Routines Are Good

Today marks the anniversary of the loss of our Blonde Lab, Queenie a year ago.  Aside from the loss of a family member I lost the individual most likely to delight in a morning walk when the conditions were good.  And maybe go out with a shotgun to see if we could jump-up some dinner.  Sigh.

Anyway, three days ago a nine-week-old Golden Retriever came into our lives.  Ruby is her name.  And I would be lying if I didn't share with you that raising a puppy is hard work.  It requires patience, routine, correction, redirection and a schedule of feeding, supervised play and exercise, potty training and rest.  Part of the routine includes daily walks.  Yes, I now have a walking partner who would prefer to run not walk.  Hooray!

From our walk this morning there was stiff goldenrod and sneezeweed.   Yup, X marks the spot where life is good...

ACHOO!

Allow me to introduce you to Helenium autumnale - named after Helen of Troy and the autumn time of the blooms.  It is commonly knows as Sneezeweed.

It is not a weed - it is a member of the vast family of Asters (Asteraceae).

It begins blooming late summer and persists into the fall with sometimes as many a 100+ flowers on each plant.  Multiply that by many multiple plants and it puts on a stunning display of blooms.

It grows all over around here preferring the wetter clay soils.  We didn't plant any of it but there are ginormous clumps of it growing around the rain garden pond so maybe the seeds came in with the ducks.  It's anybody's guess.

The deer appear to avoid it so if anyone wants to propagate it in their yard come by this fall to shoot some deer and collect seeds.  It is a maintenance-free and lovely flowering native plant.

Here's a historic tidbit about this plant that you can use to amuse and impress your friends.  Back in the day the early settlers collected the leaves and flower petals of this plant, set them aside to dry and pulverized it into a powder that was utilized as snuff.  Hence the sneeze.