Muck About

A Little Spring Cheer

 This morning the sun is shining, but only for a short-lived moment.  I can see clouds progressing in from the southwest that will swirl around my little town and eventually envelope us in a gray murk.  For that reason, I am looking for sunshine everywhere I can uncover it and at this moment it is in this appealing little daffodil—Narcissus ‘Elizabeth Ann’. Not yet in bloom in the garden; however, the buds are plump with a promise of bursting into color at any instant.  I peered into the plant gallery at Rainyside.com and found it blossoming profusely on the web.

Arizona's Stark Contrast to Home

I recently returned from a five-day whirlwind trip to Arizona to visit my daughter, Kela and enjoy a slice of her world. The warm sunshine and stark splendor of Arizona boosted my spirits, much needed after a long winter I would just as soon forget.  While the Pacific Northwest took a bath in snow, I took walks in the daily sunshine. There was no need for me to take my vitamin D tablets with all the splendid light saturating my body.

It is strange to be in an unfamiliar place where the plants are alien and the bird song is in another dialect, unlike the familiar melodies of the chickadee, towhee or robin back home. I photographed the fruit of the cholla (Opuntia), which I mistook for flowers, silly me.  Kela and I enjoyed a day trip to Sedona where we photographed the beautiful red rock and plant life.  I took a walk down memory lane remembering our last visit to the red rock country, when she was two years old.  Now at age 27, she endures the endless stories about her precocious antics in Sedona her grandmother, auntie and I dredge up.

 Late winter to early spring is a beautiful time to be in Arizona, especially when our Pacific Northwest dreary and cold springs drag on until early July.  Although I miss being close to my daughter, it is good to be home in Washington again romping around the neighborhood with Kono dog and enjoying the antics of my four egg laying wonder girls. Even though it is cold, the signs of spring are everywhere, especially the early flowering, let’s-cut-to-the-chaise-it’s-spring plants.  Other less enjoyable signs crop up, such as the annoying weeds growing in leaps and bounds, the containers in the greenhouse need constant watering and I am behind in starting seed for the vegetable garden.  Nevertheless, I feel like Dorothy at the end of her trip to Oz, when she returned to the black and white world of Kansas and said, “There’s no place like home!” The clattering sounds of heavy rainfall falling on the skylight above me, reminds me why there is no place as splendid as our green Pacific Northwest.

Top photo: Opuntia fruit
Middle photo: Sedona
Bottom photo: Fragrant orange blossom

Crappy Decisions

Here’s another good reason to get off the herbicide-go-round. At the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle, unacceptable levels of clopyralid was found in the compost that is made up of animal manure, straw bedding, wood chips, leaves and grass.

Dan Corum announced that the Zoo Doo will not be sold for garden use as the herbicide residue can kill some plants. Instead they will use it around the zoo this spring. Hopefully, this autumn Zoo Doo will once again be available in time for fall garden applications.

Go ahead and say it, you know you wanna!