Spring

Last week it was spring. This week it's summer. Not fair? It's also Michigan. Clicking on photos will enlarge them. The flower petals of the magnolia look like, what, snow, ice, ticker tape, rice, regardless, very pretty. The first irises have been perfuming the whole garden. Lovely smell. It looks like the tree swallows have allowed one of their nest boxes to be taken over by a pair of bluebirds. I brought up three kinds of epidmediums, this yellow one performs best here. There are three kinds of violets - blue, mixed, and white. The white one came from Aretha's home. The daffodils (narcissus) are still flowering; Kria insists photo bombing. I like the contrast between the dark color of the leaves and the white flowers of the wild cherry tree. This is the first year the ajuga have filled in. I like how the chartreuse herb contrasts with the purple flower and dark leaves. The Jacob's ladder has multiplied. Frogs, Brunnera, striped lily of the valley, four kinds of ferns - oak, Christmas, felix-femina, and ostrich - maybe.

 

 

Grima - All the Way From Iceland

I was contacted by a couple who had recently lost their Icelandic Sheepdog Grima that they brought back from a trip to Iceland.  Here, slightly edited, is some of what they had to say about their life with her. Those of you who know Icelandics can easily relate to their experiences with Grima.

I think they'll be able to work on the barking and the separation anxiety for the next Icy -  Hehehe!!
Clicking on photos will enlarge them.

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Grima

You have opened the floodgates in asking about Grima.  Geoff and I are of course thrilled to talk about her and share photos and have no objection if you want to put anything about her on your blog. 

We are transplants from New York (I worked in the city; Geoff in New Rochelle). We moved to  Maine in 2005 to a rambling old farmhouse and barn and have never looked back.  (We lived in in the farmhouse until a couple of years ago when we retired and moved to a smaller house a half mile up the road.) 

Six months after making the big move to Maine we got it into our heads to get a couple of small horses to keep in that barn (small, because less distance to fall) and went to Iceland with a group of ten with the idea that we'd learn about the Icelandic horse and learn how to ride the tolt, etc. etc.  

We stayed at a farm/horse place near Hella for a week, learning and riding, and one day the wife of the couple who owned the place came home with two pups to add to her fleet of dogs and let it be known that the runt of the litter was still available.  That was Grima.  She needed an export certificate and so we needed a name and found Grima in a book of horse names.  Grima supposedly means mask and that fit her little raccoon face. 

Geoff did a quick Internet search on the breed and learned that they bark and that they are energetic and then we went to the nearest cash machine and also bought a cat carrier,  and Grima came home in the back of the plane we were on (we weren't allowed to bring her into the cabin) and we drove home to Maine from Boston with her.  The AKC didn't even recognize the breed in May of 2006.  In any case, her breeder in Iceland had put a microchip in her but we never registered her for anything here in the U.S.

 Grima did everything with us--walking, hiking, canoeing, sailing, cross-country skiing, snowshoeing.  She was smarter and far better company than most people.  What we loved about her was her intelligence and enthusiasm, her incredible eye contact and expressive face, her happiness, her smile, the way she'd sit on your lap and lean into you, the way she'd come visit you every five minutes or so while you were weeding the vegetable garden and act--every time--as though she hadn't seen you in months.  

She was a barker all right and also had some odd quirks such as biting doors.  She was awful in the car--barking hysterically whenever you came to a stop somewhere, even if she'd never been there.  We tried a trainer at one point  but it was sort of too late.  We wore earplugs in the car and learned a few ways to keep her calm-ish.  Friends asked us to bring her with us to dinner at their houses, which was wonderful because we hated leaving her. 

The separation anxiety is something we wish could be solved--it was heart-breaking to leave her barking and frantic--but gather it's just hardwired into herding dogs.  She adored Geoff; he was her person.  He was the only one (besides owls and coyotes) who could get her to howl.  But she loved me, too.  I was the one she'd come to for play or protection if she was in an uncomfortable spot.  

Rain, Rain, Go Away, Come Again Some Other Day . . .

Normally, I know, I know, there is no "normally" now, I would be focusing on outdoor flowers and events at this time of the year. Like last year, May is our wet month again - NOT April. (April Showers, Bring May Flowers!) So I focus on what I am able to focus on - my beloved Clivia. In English nothing rhymes with the word "orange" which sets their flower color apart. (Clicking on photos will enlarge them.)

Clivia  (Note my 40 year old Cycad in the background)

Clivia miniata

Before the killing frost/freeze the other night the magnolia was just starting to open. The freeze damaged many of the flowers. Spring in Michigan. We're used to that in April. Weather swings have become more erratic.

Magnolia a few days before the freeze.

Magnolia after the freeze.

I used to stop at Mary's for breakfasts when I first was traveling up here to my Pole Barn, aka Sans Souci, and on one of those morning visits I picked up several horse chestnut seeds which I  planted around the property. On my next visit, they were all, every single nut, dug up and eaten by some animal. I gathered a few more seeds and took them home to plant in pots. Three germinated. A year later I planted them at my northern retreat. One was planted in my north garden, one in undergrowth at the north edge of my bluff, and one out in the open where I expected to see it mature and flower. That last one was promptly pulled up and eaten - perhaps by deer? The one in the undergrowth is alive still and growing slowly. It has been attacked by deer but is so far making it. The final one in my north garden is doing very well. I think (hope) that it's now tall enough to be beyond deer browsing. I love viewing the swelling pregnant buds filled with the palmately compound leaves at this time of the year. Of course they also remind me of France.

Horse Chestnut - Aesculus hippocastanum

"What's the main reason people get angry? Because they get frightened." From Inspector Maigret. Of course, naturally I thought of our leader who seems angry all the time. He should be angry. The storm is coming, "Winter's coming".

Horse Chestnut - Aesculus hippocastanum

From the analects of Confucius: If you govern people by Zeng (law/punishment), then you get people who have no shame. Hmmm! They don't know what they're doing wrong. If you govern people by De (virtue/morality), people have a sense of shame and you'll have moral progress.

Horse Chestnut - Aesculus hippocastanum

The ideas of Confucius weren't religious but political; not theological but ethical. Good government will come if the elite are educated. Any leader without virtue is morally bankrupt and should be resisted. Speak truth to power. That is the overruling power of education. (Perhaps we have failed the citizenry by failing to educate them properly - just wondering.)

Lovely Kria taking a morning nap on her bed.

As you can no doubt can tell, I've been watching a great program about China and saw this scene of primroses high in some mountains somewhere in China. The story was not about flowers but nevertheless I saw relatives of one of my favorite spring flowers. I'm sure mine came more recently from The United Kingdom, but now I know their true origins. First photo from the China series, second one from my garden. Like Carlo I tend to "rescue" to "adopt" . . .

Primula veris

Primula veris

Friday, May 15, 2020

I am continuously amazed at the willful ignorance of so many of my fellow country folks. Thankfully I have some nearby distractions. Now I don't have to travel two hours in order to see the various migrations of returning birds. They come to me. Some, like the goldfinch, stay here year round. Others pick the appropriate time and fly back north to begin courtship, nesting, and brood raising. After talking with David and Carolyn, I bought some citrus fruits and fed the orioles. I'd forgotten how many fly through here on the way to nesting grounds further north. Dozens and dozens picked my oranges clean in less than five minutes. I will not be feeding them all - again.

American Goldfinch - Spinus tristis tistis

Feeding on Birch flowers

American Goldfinch - Spinus tristis tistis

American Goldfinch - Spinus tristis tistis

Ruby-Throated Hummingbird - Archelocus colubis

Ruby-Throated Hummingbird - Archelocus colubis

Baltimore Oriole Male - Icterus galbula

Baltimore Oriole - Icterus galbula

Baltimore Oriole Female - Icterus galbula

Baltimore Oriole - Icterus galbula