Digging the Dirt: Garden Visitors and Garden Invaders

debra roby — Wed, 23 Aug 2006 17:34:36 -0500

When Yvonne Cunningham convinced her husband to plant a 2 acre meadow, she thought it would primarily eliminate the need to mow that spot very often. (meadows are typically mowed once or twice a year). What she's discovered is that

Of all the garden areas we have, I enjoy the meadow most because it attracts masses of birds and butterflies and it doesn't have to be weeded.

She shows the beauty of the July meadow in the height of bloom, and highlights a late summer winner: meadow blazingstar (liatris ligulistylus shown) which "is an amazing butterfly magnet â€“ we often see four and five Monarch butterflies on a single flower stem, and as a bonus the seeds are a goldfinch favorite."

If you wish to attract Monarchs to your garden, The Wildlife Porch has five suggestions.

Farm Girl, writing from her personal garden blog, is beginning to plant her fall garden, and writes about all one must consider when doing this.

Susan of Takoma Gardener has some 'splaining to do , too. But she makes up for it with her article at Garden Rants on photography in the garden.

Let me end this review with one of the funniest garden bloggers! Genie, The Inadvertent Gardener, is having all kinds of adventures!! She is dangerous with scissors (even when not running), and a threat to tomato-tasting bunnies and her own ankles:

I found a not-really-ripe, but-sort-of-smooshy-and-gross tomato with awfully suspicious toothmarks in it, and threw that at the rabbit with all my innate pitching skill. It moved at the last minute, so I missed it, which is probably good, because I would have had a hard time explaining the unconscious rabbit to you, the reading public, and to Steve.

Then I chased the rabbit around for awhile, running clumsily in my ridiculous Target faux Chinois flip-flops that have about five-inch platforms and that have lost any elasticity in the top straps, so every step takes me just millimeters from certain doom when my foot plunges to one side, and I either go down hard and crack a rib, or stay up and break an ankle.

I love those great choices. Particularly when Iâ€™m running like an idiot after a bunny. I used to hold a high school record in the 500 metersâ€¦youâ€™d think Iâ€™d know better, at 33, than to run in unstable flip flops. This gardening thing puts me over the edge.

Then the bunny went and hid in my squash plants. I stopped running like an idiot, but stood there yelling at the terrified bunny. â€œGet out of there!â€? I yelled, quite glad that none of my neighbors were in their respective yards. â€œThat is totally unacceptable! Get out of the squash plant!â€? I was also quite glad that Steve had gone to the store, although now heâ€™s going to find out about this through the blog instead.

But this is not another post about the rabbit.

photo credit: Yvonne Cunningham.

Debra Roby blogs her art at A Stitch in Time and her life including garden at Deb's Daily Distractions .

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Digging the Dirt: Garden Visitors and Garden Invaders