detritus was. I figured little birds probably had white fluff.

When I finally inspected it, I realized it was fur. It must be opossum.

I didn’t see any other signs of injured opossum so either it was (a) a light brawl, (b) the injured party scuttled off to some other yard, or (c) they were out there making baby possums.

There are two that show up on the trail cam and I will try to post. One has more brown on its fur and the other is smaller and more white. I saw the brown one the other night around 6pm when the motion-light went off.

I don’t know what it was doing but it was wiggling around at the spot where it exits from underneath the shed and I was afraid it was stuck. Obviously I didn’t want to leave it there but also, I wasn’t sure how to help it without risking a bite.

It toddled along eventually.

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Animal Cam Report

Bunny is a regular visitor to the yard. I can tell he (they) have been around because there are dozens of clips when I download.

I move the camera to the garden for a week and got a good bunny close up.

This is from the very end of summer but it’s a funny one. There’s one raccoon sniffing around the camera and the other two are on the lookout for … what?

Probably other raccoons.

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A Leopard Cannot Change Its Spots

This one is a little bit hard to see but the raccoon was hilariously playing with the hose. I was a little worried about the hose when I saw the clip but I did a close inspection and it was fine. It’s a pretty nice hose so either it was built to withstand raccoon teeth or the raccoon wasn’t trying to destroy it.

I had the feeders down over the summer but put them back up in the fall. It’s especially active out there now. More than once I have seen a cat wander through. I think they like to troll the birds. Sometimes they sit under the feeder and relax like little jerks.

The other morning I was sipping my hot chocolate and went to look out over the activity but instead of birds, there was Noah the cat, sitting under the feeder. A little bird stopped to checkout the fly-through feeder and 1-2 pounce! And my little guest was caught. Noah took his prey and scooted back over the fence to his house.

I was very sad. I never saw the cats actually going after the birds so this feather-shed was upsetting. But also: nature, baby.

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Stand in the Place Where You Live

I have those new raised beds and I am filling them with leaves and garden refuse. In the spring I will add dirt and hopefully have an amazing place for planting.

My neighbors have a giant tree — I think it’s a big leaf maple. And it drops so many leaves so I asked them if I could rake some for the garden.

He said, “If I was home I would help you.”

Who is going to tell someone not to rake their leaves?

I started on Friday and while I was out there a very friendly guy drove up and asked if he could have some of my leaves for his garden.

I explained that I lived next door and was raking them for my garden. I don’t think he was offering to rake, only to haul off leaves. He seemed confident he could get leaves from someone else.

Today I did another session and while I was out there a guy drove up and said he was from the Census. I explained that I lived next door and was raking leaves for my garden.

There’s a lot of action next door for leaf rakers.

I got enough to fill both beds and it’s supposed rain a lot tomorrow so I think my work there is done. It was a great workout while it lasted.

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Sunflower Hearts

I just put the bird feeders back up.

I had them down for the summer because it seemed like it was attracting the deer and too many animals.

It’s been fun having them back and all the chaos and flying around. One of the feeds I use has peanuts and the bluejays are very possessive about the peanuts.

I filled one of the feeders most of the way with sunflower hearts and I was amazed by how fast it was getting emptied.

I went out there and saw most of the seeds on the ground. Meanwhile, the bluejay is smart enough to know the lady brings the peanuts so he stood by.

“No more peanuts until you eat the sunflower seeds,” I told the air. I wasn’t scolding the bluejay directly.

I looked it up and I guess it’s a normal bird behavior and today when I was out there the ground was mostly cleaned up. Birds and squirrels and who knows what else ate the sunflower seeds.

All the feeders were refilled.

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