Birth of a Garden

It was a productive day, scouting and annihilating non-native honeysuckle. We find fewer plants each year so our annual search-and-destroy missions are paying off.

The heirloom tomato sprouts are coming along, though waaaay behind the lovely bushy green things I see at garden centres. Organic topsoil was delivered and distributed o'er the garden patch, O installed a fine and dandy rabbit-proof fence... and I don't have a clue in hell what to plant where, how to do it, how to keep weeds from sabotaging my efforts, nor what to do with insects--not yet even born--but already dreaming of devouring our crop.

Baby tomatoes, grown from seed

A Rose-Breasted Grosbeak fed at the back feeder and O heard a Wood Thrush "EE-oh-LAY"-ing--my favourite birdsong. A Carolina Wren flits about the yard with billfuls of nesting material. American Goldfinches are now brilliant yellow, brightening the view as trees leaf out and begin to shade the yard. Spring comes so slowly and happens so fast.

Last year, we measured our "back door tree," a Shellbark Hickory, and noted that it was 126"/320 cm on April 26th. We measured again today, a year later, and after a dangerously dry summer, it grew 20"/50.8 cm. Not too shabby (but being a back door tree, it did receive more than its fair share of water).

Here are some wildflowers around the yard:

Large-flowered Trillium

Fire pink

Rain spattered Bloodroot

Virginia Bluebells