Blooming Now: Coneflowers

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Baby Birds

A couple of evenings ago, I saw my dog with her ears up, perky, focused on something on the ground in front of her. It was a familiar stance, and it meant she was playing with wildlife.  I went out hoping it wasn't another rat, and was surprised to see it was a bird. A not-quite-dead bird. Yuck.  I looked around, and found a clearly baby  and clearly dead bird nearby on the ground. My birdhouse was open, and the English sparrow nest had spilled out and there was bird poop everywhere.  I dealt with the two birds (the second was motionless and limp by the time I picked it up, hopefully dead) and left the nest for the next day.

Yesterday morning, Abbey pranced by the window with a bird in her mouth, held by one wing.  She set it down, and approached and backed off several times having a lot of fun. I went out there, and again it was a newly dead English sparrow, again disposed of before it got ripe enough for her to roll in it.

This morning, as I went in the back, I heard the familiar but unexpected chorus of "cheep cheep cheep cheep cheep" that indicated babies were about to be fed. I checked out the box that formerly held the English sparrow nest and there was no sound or activity there. As I cast about, a female cardinal appeared in the shadbush along the back fence and the cheeping ceased.  Aha!

I had hosted cardinals before, in Chicago, so I knew what to look for.  I approached cautiously, and peered into the thicket.  There was the nest, with what looked like two beaks at least.  In my photography days, I would have been out there with tripod and all trying for the best angle and a remote setup to get mama feeding. Now, life is too busy so here I am just writing about it.

Fighting the Weeds

Things are getting dry in the garden, but several of my more noxious weeds continue to thrive.  Earlier, I cut back the trumpet creeper along the side street, and sprayed the remnants. That held it back for a while, but now its up and thriving again. So again today, I cut and sprayed RoundUp on it, hoping to kill what I imagine is a giant and thriving root system.

A couple of years ago, a volunteer tree showed up that I never positively identified. I thought "sumac" when I looked at it, but it was all bristly and spiky along the stem. It grew in two years to over six feet tall, and I decided last summer that if it did NOT have good fall color (as sumacs should) it was a goner.  Sadly (for it), the green compound leaves turned a blah shade of yellow and just kind of faded away. So this spring, I got the heavy duty loppers and cut off the two inch diameter trunk near ground level.

But now I've got new sprouts coming up in a four foot radius from where I cut the main trunk! What is this thing? How can I get rid of it?  I mowed it off about three weeks ago, but its up again and thriving. So this morning I sprayed and sprayed it. We'll see what happens. I can see I'm going to have to get out the book and figure out what I'm dealing with. I scrolled through the digital archives, and it appears I never took a picture of the original tree - probably because it wasn't worth it, not so attractive.

I also went after poison ivy today.  This is a lovely native vine, with beautiful fall color and berries valuable for birds. However, I can't have it here because I am quite sensitive to it - I've had to have systemic steroids to fight it back, and it also often gets infected. So today I sprayed with RoundUp every place I saw it - three or four outbreaks in the front.

In May, I spent time fighting back the vines in my butterfly bush and in back of the house.  Again, the mechanical removal allowed the underlying plants to thrive, but the ipomea vines are back and rampant once again. I didn't spray at all last time, so this time, with just a few additional minutes to spend, I went for it. It's hard to separate out the vines from what they are growing on, but I foamed away on some of the biggest clumps. Hopefully, I'm only getting the bad stuff, but we'll have to see.

The Bounty

Just harvested a whole cup of blueberries - the most I've ever been able to get. Usually the birds and squirrels eat them before I can get them - they seem to like them slightly less ripe than I do. I deployed a net over the most prolific bush, anchored to the ground, and it seems to be working. However, when I approached to harvest this evening, a couple of birds were extremely annoyed I was there - I think they had been working on the other, unprotected, bushes.

Blooming Now: Monarda

This is a humming bird magnet!

Blooming Now: Stokes Aster

A beautiful native plant.





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Battle of the Blueberries

I decided I couldn't give up without a fight. I bought some netting and deployed it over the largest blueberry bush. I am not optimistic, but I had to try.  Every time I go out there, birds have flown off so they know what is there. I don't think the netting will keep squirrels away, but it may have some minor effect on the birds.

I've eaten maybe a half dozen individual berries that have ripened, so far. Now, I'll have to leave the net in place for a few days and hope they ripen all at once.

Blooming now: Milkweed

I do this for the monarchs, though I haven't seen any yet this year.





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The Wall of Foliage

This is my view out the front window:

This time of year, it's a regular Wall O' Foliage. That's the point. There are different textures and shades of green in this wall, but it hides the view of the street.

I find watching this endlessly fascinating. I watch the leaves pop out and fill in the solid view. I can spend time tracing individual branches, planning what to prune out. I watch the birds moving through them. I watch the squirrels travel without ever touching the ground.

Before I moved in, this was nothing but Norway spruces and English ivy there.

Fruit I Will Never Eat

Because birds, squirrels, deer, and raccoons will get them first.









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The Iron Peony

Peonies are famous for their longevity. I’ve never planted a peony, but I’ve seen them around and had a quite handsome large one at my house in Evanston. I never did anything to it (except tried to keep it from flopping over), and it was always fine.  I did notice, however, the flower buds would be covered with ants and so I never desired to bring them into the house. An old friend of mine thought peonies were only suitable for decorating French whorehouses, because they are so overdone and blowsy. 

I noticed some foliage in the small bed along the front of my house some years ago, and left it alone. I finally identified it in my own mind as a peony, based on the foliage of other peonies around.  It never bloomed, and it didn’t really thrive until last year. But this year, JACKPOT!  I got two blooms on the two stalks, and they are nice in a blowsy overblown sort of way. The palest of pinks, very nearly white.

This is my thirteenth year in the house. I guess it was worth waiting for.

Blooming Now

Coreopsis and Daylilies



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