LysmachiaMoon's blog: Just watch for me on Hoarders

I don't know how it happened. Me and E took a load of junk up to the dump the other day and I came home with MORE stuff than I went with. I got an empty 5-gallon bucket, a huge red plastic "muck tub" (that E was tossing out), a lovely window box planter with a decorative metal hanger, and this absolutely adorable iron plant hanger thingy with little birds on it. It's meant to be screwed onto a deck rail or fence rail and the arms are articulated but the whole thing was frozen with minor rust. A shot of WD-40 and it's fine. I also got a book "1001 Things to Pest Proof Your Property." Who tosses out stuff like that? As well, and I probly should have my head examined, E talked me into taking a mess of wire fence. She has given up gardening and wants to get rid of everything. I take these things from her with the full knowledge that she'll probly change her mind next year and then i can give them back so she doesn't have to re-purchase them. The smaller sections of wire fence I made into 3 more cages for the veg garden. The big one I just rolled up tight and stored. We also hiked around the woods a bit looking for "free" redbud seedlings (dint find any) and I came home with a couple of nice little sassafras starts, a tiny holly, and some sort of pretty vine thing that will no doubt turn out to be a flesh-eating, chicken chasing rampant monster of an invasive from Outer Mongolia because that's just the way my luck goes....
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Got 6 more cabbages and 6 cauliflower plants into the ground. Pulled a lot more garlic mustard; I'm not the only one noticing a big increase. Another neighbor complained that it is coming up everywhere on his property too. Must be a bad year for it. I noticed yesterday that my silver maples are loaded with seeds; it's going to be a "mast year" and what a mess that is. If anyone knows of a reforestation project that can use native silver maple seeds, let me know. I will probly have buckets of them. One thing about these seeds: they sprout where ever they land. I'm often tempted to scatter handfuls of them on abandoned land and let them start a new forest.
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Got my veg garden hoses laid out and tentatively connected. I don't have the outside faucet turned on yet, so I haven't tested the system for leaks. I'll do that later today, once the temps warm up. Thank the garden gods i had the foresight to number all the hoses (7 of them!) and draw up a diagram showing exactly where each one goes and where the Y splitters and the 4-way splitters go. I'm a bit concerned about a couple of those connectors; may have some leaks there.
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Finally, our overnight low was forecast to be 37F. It went to 30F. I'm seeing frost over the neighbor's lawn. I bundled up everything in the greenhouse late yesterday afternoon, but I never expected it to get below freezing. I dread what I'm going to find. This April has been the most bizarre temperatures I've ever witnessed. We ride a rollercoaster that goes from nearly 90F to below freezing within a few days. And no significant rain. We're verging into drought conditions now (hence the veg garden hose drag-out). Looking back over old notebooks from about 15-20 years ago, April was chilly (40s-50s for highs) and wet. Consistently, with a gentle upgrade in temperatures toward May, when a day in the low 80s was a rarity and considered hot. Now? Who knows. We've got to work harder at keeping CO2 out of the atmosphere. Everybody hold your breath starting.....NOW!

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