A Long HOT Summer

It’s been really hot all summer, and very dry.  Hardly any rain in June or July.  Many of the perennials were looking pretty shabby, until a recent rainfall did some amazing things.  I have never seen anything like this.  The purple coneflowers throughout the yard began sprouting new growth from the spent seedheads.  They are actually quite beautiful. 

Pretty much every clump of them has at least one head doing this.  I’m not sure what they will do next, whether those are flowers or new plantlets.  But for now, pretty special.

Desert Dry

There has been no measurable rain here in over 7 weeks.  It is very dry.  The grass is totally brown, with a few specks of green here and there.  Most of the rest of the perennials have dried up terribly.  I water the vegetable garden, and some of the pots and gardens around the deck and front porch.  But, most things are just going down.  They will not likely die, or at least most of them won't.  But it will not be a good year for any.

The Bufo americanus tadpoles are growing, some faster than others.  They grow legs and emerge as young toads only a few at a time.  I wonder if there is some sort of pheromone or hormone in the water that the mature ones exude to keep the others immature.  In any case, they really emerged in the small rain we had this evening.  I found them all over the leaves of the floating plants in the pond.  They've been hiding in the crevices, and sometimes getting caught in a low moisture situation that is deadly to them.  There are more than a few tadpole shapes dried up on leaves of the water lily.  But tonight they are happy.  That is nice.

It has been way too long...

I've just not gotten around to writing in the blog in the last month or so.  Here it is, July 5th, and I haven't updated since June 9th.  The likely most explosive and changing month in the year, and I haven't written anything about what's happening.  This has been the time when things have solidified, become relaxed, opened up into summer.  The spring was tenuous this year, and we never really got to the point where things grew like they trusted that it would last.  Then the heat came.  Big heat.  and no rain for a couple of weeks.  It is now high summer, and we are almost in drought conditions.  We need to water every day, and every two or three out in the vegetable garden to protect the investment in plants and to preserve the hope that we'll have fresh tomatoes in August. 

This was the 4th of July weekend, and we had three days of both of us home to really work out the neglected parts that had been ignored as we prepared for the Torch Convention.  I had ordered 8 cubic yards of bark mulch last week, and so there was that to disperse.  And the watering, and the weeding, and the edging, and the creation of a completely new chipped area behind the apple trees.

The raspberries needed to be weeded, preparing for the harvest in the next couple of weeks.  And the area around the pond needed weeding and tending, to make it pretty for the rest of the summer season.  The lilac was totally overgrown, creating a problem for both Lee and me when we mowed the space between our yards.  And there were spent spring blossoms everywhere, as well as yellowed tulip and daffodil foliage.  Lots of sprouted tree seedlings, and other weeds everywhere.  And it was time to do a major weeding in the vege garden and then lay down the straw mulch for summer.  Had to water first, then weed, then remove the walking boards that kept me from tramping down the roto-tilled earth, then finally, spreading the straw.  Again this year I believe I have been careful about not letting too many sunflowers grow, but time will tell.

The deck has finally been cleared of all of the nursery functions, and the only non-ornamental plant left there is a single remaining Christmas Amaryllis.  The leaves keep living on, and I keep watering it.  Soon I must stop, let them die, and hope for a beautiful show next Christmas when I start watering again in October.  Most of the plants around the deck are doing OK, but progress is slow this year.  A nice surprise jumped up in the last week or so, I planted them years ago, and never know where they will come, never can count on them, but there they are.   

Waiting for Rain and Warm Weather

It is getting so dry that the grass is going dormant, and burning out in the front near the road. There are cracks in the yard a half an inch wide. The garden beds are hard as a rock, which keeps me from planting. This may be a good thing, since the weather is still so unsettled. It looks like we will have above freezing temps for the next week or so, and that should be the end of the killing frost for this season. But I think I said that a couple of weeks ago.

There is rain supposedly coming tonight, and then clouds and more rain possible for the rest of my vacation. I'll take rain, but it may mean that I can't get the planting done.

I saw the female Oriole today at my grape jelly feeder. I was standing just a few feet away when she swooped down to the gazebo and let out a joyous cry. I turned but didn't move much as she flew over to the feeder and ate for a few minutes, then up to the library honeylocust tree and off again into the woods. I think it is quite possible that we have a nesting pair this year.

Yesterday I missed a chance to catch a shot of the ducklings that have hatched and are swimming up and down in the creek with their mother. There are 7 or 8 of them, and my goodness they grow fast. They will be out of here soon, but for now they are very cute.