The season continues to be a good two weeks advanced. All the August wildflowers are blooming – goldenrod Joe Pye weed in full bloom. Trefoil continues along with along with several other yellow flowers I haven’t identified yet, a few late daisies and yarrow. And the catttails are in full “bloom” – the characteristic brown fuzzy bits are the flowers.
The day lilies in the flower gardens are still blooming, as is the creeping Jenny, along with a few poppies and cosmos, and the brown-eyed Susans (aka gloriosa daisies) are, well, glorious — but my vegetable garden is a disaster, thanks largely to the !@#$%^&*! groundhog, who is eating the flowers off the peas and beans. No flowers, no seeds – that is, no peas and beans. He has also begun digging a run right in front of the house, against the chimney, which we have filled in twice, the second time topped off with a large rock. Since the heavy rain earlier in the season washed out most of my spinach and lettuce, it looks like the only decent crop I’ll have this year will be carrots. The ground hog doesn’t seem to like them. So far. We are going to have to contemplate more drastic measures.
Next year when we move the vegetable garden to the larger clearing near the road, we are planning on installing a line of electric fencing around it, and burying chicken wire around the perimeter (or something similar, to prevent it from digging under the line). That will protect the veggies, at least. Unfortunately it is just not workable to run wire around all the flower gardens. I foresee traps, or worse …
I had another exciting sighting recently, while we were outside admiring our new window. A large bird flew over, high up, but not so high that I couldn’t distinguish a white head and neck – my first eagle! My husband and the crew saw two while they were installing our new roof a few years ago, but I’m not much for hanging out on the roof. What a thrill! They are majestic birds. (I resist the temptation to insert a comment contrasting them to the country which claims them as its national bird.)
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.