She Brings Me Water
An aeclectic look at the nearby worldArchive for Animals
A Taste of Spring
Today and for the past couple of days, we’ve had a taste of spring here on the island. The temperatures have been in the 70’s, the breeze has been southerly, and the sun has been shining (some occasional showers as well). Our double row of daffodils are coming up and have their buds on them. The narcissus are coming up, birds are clamoring at the feeders…I know it won’t last, there’s more winter on the way, but a little taste of spring is better than none.
Back in December 2007 we ordered and received six blueberry plants from Finch Blueberry Nursery. Each plant is a different variety and their names are Brightwell, Croatan, Legacy, Powder Blue, Tifblue, and Climax. They are three-year old plants and we have planted them where the strawberries that the foxes eat used to be. We were told they wouldn’t produce this year, that it would be next year before we’d get any blueberries, but I’m hoping that the little guys are so happy here that they’ll pop out a few this year. And I’m hoping that foxes don’t like blueberries as much as they like strawberries.
Somewhere earlier in this blog I said that I wanted to choose the seeds for the Native American Three Sister’s garden earlier than we did last year. Because we conceived and executed said garden so late in the planting season, we were limited to the seeds we could find locally. So here I am, looking earlier, and after researching heirloom seeds and Native American varities online, I have requested catalogs from Seeds of Change and Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.
We don’t really need any more seeds. Our refrigerator’s bottom shelf is half-covered with a basket, bags, and a covered container of all different types of seeds, many that we’ve harvested ourselves, including some of the Ruby Queen corn and King of the Garden limas and Kentucky Wonder pole beans from last year’s garden. But I would like to plant heirlooms, and “real” Native American varieties, and I also want pods to pick that aren’t green and therefore camoflauged in the corn stalks. Picking the green beans and limas last year was like being on an Easter egg hunt where the eggs are all green and are hidden in tall, green grass. Give me some color, please.
So, from the above-mentioned sources, I’m considering pole beans called Gold Marie Vining Bean, and Purple-podded Pole Bean. They should stand out in the crowd. And for the Native American choice, there’s Cherokee Trail of Tears Pole Bean. Green, but native. Also Lakota Winter Squash, Black Aztec Sweet Corn, and Rouge Vif d’Etampes. I threw that last one in to see if you were still paying attention. Actually, it’s a pumpkin that was a staple of the Paris markets, and like my husband says, I’m a sucker for anything Parisian.
Who was that Masked Man?
That was no man, that was a raccoon- or two, or three. They caused the above damage, and much more too. When we planted this Native American garden, the book we got the plan from said to plant enough to share with the wildlife that will surely be attracted to your lush, green and tasty plants. Okay, we had plenty, enough to share. But what the book didn’t say was that the wildlife wouldn’t just come in, take a few ears, thank us and leave, they’d come in, tear open unripened ears looking for the ripe ones, tear down stalks looking for more ripe ones, and destroy the stalks that the beans need for their support- no wonder they wear masks.
Our neighbor, the one that has done a large garden for seven years now, put out a radio to scare the raccoons (and deer) away, and he said it worked as long as the batteries didn’t run out. So we put out a radio, which seemed to work except for the areas of the garden far away from the radio, so we put out another radio, so that more of the area of the garden is blanketed with a barrier of sound. Nocturnal animals use sound as a powerful guidance system (that’s why a lot of them have such big ears); they also use scent, to guide them and warn them of dangers, so to take advantage of that, we are collecting our urine and pouring it around the garden at night. Both methods seem to be working and we are glad to have found ways to discourage the animals without harming them.
And we are picking, as the ears are ripening very fast now, especially the Ruby Queen. Here’s me and our cat Junior and some of the harvest:
Junior helps by rolling in the dirt, he says it keeps down the weeds.
The package of Ruby Queen seeds showed a completely red ear of corn, all the kernels, not just some like the Indian corn you see in grocery stores around Thanksgiving. Ours were not all red, but having silver and yellow corn growing near it, it probably cross-pollinated with the others. So we have red kernels mixed with silver, some all silver, some all yellow, and some mixed yellow and silver. We had some last night for dinner, steamed for about 10 minutes, then eaten with butter, salt and pepper. It was very good.
