the little wild kingdom

[flowerbug]

in recent good news at the place here, i think and hope we've finally gotten the roof leak taken care of after almost 10yrs of intermittent leaking. the roofing contractor came by about a week and a half ago and replaced all the roof vents. the old vents were clearly not the right kind that the previous roof contractor installed. the lip was not high enough to prevent heavy rains from overtopping them. the new vents are three times higher on the lip plus they don't have any exposure to the uphill side (it is solid and sloped and any water that runs down should go around). they also look nicer. we had a pretty good storm about four days after he did the work and i didn't notice any leaks after that happened. so perhaps we're finally past this... it's been so long it will probably take me a few years before i finally think it's taken care of...

 

[flowerbug]

a few pics from the cedar tree trim i had to do to keep this tree from taking over the pathway back to the fenced gardens.

i'm sure it will get some green on it again eventually as these buds of new growth show that the trunk is always checking to see if there is enough light reaching in there to support some new greenery. the way the deer constantly trim these trees i can see where that is a required adaptation to have. it was my hope that the deer would trim this particular tree back for me enough through the years, but for some reason they rarely touched it. so after being patient for so long i finally had to give it a hair cut.

ok, gotta get out and finish up mowing the grassy spot to the south.


and of course a bean picture:

my attempt to capture the various stages of drying down of the Spotted Pheasant. mainly i wanted to show the pattern and the pink color in contrast to how it looks when it dries all the way down to the golden color.

 

[flowerbug]

tree froggy picture from the other day:

 

[flowerbug]

Mom wishes she had my camera and knew how to use it yesterday as it was raining and it wasn't raining quite hard enough so i went out turned on the hose and then filled up the trench i dug out to see where the level was in a garden i'm shifting some dirt around in (after it has settled for a few years). i got my markers stuck in the dirt in some key places so i can use them the next time it actually dries out enough that i can get back into that garden.

what's not to like about a chance to play in the rain and mud? i didn't get that bad though, i didn't even have to scrape off my mud-shoes.

 

[flowerbug]

this pic is from mid August, showing i really needed to fill in that slope some more with thyme.

yesterday i got this edge built back up as the dirt was all washed downhill and then i put some thyme on top of it to hold it in place. so much dirt had gone downhill that the daffodils were halfway out of the ground and i couldn't scrape it any more. hopefully by mid-summer or fall next year this will all be covered up. about a month ago i'd transplanted some thyme to the top right and the ridge along the north edge of the garden to start that growing along there. it looks like it is doing ok, but i have to repair it in spots when the deer trample through.

a different perspective of the bottom part and also showing the thyme ridge to the left that i also transplanted yesterday.

the bottom large area used to be two different sections with a ridge between them but i combined them and leveled the whole area. hopefully by next spring i'll be able to get the whole thing level to where i want it.

the top terraces and ridges for water control (moving it to the right and to the left). i built up the very top edge more and lifted some thyme and also transplanted more on top of the ridge to hope to help hold it in place. that very top border has gotten washed out so many times already so i put in the two backup bigger ridges to take the brunt of things if the top gets washed out yet again. we'll see how this works out. trying to split and redirect the flows from the top gravel area to go around instead of through this garden. it would really help more if i just built up the pathway gravel area above the garden to divert the water around but dirt is easier to move than gravel...

all that is left to do now is to get the far north edge weeded and some of the dirt moved back up there to cover the daffodils back up and then to transplant yet more thyme. i'm glad i have another area that i can raid for more transplants as now i've used up everything available in the north garden itself. the Creeping Thyme is wandering into our pathway down to the back fenced gardens so i can probably get a few dozen starts from there and in between some rocks nearby for that part of the project.

it won't be happening for a few days though because we're due for more rains so i get to shell beans and ponder life here inside looking outside. no rain at the moment but my brother is getting rained on and we'll get a glancing blow by the looks of it and then later on today perhaps more.

looks much better than this pic (from 18 months ago)

 

[flowerbug]

we already had a small test of the new earthworks as yesterday we had a downpour of about an inch and a half of rain in about 20 minutes. it all held up ok, the top part which is what i'm most concerned about getting too much flow off the gravel areas at the top showed a few small puddles but not enough rain to show a clear flow in the area i'd set aside to split the flow so i think it should all be ok now. more rains on the way today and for a few days and then we have some sunny weather to dry things out again. more rain we don't need, but i guess i'll get more beans shelled out and sorted...

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I love your gardens. They must be a full-time job for you!

 

[flowerbug]

I love your gardens. They must be a full-time job for you!

they are!

a big harvest this morning worth thousands of $. i can't make that kind of $ working a local podunk part-time job.

 

[flowerbug]

a few bean pics from yesterday. these are of a cross breed that showed up here which i call Yed (for Yellow Red ). it is a longer season bean than fits here well, but it has persisted so it will keep getting grown when i get a chance to renew the seeds.

the first picture was made using my indoor light setup which didn't work out very well at all, but after some fiddling i could at least get this to look sort of ok:

and then a bit later the sun happened to finally come out and in between clouds i could get this snap shot (which didn't need any fiddling at all for the colors to show up):

i've seen many different kinds of beans but none with this sort of pattern so i hope eventually i can find a bean lover further south who will adopt some of these so they can continue to be grown in a more friendly climate.

 

[tortoise]

a few bean pics from yesterday. these are of a cross breed that showed up here which i call Yed (for Yellow Red ). it is a longer season bean than fits here well, but it has persisted so it will keep getting grown when i get a chance to renew the seeds.

the first picture was made using my indoor light setup which didn't work out very well at all, but after some fiddling i could at least get this to look sort of ok:

and then a bit later the sun happened to finally come out and in between clouds i could get this snap shot (which didn't need any fiddling at all for the colors to show up):

i've seen many different kinds of beans but none with this sort of pattern so i hope eventually i can find a bean lover further south who will adopt some of these so they can continue to be grown in a more friendly climate.

I wonder if Baker Creek would be interested?