Rain and Cold.

6-9-09 VERMONT: I came up yesterday. It was cool, in the fifties, and there was 2.35 inches of rain in the gauge. Over night it started to rain more, and we got another 0.5 inches by midday. In the afternoon, the rain stopped, but it stayed raw, cool, overcast and windy. I did get out to plant the little elm volunteers along the pasture fence. I replaced two dead basil plants. I’m guessing they died from cold weather. A few corn seeds and pumpkin seeds failed to germinate, and I planted new ones. The corn and pumpkin seedlings are about an inch tall, as high as an insect’s eye.

I saw a garter snake slither under the black plastic mulch, he’ll help with pest control. A big woodchuck is living under the little barn.

The flowers are all on schedule. In bloom: lilac, honeysuckle, azalea, burning bush, viburnums, blue berry, bleeding hearts, columbine, red trillium, forget-me-not, solomons seal, sweet woodruff, creeping phlox, false solomons seal, may apple, epimedium, celandine, geranium, siberian iris, foam flower, mt. bluet, meadow rue, jacobs ladder, lupin.

Woodchuck in the Grass.

Red and Blue.