Not Tonight, Deer

We travelled up to the Storm King Art Center in New York State to see works by great sculptors like Andy Goldsworthy and Maya Lin and got home just in time to pick another batch of raspberries. The extra day of sunshine made them so ripe, they nearly dropped off their stems into my bowl. And they tasted like candy. I ate half of them before I could take a picture.

I've been growing morning glories along the picket fence between my herbs and the raspberries. Today I noticed that all the leaves on the herb side of the fence had been eaten. The good news is that when I was chasing away a deer I discovered some new flower blooms starting to appear. I'll try to get some pictures tomorrow and hopefully figure out what they are. That is, if the deer don't eat them first!

Picky

Every morning now I go out and pick raspberries for our breakfast while birds sing and chatter in the trees above me. I sometimes get the feeling they'd prefer me to leave the berries for them.

All the blueberries the critters left 

After Saturday's discovery of blueberries by the pond, I googled how to pick them: if they are of varied ripeness in the same cluster, gently roll the cluster between your fingers and the ripe ones will fall off. So I waited a couple days to allow the berries to ripen a bit more. But when I went back to pick them, they were all gone.

Like so many other garden things, picking raspberries here is different from what I've done before. First of all, I'm walking down somewhat orderly rows instead rummaging through jumbles of bushes. The jumble method is how I'd always picked berries before — whether I was picking blackberries in the Berkshires, or along the side of the road while biking in France, or beside a hiking trail while backpacking in Colorado or in my and my neighbors' backyards in Boulder. But also, in Boulder, I had to wait a bit longer for the raspberries to reach the perfect ripeness. They had do be starting to turn a bit blue and loose their sheen. While in New Jersey, the berries grow a strange mold by the time they reach the blue stage. Here, I pick them when they're the color of grocery store raspberries. And they're delicious.

Of course the best rule is to pick berries that slip right off the stem. If you have to tug them at all, they're not ready. That is, if someone else doesn't get to them before you do.

Yesterday evening I scoped out the blackberry patch and saw a dozen or so blackberries that I planned to pick for my breakfast. But this morning, they were all gone. Whoever ate them in the night only ate the ripe ones. (How could they see the black ones in the dark?) It looks like I'm not the only berry lover around here.

Sunday

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

A Berry Good Day

Over 60 people toured our garden on Saturday. I talked to most of them. Quite a few discovered things I hadn't noticed. Others gave me some good advice. All of them were very complimentary.

Blackberries! 

Tiny Wild Blueberries

Here are a few of the things I learned that I hadn't known before:

Beautyberry

• People who go on garden tours are very nice
• Wild blueberries by the pond are ripening
• There are wild blackberries growing under the gigantic Engelmann Spruce by our garage
• The pretty white flower several people asked me about is an Elderberry and I can make a delicious tea from the flowers now or pick the berries when they're ripe -- but I'll have to fight the birds for them
• We have poison ivy (I had been looking for shiny leaves that shone like patent leather but they're more like polished leather)
• In addition to watching out for ordinary ticks, I need to beware of the tiny deer ticks that carry Lyme disease
• Lyme disease is awful
• An unremarkable row of bushes I've wondered about are actually Burning Bush (which I had in Boulder) and they will turn a spectacular orange red in the fall
• The bush with tiny pink flowers above its leaves instead of below is called "Beautyberry" (Callicarpa japonica)
• We should put up a bat house by the pond because it's a perfect location
• There is a small, rare and beautiful purple-leafed redbush tree in our back yard and I was invited to someone's house to see how magnificent it will be when it's mature
• The reason my raspberries are so small is because they're choked with weeds. I wanted to tell this helpful visitor that I had pulled out wheelbarrows full of weeds and she could look at my blog to see proof. Instead, I invited her to help me pull some out. She said she had to go play tennis. 
• There might be a Butternut Tree (Juglans cinerea) by the pond
• There is such a thing as a Butternut nut and it's not just a kind of squash, a ski area in Massachusets or an ice cream flavor

Elderberry Flower

Elderberries

Redbud tree

Butternut nuts -- still to be varified

When I first moved to Boulder, I went to several garden tours and wished that my garden was big enough to be able to include in a tour. I even entertained a fantasy that I could partner with my two neighbors, Anne and Paulette and show our three as one stop. There were no fences and our gardens flowed together nicely. Saturday's tour was so much fun, I wish we had done it.

Imperfectionism

The relenteless reoccurance of weeds brought me to tears today. I will think I had cleared a patch, turn around to tackle a new one, and when I return to the original patch a few minutes later, there are more weeds! I spent roughly 10 minutes a week keeping my little Boulder garden weed-free. But here, I can't even keep weeds from overtaking my small veggie/herb patch. And then, there's the rest of the property -- with a garden tour coming through in four days!

The Weed Wagon

I just have to do what I can and accept my efforts as good enough. There is no space in this vast garden for perfectionism.

Heights, Lights, Highlights and Lows

Heights

Every single day, I am in awe of how tall the trees are on OUR property — 60 to 70 feet. In the previous blog I mentioned the mulberries that are out of reach. But there are other things that seemed to have been perfectly good heights in Boulder that are super sized here.

Looking up at Yucca
instead of looking down

Who knew Yucca flowers
were so beautiful?

Like Yucca, which grew like a weed in the open space. I called them "yuckies" because they were scruffy and the leaves scratched my calves. Only my friend, "B" had a special Yucca that rivaled what grows in practically every yard in my NJ  neighborhood. Even the Yucca flowers are more beautiful.

Dinner plate-sized leaves
on these Hostas

My Hosta plants in Boulder were perfectly lovely -- but they were little shrimps compared to the beauties in our side yard.

Lights

The fireflies have arrived. They sparkle around us while we eat dinner on the patio. It's a shame one has to endure humidity in order to enjoy fireflies.

Highlights

1. We have already made a batch of pesto from the basil. The plants grew as much in the last month as it would have taken all summer to grow in Boulder. 
2. We're now having home grown mesculin salads. 
3. I picked about 4 dozen red raspberries this evening, plus one tiny black raspberry and a not-quite-ripe blueberry (I couldn't wait).

Lows

I had taken a couple days off from weeding to give my aching hands a break. Then yesterday, I fell while bike riding -- and landed on the achiest joint. So, the weeds have gotten an even longer reprieve. Then I hear from my friend, "B" that he took a real vacation and quickly had his weeds under control when he got home. Maybe he could vacation in New Jersey and teach me some more efficient weeding practices. I promise I won't take him bike riding.

Getting Caught Up

Today's Daylily

Plants and flowers are blooming and then fading so quickly, I'm having a hard time enjoying their brief appearances. Yesterday I looked out toward a planting area I had weeded a day earlier and saw a new orange bloom: a gorgeous daylily (hemerocallis). Today, there were two of them.

Pink Peonies

White Peony

It was only a couple weeks ago that I was anticipating the 21 peony bushes blooming. Then I missed seeing most of them. The days of 90°- plus weather and no rain wilted them when I wasn't looking. The Siberian iris disappeared as quickly.

Mulch Madness

The 3 remaining cubic yards of mulch 

Mulch nicer path

Next Saturday, June 25 from 10 AM to 2 PM, our garden will be part of a garden tour. So, I've been working against a deadline to spread the 10 cubic yards of mulch we had delivered. First, I've had to weed. Then I've put down an experimental new weed mat -- the New York Times. Our new subscription was quickly piling up and I figured turning it into weed mat would be a good way to recycle all that newsprint.

Mulch nicer entrance

Foxgloves, dianthus and roses

The garden tour is supposed to emphasize green growing practices so I mentioned that I make my own compost. That prompted a local Girl Scout to seek my expert advice. She and her mother visited on Thursday to interview me and take movies of me stirring my compost pile and showing off all the worms. I saw her display today at the Farmer's Market and she taught be things I didn't know. For instance, you don't use protein because it slows down the process.

Berry Good News

For the last week, I've picked about a dozen rasperries a day from our raspberry jungle. There are other berries and brambles that are showing up as well. Some, I'll have to wait to see what they become. All I know is that they're pretty tough survivors to pop up among all the weeds and still yield some fruit.

Raspberries

Blueberries!

Surprise bramble

And as a special added bonus, Mulberry trees are dropping fruit all over the neighborhood. The ones in the picture below fell from our next door neighbor's tree. Unfortunately it would take a 6-foot ladder to reach a branch and pick some. I'm reminded of the Mulberry trees I used to snatch fruit from in Boulder. So now, when I find reachable branches on other trees, I remember fondly the tree at the entrance to the open space trail behind our old house. Though, I have to admit New Jersey Mulberries are juicier and tastier. Humidity is good for something.

Mulberries

Possibilites

The raspberries are getting ready!

Home grown salad greens any day now!

Words, Trees, Flowers, Keys

While my cat, Beans was stalking a chipmunk early this morning, I chased away a deer that was nibbling on wild berry bushes 10 feet away. Hopefully, it warned the chipmunk in time.


WORDS:  I'm really pleased that I've heard from some of my gardening friends in Boulder who are reading this blog.


Friend "A", whose vegetable garden I always admired and envied reported that her spinach, mesclun, radishes and scallions have come up.


The two rows of carrot seeds I planted have yielded a single, lonely half-inch tall sprout so far. The chard sprouts are doing a bit better, popping up along 1.5 feet of a 6 foot long row. On the bright side, I expect to be making salads with the mesculin mix in a week or so and the zucchini seem to be progressing. Even the withered potatoes I planted on a whim seem to be sending up hearty looking leaves.


Friend 'B", whose flower garden rivals the spectacular perennial garden at the entrance of the Denver Botanical Gardens, is ahead of his weeding thanks to several days of rain that made it easy to pull them up.


TREES:  Friend "A" and her neighbors have planted Braeburn and Honeycrisp apple trees. She didn't report the progress of her cherry tree. Seems like it's about time for her to be calling all her friends to reap its bounty. I'll miss the pies and sorbet I used to make.


Apparently this property once had numerous apple, pear, peach and cherry trees that aged out over the last 15 years. There's a lawn now where the trees used to be -- and where the deer was nibbling this morning. If I can catch up with the weeds here, I might allow myself to fantasize about putting in some fruit trees. And while I'm at it, I'll fantasize that the deer leave me some fruit.


FLOWERS:  The "magnificent flower" in my previous blog turns out to be a Mountain Laurel (Kalmia latifolia). The plant that I thought was a tree by the screened porch is actually a leggy shrub. I'm enchanted by the structure of its flowers.


KEYS:  Look what I found while stirring the compost: