forest hopes and summer breezes

This morning we did the sensible thing: we met with one of the brothers who operate a "forest service." Here's a lucky break -- they're just up the road from us. Two guys who are in the business of removing and chipping trees, clearing lots and, too, helping you with all your tree problems. And we surely did get ourselves some 75 (possibly more) new problems, coming to us later this month. I am so hoping that Ed will get on board with hiring these guys to help us clear the land for the new, baby forest we will be planting.

We also talked to our neighbor from across the road. He did something similar on his property, only his forest is predominantly firs and pines. I take photos of them after heavy snowfalls -- they're gorgeous then. Too, he planted possibly twice as many trees as we're about to do. In other words, he has experience. And he was adamant: protect your saplings well because they will be otherwise destroyed. He lost a significant number to rabbits. Did you know a rabbit can take down a tree? Chomp chomp -- gone.

Other weekend happenings? Here's proof that this day is magnificent in its warmth and spring-iness: we take the nearly six week old chicks outside for the first time. It feels like summer (almost)! We eventually climb to 70F (21C).

The cats stop by to visit, as do the big cheepers. Palpable excitement (and slight apprehension on my part, but we protected the chicks well from unwanted intruders) on all sides of the fencing.

Somewhere in this rather early and very busy morning, there was breakfast.

And soon after, my daughter arrives with the two kids. Outside time? But of course.

Snowdrop is buoyant. Sparrow, on the other hand is terribly worried that his t-shirt sleeves do not reach his wrists. He finds safety in his hoodie.

If there is one pose that would shout "quintessential Snowdrop!" -- this would be it.

Sparrow is a bit more tentative...

Though his smile, their radiant smiles are never far away.

As the day warms up, Ed, as if to negate the fact that we've taken on too much to do on farmette lands, brings out the old plastic cups and leftover seeds and proclaims it's time to start the tomatoes!

Well yes, sure, but if we are to grow tomatoes again, we must prepare their patch and, too, we must provide fencing because we did lose 90% of last years crop to deer and whoever else chomped down on ripening fruit all summer long. And so another project is added to our heaping cartful of projects!

Oh but on a day like this, who could possibly mind! Gloriously sunny, unseasonably warm, spring at her finest. I'm writing this in the early evening, sitting out on the porch (first time this year!) listening to the songs of birds, spilling over each other as if they were in a chorus, with their very first unpracticed rehearsal! Happy weekend indeed!

the next hurdle

And again, we're swirling with tree decisions. No sooner had we forged a plan to clear the land where we will be planting our 75 baby trees, than we meet our next hurdle: how will we protect these saplings from deer (and groundhogs and who knows what else)? I always assumed we'd place cages around them. We have some material to make those. But of course, the effort is so much more than that! Securing adequate wiring to the ground, chipping the base of the tree, accessing the sapling so that we can continue to weed each little guy until it is well established -- real issues requiring real effort, multiplied by 75.

We have no regrets, but it's becoming abundantly clear that the purchase of these trees was the least of our problems. The work before us is daunting!

But, the skies are clear, the temperatures will be rising, and we are onto the second day of April.

Breakfast, with my favorite table flowers. Well, the concept of "favorite" rotates, but it is true that spring cut flowers are to me the most exciting. 

And then there is a scramble to get stuff done. I want to move my mom to a different assisted living place and that will be a super scramble -- not one she especially wants, but nonetheless, I'm of the opinion that it has to happen.

Apart from indoor work, I have the garden to pull me out once again. Weeds! Many of them. Ones I had forgotten existed sprung up in a "cleared" bed. Yes, it happens -- beds with lots of empty spaces, waiting for new flowers tend to sprout weeds. 

And in the afternoon, I pick up Snowdrop and bring her to the farmhouse.

Well, sort of to the farmhouse. I ask if she would like to take a walk in our favorite county park. It has a forest, a lake... She wants to go! Right after the fruits and book session on the orange couch, of course.

We did not count on it being so windy! 

The outing did not last long, but it had adventure written all over it! Pigs copulating, burned prairies, snakes chasing each other, hounds barking, kites flying over the lake.

A girl, flying down a hill.

Who said your local county parks are boring!

In the evening, Ed and I try not to dwell on the obvious: we've bitten off more than we can chew with the farmette lands this spring. Still, if we don't do it now, while we (sort of) can, then when? Plant saplings when we're ancient? Dig weeds out of new beds when our knuckles wont bend anymore? It's now or never. We choose now.

foolish ventures

I do so love April, in the way that one loves the night before a very special event. The excitement! The promise of new growth, not next month or next week but tomorrow! The opportunity to get even closer to the natural world! It happens now.

In Poland, the first day of April is affectionately called Prima Aprilis. It sounds a lot better than our old April Fool's, but the intent is the same: we fool family, friends, anyone with something slightly annoying, potentially unpleasant, definitely funny. I read, for example, these small suggestions in a Polish newspaper: take a raisin, cut it in half, roll a half out into a thin string-like formation and put it in someone's sugar bowl. It really does look like a worm. Or, put a hard boiled egg in someone's egg carton. Or, if you're like me, send a text with some absurd announcement to your daughters and hope that they have forgotten it's April first. I do this every year and usually I manage to fool at least one for at least a handful of minutes. Why do we do this? Because small foolishness can lighten the heart just a little bit! And who doesn't need a lighter heart these days...

A less beneficial foolishness is one where you decide to stay up late with your tree planning maps. It's after midnight before I am satisfied that I did my best effort, placing some 75 trees on the two acres behind the barn and behind the new orchard. Drawn to scale, I hope.

And still less beneficial is then getting up before dawn because Ed chooses to discuss at that moment how to prepare the overgrown jungle out there for the arrival of the new trees. This is a huge deal and the stumbling piece that has kept us from doing anything for years. I used to try to mow down the weeds that grow there, but I routinely broke the tractor and the power mower over boulders, vines and invasive shrub stumps. Since no one ever ventured to that stretch of land and I left Ed burdened with the constant struggle to keep the machines in good repair, I gave up. 

Now that the trees are coming, we have to confront reality: a six inch high maple or a one foot chestnut cannot go into a jungle of weeds and shrubs and vines. We have to in some way clear the land. To some degree. The dilemma? To what degree and who should do the job (Ed, Ed and Nina, professionals and if so -- which professionals). So much to decide and though my input in such matters is sought out and welcomed, ultimately Ed follows his own predilection. Me, I would just pay someone to clear the land. There is now a growing industry of forestry mowers -- people who clear the invasives in forests and presumably on our overgrown land. It's ecologically friendly, as they mulch all that they pick up, and it prevents erosion. No digging or tilling. How expensive can it be to hire someone to do this for us a couple of times each year?

At breakfast...

... we go over the possibilities. Or rather, I lend an ear and offer my vote. By late morning, we've made progress: we ask someone to come out and give us an assessment. 

Okay, enough about trees. Why am I not outside? Well, it's sunny, but still cold. 

 

 

 

So the morning is spent finessing the details of my flower and now, too, tree maps.

In the afternoon though, we want to grab that sunshine. Snowdrop is on spring break and so I do not pick her up today. Ed and I could always do more yard work, but I suggest instead that we take a walk. We've been pretty farmette bound in the last few weeks. Time to see how spring unfolds in other parts of the world!

We head out to our local county park. I believe the last time we were here there was still snow on the ground. Not anymore! And indeed, we see that they recently did a controlled prairie burn.

Ed puts that on the table as well -- maybe we should consider a burn... 

No, we should not.

But we do pay close attention to the forested part of our walk. We study the maples, the shagbark hickory...

And in my head, I immediately redraw our own tree plan. Walking through a native forest helps me visualize these trees as they will appear long after we're stardust (or, in the alternative -- nutrients feeding the roots of these giants!). It's a slow paced walk. Truly we are taking a forest bath...

 

 

 

The evening calls for a frittata, don't you think? I cook it while chatting up Primrose, who is always fascinated by the culinary exploits at the farmhouse.

 

 

 

Yes, I stir in lots of local mushrooms, brussel sprouts, corn. And cheese. I must admit, the cheese is not from Wisconsin. As I said, sometimes, you just have to go out and taste something from a more distant part of the world.

huddle inside

We're having one of those see-saw events: very cold today, with a promise of a very warm weekend ahead. I like that! I need time to huddle inside and finish my planting maps. 

I'm thinking that I went about it the wrong way. I purchased plants I wanted to see in the garden in more or less quantities I could accommodate. I didn't think too much about what would go where. It always sort of works out. But the quantities turned out to be, well, not small and I did not want to be overwhelmed so I decided to do these flower bed maps. This may have been a good idea if I remembered every single plant that I'd already put in. I can't say that this is the case. At least not to the centimeter, or to the meter. Where are the old plants, where are the gaps?? And of course, I lose about 5% of last year's growth but I don't know yet which 5%. All this means that drawing maps is only easy for empty beds. I only have one empty bed. (Lookin' at you, bed number 11!)  The rest? My maps are an exercise in inexactitude.

Compounding the difficulties, I no longer remember why I thought, for example, that buying a 3 pack of Pyncnanthemum Verticillatum var. Pilosum from the Prairie Moon Nursery was a good idea. Moreover, this is the first time that I am working with that nursery (I'm trying very hard to introduce even more plants that will be compatible with the bugs and birds that live in south central Wisconsin), so I do not know if I can count on their, for example Blephilia Ciliata to spread as advertised. You have to know your growers and I don't know these growers yet.

So, on this cool day, this very cool day, I huddle inside and give my very best effort to the job of placing every new plant in a farmette flower field. At least on paper.

After breakfast of course.

The urgency here is obvious. Planting will start exactly three weeks from today. And in these three weeks, I have to keep up with weeds and here's another thing -- I have to draw out a tree plan! What tree plan? Well, I'm easily influenced by upbeat articles about planting beneficials and today, I read the piece in the NYTimes on how everyone should plant acorns and encourage oak trees to grow in their back yard. Now, this is a silly proposition, because oaks just never stop growing: they are huge! What suburban garden can accommodate a massive oak? And of course, it is just a short leap from there to my next thought: we should go back to our tree planting project! 

Ed is on board. And so some time in the afternoon, we list the trees we want to grow Maples, chestnuts, hickory, walnut, pecans. About 100 of them. Maybe more. Only now I'm dealing with a different gardener: Ed. He doesn't first buy, then adjust the purchases to the land. He plans. And does research. And reads everything. And so we have my quick to act style mixing in with his slow to decide demeanor and we have ourselves an interesting afternoon.

And speaking of growing things, out of the millions (or so) of tulips I planted, I now have almost none left. The groundhog did his job well, returning to the crime scene last night, before we had a chance to spray anything with habanero peppers. But, today the pack of peppers arrived in the mail and we set to work, grinding them up with water, milk, and oil. In the cold, cold evening, we spray all the tips that the groundhog left behind. 

A full enough day, you say? Oh, we also dealt with the chicks. I told Ed their room was beginning to smell of... chickens, so we dumped out old wood shavings and refreshed their box with new stuff. (We let them run wild during the cleaning process.)

(And gave them a treat: parsley.)

The day's not done. I must now produce a plan of our tree planting project. Ed will not go through with the tree purchase (we're talking saplings, less than a foot tall, at about a dollar or two a shot) before I produce a planting plan. 

Huddling inside never felt so... busy!

(And the daffodils keep on blooming and they're lovely.)

(And Dance finds a new place to find comfort inside.)

hot peppers

Brazen. Audaciously brazen. I've no better word for it.

It happened during the night. I'd had hints that it may take place. Here and there, little clues. And Ed had suggested maybe taking precautions. He floated ideas, I was mulling them over, and then boom! Too late. Battle lost (though the war is definitely not over).

This is the problem when you have shared your residence with those whose main purpose is to reap benefits through the destruction of your labor. This morning, I step outside and right away I see the damage. Two robust coral bell plants with mounds of colorful leaves: completely decapitated. Day liliy tips -- sawed off, as if by a sharp knife. Tulips, carefully planted along the new path -- mowed down to the ground, with some bulbs dug out for emphasis. And so on. 

The groundhogs danced by the light of the moon in my flower beds last night, feasting on all that's green and bountiful.

You cannot blame him (and probably his extended family). There's so little for them to eat right now. The flower beds offer hope. An appetizer of foods before summer gives them a full bounty of tasty delights. Still, it hurts.

Ed and I eat breakfast and discuss possible solutions going forward. The internet is full of strategies you can employ, even as I know most of them wont work. But, how about mixing the hottest of hot peppers (habanero) with other distasteful ingredients (maybe garlic? onion?), along with water and a bit of oil, and spraying at least some of the emerging plants with that potent mist? 

We order some habaneros from Amazon. Tomorrow, we fight back! Or at least redirect the woodchuck to more appropriate feeding venues. I mean, go eat the weeds already!!

(Breakfast)

It's a stunning day, albeit windy once again. No matter -- I have two Zoom calls today. One to help Ed, so more work than pleasure, and the other -- total pleasure, as I connect with my friend in Warsaw (though the COVID news there is not good, so I just listen and hope that she and so many others can hang in there before the vaccinations reach them).

(Ed takes a photo, possibly because Dance is there, lounging next to me.)

 

 

 

Eventually I do go out, shovel in hand. Such glorious weather! And of course, once you get the first daffodil, others come running to join the band!

(Another bloomer: my Hellebore plant, sometimes called the Lenten Rose, even though it is no relation to a rose.)

I try to ignore the groundhog damage. These animals are, after all, an integral part of farmette life. Groundhogs, hawks, possum. They take what's theirs, we replace what we can, with the hope that they'll be satisfied and leave plenty behind for us to enjoy.

how can you not be thrilled with them...

I know what you're thinking: here comes another grandmotherly post about those magnificent grandkids! Well yes, they are that, and yes, I'll say a word on them in a bit, but they aren't in my immediate field of vision when I first go outside this morning. And I'm not thinking about the chicks either, except that soon I wont be calling them chicks because they are getting plump and feathery. More and more like pullets (in case you are not a chicken person -- a pullet is a hen that's not quite an adult, but without the down of a baby chick).

I am thinking, when I step outside today, how thrilling the flowers of spring are when they do finally blossom. Even though one that is indeed blossoming massively (not because I planted it, but because someone once did), has this habit of spreading and squeezing out others, which makes it actually an invasive.  I'm thinking of you, scilla siberica! Pretty and bluebell-like, introduced here in the Midwest as an ornamental and now taking over many a wooded area. Including at the farmette. You really should not plant it. Still, it is, well, very pretty. 

I do take full responsibility for the crocuses. They are not natives, but they cause no harm. And they're gorgeous.

Similarly, I'll take responsibility for planting daffodils. Again, it's not a native, but not invasive either -- so no harm done and lots of beauty in its first appearance. Last year my first daffodil bloomed on April 1st. This year -- today! So three days earlier.

It's no surprise, really. By afternoon, we reach 65F (that's 18C). It's terribly windy, but who cares! It's 65F! (Well, Sparrow cares. As I help him navigate the great outdoors, he tells me -- I hate the wind. I list some of it's virtues and he does an about face -- okay. I like the wind. Kids are so impressionable.)

The early morning though is still a bit nippy. Breakfast in the kitchen.

The kids come soon after. I love how they find their own paths to the front door!

These days, Sparrow often begins his time here with a man-to-man chat with Ed. 

Snowdrop, on the other hand, almost always begins with a bowl of fruit and book time on the orange couch. I'd dug out some books on Jane Goodall. Snowdrop, who had had some exposure to Goodall previous to this, has a spirited discussion, also with Ed, about whether a chimpanzee is an ape or a monkey. (Happy to report that indeed, chimpanzees are apes. No tails, stand upright. Like us.)

And speaking of Ed, I'll put in this photo, because I don't think there's been a year where there hasn't been a photo of Ed pulling garlic mustard out of the raspberry patch while Snowdrop (and now Sparrow) romps.

Is it still windy? Yes it is!

Evening. We have some gizmo failures today -- my Fitbit battery is draining like a speed demon, to the point of making the movement tracking device useless, and Ed's little solenoid on the chicken coop overheated and died. Terrible news! How will I know my step count? And how will the cheepers get out in the morning? (The solenoid is set on a timer to spring the door open. Since it's dead, a real human being has to be there to let them out.) But by the end of the day, replacement parts for both gizmos are in place to arrive soon-ish. Once again I marvel at how easy it is to work through problems from home. All this and spring daffodils too. How thrilling is that!

the primrose

The English Primrose can surely withstand Wisconsin winters, but you have to mulch it, and care for the roots since they detest hot summers or very cold winters, and watch the water saturation of the soil, and kick any early plant loving animal out of your yard when the first shoots emerge. In other words -- it's not an easy flower for me to grow here. Some people prefer to put a primrose into a container. In that typical trilogy of spiller-thriller-filler (where you often see in a pot a trailing flower, a tall showcase bloom, and a low growing dense filler), the primrose takes on that "filler" role. But personally, I prefer to see a primrose where it does so well -- in her natural habitat, wild, in the English countryside. (Or, carefully planted and tended in the Luxembourg Gardens in Paris!)

In the alternative, I'll snatch one from a shop in early spring and put it on my table, where it will perform nicely for a little while.

Such a pretty flower! As you may remember, it's also Ocean's name for my little grandgirl. She turns three today!

 

We are adhering to virus precautions and so I cannot zip down to Chicago to be there for her grand day, but I know the little one is in for a spirited time, extending her celebration from school on Friday through
the weekend with her Chicago family. She is happy and so I am happy!

 

It's a bright and cheerful day, full of that wonderful spring sunshine. And wind! We hear it all day long -- like the sound of a train speeding through the farmette lands...

Breakfast, in the kitchen. I'm exasperated with Dance, our on and off feral cat who these days chooses breakfast time as the moment when she absolutely has to be petted or else. There goes my quiet morning meal!

We work outside  -- a little in the yards, but mostly on the porch. Spring cleaning time!!

And of course, I break for Primrose.

Such a perceptive, playful and affectionate little girl! Big observant eyes, big heart. And a big voice, too -- she is my one enthusiastically singing grandchild! And today she is three. How awesome is that! (And yes, she loves to dance. Put on Coppelia and she's off!)

I can't believe it: three!

 

Evening. A sunny evening! The young family comes for dinner and for the hundredth time I smile to myself about the grandness of having daylight with us the whole time they are here.

(Predinner munchies: yeah, she's the family beet thief)

 

(He stays with cheese and crackers...)

The day ends, the sun sets. At 7:20! I remember all too well when it set at 4:25 in December. Short winter days call for patience. The reward? Days like this one. 

Happy birthday, little Primrose. Happy evening everyone else!

With love.