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.
