Tuesday Treasure #19 - A Posting in Four Parts

The big move day is getting closer - six days away.  As I count down to that I have been reflecting back on our time at this house by posting old blogs.  

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This one first appeared in May 2011.  I made a lot of changes in the garden from 2011 to present.  It's interesting to look back to see how it once looked and compare.

Linking to Tuesday Treasure.

A Posting in Four Parts

(May 3, 2011)

PART ONE - "GONE FISHIN'"

That's the sign the heron left on its nest this morning. I startled it as I walked through the perennial garden taking photos at 10 am. It must have been perched on my roof

and when I walked by it flapped it huge wings and took off. I tried to see if it landed on the north side of the house but it wasn't there. Then I thought of the goldfish in my pond.

Here are some of the goldfish some days ago.


I think I had between 25 and 30 of various sizes. Some of them were 5 years old and 6 inches long. I got them as 29 cent feeder goldfish. Notice I used past tense. Yep! No sign of them. This afternoon I did spot this tiny one but nothing else there.


The heron didn't fish for frogs or tadpoles. I'm sure the goldfish made it easy because they were probably attracted to those pinkish orange legs and all it had to do was keep snatching them up.


Goodbye goldfish. You'll be missed.

PART TWO - "I Don't Know, Honey If This is the Right House for Us."



The bluebirds have been in and out of the bluebird box today. I thought finally they're building a nest and so I took a peek. Nope, no nest. They can't make up their mind which house to use since I put up two more. They will miss their chance because the chickadees have moved into one already.

PART THREE - Faces in the Garden

The glen garden

A wooden rabbit - its really just a piece of scrap cedar.

The perennial garden looking east.

PART FOUR - The Pile is Gone!

I moved the last of the mulch today finishing the paths in the perennial garden, adding more around the new junipers on the north side and mulching the vegetable garden pathways. Glad to have that chore complete.

You can see the lavender showing green. I hope they fill out a lot more this year.

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2016 Footnote:  All those faces in the garden except the little girl angel statue are gone.  Sold in the auction!

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Spring To Do List

We all have it - that Spring to do list.  This week it finally looks like the weather will be conducive for me to start tackling my list.

1. The Perennial Garden.

 All the old growth from last year needs to be cut down and composted.

 The leaves that cover the beds need to be removed or dug in so the new growth can get the sunlight.  These crocuses have pushed through those leaves.

 The stone walls of each bed need to be straightened.

 2. The Pond Garden

 The pond needs cleaning out of the leaves that accumulated there.  We never had the long frozen spell that would have let me walk on the ice to cut down the cattails.  I'll have to put my boots on and wade in there to cut them.  The Joe Pye and the butterfly bushes and all the irises around the pond will have to be trimmed.

 The grasses need to be cut and divided and divisions moved to other locations.
 3. The Vegetable Garden

 The garlic is growing.  I don't think it ever stopped this winter.

 The other beds need compost added and then peas, spinach, lettuce and other spring crops can be planted.

 One small patch of spinach that wintered over but it was disappointing.

4. The Front Garden

 The Russian sage will have to be cut back.

 As will the butterfly bushes and hydrangeas.

 The hibiscus will need a cut back of dead limbs.

 The sedum will soon put out new green growth so I need to help it along by cutting the old flower stalks.

 I left my pots out all year in the front and the Daisy Miller may come back but nothing else will.

These pots wintered over in the vestibule.  All the plants survived and soon will be putting out new growth.  I'll need to freshen them up and when temps allow move them to the back deck for another season of growth.

Sunday Gardening

This is the bed in which the tomatoes will go into. I don't want to disturb too much of the spinach since it's producing so well.

I modified my original plan and put the indeterminates (Rutgers) on the far end where there will be a netting trellis for them to be trained on. The Golden and Amish past will be in the nearer holes.

I cut up plastic bottles to use as cut worm collars. One of the Golden tomatoes had a bud on it already.


Here is the bed with the snow peas, onions, and beets.

The bed with more onions, lettuce, Brussels sprouts and more beets seeded where the peas did not germinate well or got eaten by the turkey.

The garlic bed. I'm using one for dinner tonight. I had Dan pound in stakes at the end of the bed for a later trellis.

The bed with more peas, Brussel sprouts and more spinach.
My other task today was to plant these pots. I got the plants at an Amish nursery in PA.





Don't you love the geraniums? I've never seen any like them before.

I'm going back to the nursery in two weeks to get some hanging planters.