Divisive garlic

It hasn’t rained for a couple weeks. The heat is setting in. The less irrigated corners of the garden are getting crunchy underfoot. The rain barrel is even running low. This week is going to be hotter. Summer weather in July, what a concept. No wonder the garlic cloves I stuck in the ground last […]

Three cheers

For the red, white, and blue!

The bees have arrived on the coneflowers

The full trinity of bees have found the coneflowers. Bumblebees, honeybees, and Agapostemon Virescens. Let’s call her Aggie.

Hummingbird moth

There are bugs that make you say, What’s that? And there are bugs that make you say, Oh my god! I didn’t know anything like that existed! This Nessus Sphynx moth is like the size of my thumb, and it looks like a tiny hummingbird. I don’t exactly have a high-speed camera, but I could swear […]

Bees and Onions

This is what happens when you let an onion get away with being an onion. It was sprouting and I let it sprout. Then I planted it in the ground, and it was growing and I let it grow. Finally, it sent up a flower shoot and I let it flower.

Bee approved, mystery plant

There is no more doubt about the mystery plants. It’s a sunflower. Several sunflowers, that is. Everything about them says “Sunflower”: the broad leaves, the flat yellow disks, the mathematical spiral in the centers, the honeybee, the green Agapostemon bee, and more bees to come.

Plums are ripe!

The first ripe plums have been picked, not by me, but by the raccoons (I think). I found tooth marks in a few ripe ones, more marks in a bunch of unripe ones, and still more green plums thrown to the ground. The raccoons were so stupid, they missed a couple of ripe ones.

Think blue, Think cool

Imagine everything around is the cool blue of a water hyacinth.

Raccoon Moon

The bright moon last night brought back the raccoon, and three kits as well. It was pretty funny watching them stuff themselves into the bird feeder, trying to convert sunflower seeds into raccoon. When they were done with that, two of the little ones waddled up the hill toward a scrawny raspberry that hasn’t been […]

Giving ground to the bees

Once you’re feeding native bees, they also need a place to live. For a lot of native bees, that’s in the ground. Miner bees, sweat bees, squash bees, and more, are solitary bees that dig secret tunnels where they lay their eggs on a time capsule of food. The larvae need a safe place to […]