“They say” that growing the Himalayan Blue Poppy is notoriously difficult so it is not without a degree of gardener’s smugness that I’m celebrating its appearance in the garden this spring. And what a sight it is, this clear blue burst of color tucked in the corner behind the coral bark maple. The 120 seeds I planted in The GreenHouse a year ago February yielded just 6 seedlings. Of the 6 seedlings 4 survived. Three are still only 5 inches tall and taking their own sweet time doing not too much of anything. The fourth grew up and is flowering. I’d say this gives me gardener’s bragging rights.
“They” also say that the reason you see so many gardeners living to a ripe old age is that the very act of planting is an act of hope, an expectation of living long enough to see the next season’s results.
On the other side of the poppy spectrum, that same February I planted 240 Papaver somniferum seeds, as the package said to expect 50% germination. Right. They all sprouted. I planted some, gave some away and sent the rest to compost. After flowering I left the seed heads on, ‘oh aren’t they pretty’. Fast forward to this season, and I have pulled up 12,000 self seeded seedlings, leaving only a dozen or so plants, which have morphed into these huge 3 feet tall bush-like creatures. Returning this past weekend from several days away in Vancouver, we were greeting by a forest of coral red blossoms. Charming, but this time the seed heads are less entrancing and will make it to compost in short order.
Standing at the cash waiting my turn in the garden center the other day, I listened to a conversation two other customers were having. One, a farmer, was lamenting the fact that he didn’t think he was going to have apples this season as there were no bees at all in his garden. “Where are all the bees?” he wondered. Well, I think I know the answer. They are all at our place. Hundreds of them.
We planted one of the perennial beds with a variety of plants that attract bees – purple flowered nepeta, rosemary and lavender, yellow euphorbia, neon blue lychistrata ‘Grace Dodd’, an overwintered potted lime heuchera that is now flowering and clumps of flowering thyme. To say nothing of my Fuchsia Ranch. They come into the greenhouse through the open Dutch door to feast on several flowering fuchsias I’m keeping in there for the time being. From time to time, at the end of the day, when the roof vents have closed and I’m ready to shut the door, a bee will become disoriented, hurling itself against the windows with loud thumps, at which point, worried about its health and safety, I’ll rescue it and place it outside. Sometimes one will hang around my big orange sun hat, clearly confused (the Bee Who Mistook a Hat for a Flower), and occasionally one will land on my hand and just sit there, perhaps resting in between gorging. One day I was “working” in the Summer GreenHouse, the arbor beside the house, and could hear what sounded like a neighbor’s electric lawn edger somewhere in the distance, a persistent buzzing sound. It took more than a few minutes to realize that this very loud sound was actually the sound of bees going in and out of an entryway in the eaves above my head. The bees have literally moved into the house.
Bees are not the only wildlife in the garden. A Rufus hummingbird zaps in and out throughout the day and other birds hang out in the brush and trees of the vacant property on the other side of the fence – now endangered habitat. The other day I heard the unmistakable sound of a chain saw, and peering through the lattice of the fence, watched in horror as a man chopped down one of the huge cedars of this small patch of wildlife sanctuary. 60+ years to grow and 10 minutes to destroy. I know there’s more to come and I’m on tenterhooks waiting for the rest of the carnage to take place. We live in a neighborhood called Qualicum Woods, and if people wish to live in a place that looks like Calgary or Ottawa suburbs, they should live there, rather than wreck what attracted the rest of us to this geography. In my humble opinion.
And, speaking of carnage in the garden… Earlier this week I went round to the utility area in back of The Bunkie, the place where we store the lawn mower, bikes and garden tools and found the corpse of a rat. It took a few minutes more to realize that a couple feet away were the bodies of 2 of its offspring. Now I’ve watched enough CSI in my day to recognize a staged corpse scene when I see one. This extreme musophobe didn’t know whether to throw up or pass out or both, so I did neither, and instead joined in the praise of Dennis, Rat Slayer Extraordinaire.
Clever kitty.
Town news from the local paper:
A bear has been sighted recently in 3 areas of Qualicum Beach. Another was found dead, hit by a car. When wildlife officials arrived on the scene they found a couple of guys in the process of cutting off its feet. Her 2 orphaned cubs were found nearby and taken to wildlife sanctuary.
In other breaking news, Town Council voted in favor of allowing townspeople to keep beehives in their backyards.
