Elizabeth’s Journal

Gardening Progress and Avian Friends

I am getting worn out—but I am making great progress in the garden, with the able help of my father-in-law, while my mother-in-law makes Jonathan giggle. Over the weekend I worked in 10 bags of garden soil into the bed, and my entire vegetable garden is now planted—a cherry tomato plant and a Better Boy tomato plant, a strawberry plant, a dill plant, a few sweet onion plants, and seeds for the following: falltime leeks, yellow crookneck squash, spinach, carrots, snapdragons, bush beans, and Texas hummingbird sage. Within a week I should know if anything is going to germinate. Pictures will appear within my blog soon.

I also weeded the area around my birdbath—cleared out the grass & weeds choking the roses and salvia and added a bag of dirt there as well. I didn’t get many flower stalks on my red yucca last year and am hoping for more this time around. I have an errant daylily between it and the birdbath—we’ll see if it sends up a flower stalk as it won’t get any sun where it is.

In the front garden bed around the electrical box, I added some maroon bluebonnets in honor of Courtney, my cousin who is soon to become an Aggie. I also added some red salvia and moved a couple of plants into the back garden; I think the deer were eating the flower petals. Last weekend Joy planted some lantana, which looks very nice. It is so pleasant to be driving down the street and see all the welcoming blooms in the garden. Much nicer than a patch of dirt covered with weeds.

In a last-ditch effort to stop my live oak in the front yard dropping so many damn leaves, after Brian weeded it, I added three bags of Dillo Dirt and then some pine bark mulch. I also gave it some plant food. Perhaps that will stop the constant shedding of leaves.

Today I also added some edging to the bed in front of the study window and put a pot of bright red geraniums behind it—it looks so professional! I had intended the edging for my herb bed in the back, but didn’t realize that it wouldn’t work for reasons really too boring to detail here. Nice that it worked out somewhere.

The cardinals are loving my bird feeder, although the psycho lady cardinal still pecks at my windows, trying to intimidate her own reflection. They are also pleased that as of this morning, I have put out mealworms again. I am getting finches at my new finch feeder, and last week while sitting in my new deck furniture enjoying the approaching twilight, I saw a baby hummingbird visit every single flowering plant in my flower bed in the back. It was there long enough for Brian & Joy to come watch it. I’ve since put my hummingbird feeder out; it should be a good year for hummingbirds since it’s been so wet—lots of wildflowers should be out. Also, although my birdhouse is currently empty, I do have a nest of Carolina wrens in my hanging basket of snapdragons. Yesterday there were four eggs in it. I love having baby birds around—hearing them in the nest is beautiful.

I have also seen some tufted titmouse at my bird feeder quite often, and over the last month I’ve seen quite a few cedar waxwings; the first time I saw them was the day Andy left to go back to England, and they swarmed all over the berries on my nandina bushes. Last time I’ve seen them was Saturday, however, so perhaps they have moved on to warmer or cooler climates.

For anyone who’s made it this far, you can see some pictures of my peppermint peach tree, my son, and my in-laws at Dale’s web page; the password is the first name of my child in all lower-case letters.

Tomorrow (Wednesday) we are to go to the Austin Rodeo. I am hoping that this year Jonathan will be big enough to go on some of the rides. He had a blast on the ones we did at last year’s Victorian Christmas Festival down on 6th Street, and I would love to do some more with him.

Posted by elizabeth at March 26, 2003 01:07 AM