dead nettle mettle

I love this time of year.  Every time we walk, we see new things popping out of the ground and new green on formerly empty vines and branches.

My favorite right now is the ferns.  They are so beautiful as they slowly unfurl.

We're seeing so much activity, too.  Squirrels...

...geese...

...turkey vultures...

...and raccoons are daily visitors.

Chogs are back!!

Oh, hello!

We have a nesting pair of herons in our back pond!

It's a lot of excitement.  ;)  We've even got some insect activity!  Spiders have been making webs everywhere.

I've been frantically working in the back garden to try to stay ahead of the weeds.  It was cold, and then we had a week of rain.  Finally, it dried out, but the weeds got a head start.  This is the front of our side bed...

...and this is the huge weed patch in the middle of it. My perennial bee balm is growing up amidst the sea of dead nettle, wild cress, poison ivy, and other monsters.

So...much...dead nettle.

I've put in hours and hours and barely made a dent.  There's a lot of guilt, too, because in early spring, bees rely on dead nettle for sustenance...and I'm yanking it up by the handful.

I've left plenty for them, and besides...our crabapple tree is blooming.

Dandelions and violets are up, including some especially pretty varieties...

My late-blooming daffodils are still holding on, and vinca is blooming everywhere...

In short, they have plenty to eat right now.  

Claudia continues to come outside, briefly, on nice days...

...but she's definitely ready to go back in the barn after a few hours...and she never wants to be outside at night.  She and Todd have always gotten along...

...but he never thought they'd be roommates one day!  :)  She's always by his side in his barn office now, begging for attention or sleeping on her special mat.  She's definitely enjoying retirement!  

And, as usual, our indoor cats are enjoying...whatever.

Still not allowed on the table...but taking advantage of my distraction while working on a business project.

Spring is a busy time, but hopefully I can get the garden in shape in time for the hot weather.  Have a great week!  

an iron fist in a velvet ant

 It's mantis season again!

Despite the fact that we crush the egg sacs of these large invasive insects they still proliferate, especially in the fall, and especially on the front porch.  They feast on the many insects drawn to our porch lights, and I am always a bit fearful, stepping out in the dark of the early morning to feed Claudia.  There might be a bug-eyed, serrated-armed, six-inch behemoth hanging over my head!

I found another scary insect in the garden this week, but I was actually pretty thrilled.  I've been looking for "cow killers" since I heard that they were pretty active in the fall, and I'd never seen one.  A cow killer is a velvet ant, and they get their unsettling moniker from the rumor that their stings are so painful that they can easily kill a cow.  Well, that's unsubstantiated, but they are rated as having the fourth worst insect sting on the planet.

A velvet ant isn't an ant at all, but a type of wasp that resembles an ant.  Males have wings, but females are wingless.  Up close, you can see the fuzz that gives them their name:

I wasn't a bit worried taking these shots, although I did squirm a bit when watching this video about velvet ant stings (jump ahead to 9:55 to get to the sting).  I'll just have to be careful where I put my hands when I'm working there!  This velvet ant female will wander, looking for a ground bee/wasp nest.  She'll lay a single egg, which a bee larva will consume.  Then it will incubate inside its body, parasitizing it.  They're pretty interesting insects!  

Although I'm definitely going to keep an eye out for velvet ants, I'm actually more worried about the goldfinches.  They are decimating my sunflowers!  See this female under the flower head in the middle?  By this time of year, they've totally lost their fear of humans.

I want to split the seeds with them 50/50 (or even 75/25 in their favor), so I tape newspaper over some of the heads until the seeds mature.  Then I can cut them down and harvest for next year.

Happy to see monarch butterfly caterpillars...

...and black eastern swallowtail caterpillars...

...in the garden this week!  This bodes well for lots of butterflies next year.  We still have quite a few fluttering around, although several of them look a bit worse for wear, with torn wings and faded colors.

Our hummingbirds are still here...

...but with overnight temperatures dipping into the 40s (!!!!!) this week, I expect that they'll be heading south soon.  For now, they're absolutely devouring the flower nectar.  

This is "summer's last gasp" for crickets and cicadas.  I've found three types of tree crickets in the past few weeks!

I grew up being more familiar with the brown crickets that you'd find under overturned rocks, but tree crickets are just as common.  You're probably really familiar with their chirp, although you don't necessarily see them!  

Geese are flying overhead...another sign of fall...

...and even Claudia seems more active, actually bringing us a vole this week!  I think it's the first time in months that she's roused herself from the porch.

terrible cell phone pic

And so...many...turkeys.  This is their really active time.

The corn will be ready in a couple of weeks, too!  This ear was partially eaten by crows, but when the husk was peeled back, I saw what the rest will look like.  I'll even turn the dried stalks into decorative bundles for the porch.  

Pumpkins are coming along and I expect to start harvesting them in about three weeks.  

In line with everything else right now, our apples are ripe...really ripe. 

Although we had a fair amount of rain and moderate temperatures this year, we just don't have many apples.  I don't expect to get more than 10 pounds from the entire tree.  We have a lot of blue jays that peck holes, which are rapidly filled with and expanded by yellow jackets.  I cleared all the lower branches of apples this morning, and got a grand total of two pounds.  Just enough for a small apple crisp in an 8" x 8" pan.  We'll take the ladder out this week and get the rest.  Better luck next year!  

Dahlias really come into their own in the fall.  My favorite ones are blooming...

Pick them and more will grow.  I love putting them in late-summer bouquets!  The other colors I selected...orange, white, and purple...are great for fall too.

It's just a really wonderful time of year.  Honestly, mid-September until Christmas is just the best, although the kittens don't like it when we close up the windows for the year.  They spend quite a bit of time in front of our dining room screen door, "taking the air" like Victorian dandies. 

For their benefit...and for fresh air circulation in the house...I still open the windows for about an hour in the morning, no matter what the outside temperature.  The only time I leave the windows closed is when the humidity is near 100%.  The floor actually becomes slick with moisture and it's pretty unpleasant.  Thankfully, I think that season is nearly over.  Welcome, fall!!!

From 2022

Have a great week!

Ephemeral Emeralds

Late March...some rain...a warm spell...I knew that ephemerals would be popping up!  Like the name suggests, ephemerals are woodland wildflowers that are here-and-gone.  In a brown landscape with not a lot of green growth, they are little gems scattered in the forest.  I love seeing their little faces every year!

Rue Anemone

Spring Beauties

Cutleaf Toothwort

Harbinger-of-Spring

Red Maples are budding out!

The woods are alive, finally!  This spring peeper is singing his heart out.

I've seen so many southern leopard frogs!

Turtles everywhere.  Todd, with his eagle eye, sounds a "turt alert" when he spots one from the trail.

Are these geese making a nest?

This freshwater snail is working his way through the debris on this submerged leaf.

Insects are stirring, too.  These water skippers are killing two birds with one stone, makin' babies and having a snack simultaneously.

A pair of predacious diving beetles, clasped in an embrace, dove for cover as I leaned in for a photo.

Interesting creatures.  They can't breathe underwater, so they bring air down with them, storing it within their bodies.  It has to be just the right amount.  Too much and they would be too buoyant, and not enough, they would drown.  They're called water tigers for their somewhat brutal hunting methods...floating limply in the water until prey (fish, tadpole, etc.) passes, and then, quick as lightning, biting.  They inject a digestive juice that partially liquifies their victims, making them easier to eat.  

I spotted another fascinating insect yesterday.  This is a violet oil beetle.  Not just a pretty face!

They're also known as blister beetles because they secrete a corrosive liquid from their joints if bothered, causing skin to blister.  Their life cycle is absolutely fascinating!  Any Creepshow 2 fans?

Young oil beetles have tiny grappling hooks on their legs, and after burrowing out of the ground, climb onto the nearest flower.  They wait for bees and hook onto their bodies, hitching a ride back to the hive.  There, they gorge on eggs and prepare for pupating.  They're so interesting...the Czech Republic even had a violet oil beetle stamp!

I love being out in the woods in spring, and so does Borga!  

After more than a decade of dragging us around, she's finally starting to slow down.  She's pretty tired after an hour, and she no longer leads the pack...she's content to trot behind Todd.  Sometimes she even lets me walk in front!  Hopefully this will be a very active spring for us, and she'll have lots of opportunities to stretch her legs.

Have a great week!