We had two large hornet nests in the spruce that overhangs our back deck, here at Anchovy World Headquarters. Normally, I'm a live and let live kind of guy when it comes to wasps and hornets, but this was beginning to be a problem, so I called in the experts. They use long poles, spray insecticide foam into the nest from the end of the pole, then cut the nest out of the tree. We thought there was only one, but once that was down, we saw clearly the bigger one in behind it.
One of the two main stems of this maple crashed down in the storm today. This is about 3 blocks from Anchovy World Headquarters. On closer examination, it's amazing the tree stayed up as long as it did. Well over half the trunk was rotted and along the top where the trunks join, there are several large bracket fungi feeding off it. The neighbourhood weekend lumberjacks cleared the street with chain saws early this afternoon, and the street was passable again by the time the city managers came by and put up some pylons. There were a number of houses in the neighbourhood that had trees damaged from the storm today. The tree in the photograph was the most dramatic I saw.
This article from the Toronto Star caught my attention.
The garden-lover's version of Lavalife was launched in Toronto this week by a group of diehard food-growers. The site, SharingBackyards.com, posts ads from green thumbs looking for sunny spots to dig in and "brown thumbs" who have the land, but not the time or gift for growing food. In exchange for their soil and water, they get half the bounty.
The idea is to match unused space in the city with people who want to grow food on it.
Great idea!
Yesterday morning, as a nice breeze came off the lake, I heard a drum-roll from the trees. The breeze found the silver maple out back releasing thousands of maple keys that rattled through the branches, spinning to the ground.
Today I added a pair of trellis' to the new garden at the side of the house, for the clematis to climb on. I also created the new smaller back garden. The light is really odd in these shots. A dark cloud had come by and we had a little rain, and then the sun came out for just a few minues. That's when I took the garden shots.
This weekend, I plan to build another small garden out back. This one will be like a little peninsula emerging from the wooded area, relating with the oval garden. This one is going to be a hosta garden.
I'd also like to do some weeking on the front gardens. They really need it. Hopefully the weather is better tomorrow than it was this evening. We had quite a thunderstorm. In fact we were out walking Memphis through much of it.
Over the past couple weeks, we have experienced squillions of little wee insects, that swarm in clouds over our yard and all around the area. My fly fishing experience suggests to me that these are midges, aquatic insects that have emerged from the shallows of the lake. The swarms are likely mating frenzies. There are enough of them that I've been swallowing a number of the little insects inadvertently each day. Fortunately they don't bite. Other area residents tell me they will disappear soon.
Yesterday I made a new garden at the side of the house, right near the side door. This area is partly shady, and had been overrun with lily-of-the-valley. I dug out the lily-of-the-valley and moved it to other shady areas of the backyard where I'd like to encourage it. I removed all the bits I could because this plant is pretty aggressive (spreads by rhyzomes) and I'm sure it will try to come back. I actually moved a lot of soil with the plants, then put down some newspaper and then added triple mix on top of that to form the new garden. When we first moved in, we hired an arbourist to clean up tree branches from various trees around the property. I used some of the offcuts I've had piled up to form the edging for this garden.
We also bought a flat of impatiens yesterday and I added them to the first garden I made to spark up the colour until the perrenials start to grow in.
Memphis makes friends with Roscoe
One of our best garden centres was having a customer appreciation day today, meaning 20% off on everything. I showed up at 9:30 a.m. and already both parking lots were full and the place was packed with gardeners. I bought some astilbes and some wood trillium and a bleeding heart. I'm meanwhile busy rehabilitating a garden overrun with lily-of-the-valley. I'm digging out the plants and moving them to another part of the garden, then adding new soil and replanting the garden. I somehow doubt I'll be able to eliminate it from this garden entirely, but I think I can slow it down some.
This week we're having the last of the electrical work done on the house. This includes a light over Sheila's studio door and a light on the deck, some hard-wired smoke alarms and some new lights and a ceiling fan in what we call the tree-house room above the garage. It also includes a dedicated line to Sheila's studio for a heater in there (it used to be the garage and so it isn't heated by the furnace).
A while back I found some interlocking cement items cast aside along one of the edges of our back yard. I decided to reclaim them and use them to create a raised perennial garden. I wanted to raise the garden because the maze of tree roots back there make digging one very difficult. I brought in a load of triple mix, and spent part of the day moving it from front to back, supervised my our bear of a puppy.
The whole back yard is quite shady, and with all the mature trees around, I decided to make a garden with a woodland feel. I planted some of the big ostrich ferns. These get up to 4 feet tall and are quite dramatic. They're also the ferns used as edible fiddleheads in Southern Ontario.
Spicecat gave me a container with two plants in it. One is Lysimachia ciliata "Firecracker", a native wildflower known as fringed loosestrife (not to be confused with purple loosestrife, an invasive weed in Ontario). The other plant in the bucket is Polyganatum, or Solomon's Seal, a herbaceous plant of the lily family.
I added three different Coral Bells. I had Coral Bells at Blackthorn, in the partial shade of a Japanese Maple. Based on that experience, I think this spot should have enough light for these plants. At least I hope so.
I planted one red-leafed Mukdenia "Karasuba". I think this plant would like more sun than I have but I think it will tolerate our conditions OK.
I planted half a dozen little Labrador Violets in the biggest holes.
Finally, I planted two Foxgloves, a Camelot Rose Foxglove and a Camelot Lavender Foxglove.
It still looks pretty empty, but give it some time, and it should make a fine garden. In the meantime, I may supplement it with a few annuals for colour.
Looks like rain tonight. Perfect.
I started three weeks of vacation today. I'd like to say I was ready for a vacation, but then, who isn't? I decided to take the time to work with our new pup a little each day, and at the same time, do some work around the house.
Today I did some work on the front garden, moved around where we keep our various garbage and recycle bins at the side, and improved a bark chip path that forms the access to the back yard. Tomorrow, I have a couple yards of triple mix coming, and I'm going to work on making a raised shady perennial garden in the back. I found some interlocking blocks that had been discarded along the edge of the property and decided they would be fine for forming the garden.
I'll take some garden pictures and post them tomorrow.
We're still waiting for the desktop, which we should have sometime during the week. It goes along the bottom of the window and around the bookshelf on the left. You can't see too well in that darker picture, but there is are drawers on both the left and the right. The space behind the cabinet that sticks out into the room is for the dog kennel. Yes, that means we're definitely getting a pup. She should be on-board in early May.
There's still some work to go and lots more painting but it's getting there...
Over the past week or two, I've noticed more and more birds around the house. This morning, when I walked out the door, I was greeted by a symphony of bird-song. Delightful. Spring is in the air.
We're turning what was the living room of our house into a library/den/office space, since the big room above the garage really takes the place of a living room. The library will feature several large built-in bookcases along with a 12-foot desk, plenty of drawers and loads of cupboard space too, under the book shelves. A friend our ours from the old neighbourhood is making doing all the millwork. All the cabinets are basically in place. We're waiting for the desk-top, which should come this week. Meanwhile, the whole business has to be painted and that's keeping us plenty busy.
Right now, a chunk of the space in the room above the garage is being taken up by boxes of books, all of which will soon disappear into the bookshelves. That's going to be quite a job too, but a fun one. I'll post pictures once we have books on the shelves.
