Life on the funny farm

Suddenly it’s nearly Sunday again, and where has the time gone? Well…digging in the dirt is always a way to spend a lot of time around here. Actually, it’s been a case of digging up weeds, digging up perennials and dividing them, digging up manure and adding it to the big bed out back that acts like a swamp, and then adding more soil on top of the manure and rotted straw to create something resembling real soil. Well, it’ll be real soil in a few months; the bed I created this way last year is now soft, friable and delicious looking, although I haven’t sampled it other than in getting it under my nails, ground into my feet, and so on.

It will surprise no one who knows me to find that I’ve been out planthunting again. Yesterday I collected some astilbes and hostas from some people I know in a small community near ours. They have a majorly impressive daylily collection—when I asked Doreen how many they have, she sheepishly confessed, “I don’t know!” Mind you, they just put in some new ones so that may be why they don’t have their count up to date. They also have irises, and while I don’t know if I got this one from them or not, it’s a charmer—a little dwarf that is just too lovely. Pity they flower for such a short time.


To add to the wine and chocolate garden, I had to have this Chardonay Pearls Deutzia. I wish the flowers wouldn’t open—the pearly buds are so charming—but I love the colour of the plant most of all, of course.


In the shade garden, things are still doing well, including the always delightful Virginia bluebells.Mine are young, as I’ve inadvertently dug them up in the past, mistaking them for something else. But this year they’re well labeled and I put two plants close together to start a clump. If they spread—brilliant. Go for it!


I’m not a primrose expert—I’m not an expert on any plant, just a general plant nut—but when I spied this orchid primrose at a nursery, I had to have it. Immediately. And others who saw it as I drove it around with me needed to have one too. I bet the nursery has sold out of them. Wonderful plants! This is my first primrose of this sort, and it’s in the shade garden which stays moist as well as shaded. People are often amazed that under spruce trees could be moist. That’s the benefit of living on clay with springs running through the land, I guess. Astilbes and ferns do well in that bed too.


One of my goals in the past couple of days has been to catch a few of the hummingbirds when they’re swarming. After many attempts, I think we did pretty well with this one, though I have another photo (not as good) with seven in the picture!


Not surprisingly, I’m incredibly sore and tired tonight, but in a blissful sort of way. Because after supper, I initially thought I’d go back to the gardens, but then the big brown eyes of one of my favourite beings (next to my spouse and the cat children, of course, caught my attention:

This is Leggo my Eggo, my Morgan horse. I refer to him as my thousand pound child. He’s a big boy, and a brave, energetic fellow who will go anywhere I ask. Sometimes, he bounces a bit like a dressage horse, doing airs above the ground when we haven’t been out for a while. But he’s a darling. There’s a saying that goes something like the outside of a horse is good for the inside of a human. Three hours on Leggo, up in the woods looking at spring wildflowers, and I’m tired but sore.


And the bad catchildren--four of them, Spunky, Mungus, Simon Q and can you see Toby's eyes? What are they looking at?



Oh. That explains it. Fortunately, they're on the inside, and Mr. Squirrel is on the outside. We don't usually have squirrels up here--they stay in the woods, avoiding the three senior cats that do go outside. Tigger, the oldest of the herd, actually got spry and chased the squirrel last week for about fifty feet before he decided a nap was a better idea.
Tonight, most of the catchildren are in the office with me--hanging out in the windows, listening to the Junebugs glunking and buzzing, and whirring their way up the window screens. Thankfully, the Junebugs are outside, not in...occasionally one gets indoors and it's quite hilarious watching the cats chasing it. Til they catch, eat and recycle it, of course.

More plants next time...but I think it's time for a snooze now. Good night all, and good gardening from beautiful Scotts Bay, Nova Scotia.

The Gold (berg) variations, or mellow with yellow

Not surprisingly, when I went to Bridgetown yesterday to give a talk, I had to stop at a variety of nurseries yet again. I’ve not yet written down the names of ALL the plants but I will tell you that another Green Envy Echinacea pleaded to come with me…and a Pink Spike cimicifuga did the same thing. As did a Deutzia Chardonay Pearls…with lovely gold-green foliage and pearly white buds. The back seat was mostly full, as the trunk was occupied by assorted electronic equipment. (Thank goodness, says my longsuffering spouse, amazed and bemused at all the plants…

This morning I was writing away at my desk and watching a hummingbird flit around the feeder outside my window. With her were a few goldfinches, and out beyond I could see the flowers of Lamiastrum, or yellow archangel. It happened I was playing one of my most favourite pieces of music at the time (on iTunes, not an instrument) Bach’s Goldberg variations, performed on the piano by the inimitable Glenn Gould. Surely this is one of the most perfect pieces of music ever…

...Though the twittering of goldfinches and the zooming of hummers is pretty fine too.
On a whim I went out and walked around to see what has popped into bloom since yesterday. Over the next several months, this will be a regular event, usually twice daily, as we walk around and savour the joy of green growing things flourishing and pollinating and just giving hope to our world.

If I have a favourite colour in the garden, it’s probably blue—but yellow and gold make me instantly happy. Sunlight made flesh, yellow flowers are, and the perfect anodyne to a foggy day on the mountain. Here’s a look at what’s flowering at our garden (now, hum along with Variation one…Dum dum di di dum dum…

Yellow corydalis. Doug Green rightly observes this is surely one of the longest flowering perennials, starting in late May and going until a hard frost takes it out in mid-late autumn. Self seeds politely, never uncouthly.


Yellow lamium. I like this for the gold in the foliage, and the contrasting shade of pink flowers. This lamium is a politely growing plant, less enthusiastic than its cousin lamiastrum, or yellow archangel. I love the lamiastrum too, however, especially as it’s easy to remove if it’s getting too exuberant


Portulaca is a memory garden plant: I put it in containers and at the edge of beds every summer in memory of my aunt Joyce, who dearly loved this plant—and cats. She was my mother’s twin, and always very good to me, and I miss her still.


I’ve discovered that yellow-flowered rhododendrons and azaleas make me very happy too. Golden Lights azalea came home the other day; this is Capistrano rhododendron, (I think)—not yet dwelling in our garden, but probably by the weekend…


As I’ve surely mentioned before, I’ve never met a poppy I didn’t adore. The various Icelandic and alpine poppies especially appeal to me, although I’m not sure of this one’s species. I must go check it. Regardless, its soft yellow colour makes me peacefully content with life.

Jubilation reigned supreme when I realized the yellow trillium was doing just fine, thank you. It has curious flowers, unlike the more showy painted, red, and white species, but between those dainty flowers and its mottled foliage, it’s a jewel in the shade garden.


Yellow globeflowers. I heard someone sneer about these ‘common’ plants that look like giant buttercups. Well, yes, they do…and they’re lovely, happy, wellbehaved plants, and much loved in my spring garden, common or not.

Last but not least on this mellow yellow tour is Thermopsis, or false lupine. We have lupines too, but they tend to come and go, while this plant politely grows in its clump each year, getting a bit bigger and generally minding its pees and queues. It looks great with the Mourning widow cranesbill that grows near it.

We’re only in to about variation 10 in the Goldberg, but that will do for tonight. Perhaps next I’ll do gold foliage. Won’t that be cheery fun?

Catching up with things

It’s been a busy busy weekend, and now I feel like I should be like Simon Q, basking in the sun…

First I jumped in the car on Friday morning to head to Yarmouth to the annual convention of the Nova Scotia Association of Garden Clubs…and to visit a few nurseries along the way. Among my ports of call were three I’d never been to before, which I have to write up and post for other NS readers to check out.



One of them is Woodland Farm Nursery, in Upper Clements (not far from Bunchberry Nurseries), and it is a lovely place, up on the hill overlooking the Bay. Another is Garden of Eatin’ Farm and Nursery in Paradise (Lovely pun, yes? )

What I like is that a lot of nurseries do these wonderful display gardens to show what some of their plants look like planted out and to give us gardeners new ideas about designs.One of my favourite gardens is at Bunchberry Nurseries, as I'm sure I've mentioned before. (I feel like I ought to show them off because they don't have a website--yet.

I rolled into Sandford to my friend Flora’s place about 630—eight hours after I left home. It’s normally a 2.5 hour drive…but when one visits no less than six nurseries along the way….

Flora is one of the most marvelous gardeners I know of. She has this great sense of colour, and she is the propagation princess of the universe. She can take a cutting from anything and get it to root...and she's a great one to share her plants. Her sister and another friend were also staying with her, and I understand that on their way back home, they visited some of the nurseries I told them about--and their car was filled too when they got home.

Saturday morning was foggy in Sandford, but not wet so it was a nice time to wander around Flora's back garden and refresh my soul--and get inspired to try some different ways of planting our yard! She has the best tulips I've seen in a personal garden!



New plants that rode home in the car included:
Half dozen lovely heritage tomatoes
An orchid primrose
The Thujupsis I was talking about the other day
Canada Holly (Ilex verticillata) and Winterberry (Gaultheria procumbens)
Golden Lights Azalea
Lemon Princess Spirea
Another delicious selection of annuals
A lovely copper beech

And when I got home, there was a truckload of soil waiting for me. In between deadlines, you know what I'll be doing!

closeup in the garden

Because i'm up to my ears in deadlines (to say nothing of couchgrass and buttercups in the garden), I'm a bit rushed and don't have a lot of time to update my blog. But I thought a few intriguing photos would be worth a thousand words....

I will plant these tulips faithfully every year, because they are a work of complete and wonderful art in themselves. Meet Apricot Parrot....


Ruby Wedding Astrantia: a perennial that deserves to be more popular than it is, as you can see by contemplating the intricacies of its lovely flowers.


One of my favourite trees is the dawn redwood, with the deliciously cumbersome botanical name Metasequoia glyptostroboides. This is a deciduous conifer like larch (Larix laricina) and an ancient, intriguing tree. Thought to be extinct when first described from fossil records in 1941, live specimens were found in China that same year. It's becoming more popular as an ornamental tree. Mine is small, but growing.


Someday, perhaps I'll get to visit Namaqualand, in southeast Africa, during the spring wildflower bloom.
Until such time, I'll celebrate the wonders of African wildflowers by planting some of the hybrids developed from these plants. This is an osteospermum with the well-descriptive name of Pink-Yellow. Or maybe it's Yellow-Pink?


These are the lovely cones of a spruce, Picea glauca Acrocona (Acrocona Norway spurce). I think spruce are another underused and splendid tree, and while I don't have this one--yet--I'm going to go back to Briar Patch to get it. Sooner than later, too.


Another nemesia in the Sunsatio series, this is Sunsatio Lemon. Though it's not as lemon-yellow as all that, but I sure like it!


Viburnums turn my horticultural self on--there are lovely native varieties, such as V. trilobum (Highbush cranberry) but I love this fragrant darling, Birkwood. Did you know you can get a five foot tall shrub into a Yaris? And that the car will smell divine during the drive home from Blomidon Nurseries?


Another unique tree--the Thujopsis, sometimes called False arborvitae. Its foliage has this surreal, almost rubber-like texture. It again doesn't live here--yet--but will shortly.
Back to my deadlines...hopefully I'll get some planter images up over the weekend, but first I'm off to Yarmouth...and assorted nurseries between here and there. Guess the car will be full again....

A gardener's potpourri

Sunday was another of those ideal gardening days—not too hot, nicely sunny and with a hint of a breeze on the air. We fled the house right after breakfast and stayed outside until muscles simply refused to work further. First on the day’s agenda was a stroll around the property to plantwatch—what’s in bloom? What’s come up today? What’s going to flower? What’s missing in action?


It’s no wonder I’m besotted by blue flowers. Look at Loddon Royalist Anchusa: I could drown in this shade of blue!

A lady at one of my talks told me she gives her husband a tree every year on his birthday. I think that’s a lovely thing to do! Eight years ago, when we first moved here, I gave my dearly beloved a young horse chestnut sapling, about three and a half feet tall. This year, it’s heading for 15 feet, and it’s going to flower, with no less than a dozen definite flowery ‘candles’ (flower spikes) to celebrate its life in Scotts Bay.

One of the best things about garden season is the hummingbirds. As near as we can tell, we have around a dozen of the tiny winged jewels racing around our yard all day every day. The rubythroated hummingbird is the only species that comes to Nova Scotia (and indeed to much of eastern North America, I understand) but that’s okay—these little darlings are a delight to watch. They are voracious for both the three feeders of various types we have around the house AND now for the variety of annuals we’ve put out in part for their benefit. And they’re not a bit shy in coming to ‘tell’ us that the feeders need filling.


Despite the fact that the weeds in the back yard are growing faster the perennials are, my main goal for the day was to plant up some of the containers with a variety of annuals. As many readers know, I’m quite partial to annuals because of the way plant breeders have gone into overdrive creating marvelous colours of foliage and flowers. There’s nothing shy and retiring about my colour sense, either. I always say that in a garden, you can put together combinations that you’d never dream of doing in your home décor or your clothing wardrobe. Take this gerbera—I adore it, though I’d never wear orange!


Nemesia is one of those underused annuals that people need to know more about. Some are fragrant, some come from seed, others are developed by plant breeders, including this delightful Sunsatia ‘Raspberry’ cultivar. Although it’s not one of the fragrant types, the hummers seem to like it, and I excuse its lack of scent as being made up for by its delectable colour.



Last year I planted what were supposed to be a number of Leucojum bulbs, also known as Summer Snowflake. Whether they were mostly kidnapped by naughty bulbnapping rodents or failed to germinate or else were mixed in with snowdrops, I don’t know, but most of what were supposed to be snowflakes turned out to be snowdrops. Except for this one single solitary stem of lovely bells. I’m hoping they’ll multiply and that I’ll find more bulbs this year—properly labeled.


By the time I finished planting, weeding and puttering, it was too late to photograph some of the containers and plants without using the flash—which always muddies the colours too much for my liking. Today was overcast with some rain, though mild, so you’ll have to wait for fair weather to return before I do a photo essay of why I love annuals.

The gardens are pulsing with life, although a few things are still missing in action. I don’t expect to see Lysimachia Beaujolais come up, as we wondered about its hardiness, but I’m starting to worry a bit about our Amsonia, as they haven’t put in an appearance yet. They’re always late—along with gentians and chameleon plant, they’re the last to yawn and stretch and emerge from the soil, but it seems there should be something showing by now. But I’ll be patient—and plotting what to put in if the blue stars don’t show up. There's always something new to try...

A perfect day…

The weather gods smiled on Nova Scotia again today and presented us with a hot, sunny day; ideal for heading off to the south shore, to the lovely community of Port Mouton (pronounced Ma-tooon, although it is French for sheep so you’d think it would be Mooton, right? It’s a Nova Scotian thing…). I was giving a talk to the lovely ladies and gentlemen of the south shore district of the Nova Scotia Association of Garden Clubs. The famous south shore hospitality was in full bloom and we had a great day. The meeting was hosted by the Queens County Gardeners, a wonderful group of green thumbs, and held at Coastal Queens Place, the old schoolhouse which is now a public community access site, a small library, and a craft agora, as well as a marvelous hostel! It’s so good to see old schools restored and kept as the heart of a small community.

Before we got there, of course, we landed at a couple of garden centres. First stop was the remarkable Pine View, in Bridgewater. This is a very large and very diverse, full service garden centre, with a huge collection of annuals, perennials, shrubs and trees. I was focused on looking for a few different annuals to include in my talk, and then of course I can’t pass up perennials ever…and found a few that needed to get in the car too. I’ll report on those next posting, but for now, here’s a marvelous lantana (I’ll bring the tags in from the greenhouse in the morning).

Beautiful place, the only fly in the oinment being a very rude staffperson who snapped at my longsuffering spouse, “this area is for employees ONLY!” He was standing off to one side near some building, waiting for me to stop drooling over perennials, apparently near a potting shed or something. Well, this was his first visit to the garden centre, he didn’t know his way around, and he was just STANDING there! So that was a bit offputting, and she’s lucky I didn’t hear her rudeness. Maybe she hadn’t had her coffee yet. The staff I dealt with were marvelous.

Next stop was Ivan Higgin’s in Liverpool, which is called Cosby’s Garden Centre. I’ve mentioned Ivan before: he’s a whiz of a garden centre operator, plus an artist par excellence, sculpting the most amazing figures out of his own special concrete mixture. These are lifesize sculptures, his winter’s project: I call them Cirque du Ivan! His tulips are still in peak conditions; these brilliant beauties caught my eye, even thought they’re not species tulips, I was very well behaved (fiscally, that is) at Ivan's today and only bought one plant. But I’ll be back next week…and have my eye on one of his concrete wind gods…

After we were done in Port Mouton, even though I’m still full of flu or bronchitis or pneumonia or whatever the heck it’s morphing into, my dearly beloved and I did go a bit further down the shore, as I wanted to go to Lavender Hill in Jordan Falls. This is another jewel of a nursery, a family business, and while it was sweltering hot by this time, we enjoyed visiting with Madeline and Alison, the owners, and picking out a few more choice plants. They always have a wide selection of really excellent plants, usually something I’ve never seen before and I took them out to the car to show them some of the interesting oddities I’ve collected along the way. It’s a challenge for smaller nurseries to get a huge variety in, when they have to buy a minimum of say 100 of a nemesia or a portulaca or a lobelia, and what if people aren’t into new things? SO I take it on as goal to encourage people to try new things—and mostly, people just need to see something new put together in containers to get excited and go for their own colour adventures.

After we left Lavender Hill (with a dozen happy lavender seedlings in the back seat along with other great finds), we headed back up the shore. It was really hot, and I sooked that I needed to go walk in the water at Beach Meadows beach near Liverpool—surely one of the most beautiful beaches in our province.

Some adventurous souls further down the pristine beach were in swimming—or at least splashing—but I contented myself with just walking in the water up to my ankles, and admiring the still life portraits of seaweeds. There are at least six different species of seaweed in this photo—a rainbow of colours, from the underwater tapestry so many will never see. These broke loose in the tide and the gales of wind recently, and swept up the beach. While they’re in water they pulse and heave and shimmer; then once beached they dry and become excellent fertilizer for gardens, or just nutrients returned to the sea. That circle of life thing again.

Back home, the gardens seemed to have grown six inches taller today, and things are eagerly waiting to be planted, including the new treasures we brought home today. Now I’m blissfully tired, being serenaded by spring peepers, and ready to sleep—without thunderstorms tonight, please!

The smell of dirt

The great Canadian writer and thinker Margaret Atwood remarked that "In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt." I’m happy to declare that when I finally slouched my aching bones into the house, I smelled of dirt, sweat, Naturally Nancy’s protective cream, and probably a bit of residual sunscreen. I was also intensely tired but happy.

Every now and again, we have to declare a mental health day. Given events of earlier in the week, and that I have to go away tomorrow to give a talk, today seemed like a good day to do that. As soon as I could, I was outside ready to grub in the dirt. My dearly beloved arrived home with the Tacoma’s box filled with bags of lovely, rich, fragrant mushroom compost from the organic mushroom growers down the Valley. He then proceeded to put a couple near each garden bed for me so that I wouldn’t have to wrestle with them myself. I sort of overdid it yesterday, digging in the manure heap for the well decomposed black muck that the gardens love, then digging up things, moving stuff, hauling around piles of dirt and manure and weeds.

Two days of warmth and the gardens have shaken themselves off and remembered what they’re meant to do. I could almost HEAR things growing; the unfurling leaves of the horse chestnut report that we will have at least 9 blossoms on that dear young tree this year . The mayapples have poked their alien looking noses up out of the soil and in another day will be opening their umbrella like leaves. Which reminds me—I will need to take the axe and the hacksaw to the Darmera peltata, because it desperately needs dividing and is lurching up out of the soil, its thick rhizomes like elephants trunks. I’ll save that for Sunday, perhaps.

Mungus was my able assistant this afternoon, fussing to go out until I relented and put his harness on him. He’s perfectly happen on the harness so long as he can see me—if I get out of his sight, he sits and cries tragically. He contented himself with digging those giant feet in fresh soil, rolling upside down in the grass, and laying flat pretending to be a tiger stalking the hummingbirds. They were too busy arguing over the feeders and the flowers to pay him any mind, supremely confident in their dazzling speed.

I’m not a fan of some common annuals—I like them in other gardens but don’t want them in mine. Impatiens are a case in point—except for New Guinea impatiens, particularly this delicate yellow darling. It and its sister are going into the shade garden where they’ll look quite lovely, I think.

The next photo is a bit of a monumental task, half accomplished already though. This bed was badly weedy with those blasted creeping bluebells (Campanula rapunculoides) and finally I decided the only thing for it was to dig things up, remove the bluebells, and replant. In the progress, I’m also raising the bed about six inches where I don’t have plants that need digging up. First a layer of newspapers, then the old wet hay we used to bank the house through the winter; follow that with a generous helping of well rotted horse manure, and top that off with a couple of inches of soil. I can plant shallow-rooted perennials into it now—well, in a week after some rain and settling—and come fall, it’ll be ready for bulbs too. But it’s slow work and my old aching muscles are well and truly tired! But happy. Long Suffering Spouse doesn’t do bed building/raising although he’d shovel piles of manure for me if I asked. But I can do it. My experience with hiring someone to help turned out rather less happily than I had expected, so whatever I can do is what will get done. He can edge the beds that need edging and I’ll be thrilled with that.

Mungus and I did some moving of plants this evening; I tucked in the tree peony, the Coppertina Ninebark, and the Lime Glow juniper, plus some perennials. I scored a Harvest Moon Echinacea this afternoon over town while in search of annuals for my talk tomorrow, so that will go in with Jade, Green Envy, and another Sunset Echinacea. It would be lovely if they’d all flower at the same time, wouldn’t it? Now I just need a white one again—I find them less hardy than the standard purple coneflowers, but the new Big Sky plants have come back just fine for me.

This little bed has a lot of plants in it, and while most of them are still young, they put on a great show. Stars include Cimicifuga ‘Black Negligee’, Bromus ‘Skinner’s Gold’, Geranium ‘Hocus Pocus’, a variety of pulmonaria, some fall flowering asters, ‘David’ phlox, and ‘El Desperado’ daylily. But there are also blue star (Amsonia), several euphorbia, some pinks of various shapes, a couple of bellflowers, and I expect Raspberry Wine Monarda to put on a great show this summer.

And just a little while ago, we were treated to the first celestial pyrotechnic display of the season. A nice little thundershow, mostly lightning, mostly a few miles off, not enough rain to wash the birdseed off the deck where Long Suffering Spouse spilled it earlier. It’s been a good day. Tomorrow, I wonder what we'll bring home in the trunk? There are always new plants to find....

RIP Quincy, 26 Sept 1998 -23 May 2007

The gods of irony are infinitely cruel at times. When I wrote about our cat children several days ago, I observed that I didn’t have a good current picture of Quincy, the biggest mackeral tabby who can’t stand his brother, Rowdy. There will be no chance to take a photo of him now, as we buried him a couple of hours ago down in the woods. He was hit by a vehicle at suppertime when he bolted across the road.

This too is bitterly ironic. We keep all the younger cats in the house except for occasional visits out in the back yard for several of them. Mungus goes out on a harness, Spunky has no desire to ever go out, and Nibs gets reminded that he doesn’t have any extra legs to spare since playing chicken with a car several years ago. Tigger and Thistle don’t cross the road, and Rowdy and Quincy have always done the stop, look and listen routine. They would go down into the ditch if they heard a car coming. So what caused Quincy to bolt tonight, we’ll never know.

Lowell went into uberprotective mode when he saw what had happened (we saw cars slow down near the house and he went to see what was going on.) He wouldn’t let me go outside, and he went up to deal with the situation. In the past when we’ve lost a cat, I’ve been the one to deal with it, but this time I simply sat down in my office and cried. The poor man who hit Quincy was also in tears; he tried to stop but it happened too fast. At least it was quick—probably a broken back.

There will be some who will say that we shouldn’t let any of our cats out. That’s why five of them don’t go outdoors except with us—only the four oldest cats in the household went out unsupervised. When Quincy and Rowdy and his four brothers and sisters were born in my closet, we lived in another place, in a farm house that was even further from the road. We let them all go outdoors back then, and when we moved here, it was next to impossible to teach them to stay inside. It’s hard enough to keep Simon, Toby and Mungus from bolting out the door when we open it. I’ve already berated myself with ‘what ifs?’ for the last several hours. But I also know that Quincy had a very good life here, that he was loved and pampered and cared for from the moment he was born, and he’s loved now too. I haven’t decided what I will plant in the memory garden for him—a quince would be appropriate in some ways, but I think it will probably be a native tree, because he loved the pasture and the woodlands around our place so much. There’s a big clump of red trillium growing near where we buried him, and it’s peaceful there. He’ll like that.

When we came back up out of the woods, I put the harness on Mungus and we went out in the back yard; me to grub in the garden and he to eat grass and watch birds. I was busy digging creeping bellflower out of the columbines and beebalm, and watching the birds at the various feeders. The ducks that frequent our pond came in to land, and the redwinged blackbirds were up at the feeder with juncos and finches all competing. The Bay is flat calm tonight and the peepers started at sundown, just after we came back indoors. The cats KNOW something is wrong—they always do, and in their wise feline ways they offer comfort.

I think it’s been four years since we lost Tommy Tiger the Crabby Tabby to the road after a raccoon chased him late one night. The next day, we were sitting on the back deck after we’d buried him, feeling very miserable, with Quincy laying nearby. Rowdy came parading across the meadow and the lawn with a great big field mouse. He came up on the deck, marched across to Quincy, and dropped the mouse in front of him. These two ALWAYS fought and glared at each other. Not this day. Quincy said, “thanks”, scooped up the mouse and went off somewhere with it for supper, and Rowdy climbed up on the picnic table to be admired, purring his low, steady purr. And we smiled through our tears, and rejoiced in the love of cats. So it goes tonight, too.

Welcome to our water gardens....

…that’s what my longsuffering spouse told me he wanted to put on a sign outside our property, when he got up yesterday morning. I simply didn’t get up yesterday morning, being sick with a relapse of the flu. Small wonder, given the weather and having gotten soaked four times on Saturday.

We have had monsoons of rain. Saturday was one of those drownpour days, and I had to go to Truro to meet my friend Wild Flora, visit Jane of Woodlands and Meadows Perennials, and give a talk at the Truro Tulip Festival. We got good and soaked at the farmers market, then again unloading and loading my car for the talk. Then I was getting sort of dried off as I drove east toward Antigonish and The Willow Garden, but got soaked again at West River Greenhouses in Pictou county.

The wall of water stopped outside of Pictou, and it was just like a wall—one second it was raining, the next second the pavement was DRY. And while it didn’t get really sunny, it was at least pleasant to Antigonish, where I first stopped at Pleasant Valley Nurseries before going on to Bill and Sharon’s wonderful garden a few miles outside the town.

You know, you can get a lot of plants into a small car if you try. I had a 5 foot tall catalpa in the front seat, a yellow azalea and a Kerria shrub in the back seat, assorted perennials filling the trunk and the other part of the back seat…everything from a ‘Chocolate Stars’ corydalis to a fern leaf Peony (Paeonia tenuifolia ‘Rubra Plena’) to wild bergamot (thank you, Flora!) some merrybells (Uvularia), a 'Destined to See' daylily, a ‘Jade’ Echinacea and white Asclepias incarnata. My tastes are nothing if not eclectic!

When did I get wet again? When I got home of course—the heavens opened as I was moving my new treasures to the greenhouse. We were having some weather coming in off the bay, as so often happens (here's what it looks like in our back yard on a clear, if soggy, Monday afternoon.) Already was feeling miserable with fever and aches, so this about finished me off. Hence I decided to stay in bed much of yesterday!

The sun came out today for a while, but as so often happens after a big rain, it was cool again. No matter. I took more cold medicine and sallied off to work on a project for one of my clients, then retired to putter in the greenhouse potting up containers. At least it was semi-warm in there, and no wind either. While the sun was out, I did take a few photos.


I love poppies. I know I’ve mentioned this before, but they are just so delightful, all of them. This is one of the Icelandic poppies (Papaver nudicaule) and while I don’t know its cultivar name, these are winners in my book, blooming their little hearts out well into late summer. I have a few small alpine poppies too, and just got a brilliant yellow Celandine poppy to add to the collection.



The Yellow Bird magnolia isn’t mine; it belongs to Gerry Frail, owner of Gerry’s Nursery in Centreville, another of my favourite places to leave grocery money—whoops, I mean disposable income. I have to content myself with Stellata and Susan (my two magnolias—not Betty as I wrote earlier!) and maybe next year I’ll succumb to the urge for a yellow magnolia too!

Rhodochiton is one of my favourite annual vines, and it overwinters nicely indoors too. It has a more rude name besides purple bell vine, and I bet you can’t guess what it is!


These little anemones are so sweet—I’ve been wanting some for years, and I hope they’ll settle in and stay with us but in the meantime, I’m enjoying their delicate flowers and foliage very much.

And here we have a mystery: I’m not sure if these are species tulips or an allium, because I’ve lost their label after planting them last fall (surprise surprise surprise) and didn’t try smelling them with my stuffy, achy nose. But aren’t they cute?

Despite the wet, things seem to be doing well, although of course we continue to be about two weeks behind the Valley floor—and about on the same level as Antigonish. I noticed tonight my PJM rhododendron is showing colour, and Ramapo is also starting to flirt a bit. And the grass on the lawn is decidedly growing, though the pasture seems slow. But we’ve now had enough rain for a few days—could we PLEASE have some sun and warmth again? Otherwise, we’ll be growing mushrooms everywhere….

In praise of felines

I sometimes wonder what makes us prefer one animal over another—for those of us who love animals. For those who don’t, well, frankly I’m always deeply suspicious of such people. It's okay to prefer some animals over others--I like some dogs in particular but all cats in general, and heartily dislike goats, monkeys and miniature horses. But I've met people who don't like animals, and i wonder what they do like--and how they treat other people.

I distinctly remember being less than five years old when I discovered I was crazy about horses. Probably my love for cats blossomed at the same time. My grandmother DeLong always had several cats—usually Tabby in colour, and named (according to gender) Babes or Tommy. I was 12 before I convinced my parents that we needed a cat at home, but it wasn’t until I went off to college that my father decided he really liked cats. A lot. (he always pretended to be allergic to them, to not like them, etc etc. Big softy that he was, he adopted a little kitten that showed up at the door one time, and that was the end of the ‘dislike’ of cats.)

Sitting here in the kitchen right now, there are four of our herd hanging out with me. Two have just gone out to take the evening air, but they’ll be back pounding on the back door with their soggy wet paddypaws in about five minutes. Two are asleep upstairs, pretending to supervise my longsuffering spouse (who also loves cats) as he plays on his computer. One is in the basement being a fierce hunting tiger, but when he gets bored he’ll arrive up here to tell me about his brave ventures stalking whatever he was stalking, be it spiders or shadows or actual voles.

I’m ably assisted in my work wherever on the property I am. Outdoors, the four senior cats act as garden consultants, and sometimes, garden rototillers. I could care less about a little disturbed soil or some little parcels in the beds. It all decomposes, after all. Tigger especially loves to assist me by sitting as close as he can as I dig in the garden, his Cummins diesel purr thrumming in pure happiness. Rowdy and Quincy (not currently in the photos as I need a new one) glare at each other territorially, despite the fact that there are hundreds of acres around us including our smallholding for them to roam on. Miss Thistle hurtles around the yard, her taillessness not detracting one iota from her speed. (she was run over by an ambulance as a 3 month old kitten—the paramedics got her fixed up and then called me asking did I know of anyone who could foster a kitten? As if….) The younger catchildren, who aren’t allowed outside without supervision, variously pose in windows editorializing about what I’m doing outdoors, or catching up their beauty sleep.

In the office, there are always helpers. Sometimes it’s Hugh E. Mungus, watching bird television. Most often Spunky Boomerang, who thinks I’m his mama because I rescued him when he and his sister were abandoned on the roadside as tiny kittens, is nearby. His perch of preference is on the desk, either in the corner where he can lay, meatloaf style, and watch for signs that it might be naptime for us, or else behind my computer peeking out at me. Simon Q hurtles in from time to time, attacks the dangerous mat on the floor because it moved—didn’t you see that, Mum?—gets into a rumble with his brother, Toby Soprano, and flashes out of the room at just under the speed of a cheetah.

My grandmother, when she was lost in the fogs of dementia in her last days, brightened up when I mentioned that my love of cats came from her. It was as if a curtain lifted from her eyes. “I was always good to cats, and they was always good to me,” she told me, a stranger to her whereas once I’d been a cherished grandchild, but we shared that connectivity for a moment before the fog descended again.

I should like that to be my epitaph. Because cats are always, always good to me. Even cats whose owners tell me, “he’s not friendly” or “she will bite” or, “he NEVER comes to strangers” appear where I am and sit with me, teaching me their wisdom with their perfect stances and their wise glowing jewellike eyes. And I am a better person for being with cats.

So I’ve added the catchildren of our family to the sidebar of the blog, as does my fellow gardener, blogger and catlover Yolanda Elizabet of Bliss. My blogging buddies are rather like cats, too—I learn so very much from all of them, and am a better gardener—and probably writer, and person too—for their friendships and acquaintances.