The Garden Chronicles

We're back and the blogging resumes.

Took this picture last week so as to periodically measure progress in the main garden.

click on image to enlarge

Tomatoes and peppers are in and everything is doing well.

The bunnies have eaten some of my kale plants and almost all of my Swiss chard.

Still have to plant lima beans and pumpkins.

A Short Hiatus

There was a disturbance in The Force last evening and the blog went down.  Sort of what you might expect when a solar flare goes-off and there is a mass ejection of charged particles.  While no major power grids failed - the blog was singed.

The blog is going to have some for routine maintenance and will likely be back online by early next week at the latest.

Thank you, in-advance, for your patience.

Sincerely,

The Technical Staff

The Fartiste

Any of you who have spent any length of time around a group of guys know what I am talking about.

They like to fart when the fairer sex isn't present.

One of my pals calls himself a Fartiste.  Which is a synonym for Flatulist and Farteur.

He claims that his sphincter is his palette and the atmosphere his canvas.

Scent Control

The reason that this regularly visiting buck is giving this branch a very careful sniff is probably because I push it aside with my left hand whenever I approach the camera from this direction.

click on image to enlarge

Either I break myself of this habit and do a better job of scent control or maybe continue the habit since he certainly isn't spooked by my scent.

A mature buck would avoid the place entirely with the stink of people around.

Or maybe I should put some peanut butter or deer pee on the end of the stick and see what happens...

Changing the Wardrobe

Nice example of the transition from winter wardrobe to summer wardrobe.

click on image to enlarge

The gray winter coat on this whitetail is transitioning to the rich, reddish coat of summer.

For the present it just looks shabby.

Milkweed

There is a bumper crop of this stuff growing all over the place.

Common milkweed - Asclepias syriaca - a perennial native that is the chosen forage of Monarch butterfly larvae.

There are a couple thousand species of this plant found throughout the world and thirteen of them to be found in Wisconsin.

The sap of this plant contains cardiac glycosides.  If consumed you will manifest an elevated heart rate, hot flashes and generalized weakness.  The Monarch caterpillars eats this stuff without consequence.

It does make the butterfly a toxic feast to predators.

Interesting defense mechanism.

My Girls

It's a treat to be able to get out and ramble all over the place now that everyone has put their orthopaedic woes behind them.

Everyone is running on all eight cylinders.