Refrigerator Story.

7-3-12 VERMONT: It turned out that the last storm zapped our refrigerator. Yesterday, after dinner, we discovered the ice cream had melted, and then that the freezer and refrigerator were too warm. Resetting the temperatures didn’t help, and, by morning, it was clear that some circuit board was toasted. A serviceman advised us that the repair would be too expensive to justify on an older unit. So, it was off to Home Depot. The new one won’t be delivered for two weeks, but they set us up with a “loaner” until then. I took the opportunity to level the floor in the refrig’s nest. All the floors in this old house are uneven and slope one way or another. I also put a surge protector on the frig outlet.

I feel as though I have control of the weather. Anytime I shovel out the culvert, it rains within a few hours. It happened again yesterday night. After about seven wheelbarrows of sand shoveled out and dumped in a marshy spot, it rained last night. This time there was only distant thunder, but we got another 0.35 inches. This morning the sky was total blue, but I cleared out the culvert this afternoon, and now it’s overcast, cool and threatening.

Back to the garden—yesterday I did a lot of weeding and pruning and added two more artemisia to the bed that used to be the lily bed.

 New blooms: evening primrose.

 
Mallow.

Rosebay Rhododendron. This one has retained more of the pink color present in the opening flower than the one last month from NJ.

New Plants.

7-1-12 VERMONT: It has been hot, hot, hot, up in the mid-nineties, no more fires at night, for now. Many cites in the south and mid-west have set record temps.

I have been busy with weeding and pruning, of course, but also hit the nurseries and did some planting. In the bed by the new French doors, I dug out the old soil, some of it, put in a mix of top soil and sand and planted two strawberry foxglove, Digitalis x mertonensis, two silvermound wormwood, Artemisia schmidtiana ‘Silvermound’, and one Phlox paniculata ‘Red Riding Hood’. The foxglove is marginally hardy for here, but we’ll see. That bed had had lilies, real lilies, but something ate most of the bulbs this spring, probably a striped rat. The reason for the soil change was poor growth of whatever went in that bed.

Similarly, the bed in front of the old house has been death for plantings, and I did another soil change there and planted two false indigo bushes, Amorpha fruticosa. They are legumes, nitrogen fixers, and should do well. I planted another echinacea, Echinacea purperea ‘Tomato Soup’, and a larkspur, Delphinium grardiflorum ‘Blue Butterfly’, in the porch bed.

I put another Joe Pye weed, Eupatorium maculatum ‘Carin’, in the bed behind the pond and a blue flag iris, Iris versicolor, on the edge of the pond near the drain.

This afternoon we had an intense but short T-storm with a bit of hail and lightning strikes nearby. There was 0.4 inches of rain.

New blooms: mallow.

 
I was up early the other day and caught this orange sky about 5 AM.
A few minutes later.

Pond Story.

6-28-12 VERMONT: The rain stopped today, leaving us with another 0.75 inches. The sun came out this morning, and I immediately recognized it from memory. It was actually warm this afternoon.

After a mercy mission to rescue a stranded motorist who’s clutch burnt out, I started on all the weeding and cleared a few beds, dead-headed the peonies and pruned a few small trees.

Our pond is small but close to the house and attractively set and planted. However, it has been getting browner and browner over the years. There was a lot of algae this spring, now gone, but murkiness remains. It’s actually not much different from the last few years, but, as I mentioned in the 6-10-12 post, we had a consultation and testing done. The tests were negative for anything harmful, as attested to by the abundant happy, pond critters. Tim Matson, the pond guru, did find the dissolved oxygen to be low which retards the degradation of organic material and contributes to the color. Dissolved tannins from pine needles and leaves also cause browning.

At Tim’s suggestion, we contacted Brian Furze of Aqua Dynamics Solutions. This company makes AquaPucks which act to increase oxygen levels, kill algae, aid in organic decomposition, and flocculate particulate matter. All without harming plants and animals. [Their website describes it all.] I put four pucks in a few days ago.

New blooms: rosebay rhododendron, summer sweet.

 
The water is the color of black coffee.

The tape measure blurs at six feet, at a foot and a half depth.

Flowers and Rain.

6-26-12 VERMONT: It’s cold and clammy here, everyone is wearing sweaters, and we might have a fire tonight. When we arrived there was 2.4 inches of rain in the gauge, and since I emptied it, it has been raining.

I got outside yesterday during periods of drizzle to do a bit of work. I cleared the culvert, only to have it refill with the next downfall. I put up supports for a lot of drooping plants, and did some weeding and pruning. There’s another week’s worth of weeding and pruning waiting for me.

New blooms: native daylily, baptisia, filipendula, campanula, rogersia, salvia, Russian sage, feverfew, ground sedum, first hosta, vetch, indian paintbrush, pyrola.

 
This sweet wildflower grows in the woods. The whole plant is below.

Here's the whole plant with the flower stalk and leaves close to the ground. Give up? It's called roundleaf pyrola.

And what's prettier than today's daylilies.

Metro Wrap-Up.

6-24-12 VERMONT: We came up today and were joined by Val, Maggie and Lucy, who are here to drop Lucy off for camp. Judy and I had a busy weekend. Friday we were in Sea Cliff, Long Island for Lily’s HS graduation. Trying to get out on LI on a summer Friday is a disaster because of all the beach traffic. We left for the evening ceremony at 11:30 AM, and it still took us almost two hours.

That afternoon, I was running errands with Alison, for the graduation party, when the heat wave ended with several crashes and bangs and a load of rain—we got 0.5 inches in NJ. Because of the threat of rain the graduation had been moved inside to a packed, hot gym, but it was great, as was dinner and the party. Congrats to Lily and the Empty-Nesters.

Saturday we went to friend Bette’s birthday party, no numbers will be given. It was at an old, grassy, NJ institution that will remain nameless. The setting is beautiful, and the food was plentiful and good. The birthday girl seemed quite pleased. We were delighted to be there.

The update on the garden status here will be in the next post.  


Peonies in red.

Roses climbing the fence.

First water lily.

Hot Times in the City.

6-21-12 SHORT HILLS: This is the second day of a heat wave with temps near 100° in the afternoon. Yesterday was the Summer Solstice, so the days now begin to get shorter as the sun works its way back to the Equator.

Yesterday we were in the city to see the Terracotta Warrior exhibit at Discovery—Times Square. These life-size clay soldiers, an army of thousands, guarded the huge burial tomb of the first emperor of China. There are enough figures to give one an idea of the detail and scope of the burial city. The supporting text and videos give plenty of back round info and provide a fairly complete picture of the story.

We met Lynn and Bill for dinner at a Thai place, and then we all saw ‘Clybourne Park’ at the Walter Kerr Theatre. It has enjoyed rave reviews and theatrical awards, but we were all a bit disappointed. There are two acts, the first is set in the fifties and the second in the present. The cast, direction, sets, costumes and dialogue are all excellent, but the plot falls short, the subplot is contrived and superfluous. It works as a pair of vignettes, but seems forced and hasn’t got a lot of laughs. The ensemble does what it can with the vehicle. It doesn’t compare to the Aquila Theatre’s ‘Macbeth’ and costs ten times as much.

 
Honey Bees are still out there and busy working.
Rosebay Rhododendron have pink buds, but lose the color in the open flower except for the stigma, in the center of the flower.
 
Roses continue to thrill.

Terra Cotta Cavalry.

Dogs, Hot Dogs and Reading.

6-19-12 SHORT HILLS: Today was the last visit to Lincoln School for Judy and the dogs, who are reading instructors. I came along because there was a picnic, in the classroom, provided by an amazing teacher, Joanne Catalano. She supervised hot dogs, chips, sodas and cake for the kids and the visiting dogs teams, two other teams as well as us. My being there meant that both Nick and Gus both could attend because the ratio of dogs to handlers must be 1:1. After the lunch, lots of the kids read to the dogs and feed them treats.

New blooms: Rosebay Rhododendron.
 
Judy at work.
 
Lincoln Second Grade and Ms. Catalano in the back.
More readers.