Visitors to the Garden

The wiley wabbit from a few evenings previous.

I didn't get pictures.  Someone should have,  I am sure it was a funny scene; me out in front with my cane going, "Quack, quack quack!"  in a rhythmic pattern, four little duckling following along, quack, quack, quack, as I lead these little ducklings across to my neighbor's, whose yard is gated and fenced.

I was sitting on my deck pounding finishing nails into a shoe cabinet I am making featured on Ana White's website.  Handsome Son has returned for the summer with his 35 pairs of shoes in tow, all of which are seemingly congregating in my entryway, like shoe-apalooza. (This must be something inherited from his dad; I have, like, two pair of shoes--one for the gardening and one for not-gardening.)

  They could have been goslings, I hope not.  I don't think they were as the goslings here are already nearly three times the size of these guys.  They were four little brownish-blackish yellow balls of fluff with black webbed feet, completely capable of hopping up the stairs of my neighbors porch and with the ill-conceived idea of waddling down the road to find the source of that tap, tap, tap from my hammer.  I want to think they were wood ducks.  I did not take pictures.  You'll have to take my word on this.

And then he was on my side.

My son on coming home, went across to Darrel's and scooped them up and took them back to the Mill Pond, where they are only marginally better, but away from cars traffic and dogs.

A few nights previous, we had heard loud whooping coming from the street.  My son looks out to see Darrel chasing three rabbits from his yard into mine.  Before seeing the object of the whooping, my son had a momentary though that the neighbor has finally lost it.  (Young people are constantly looking for signs their elders have "lost" it-- whatever "it" is.)

Another incident of which  I wish I had damning photo-evidence.

Could you see the YouTube videos going viral?  "Noted Horticulturalist Whooping in Street at Wiley Wabbits"?  ""Mother Goose Leading Her Goslings"? 

Rabbits in the Garden: Life As We Know It

(Photo: www.outdoorhub.com)

Rabbits.

They are sort of fun to watch, but as a gardener I know they spell trouble.  So it was not without some trepidation that I watched a rabbit burrow itself out of the snow from under a spiral pruned Alberta spruce in the parterre garden I can see out one of my two erstwhile bedroom windows.

I watched it for a while.  It scampered happily about as if to be saying, "Oh what to choose!"  It finally hopped over to some long caned heirloom roses and settled in for a snack.  I have seen many a shrub rose girdled and pruned back in just this fashion.  Of all the possible feasts laid out for Rabbit, my odds were on the roses from the start.

So yesterday, being a gardener, I had a lot of angst when, sensing movement in the garden, I looked up from my studying and saw Rabbit yet again.  Rabbit,  with all our winter has hit the outdoor creatures, looked good, healthy; and as temperatures soared to freezing (first time since January 13 for us here) Rabbit looked happy and joyful.  The day was warm.  The garden full of gnawable snacks.  The garden would provide.

And where there is one rabbit, you will certainly have more rabbits.  Or maybe not...

It was not more than a few seconds before I saw a second rabbit had joined Rabbit.  Both rabbits were scampering to and fro, enjoying the warm day, and playing tag of a sort, and I thought to myself they are going to do something for which rabbits are famous, multiply like, well, rabbits.

Being well-versed on the reproductive abilities of rabbits, I know rabbits multiply like rabbits because just being with a male rabbit or buck will bring the female into estrus.  About 30-31 days later, baby rabbits!

So, baby rabbits.  With such a short turnaround and so much snow to melt before I can hope to get to my car unless I hire a plow, in 30 days I will still be here and see yet more rabbits.

So Rabbit and Buck are doing their happy hopping and thinking about doing the nasty rabbit.  I'm watching thinking I should get my camera.

And suddenly...

(Photo: www.witchita.edu)

 
He was so impressive.  I saw him swoop in at an anterior angle, talons out, with his full, nearly five foot wingspan extended.  The snowy white, speckled with rust, downy under belly plumage and bright rust tail feathers, and his size, again I was taken by his size; left no doubt as to the identity of my latest visitor to the parterre.

I craned my head to see if I could capture a better angle of this bird...of prey.  I could not.  He was quick.

Hawk was gone.

My focus returned to Rabbit and Buck.

But... Buck...Buck was no more.  Hawk had been quick.  And life had changed for Rabbit and Buck and the heirloom shrub roses.  And Hawk, who was obviously at the top of his game and feeling the clear blue skies and warming temperatures, too.

And I was struck by how quickly life can change, yet again.

Daffodils! (And Garden Scourges)

Daffodil spears

Whether there is snow on the ground or not, my bulbs are trying to grow.  There is some sort of quality of light.  There have been so many overcast days.  So few sunny days.

But there are these sprouted daffodils.  One on the left actually has a bud.

It was 60 degrees late, late yesterday afternoon.  That is not a misprint.  Today, is cold.  Farther north they canceled school... another snow day.  Here, we did NOT have snow, though.

This weekend the forecast calls for sun AND 60 degrees. 

NOT daffodils!  These are actually surprise lilies.

The foliage looks like a daffodil on steroids.   When I was a naive gardener, a long time ago, I would get slightly excited to consider what the bloom of these beefed up daffodils might be, only to watch then turn brown and wither without blooming.  Then in August, BOOM!  From nowhere a stalk shoots up and blooms within 2-3 days, incredible pink blooms without a leave in sight.    I have a couple in my hosta bed under hosta just to mess with people (evil genius...).

Scilla

 These form a nice glow of blue.  I used to be able to see the flowers.  Now, I just see the glow of blue.  One of these days on the end of their bloom (when I can still find them), I will move these out so I can once again see their blooms. 

I'll probably also place some other places, too.  That way, when the gravel is graded or the snow plowed on the alley, I won't be at risk of my bulbs being graded and shredded onto the neighbors yard.

I feel I garden against all comers.

The mean rabbit...

This fat Budda rabbit is a stand-in for the bad rabbit poser in my garden yesterday.   I get out of my car and there in the border six feet from me is a brown cotton-tailed rabbit.  I walk over about two feet from the frozen rabbit, "I can see you!" I point my finger at Rabbit.  Rabbit hops off six feet.  I re-center.  "I can still see you!" I scream.  Obviously, the Rabbit Cloak of Invisibility stolen from some poor Romulan is just not working correctly.

The weather...

A broken pot of muscari (I love this blue!)

My crazy neighbors...

I have blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, and an echinecea nitidia planted along my neighbors garage.  Finally, after my staring at that pile of metal trash he affixed to my side of his garage for ten years; he has decided he will re-roof and side  his garage-- just in time  to accidentally trample landscaping in my yard right before the Garden Walk.   Hopefully, he'll get his project completely before everything leafs out.  Otherwise, I wish him the joy of those blackberries just out of the picture on the right.

I have already had to remove two badly broken branches from my spruce.  The middle of my bridal wreath spirea has a chunk of frozen ice holding it to the ground.  I am hoping some nice warm sunshine encourage branches to orient more to the south and also to fill in with some new growth.  The bottom six feet is very sparse since having snow plowed up against my spruces' trunks and through the spirea and roses under-planting these evergreens.

Allium 'Summer Beauty'

 

 

 

If you don't grow this allium, you should!  The foliage is flat,wide, and green; flower head is sterile and long-blooming.

Weather note:  Snowiest MONTH on record for Wisconsin at 51 inches...not just snowiest April.

"Dang Wabbits!"

I haven't seen any evidence of rabbits all winter. I'm not sure why. We've had plenty of tracking snow. Maybe they just hole up and sleep when it's really cold. Maybe rabbit tracks are more of a sign of spring than the groundhog seeing its shadow. I do know that since the last snowfall, my yard is a den of rabbit activity. I wish that Cooper's Hawk would make another appearance. Or may an eagle from the Mill Pond. The rabbits have checked out each and every bush above the 16" or so inches of snow still on the ground. Lucky for me, the village plow has pushed up a good mass of snow over the blueberry bushes. So far no evidence of gnawing.

On February 28, I saw a solitary sandhill crane flying north by Borth. (I couldn't make up names like these!) Last year the sandhill cranes flew back on February 19, heralding an unusually warm March. Typically, they appear between March 10 and March 20 or so, sometimes as late as the 27th, when it has been really cold. Since they usually sit on eggs when the snow has gone and that is about three weeks from arrival. Their arrival is a sure sign spring comes.

Also today, for the first time this year, a small flock of chickadees were chirping in my hedge until I scared them off trying to take their picture.

More sign of rabbits!


Right now?

LOTS of snow!

Face-off at the Waushara County Fair: 2012

In an empty cage next to the second place bunny we have an also-ran putting up a "big front".

And, in farming country, guess what? The tractor cake always wins!

First.

Second.

Third.

More from the Waushara County Fair next post.

Sounds of the Night

Last night, coming up the steps with my son, he suddenly shushes me.

"What?"

"Shush!"

I listen.

"Hoo- hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo---!"

I continue to listen. I hear it from the top of the white pine a block away, then the top of my majestic white pine, then I hear it across the street in the Norway spruce. Again and again it repeats.

Three male Great Horned Owls each in his own tall tree, right here it town; I hear no female cries. maybe she is waiting to see which of her young suitors develops the best song. The thought there might be a whole "parliament" of owls living right in my block is wonderful news.

I knew those rabbits that killed my burning bush last year had it coming! Sounds like it might be a bad year for moles, voles, and shrews, too!

Yeah!