This has been a summer teeming with critters, mostly because our community has declared war on coyotes and the local population of rabbits has just multiplied. After noting all the damage in our yard, I decided to live-trap and relocate the delinquents to a new home. So far this year, I have moved 9 rabbits […]
Garden Notes
Laundry Day
One of my favorite jobs in summer is to hang laundry out in the yard. We have a clothesline apparatus that is attached to the house and when I am ready to hang the wet clothes, I simply pull out the lines and attach the far end to the clothes pole. When finished, I reverse […]
Rhubarb Queen
The first 18 years of my life were spent on our family’s dairy farm northern Wisconsin. My mother, father and in fact our whole family spent a lot of time producing food for our meals. We had a large vegetable garden, along with an orchard that provided apples, plums, and grapes. We grew strawberries, raspberries, […]
Amaryllis for Christmas
I have always admired Amaryllis plants because of their huge showy flowers and this year I bought one at Home Depot during the “Black Friday” sales hoping to have blooms for Christmas. The amaryllis I chose was planted in a small pot and had 2 flower stalks already emerging from the soil. I took my […]
Toad in a Hole
I have always wondered where toads and frogs go during our long winters. I knew they were supposed to hibernate, but had never actually seen one in cold weather. All that changed this fall. I was helping our daughter-in-law plant a few tulips and daffodils in their front garden in late October. This sounds simple, […]
Blooming Sweet Potato
Each spring I plant a few pots with flowers to place on our patio. The plants vary from year to year, but I especially like the ornamental sweet potato vines, (Ipomoea batatas) both the lime green ‘Margarita’ and the purple/black version called ‘Blackie’. While being actual sweet potatoes or root vegetables, the Ipmoea batatas have […]