Birds, Bees and Bugs

It has been pointed out, ad nauseum, that we have had only 9 days without rain since the 'unofficial start of summer' - Memorial Day. I have heard from some people starting their gardens that the excess water has caused no end of heartache, including flooding and rotten seeds. We tried to plant a traditional garden and we could not find more than one square foot that was not inhabited by rocks, tree roots and various other impediments. So we are trying a 'raised' garden - sort of. We did not build all the nice walls and make it look pretty; we just laid down newspaper, threw purchased soil (cheapest we could find) on top and planted. We surrounded the ugly garden with some fencing that was left in our barn and, amazingly, things are growing! We have already eaten some of our lettuce - we have tasted better, but this is the stuff that we grew! The corn is trying, as is the squash and some basil. That was all we planted, as this is our first attempt, except for some tomato seeds we planted in containers. Those seeds have been lost due to over-flowing container pots, especially after we had three inches of rain in less than an hour, 2 days after we planted the seeds.

Now, we did try to go out and do the traditional weeding, raking and all that, but the bugs have been overwhelming and, well, it has not stopped raining long enough to get anything accomplished. Do not get me wrong, I don't mind getting wet, but the areahas had some pretty impressive thunderstorms, with lightening, wind, etc. Not smart to stand outside in a thunderstorm holding a metal rake!

Mrs. Birdie - our lodger in our breezeway nesting on our motion light - keeps a close eye on anyone who comes and goes through any of the doors - occasionally, harmlessly, flying over our heads to warn us away from her nest. She should be well fed with all the insects this year! The one bug that has not shown up too much this year are the gypsy moths; it seems all the moisture has caused trees to develop a fungus that kills the moth larvae. But nobody told the 'dumb flies' that were brought to the area to eat the gypsy moths - while they don't bite much, they are annoying. And, of course, mosquitoes are more plentiful than we remember - wet, moist weather, duh! We wear the "OFF clip-on" which works very well to repel flying insects, but if they are ravenous enough, nothing stops them.

I have not seen any honey bees either, but that is a national problem. Bumble bees are going crazy on our rhododendrons, which have bloomed late this year, but are glorious. I look at them from inside - way too many bees to get up close. This is Independence Day weekend, the big launch of the summer season around here. Almost as if it were planned, it is supposed to sunny and warm this next week. I will believe that when it happens. The good news in all of this, besides the outstanding flowers blooming, is we have not had to water anything yet. We even gave up collecting anymore rain water - we have plenty.

Our basement is another matter. It could really use some dry time. So could I.