Cheat Grass

Weather: We got rain on Monday and Tuesday morning, but temperatures stayed above freezing: indeed, they rose slightly in the night when it was raining. But since, morning temperatures have fallen to 32 or below for a short time between 5:15 am and 6:15 am.

The shrubs I transplanted that didn’t like the heat may be happier, but bedding plants aren’t ready for severe cold. So far they’ve all survived, but the wax begonias look a bit shrunken. I’m not sure how the warm soil seeds are doing that I planted last weekend, but the ones that like cold stratification may germinate.

Winds continue to develop in late morning as soon as temperatures begin to rise: the warmer the day, the sooner they form. The soil surface is dry a few hours after I water. I suspect the clouds I’ve seen are Monday’s rain being leached back into the atmosphere.

Last useful rain: 5/21. Week’s low: 30 degrees F. Week’s high: 82 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming in the area: Dr. Huey rootstock, Austrian Copper, Persian yellow, wild pink, and hybrid roses, spirea peaked, yellow potentilla, pyracantha, snowball, silver lace vine, broad leaf yucca, Dutch iris, peonies, blue flax, snow-in-summer, Jupiter’s beard, golden spur columbine, purple salvia

What’s blooming beyond the walls and fences: Apache plume, tamarix, sand willow, narrow leaf yucca, white tufted evening primrose, alfilerillo, tumble mustard, bindweed, green leaf five eyes, fern leaf globe mallow, fleabane, plains paper flowers, strap leaf aster, goat’s beard, native and common dandelions; June, needle, feather, rice, three awn, brome, and cheat grasses

What’s blooming in my yard: Wood and rugosa roses, cliff rose, beauty bush, skunk bush, chives, baptisia, Bath pinks, vinca, coral bells, pink evening primrose; pansies that wintered over

Bedding Plants: Wax begonia, nicotiana, sweet alyssum

What’s reviving/coming up: Datura, toothed spurge, goat’s heads

Tasks: Several men cut their hay. Onions are up in one market garden field.

Animal sightings: Chickadees, gecko, cabbage and monarch butterflies, heard crickets, harvester and small ants, earthworms

Weekly update: Grasses are flourishing this year: with the increased rain the stems have gotten taller and seed heads fuller. That’s all well and good on the prairie where the needle grass shimmers in the sun, but the Gramineae are less welcome in the garden.

Smooth brome grass has been a bane ever since some seeds blew in from some farmer’s hay field. Bromus inermis roots are tied to runners an inch or more below ground, that break when the tops are jerked too strongly. I’ve been using a spade to get under them.

It’s cheat grass cousin isn’t as hard to remove: Bromus tectorum roots are shallow stars that usually can be removed by inserting a chisel under them. The problem is the seeds drop and replant themselves in the disturbed soil even as I’m removing them.

Last summer I tried again to level the main flower bed by adding soil from elsewhere. Naturally, it had been broken up before I used it, so was fine grained. If it didn’t come with seeds, it collected them from the wind.

Cheat grass invaded every place I put down soil. It didn’t just settle in the open spaces between the daylilies I’d planted, but it cousined up to them, and rose between the leaves of the Hemerocallis. Sometimes all I can do is break off the stems and leave the roots, which is OK since it is an annual.

Brome grass is a perennial, and its seeds too were stopped by the daylily leaves. One can’t dig them out without disturbing the perennial. Sometimes the chisel will get between them and the desirable plant and remove some of the root. The runners, however, sometimes go under the existing plants to come up on the other side.

I have no hopes of removing the main brome grass patch that developed on the edge of the drive. All I can do is cut the flowering stems, and chop it down like the local farmers when it gets too high. If I managed to dig it out, I would disturb the soil so much cheat and other grasses would come back with vengeance.

Notes on photographs: Taken 23 May 2019.
1. Cheat grass (Bromus tectorum).
2. Needle grass (Stipa comata).
3. June grass (Koeleria cristata).

Potting Soil

Weather: We must be in a cycle where the heat and winds are drawing up the water from last week’s rain, becoming clouds in the night that hold in the heat that in turn creates the next day’s winds as the lowering sun interacts with the heat.

First tropical disturbance of the week in the Pacific on Thursday.

Last useful rain: 5/12. Week’s low: 34 degrees F. Week’s high: 86 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming in the area: Dr. Huey rootstock, Austrian Copper, Persian yellow and wild pink roses, spirea peaked, yellow potentilla, snowball, silver lace vine, broad leaf yucca, Dutch iris, peonies, blue flax, snow-in-summer, Jupiter’s beard, golden spur columbine, purple salvia

What’s blooming beyond the walls and fences: Apache plume, tamarix, sand willow, white tufted evening primrose, alfilerillo, tumble mustard, bindweed, green leaf five eyes, fern leaf globe mallow, fleabane, plains paper flowers, goat’s beard, native and common dandelions; June, needle, feather, rice, three awn, brome, and cheat grasses

What’s blooming in my yard: Wood and rugosa roses, beauty bush, skunk bush, daffodils, lilies of the valley, chives, golden spur columbine, Bath pinks, vinca, coral bells, pink evening primrose; pansy that wintered over

Bedding Plants: Wax begonia, nicotiana

What’s reviving/coming up: Perennial four o’clock, lamb’s quarter, last year’s African marigold seeds

Tasks: Something bright green is up in two market gardens; it might be lettuce that was planted in a horizontal band crossways to the irrigation furrows.

One man got his first alfalfa cut.

County road crew cut weeds on Thursday along the shoulder; mainly tumble mustard and goat’s beards were affected.

Animal sightings: Neighbor’s cat, chickadees, hummingbird, cabbage and sulfur butterflies, bumble bee on pink evening primrose, hornets, dragonfly, ladybugs on goat’s beards, baby grasshoppers on dandelion flowers, heard crickets, small ants, earthworms

The ground squirrel is back. On Monday I found a dead hollyhock in an area it has tunneled in the past. On Tuesday the hose near a cholla was destroyed. It is bent on killing that cactus. It already has killed the other native one. My neighbors’ dogs and cat are not earning their keep.

I planted seeds near the cottonwood. A couple hours later I saw birds flying up from the general area. I laid some of the mesh fencing over the bed, but it probably was too late to prevent depredations.

Weekly update: We live on two calendars: nature’s and man’s. In the church, the one was borrowed from pagans. The other, the cycle of Christ’s birth and death with the various saint’s days was synchronized with the agrarian one at important points.

In a garden, one’s annual work patterns also follow two calendars. A week ago, when it was raining, I transplanted. Then, when afternoon temperatures grew warm this week I planted seeds.

The manmade cycle comes from the industries that support domestic landscaping. In the early spring, when I need to prepare hoses for the summer, I complain about poor quality control and cost accountants who find ways to cheapen products that work until they fail.

This past week I have been having my annual problems with potting soil. "Soil" is a courtesy title, or perhaps like so many other things, has been so redefined it has lost its earlier meaning. I heard a commercial on radio telling listeners dirt is what you get under your nails while soil is that plants grow in. It then went on to list its products that eliminated the need to improve dirt.

The artificial media used for annual plants is worthless. It only needs to function for a few months, and it’s highly desirable that it weight as little as possible to lower transportation costs.

Its worst characteristic is that it remains alien in the soil. That means water does not seep from the dirt to it. If you don’t target the water for the root ball, it does not absorb water a centimeter away. Each year when I’m removing last year’s dead plants, the potting soil comes with them. Even when there’s no sign of the plant, the clod is obvious and comes out nearly in its entirety.

The industry has an answer. Build a raised bed; it will provide the materials. Fill it with potting soil like that used by the nursery industry; it will provide it by the bag full. Then, to keep it wet all day, it will provide a drip irrigation system with timers.

The alternative is to remove as much of the artificial substance as possible. The trick is doing it when it is so dry it flakes away, but not so dry it forms a solid mass. If the potting soil has any water, the roots break when you try to isolate them. Then, when you plant them, they need a long time to adjust.

If the weather remains cool, that will work. Unfortunately, temperatures went into the 80s this past week. Then the young plants go out of bloom as they struggle, and, if history is a guide, never become strong enough to produce more flowers.

The stuff nurseries use with shrubs is a little better, if for no other reason than it has to support life for more than a few months.

It usually is easy to remove the medium from the bottom roots, which are stronger than those of annuals. However, an impenetrable shield forms at the top that will not break away. One has to dig the hose nozzle through the plate to get water down through the roots.

When the temperatures soar as they did this past week, the shrubs die back and may take several years to recover.

Notes on photographs: All taken 18 May 2019.
1. The flowering crab apple started to produce fruit this week.

2. Pink evening primroses (Oenothera speciosa) have moved out of their bed into a path where they invade the grasses I’ve worked so long to nurture.

3. The fern leaf globe mallows (Sphaeralce digitata) are producing much taller bloom stems this year.

Fruit Formation

Weather: After another too hot Monday, rains started on Tuesday and continued through Saturday night.

Last useful rain: 5/11. Week’s low: 37 degrees F. Week’s high: 83 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming in the area: Austrian Copper and Persian yellow roses, spirea, snowball, broad leaf yucca, Dutch iris, blue flax, snow-in-summer, purple salvia

What’s blooming beyond the walls and fences: Apache plume, white tufted evening primrose, alfilerillo, tumble mustard, hoary cress, bindweed, green leaf five eyes, western stickseed, fern leaf globe mallow, fleabane, goat’s beard, native and common dandelions; June, needle, rice, three awn, brome, and cheat grasses

What’s blooming in my yard: Wood rose, skunk bush, tulips, daffodils, lilies of the valley, grape hyacinths peaked, chives, Bath pinks, vinca, coral bells, pink evening primrose; pansy that wintered over; globe willow dropping catkins that have tiny white flowers.

Bedding Plants: Sweet alyssum, wax begonia, nicotiana

What’s reviving/coming up: Desert willow, trees of heaven, roses of Sharon, buffalo gourd, showy milkweed

Tasks: Men have been working in the market gardens.

I took advantage of the rainy, cool weather to plant some shrubs, oriental poppies, bedding plants, and seeds that like cold weather. Because such weather is so rare, I worked much longer than usual. When I finished, I changed into warm, dry clothes, and thought about men like George Washington and William Henry Harrison who were supposed to have died after they got chilled. Since I assume they had warm, dry clothes or blankets, I presume the problem for them was the lack of enough heat from fireplaces to warm the air in their houses. Only snobs sniff at having a furnace that ignites automatically, a supplemental electric space heater, and an electric blanket.

Animal sightings: Neighbor’s cat, chickadees, hummingbird, cabbage butterflies, small ants, earthworms

Weekly update: The mechanics of fruit production are one of those things I’ve known from books, but never seen in operation. Frosts kill the blossoms nearly every year. When fruit did form, it was high or in protected areas where I never saw the fruit until it was ripening.

This year the cold only affected the apricots. Other members of the rose family were beginning their fruit formation this week.

When the petals dry, they leave the ovaries and attached styles.

The ovaries begin to swell within their protective coverings.

Soon, the ovary takes on the form of the final fruit. The protective covering falls away.

The last thing to disappear is the style that had acted as the tube that guided the pollen into the ovary.

Over the next few weeks, the fruits will expand in size, and the peaches will become round. As they get larger, they also will become heavier, and limbs will begin to bend. Then, even before they are ripe, I may have to remove unripe fruit, especially from the peach, to protect the trees from the consequences of their fertility.

Notes on photographs: All taken in my yard on 11 May 2019.
1. One-seeded juniper (Juniperus monosperma).
2. Siberia pea pod (Caragana arborescens) with remains of its style.
3. Sweet cherry (Prunus avium) with remains of flowers
4. Crab apple ovary (Malus sylvestris) expanding in its protective covering.
5. Sour cherry (Prunus cerasus) emerging from its protective covering.
6. Peaches (Prunus persica) with and without the remains of their styles.

End notes: The female part of the flower is the pistil. It is composed of the ovary at the base, the stigma at the tip, and the style that connects the two.

Terracing

Weather: The rain late Monday afternoon was like a gully washer, though those usually come when the ground is dry in late summer. High winds, a little hail. The main thrust last half an hour, then it throughout the night and int the early morning hours on Tuesday.

With the early end of apple flowers, we’ve gone from early to late spring.

Last useful rain: 4/30. Week’s low: 32 degrees F. Week’s high: 82 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming in the area: Flowering quince, spirea, lilacs, Dutch iris, blue flax, donkey spurge, lavender moss phlox

What’s blooming beyond the walls and fences: White tufted evening primrose, alfilerillo, tansy and tumble mustards, hoary cress, bindweed, western stickseed, leather leaf globe mallow, fleabane, goat’s beard, native and common dandelions; June, needle, three awn, and cheat grasses

What’s blooming in my yard: Choke cherries peaked, skunk bush, snowball, tulips, daffodils, lilies of the valley, grape hyacinths, vinca, coral bells, pink evening primrose; pansy that wintered over

Bedding Plants: snapdragons

What’s reviving/coming up: Catalpa, caryopteris, Russian sage, buddleia, tomatillo, ostrich fern, black grama grass

Tasks: I’ve been cleaning under trees that were left wild because I couldn’t under the low branches that I had cut this winter.

When I removed cheat grass, I uncovered dandelions and leather leaf globe mallows. When those were removed, one area was thick with golden-spur columbine seedlings.

Animal sightings: Neighbor’s cat, chickadees, house finches, hummingbird, quail, small bees, cabbage butterflies, ladybug, small ants, earthworms

Weekly update: Gardening on a hillside remains a challenge. The slightest incline causes water to run away, taking with it any seeds or nutrients that have been added.

This year I’ve been adding backstops in some beds. They resemble what some called waffle beds when I done: series of small, walled squares. Native Americans created them in the southwest to create small reservoirs in the arid land.

Monday’s rain was an opportunity to see how well they worked. Most were flooded at the end of the torrent, but had drained within half an hour. As near as I could tell, the soil remained relatively level.

Notes on photographs:
1-2. Choke cherries (Prunus virginiana melanocarpa) have had a good year. Each of these flowers will turn into a small fruit that will disappear before I ever see them. 2 May 2019.

3. Retrofitted terraced bed with hostas and daylilies, 30 April 2019.

Pruned Hedges

Weather: This was the first week that temperatures did not go below freezing. We had a good rain on Tuesday with brief showers on Friday and Saturday that watered in fertilizer. The snowy winter may have killed a buddleia, but the spring bulbs and rhizomes are flourishing. The continued moisture may be setting up summer-blooming plants for hard times when it gets hot and dry.

Last useful rain: 4/23. Week’s low: 34 degrees F. Week’s high: 80 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming in the area: Apples peaked, purple leaf sandcherries, flowering quince, forsythia peaked, lilacs, redbuds, Dutch iris, tulips, daffodils, donkey spurge, lavender moss phlox

What’s blooming beyond the walls and fences: Alfilerillo, tansy and purple mustards, hoary cress, western stickseed, oxalis, fleabane, native and common dandelions, June and cheat grasses; elm seeds in the air

What’s blooming in my yard: Sour and weeping cherries, sandcherries, choke cherries, fruiting crab apples, grape hyacinths, vinca; pansy that wintered over

What’s reviving/coming up: Cottonwoods, Russian olives, black locust, grape vines, Virginia creeper

Tasks: Spent my time digging out brome and cheat grass that were invading the mums and daylilies. I planted coreopsis and blanket flower seeds in openings, and fertilized the mums. It may not be the right time, but it’s the convenient time.

Animal sightings: Chickadees, cabbage butterflies, small ants. The small bees prefer the Siberian peas and lilacs to the crab apples and sour cherry. The neighbor’s cat is back. An earthworm was sluggish when it was uncovered.

The quail landed on my back porch rafters again. When I chased it off, it flew under the porch roof of my neighbor. I suspect it’s hiding from the black hawks that have been soaring overhead.

Weekly update: Neatly pruned hedges always mystify me. I wonder why anyone would bother to plant something that flowers, only to chopped the branches so it never blooms. If someone wants to go to the trouble of maintaining a clipped hedge, there are evergreens that are ideal, and they don’t even drop their leaves in the fall.

The shrubs that get this treatment are the ones that tend to have lots of dead wood that needs trimming out: spirea, forsythia, roses of Sharon. Apparently some garden advisor sometime in the past thought, since you have to do the work anyway, why not make the effort pay with something visible.

The spirea takes it, though it looks like it has mange when it blooms. One person keeps a row of roses of Sharon cut down to low squares. The lavender flowers looked pasted on in summer. The forsythia does not do well when it gets cut arbitrarily. Some years it can take it, and others it can’t.

Privet not only does ok, but volunteers to be a green hedge. Mine have begun to send out suckers along the wettest land, which means in a line. I don’t prune mine, so they fill in and bloom in late spring. As I mentioned in the post for 21 November 2010, my aesthetic reasons developed when I had a neighbor in Michigan with a privet that grew so large it resembled a tree.

Lilacs are another shrub that sends out suckers that form copses. A couple people in the area have them in hedges. The one is tall and doesn’t look like it’s ever been pruned. Another died after people strung an irrigation line through the top branches and ran water in winter than froze. I don’t know if the ice killed it, or if it was suffering and the water was a fatal attempt to save it.

My lilacs, especially the uncultivated species, have created forests of stems. They compete with each other for light so the flowers appear up higher every year. I probably should cut them down a little, but I’m always afraid insects will invade if I do it during the summer.

Notes on photographs: Photographs taken 27 April 2019.
1. Common lilac (Syringa vulgaris) on left and Paul Thirion cultivar on the right. You can see the dense number of stems on both.

2. Common lilac suckers that found the hose laid down last summer.
3. Cheyenne Privet (Ligustrum vulgare) that has suckers to the left.

Trees Fight Back

Weather: Sweet cherry blossoms succumbed to the succession of cold mornings; they still are producing flowers buried in leaves but the ones that were visible and exposed are gone.

I’m not sure about the butterflies. Monarchs can’t withstand temperatures below freezing and, when it gets cold in México, cluster together on evergreen boughs. I still saw some, but each day’s group may have been a different set.

The hose failures last summer are affecting my plants this year. I have a row of fruiting crab apples and the two that were on a hose that developed a large hole survived the winter, but have no flowers, while the others all are in bloom.

My forsythia leaves started wilting in last summer’s heat. I did what I could to get the shrub more water. It survived the winter, but has not bloomed. Few flowers appeared on some 10' high plants near the river that usually are covered. A few lots down, the forsythia that grows in an irrigation channel was doing fine.

I talked to a woman who was buying a particular type of tomato plant. She’d tried Wall of Water, only it crushed the plant when the wind came up. Like the rest of us, she buys as soon as she sees something and nurses plants until the weather is right because she knows they won’t be available then.

Last useful rain: 4/17. Week’s low: 26 degrees F. Week’s high: 84 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming in the area: Apples, flowering crab apples, purple leaf sandcherries, flowering quince, forsythia, tulips, donkey spurge

What’s blooming beyond the walls and fences: Alfilerillo, tansy and purple mustards, western stickseed, native and common dandelions, cheat grass

One of the difficulties of controlling the spread of dandelions by picking the flowers is they open at different times of the day in my yard, depending of when the sun reaches them.

What’s blooming in my yard: Sour and weeping cherries, sandcherries, fruiting crab apples, grape hyacinths, vinca; pansy that wintered over

Last year was the first time my flowering crab apple produced lots of flowers, and they were killed immediately by the frost. This year they survived, and are fragrant.

What’s reviving/coming up: Raspberries, Russian olives, weigela, sandbar willow, lilies, lilies of the valley, Rumanian sage, Siberian catmint, tumble mustard, David phlox, green-leaf five-eyes, Silver King artemesia, Mönch aster

Tasks: The warm weather has encouraged weeds. People were kicking up dust with weed eaters, and electric and rider mowers.

Animal sightings: Chickadees, quail, first gecko, cabbage and orange butterflies, ladybug on globe willow, small black ants, small bees on Siberian peas, sandcherry and flowering crab apple

From the sounds I hear in my drive, young birds in my neighbor’s metal building must have hatched.

Weekly update: I’m amazed at how little I learned growing up about trees. I suppose the reason is I was older than they, and I left home for college before I turned 18. I wasn’t around to see them reach adulthood.

This winter was the first time I had someone cut limbs off living trees. In most cases it was to removed dead wood, but in others it was to remove branches that were in my way.

They were cut in mid-February, and two months later they are replacing what was removed.

The cottonwood must have suffered more than I thought from last summer’s heat. Despite getting water every week, it dropped leaves on the southeast side early. This year that limb has no leaves, and should have been cut this winter.

It knew it had problems, and produced branch buds in its main trunk last summer. They have been leafing all along the trunk.

The Russian olive had the same problem, and I forgot to have it pruned. Now, I only see new leaves high on the west side. On the east side, leaf buds are opening on the trunk.

I imaging people who lived with trees eons ago observed these patterns in Nature and must have figured out they could stimulate new growth by dismembering. That, after all is the essence of pruning hedges and fruit trees.

I had some branches taken off an apricot that were reaching into the drive. I assumed it would put out new limbs higher up, since trees seem naturally to die up from the ground. But no, the tree wanted a branch at that level and is putting out new leaves around the cut.

Notes on photographs: All taken 21 April 2019.
1. Russian olive (Elaeagnus angustifolia).
2. Cottonwood (Populus deltoides).
3. Apricot (Prunus armeniaca).

Monarch Butterflies

Weather: It’s time to start counting the days since the last rain. The clouds that moved through this week were like the robin, just passing through for some other destiny.

There’s still snow in the Jémez from Tchicoma south.

Last useful rain: 3/21. Week’s low: 21 degrees F. Week’s high: 85 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming in the area: Cherries, peaches, Bradford pears, purple leaf plums, flowering quince, forsythia, daffodils. Cherries get tall and tend to be planted behind houses.

What’s blooming beyond the walls and fences: Alfilerillo, tansy and purple mustards, western stickseed, native and common dandelions

What’s blooming in my yard: Sandcherries, vinca

What’s reviving/coming up in the area: Weeping willow, heath aster, wild lettuce, pigweed, needle grass

What’s reviving/coming up in my yard: Beauty bush, catmint, Maximilian sunflower

Tasks: Men are still getting their irrigation systems working. One was out with a shovel in his ditch, another was letting yellowish water bubble out onto the ground. One house had standing water in its yard one morning this year. A man was out with a hoe working in another field around noon.

I spent several days testing hoses before I installed them. The first batch, which was made in China, all had connectors that leaked at the fittings. The second batch, which was from the same company but made in this country, had one with a leaking connector and another that only delivered water for half its length. The ones I installed only had functional water holes on one side, so I have to move the hoses from the centers of the watered areas to the edges. I have no idea how they will actually work when it gets warm and there’s less humidity in the air.

Animal sightings: Chickadees, robin, butterflies, small bees, small black ants, first house flies.

I found a hornets’ nest in the dead sweet pea leaves I was removing. I picked it out with the tips of my nippers. A few minutes later there was rustling in the trash bag and I thought I saw wings. I kicked the bag away from me, so the opening was in the other direction. There are limits to my curiosity.

Weekly update: I started seeing small butterflies this week. They usually were flying at a distance and it was impossible to detect their color.

Then, it must have been Friday, I was walking in the drive when a flock rose and flew off in different directions. I wasn’t expecting them, and was so disoriented by their movement I couldn’t focus on a single one to identify it.

Saturday this happened again. This time I had a sense they were gray and orange, and in the area of the sandcherry which had come into bloom on Wednesday. Prunus besseyi is densely covered with small, fragrant, rose-shaped flowers.

Yesterday I moved more cautiously and saw a number on the shrub, sharing the space with small bees and house flies that also started hatching this week.

I don’t think they are monarch butterflies, but I don’t know enough about Lepidoptera to be sure. The only ones I recognize in this area are the white cabbage and yellow lettuce ones. The woman who sternly told me several years ago that the latter were sulphur butterflies, also said the small orange ones I’d seen were monarchs. However, every monarch I saw in Michigan was much larger and had more definite patterns. Wikipedia says their wingspan is 3.5" to 4". [1]

As a child I must have assumed butterflies were like plants. The eggs hatched in spring, the caterpillars were around in early summer, and the butterflies appeared later. That narrative matched my observations and the things I knew about the life cycle of insects.

That image was one reason I had such a problem recognizing the butterflies this week. It simply was too early in the season.

I’d seen headlines about more monarchs wintering over this past year in México, but hadn’t bothered to read them. When I went back to the stories I found Danaus plexippus go through several generations in a year spread over a number of geographic areas. The differences between what I see here and what I remembered from the north fit that biogeographic pattern.

The butterflies fly south in fall to winter in forests a little northwest of Mexico City, where the air is moist and temperatures rarely fall below freezing. [2] For a time, scientists assumed they were in a hibernating state in which they neither ate nor drank. A reserved area has been established in México and observers have found they do go out in the day to seek water. [3]

The ones that migrate begin moving north in late winter, and lay eggs in the south that begin hatching caterpillars in March. They, in turn, become butterflies in April. Adults feed on nectar, and follow their food supply north, so that each of the four generations hatched in a year lives farther north. [4]

I couldn’t discover anything about differences in physical size by region or season. However, research has been done on the coloration. Females are more amber colored, and males are more orange. [5] More important, those raised in warmer environments, like New Mexico, are lighter colored than those raised in the Midwest. [6]

I don’t know if the quality of the milkweed the caterpillars eat or the kinds of nectar eaten by adultsl has any impact on size. The larvae feed on a number of Asclepias species, and their nutritional quality may differ by environment. Moisture, soil, and temperature may all make a difference within a single species. Most of the research is done in the Midwest where the butterflies spend most of their time.

Notes on photographs: All taken 14 April 2019. I lopped off the sandcherry branches that were crossing my paths; its shape is still asymmetrical.

End notes:
1. Wikipedia. "Monarch Butterfly."
2. Wikipedia. "Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve."
3. "No Food for Five Months?" University of Wisconsin Arboretum Journey North website.
4. "Annual Life Cycle." University of Minnesota Monarch Lab website.

5. Andrew K. Davis, Jean Chi, Catherine Bradley, and Sonia Altizer. "The Redder the Better: Wing Color Predicts Flight Performance in Monarch Butterflies." PloS One, 25 July 2012.

6. Andrew K. Davis, Bethany D. Farrey, and Sonia Altizer. "Variation in Thermally Induced Melanism in Monarch Butterflies (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae) from Three North American Populations." Journal of Thermal Biology 30:410–421:2005.

Toils of Spring

Weather: We returned to the state of being a passive stage set for acts of nature that are oblivious to us. Sunday a storm went through: it snowed in Los Alamos and Santa Fé, but not here. We had the wind, we had the clouds and misty air, but it was so warm nothing happened. At night, of course, we got the cold.

Again on Wednesday a front passed through, and we saw the clouds and felt the occasional wind gusts, but we’re not the actors. We’re not even the chorus. By Thursday, the ground was drying in places where no leaves trapped the earlier moisture.

Last useful rain: 3/21. Week’s low: 22 degrees F. Week’s high: 75 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming in the area: Apricots, peaches, Bradford pears, purple leaf plum, forsythia, daffodils

What’s blooming beyond the walls and fences: Alfilerillo, tansy mustard, western stickseed, dandelions

Purple mustard (Chorispora tenella) is said to be an aggressive invader. It became noticeable in 2014, but stayed closer to town and the river. This year it’s taken over a number of yards a mile and a half away.

What’s blooming in my yard: Last of the violets

What’s reviving/coming up in the area: Four-winged salt bushes, bindweed, yellow yarrow

What’s reviving/coming up in my yard: Purple leaf sandcherry, buddleia, garlic, Johnson’s Blue geranium, sea lavender, lady bells, sidalcea, Rumanian sage

Last summer’s heat was more than some plants could take. The daylilies started wilting in July, and some had lost their leaves by late August. They’ve all come back. Likewise, the garlic chives only flourished where they got lots of water. This year they’ve returned to places they abandoned.

I had the tree trimmer cut dead wood out of the globe willow. It’s now putting out new branches from the trunk.

Tasks: The acequia is running. Friday there was water in the ditch, and two men were out with shovels clearing their sections. One field had standing water in furrows.

I continued doing clean-up that was postponed for two years by my thumb. The first year I did nothing to let it recover. Last year other things had greater priority than pruning the Apache plume.

The problem with pruning is the burn pile got huge. The winds were blowing loose branches back into the drive. This morning it finally was warm enough to turn on a hose early in the morning while it was still. The brush all disappeared, but the locust limb from last year and this year’s Siberian pea only turned to charcoal.

Animal sightings: Chickadees, small bees around peaches, small black ants. Some quail were reconnoitering my back porch today.

Weekly update: I began the worst job of the year yesterday. Testing and resetting the hoses reveals every one of my physical weaknesses. My lungs doesn’t much like bending down in the sun, my arms hate tugging on heavy hoses, and my thumb can’t unscrew and rescrew fittings.

The problems with replacing the soakers that sprouted holes got worse. I know I repeat myself, but the supply does get worse every year. Last year there were two brands available. The better one no longer is available in 25' lengths.

Supersizing has taken over the business. There are no new 25' regular hoses in the local stores. The ones available are ones that didn’t sell last year. It’s hard to even find 50' lengths. Now, they are pushing hoses that are 75' and 100' long. The problem with low water pressure is the longer the hose the less useful it is.

I ordered six of the cheaper soaker hoses. They came tied by heat-glued strips that are so tight they pinch the hoses, and never disappear. I laid them out on the drive, because, if I don’t make them lay flat for a couple days before I install them, they never will. No two were the same length, and the longest was a foot longer than the shortest.

Some day this week I’ll screw and unscrew each one to a garden hose to test them for holes. I learned last year this particular brand was prone to arrive with flaws.

It’s only after I replace the hoses that leak so badly they deliver no water that I can begin the next task: bending down to get them to lay flat again so the water goes where it’s needed.

I know I say it every year, but American corporations really have forgotten there serve more important functions than paying bonuses to executives who make the cost-cutting and marketing decisions. Buying up the competitors insulates them from the consequences of their actions. Nature does not protect me from them.

Notes on photographs: All taken 7 April 2019.
1. Peach (Prunus persica) in full bloom.
2. Globe willow (Salix matsudana umbraculifera) sprouts.
3. Remains of black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) in burn pile.

Bags of Stones

Weather: The decent weather of the past few weeks turned rococo this week. First, it got way too warm, up to the high 70s from Tuesday to Thursday. Then, as always happens when the weather’s abnormally warm, cold air began blowing through yesterday. It brought snow to Los Alamos and Santa Fé, but so far all we’ve had here is wind and gray skies. The temperatures in the low 40s apparently haven’t created conditions to force precipitation.

Last useful rain: 3/21. Week’s low: 23 degrees F. Week’s high: 78 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming in the area: Apricots, first peaches, pear, purple leaf plum, forsythia

My largest apricot was fragrant on Monday; it’s the first time since it was planted in 2007 that the flowers have lasted long enough to reach that stage. Blossoms on the first trees to bloom in the area began turning brown Thursday, perhaps from the cold morning temperatures, while other trees that waited a week were still white on Friday. Usually, plants begin to bloom near the river first, and gradually work their way up to my yard. The apricots showed no such pattern. I suspect the first trees to bloom, like mine, were grown in some out-of-state nursery, while the later trees were grown from pits of locally acclimated parents.

What’s blooming beyond the walls and fences: Alfilerillo, purple and tansy mustards, dandelions

What’s blooming in my yard: Bradford pear, male cottonwood, violets

What’s reviving/coming up in the area: Siberian elms, leatherleaf globemallow, winterfat, golden hairy aster

What’s reviving/coming up in my yard: Spirea, choke cherry, flowering and fruiting crab apples, snowball, privet, lilacs, Siberian peas, blue flax, Mexican hats

Tasks: Saw a man out with a rototiller on Monday.

I spent the week cutting dead stems on Maximilian sunflowers that line a fence, then collapse over the walk in August. I usually do this in mid or late summer, but hadn’t done anything since I hurt my thumb in 2016. It always takes time because the stems have to be cut: if they’re broken off the dead wood brings the roots with it. I used to do this sitting on the ground with pruners. This time I used loppers to remove the long stems, and then sat on the ground and cleared the debris. I could spend less time bending over the loppers than I could sitting, but the loppers use my hands and arms, while the pruners use my thumb.

Animal sightings: Chickadees, small bees around apricots, small black ant hills appearing

Weekly update: Gravel is the cheap answer to building roads, and because it’s cheap it requires more maintenance than concrete or whatever the black paving material is. The stones gradually sink into the earth from the weight of passing vehicles. I put some rocks down this spring in an area that was still thawing, and half of them disappeared.

Last summer another problem developed. My neighbors killed some winterfat that was blocking the way past their main gate, and the loosened sand blew down on top of the gravel in front of my gate. It raised the level enough that the horizontal post on the gate couldn’t clear. At the time, I raked enough away to solve the problem.

Only, of course, it was a temporary fix. When the ground froze this winter it heaved just enough that the gate wouldn’t clear for months.

One thing you learn is it is far easier to hire someone to do a big job than a small one. If I wanted my drive rebuilt or needed a mason to build a long wall, I would have some problems but probably would eventually have found someone. All I needed was replacement gravel and a short retaining wall. For that, I was on my own.

I bought some pavers because they were the cheapest and lightest weight blocks available, and piled them uphill from the path of my gate. No mortar. It would function, but wouldn’t stand someone trying to use it as a step. Of course, some deliveryman has already tried to use it as a shortcut.

I discovered one of the local big boxes sells bags of rocks from Arizona. I bought the pea gravel to put under the gate, because of the low clearance.

The rocks were dirty. I don’t mean filled with seeds, like the base course from the local quarries, but muddy. Since it was sold by the bag, and not by weight, it didn’t mean the company was inflating its product. But, it did mean that, when it rained, I was going to have mud where I least needed it.

Every few years, some of my neighbors refresh their drives by having truck loads of base course delivered and crews with wide rakes spreading it. Only the gravel’s for sale. You have to supply the labor yourself.

I went back to the big box to buy some of the river rock, but it had been picked over and the only bags left were way back in a space under a shelf. When I asked an employee for some help, he told me he always tells customers to bring their own help because he’s too short staffed.

There are times when I wish my hair were completely gray so I could lay the grandmother’s guilt trip on people. As it was, I was left wondering if I was supposed to grease his hand to get some help.

The river rock, like the pebbles, came with bits of the river. The rocks no doubt were a different variety and color than the local ones, but the dirt was red. If I were creating a zen garden I might have created geometric patterns. However, I was being more utilitarian. I emptied a bag into my wheel barrow and used a small hoe to pull some out where the existing rocks had sunk.

For the time, the worst of my problems are solved. I’ll probably spend the rest of the summer going back to the big box every week or so and buying a few more bags of pebbles to spread in the thin areas that were impassable during the thaw period.

Notes on photographs: All pictures were taken 30 March 2019.
1. The retaining wall built with piled pavers with pea pebbles in front.

2. Pond rock that I placed in a wet area where part of it sank.

3. The gate with the low hanging post. If it didn’t drag, then the wood would have. I gouged a narrow trench under its path and spread pea pebbles under it.

4. The red, muddy river rock mixed with the local base course in the drive.

Rites of Spring

Weather: Rain Thursday night, with only a few bouts of high winds.

Last useful rain: 3/21. Week’s low: 28 degrees F. Week’s high: 64 degrees F in the shade.

What’s blooming: Apricots, tansy mustard

What’s reviving/coming up in the area: Globe willows, Japanese honeysuckle

What’s reviving/coming up beyond the walls and fences: Shoulders were green before the rain last week, probably tansy mustard and cheat grass; alfalfa, western stickseed, stickleaf, broom snakeweed, goat’s beard, and purple asters are up in my yard.

What’s reviving/coming up in my yard: Roses beginning to leaf, potentillas, tulips, daffodils, daylilies, bouncing Bess, Maltese cross, chrysanthemums, coreopsis, tansy, white yarrow, Shasta daisies

Tasks: It’s ditch cleanup time; one burned the banks of his ditch, another group were in their bank clearing debris yesterday.

Animal sightings: Quail, chickadees, small bees around apricots, small black ants

Weekly update: It’s been a disconcertingly normal winter and spring. While it got colder than usual in December, there was snow on the ground that lingered until temperatures warmed a little in January. The ground was saturated while the snow melted and the lower layers were still frozen, but that problem passed by the time we had more snow and rain. The winds have only been high a few times.

Last week the chickadees returned. One was keeping watch while the others moved into my neighbor’s metal building. It compensated for the lost black locust by perching on the highest branch on one of the remaining Siberian peas.

I heard the sounds of geese a couple weeks ago, then saw the flock back in the yard of near the river. This time a white chicken was with them.

The quail also have returned. One was perched on the utility wire on Thursday.

Plants have been emerging in the same places in the same order as previous years. The globe willows began to show a haze a couple weeks ago, and the color has gotten brighter and more uniform since on area trees. My tree is always slower. The bright chartreuse leaves are still laying prone along the branches.

The plants that invade other beds are all back before their prey: the golden spur columbine, winecup mallow, garlic chives, purple asters, dandelions, alfalfa, and Queen Anne’s lace. They actually appear before the more traditional weeds. Even before I can think about seeds, I’ve been out with a spade and trowel digging out unwanted volunteers.

The first flowers of the year are opening, the tansy mustard and the apricots. Nothing kills the mustard, but as soon as the apricots appear one begins to wonder when the next frost will come, and if the white flowers again will be sacrificed to the weather.

Will the year continue to be normal, or will this be of those rare seasons when the trees bear fruit? At least the bees have returned and are doing their part.

Notes on photographs: All take 3/24/19.
1. Daylilies (Hemerocallis fulva) sprouting from last year’s dead matter.
2. Bearded Dutch iris (Iris germanica) emerging.
3. Apricot (Prunus armeniaca) blooming near a one-seeded juniper (Juniperus Monosperma).

Siberian Pea Tree Autopsy

Weather: Sun angles are changing; the sun was in my eyes when I was sitting at my desk for the first time this year on Monday. The zonal geraniums on the indoor porch are happier than I; they all are in full bloom.

Last useful rain: 3/11. Week’s low: 23 degrees F. Week’s high: 72 degrees F in the shade.

What’s reviving: Hollyhocks, sweet peas, golden spur columbine, chrysanthemums, brome grass; arborvitae have greened; fern bushes have leafed

What’s coming up: Garlic chives, Queen Anne’s lace, oriental poppies, larkspur seedlings, alfalfa, white yarrow

Tasks: Finished the difficult work on the wall I built to stop soil from eroding into the path of my gate, and keeping it from opening when the ground heaves in winter.

Animal sightings: Small birds. When I was digging out soil for the lower course of the wall, I uncovered an active caterpillar and a grub. Heard geese honking near the river on Monday.

Weekly update: High winds returned Wednesday. Friday night they took down one of the Siberian pea trees. When I looked, one of the stems had no roots and one had a few laterals that tore before they broke.

The trees grow like shrubs here. This one was about 8' high and 5' across, with two main stems. I pulled the interlaced branches apart, and loaded the smaller one onto the wheelbarrow to take to the burn pile. The other was larger and heavier. It took some effort to get it to balance diagonally across a dolly.

Then I looked at the roots. There were none on the smaller stem. The larger one had a few laterals that had torn, and a few tiny ones I had to cut. I pushed them back into the hole and covered them, hoping they would resprout.

When I tried to discover what type of roots the species had, I ran into the usual problems that no one looks, and everyone copies Wikipedia without attribution. All the it said was the root system was extensive, but not how wide or how deep. [1]

My first thought was the ground squirrel, but there was no tunnel. Besides that animal seems to feed on members of the rose family, and Caragana arborescens is a legume.

The second possibility was some kind of root rot. The trees are native to Siberia and Manchuria, [2] but researchers did not include Siberia pea trees in their list of Russian trees affected by fungal diseases. [3]

The question remains what happened. The species is used for windbreaks on the northern plains. [4] The high winds of last week and the snow load in February should not have been a problem.

Canadians indicated Caragana arborescens normally lives for fifty years. [5] This tree was planted as a bare root along with two others in 2001. They are about 18-years-old, so it didn’t die of old age.

The Canadians also suggested the pea trees were "very drought tolerant" but would "not tolerate prolonged flooding." [6]

Last summer was hotter than usual. That amplified the effects of the lack of rain. The first of July I noticed this particular shrub was losing leaves.

Last year was also the time I replaced some soaker hoses that, at the best of times, supplied water in 3" strips with sprayer hoses that provided more water over a wider area. When I was fighting with the older hoses, I had snaked one around the base of this particular tree when I looped it back on both sides of the others. That may have caused the roots to be concentrated in a small area. They then may not have been able to respond to the change in water distribution when it got hot.

When I saw the leaves dropping, which is a normal response of the species to drought, [7] I shifted the hose a bit to make sure it got more water. Maybe I was flooding it instead of starving it. The lack of roots is consistent with too much water.

So it may have been victim of the classic conundrum: is it too little or too much, and did compensating for the one cause the other? Killed with loving care, but which kind?

Notes on photographs: Snow picture taken 23 February 2019; the others were taken 9 March 2019.

End notes:
1. Wikipedia. "Caragana arborescens." The tree was discussed in more detail in the post for 4 May 2008.

2. James A. Duke. "Siberian peashrub." Handbook of Energy Crops. 1983. Purdue University Department of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture website.

3. Evgeny P. Kuz’michev, Ella S. Sokolova, and Elena G. Kulikova. Common Fungal Diseases of Russian Forests. Newtownsquare, Pennsylvania: USDA Forest Service, June 2001.

4. Duke.
5. "Caragana." Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada website.
6. Agriculture Canada.
7. Wikipedia.

Black Locust

Weather: Rain Saturday evening; drive is still spongy underfoot and wheel barrow is still leaving ruts in saturated soil sitting above frozen ground.

Last useful rain: 3/2. Week’s low: 11 degrees F. Week’s high: 65 degrees F in the shade.

What’s green: Leaves on juniper and other evergreens, Dutch iris, grape hyacinth, vinca, snapdragon, blue flax, winecup mallow, hollyhocks, sweet peas, anthemis, dandelion, needle and cheat grass

What’s gray, gray-green, or blue green: Four-winged saltbush, winterfat, snow-in-summer leaves

What’s red or purple: Stems on sandbar willow and bing cherries; new wood on peaches and apples; leaves on coral bells, alfilerillo, golden spur columbine, coral beards tongue, purple aster

What’s yellow: Stems on weeping willows

Tasks: Spent more time removing soil that slide from a bank into my drive. Each day I removed a little, then let the sun thaw some more for the next day. Many of the rocks I put down in a saturated path sank so only the tops are visible. They’re enough to keep me out of the mud.

Animal sightings: Small birds.

Weekly update: The black locust has been a problem since Megacyllene robiniae larvae first attacked it in 2007. Adult longhorned beetles feed on goldenrod, then lay their eggs in tree trunks. Come spring, the eggs hatch into locust borers that eat the wood. By the time you see a pile of sawdust at the base of the tree, it’s too late. Each year, sometime in June or early July, a trunk has fallen, usually into my drive.

The first man I called to remove a fallen branch said borers weren’t unusual, and the tree wouldn’t die. He added some farmers used to use the regrowth for fence posts.

The first few years I tried to get the fallen branches removed before August when the pupae hatched into beetles. That didn’t help, so I waited until winter to call a tree trimmer. Then I could have him prune other trees while they were dormant.

When I first had the problem, I removed my goldenrod plants. Since the insects came back, I decided there was no reason to forego the yellow flowers.

In July of 2012, the man I called told me winds the previous week had taken down a lot of branches. He also said a number of people were having problems with the black locusts and that people who had them near their houses were having them removed, especially the really big trees. I’m not sure if that meant the locust borers were a new problem or not.

I saw some adult beetles for the first time in September of 2017. In October, I heard a red-headed woodpecker in the tree. It didn’t help. Three trunks came down last year.

Each year when a trunk came down, the locust put out one or two new ones. They moved over to a soaker hose I had and destroyed it by squeezing it. Last summer there were so many branches, they began infringing on other shrubs.

This winter I decided to have everything cut down, in hopes that would remove the borer eggs. After the tree trimmer left, I went out and removed the leaves and duff around the stool. I hoped to remove any eggs that might have fallen. When it gets a little warmer I may put down one of those poisons that kill grubs.

I know it will come back. Suckers I cut to the ground, always return. I haven’t decided how much new growth I’m going to let grow. I’m thinking I may try to return to a single tree, instead of the copse I had. As I expect many suckers will come up, I should be able to select one that won’t be in my way. The thorns are a nuisance when the branches grow into my pathways.

Or, once I get used to the bare spot, I may just keep them all cut down. While the legume flowers are fragrant when they bloom, the buds or flowers usually are killed by frost. I’m not sure they’re worth the cost of a tree trimmer every winter.

Notes on photographs:
1. Black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) trunk fallen over the retaining wall, with the Dr. Huey roses that grew up into it. 5 June 2016.

2. Leaves and sawdust at the base of the tree. 8 June 2008.
3. Black locust stumps after it was cut down. 3 March 2019.
4. Damage in to wood of a trunk. 14 February 2019.