Intersession

I am between semesters and seemingly between big gardening seasons. It has been cool, rainy or gray most of the week and as of late. I got the big garden in and now I wait for summer delights- eggplant, tomato, basil, squashes, peppers.

Kiddo and I took a quick hike at a local nature preserve.
Either I rarely hike when Poison Ivy is in bloom or I don't notice it, but this is what the flowers of PI look like in full glory.

 PI flowers

 Box Elder sapling

Poison Ivy is often confused with Box Elder saplings. PI is on the left and BE is on the right.

PI can take the form of a shrubby plant or a vine. Both have leaves in 3's. BE has more serrated leaves and green woody stems. 

Wild Quinine (below)

 Bradbury's Monarda with mating bugs on top (below)

 A forest Milkweed. I need to go back in a couple of days 

and check out the flowers for ID. Very cool. (below)

 White Wild Indigo (below)

 Penstemon digitalis (below)

 Yarrow (below)

 Green Dragon

 Moonvine- not to be confused with the non-native

annual with huge white flowers. This one has crescent-shaped

seeds, which I believe is where the name comes from.

 Viola palmata (maybe?) below

 Wild Yam vine

I really like these leaves. I think it's the palmate veins that

attract me.

 A putty-root orchid! Found along the trail.

Karst Topography

Stemler Cave Woods Nature Preserve sits atop an underground cave system and the area is full of sinkholes. This geological condition is called Karst topography. We are lucky to live so close to this unique landscape. Some of the sinkholes fill with water, some do so temporarily and others permanently. Because of their relative shallowness and impermanence they make great amphibian ponds. 

Fungus Amongus

 White Coral Fungus? I can't find my Mushroom

Field Guide!

 Red Jelly Fungus (above)

Wood Ear Fungus

One of the largest ones I've seen

Critters

Mama Wolf Spider with babies on her back

 Spittle bug on Narrow Mint

 Zabulon Skipper (male) on nasty honeysuckle

What Fire can do

I wish I had a before picture of this. 

Volunteers put in many hours each year pulling the

invasive Bush Honeysuckle and burning unit by unit thereafter. 

The reason you can see the forest AND the trees is due to these

efforts, otherwise there would be no view of the forest floor here. 

I love that this special place is so close to home. 

Wish there were more.

Back at home

First of the Snap Peas

I made a cold Peanut Noodle Salad with these 

and plan on making Bowties with Ricotta, Lemon and Peas

next. 

 Indian Pink- Spigelia marilandica

(above-native) just started blooming

I started this Blue Angel Salvia

from seed. The blue is amazing and the blossoms

are huge!

Chicken feeders: Greens & Nasturtiums

covered with wire enough so the chickens can eat greens 

w/out killing the plants. The new coop in the background. 

The Dome in Summer

 The madness within. Everything going to seed.

Cleaned up and planting more in this area (below) in the Orchard,

Holly, arborvitae, Black Eyed Susans, 2 kinds of Monarda, 

P Coneflower, 2 kinds of daisies, asters, blueberries, lilies

Rosa showing the feeding station below the new coop. 

The older girls love it so much I haven't fully enclosed it yet, as

it is suppose to be for the young gal's new coop. 

Next Generation

The curious little ones. 

They like me.

They really, really like me. 

I can't post as fast as plants grow.

Every day there is something new and I feel like if I don't post each day I will miss something! So, not a lot for words today, just a lot of going-ons.

Before & on Memorial Day: Events

 
Before and After 
I get so repulsively excited when Stinkhorns pop up in the yard! Immediately upon opening the back door I KNEW it was there. Just follow your nose. The flies found it and removed the spores in no time flat. See the brown mass on the first photo and then gone on the second?The next day the fungus was gone, like it never happened. Fleeting natural events. Since I'm in charge of celebrations today I celebrate the Stinkhorn.

I bought a successive broccoli seed mix from Territorial Seed this year. Several of the varieties bolted quickly. Instead of wasting the food plant I collected the leaves, stems and flowers and made a stir-fry with them. It was completely satisfying. If this happens to your plants- just eat it!

  When life hands you bolted broccoli
                                                                               just eat it. 

Our lovely bolted broccoli stir fry, fresh strawberries and salad from the garden. 

What do you do when you have leftover cucumber & melon seedlings, but no place to put them?

You make a new bed!         

 Below: outline the bed with a shovel & sticks        

 Put a thick layer of newspaper & straw down

 Make depressions in the straw, add compost, plant seedlings.
Wa-la = new bed with more plants. Who needs grass, anyway?

Food in Jars

                   

The folks brought over some surplus berries = freezer jam.


1 head of local cabbage + 2 shredded carrots + salt + caraway = future sauerkraut.

I easily forget that NOW is the perfect time to harvest, dry and store some herbs, like chives & oregano. Done.








Garden at the Back Porch

 Relocated water fountain

 Pot of Browalia & Rosemary

 New wall plant hanger- from Freuhlingsfest with  

Goblin-fingered jade

 This year I did fewer porch pots and am trying annuals and herb combos.

Here I have Curry plant, Lavender, Berggarten Sage and petunias.

New- Verbena- Glandularia bipinnatifida

(say that twice)

The "Old" Garden

 Doing fine. Looking Good.

The Broccoli & Carrot bed.

Das Biergarten

 Salvia "Caradonna" Catmint & Perennial Cornflowers in bloom.

Centaurea dealtbata- Perennial Cornflower

Grown from seed- Thompson & Morgan (source)

Skyward Caradonna

 Memorial Day visitors: this Lovely Black Rat Snake and

a smaller, possibly Water Snake, near the garden. 

Third snake of the season. Three different species!

Happy Snake Day! 

First Harvest:

 These petite snow peas were accidentally purchased from Baker's Creek. They grew fast, short and were productive, but I don't LOVE snow peas. I would have rather grown snaps. Oh well. They aren't being wasted. 

First Serviceberries are coming in- the robins told me so. I wish they would just eat the ones I can't reach and save the "low hanging fruit" for me. 

 

The rose: Is it Cecile Brunner? I can't remember. She is lovely and oh so aromatic. She lost the support of the old dead peach tree this year, but doesn't appear to have suffered.

 She flushes in bloom

See her behind the prairie? She's huge!

In other bloom news:

 The torch lily by the veg garden.

 The Coreopsis I started from seed last year- first bloom.

Above & below.

 Missouri Primrose

 Clematis- violacea

 I can't get enough of the diversity in these

old fashioned petunias that appear each day.

A friend sent me this tshirt idea. 

I love a good play on words. 

This is my BIO...TCH face.

The "Old" Garden behind me. 

This garden needs to slow down a bit.