Big Rain.

6-29-18 VERMONT: We got a big rain, 1.35 inches, over two days. The ground above the pond is wet and squishy, and everything’s thirst is sated, for the moment. Today is hot and sunny, and it’s getting hotter this weekend. I have continued to prune and weed.

The rain has knocked things over, so I am propping them up with supports. The culvert is filled to the brim with gravel, and the flood cut a shallow trench across the road.

New blooms: red spirea, goats beard, first hostas, campanula, foxglove, feverfew.


I don't have much luck with foxglove, generally, but this one popped up on its own.

Lychnis chalcedonica, Maltese cross has brilliant red flowers for several weeks in June and July.

Campanula can get lost among bigger plants, but these and a few others found spots on the edges of the beds.

Goats beard grows in a very dark spot and has thrived. There is a new volunteer nearby.

Just Another Gorgeous Sky.

6-26-18 VERMONT: Last night was in the forties and tonight is predicted to be in the thirties. A frost would be a disaster. There was rain, 0.75 inches, followed by sunny and windy days and brrry cold nights.

I have done a lot more pruning and weeding and tomorrow, I start watering again. I did get to Browns Nursery and pick up a few things—an astilbe, A. chinensis ‘Mighty Pip’ that went by the new French doors, an echinacea, E. purpurea ‘Green Twister’ for the top of the new wall bed, a hibiscus, H. x ‘Hardy Hybrids’ ‘Cherry Choco Latte’ that is in the upper terrace bed, and three lobelia, L. siphilitica ‘Great Blue Lobelia’ went in the lower terrace bed.

New blooms: bind weed, native daylily, Russian sage, Purple Rain salvia.


I like the single peonies better than the showier doubles.

Sorry, I have to post another red sky, another dawn.

Bind weed is just that, a weed that grows over and on everything. It's a morning glory relative and an attractive nuisance.

Pond cliché, frog on a lily pad with a pink flower behind it.

Preversary.

6-22-18 VERMONT: Another beautiful day after a night in the fifties. It was sunny all day with a few fluffy clouds. Actually we need more rain, and I’ve been watering the veggies and new plantings. It looks like everybody else in the country is getting all the rain they want and then some.

I trimmed and pruned around the roses and cut paths in the pasture today. Yesterday I pruned the trees above the pond. I’m slowly catching up the yard work.

Today is June 22, a preversary, is that a word, for next year’s big event. The roses and the peonies never looked better.

New blooms: Maltese cross, valerian, yellow devil.


The last peonies to open are these red ones. Last because they get the least sun in early spring.

The pale pink peonies are next to monarda, which opens in August.

I call these roses the fence roses because they grow between the fence and wall...

and spill onto both.

It seems like a day for red and this Purple Finch was at the feeder, that might be the missus on the other side. House finches are common here, but purple finches are less frequent visitors.

Sunset at 9 PM, surprised us with more red.

Long Days, Short Nights.

6-19-18 VERMONT: Anna and Gardner were here for a couple of days planning for next year’s big event. They picked a spot for the tent, a caterer, tent provider and photog.

We had a very welcome 0.6 inches of rain last night. Before the rain I removed the corn cage and weeded and pulled out all but one corn seedling from each hill. I also did pruning and weeding elsewhere.

I have seen hardly any fish this year, but spent about a half hour walking around the pond and spotted a school of two-dozen baby fish, one-inchers. I assume there must be adult fish in there somewhere.

At 9 PM it was dusk, after an 8:30 sunset, and at 9:30 the sky was still bright, and I could walk around in the semi dark, with a first-quarter moon and fireflies. First light will be at 3:30 AM.

The Game Cams took over 300 pix in the past three weeks, mostly of foliage blowing in the wind and about forty of deer. The Moultrie cam had fewer pix and more deer and won this interval competition over the Bushnell. I moved them both to new spots.

New blooms: baptisia, cinquefoil, Indian paint brush.


Peony, along with iris and roses are the big three in June.

Showy lady slipper is a very complex orchid.

That yellow blob is another flower about to open.

Rose-breasted grosbeak, first one of the season.

Below are three pix from the game cameras. There were about 300 images over three weeks with many deer at night and during the day. Most of the pix were of wind blowing foliage, but the cameras react to motion, so that is expected. The Moultrie did better this time. I moved them both to new locations.

Bushnell-a pair of deer at midday.

Moultrie-he's growing a pair.

Moultrie- a doe posing just before dawn.

Summer Begins.

6-17-18 VERMONT: We’ve been here for a couple of days getting set for the summer. The days have been warm and sunny and the nights cool, but things are dry and we need some rain. I have been watering all the new plantings, which have been looking droopy.

The corn is up and about a foot tall, inside the cage. I will need to take the cage down now the seedlings are growing, and the crows have been foiled. I hope I can do that without destroying anything.

Neighbors have added turtles to the pond, and Judy also found one on the road yesterday. I guess there are six or seven now. There are tons of tadpoles and not many fish, which is why there are a lot of tadpoles.

The phoebes nesting by the back door of the old mudroom have been incredibly busy from sunrise to sundown feeding four chicks. Speaking of sunrises, there was a brilliant red one this morning sometime between four and five o’clock.

I planted a huge astilbe, A. chinensis ‘Mighty Red Quinn’, that I got at The Farm in NJ in a shady spot that has resisted or rejected everything I planted there. Otherwise I have done a little pruning, weeding and watering.

New blooms: Wentworth viburnum, maple-leaf viburnum, anemone, bishops weed, weigela, knapweed, meadow rue, bearded iris, Siberian iris, Jacobs ladder, peony, chives, thyme, showy lady slipper, lupin, rose, trascantia, lady’s mantle, white spirea, Asian lilac, water lily, stephanandra.


Indigo bunting and goldfinch again.

Primrose, iris, anemone, forget-me-not by the pond.

Canadian tiger swallowtail on yellow flag iris.

Brady in the buttercups, but eating grass around them.

The daylily in the center is a double with duplicate reproductive organs and twelve petals. I've never seen that before.

White admiral on a daisy.

The phoebes are busy feeding four chicks. They are back and forth all day long with bugs for the brood.

Early this morning.

End of the Year at Lincoln.

6-14-18 SHORT HILLS: Today was another beauty. We were at Lincoln Elementary School in Newark for the end of the year party. Judy visits there regularly during the year to help the students with reading skills. The teacher, Jo-Ann Catalano, made a hot dog lunch for everyone and followed with a sheet cake for dessert. Judy and Blair brought the therapy dogs and gifts for the kids. No reading got done today.

Yesterday I had dinner with Bill and Lynn, Judy was feeling ill then, but seems OK today.

Tomorrow we are off to VT for the summer, I always have slight ambivalence about leaving here before the late soring flowers open, but it's time to go, and there’s work to be done there.


Two smiles.

Maizie has almost enough kids patting her.

Taking a break.

Judy showing the kids how to give Maizie treats.

The black dog is Parker. Judy and I are in the background.

The High Line and a New Aucuba.

6-12-18 SHORT HILLS: We had a brief visit from Jon, who was on his way from CA to India on a work trip. We had dinner Saturday at Taste of Asia in Chatham, and on Sunday went to NYC to walk The High Line.

There were plenty of other walkers on a nice afternoon. The lower end of the elevated park is lush with vegetation. It is an abandoned, elevated RR spur converted to an amble above the traffic, a great idea and great execution. I spotted a stand of equisetum, an antique plant, from the Paleozoic, and a nice cluster of maidenhair fern. There are lots of benches, vistas, flowers and birds. We started at 12th St. and did the whole 1.5 miles to 34th St. The northern part of The High Line, added last, is still under development. We walked east on 34th to the Empire State Building and then south back to the car in plenty of time to get back to NJ and the airport for Jon's next flight.

Thursday we were also in the city to visit Val, Steve and Lucy. Val gave me some magic beans to plant in VT.

Yesterday I went to the Farm and bought a gorgeous astilbe for a problem spot in VT, and an Aucuba japonica ‘Mr. Goldstrike’, a shrub with yellow spotted leaves that I planted next to the house between the den and dining room windows.

New blooms: elderberry.


At the Farm picking out a couple of plants, I heard birds everywhere, went to the car for a cam and caught a chipping sparrow and...

A great blue heron. At first I thought a garbage bag had blown into the tree, but took a picture and enlarged it in the camera to see the bird. I missed another bird who wasn't patient enough to wait for me while I went for the camera.

We walked The High Line, in NYC, with Jon. This is a big stand of equisetum. Equisetum is the only relic and survivor of the tree/fern forests of the late Paleozoic.

The west side of Manhattan has construction everywhere. I counted seven sites in this shot.

A lot of the old RR tracks are still visible.

Architects have designed a lot of odd looking buildings near The High Line.

Last Concert of the Season.

6-9-18 SHORT HILLS: We have had more lovely days with afternoon temps at 80° or so, and nighttime temps in the sixties. I did more pruning and trimming and am about done here, but whenever I am outside, I see something else that I missed.

When the black pine near the house fell in one of the winter storms, its root ball lifted several big flagstone pavers that were next to the tree. At the time I just pushed them back in place. Later I trimmed the root ball and roots, replanted the spot after adding soil and making a mound of the residual stump. Yesterday I repositioned and re-leveled the pavers.

A few nights ago we heard the final NY Phil concert of the season, a nice program of Mozart and Tchaikovsky. We had dinner at Café Fiorello beforehand with my Aunt Jean.

New blooms: hibiscus.


Hibisicus seems to enjoy its outdoor summer vacation.

Gus looking stately.

This hydrangea is an addition this year which is why it's already in bloom. I like the color. Even when the plant's tag tells you what the color should be, its always a bit of a surprise.

The incredible complexity of the spirea flower clusters.

Spring Edges Toward Summer.

6-6-18 SHORT HILLS: Things have been wet in NJ, we’ve had 2.5 inches in the past two weeks, and nothing looks thirsty. It has also been cool and cloudy for the few days we’ve been here. The yard is fully leafed out, and the neighbors have disappeared behind the foliage walls, even road noise is muted. This yard becomes very shady when the trees are all out, but not quite as shady as it used to be because we’ve lost several trees.

There’s plenty to do. Yesterday I pruned enough for a full load to go to the dump. I also pulled up three dead butterfly bushes and one dead crape myrtle. I have had no butterfly bushes survive a challenging winter intact, I’m 0 for 7.

New blooms: purple rhododendron, English holly, Asian holly, mock orange, linden viburnum, rose, Stewartia, Japanese snowball, kousa dogwood, privet, clematis.


Rose, one of my many favs.

Stewartia, a variety of camellia, but not evergreen. Every flower has one petal with a red spot.

Stewartia is a tree of moderate size.

The front part of  our garden is now in full shade. Everything here blooms, now privet and viburnums are on stage. That robin is about to use the leaning birdbath.

Clematis, one of two in this spot.

Wild Primrose and Fox.

6-2-18 VERMONT: We’re closing up to go back to NJ for a few weeks. Today I weeded, fertilized and mulched the blueberry bushes. After that we went to see the wild primrose that grow along a brook that follows a logging road not too far from here.

On the way back from town after dinner at Murphy’s, we saw a fox kit on the road near us. I got a very blurry pic that I won’t post.

New blooms: yellow flag iris, centaurea.


There's a spot in the woods just off a logging road with a brook where primrose grow wild.

The brook and primrose wander back and forth under the road for a few hundred yards.

The Bushnell game-cam won this weeks pix-comp with several deer. The one in the bottom left has antler buds.

The images show date, time, temp and moon phase.

This one is just before 4 AM this morning with a nearly full moon.