a yummy mummy...

 A lot of help in the garden this week.

It's a busy, busy time.  First, we had a load of compost/mulch brought in.

Before plowing, the landscape fabric paths...now buried under multiple inches of dirt and plants with heavy, matted roots...had to be pulled up.  Tough, tough job.  

I'm so prone to migraines now that I don't dare do anything where I'm bending over with the blood rushing to my head, so poor Todd, still queasy from his tick bite meds, had to do the pulling...sometimes gagging from the nausea, but carrying on cheerfully.  He's a saint!!  💗

He also put up the cattle panels for my sweet peas...

...and laid the paths in the garden (more upside-down head work that I can no longer do).

I was able to power-wash the front porch (although Todd stained it)...

...and we're slowly getting the outdoor furniture and plants in place.  This half is mostly done and still working on the other side.

We aren't the only ones who've been active around here.  Every morning, I hear turkeys gobbling, and sometimes see them in the far fields...

The goz occasionally come back, even though we haven't gotten around to de-algae-ing our front pond yet.

Our chog has had babies!!

I hear the groundhog alarm whistle if I have to retrieve anything from the white barn, and I can watch them forage from my office window.  

They are very curious and sometimes I can see their little noses when I'm by their nest, poking and sniffing.

Hummingbirds are back!

I love the return of insects, too.  This teeny tiny spider (okay, an arachnid and not an insect, but still) on an opening peony, smaller than a pinkie nail (upper right side of bud)...

These guys are aphids who specifically attack dandelions, making them my very special garden friends, as I hate grubbing up dandelions over and over again.

Speaking of aphids, I originally thought the insect on this rose bud was a spider, with a mysterious hole in his abdomen.  When I looked closer, I saw antennae.

I did some research and discovered that this is a mummy aphid.  It was parasitized by an Aphidius wasp, who laid its egg via a sting about a week ago.  The larva hatched, ate, and grew.  The aphid swelled, then died as the now fully-formed wasp chewed an escape hole in its abdomen.  Pretty big drama going on right outside our front door!  

The kittens do a good job in watching for any other nature-related dramas near the house...sort of.

Have a great week!

  

the annual mating game

 Spring!

A much-need rain turned torrential.

The birds tried to keep dry under the shelter of newly-leafed branches....

...but my outdoor seedlings took a pounding and had to be repotted.

The warming temperatures have brought out the lovebirds!  These two earthworms are makin' babies!

Have you ever wondered what that pink band on earthworm bodies is for?  It actually moves during reproduction, producing mucus.  The worm's eggs stick to the mucus and then passes them over the seminal receptacle of the male, thereby fertilizing the eggs.  

These two cabbage white butterflies caught my eye with their fluttering mating dance.

Male cabbage butterflies inject a hard packet of sperm, which makes up 13% of their body weight (for comparison, this is equivalent to a 5-gallon bucket for a human).  The hard packet helpfully contains nutrients that the female butterfly uses for nourishment.  Clever!

Todd and I disturbed this (nesting?) pair of geese on the back pond.  

I miss our South Carolina "goz" so hopefully we'll see babies later this spring!

There are nesting bluebirds along the fence line...

We've seen turtles peeking out of both the back and the front ponds...

...looking for mates?

We're planning a spring garden expansion.  Here's a big delivery of compost...

...and I've been hurrying to get hardy annuals into the ground as weather permits.

It's nice to enjoy the plants that don't take these exertions...the perennials that faithfully return every year.  

We're loving the redbuds coming on and all of the green that's suddenly (and delightfully) crowding our senses.  Hooray for spring!

compost engrossed

 Our unusually warm weather has lulled us into a sense of complacency.  It's hard to believe that we're a little over two weeks from December, especially since we've been experiencing temperatures into the low 80s.  But I know that it can't last, and there's much work to be done before the cold weather hits.  So we've been up with the sun...

...and plotting to take advantage of these last few days of heat.  This past week has been especially productive.  In an effort to locate our main water line, a trench was dug...

...water line located, and frost-free pump installed...right in the back annual garden.  Very convenient!

All of the dead plants and debris had to be removed from this back garden, so I collected the very last bit of seed...

...and pulled up the dead plants.  Claudia helpfully slept in from of the wheelbarrow most of the time.

I think she's going to miss our hang-out times there!

I was amazed to see the size of the celosia stalks.  With a plastic knife for scale, you can see just how thick the 'trunk' of this plant is...and the seed was the size of a grain of sand!

I also found a few garter snake skins...a nice sign in a garden!

It's strange to see the area so flat and brown.  But no time to think about it...so many other things to work on.  Todd cut our old fence...

...since we were having a dump truck full of compost delivered to that space, the garden expansion area.

Loads of mulch and gravel were also delivered.

Not only do we have to spread compost over the new expansion area and then have it tilled in, we have to top-dress the back annual garden with compost and mulch.  That work we will probably hire out...but we had to do the more detail work in the front beds ourselves.  The perennials in all 3 large beds were cut down and hauled away to be burned.

All beds were then top-dressed with a thick layer of compost.  A load of dirt was delivered earlier this week, to build out a new back perennial bed.  This was raked out, and we're slowly adding compost to the top.  As soon as the weather cools, I'll be planting perennial seeds here.

It's exciting to think about...just last year, this was a blank, ugly space.

One half of the perennial garden has already been added:

We're adding a huge wooden bench seat with a pergola for climbing roses that will sit against the house, a bird bath, and bird feeders.  Two mulched paths will meander through this space.  I'm excited to do a same-perspective photo, from 2019 to 2021!

While I've been spreading compost, Todd has been using excess fill dirt to even out ruts and dips on the property.

I had to hurry and dig up my dahlias this week, too.  Even though they were first root-bound and then completely dried out by the drought (my watering was very sporadic), they were gorgeous.

It's too cold in our zone for the dahlia tubers to overwinter in the ground, so they have to be dug up in the fall after a few good frosts, like potatoes:

Dahlia tuber multiply.  From 5 tubers planted, I got this amazing bounty:

Over 50 tubers!  But I learned that these are only the food sources for the plant, and that growth comes from the "eyes" at the base of the stalk.  You have to slice up this mass carefully, since multiple tubers can hang from just one eye.  The problem?  I don't see any eyes, which look like little white bumps.  They become more prominent in spring, apparently, so I'll overwinter these clumps in the garage and hope that I can do a better job of spotting them in the spring.  I'm not getting 50 dahlias from 5, but there's a good chance that I'll end up with 20!

With so much outdoor work, my only indoor activity has been collapsing on the couch at the end of the day.  I haven't had the time nor energy for working on my quilt, although it remains in the sewing machine, ready at a moment's notice.  Apparently it's a well-loved item, even before being finished!

They heartily approve of this hobby.  :)

Have a great week!