| A cloudless sky, a world of heather, | |||||||
| Purple of foxglove, yellow of broom; | |||||||
| We two among them wading together, | |||||||
Shaking out honey, treading perfume.
|
Sunday, June 6, 2021
A Beautiful June Day
The Fields are Still
The evening comes, the fields are still.
The tinkle of the thirsty rill,
Unheard all day, ascends again;
Deserted is the half-mown plain,
Silent the swaths! the ringing wain,
The mower's cry, the dog's alarms,
All housed within the sleeping farms!
The business of the day is done,
The last-left haymaker is gone.
And from the thyme upon the height,
And from the elder-blossom white
And pale dog-roses in the hedge,
And from the mint-plant in the sedge,
In puffs of balm the night-air blows
The perfume which the day forgoes.
And on the pure horizon far,
See, pulsing with the first-born star,
The liquid sky above the hill!
The evening comes, the fields are still.
- Mathew Arnold
Time at the Farm June 4 - 6, 2021
Arrived Friday night. Next week is my work from home week, and we have Airbnb people coming on Friday.
- Saturday. I worked in the Long Border first. Weeded and cleaned up. I pulled up spent wildflowers. I pulled up ageratum that was crowding my altheas. And I pulled up the wild aster that loves that flower bed. Now that the cardinals in the Veilchenblau rose have finished raising their babies I was able to deadhead that rose.
- I cut back several salvias in the Rose Garden. I pulled all the spent clasping coneflower. And I pulled up peppervine coming up everywhere.
- I spent some time cleaning up in the Daffodil Border. I try to keep that border free from weeds by dumping tons of leaves in there in the fall. But last year I only did about a third of the area, and it really shows. I will have to spray a bit of herbicide in there, but it has rained every day for several weeks, with no end in sight very soon.
- Next I went into the the Star Garden and pulled up lots of spent brown eyes. I did a bit of work training up my Peggy Martin rose on the chain link gate. Did lots of weeding. I searched for my abutilon and my Mexican Turks Cap amongst the brown eyes and cleaned up around them so that they can flourish. I deadheaded lots of Ox Eyes.
- I pulled up lots of ageratum crowded aroend my Carefree Beauty rose in the Star Garden so that it can flourish.
- 1:00 - cleaned up and drove to Madisonville for a family wedding.
- Sunday. Straight outside to the Rose Garden. I pulled up spent wildflowers - brown eyes, moss verbena, tall poppy mallow. I spent time digging up 10 or so Fruity Pebbles Lantana growing in paths and moved them to various beds. I sowed castor seeds throughout the beds in that garden, hoping I will kill voles. Ugh! The bastard voles.
- I spent some more time in the Daffodil Bed pulling up Day Flower. I skipped Day Flower yesterday and pulled up only the easy weeds. But today I took on the weeds with the deep tenacious roots. But there is so much wonderful leafy mulch in there that they came up easily (especially with all the rain lately). So I really caught a break there. Weeded, weeded, weeded (always).
- Moved to the Star Garden. I cut back a really big salvia. I caged my white mist flower. It will get unruly soon. Deadheaded Ox Eyes.
- I dug up 10 or so Philippine Lilies growing in paths in the shady part of the Star Garden and planted them in the Medicine Garden. Pulled up lots of horsetail reed to make room for them. Cut back lots of Turk Cap that was crowding my Hearts a Burstin' shrub. Also dug up a clump of woodland violets and moved them to the Medicine Garden.
- I harvested more seeds from my white Larkspur in the Vegetable Garden that I marked and threw them in my mom's garden.
- I dug up a clump of African Hostas that was growing randomly in the middle of the yard. I moved them to my mom's garden. They are a great front of the border plant. And the flowers, though insignificant except when massed, are white. That ended up being about a dozen bulbs.
- Next I worked in the Vegetable Garden. I dug up the last of the potatoes. It's not quite the last of them, but I would have to uproot a bunch of wildflowers if I take them now. Cleared out 3 of the buckets where I had potatoes growing and the middle section of the big bed. Maybe 30 - 40 potatoes. Harvested some jalapeno peppers and some tomatoes. I cleared a small bed in there. Cleaned up all the potato beds. Smoothed out the soil in all of them in preparation for sunflower seeds and amaranth.
- Inside for lunch - BLT sandwiches with tomatoes from the garden.
- The wildflowers in the Meadow are still beautiful. Thank you, rain. I love my Meadow.
- After lunch the sun came out and the chance of rain was small, so I sprayed herbicide in the Star Garden and the Rose Garden. I'm so glad I got a chance to do that because we have Airbnb people coming and I don't like weeds in the paths.
- It was hot work. I went back inside and never went back out to work. Bathed the dogs then napped.
- About 5:00 I went outside to the Vegetable Garden and sowed red and golden amaranth and Grey Stripe sunflower seeds in the Vegetable Garden. The sunflowers I sowed at the beginning of spring are about 8 feet tall and about to bloom.
- Then I sprayed herbicide around the pool area and the Greenhouse Gardens. Whoo! It's hot out there.
- Buckeyes, Giant Swallowtails, various black swallowtails (I can never tell them apart), skippers and American Beauties in the Rose Garden getting their last sip of nectar before dark sets in.
Tuesday, June 1, 2021
Time at the Farm May 30 - June 1, 2021
Arrived Sunday afternoon after babysitting all week for Josh and Blake who went to Mexico for their 10 year anniversary.
- I planted an alocasia in a big pot and placed it in the Medicine Garden. I don't know what variety it is , there was no name on it. But it is pretty with a bit of ruffle to the leaves and reddish stems. Alocasia leaves point up and Colocasia leaves point down.
- I mixed up vermiculite and potting soil and made 2 cuttings of my oakleaf hydrangeas. Dipped the stems in rooting hormone. Covered the cuttings with plastic bags and pinned down the ends of the bags with clothes pins against the pot. Hopefully they will take root. They are so expensive, it would be great if I could grow them on my own. I'd love to plant some more along the Boardwalk. They are so beautiful.
- I harvested seed off of the white larkspur that I marked several weeks ago. I tied green garden ties on a few of the white larkspur to keep track of them vs the purple and pink so that I could harvest the white seed for my mom's garden. Spread them in her garden.
- Cut back the white petunias in mom's garden, I don't know if they will make a surge or just die. Petunias don't like heat, but the new crop of petunias are more heat tolerant than in my younger days when I planted lots of annuals. So I cut them back to see what they will do. But I planted white yarrow between the sheared petunias. I'm golden no matter what happens, I will have white flowers in that spot.
- Monday. Memorial Day. Up early and straight outside to use my flamethrower in the lower part of the Meadow. I wanted to burn up a particularly yucky area of peppervine and beautyberry. It has been raining so much over the past two weeks, and everything was really wet. But I persevered and hit everything I wanted to hit. But it didn't want to burn, and I felt like I was wasting propane. I will hit some more areas the next time we come up here.
- I planted 2 Poquito Orange Agastache in one of the front beds. Voles love agastache, but this bed, in terms of its placement, is really in the hinterlands for the voles. Beyond the spot where the Agastache were planted is driveway, so maybe the voles won't venture over there. I also planted 4 Pirates Pearl in the front bed.
- Did a lot of weeding in the Rose Garden and the Star Garden. I pulled up brown eyes.
- Picked a big bowl of green beans in the Vegetable Garden. Picked an eggplant and 3 big yellow peppers. Did some clean up in there. I cleared out all the calendulas. In their place I will plant sun flowers and amaranth. No okra this year. I'm just not feelin' it.
- Mom, Dad, Nancy and Lisa arrived. We spent the day together. Memorial day. We can never understand their sacrifice or repay it. The six of us had lunch and sat by the pool. The weather was changeable. We never went swimming, but the weather was quite pleasant and we sat outside by the pool after lunch for about 4 hours and talked.
- After everyone headed home I went out to the Rose Garden and cut back to the ground 2 blue salvia that were spent. They will come up from the roots and have another big bloom in a month or so. I pulled up lots of Tall Poppy Mallow in the front bed of the Rose Garden where La Vesuve grows and in the back bed where Fortune's Double grows (or used to grow - I can hardly believe the freeze killed it). I pulled a bunch of Tall Poppy Mallow out of the arbor box. The Coral Honeysuckle vine in the arbor box that I dug up on my plant hunt with Amy is alive. It will make it if I give it just the bit slightest bit of attention this summer. That sounds easy, but I have so many, many, many plants, that I forget what to baby along through their first hot summer. I cut away oregano from my small roses. I cut back Tickseed and Ox Eyes. I cut away and culled many armfuls of debris.
- I walked the Meadow. Again, I will say that the Meadow is absolutely fascinating to me. The biodiversity is endlessly interesting to me. And in most cases, I didn't introduce it. And even if it is seed that I collected and distributed, it is really hard / impossible to connect that seed distribution to the plants that are growing in the Meadow. It may take years for my seed distribution to bear a plant that can be noticed. And the seed in my seed bank could be 10 or 20 years old and still be viable. So was it me or was it my seed bank that made that plant?
- I planted 4 gomphrena in the bed at the front of the Rose Garden where I pulled up some Brown Eyes.
- Spent some time cleaning out the Kitchen Herb Garden. I cut back lemon balm (that stuff gets crazy) and pulling up lots of mint. Very pleasant work because it smells so nice. Lots of ageratum has snuck in there too, so I pulled it up. I am trying to remember to pay attention to my little herb garden so that my chives, thyme, marjoram, and oregano don't get smothered.
- Tuesday. Vacation day.
- I went straight out to the Orchard to work there. I stayed in there for about 4 hours culling. I pulled up ageratum, Tall Poppy Mallow, and zillions of brown eyes. Weeded, weeded, weeded. Cut lots of salvia to the ground. I trimmed a lot of grape vines down to the point where the grapes were growing. I spent a lot of time doing that. I surrounded some areas with chicken wire. The armadillos really like to get in the Orchard. I filled the cadet up twice with debris until it was so tall I couldn't reach to get more stuff in there.
- Picked some tomatoes in the Vegetable Garden.
- I planted a butterfly vine against the conveyor belt in the Star Garden.
- I planted a Cinderella milkweed in the Star Garden.
- Sowed some Grey Striped Sunflowers and red amaranth in the Vegetable Garden.
- Headed back to Houston about 5:00.
Coneflower June 1, 2021
This is a bed down in the Orchard. There is a little fig tree in there that will soon take over the whole thing and the flowers will get crowded out. But they were very pretty today.
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