LysmachiaMoon's blog: Stormy weather

Big storm blew through Monday afternoon, about 2-3 inches of rain, some minor hail, lots of wind. Much sturm und drang, but thankfully no damage. Picking up twigs and branches everywhere. I'm amazed and pleased the bean towers in the veg did not topple, but then again, they are so covered with vines I guess they are firmly anchored. Once the storm passed, it suddenly got GLORIOUS. Everything burgeoning and growing. I swear the cornfield down the road shot up to 8 feet overnight. I love the scent of corn in bloom, that strange evocative sweet musky odor on the hot air. For a day or two, it was everywhere.

I'm doing up my saurkraut today without fail. I've got 3 big cabbages to shred. Then I need to pick more beans and cukes, tomatoes. We had family to visit on Monday for lunch, served them a huge chef's salad with tomatoes and cukes from the garden. They left just before the big storm started, drove right into the teeth of it on their way northeast to Indiana, PA, but once past our county they said it was blue skies and no problems. I wanted them to stay until the storm passed, but they were in a big truck and said they would be ok, which they were.

Hummingbirds! I saw only one lonely little hummingbird until yesterday: it's like they came out with the rain. I've got three of them zooming around the back yard even as I write this, chasing each other and also chasing bumblebees. Yesterday one of them came right up to the patio door and hovered there, checking out what I was doing.

Still seeing only a couple of Monarch butterflies though, and none since the storm. I have started checking milkweed for caterpillars but none spotted. Every year they seem to appear later and later and fewer and fewer. I'm hoping I'll find a big surge of them soon. Last year we raised I think nearly 30 to adult and released them.

The little rescued kitten Hazel will be spending the day with us today. Hazel had to have "urgent" surgery on her bad eye yesterday; she did fine and is recovering/healing nicely. Her person has to go for a follow-up to Hershey Medical Center today, hopefully to be cleared for walking after recovering from surgery for broken leg. It will be an all-day follow-up, so we're having Hazel stay with us rather than be alone all day after her eye surgery. It will be nice to have a baby kitten in the house, even if only for the day. I just hope Ghost doesn't fall in love with her like he did with the baby foster kittens. That big tomcat (neutered!), just loves kittens. He won't want her to leave.

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Spent a few wonderful hours just "gardening hither and yon" yesterday morning. I armed myself with secateurs, a weeding tool and a bucket and just wandered around doing whatever came to hand. This morning, walking up to the henhouse I was surprised at how much nicer it all looked, even though it felt like I was sort of random in my cleanup. I did concentrate in the Storybook Garden for a while, but oh my, what a thorough-going mess that is. Very discouraging. That dratted Monster Grass just Will...not...die! I dug dug dug as much as I could with my weeder, to get some of it out, but honestly, I'm thinking I'll need to lift almost the entire border up there, clean it out, and replant and that is something I really don't want to do. I've dug over that garden so many times trying to rid it of Monster Grass, it gets old. I've resorted to spraying bigger areas with Roundup. I did that last month, figuring I'd sacrifice some of the daylilies it was entangled with. Fortunately, it looks like the grass is killed off but the daylilies are sending up new shoot, so that's ok.

And good news from the Storybook Garden: The lovely little Japanese Holly I planted last fall, thrived, then suddenly died. It is not dead! I'm so glad I did not rip it out. Yesterday I noticed new green shoots coming up from the crown of the plant. I'm going to leave the dead wood in place to protect this and see what happens. I'm going to make a point to feed it with some compost and mulch it.

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