Gardening

Weekly Photo Challenge: Reflection

~ Heart To Harp ~ 9 Comments
Christmas Garden
Winter Evening at Daniel Stowe Garden
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Daylilies Give Me Reason To Believe

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Believe

Last summer I spent many heat-indexed, ozone-alerted days digging out and dividing all my Stella d’Oro daylilies. They’d entered that phase of daylily life where they produced many leaves but few flowers. It was time to wrest them from the sun-baked ground and chop their root balls into pieces, making sure that each small root blob still had a couple of leaves attached to help it grow and recover. I planted a double row of these thin shoots beside the walk to my front door.

This morning the first flush of gold blossoms greeted me as Charley and I left for our walk.

The daylilies are a lesson in believing: From the tiniest pieces of root and leaf, planted with care and attention months ago, grow full, vibrant plants filled with buds, filled with the promise of flowers for months to come. From the slimmest of shoots, comes abundant, radiant beauty.

Owl Comes Calling

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I was weeding my hosta bed yesterday evening when a shadow scudding across the ground and the slow whoosh of flapping wings made me look up. The neighborhood barred owl glided over the potting bench and the bird feeders, and landed in the lowest branch of one of the willow oaks by the fence.

This spring he’s feeding three owlets and mother owl, according to my neighbor who can watch the goings on in the nest box via the mini-cam installed last year. With all those mouths to feed, father owl is hunting nearly continuously. Perhaps he needed to get away for a bit, and have a little respite from daddy-owl duties. Whatever the reason, he was content to sit on the tree branch and was undisturbed by my quiet approach.

I thought that by the time I got my camera, he would be gone. But when I returned he was still sitting in the tree, occasionally answering his mate’s concerned call. He let me get these shots before extending his wings and sailing up and over the fence, and back to the nest box.

Owl visit April 6, 2012
Owl visit April 6, 2012

Such a gift, being blessed by owl’s presence once again.

Who Has A Recipe For Chickweed?

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I’m back from a visit to my chiropractor, which is the end result of three days of removing chickweed and henbit from my vegetable garden. If chickweed were edible, I could end world hunger with what I pulled up these last three days. I just need a good recipe!

All the winter weeds flourished mightily this year. We’ve not had any weather cold enough to stymie their growth. Instead, we’ve had plenty of rain that stymied this gardener from getting into the garden and heading off the weeds’ rampant takeover of every garden bed.

Finally I can see dirt where there was verdant green, weedy carpet. The pea seeds are nestled in their trench. The bolting five-foot tall dinosaur kale plants that fed me all summer and winter are dispatched to the compost bin. The first rabbit of spring fled the yard when Charley and I went out for her bedtime walk last night. Soon I’ll be finding my spading fork in the dark reaches of the shed, and turning over the cover crop on last year’s tomato beds. And then scheduling another chiropractor visit.

Gardening – good for the soul, but just a little hard on the body.