Weekend at the Farm May 18, 2019

 Arrived on Friday evening.  Bert was already here mowing, etc.  Will, Kim and the kids came up on Saturday and spent the night, left after breakfast.

• I was really surprised at how dry everything was.  It rained so much last weekend and the entire previous week that I turned off the sprinklers.  My pot of fennel was practically dead, I don't know if it will bounce back.   
• I spent Saturday morning in the Star Garden pulling weeds.  I also watered in the Rose Garden.
• I did more culling - pulling up brown eyed Susans and spent wildflowers in the Rose Garden.  I'm hoping that next weekend the Coreopsis seed heads will be dry and  I will be able to pull up the plants and spread the seeds.  They are at the floppy stage and therefore not pretty.  
• I staked a few verbena bonariensis stands.  The iris and Montbretia are leaning into the paths in the Star Garden.  I kept brushing against them and promising myself I would stake them.
• Zelda, Henry and I picked a bowlful of blackberries.
• Sunday after the kids left, I sprayed herbicide here and there in the Star Garden, the Rose Garden, and the Orchard.
• There are plums all over the ground in the Orchard, and many broken branches.  The raccoons have obviously found the plums, and they are decimating them.  It's so hot that I can't get up the energy to go down there with a ladder and pick plums.  I'm not acclimated to the heat yet and I really suffered all weekend. 
• Watered in the Rose Garden throughout the day on Sunday.
• I dug up some plugs of Southern Wood Fern in the Shade Garden that had spread into a path, and I moved it to shady beds in the Star Garden.
• Bert and I got all the sprinklers set up in the Medicine Garden and the Rose Garden.  Up until now I have not had the timers on for sprinklers.  The hoses have all been rolled up since the winter (except for one that I drag around in the Rose Garden.
• Did some more weeding.
• Headed home Monday morning.

Red Cannas May 19, 2019

 My gorgeous purple and red cannas looked beautiful this weekend.  The flowers aren't in full bloom, but the foliage is special.

Giant Rudbeckia May 19, 2019

 I love this plant.  It's one of my favorites, but I have too many of them right now.  Last summer I threw handfuls of seeds down in an odd place in the Orchard where nothing seems to grow.  Now I have several dozen plants growing there.  And here in the Star Garden, I have many of them as well.  Real estate is too precious in this garden to have so many of one thing.  I will have to figure something out.

Views of the Meadow May 18, 2019

St John's Wort May 18, 2019

This is a decorative variety not the one that supposedly relieves depression.  It is growing in my Medicine Garden.  This is its time to shine.  So pretty this weekend.

Crinum Bud at First Light May 11, 2019

Weekend at the Farm May 10 - 11, 2019

 There are three caterpillars in this picture above, two of them seem to be wrestling for the same mouthful.  This spring I have really enjoyed having this planter-ful of parsley-munching caterpillars.  The one below is enjoying some dill I planted (also for the caterpillars).

I spent the night Wednesday and Thursday at Blake's house to take care of the boys while she and Mr. H were in the Bahamas.   I took Friday off and drove to the farm after Julie arrived.  Bert was already there.  We left early Sunday morning and headed home for Mother's Day.  We had brunch at the Buckingham with Mom and Dad, Max and Nan.

• The weekend was all about culling.  I pulled up tons of Brown Eyed Susans and spent poppies.  I pulled up plants wherever I saw them crowding the next phase of plants.  Early spring is over, and the late spring plants are coming on. I am particularly watching my Coneflower that I sowed last fall - I don't want poppies and other mostly-done annuals to smother my future anchor plants.  I pulled up lots of ageratum as well.  I am also fiercely guarding my salvia nemorosas that I planted last fall and this spring.  So pretty.  I don't want them to get smothered.
• I dug up three Henry Duelberg salvias from the Orchard and planted them in the Star Garden.  It's perfect weather for transplanting - cool and cloudy - strange weather for May.
• I planted a Caerulea passion vine on the front arbor.  Caerulea is fairly cold-tolerant, and out of the many stunning varieties of passion vine, I'm thinking this one will survive in zone 8B.  I've tried two other times to grow passion vine - it is the larval food of the Gulf Fritillary butterfly, so I'd like it in my garden.  I'm not sure if the cold or the voles killed the vines the other two times I tried to grow it.  I do not believe it was lack of water.  
• I spent some time in the Orchard pulling weeds.  Last fall I sowed a ton of Philippine Lily seeds under the apple tree in the Orchard.  That is going to be a nightmare to weed amongst the seedlings for a year or so until the lilies get bigger.  So, I weeded in there for a while.  I pulled up lots of dollar weed.  Not sure how I ended up with that scourge, no doubt brought in with a load of soil or mulch. Apparently it flowers and throws off seed, because I started pulling it up and there were all these little flowers.  I pulled up as much as I could until I got tired from the awkward standing / leaning / crouching required to pull it up.
• I walked the Meadow several times, but only along the paths we cut out.  Everything is more than knee high now and a bit more intimidating, especially after I came upon the copperhead last weekend.  Bert and I discussed cutting a swath through the Meadow in a spot that is covered with a wildflower that I do not like at all.  It is extremely invasive, I should have never let it bloom last summer.  And it is very tall which I don't like and what is worse, the dead vegetation does not beak down easily.  It sits there for several seasons tall and dead.  I want the Meadow to be approximately all one height because I think it looks neater and prettier.  Once the swath is cut I will use the path to get at everything and start eradicating what I don't want.  I won't have the cut down again, I just need to get in there, and it is impenetrable right now.
• I cleaned out the bed at the entrance to the Rose Garden.  There were some pretty wildflowers in there, but the Inwood daylilies are in bud, and I don't want them blocked.
• Saturday morning, also cloudy and cool. 
• I spent some time in the Rose Garden pulling up tiny dayflower.  It comes up really easily when it is small like that.  And I pruned the Noisettes.  There was a lot of dead wood in the middle of them, and it looked pretty ugly. 
• Transplanted another Henry Duelberg salvia to the Star Garden.  
• I walked around with the ant poison and hit a bunch of nests.
• Trimmed dead wood off the Harlequin Glorybower.
• Bert mowed the swath through the Meadow that we discussed the day before.  I walked around and pulled up the thing I call the Bear (the tall weed in the Meadow that makes the weedy white flower).   I pulled up lots of them.
• I pulled up a bunch of Brown Eyed Susans in the front beds that were smothering the young roses and my daylilies that are full of buds.  
• Pulled up some beets for dinner.
• Headed home early Sunday morning.

My Meadow May 11, 2019

Views of the Rose Garden in Late Spring May 11, 2019

Caldwell Pink Rose May 11, 2019

Caldwell Pink is a found rose.  It blooms later than most of the other roses in my garden.  It is having its spring flush right now, and all the others have already passed through theirs.

Caterpillar to Chrysalis May 10, 2019

I witnessed the most amazing thing Friday morning.  There were 4 black swallowtail caterpillars on some dill I had growing in a pot.  I moved them last weekend close to the wheelbarrow where they could climb into the parsley (in case they totally devoured the dill).  Well, this morning I noticed one of the caterpillars was slightly curled, and I figured it was about to make a chrysalis.  I was right.  A mere two hours later it had completely transformed from a caterpillar into a chrysalis.  I was truly amazed.  I guess it makes sense that the transformation would occur quickly (because they are so vulnerable during the metamorphosis), but two hours really struck me as incredible.

In the picture below, the shape of the caterpillar was odd-looking which drew my attention.  You can see that all the little feet are already starting to disappear.

 Two hours later I went outside to check on it, and this is what it looked like.  I couldn't believe it happened so quickly.

Weekend at the Farm May 4 - 5, 2019

It's been raining hard here all week, so everything has taken a leap in growth.

• Saturday morning I took pictures of the house before we messed it up too much.  We are going to try and rent our house on Airbnb while we are in Alaska.  I created our account and posted the pics and time the house is available.
• Sprayed herbicide in the Star Garden.  
• I spent several hours pulling weeds in the morning before it got too hot.  I pulled weeds in the Rose Garden and generally cleared the way for my young roses.  I am being careful not to let them get smothered by verbena, tickseed, and brown-eyed Susans.  I cleared some weedy growth out of the Daffodil Border.  Deadheaded roses.
• Weeded in the Star Garden.  I am pulling up lots of ageratum, this year I will be lots more organized with the ageratum, I'm not going to let it get so pervasive.  It's pretty, but enough is enough. 
• The birds were singing, and it felt very merry - not too hot, just pretty and warm.
• Lots of butterflies are fluttering around - Monarchs, black swallowtails, mourning cloaks, red admirals, and painted ladies.
•  I took several walks in the Meadow.  I'm fascinated by it.  All the diversity is endlessly diverting.  I'm sure by the time the dead of summer is here and the crabgrass has taken over, I will not be singing the Meadow's praises.  But right now it is beautiful  I came upon a copperhead on one of my walks which startled me (as always), but I just kept walking past.  
• I spotted a Painted Bunting at the feeder.
• I walked around all the gardens for several hours after dinner and enjoyed the evening air and all the flowers and the hummingbird moths.
• Sunday.  I walked the Meadow first thing in the morning.
• I cut some yaupon along the edge of the Meadow and squirted Remedy and diesel on the cuts.  Soon it will be too hot to even consider getting out there and doing that kind of work.  Hauling them off is the worst part.
• Pulled weeds all morning in the Star Garden.
• I staked my asters in the Star Garden.
• Planted Mexican Butterfly vine against one of the conveyor belts in the Star Garden.  I've decided to plant perennial vines on all my arbors.  I decided this after I had such a poor performance on my front arbor last year of Morning Glory.  Lots and lots of green, no flowers, I am pretty certain because of nematodes because all of a sudden they just died away.  That is what things do that are infested.  This year I've planted a coral honeysuckle and now the Mexican Butterfly.
• I worked until about 1:00 then headed to the Antique Rose Emporium.  I was on the lookout for a Sky Vine, but they were not selling any.  So I bought a pink Coral Vine.  I have the white Coral Vine, growing over the arbor leading to the Orchard.  I planted the pink on the mattress springs we hung on the dead tree in the Rose Garden.
• I'm also on the lookout for a cold-tolerant passion vine such as incarnata or cerulean.   
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• I also bought two Peachie Keen agastache.  I already have one, and I think they will look much better massed in a group.  It killed me to pull up the larkspur and poppies.  But the poppies are almost spent, and the larkspur were over-crowded anyway.  I have never had luck with agastache, but I am determined this year to keep them from getting crowded and covered up with zinnias and other culprits.  I also bought 3 Rosie Posie agastache and planted them near the peach ones, again, I pulled up poppies and larkspur.  And I bought 2 Blue Marvel salvia and planted them next to the one that I planted several weeks ago.  
• I have been so happy with all my salvias this year.  They are so showy.  I have been making a conscious effort to put perennials into the Star Garden and stop relying on the seeds.  It's easier to keep the weeds down when I can mulch.  If I sow seeds I can't mulch.  All the coneflower seeds that I sowed last year are really doing well.  Coneflower is a perennial, and when the plants get large I will be able to mulch around them as well.  Less work for me.