Hidey-Holes and Fairy Gardens

Unlike some of my fellow human-kind, ProfessorRoush has never quite bitten on the lure of the supernatural.  Sure, I have always liked a good scary movie, particularly in the company of a younger Mrs. ProfessorRoush.  In those days, she reacted to fright by clinging all the more avidly to my brawny gardening arms.  Scare the current Mrs. ProfessorRoush and she's just as likely to take a swing at you.

The whole gobbledygook of ghosts and goblins and garden gnomes, fairies or elves is not part of my fantasy world, and as much as I liked Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy, or even Brendan Fraser as the hero in the modern "Mummy" films, I seldom worry about encountering such creatures in real life.  I normally agree with Rod Serling, host of The Twilight Zone, who said, "There is nothing in the dark that isn't there when the lights are on."  At least that's what I tell myself on dark nights on the Kansas prairie when the wind is howling outside.  And when I'm trying to decide at twilight if the dark lump in my landscape is a known bush or a browsing deer or a Sasquatch.

I briefly reconsidered my thoughts on the other dimensions last weekend, however, when I noticed the little tunnel as pictured above, heading darkly under the roots of a Purple Smoke Tree.  Just for an instant, one can believe that this Hole would be a perfect little entry to Alice's Wonderland, the motivation for any number of fantastic tales.  Shrink me down, and how far would I tumble here before I encountered the Red Queen?  What sort of creatures, do you think, have made this Hole a haven?  Mundane little prairie frogs or mice?  An intrepid little pixie or goblin?  If a leprechaun had popped out of The Hole right as I discovered it, I wouldn't have batted an eye.  Surely, on this prairie, I'm not about to poke The Hole with a stick.  With my luck, it wouldn't be a grouchy gnome that would answer, it would be an unreasonably angry copperhead snake with vengeance on its mind.  

I won't do anything as rash as creating a fairy garden to lure something out of the Hole (the picture at the left is from a friend's garden), but I will watch this Hole for activity, perhaps spreading a few grass clippings on the bare ground so I can detect movement in and out of it.  In the process, I may discover new things about my prairie ecosystem, or I might be permanently perplexed at this prairie perforation, or I might yet discover that I'm just another part of the Matrix and learn something of the unknown worlds beneath our feet.  The mere discovery of this Hole has convinced me that I should at least be more open to the viewpoint of Woody Allen, who stated, "There is no question that there is an unseen world.  The problem is, how far is it from midtown and how late is it open?"

Tulip Trysts

A recent post by Carol, at May Dreams Garden, reminded ProfessorRoush that he previously started a draft blog entry on the species tulips in his landscape, the few colorful little clumps that add very little to my overall garden ambiance, but which mean so much to me as they sneak back into the garden each year.

Species tulips, you see, are one of my garden guilty pleasures, a little niche of my garden that others seldom discover, visible and yet hidden behind the more blatant garden performers.  In my garden, alternatively Zone 5 or Zone 6 depending on the whims of weather and weather maps, a few species tulips return reliably, while large and showy Dutch tulips return in annually diminishing numbers until they finally just don't return at all.  

'Little Beauty'

Such a species tulip is Tulipa hageri 'Little Beauty', photographed at left, a  4-6 inch tall dwarf (or to be politically correct height-challenged), fuchsia flower with a slate- or cornflower blue star-shaped  center inside a narrow white zone.  A daytime lover, 'Little Beauty' can be enjoyed only in the sunshine because she opens up her flowers every morning and closes them every evening, an exhibitionist by day and shy at night.  She is supposed to naturalize well, but mine seems to have confined themselves to a single clump, her survival in Kansas perhaps dependent on some combination of light, moisture and soil unique to that spot in my landscape.  

Tulipa clusiana var. chrysantha

A similar "one-bunch" species tulip for me is Tulipa clusiana var. chrysantha, the "Lady Tulip", originally thought to be native to the Middle East, but some more recent authorities believe it to be native to Spain.  Many T. clusiana are red and white, but my variety, 'Cynthia' is a subdued red and yellow blend, brighter if the springtime has been cloudier on average.  A little taller than 'Little Beauty', about 8 inches in my garden, the buds are also larger and longer and they also are shy to display their beauty at night or on rainy days.  To search for mine, you need to go to the westernmost point of my front landscape, where they return year after year to greet the afternoon sun.

If you're in search of a similar guilty garden pleasure, I'd recommend planting both or either of these little ladies in an out-of-the-way place of your garden.  You all know what I'm talking about; a spot with a gardening "no-tell-motel" sort of feel, away from the beaten path, a seedy spot where you can sneak away and enjoy some brief illicit pleasure, just you and them.  The best meeting times between gardener and species tulip are always, as one would expect, in the middle of the day, a gardening nooner of sorts.  Mea culpa, with these little Sirens in my garden, I can easily be be accused by a careful observer of slipping home more often at noon for a couple of weeks each April.  Mrs. ProfessorRoush thinks the frequent visits are for her company, but you can keep a secret, can't you?   

Ever Just Get Tired of Something?

ProfessorRoush does.  He gets tired of winter.  He gets tired of the peak of summer heat.  He gets tired of mowing grass.  He gets tired of drought.  He gets tired of frosts on the fruit trees.  He gets tired of resurfacing blacktop.  He gets tired of cleaning the garage.  He gets tired of home maintenance.  He really gets tired of large furry white-tailed rats invading his garden and smaller naked-tail pack rats invading his shrubs.

He also occasionally gets tired of a particular plant, and this weekend's victim was this short hedge of Buxus microphylla koreana 'Wintergreen' that I had planted in the center curve of the circular driveway.  I planted it initially to partially hide cars parked in the driveway in front of the house.  If I had a more mystical side, I'd say that it served as a feng shui improvement to divert bad energy flow from my front door.  It's been a love-hate relationship from the outset.

Before planting them, I was ignorant of boxwoods, save for my extreme desire to surround myself with broad-leaf evergreens instead of conifers, the latter being a magnet for bagworms in this area.  I didn't know then, but soon learned, that they smell like unneutered male cat pee over vast portions of the year.  I didn't understand that a medium hedge would break up the view of the prairie from the house. I was unaware that in a very bad winter in Kansas, boxwoods could sustain snow damage and look terrible for most of a spring season.   I didn't even suspect in my naive state that the pack rats that would soon consider me a particularly benevolent god for erecting safe shelter as a base for their nefarious car and lawn mower wire-eating activities.    

So, this spring, tired of my boxwood pack rat condominiums, I resolved to eliminate them.  Yesterday, I took advantage of the prediction for strong spring winds and I used the tractor and bush-hog to mow them all off at ground level.  That took a satisfying 15 minutes and it only took another half-hour or so to load and remove two cart-loads of debris.  It's not perfectly clean yet, but I'm hoping the Kansas wind completes the job before Mrs. ProfessorRoush takes issue with my work.  I can feel her somewhere inside, trying to find something fault with the effort anyway, because she was merely lukewarm to the idea of savaging the hedge in the first place.

But the house, in my opinion, looks much better now.  In tactical terms, I now have a clear field of fire to defend against pack rat invaders. The prairie to my north view can serve as a guide to all the summer storm clouds that want to slide over the Flint Hills.   Passing cars will also have a much clearer view of the flowering trees and spring peonies and the summer Orientpet lilies and roses that dot my front landscape beds.  Thankfully, given the natural inclination of Kansas landscape plants to die, it is fairly simple to give them a nudge and correct gardening mistakes, I'm not sure what a Feng Shui practitioner would say, but ProfessorRoush feels much better.

Hemerocallis Haiku

'Bettie Mae Ferris'

After making fun of Mrs. ProfessorRoush's tastes in daylilies in the last post (as previously noted, she considers orange daylilies to be the height of fashion), I thought that I would try to atone with a carefully-written haiku:


Sun seared daylily
Golden rays within become
Shining floral love

'Tuscarilla Tiger'

I didn't promise you it would be good haiku, did I?  To fully appreciate my efforts at reconcilation here, you should know a piece of our history.  Early in our courtship, Mrs. ProfessorRoush attended college far away and I attempted to keep her attentions from wandering with lousy love-stricken poetry delivered by snail mail.  She, in turn, tolerated said poetry because she was stuck in a news-less limbo and needed my continued letters to inform her of minor world events such as the 1979 Iranian Embassy hostage crisis.  To be a helpful and attentive boyfriend, I also wrote sonnets and poems to improve her English 101 grades.  I know, that was cheating, but it was done for love and I disclose it only now, certain that the academic statue of limitations has finally passed.  I've always been pleased, since I never had a single day of college English, that her instructor made her read one of my sonnets aloud for the class.

So here, my darling, is a charming haiku to the genus Hemerocallis, accompanied by some of the classic orange daylilies that so warm your heart.  Can I please stop sleeping on the lawn now?

Secondhand Roses

While I'm off on a garden book tangent, I am pleased to show you one of the many reasons why I browse secondhand book stores and visit every Half-Price Books store that crosses my path.  Last week, I ran across what I think is a first edition of Roses by Jack Harkness, published in 1978 by J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd.

Roses is a catalog of sorts, printed in the style of its era.  None of the flashy full-color-photographs-on-every-page of modern book layouts, this one has two inserts of color plates, 16 pictures in each insert chosen from the hundreds that Harkness described.  I bought it, not for the photos, but for this famous rose breeder's prose regarding the hundreds of roses. Summarizing this excellent work, Harkness wrote, "I could truly claim that this story has no end, an obscure beginning, and a heroine who is forever changing."

Each individual rose description is marvelous for their collective gold mine of personal insights.  Take, for example, what he writes about my personal favorite, 'Madame Hardy';  "...one of the most wonderful roses, provided its lax, ungainly growth may be forgiven...a further pardon is required in case the weather sweeps away its intricate flowers.  I do so pardon it....a bloom like that is remembered all your life."


He was not as complimentary of 'Mme Isaac Pereire' and her sport 'Mme Ernst Calvat':  "These two are generally applauded...as examples of the beauty of old garden roses.  I cannot see why....if 'Mme Pierre Oger' is Cinderella, these two are the Ugly Sisters fortissimo....long branches are clad with dull foliage, nasty little thorns and mildew...flowers, revolting in color, frequently ameliorate that sin by failing to open at all"  Grudgingly, he finishes his description of these widely-acclaimed intensely fragrant Bourbons with "...to give the devils their dues, they are both fragrant."  

I certainly agreed wholeheartedly with the opening of his description of 'Blanc Double de Coubert': "This rose has been praised too much...the petals are thin, easily spoiled by rain....If one wants a double white rose, I see no point in planting this one."  And his paragraph about 'Charles de Mills':  "I have had little joy from this variety, which the experts describe as tall....(it) does not grow tall when I plant it and I do not admire its short buds...(but)it improves on opening."

 I especially admired and noted the book's dedication "To Betty Catherine Harkness.  I met her in 1946, had the extraordinary sagacity to marry her in 1947; and we have lived happily ever after, thanks mainly to her."  Should I ever write another book, I must remember to follow his lead and provide some recognition for the long-suffering Mrs. ProfessorRoush.  I believe she also exhibited "extraordinary sagacity" to accept my proposal of marriage, even though she might submit some trivial examples to suggest otherwise during our 32 years together.

I'm Ticked Off

Hey, now this isn't fair.  This entire summer, the tick-averse Mrs. ProfessorRoush has been forcing me to disrobe in the laundry room immediately upon entering the back door and to submit to a humiliating tick check which involves minute inspection of every inch of my tender pink skin.  While that might sound like the start of a fun afternoon to some of you, you can trust me when I say that the only intimate contact it initiates is her scratching at every suspicious skin blemish to assure that some creepy little legs don't appear at the edges.  On most occasions, satisfied that I'm not harboring a pregnant momma tick which could birth-start a tick Armageddon in the house, she banishes me immediately to the shower, merely bleeding from a few overzealous scratch marks, while she lifts my clothes with a stick and washes them in scalding water.

On two previous occasions Mrs. ProfessorRoush did find and remove ticks, justifying her careful diligence.  There were also two other instances when I found and removed small ticks on my own due to her understandable but unconscionable unwillingness to diligently examine certain skin expanses.  The past few weeks, however, I had returned tickless and we had dropped our guard, sure that tick season was over.  Heck, I had even scabbed over the previous tick-created welts that I received from each bite.  I seem to have developed a type II sensitivity to tick bites this year and I form a nice hive at each bite, even when the tick hasn't been attached long.


Today, when I was driven in from a good day of gardening by the July heat, I noticed that my shoulder was itching and, in the mirror on the way to the shower, saw a small speck in the center of a red circle that appeared different from my normal freckles.  Primarily, it looked different because it was RAISED.

There were a few lost moments of reaction while Mrs. ProfessorRoush located her reading glasses.  I've found that older wives are constantly wearing the wrong glasses for the activity at hand and I would estimate that they spend approximately 25% of their lives looking for the alternate pair.   Once she could see the speck closer, she still wasn't sure that it was a tick.  She and I were both willing, however, to play it safe and have her grab this possible part of me with the tweezers and rip it off.  I braced myself for the fear that my farsighted wife would pluck a piece of ProfessorRoush rather than an invasive arachnid, but the "speck" was removed without any trauma other than a raised heart rate and some minor palpitations.  Under a magnifying glass that I've had since I was a child (a side benefit of living a long life interested in the sciences) we discovered that it was, in fact, a tick, the same minuscule invader pictured above one a paper towel next to a 22 gauge hypodermic needle.

There are, it seems, Darwinistic advantages to having a little tick hypersensitivity, even though this episode will likely initiate another series of strip tease inspections by the missus.  If I hadn't started itching, this little guy could have feasted for a few days on my fair skin.  Instead, thankfully, he was encased in this paper towel and flushed down where the sun doesn't shine.  Tough luck, buddy.

Mary Rose and Cuthbert Grant

Sometimes, even ProfessorRoush wonders if the real purpose of his blog is to herald the joy of roses to the world at large, to serve as an outlet for pompous written expression or fire-fanning frustration, or merely to sound the gong of life and proclaim the joy of breathing still.  Today however, there is no hidden message, no subtle cynicism to digest.  I simply love the photo at left and so I'll discuss the rose in the foreground as a pretense for displaying the photo here.

The floriferous subjects here, taller and deep red Canadian rose 'Cuthbert Grant' behind pink and demure English rose 'Mary Rose', came together in a moment of May, 2013 to form a photo engrained in my memory.  I don't know if it was the lighting or the quiet evening ambiance or the wine color of 'Cuthbert Grant', but it remains one of my favorite impromptu garden pictures, imperfectly composed  and focused as it is.



'Mary Rose'

I've discussed 'Cuthbert Grant' before, and he remains one of my best Canadian roses, but I haven't touched on 'Mary Rose' until now.   She was one of the earliest David Austin roses I ever grew, and while she is not my favorite English rose, she has earned a place by persisting in this shady spot, thriving some years and barely hanging on in others.  'Mary Rose', or AUSmary, is a medium pink shrub rose introduced in 1983.  She is cluster-flowered, with double cupped blooms that are infused with a heavy fragrance.  She blooms in flushes, not quite continually, and her only real failings in my eyes are those delicate petals, short-lived in the ravages of my prairie winds.  I don't get to enjoy these blooms long outdoors, so I cut them and bring them in as I find them.  She is stout, seldom over three feet high and wide in my garden, and generally healthy, although she can lose her skirt from blackspot in humid weather.  This daughter of 'Wife of Bath' and 'The Miller' does seem to be reasonably hardy in Zone 5, experiencing some cane dieback, but she is seldom nipped to the ground. 

Average roses on their own, together the colors of these two roses are perfectly suited partners, the strong hues of the regal gentleman and the coy complexion of his shy lady blending seamlessly to complement each other.  If all the tints of a garden and all the marriages of men and women mirrored the devotion and bond between these two, as strong as the connubiality of myself and Mrs. ProfessorRoush (publicly avowed here in the interests of my continued health), then the world would be a better place and the garden a more beautiful one.

Strawberry Fields Forever

By posting these photos, I stand in minor danger of turning this blog from a gardening blog into a dog blog, but I couldn't resist sharing these new pictures of Bella.  Mrs. ProfessorRoush took them with her iPad after she returned from helping me pick these strawberries, and slightly blurry as they may be, I thought they were adorable.   Look at those beagle-hungry eyes.  I think Bella would like a strawberry, don't you?

To deflect any criticism about yet another post reflecting the intense love between a gardener and his faithful companion, we will feebly pretend instead that this blog entry is about my triumph over the fickle scarlet-skinned god of the strawberry patch.  Because, really, that's what it is, a bragging post unmitigated by any trace of self-restraint, even while I know deep down that I'm depleting my gardening karma account and probably will soon be punished by a June freeze for my impudence.

NEWS FLASH:  I HAVE HARVESTED HOME-GROWN STRAWBERRIES IN KANSAS!

Devoted readers of this blog know of my deep, life-long love for strawberries.  You've endured my epic, all-out campaign to get a strawberry patch through the August heat and drought, the bitter winters, and the late spring freezes that define Kansas gardening.  You have suffered through my purchase and erection of a shade house and my defensive measures and counterattacks against marauding deer.  You have bravely endured the whimpers and the whining and the woeful wailing against the cruelties of nature and the Kansas Flint Hills.  I have successfully spared you (till now) my agony during the past 3 weeks of cold, March-like temperatures and rains that have conspired to prolong ripening and increase rotting.

ProfessorRoush can publicly declare now that it has all been worth it, every drop of sweat, every aching muscle, every curse muttered in the general direction of the unsympathetic earth.   Mrs. ProfessorRoush, Bella, and I harvested 2 or 3 quarts of sweet strawberries over the last week or so, and last night we filled this bowl with another 4 or 5 quarts.  I'm sure there will be a few more quarts to come over the next week.  Not a grand harvest, but they exist and they made it to the reddened finish line.  And I accomplished it all through perseverance, labor, and sheer determination, not to mention the wad of cash I bestowed on the shade house manufacturer.   I refuse to calculate what a $1000 or so total divided by 10-15 quarts of strawberries works out to be on a per quart basis.  Not including, of course, my time and emotional trauma.

Whatever.  These are my strawberries, and, as Bella's twitching nose confirms, they are sweet and they are ripe and mouth-watering.   For one season, for one year, I have grown strawberries!

Despondent Dog

Woeful, she waits.
Outside, her love, ceaselessly puttering.
A glimpse she sees, then gone again,
A wisp, a phantom, endlessly muttering.
Moving through chores as hours march on.
Spraying his poisons into the air,
Pumping and misting with no time to spare.
Fretful, she waits.

Sadly, she waits.
Outside, blue sky and green grass beckon.
Scents, they abound, echos of sound,
Roll across hills and over horizon.
Breezes carry the fury of life.
Sunlight blesses the restless soil,
Earthworms squiggle in endless toil.
Fitful, she waits.

Doleful, she waits.
Outside, out there, is her friend and her love.
Lost to the world, intent and tired,
Her father, her playmate, her gardening other.
Inside she barks as her patience wears thin.
A world to explore, a garden to smell,
A drama to track and a story to tell.
Forlorn, she waits.

At last the door opens.
So joyful is she.
A wag of the tail,
And a few licks for me.
Then out she bounds to the world that awaits.
So happy, she laughs as she dances and shivers,
Short legs are pumping, whiskers aquiver.
Bella, my dog.

Mrs. ProfessorRoush took this photo last Sunday while I was spraying to keep the bagworms out of the evergreens and the worms out of the cherries.  Mrs. ProfessorRoush hates worms in the cherries, and as much as I hate insecticides, I surrendered my garden ethics quickly in the face of spousal demand and potential withdrawal of affections.  Meanwhile Bella has become my steadfast garden companion over the past month of warmer weather and has become extremely attached to me when I'm home.  She's headstrong (I'm referring to Bella right now) and I was afraid she would run away after the first bird or car that appeared, but I slowly trained her to stay within my sight and she is now allowed off leash in the garden while I work.   Bella didn't understand why she couldn't join me within the haze of poison spray this weekend, however.  Nothing looks more dismayed than a beagle separated from the outdoors and her love.

p.s.: and, yes, "aquiver" is a real word.

Lilliputian Garden Drama

Just a few evenings ago, ProfessorRoush was madly capturing a few photos with his Nikon, plausibly preserving images of about 30 rose blooms for such purposes as posterity, public lectures, or potential future blog entries.  In full disclosure, however, he was just taking pictures of pretty flowers and enjoying the moment.

As he labeled each photo later, however, he noticed that a number of the blooms had insects or arachnids on them.  As an example, he noticed this tiny spider on shockingly pink 'Duchess of Portland':

For another example, ProfessorRoush had taken this photo of 'Souvenir du President Lincoln' at 6:27 p.m. See the wee spider at the lower left of the bloom?



         



                                                                                                        Here he is closeup:

                                                  Talk about your itsy-bitsy spiders!








By accident, and with no particular purpose in mind besides flitting madly from flower to flower like a honey bee on fast forward, ProfessorRoush randomly wandered later past the same 'Souvenir du President Lincoln' blossom and took another photograph at almost the same angle.  This one was taken at 6:44 p.m.  Look again at Mr. Spider on the lower left of the bloom.




He doesn't seem to have moved very far, but he appears a little less distinct, doesn't he?  In closeup, you can now discern that he has captured a tiny green insect, one that I would naively call a "leafhopper" but I don't really know the genus.

Whatever the identity of this spider and insect, these photos pretty much sum up the microscopic war hidden within our gardens, don't they?  We lumbering apes think it's just all about color and growth and sex, but we too seldom get a glimpse beyond the veil like this one.  There are likely lots of lessons lurking in this unfolded drama, but ProfessorRoush has gained yet more evidence that a garden can ably manage to protect itself in the absence of synthetic insecticides.

If we could please keep this between us, however, I'd appreciate it.  Some of these roses come inside, hitchhikers and all, and Mrs. ProfessorRoush takes a dim view of even the most microscopic spiders on her kitchen countertops.

 

Columbine Collage

I do not recall ever blogging about my columbines, my beautiful beloved columbines, but I won't miss the opportunity now as they bloom out their season.  Some of you who are familiar with their favored habitat may even be surprised that they survive here in the annual Kansas drought and heat, but what they lack in fortitude, they seem to make up with proliferation.  In fact, I think they self-seed better on bare dry ground then they do in mulched and shady areas.  Wherever they seed, I smile and think about blue skies and happy children.

I assume my columbines are some form of Aquilegia vulgaris, but I've had a number of cultivars in my garden over the years and the entire Aquilegia clan is notoriously self-fertilizing.  The dark blue columbines at left, for instance, might have had some genetic influence from a named double-flowered cultivar, 'Black Barrow', that I once had.  Columbines are no trouble at all, however.  They cheerfully self-seed around my northern exposure, in the partially shaded beds on the north side of the house, and I simply weed out the colors that I don't like and root out the clumps that spring up in the wrong locations.  I'm partial to whites and blues, as you can see, and the occasional wine-purple flower is also allowed to grow uninhibited.  But it is the blues, the rare bright-sky-blue flowers, that I favor the most.

I do have an occasional maintenance issue with "Granny's Bonnet", as these are sometimes called.  Here on the prairie, they often become infested with "columbine leafminers" (Phytomyza sp.), a fly larvae that lives and lays eggs in the leaves, leaving unsightly trails behind as they migrate and feed.  The  Internet provides scant useful advice regarding control of these pests, with one prominent page suggesting only to ignore them or to pick off diseased leaves.  If I followed the latter advice, I'd only be left with a bunch of completely defoliated columbines by early June.  Similarly, I ignore written suggestions to cut them to the ground and start over.  Older sources suggest the use of DDT, a chemical that likely would do the job, but which I suspect is a bit difficult to obtain these days.   Occasionally, I've resorted to spraying with less lethal insecticides or even to tossing down some of the commercial fertilizer which contains systemic insecticide, all in an effort to keep the leaves unblemished and healthy.  Other years, as some of these photos this year demonstrate, I let the leafminers alone to do what leafminers must do.

Columbine folklore is rife with tales of love, attraction, and betrayal.  Columbines were held to be sacred to Venus, but were often associated with folly and cuckoldry.  At one time, giving a woman a bouquet of columbines was an insult since they were only presented to women suspected of loose morals.  Mrs. ProfessorRoush, however, thinks they are fabulous little flowers and takes no umbrage to my growing them near our main entrance,






Aquilegia belongs to the Ranunculus family and many sources say the entire plant is poisonous, including the seeds.  Of course, the skeptical gardening professor scoffs at the warnings about its toxicity, warnings that seem to mirror those of many, many other plants, and I wonder if it actually toxic at all, particularly when Wikipedia tells me that a dose of 3000 mg/kg is not fatal in mice.  

While skeptical, however, I'm not an idiot and I most assuredly won't use myself as a test subject.  It is said that Native American men crushed the seeds and rubbed them into their hands because the scent was so pleasing it was thought to attract a mate.  Perhaps Mrs. ProfessorRoush would appreciate the gift of a new fragrant soap if she believed it would rekindle the marital fires?

Basil Indicator

ProfessorRoush is, at times, an incredibly bad gardener of houseplants.  I am usually able to keep them alive, but, with the exception of an occasional Pothos sp., they don't often thrive under my care.  There is, for example, an infamous episode some years ago during a period when I had approximately 20 thriving orchids and 10 Christmas cacti, all of which would even occasionally bloom.  I adjusted the thermostat when we left for a Christmas vacation and we came home a week later to find that I'd accidentally shut the heat off and the house was hovering at 33ºF.  Not a single orchid survived the episode.  The Christmas cacti sulked for a bit, but eventually decided to give me a second chance. 

I restrict myself these days to Zygocactus and Pothos.  Occasional gifted houseplants and the annual poinsettias are held prisoner and then offered as sacrificial lambs to the houseplant gods to curry their favor in the direction of my Christmas cacti.  In place of the ceremonial altar and a flint knife, I have substituted benign neglect and the arid, desert-like humidity of the natural Kansas environment, watering only when I see signs of wilt.

That practice has not been kind to the mandarin orange and lemon tree that Mrs. ProfessorRoush insisted I add to our floral menagerie.  Both trees spend their summers outdoors on the porch, where it is moderately humid and I frequently forget to water them. They spend their winters indoors where the humidity is very low and I frequently forget to water them. 

Recently, I noticed that my fairly spindly orange tree was wilting at the top (above).  "Wait a minute," I thought, "orange leaves don't wilt; they yellow and fall off."  And indeed, on a closer look, I recognized there was a second stem in the pot; a spindly sun-starved basil that presumably was an offspring from one of our herbs, which also spend summers in pots on the back porch.  You can see the second stem better here at the left.

I'm certainly not going to root up this volunteer.  If a weed is just a plant in the wrong place, this "weed" is in the right place.  Mrs. Basil has done me a favor by going to seed and placing an offspring here in this pot to be nurtured.  The rest of the winter, I think I'll just watch the basil as an indicator for watering this pot and the lemon tree next to it.  Maybe both trees will now have a better chance to live to see another spring.  Besides, the basil smells so good.   

 

Slithering Surprise

"Take out the garbage."  "Water the hydrangea." "Refill the bird feeders."  My mind was busy running down a list of things to get done as I walked out the garage door and down the steps at sunrise.  As I turned back around to fill the pail with birdseed, I noticed that I had walked right by this little guy, who was waiting in ambush just inside the door for his morning rodent.

 I'm proud to say that my self-restraint at sudden snake appearances has evidently reached a new level of control. This time, for perhaps the first time, I did not spontaneously levitate, shout, or run.  I merely said "Hi, little guy," took the iPhone photograph above, and walked back past him to get the good camera.



Seeing that Mrs. ProfessorRoush was awake and taking care of Bella, I told her to come out the garage door to see something "neat."  She followed me back outside, took one quick glance, and pivoted back inside so fast she left a scorch mark on the concrete, all while fixing me with a cold stare over her shoulder and telling me never to do that again.  It was an impressive bit of ballet.  Lesson learned; Mrs. ProfessorRoush requires morning coffee before she is ready to deal with snakes.

I took another few pictures, ignored the snake's impertinent and rude tongue gestures, and then gently swept this cute little Common Garter Snake (Thamnophis sirtalis) off the edge of the driveway into the lilacs.   I hope he's learned his lesson and catches his rodents outside in the rocks in the future, saving me from further marital discord or spousal displeasure.

Toad Behavior

So, there I was, rushing home from a trip to Kansas City at 4:00 pm. on a hot Saturday afternoon because I had to go out and mow in the boiling sun and be showered again by 5:30.   "Why," you ask?  Because Mrs. ProfessorRoush, always mindful of social opportunities, had asked me earlier in the week if I would go out to dinner Saturday night with a couple of old friends who were going to be in town.  Ever the indulging and doting husband, I had agreed immediately, not knowing that "going out to dinner" would ultimately also include a plan for visiting my garden prior to dinner.  My garden that I have abandoned to the heat of summer, sans weeding and mowing for three weeks.

The lack of regular maintenance is not as big a deal as you might surmise, primarily because our ample rains of early June ceased around June 20th and we haven't seen a drop since then.  All the prairie grass has stopped growing except for a small rim around the asphalt where the grass gets more runoff.  And weeds have stopped sprouting, except for my Ambrosia sp. nemesis which seems to merely require dehydrated concrete to grow.  So, except for finding a few giants that I've missed, the garden really wasn't too terrible, but I still couldn't let it be viewed in its current condition.

Anyway, at minimum, the fuzzy edges needed to be trimmed, and here was Mrs. ProfessorRoush, trying to talk me out of it, telling me the garden looked fine.  I responded poorly to the discussion, stormed out into the heat, and proceeded to perform my impression of a Tasmanian Devil from a Bug's Bunny cartoon as I rushed about performing emergency cosmetic surgery on the garden.

Why?  Oh why, I ask you?  Why didn't I just point out that impromptu visitors to my garden are no different to me than impromptu house visitors are to Mrs. ProfessorRoush?  She goes into a tizzy every time visitors are nigh, despite keeping a house so constantly clean that I could safely eat off the floors at any random moment.  That simple analogy would have so easily been game, set, and match in favor of ProfessorRoush.  Alas, it seems instead that I was close to testing out my theory of eating off the clean floors for awhile.  

(The toad picture, BTW, is merely for blog decoration and is not a comment on the actions of any individual mentioned herein.)

Distant Drums Doubt

Friends, you would think that an old gardener could catch a break.  Out here on the Kansas Prairie, I garden in defiance of scorching sun, bitter blizzards, desiccating droughts, gale-force winds, rocky soil, and even the occasional prairie fire.  Is it too much to ask if the gardener's wife could cut him a little slack?

I took the picture above yesterday morning when the ground was still wet with dew and I sent it to Mrs. ProfessorRoush after telling her that I thought I'd captured a photo of a rose with exquisite coloring.  After receiving it on her iPhone, sitting in an adjacent room to where I was engaged on the computer, I heard her immediately exclaim "no way!".  And she then proceeded to accuse me of faking the coloration by photoshopping it.  And wanted to know where it was in the garden (even though she passes by it every day).

Mrs. ProfessorRoush is a wonderful wife and human being, but I was deeply hurt that she could suggest I would resort to falsifying a photo to deceive her.  I'm certainly not above cropping out a decaying bloom from the corner of a picture, nor occasionally playing with the brightness/darkness setting of a photo, but I would never, and probably could never, fake a picture like this one.  I don't even own Photoshop.  I do my cropping and compressing on the Microsoft Picture Manager  that comes with the computer.  If I had really faked this photo, I'd have certainly smudged out the insect bites on a couple of the petals.

The photo is, of course, of Griffith Buck's 'Distant Drums' rose, a rose that I've written about before and one that is admittedly not one of my favorites.   The blooms of this rose always have a unique coloration, but this trio went above and beyond their usual palette.  Since it just gave me a chance to astonish Mrs. ProfessorRoush, I may have to raise my personal ranking of 'Distant Drums'.  It's not often that I can gain a little respect at home, even if I have to loudly and fervently assert my innocence to get it.

I liked the photo so much, in fact, that I just made it my "masthead" for the blog.  What do you think of it?

Wanton Whimsy

Gardeners one and all, please forgive me for the crass display you are witnessing.  I took a long step this past week beyond acceptable garden ornamentation, crashing and burning far past the gates of conventional decorum.  I created, in my unsuspecting garden, as you can plainly see here, a bottle tree.

I've lusted for a bottle tree for years and I still can't explain the urge.  It's like I am a Babtist preacher who keeps coming back to Mardi Gras.   I normally strive to maintain a garden that the general public will likely approve of, even as I push back against pruning conventions to the irritation of those who like their shrubbery carefully clipped and marching in step.  The existence of a bottle tree in my garden is a leap far past the line of whimsy for me, a singular incongruity like a wart on a princess.  I've flirted with whimsy before, bringing yet another rabbit statue into the garden, but until now I've stayed on the safe side, refusing to add figures of gargoyles and peeing little boys.

There are commercial bottle trees available, even an entire company dedicated to their creation, but I had to make my own.  For one thing, I felt the commercial trees were too small, usually under 5 feet tall and seldom holding over twenty bottles.  And they're pricey.  And I was worried about anchorage against the Kansas winds.   A bottle tree that has to be straightened after every storm would be exhausting.  So I created my own, cementing a treated landscape post into the ground so the trunk would be over 6 feet tall. I cut rebar for use as "limbs".  Best of all, I can add to it merely by drilling a hole and adding another limb.  I want lots and lots of bottles.

The King of Bottle Trees, Felder Rushing, who himself has fourteen of them, believes that bottle trees date as far back as men have made glass, from back when the belief arose that spirits could live in bottles and that evil spirits could be captured in them. Rushing also relates, and I agree, that blue-only bottle trees are the best.  Doubt me?  Click here to be convinced by a picture of Rushing's blue tree covered in snow.  Mine would be all cobalt blue already, but Mrs. ProfessorRoush and her friends insist on choosing wine for its taste instead of the pretty bottle it comes in.  Consequently, I have only one blue bottle at the moment, but the Internet may come to the rescue since I can buy a dozen cobalt blue bottles there for a mere $19.99.   I think making an all blue tree will really spruce up the bottle tree and my garden. 

(Get it?  "Spruce up my bottle tree?")

 

A Thor Kind of Night.

ProfessorRoush is angry today.  Lightning bolt throwing angry.










We need rain here in the Flint Hills. Lots of rain.  As a result, I've been waiting all week for the predicted rain this Saturday and Sunday.










Last night, we saw this thundercloud form just to our west.  Mrs. ProfessorRoush was excited for me and for the garden.

I watched it, however, with a sinking heart.  Because I saw this pattern all last year.  And I knew this cloud was going to move north and west of us.









And it did.  Oh, we had a wonderful lightning show.  My iLightningcam app triggered off 220 pictures in under 5 minutes. Click on the pictures if you want to see more detail.

I was happy to get the pictures, however, I had to quit because the cats kept rubbing around my legs.  Standing in a lightning storm with cats rubbing their fur all over your legs is probably not a good idea.  Think static electricity.



Not a drop to drink here though.  Another storm also came and went to the south and east of Manhattan.  Nothing.  We've got a 60% chance here today, but nada currently visible on radar.


We'll see.  It's going to get cold here again tomorrow.  There's a predicted low of 27ºF here Tuesday morning.  Maybe it'll snow.  Does anyone else see a sneering face in the middle of this cloud pictured at right?  Cause I totally think it's laughing at me.

Excuse me now, I need to go cover a few baby roses.  And throw some more lightning bolts around.  Stupid weather.



Update 2:46 p.m.;  Got 0.3 inches rain at noon, but the predicted high today was 72ºF.  It only reached 52ºF an hour ago and is back to 50 already with a stiff north wind.   Yesterday, remember we had a high of 86ºF   Predicted low tonight has gone from 38ºF to 32ºF a...a 54 degree swing in a little over 24 hours. And snow is now predicted after midnight.  Tuesday morning's low is now predicted to be 23ºF.  That would be a catastrophe to just about everything...lilacs, roses, magnolias, etc.   Maybe I can mow it all off and just have lawn.....

Interloping Chores

With the return of several days of above-freezing temperatures here, the Flint Hills have at least temporarily morphed from deep snow back to brown grass, and I was enticed outside yesterday afternoon by Mrs. ProfessorRoush to participate in what she envisioned as a nice brisk walk in the sunshine.

Unfortunately, Mrs. ProfessorRoush underestimated my determination to avoid useless cardiovascular exercise and she found herself accompanying me on a few brief gardening chores on the thin-muck-on-frozen-ground that currently serves as the prairie surface.  I pulled the Christmas tree down onto the burn pile, changed the memory card in my garden camera, and dragged Mrs. ProfessorRoush to the pond, where we proceeded to relocate a few bluebird boxes to locations that I hope will entice bluebirds more than the wrens that occupied them last year.  Mrs. ProfessorRoush was a great companion, providing a running commentary of the beauty of the frozen pond while picking her way gingerly through the slop, and thus preventing me from feeling any sense of loneliness in the quiet and peaceful surroundings.   

As is often the case when a puttering gardener is trying to take advantage of a warm day, there were numerous other interlopers besides the lovely Mrs. ProfessorRoush who demanded my time and attention.  Near the pond, we found ourselves being chased down by the donkeys, Ding and Dong, who both seemed intensely interested in the bluebird boxes and who provided close supervision of the move and their advice and final approval of the new locations.  Once or twice, they even had to be swatted away from breathing down the back of my neck while I tightened the screws holding the boxes to the fence posts.  Warm, moist, donkey breath around my ears makes me a little nervous, especially since Ding likes to bite the fingers that give him treats.  I didn't need any Mike Tyson-style ear-mangling events to provide stain the remaining snow.

Soon, I'm sure, Spring will arrive, providing succulent grass to occupy the donkeys and a lack of novelty to outside excursions, and I'll be forced back into solitary gardening, puttering alone with my hands in the dirt. It's a dirty, lonely chore, but one that I'll be happy to tackle once again.
 

Meet Moose and Millie

I'd like to take this pre-Christmas opportunity to introduce you to Miss Millie and her live-in companion Moose.  The pair has settled in nicely over the past month, so I suppose they're going to stay around long enough to let my readers in on their lives.  They are both about 7 months old now and I obtained them from a veterinary student who had promised their original owner that she would try to find a single home for them so that they could stay together.  

Moose

Moose is a Maine Coon cat and will likely be a pretty big boy when he's fully grown and muscled in.  He's withdrawn and calm, moving slowly and meowing quietly and sparsely.  His fur is incredibly long and soft, so Mrs. ProfessorRoush spends a lot of time holding him while the very jealous Millie climbs around her legs and shoulders and demands attention.  Despite his much larger stature, Moose is a pussycat (ouch), allowing Millie to have first chance at the soft food and ignoring her as much as he can.  It is Moose that's going to be my mouser; he's already left me two pack rat corpses to admire.  Unlike many rodents trophies, these happily presented rodents still had their heads and tails so I presume that he's not acquired any culinary interest yet in fresh, warm mouse meat.

Millie

Millie is a dainty tortoiseshell female, with a mischievous and restless nature.  If a cat ever needed Ritalin, Millie does.  She has a needy personality, constantly rubbing around our legs and making us worry about stepping on her while we walk to the barn.  She will play with a mechanized toy that Mrs. ProfessorRoush brought into the barn, but otherwise, she seems to merely exist to eat her weight in cat food and to aggravate the more stoic Moose.

I'm expecting big things from these two, hoping  that they'll keep the mice and moles away from the barn and garden, which, in turn, should decrease the number of snakes in the area as well.  Hopefully these two cats will leave the prairie birds alone and they'll stay around the donkeys at night for protection from the coyotes.

If you are wondering about their names and how they got more imaginative names than "Big Cat" and "Little Cat", it is because I named them myself instead of letting Mrs. ProfessorRoush and the kids have a say.  Millie just seemed like a "Mildred" and my theory in the seemingly random name is that she may be a reincarnated pioneer soul of the last century.  The other choice for naming Moose was "Bubba", and although he seems a little like a "Bubba", the aliteration of "Moose & Millie" was just too good for me to pass up.

Corral Complete

It's been quite some time since I updated you on the barn project, but it is essentially finished, minus a little painting of the iron fencing and a well-chosen corral sign.  Yes, yes, I'm aware that most "oil pipe" fence is left to develop a patina of rust here in Kansas, but at the ripe age of fifty-four I am still apt to climb over the fence rather than walk around to a gate, and I don't want to soil my britches.  My initial plan is to happily spend most of my summers sliding in and out of this "man cave," and rust stains are not part of the vision.

The northernmost third of the barn has been reserved for hoofed critters, hence the "corral".  My original intention was to house a couple of bred Angus heifers for the winter and thus gain the benefits of both the miracle of baby calves while also providing to Mrs. ProfessorRoush some nice grass-fed steaks (the latter individual is an unreformed and unapologetic carnivore).  It has, however, been appropriated by the donkeys and a pair of barn cats for the foreseeable future.  The rest of the barn is storage for the "big green" tractor and its various implements, and the small green" lawn tractor, and various gardening implements that otherwise dirty and clutter up the garage.   

There is something both incredibly calming and deeply biblical about having a barn filled with straw bedding, feed, and living creatures.  I imagine that my blood pressure dropped ten points the minute I started feeding animals again every morning and evening.  There is a peace and stillness in the barn (with the exception, of course, of the donkey's braying at the sight of me), that I haven't had in my life for quite some time.  It may be a -10º wind-chilled trek to the barn, as it is this morning, but it's a short one and it does serve to stir the blood every morning.  Inside the barn will be some hungry kittens and some impatient donkeys, waiting on the stupid primate for some decent sustenance.  It took only two days once the barn was opened for the donkeys and cats to learn when feeding time was.  Creatures of habit, each and every living soul here.

So this is where I can be found this winter, lazily sharpening lawn mower blades and hoes and dreaming of Spring.  The barn cats?  I'll introduce them to you later on, I promise.