I was talking to someone yesterday and he mentioned that his neighbor's weed-whacker stopped working and brought it over to him to have a look at. Shortly after his own weed-whacker stopped working. He took it to a repair shop and it was the ethanol in the gas that was responsible. It corrodes some of the inner workings that aren't made for ethanol. The Red Witch does not have a problem with her whipper snipper because hers is electric but, for people with acreage, being plugged in makes it impossible to get to the outer reaches of your property. So, a tip for you, try to get alcohol free gas for the whipper snipper.
We know Lunasceiling does not need this tip because she is never going near another weed-whacker in her life.

You know - you work hard, you plant trees and flowers and it takes years for your garden to mature and look good - and then the bugs move in and try to kill everything in sight. I do not mind the flowers so much, they are easy to replace but trees are expensive and they take so many years to get to a good size. I am feeling a little discouraged at the moment. I have read that there has been a huge outbreak in aphids this year due to the collapse of the ladybug population. There has been a huge explosion in ants too which goes hand in hand with the aphids since they farm them. But now, I have mealy bugs on my Eastern White Pine!! I have seen them before on my orchids and it is a challenge to kill them before they kill the orchids due to the fact that they like to hang out where the leaf meets the stem. On a pine tree that leaves lots of places for them to go.
In case you find it hard to believe that this far north, I have mealy bugs on my tree, here is a photo,




Not only do I have mealy bugs but there are also clusters of spider mites on this tree,




The tree is has been there about four years, is well established and starting to get to a decent size. I had another Eastern White Pine that I lost to disease so this is my second attempt, though not in the same part of the garden. If I lose this one, I am giving up and planting grass here.
I read some online suggestions that isopropyl alcohol applied with a Q-tip is effective but I am never happy to use that stuff. I worked with cars in the past and whenever I had to wipe them down with isopropyl alcohol to prepare them for painting, I came down with respiratory infections even though I was not spraying it. So, needless to say, be careful if you try this and keep kids and pets away. I tried it. It seems to work but I will need to apply it repeatedly until I get all the newly hatched ones. It is not supposed to damage the tree at all and so far it has not.
I also used it on the spider mites and they curled up and died as well but did not find it helpful with aphids so I will be back to direct blasts from the hose on them.
I also read in a local newspaper a suggestion that ants do not like cinnamon. This is a new one for me but I am trying it out. It has only been a day but it seems to reduce activity but not eliminate it. The jury is still out on that one.



It is not all bad news. I did succeed in saving the Arrowwood, viburnum dentatum this year. I cut it down to the ground to eliminate any viburnum leaf beetle eggs and it did grow back from the roots. There were a few beetle larva on it this spring but I killed them. Then there were aphids and I killed them. It is bug free for the moment and looking good, if it is a big small.

I have been spending too much time ranting about bugs. It is time for some good news or happy thoughts.
This is a sample of what is blooming in my garden this morning.




Carpathian Bellflower, campanula carpatica, this poor plant has survived being moved four times. That is hardy.




It is some kind of mullein, possibly Moth Mullein or verbascum blattaria, but don't quote me on that.




Rue, ruta graveolens, has pretty flowers but it is also a hard working herbal. It repels basilisks but, in case you have other pests in your yard, it is rumored to also ward away Japanese beetles, aka June Bugs. I was looking for more to plant around my garden since the June bug repelling gets me very excited but I couldn't find any. No matter. There are dozens of seedlings around this plant; I shall dig them up and transplant them.

The old camera died and I have a new one that takes better close ups of flowers like this digitalis



or this cranesbill geranium,



and this Columbine



Beauty, eh?

It seems like a lot of people are having problems with ants and aphids this year. Soapy water works for killing ants. I have been using it in my yard. My husband who wanted something store bought, was not impressed with the diatomaceous earth. A bottle of Ivory dish soap retails for about $2.49 at the local grocery store and will go a long way. It tends to fry the leaves on plants so it needs to be well diluted if you are going to use it on aphids but a direct blast of water from a hose works very well for those pests.

It has been cool and rainy these last few days but today I wandered out to see what is happening. Someone mentioned to me that because the winter was so severe and the spring so cool, that things are two weeks behind. So I went to see if my lily is growing. Nope.
I also went into the backyard to drop off a new purchase: two Arctic Kiwi vines. I am giving up on the Highbush Cranberry. While I was inspecting the plants, I noticed my two mugho pines were covered with pine sawfly. Hundreds, maybe even thousands of them. So I spent an hour with a bowl of soapy water scooping the worms off the pines with a Tupperware lettuce corer (a prize I won at a party long ago but had not used much before today). I had to crawl deep into the plants to get them and I am still itchy, feeling like there might be a couple of strays that landed in my hair and are crawling around. Ugh!!
Then I noticed my Bridal Veil Spirea was loaded with aphids. Out comes the sprayer with more soapy water but what is going on? Was not the spirea one of those old reliables that people planted because they are problem free? It will be a while before my Diable Ninebark starts picking up again. It is enough to make a gal pave over her back yard and give up on gardening.
Here is a link to pine sawfly in case you want to know what the squirmy bastards look like,
http://woodypests.cas.psu.edu/FactSheets/InsectFactSheets/html/European_Pine_Sawfly.html
And as you might tell from the link, they are not from hereabouts so feel free to squish them all.

I noticed a quote somewhere attributed to Emerson - "Earth laughs in flowers"
The full quote from Hamatreya is,
"Earth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud, proud of the earth which is not theirs;
Who steer the plough, but can not steer their feet
Clear of the grave."

And this quote attributed to Emerson is nice too,
"“For every minute you are angry you lose sixty seconds of happiness.”
but none of the sites listing it could say where it came from so consider this one questionable.
I would be willing to bet Thoreau has a thing or two to say about flowers.

My Diablo Ninebark was looking a little worse for wear and tear this week and I discovered it was infested with aphids. I think that was the worst infestation I had ever seen. Aphids are the main reason you do not want ants in your garden since they farm the aphids and will kill ladybird larvae which are their natural predators. I hosed the plant with soapy water and it worked gratifyingly well.
Soapy water did not work as well on the viburnum leaf beetle larvae but then I did not expect it would. A direct blast from the hose got many of them but it meant going leaf by leaf. I cut both viburnums to the ground but the Highbush Cranberry is still covered with the larvae. The Arrowwood is doing well however. I am still unwilling to give up on the viburnum trilobum but it is not looking good.
No sign of the Monarchs up north here yet. I have been watching out for them. No sign either of my giant dragon lily, drat. I will have to buy another. Most of what I planted, where the raspberry bushes had been, did not survive the winter. There is one little bud on the grape vine that I thought had perished so it pays to wait a little until summer is really and unambiguously here. There were reports of snow and hail not too far north of me last weekend and, one year, we had frost in the first week of June that lasted for three nights. No sign of last year's nests being inhabited this year but I am glad that I will be able to trim my hedge without fear of scaring hatch-lings. That is it for me, how is your garden growing?

As if tending her own sizable garden is not enough, a Red Witch has taken on the challenge of tending a wildflower garden and vegetable patch at the Willow Creek Supply Depot, most commonly known as Fort Willow.
The vegetable garden is simply a demonstration of native plantings called the Three Sisters, maize, beans and squash. Since ours is just beginning to grow and there is nothing to show you, here is a link to a website on how and why you would do it. http://www.reneesgarden.com/articles/3sisters.html
The land, that the Fort is on, used to be pasture land but trees have been planted years ago and the site is slowly turning back to what it was before the Europeans came. At least as much as is possible in this day and age with the North American Elms all but gone and the viburnums and possibly Ash trees about to join them.


Last week I saw some Columbines growing, Aquilegia canadensis and of course I took a photo.


False Solomon's Seal, Maianthemum racemosum


Wild Blue Flax, linum lewisii, discovered by Lewis and Clark. When you find them, you get to name them.

The week before this, the gentleman who owns the property next to the Fort in the Minesing Swamp, took me for a hike one mile into the swamp. I was hoping to spot some orchids but they were done blooming. He told me that the orchids have slowly been disappearing from the swamp because collectors keep trespassing onto his property and trying to dig them up. He has found things left behind by some of these people. It is so sad.
It is impossible to dig up orchids in the wild. They have roots that stretch for a meter in all directions and they are not hardy. Damage the roots and they die. Collectors are the main reason so many native orchids are endangered.
I was visiting a place one time where there were literally hundreds of Lady Slipper orchids. I will not say where but I do understand the temptation to dig one up. I was sorely tempted. They were all so beautiful but this is all I took, this photo.



It really is the only ethical thing you can do if you find an orchid in the wild. There are so many exotic varieties that resemble the Lady Slipper that you can grow at home, see entry of May 12, that it does not feel like you are settling.
Anyway, it was a difficult hike into the swamp and back out again. I was so red in the face, huffing and puffing, by the time I got back to the Fort that I had to sit down and put my head between my knees. There is no trail there. My guide, who is 74, was not even winded.

I was out shopping for annuals yesterday to fill in some bare areas that I don't want to be weeding all summer. I spotted a foxglove called 'Candy Mountain' which sparked a round of "Candy Mountain, Charlie, Candy Mountain." to drive my daughter crazy. Thanks to Rattlesnakeroot for posting a link to that video.
I have been weeding this week and checking out what has made it through the winter and what has not. It looked like my blue rose died but there is one tiny little shoot at the bottom, soil level. I probably should have wrapped the shrub up. Maybe next fall. The black dragon lily does not appear to be growing yet either. It is different from the day lilies but they have been growing for weeks. My anemones don't appear to be growing either or my purple foxgloves. It might have been a harsh winter because I also seem to have lost one of my grape vines. I would not mind replacing them with Arctic kiwi but it has been impossible to find this year.
I want to do some vegetable planting but someone has sprayed corn gluten all over the place so I will have to wait a couple of weeks. It is of no matter since they were calling for snow last night. It did not snow (as far as I know) but it sure was nippy. I must go check to see if my impatiens survived the night.
Here is a photo of an area around downtown Toronto. It is simple and pretty.

This weekend, I was sitting around and my honey came home with an orchid for me. This one.



There was no tag so I could not tell you the latin name but it is pretty.
It reminded me that I have not posted here in a while. It is definitely time. While I was at the gardens of the Butterfly Conservatory in Niagara Falls, I saw this plant,



Reminds me that I have not reread Lord of the Rings in a really long time. I should get it out and, while I am at it, I should make a list of the plants named in the book, especially the names of the men of Bree and show what they all look like. Here is a start - Butterbur, the innkeeper. That is one of the really good scenes in the book; at Butterbur's inn where the hobbits joined the common room, made fools of themselves while Aragorn sat in the corner, silent and mysterious. And who knew a guy like Butterbur could be BFF with a wizard?

Yesterday, while driving my daughter around, we passed the honey wagon. Does anyone still call it that? I think I have been living in farm country too long because it does not even stink anymore. I thought it smelled rather sweet. Manure certainly does make fruit and vegetables sweeter and more nutritious. It is the only fertilizer I use in my yard, although I will admit to occasionally using Miracle Grow.
The spreader was spraying the manure all over the field, a far cry from the days when people went out with a wagon and a shovel. I had the experience once when I had an allotment garden that I rented from the city of Toronto. A male friend had a cousin who owned a horse farm and he offered to fill up the back of his pick up truck with uncomposted manure and help me shovel it. That was in the days when I was still cute enough for someone to want to dirty their truck with manure for me unasked. *Sigh*

There are others that come sooner but, in my garden, it is the crocuses that bloom first. Mind you, this year, the daffodils looked like they might be out before them. There was a lot of leaves and the like on the crocuses so I have done a little clean up yesterday. Cut things down to the ground that need to be trimmed off. One of the leaves had a ladybug on it so I hope I am not cleaning up too soon. I like ladybugs, they are very beneficial in the garden. And cute too.
Here are my crocuses.

In in the forefront you can see the daffodils growing. The rest of the greenery is tulips and hyacinths.




As you can see, there is a sidewalk here and some things get trampled and the snow removal and salter gets some other stuff so this is all hardy enough to withstand the barrage.

When the robins come home, it means it is spring, does it not? Well, the kids have a snow day today because the county decommissioned the snow plows and there is 20 cm on the way. It has already begun and the view out of my back door is this,




The storm has only just begun. The view is going to get worse. Waaaahhhhhhh!
Anyway, before I turn into the Weather Channel, the view it supposed to be like this,




Okay, it does not normally look this green this early in April but it is a spring photo. Notice the blossoms on the apple tree. *Sigh* Someday.

I was out walking yesterday and spotted a Robin on a telephone line. It must be spring. My first robin!! And on the way back, I saw two more fighting in the middle of the street over something. Perhaps they were fighting over some girl robin but I could not see her anywhere.
I raked a bit of the boulevard yesterday. The boulevard is the grassy area between the sidewalk and the road; it does not belong to me but I maintain it anyway. I have a lot of boulevard to look after since I have a corner lot. There was still a bit of ice along the curb and the ground is still frozen so I did not put a great deal of effort in to it. One year, after all my neighbors had raked their boulevards, we had a late snow, the snow plows came around and all that sand ended up right back on the grass.
No sign of my crocuses yet but I have some daffodils growing.

I was reading an article in today's Toronto Star about the Emerald Ash Borer, another gift from trade with China, that has been devastating the ash tree populations in the U.S. and Canada. It seems we are losing the fight and losing the trees and now seeds are being cryogenically preserved so that the dna of these trees will not be lost forever.
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/601606
It does not appear that there is an effective pesticide against this insect. Quarantine zones have not been working because people keep violating the ban and moving wood from inside the zone to outside without it being inspected. I guess, for some people, money has its own moral code in which anything is permitted.
The bug has been found in a county 20 minutes south of here so it is a matter of time before it reaches my county and my green ash will be under attack.

After the devastation caused to my viburnums, by the European pest, viburnum leaf beetle, I do not think I could stand to see my tree go. It is the largest tree on my street.

There are two issues of Martha Stewart that are generally worth buying, if you do not normally buy her magazine. The December one is excellent for crafts and cookie recipes and the March one, which is the gardening issue.
The gardening issue has beautiful photographs and it was Martha who made me realize how beautiful a Hellebore could be.
There is an article on roses and fragrance with lots of beautiful photographs, a garden in New Hampshire which is more than my garden ever will be, suggestions for sloping or hillside gardens, lilacs, tomatoes, watering plants and some great recipes for St. Patrick's Day. I have yet to have anything I have cooked from her magazine recipes not turn out.

One year, we visited Paris at the end of April when the lilacs were in bloom in the garden of the Tuileries and you could sit by the pond without a jacket and watch the kids throw pebbles into the water. Paris has many gardens left over from the times when kings could say "Okay I want a garden here, everybody out!" Money was no problem because you could always raise taxes. It seems like fountains were popular items too. Extravagantly large fountains. When I visited the gardens of Versailles, it seems like it was the fountains I was snapping photos of. Unfortunately since it was still early in Spring, the fountains were not turned on.
So my first photo is of the Orangerie, which is right next to the main palace. There are several smaller palaces in the gardens for when the royal family wanted some rest from 'official functions and rituals'.




There is a little too much pavement for my liking. It must be a brutally hot place to stand in the summertime. Have a look at the stairs, that descend from the balcony that I was standing on into the garden, because I have a photo of those to show the size and scale of things in the garden.




Look at the people standing at the top of the stairs!! Everything was large in the garden! This canal behind the fountain with the golden statues is the Grand Canal where the royal family watched naval battle re-enactments.




I came home soon after visiting Versailles and I looked at my modest little garden with much disappointment but then I do not have an army of gardeners and grounds keepers helping me. And, after looking at the formal gardens, a little formality crept into my English country garden.
I was looking at this photo taken from on top of Notre Dame cathedral and I noticed a beautiful little square.

It is across the Seine, next to an old church called St. Julien le Pauvre, which is so old that Gregory, Bishop of Tours, stayed there and tells a story about a man, who having been thrown in jail broke out, got drunk and was found by the Bishop sleeping on the floor of the church and smelling worse than the sewers. Gregory lived in the sixth century but what we see here is a church, that was built in the 12th century on the ruins of the church he visited, and repaired in later centuries after a riot by students at the University of Paris set fire to it. It is a beautiful little square and, as you can see other little clusters of trees in the distance, there are others like it.
It seemed like spring was coming. My walkway was heaving, showing the frost was coming out of the ground but then it snowed and snowed. Oh dear.

There are some wonderful websites out there with photographs and sounds. One of the best that I have ever seen is the website for the Lost Gardens of Heligan in Cornwall, England. You can have a virtual visit complete with sounds. It is a nice pick me up for when you can't get away. They have a few wildlife webcams for a barn owl, badgers, foxes, bird feeders and bats, which are live in the spring for U.K. viewers. If you look at the menu across the top, click on explore and select the virtual tour.

http://www.heligan.com/flash_intro.html

And here is a quick view of one of their floral displays that I scoffed from Wikipedia. It looks like it is worth the trip to Cornwall. Send me a ticket and you won't see me for smoke.

This would be a good time to discuss roses and their colors and meanings but I do not really care for roses. I love orchids. Next, a nice bouquet of Gerbera daisies would be lovely but, for Valentine's Day, chocolate reigns supreme. Bring on the chocolate!!
And a movie suggestion for today.