I am hearing thunder Jan.....
Thank you All. My little gardens are places of great contentment. They are places to meditate and find peace. I find such joy in the garden from bird song to frog song. What a gift it is to be able, and to have a place, to sow and to reap. I wish i could share that contentment with the world. The greatest gifts in life really are free.
LONG STORY ALERT.......!!!! (nothing about irises either)
Talking about birds....... crows. I grew up knowing that the crow was like a blackbird only three times as big. And they walked.....well, strutted in most cases, instead of hopping. I knew they were important but boy did I learn a lot about nature from Brother Crow.
I live on a ridge in a valley in the hills. The north side of my patch drops off abruptly (no, you cant climb down it in most places you could only fall down it) into 3,500 acres of a game preserve. Most of the trees in the preserve have never been cut and there are some reeeeaaaallly tall ones. I can stand and look way down at the bottom of the trees and way up at the tops. In the early morning the tops of the tall old trees are the first things in my world to be lit with the sun as it comes up and the last to see its rays as it sinks in the west.
Every spring, usually during April, but always before the trees leaf out, the crows come to the 'holler' in remarkable numbers, all at once, on a clear morning. Half of them sit in a tall tree to the northeast of my patch and the other half sits on a tree opposite them. Their are almost too many to imagine, There are so many they could be taken for black leaves on the trees. A few, perhaps a dozen or so, will alight on a smaller tree in the middle of the 'holler'. When they are all settled in it becomes very quiet and then one tree begins to 'talk' They make such a racket that I stop whatever I am doing and stand to watch. Then the racket stops, the few crows in the middle tree 'speak' for a moment and when they grow silent the other tree starts to have their 'say'.
This continues for 10 to 15 minutes and always taking turns in an orderly fashion. The last to 'speak' is the center tree and then one tree of birds, with much noise of their flight taking, will fly off in one direction followed by the other group taking flight in the opposite direction. Then the middle tree takes to their wing.... some going with one group and some going with the other. The trees are bare again and the world is silent. I am always in wonderment and know that I have witnessed some important transaction in the crows world.
After several years, of standing silent witness, I had the urge one day to speak. During the quiet pause I would say something such as 'good morning brother crow, I admire the way you are sorting things out. Humans could learn a lot from you. Please continue and pay no mind to me'. They would remain silent until i finished speaking, the middle tree would then speak and it was back to their own business.
Now after four or five years of this 'crow council', during the weeks following, a lone crow would fly down where I was working only 3 or 4 feet from me. I would straighten up and say 'Good morning, brother crow'. The crow never spoke but would walk around me keeping one eye on me. Occasionally i would add thoughts such as 'Isn't it a wonderful day' or 'wish i could fly like you do'. I
went out into my garden one morning and noticed a tab from a can laying where I had been working the evening before. I have never used aluminum cans and was puzzled by how it could have gotten there. I bent to pick it up and noticed a piece of heavy string too. I scooped up what looked like trash and took it indoors and disposed of it. Several days later more trash appeared. Puzzled.??? How did this get here. Every few days a stray bit of trash would be in my iris bed. One day. as I was hoeing, a crow flew down and walked around me then over to the 'bits and pieces' area and dropped a smooth little shiny stone. Then the crow looked at me and slowly lifted off and flew away. Amazed!!! The crow (crows? hard to tell them apart) was bringing stuff to my garden? Yes. Over the years I have saved a small hoard of gifts from Brother Crow. The most dear are small stones with holes through them. I have on a cord.
I wonder what the crows are talking about. I wonder what they think of me. I wonder if they will miss me when I am gone..... I know I would miss them. We humans can sometimes think we are in charge and that over the years, as a whole, have grown to be the wisest creature on this planet. If we were really wise we would know how much we could learn by something/someone we consider not as smart or as grand as we are.
It has lovely markings. Each year the blooms seem to improve in color and form. I really like this little iris. 
There are a lot of bloom stalks and I am really excited about new blooms. I did put the hose in it even though rain was predicted for today because it was so dry and the weather so unreliable.
