Sounds to wake up to

This morning, I awoke to the sounds of gentle rain falling, the gurgling of the drain spout, and birds singing. Not so yesterday. Yesterday, the sound was the flapping of a bat's wings. My husband had gotten out of bed and shut off the attic fan that had run all night. When the fan blades had stopped, and quiet settled in, my husband could hear a rustling noise out in the hallway. He tracked the source of the sound to our spare room, behind the door was a bat. He quickly shut the door to our son's room so the bat couldn't enter it, and then came to shut our door which he had left opened. That's when I heard it. The rustling, fluttering noise was now in our room. I opened my eyes to see a bat flying around the room over me. "Wait," I cried, "you've trapped it in here with me!" The bat had followed him down the hall into our room.

My knight in shining pajamas returned with a small trash can to do battle with the dreaded, flying mammal. He managed to trap the bat up against the wall. Between the two of us, me opening the window, him carefully sliding a magazine between the trash can and the wall, we carefully maneuvered the trapped bat to the window to be released. We knew there were bats up in our belfry, but never imagined they would enter the floors below.

What is it about bats that we so dislike? Is it that they only come out at night? Is it our association with the vampire legend? Without them we would be over run by insects. In some ecosystems they play a key role as a pollinator of plants. Anyway you look at it, I prefer the gentle sounds of rain first thing in the morning to the flapping of wings overhead. Complaining about the weather can be another day's entry.

Red Shouldered Hawks

Over the years we have had Red Shouldered Hawks (Buteo lineatus) nesting in or near our yard. This year the nest must be in a tree in the neighbor's yard across the street. I can hear their distinctive call in the yard and woods behind as they fly between the two houses. Our yard bordering the wet lands is situated near their favorite food sources. Plus I hate to admit it, our bird feeder may tempt them with an easy meal from time to time.

A couple of days ago I witnessed something unusual, three hawks landed in the same pine tree out back. I needed to figure out whether or not this variety of hawk exhibited this grouping behavior. According to the website above parents will feed their young for 8 to 10 weeks, and it will be up to 17 to 19 weeks before the young are independent. I've gotten to wondering if what I've been witnessing is the young learning to hunt under the tutelage of one of their parents. I have not been able to tell if it is a male or a female adult and young. Then move quickly and haven't perched for long. It is amazing to see them glide through the woods.

The Farmer's Market vs. The $64 Tomato

Okay I write about my garden, but the one thing you won't find in it is vegetables. The first summer we were at this house, I really didn't have the time to establish a vegetable garden so I figured I would simply grow some herbs and tomatoes in flower tubs on the deck. I had a couple of grape tomato plants and they were doing great. The little tomatoes were coming along and just when they were about to ripen, poof they were gone. The only evidence to support where they had gone was a half eaten one. Chipmunks!!! Chip and Dale of Disney fame they are not. I do not consider them cute and cuddly when they are destroying the garden. Pluto (remember Mickey's dog, not the planet that lost its planetary status) did not like those two chipmunks. Mickey tried to convince Pluto of their innocence, but Pluto like I know the truth. They're varmints of the worst kind.

Second animal problem - deer! Our lot borders wetlands and the deer live in the woods out back. They come out to feast on hosta, daylily buds, cone flower, tulips, etc. etc. etc. I would need a large fence to keep them out. This brings me to the title of today's post: "The Farmer's Market vs The $64 Tomato. If you ever get the chance, read William Alexander's book The $64 Tomato in which he recounts his experiences of building his garden and orchard. In one of the chapters he finally breaks down to calculate how much it has cost him to grow the tomatoes in his garden. After tallying up the cost of soil, compost, materials, plants, professional help, etc, etc, etc (there's a lot of those) he comes down to the bottom line - it costs $64 to grow one tomato. Well with those numbers, I might just as well go visit the local farmers that gather on the town field every Saturday morning (see this link for more info). I'll buy their tomatoes, corn, squash, etc. for a lot less. I'm still tempted at some point to dig up a section of the lawn, enclose it with a fence and plant some vegetables, but it won't be this summer.

Reading the opening pages of Jamaica Kincaid's book My Garden (Book): I was inspired to reflect on my own first garden. I don't count my first gardening experiences as taking place in my own garden since they occurred in my mother's garden. We had a small plot next to the house where we managed only to grow green beans and a patch of rhubarb. My first garden is really the one I started when my husband and I purchased our first house.

We purchased the house in March, and once spring really arrived here in New England I came to know that there were no plants in the yard except for a few shrubs in the front of the house. As a novice gardener I promptly went out and purchased what was in bloom at the garden center and planted. I discovered that certain plants only bloom at certain times in the growing season. I had early spring/summer bloomers. By July my blossoms were spent along with my modest budget for plant purchases.

The following year I did a little more research and purchased summer blooming perrenials and annuals. Now I had two seasons covered. Being a weekend gardener I still didn't know the lay of the land or should I say the path of the sun. It wasn't until I became a stay-at-home parent that I could fully come to know my yard. I had bought plants only to discover I had planted them in the wrong places. Some marked "full sun" couldn't handle the "full sun" that I had. They were better suited for partial sun spots. Some "shade" plants needed more sun than I was giving them. So I came to learn one of the most valuable lessons: "Know thy sun."

In my first yard I could not dig a hole without hitting a rock. Life gives you rocks, build rock walls to surround your flower beds. I was pretty proud of those gardens that I created. When we put the house up for sale nine years later on the listing it clearly stated that some of the plantings were going to be leaving with me. Not only did I have to pack all our possessions, I had to dig up and pot my favorite plants to take with me to the new house.

Once Again we purchased the home of a non-gardener. There was nothing but those traditional foundation hiding bushes. I was an artist with a blank canvas. Now eight years later I'm still working on my masterpiece. It truly is a work in progress. The lessons learned in my first garden were applied to the second. Although we only moved one mile away from our old house the land here is totally different. Instead of rocky, loamy soil, I have sand. There are no rocks for building walls and raising beds. Again one must learn to work with what the yard provides you.

Deadheading

Last night, once the temps started to go back down, the bees retired for the evening, I covered myself with bug spray (the mosquitoes were very active), and went out to work in the garden. It was time to start cutting back the dead flowers and tidy up my plants. This always helps to make it look nice and neat not to mention encourage new blossoms to form. It really is a form of weeding. I did a little of that as well as the crab grass is coming into its own.

Have you ever had the experience of planting something only to regret ever putting it in your garden? For me it is a variegated artemsia. At first it grew nice and slow. I was even lulled into transplanting some of it into another section of the garden to help fill in an empty spot. Well, let me tell you the stuff is out of control! It has taken over, and I am resorting to pulling the darn stuff up. I'm on a campaign to clean it out or at least get it corralled. I've also made the mistake of letting my garden phlox go to seed. Now it has sprung up everywhere. With the wet June we had a lot of it has mildew on it, not a pretty sight! Control freak that I am, I'm faced with quite a job ahead of me getting order to return.

I'm back!!

After a long hiatus I am back to the blog. I've been reading Julie and Julia the story of one woman's quest to discover herself through cooking. I'm half way through and loving the book. The author decides to blog about her experiences and it has inspired me to pick up blogging again. I've been meaning to for months now. Unfortunately, the new job/career got in the way. It was all I could do to make it through each day. Where was I to find the time to sit down and write as well? I confess that my personal writing is still done on paper in a pretty journal using a pen. I'm old fashioned that way. This is a more open venue for sharing thoughts and experiences.

What does this have to do with gardening - nothing except that it's time to think about the great outdoors and sharing it with the world again. Our spring and summer have been miserably wet. It has been quite the challenge to get out and garden. Now the yard is over run with mosquitoes making it down right annoying to work. The "busyness" of life is also keeping me from working in the garden as much as I would like to, but it does get done a little at a time. Well, now that I am motivated to write again, perhaps I will be motivated to work the garden more as well.