Tuesday, November 29, 2016

The World Turned Upside Down



Weather: Last snow, this morning.

What’s blooming: Nothing.

What’s blooming inside: Zonal geraniums, moss roses, aptenia.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, small birds.



Weekly update: The Halloween season has finally ended. That’s my term for the period after the trees have dropped all the leaves they’re voluntarily going to, and before a severe frost completes the transition to winter.

It’s a period of inversions. The clocks change and we’re disoriented for a few days. The weather changes, and some plants thrive. We treat them like pariahs because they deny our simple view that nature follows the same Newtonian rules as the Earth. Many are weeds with genes that make them immune to our most popular herbicides. The purple asters sneak back with innocent looking rosettes.

One doesn’t mind the pansies and snapdragons that keep blooming. It’s understood they prefer cool weather, and they stayed around all summer as bits of dormant green. But the golden spur columbine die in the summer, leaving large swathes of brown. Then, in the fall they recover and refill the bed they abandoned to weeds. Even today’s snow hasn’t destroyed their leaves.



It took a lot to end this Halloween. The cold front that blew through November 17 didn’t change things much, even though winds in Santa Fé were clocked at 55 mph and reached 45 mph in Los Alamos. Morning temperatures dropped to 23 the next day. My cottonwood’s leaves only turned color. Most clung to the branches.

Then they got teased with rain and warmer temperatures a week ago Monday. Nothing changed.

This past Saturday afternoon my workroom darkened, and I checked the weather maps. I had stopped bothering when the doldrums began. NOAA showed the remnants of a hurricane and a great arc of cold air sweeping from it up into New Mexico.

I wondered, how did I miss a hurricane. This one was named Otto, and the last one in late September had been Seymour. I looked at the time stamp on the display to make sure my computer’s browser didn’t have some embedded date in it.

Another inversion. Otto was an interloper that crossed from the Caribbean over Nicaragua and Costa Rica on Thanksgiving setting records for its lateness and strength.



Otto finally got Nature’s attention. A flock of migrating robins landed that afternoon in my yard. They seemed to have come for the privet berries, but left when they didn’t like them. I never get flocks of robins. At most, I see a couple closer to the river.

We’ve had some rain each day since Otto. Yesterday, I saw more flocks of birds finally heading south. They’d stopped to feed in the grasses in some adjacent orchards.

After dark last night, we got some snow, with a bit more this morning. The forecast low for Los Alamos tonight is 14. Lingering fall will die a sudden death, and claim it was all so unexpected. Why, only Sunday the morning temperature was above 37.



Notes: “Hurricane Otto Crosses From Caribbean to Pacific.” Weather.com, 26 November 2016.

Photographs: All taken 18 November 2016, the day after the big winds and first morning temperatures in the low 20s.

1. Alfilerillo completely disappeared in the summer, then comes back in the fall.

2. The cottonwood still holding half its leaves.

3. Lush, resurgent golden spur columbine.

4. Vinca, which has grown very little since it was planted in 2000. It multiplied this fall.

5. Purple aster rosettes.

Sunday, November 13, 2016

As the World Turns


Weather: Some rain last weekend, and cold temperatures Thursday morning. Last rain 11/6.

The weather forecasts are deceptive: nothing’s happening, or highs and lows are maneuvering each other to little consequence. The southern waters have cooled, so there’s little tropical moisture coming our way. The changes are coming from the Earth moving through its orbit; one of those things that can be demonstrated in any number of ways, but is hard to actually see.

What’s blooming: Hybrid roses, chocolate flowers, blanket flower, random plants close to the ground, usually sheltered by a wall, larger plant, or fallen leaves.

What’s nearly bare: Siberian pea, black locust, choke cherry, spirea.

Leaves have stopped turning color, and simply fall in batches.

What’s blooming inside: Zonal geraniums, moss roses, aptenia.

About the time the sun began to shine in my eyes in the morning, the plants on the inside porch began producing more flowers. I knew they bloomed in winter, but hadn’t realized before that it was because they were enjoying the light that was bothering me.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, small birds.

Tuesday afternoon I heard a noise about the house I couldn’t locate. I looked through the window on the enclosed porch before I entered, in case an animal had gotten in. I saw nothing when I looked through the window of the door, but still heard the noise. I knocked on the glass to make noise, and a large bird took off for the locust. It looked like a quail until it landed vertical, not horizontal, on a branch. It’s long beak declared it was a woodpecker with dark feathers spotted light.

Photograph: A tansy cluster has finally come into bloom, 12 November 16.

Tuesday, November 01, 2016

In Suspension

Weather: Temperatures staying about freezing with last rain 10/9.

What’s blooming: Hybrid roses, chocolate flowers, blanket flower.

What’s turning/turned red: Leaves on Bradford pear, pink evening primroses, lead plants, toothed spurge, Johnson’s Blue geranium.

What’s turning/turned yellow: Leaves on cottonwoods, apricots, globe willows.

What’s nearly bare: Purple leaf sand cherry, catalpa, Rose of Sharon, caryopteris, skunk bush.

What’s blooming inside: Zonal geraniums, moss roses, aptenia.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, small birds.

Weekly update: Time is standing still. Sun angles change daily, but with the warm, dry days, nature’s preparations for winter are proceeding in slow motion. Little changes from day to day. It’s death by inertia rather than by cold.

The days are ideal for working outside, but there’s little to do. Most of the people have cleared their fields and cut their hay. And, most with trees seem to be watching the leaves fall, but not doing anything yet to remove them. Only the most fastidious go out before all have fallen that are going to.

I have things I could do, but they’re all heavy labor - finishing the repairs on the irrigation channel, extending a path, pruning shrubs. They’ve all been postponed before, and can wait until my thumb is ready for abuse.

It’s possible to find plants blooming in protected areas, but little is visible from the car. Even the roses are hard to see. Chrysanthemums were all but invisible this year. My florist ones are putting out flowers with only half the petals.

Leaves on the skunkbush dropped without turning color, but a young seedling protected by the catalpa has bright red ones. I don’t know if it’s its youth or the seclusion that allowed the member of the sumac family to show its true coloring.

I suppose the birds are migrating, but I haven’t heard them. This morning when I was running a hose that’s sprung a small leak, a half dozen birds came from somewhere for the pooling water, then disappeared when it sank into the gravel.

Wednesday, October 26, 2016

Observations from the Sidelines

Weather: More nice weather with no water; last rain 10/9.

What’s blooming: Hybrid roses, chocolate flowers, blanket flower, chrysanthemums.

What’s turning/turned red: Leaves on pink evening primroses, lead plants, toothed spurge.

What’s turning/turned yellow: Leaves on cottonwoods are yellow, but those on lilacs are lime green and are brownish-yellow on tamarix.

What’s blooming inside: Zonal geraniums, moss roses, aptenia.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, small birds. Something, presumably the rabbit is eating the still green leaves on the gazanias and the oriental poppies.

Weekly update: Before I whacked by thumb, I was removing heath asters and cleaning grasses that had died under my globe willow. It was my last chance of the season, and now I can’t continue until next spring. Leaves then hadn’t started falling, but now the blankets are being laid.

Some trees and shrubs are bare: the young peaches, roses of Sharon, Siberian peas, and my neighbor’s ashes. Thick coats have accumulated under the catalpa, black locust, peach, and apricots.

There was a good reason to attack the Aster ericoides. As I mentioned in the post for 23 May 2010, their roots turn into woody masses. I found one that was lying right along the top of a tree root, so it was impossible to remove it without nicking what lay below. It was necessary, of course, because as long as it was there, no water would seep down. Most weren’t so bad, but the runners did have to be turfed out.

Flowers on the yellow Mary Stoker chrysanthemums have all died. I don’t know if this is because they are taller than the others still blooming two feet closer to the house, or if it’s the genetics. They are a rubellum hybrid, while the others are various forms of the cushion mum, morifolium. The florist mums in a much lower place are still hoping to get their flowers open before they’re cold killed. Every year there’s the same conundrum, will they make get to bloom, or will they be pinched at the last moment.

Thursday morning, after the temperature flirted with freezing, the garlic chives gave off a strong smell of onion.

I don’t know why the piñon nuts didn’t mature this year. If they’re anything like my late season raspberries, they stop developing when temperatures rise without additional water. In the past, my early season raspberries always produced, but the others always shriveled in July. My good Willamette canes didn’t survive the past winter, and I’ve been cutting down the Heritages as wasted effort, so I don’t know how they would have reacted to this odd summer.

Photographs: I can take pictures and download them, but sorting through them requires too many strokes of the space bar.

Wednesday, October 19, 2016

Hop o’ My Thumb

Weather: The sun came through the front window and into my eyes for the first time this season on Friday. Indian summer continues with no rain since 10/9.

What’s blooming: Hybrid roses, large leafed soapwort, winecup mallow, chocolate flowers, anthemis, blanket flower, French marigolds, Maximilian sunflowers, chrysanthemums. While few things are blooming, plants like golden-spur columbine which died back in the heat of summer have been putting out new growth.

What’s turning red: Leaves on woodsii roses, sand cherries, pink evening primroses, lead plants, toothed spurge.

What’s turning yellow: Leaves on cottonwoods, apricots, rugosa roses, Siberian peas, catalpas, grapes, ladybells.

What’s blooming inside: Zonal geraniums, moss roses, aptinia.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, goldfinches in the Maximilian sunflowers, geckoes, ants.

Weekly update: About three weeks ago I banged my right thumb with a heavy aluminum sauce pan in the kitchen. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but a week ago a realized it wasn’t getting any better.

Then, I decided to use it as a little as possible. Since I’ve learned a great deal about what our thumbs are for, and why they were an evolutionary advance. I seem to use it for anything that uses strength. More, it gets used every time I type a word. My left thumb simply refuses to tap the space bar.

Finally, I put on one of those glove-looking stabilizers. I figured, if nothing else, it would interfere enough to stop me abusing the digit. My typing has gotten much worse as my right index finger now takes over its duties on the keyboard.

I put off this week’s entry, thinking my typing would improve. It hasn’t. So, I’m providing minimal information until it does. After all, I also can’t work outside, much as I want to.

Wednesday, October 12, 2016

Harvest Unreaped


Weather: Some rain Sunday and Monday, but cold mornings continue to send signals of changes coming. Last rain, 10/9.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, Maximilian sunflowers, pampas grass.

Beyond the walls and fences: Leather leaf globe mallow, purple asters.

In my yard: Large leafed soapwort, calamintha, winecup mallow, chocolate flowers, anthemis, blanket flower, French marigolds, chrysanthemums.

Bedding plants: Wax begonias, sweet alyssum.

Inside: Zonal geraniums, moss roses.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, goldfinches in the Maximilian sunflowers, geckoes, ants.


Weekly update: This is just not a self-perpetuating fruit area, despite the many apricot and apple trees. Bees may have been imported to fertilize the flowers, but there are few animals to spread the seed by eating the fruit.

Even natives like junipers don’t always have their berries plucked.


But what’s a plant to do when its bounty dries on the vine or twig?


Apples shrug off their fruit to save themselves from carrying the extra weight into winter. I don’t know if apples behave like the watermelons described by William Weaver that nurture their seeds inside their moist wombs. In the past, when apples were pressed for cider, the unused debris was thrown away. Ian Merwin said, seedlings "sprouted naturally in pomace piles." Saplings certain seem to appear wherever they can begin undetected.


My neighbor’s Russian olive has a different strategy: it throws off the fruits with a few leaves to help them fly away a bit. One landed in my drive this past week. I’m not sure how all the others I cut down got here.


The buffalo gourd down the road uses gravity. It’s growing at the top of a road cut where it’s vine tumble down the bank. The fruit accumulates at the bottom. One must have rolled across the road, and on down the slight grade to lodge in the grass around a fence. On the other side is an active hay field, whose owner cannot be happy to have to worry about its fruit infesting his bales.


Notes:
Merwin, Ian A. "Apple Tree Rootstocks," Cornell University website, summer 1999.

Weaver, William. His observations on watermelon were discussed in the post for 30 August 2015.

Photographs:
1. Pyracantha berries are eaten in other parts of the country, but never here. Ones in town, 4 October 2016.

2. Privet berries are also neglected here; 5 October 2016.

3. Juniper berries in my yard, 5 October 2016.

4. Sand cherries drying on the twig in my yard, 5 October 2016.

5. Apples fallen in a nearby orchard, 4 October 2016.

6. Russian olives in my drive, 5 October 2016.

7. Young buffalo gourd vine hidden in the grass near a hay field, 4 October 2016.

Monday, October 03, 2016

Of Lemmings and Lummoxes


Weather: More clear skies than clouds, with bits of rain; last useful rain was 9/23.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, trumpet creeper, silver lace vine, datura, morning glories, Maximilian sunflowers, zinnia, pampas grass.

Beyond the walls and fences: Bindweed, leather leaf globe mallow, áñil del muerto, native sunflowers, golden hairy, heath and purple asters.

In my yard: Large leafed soapwort, calamintha, winecup mallow, Mexican hats, chocolate flowers, coreopsis, blanket flower, French marigolds, Sensation and yellow cosmos, chrysanthemums.

Bedding plants: Wax begonias, sweet alyssum, gazania.

Inside: Zonal geraniums, moss roses.
<
Animal sightings: Rabbit, small birds, geckoes, small bees, hornets, ants, grasshoppers.


Weekly update: It’s that time again, between the first cold morning and the first hard frost, when one ponders the ways leaves respond to their imminent demise.

Some trees are dependable. As soon as they detect cold, they send signals and their leaves turn yellow. One down the road with finely cut leaves is always the first to respond.


The fruit trees are rarely so dramatic. Leaves on my peach were turning yellow and dropping almost as soon as the branches shook off the last of their fruit. An apricot down the road is showing more stress. Some branches have turned yellow, and others are green. The light color backlights others on the southeast side that had died, but weren’t visible before.


Other plants just ignore the weather, following their own internal clocks. Leaves on corn that was planted early have turned brown and their stalks have been cut. But plants seeded later are still green, and the ones I planted very late are still producing new ears though the lummoxes will never ripen.


Way too many plants just never recovered from the heat of summer and like lemmings are continuing their slow walk to oblivion. My friends tell me his tomatoes still have done nothing. My melon plants only put out some more leaves and flowers, but never grew. The one person I think had squash just tore his out when he cut his corn. As near as I could tell, they finally did start to vine, but I never saw any squashes.


Catalpas never grew comfortable. The leaves were smaller than usual so bare branches showed through. At their best, they looked like newly shorn poodles. The leaves never became fully green, but always kept a hint of yellow. Now, at the first sign of fall, that green is retreating.


Bedding plants also continue to nurse their grievances. The French marigolds died about the time some reseeds came into bloom. The snapdragons have finally started to blossom, but only one flower at a time. The moss roses only recovered when I brought them inside.


But then they rarely have a chance to thrive. Growers always put too many seeds in a cell to make single threads look like full plants. They fight one another for water, and lebensraum for their roots.

Photographs: Most taken in the area on Saturday, 1 October 2016.

1. Heavenly Blue morning glories are another seed that simply didn’t grow this year. What morning glories are blooming are mixes from reseedings. I put some seeds in when I planted the corn in a shaded area, and, perhaps because it didn’t go through the harsh transition to July as a seedling, it has started to bloom.

2. Virginia creeper is one of the most predictable plants; it always turns maroon. This one is near the village.

3. The unknown trees with finely dissected leaves down the road.

4. An apricot with patches of yellow that reveal its dead branches.

5. My experimental corn plant.

6. My cantaloupe plant plants with leaves and recent flowers, and nothing more.

7. The prematurely yellowing catalpa.


8. Moss rose plants bought early in the season that finally are blooming indoors. The number of colors indicates how many seedling fought with one another. 3 October 2016.

9. I bought some single plants a few weeks ago, mainly because I was checking out with one brick, and needed something more to make a credit card charge They cost much more per plant, and it remains to be seen if they truly are what they claim. At least they are blooming in clusters, not single strands. 3 October 2016.

Tuesday, September 27, 2016

Trees without Walls


Weather: The first really cold morning, last Saturday. Some rain fell Thursday and Friday, but most stayed west of the Rockies. Last rain was 9/23.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, buddleia, trumpet creeper, silver lace vine, datura, morning glories, Maximilian sunflowers, zinnia, pampas grass.

Beyond the walls and fences: Yellow evening primroses, bindweed, leather leaf globe mallow, broom snakeweed, áñil del muerto, native sunflowers, golden hairy, heath and purple asters.

In my yard: Large leafed soapwort, calamintha, winecup mallow, Mexican hats, chocolate flowers, coreopsis, blanket flower, French marigolds, Sensation and yellow cosmos, chrysanthemums.

Bedding plants: Wax begonias, sweet alyssum, gazania.

Inside: Zonal geraniums, moss roses.

Animal sightings: Small birds, geckoes, small bees, hornets, ants, grasshoppers.


Weekly update: There is no such thing as an environmentally friendly building, or an ecologically neutral footprint. No matter the materials, the design, or the intentions of the owners, walls introduce change.

If a wall faces south it absorbs heat from the sun, then reflects it back in the evening to protect areas from the worst winter temperatures. On its other side, it casts a shadow where snow doesn’t melt and the ground stays colder longer in the spring.

Depending on its orientation, a wall deflects the wind, which in turn diverts the rain. One side has wind erosion, the other side drought. If a wall is freestanding with a broad top, or if it’s part of a building with a roof, its overhangs create drip lines.

Plants exploit these microclimates.

Down the road from me, a man had an apple tree outside his trailer. I don’t know that he had ever did much for it, but it flourished.


I don’t know what happened to him, but one day in 2013 I saw a couple men dismantling his added entry porch. A few days later the trailer was gone, and the ground scraped bare.

However, the men saw the apple tree, and had that superstitious regard men have here for fruit trees, and carefully worked around it.


The tree survived, but it had lost its passive water source. Drips from the roofs of the trailer and the porch had kept it alive. It barely made it through this past winter. There were leaves on only one side this spring.

Then came July, that month when afternoon temperatures were in the 90s, not their usual 80s, and humidities fell below 10%. The tree is now barren in a field of Russian thistles that returned.


A catalpa on the road to Chama experienced the same bereavement. A roofed area stood near the road. I assume it once had been a produce stand, because no one stores anything of value like hay or heavy equipment that close to a highway. I suspect the owners had retired or died, and the trees survived on water from the roof.


In December of 2014 I drove by after a dozer had leveled the house, and was clearing the grounds. A few days later the owners installed a pipe rail fence near the road to replace the barrier created by the stand and scrub vegetation.


The catalpa and another tree managed to survive. The drive on one side has been paved, and asphalt, or whatever it is that’s used these days, doesn’t absorb as much water as gravel. The surplus rolls to the side and creates it’s own drip line at the edge. The roots must have spread into the spillway, though the branches showed no indication of the underground patterns.

This summer was brutal, but one side of the catalpa has leaves. More important, those leaves are green. They didn’t bleach out from the iron in the soil become too dry to feed the roots.


Some Siberian elms have just suffered a similar set back. A trailer burned on one of the busier two-lane streets in town in 2014, and for some reason it wasn’t cleared.


At some point, the owners put up some yellow tape to keep people out, but that was the only warning the remains were probably unstable. With no owner to keep them cut, a row of elms sprouted in the drip line.

Finally, this past March the trailer was cleared but not the grounds. I wonder how long those elms will survive, because even an elm will eventually die if you can manage to withhold the water long enough.


Photographs:
1. A house in the village, 29 September 2007, when morning glories covered the front wall and a pink rose bloomed by the entrance.

2. Same house this week, 23 September 2016. The person living there, who may not have been the same one who was there in 2007, let things go wild and erected coyote-style privacy barriers. A couple weeks ago, whoever owned the house had scraped the land clear, removed every sign of vegetation, including iris which usually are left alone. The rose may be huddled against the porch.

3. The Apple Trailer down the road, 19 April 2012.

4. Apple tree after the trailer was removed, 24 August 2013.

5. Apple tree this past week, after a brutal summer, 25 September 2016.

6. Produce stand, 12 September 2014. There’s a tree at the back left corner that’s surviving on water from the roof.

7. Produce stand, 7 December 2014, after the produce stand was razed.

8. Catalpa growing where the edge of produce stand had dropped water, 23 September 2016.

9. Burned out trailer in town, 9 December 2014. Whatever trees had grown in front had been singed by the fire.

10. Trailer space this past week, 23 September 2016, after the trailer was removed. A row of bright colored elms grow at a fairly uniform height where water had fallen from the charred frame.

Sunday, September 18, 2016

Learning from Failure


Weather: Some rain before dawn Saturday, but mostly sunny days with futile wind gusts and thunder in the afternoons.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, buddleia, Russian sage, trumpet creeper, silver lace vine, bouncing Bess, sweet peas, datura, morning glories, Sensation cosmos, zinnia, pampas grass.

Beyond the walls and fences: Yellow evening primroses, bindweed, scarlet creeper, green leaf five eyes, goat’s heads, alfalfa, leather leaf globe mallow, broom snakeweed, Tahoka daisies, áñil del muerto, native sunflowers, golden hairy and purple asters.

In my yard: large leafed soapwort, calamintha, hollyhocks, winecup mallow, pink evening primrose, lead plant, Mönch asters, Mexican hats, Maximilian sunflowers, chocolate flowers, coreopsis, blanket flower, French marigolds, yellow cosmos, chrysanthemum.

Bedding plants: Wax begonias, sweet alyssum, gazania.

Inside: Zonal geraniums. Brought the moss roses inside to see if they could survive.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, small birds, geckoes, small bees, hornets, ants, grasshoppers.


Weekly update: Gardeners face two kinds of failures. In one case, one should learn after so many attempts that the plants sold by a particular garden center will not survive. There comes a time, when one realizes its not one’s own fault, there really is something wrong. Of course, there are those who take the opposite view, and assume it is always the shop’s fault. We ultimately come to the same conclusion, but they run out of suppliers sooner.

The second type of the failures are the ones we ignore, for if we didn’t, we’d give up completely.

I have a bed I call the island, though it’s actually a peninsula surrounded on three sides by the runoff ditch. Most things I planted there didn’t grow, so when the pinks and snow-in-summer survived several seasons, I thought, "aha - an alpine bed."

Of course that’s not what it was. But those members of the carnation family exist somewhere on that elevation schematic that shows alpines blooming at the top and the dandelions dominating the bottom.

I thought some more, and said "aha - a scree bed." All they need is a little more water and some glacial till to trap it. I duly bought some small-sized shale gravel and covered the surface, then put a weeping hose on top.

Did they thrive?


They didn’t get a chance. The golden spur columbine, garlic chives, vinca, and winecup mallow all invaded, dropping themselves along the hose. The stones make it all but impossible to dig them out.

I learned one of the secrets of post-glacial succession. Those plants that live higher on the side of that mythical mountain side are the ones that have been driven there. They can’t compete with more vigorous species, and only survive at an altitude or temperature where they alone can breathe.

As I weed to protect them anyway, I look out over the yard where I tried to preserve the native grassland vegetation and see scrub advancing everywhere. One cause is my buildings which redirected the flow of water, and other reasons include the actions of neighbors who redirected water or scraped their land bare to create seed beds of disturbed soil.


There’s no point in cursing them - too much. They’re only aggravators who are accelerating changes that are happening anyway.

When I moved here the front yard was some winterfat and lots of ring muhly grass. Some dry summers, and the grass died. The winds stripped the bare surface, and dropped seeds that sometimes germinated. A few years ago it was Russian thistles.

This year in the heat of July the erosion accelerated and broom snakeweed nestled amongst the expanding copses of gray shrubs.


I don’t like it, but I know if I went out to pull them I’d leave loose soil where seeds would drop as I removed the plants. The mere act of helping would be destructive.

It wouldn’t matter what any gardener did. The dynamics of ecological competition will triumph. In the face of that massive indifference by the universe, I weed and cut the small scree bed several times a summer, and observe the rest.


Photographs:
1. Broom Snakeweed, Gutierrezia sarothrae, blooming with the winterfat, Krascheninnikovia lanata. 18 September 2016.

2. Island after it has been weeded. The gray leaves are snow-in-summer, Cerastium tomentosum. The gray-green leaves are Bath Pink, a Dianthus cultivar. There are also some coral bells and a taller chrysanthemum. 15 August 2015.

3. Blooming snow-in-summer with golden spur columbine invading in front. Garlic chives have hidden the pinks in back. 28 June 2016.

4. Snakeweed and winterfat along the property line, where the snakeweed continues into the dirt road. 18 September 2016.


5. Barren soil that’s created an erosion bath between the shrubs. 18 September 2016.

6. Garlic chives resprouted within a week of being removed from the shale gravel. 18 September 2016.

7. Blooming pinks invaded by vinca from the left and garlic chives from the year. 15 May 2016.

Tuesday, September 13, 2016

Walls and Birds


Weather: Last real rain was 8/27. Several times we had confrontations of hot and cold air that result in winds, clouds, and thunder. However, there wasn’t enough water in the atmosphere to get more that some splashes.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, buddleia, Russian sage, trumpet creeper, silver lace vine, bouncing Bess, sweet peas, datura, morning glories, Sensation cosmos, zinnia, pampas grass.

Beyond the walls and fences: Yellow evening primroses, bindweed, scarlet creeper, green leaf five eyes, goat’s heads, alfalfa, leather leaf globe mallow, broom snakeweed, gum weed, golden hairy and purple asters. Tahoka daisies are everywhere along the roadsides, áñil del muerto and native sunflowers are flourishing in favored places.

In my yard: Garlic chives, large leafed soapwort, larkspur, catmints, calamintha, hollyhocks, winecup mallow, pink evening primrose, lead plant, Mönch asters, cutleaf coneflower, Mexican hats, Maximilian sunflowers, chocolate flowers, coreopsis, blanket flower, white yarrow, French marigolds, yellow cosmos, chrysanthemum.

Bedding plants: Wax begonias, sweet alyssum, moss rose, gazania.

Inside: Zonal geraniums.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, small birds, geckoes, small bees, hornets, ants, grasshoppers.


Weekly update: Whenever I hear someone trumpeting the merits of gated communities, I think of Poe’s "The Masque of the Red Death." I wonder, how safe is George Zimmerman from mosquitoes? The homeowner’s association for The Retreat at Twin Lakes may spray the grounds, but how high are those walls?

I’ve put up fences for all the usual reasons, and learned their limitations. I began with wide-mesh farm fence. The intent was to define a boundary so people would no longer consider my yard public land. So far as I know, it has kept out intruders. They simply park their cars as near to the fence as they can, and walk past the "no trespassing" signs to enter pueblo land.

Dogs are another matter. The ones who lived on the west would saunter along the fence to the gate, then walk through the rails. They knew what the fence was for, but that didn’t stop them.


Then, my neighbor on the north thought fresh eggs would be nice. Her chickens and turkey came through the mesh. They weren’t as smart as dogs. They couldn’t remember how to get out. They had to be directed.

So, I reinforced the northern fence and gate with vertical boards. That stopped the domestic animals, but rabbits and ground squirrels go under. I’ve watched cats go both under and over. Birds don’t even notice the barrier.

This past week I found three thriving Virginia creeper vines that had started from dropped pits. I also cut or otherwise tried to kill unwanted Russia olive trees.


Some insects are even worse. The ant queens join the mosquitoes, hornets and locust borers who fly over six-foot-high boards.

One unanticipated benefit of the fence was it stopped some weeds from invading from the north. That is, until we had a very dry year with stronger winds that usual. Then, the Russian thistles flew high enough to lodge above my head in the black locust.

People here have one problem that can’t be solved by walls. They use flood irrigation. By the time they get the water, it has traveled thirty miles through weedy banks. They can’t install filters without blocking the flow of water. I saw one lawn owner out this week standing in water with a rake. I’ve seen another in waders with a fish net trying to capture debris before it sank with the water. Their weed-and-feed chemicals can’t stop everything.


I’ve often wondered why anyone would plant anything as water-hungry as bamboo, or whatever that is in a ditch outside their wall. Then I realized, they probably didn’t. But someone, somewhere did.

As Donne might have said, no may can create an island.

Notes:
Donne, John. "Meditation XVII." Devotions upon Emergent Occasions. 1624

Poe, Edgar Allan. "The Masque of the Red Death." 1842.


Photographs:
1, 2 and 5. Tall plant growing in a ditch in the village, 8 September 2016. I doubt they planted it, and several times a year someone cuts it to the ground.

3. Buffalo gourd down the road, 8 September 2016. I don’t know if these people planted this or not. They cut it down in the fall. Right now Tahoka daisies and pigweed are with it.

4. Virginia creeper that I didn’t notice until it poked through the porch floor, 4 September 2016. The nearest plants are about a quarter mile away.

6. My neighbor’s Russian olive leaning over my fence, 8 September 2016. Every year he cuts it down, but so far hasn’t found a way to kill it. There are some along the near arroyo with is less than a quarter mile away.

Monday, September 05, 2016

Show Places


Weather: Clouds have occasionally dropped a little water, but the last real rain was 8/27.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, buddleia, Russian sage, trumpet creeper, silver lace vine, rose of Sharon, bouncing Bess, sweet peas, datura, morning glories, Sensation cosmos, zinnia, pampas grass; red on Virginia creeper stems.

Buddleia and silver lace vine flowers are more noticeable. Both have tiny florets that only show in masses from a distance. Apparently the water and cooler temperatures encouraged the individual florets to grow larger.

Produce stands back are back along the roads. They disappeared in mid-July. A friend tells me tomatoes have produced leaves but been slow to set fruit this year. In my yard, the tomatillos have grown into long, dense vines, but fortunately few that I’ve broken off had pods.

Beyond the walls and fences: Scarlet bee blossom, yellow evening primroses, velvet weed, bindweed, green leaf five eyes, yellow purslane, goat’s heads, alfalfa, Queen Anne’s lace, leather leaf globe mallow, broom snakeweed, horseweed, goldenrod, native sunflower, áñil del muerto, Tahoka daisies, gum weed, golden and purple hairy asters.

Brome snakeweed is taking over the dry areas this year instead of Russian thistles.

In my yard: Garlic chives, large leafed soapwort, larkspur, catmints, calamintha, hollyhocks, winecup mallow, pink evening primrose, Mönch asters, cutleaf coneflower, Mexican hats, Maximilian sunflowers, chocolate flowers, coreopsis, blanket flower, white yarrow.

Bedding plants: Wax begonias, snapdragons, sweet alyssum, gazania.

Bedding plant French marigolds are dying out, and been replaced by much stronger reseeds.

Inside: Zonal geraniums.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, small birds, geckoes, bumble and small bees, hornets, ants, grasshoppers.


Weekly update: A friend asked me this week if my yard was a show place. I said no, it always had weeds running loose.

I’ve since thought more about what characterizes the places in the area that would qualify for that label. Most have flood irrigation, and with it real lawns. One can snipe all ones likes about ecologically wasteful expanses of green, but they do keep down weeds. The dense roots of turfing grasses don’t provide harbors for most seeds. Dandelions, of course, are an exception. But, once you commit to a lawn, you don’t quibble at a few chemicals to maintain it.

Most of the nicer yards also have paved driveways. Weeds only colonize them when cracks appear. Weedeaters and lawn mowers can control whatever emerges in the run-off zone at their edges.

I suspect a great many also hire yard men, though I’ve seen people with lawns doing their own mowing and fertilizing. I don’t know who does the deadheading, but it has to be the owners unless they have daily or weekly gardeners.

What these wealthier gardeners buy isn’t labor. It’s time and energy. After all none of the work mentioned is arduous. But, unless you have money, you either spend hours a day maintaining a yard or you make choices.

In my drive, the car keeps its path clear by compressing the ground and running down things, but I still have to keep the crown clear of tall, woody stems. That’s a priority, but is it necessary to keep the edges clear as well?


Not all weeds are created equal. There are ones that must go like pigweed and goat’s heads, and then there are ones I’d rather not have like wild lettuce and horseweed. Only the one merits going out in the sun and stretching my hamstrings. The other isn’t worth the sore hand and leg muscles.

Then there are ones that are acceptable, so long as they keep their places and don’t attack. Tahoka daisies, sunflowers and áñil del muerto are not allowed in areas I water, but it’s not worth the effort to keep they away from the drive way edge.


After weeks of rain, everything needs attention at once. More decisions. Is it more important to keep the drainage ways clear or to fertilize? The question answers itself. I spent this week banging my knuckles on bricks that lined ditches, only incidentally tending the more desirable plants.

The friend who asked actually has a show place. But then he runs his business out of his home, and it has to be at least presentable. He’s in Santa Fé where lawns and water use are discouraged. The former owner installed black plastic and gravel to avoid maintenance. My friend hired people to break through the barriers in selected places and hauled in good dirt.

The display area is limited to the front between the concrete drives and the sidewalk, much like an expensive facing is confined to the first story on the front wall façade of a brick town house. It frames the entrance and defines boundaries that limit the width the eye associates with the building. Lawns and fences establish the same limits here. It doesn’t matter that the areas beyond have been degraded. All one sees are islands of beauty.


Without clean frames, one notices the weeds.

While I’ve known him, my friend has extended his attention to the side patches between the concrete drives. They were left to dirt and weeds, and he’s slowing reclaiming them. The back, he says, is unmentionable. There is only so much time.

When time is rationed, it’s the enemies that get attention and friends that get neglected.

Photographs: All taken, 3 September 2016.

1-2. Goldenrod. I had always wanted goldenrod, but it would never grow for me. Then, when I learned it was the preferred food for the locust borers that attack my tree every year, some came up. I thought about ripping them out, but remembered nothing I’d don’t to stop the insects from perpetuating themselves had worked. I thought why not let it grow? Things can’t get worse. The insect on the left is a hornet. I don’t know what the one on the right is, but it doesn’t look the photographs of borers.

3. Driveway with an áñil del muerto near the garage and some Tahoka daisies. The rest of the plants lining the drive path are horseweeds I’d rather weren’t there. But, it’s not worth the effort to remove them or the plants I’ve poisoned in the crown. That’s a task for winter, after they’ve done everything they can to perpetuate my problems. The drive is show place only in January.

4. Tahoka daisies have colonized the drive edge. You can just see the bricks edging the line were hoses carry water to the trees. They got unsightly during the summer heat, but revived with the rain.

5. So far I’ve only cleaned a few feet of the ditch that carries away water that empties from a down spout. I installed the side bricks when I established the garden. It was only after the winecup mallows took over the water course, that I put down the pavers. Of course they don’t fill the spaces the way they would in a show place.


6. I don’t let native sunflowers into my beds, but tolerate them along the drive. This one has chosen to spread outward rather than up. The only priority this week was clearing the space in front on an entrance that lies between it and some golden hairy asters. The low grasses in the crown and the dead stem will stay until I think to bend down sometime when I’m walking by.