Year In Review

As another year draws to a close, I find myself reflecting on all of the changes in the gardens and in our lives.

We finished the back side of our privacy fence as well as most of the east side.  It's amazing what a difference it makes not just in privacy level, but also in the visual interest that it adds.  The birds enjoy perching and pooping on it too.

We added a bench to the bird garden area.  In the mornings we like to sit there and enjoy the shade from the aspen tree.

We also expanded the landscaping bed in front of our house so that it extends to the outer edge of the fence.  Now we just need to add some plantings between the viburnum shrub and the white pine.

There is still a lot of work to be done in this front bed, but now all of the shaping and edging is complete.

Then there was the creation of a new planting bed on the west edge of our property.  I wanted to define the property line and also add some interest to this area.  We planted three "Little Henry" sweetspire shrubs near the existing black chokeberry.  They provide a real riot of fall color and won't outgrow the space.

I planted some daffodil bulbs in the edge of this new bed up near the fence.  I plan to add some perennials next year.  I hope they will help to keep some of the weeds at bay and add a pop of color during the summer months.

Digging the trench and laying those edge pavers was a lot of strenuous work, but I love the end result.

In October, we went to visit my sister and her family in Illinois.  They treated us to a delicious dinner and cocktails to celebrate our 1st wedding anniversary.

I also spent time playing in the Fall leaves with my awesome nephew, Simon.  It's so much fun watching him explore and experience the world around him.  My sister and brother-in-law are doing a fantastic job raising him to be a sweet, intelligent, and entertaining little boy.

This November, we adopted a new little kitty that we named Sgt. Pepper.  He was a semi-feral kitten, one of three that we'd been looking after in our backyard.  We successfully trapped all of the kittens and got them into foster homes.  Our seven year old cat, Digit, has really taken to the little guy, and they can often by found napping together or chasing each other through the house.

Overall, it's been a year of positive change for us.  We look to 2012 with great optimism and wish all of our friends and family a very Happy New Year!

Summer In Pictures

Hey, garden blog.  Long time, no see!  I've been busy enjoying the warm weather and sunshine of the past few months.  I thought I'd write a recap of the summer and post some photos.

In April, the hummingbirds arrived!  I got some great shots as they braved the chilly Spring weather.  I watched them visit on a daily basis all summer long.  They not only sipped nectar from the feeder but also from some potted mini petunias, and then later in the season from prairie dock and the blooms on my blue mist spirea shrub.  The weather has been getting quite chilly at night for the past couple of weeks now.  Most of the hummingbirds have migrated south already.  I did see one at the feeder today fueling up for it's long flight.  I will leave my feeder up until mid October to aid any hungry stragglers. 

I had some new successes in the gardens this year.  My native bee balm bloomed for the first time!  I have not seen any hummingbird action on it yet, but the bees certainly took notice.  The blooms are so interesting looking and a beautiful pale lavender.  Unfortunately this plant later succumbed to a wicked case of powdery mildew as they are known to do.  Maybe I'll have better luck if I transplant some to an area that gets full sun all day long.  I still consider this a success since the foliage did not develop the mildew until long after the blooms were spent.

Another gardening success this year was our vegetable garden.  We created two new raised beds and planted pole beans and peppers in one, tomatoes and chives in the other.  The tomatoes suffered foliar damage from early blight but still produced a decent crop.  The pole beans grew up a trellis structure we purchased from Burpee.  It worked out really well and we were able to harvest plenty to eat fresh and some to freeze.  It was an excellent year for peppers!  Jeremy was thrilled.  Typically we do not have a long enough growing season to get much of a crop.  This year the weather was nice and warm in early May and I think it helped them get a good jump start.  The cajun bell pepper plants from Daddy yielded the biggest crop and had a subtle but tasty heat.  We also grew yellow bell peppers, jalapenos, and a mini bell plant.  Our cucumber crop was the best I've ever grown.  I can say with great certainty that beans are not the only musical fruit. ;)

In other exciting news, Jeremy built the entire back side of the privacy fence!  He finished it in early May and what a difference it has made!  Now when I wander out to the bird garden in my pajamas to refill the feeders, the hungry birds are my only audience.  I can lie down in the grass to photograph from interesting perspectives without worrying my neighbors will call 911.  I can wander braless back to the veggie garden to check on my plants.  Oh, sweet freedom!

I'm not the only one enjoying the privacy.  The birds and the bunnies seem to enjoy it too.  I snapped this shot of a flicker hopping around the backyard in search of a buggy snack.  See how the marking on the back of it's head forms a perfect heart?  Yes, little feathered friend, I do love you!

One For The Record Books

This April has been fraught with extreme weather.  On April 10th, we had unseasonably warm temps in the mid 70s.  Conditions were favorable for the development of severe storms.  Around 8pm the tornado siren in our small town sounded.  We scooped up our cat and our laptops and headed for the basement.  We were lucky on this night as the most severe weather was just to the south of us.  Surrounding areas were not so lucky.  Kaukauna, WI experienced the devastating impact of an F1 tornado.  I found the following video footage on YouTube.

 

Menasha, WI was also hit.  I was amazed at the number of mature trees that had been ripped right out of the ground.  Thankfully few injuries were reported. 

This April has produced more tornadoes than any other April in recorded history.

Eight days later, we experienced a record breaking snowstorm.






A week later and it's now rained so much that we've attracted a couple of new visitors to the backyard.



I'm relieved that April is almost over and hopeful that May will be kinder.

And just for fun, here is a video I took today of my newest piece of garden art.  Look deep into the center of the pinwheel.  Focus.  You are getting sleepy.  You are now under my control.  You will come to my house, weed my garden beds, and mow the lawn.

The Secret Garden

When I was young, my older sister, Rachel, read "The Secret Garden" by Frances Hodgson Burnett to me at bedtime.  I recall with great fondness the vivid details of Mary Lennox exploring the secret garden at Misselthwaite Manor.  I still think of this book now and again as I work in my own garden.

Yesterday, while on a leisurely country drive with my husband, Jeremy,  we came upon a large pile of chopped up wood alongside the road.  We decided to grab some for use in our backyard fire pit.   I even convinced Jeremy to load in a really long forked branch so that I could bury it like a post out in the yard and attach various bird feeders to it.  What a guy!

While he was busy hauling wood to the trunk, I was busy snapping photos of a grove of pine trees nearby.  As I zoomed in to photograph the branches, I fixed my lens on a small opening between the branches.  It was then that I noticed a bunch of birds flitting around in a sunny clearing beyond the first row of trees.  As I studied the scene further, I realized that there was a small garden tucked behind the pines, almost completely hidden from sight and surrounded on all sides by the trees.  My camera had uncovered an actual secret garden!  How exciting!

Jeremy has been working for the past two years at enclosing our back yard in cedar fencing.  I designed it, he builds it.  I think I got the better end of that deal.  I like to imagine my backyard years into the future, now full of mature plants that block any sign of our neighbors' houses.  A secret garden of my own accessible only to me and those whom I invite inside.

Wisconsin Winters

They do drag on, and on.  This was the view as seen through our living room window on March 20th.  The snow had melted.  The robins had returned and were busy searching the waterlogged soil for worms.  I had begun putting together a mental checklist of the outdoor projects I wanted to tackle this year.
                                                                                                               
And then this happened.
Snow began falling on the night of March 22nd and continued through the next day leaving us with a staggering 17 inches of wet, heavy snow.  The birds weathered the storm in nearby evergreens and left only to quickly fill their bellies with seed or to clean their feathers in our heated bird bath.  I've read that March is the toughest month for birds and this storm really emphasized that fact.

I adore killdeer.  This pair showed up in the backyard a couple of weeks ago.  They just scream, "Look at me!", with their long legs, prominently striped bodies, and bright red eyes.  They scurry around so quickly and are particularly camera shy.  I love listening to them call out to each other.

There is a second killdeer hiding in the above photo.  Can you find it?

March in Wisconsin is like a wild roller coaster ride full of dramatic twists and turns, highs and lows.  One day you're opening your windows and breathing in that wonderfully perfumed, damp Spring air and the next you're shoveling snow.  And so it goes.  Mother Nature may be a bit of a sadist but patience has shown that she always relents.

Typical

We slowly made our way to the Christmas tree farm, taking in the scenic beauty of the country drive.  The owner greeted us with a smile and a hand saw with which to chop down the tree of our own choosing.  We drove up the hill to an area planted with majestic Scotch pines.  The late afternoon sun bathed the many rows of trees in beautiful golden light.  I hastily retrieved my camera from the back seat.  Equipped with my trusty 50mm lens, I angled myself for the perfect shot.  The shot that would encapsulate the beauty and serenity of this place.  One final check of the camera settings and then a quick snap of the shutter.  Success!  I pressed the button to review my glorious image and...wait.  "No memory card."  What??!  The string of obscenities swirling inside my head were not appropriate for the family friendly venue.  I opted instead to take many wonderful mental images of our experience.  Now if only I could find a way to develop the film.

Endings and New Beginnings

It's been some time since I updated.  Maybe it's because I was busy preparing to get married on a beach on Maui!  The experience was everything we had hoped for and we look forward to many happy years together.

While we were away, many changes were taking place out in the yard.  The leaves of the bittersweet vine climbing the pergola turned a brilliant shade of yellow.  The aspen tree is almost bare now and it's leaves litter the landscape.  We mowed over some and then added them to the garlic bed as winter mulch.  I planted 40 cloves of garlic in two equal rows.  One row is cloves I got from my dad and the other row is cloves that I grew earlier this year.  The cloves from my dad were slighter larger than my own so I thought it would be fun to monitor both rows and observe any differences.  Sadly, I have already forgotten which row is which.  Figures. 


As so many plants are beginning their long Winter sleep, others are just hitting their stride.  The goldenrod I planted last year bloomed for the first time.  It adds a gorgeous pop of color to the Fall bird garden.

Ripening crab apples and winterberries take center stage.  The berries on my "Tina" crab apple tree hang from bare branches like tiny little Christmas ornaments.   I planted a "goldfinch" winterberry shrub last year along with a male pollinator. At the time it had maybe a dozen berries on it.  This year it has settled in nicely to it's new home and berry production has increased tenfold.   I like this shrub so much that I am thinking of adding a couple more next year.  It is popular to use winterberry branches in Winter floral arrangements but I just can't bring myself to clip mine yet.

Plants aren't the only changes taking place in the yard.  Summer birds have moved on to their Winter homes while new birds have taken their place.  We have lots of woodpeckers and nuthatches.  They are year-round residents but their numbers increase at the feeders this time of year.  Both enjoy feasting on peanuts and scaling the aspen trunk in search of insects.  I typically see downy woodpeckers in the yard but have recently been receiving frequent visits from a red bellied woodpecker.

Last weekend we celebrated Halloween.  There was a hard frost that morning which made for a fun photographic opportunity.  Midday we ran to town to stock up on candy for trick-or-treaters.  Then we rushed home to begin carving our jack-o-lanterns.  Such a hyphenated holiday! :)  Jeremy passed out Halloween candy to all of the excited children while I snapped a few photos.  Then we delved into our stash of "premium" candy we'd set aside earlier in the afternoon.  And thus commenced the season of over-indulging in tasty treats.

Dog Days

Heat. Rain. More rain. Bugs. More heat. That pretty much sums up the month of July. So far August has been drier but still very buggy and humid. This is definitely the hottest Summer in recent memory.


Some of the plants in the garden have benefited from all of the rain and heat while others have really struggled. My tomatoes are ripening about a month ahead of schedule but the plants have suffered severely from the excess rains. I harvested the last of my garlic last week and was very pleased with the crop.  I am a third generation grower of this particular hybrid.  The cloves are super spicy.   I've already used some in cucumber salad and in two batches of homemade pasta sauce. As soon as I pick some more romas I plan to make a batch of salsa.

The excess of rain has caused some plants to put on a lot of new growth.  The front yard is looking very green and lush.  I'm worried that the little serviceberry tree on the front berm has put on too much new growth.  Some of the branches are starting to bend downward and others have been breaking in the many strong storms we've had recently.  I've pruned it somewhat and time will tell whether further pruning will be required. 

The backyard bird garden is a fun work in progress.  Some of the perennials that I planted last year are blooming for the first time.  I am particularly excited about the butterfly weed.  The blooms are such a brilliant orange color and are already attracting butterflies.  Success!  The joe pye weed and swamp milkweed look like they're both going to bloom for the first time as well.  Soon I'll have the thriving butterfly habitat I've been dreaming of.

Earlier this year I made the mistake(?) of filling one of my bird feeders with a mix that included sunflower seeds.  Soon after I had to spend a lot of time pulling up all of the little plants that sprouted from the spilled seeds.  I decided to let a few of them remain and they just started blooming at the end of last week.  They are petite, standing about 3 feet tall with flowers approximately 5 inches in diameter.  I am excited to watch the seed heads develop.  



Staring at the center of the flowers has a rather hypnotizing effect.  Or maybe I just need a nap. ;)

We haven't been spending too much time in the backyard due to the voracious mosquito population.  It's kind of a bummer since the area surrounding the patio is so pretty right now.   Here are a couple of photos taken from roughly the same spot.  The first showcases the russian sage in full bloom.  The little crab apple tree in the background is starting to branch out horizontally.  I think it will be a really pretty specimen in a couple more years.  

 This last shot was taken in the evening as Jeremy burned some yard debris in the fire pit.  This is my favorite time of day.  I love the way the clumps of little bluestem grass are illuminated by the evening sun.  Soon they'll develop seedheads and begin to take on the beautiful bronze shades of Autumn.