It’s been “snakeville” around here. Thursday, I pulled a 5-1/2 footer out of a nest box in the chicken coop next door. The following day (yesterday), my SIL pulled at least a 4-footer out (not as thick body as the one I wrangled). Thursday evening, she was walking across the field & a mockingbird alerted her to a snake in the field. She thinks it was smaller than the one she found yesterday. “My” snake will not be back. She released the snake she caught down the road – it will be back in a couple of days. These are Eastern Rat Snakes.
The garden is finally coming around & growing! The tomatoes (Celebrity & cherry tomato) have blooms. I’m not seeing little tomatoes yet – hope they’ll start setting fruit. My two cukes that got sunburned & I thought they’d die, have survived – they’re climbing the trellis & blooming. The peppers plants (2nd batch) are thriving & growing – letting them get some size in peat pots before putting them out in the garden was the way to go. Radishes have been harvested & just planted another row of French Breakfast radishes (our favorite now – we won’t be planting any other variety).
Flowers – Cardinal Climbing vines in pots have climbed over the last week to the top of the trellises. The ones in tub & stock tank are beginning to climb. Hopefully, they’ll start blooming soon – small red trumpet-shaped flowers that hummers like. I planted two beds of zinnias on June 1 & noticed the zinnias starting to peep through as of yesterday (warm temps/rain). The giant sunflowers I germinated in peat pots are in the raised bed now & I also planted some sunflower seeds (autumn colors & a yellow one that’s good for flower arrangements). The tithonia I started in peat pots are also in a raised bed now – as of yesterday, they looked greener & happier so they’re starting to take off a bit.
Hummers are back – not in the numbers we had last year, but enough to be entertaining. The swing on our front porch has a good view of a feeder I’ve hung off a maple tree branch. Between sunset & dusk, the hummers are really coming for their last meal of the day. I sat out until I could barely see the feeder last night, watching them. Also, in the bad news category, I think my “porch bunny” got eaten. It was hanging out in the hostas around the front porch & would occasionally come up the steps & on the porch, exploring ….. this was even when I was in the porch swing! I found a clump of bunny fur (some skin attached) just in front of the hostas on Thursday, so I think something got PB. One of the porch lizards (the broad-headed skink) is missing part of a previously long tail so it’s had a dangerous encounter of some sort as well As long as the snakes stay off the porch …...
Hot, hot, hot this coming week, along with humidity. We got an inch of rain over the last couple of days, so that’s great – didn’t have to water the garden the last 2-3 days. The wet soil has really helped my zinnia & radish seeds germinate quickly. Happy ‘summer’ everyone – I think summer temps are finally here!
Thx.
Use yoko ono spray. Gets rit of them in 6 shots.
Beetles....and worms of various sizes eating the leaves on my salvia and zinnias. 🐛 Not to mention aphids. Found aphids 2 weeks ago.
Hot out there for a few days, doing twice a day waterings on newly transplanted annuals when it is 90 and windy.
Send rain please
😅
Hollyhocks!.....................
An English Country Garden
(Sharpe/Jordan)
How many gentle flowers grow
In an English country garden?
I’ll tell you now of some I know
And those I’ll miss I hope you’ll pardon
Daffodils, heart’s ease and flox
Meadowsweet and lilly stalks
Gentain, lupine and tall hollihocks
Roses, foxgloves, snowdrops, forget-me-nots
In an English country garden.
How many insects find their home
In an English country garden?
I’ll tell you now of some I know
Those I miss I hope you’ll pardon
Dragonflies, moths and bees
Spiders falling from the trees
Butterflies sway in the mild gentle breeze
There are hedgehogs that roam
And little gnomes
How many songbirds make their nests
In an English country garden?
I’ll tell you now of some I know
Those I miss I hope you’ll pardon
Bobolink, coo cooing doves
Robins and the whirlwind thrush
Bluebird, lark, pigeon, nightingale
We all smile in the spring
When the birds all start to sing
In an English country garden.
I'd be digging into my stash of DDT and malathion if I had that!
Hahahaha!
Too funny! lol