I Wonder?

What could be better than gazing through a glass of wine? 

Hmm.  Maybe gazing through a glass of pinot gris with a turkey sandwich on the side.

Creating Your Own Hummingbird Garden

I love hummingbirds and a goal when we bought our little island home was to have a garden that would attract hummers, bees and butterflies.  We’ve sure done it with the hummers and I want to believe that we have the happiest ones on the west side of the island.   The key ingredients are the right location, flowers and trees, as well as water, feeders, bugs and moss.

We can sit right among them and they are not afraid at all.  We have even had them land on our legs.  I just love these little critters.  With 3 feeders on the go, we are kept busy keeping them filled.

Hummers and Cats

Amazingly enough the kitties are not interested in the birds.  Hummers or finches - its more like TV for them.  They enjoy watching as much as we do.

Gypsy Keeping Watch

 

 

Rufus at the Feeder

Woodland Surprises

Early Rhodo in the Fern Garden

Woodland Gnome

Woodland Mix

April Flowers - From Showers and Sun

April 24th and everything is coming alive in the garden

Ladies Mantle and Blue Bell

Blue Bells

Apple Blossoms

Lemon Broom

Early Blooms

Mish Mash

Outside In or Inside Out?

Spring has Sprung!

Here on Bowen, warm weather for the past month or so has allowed us to turn our thoughts to gardening. Actually we've been at it for several weeks now and are basically done.  If you follow this blog of mine you will know in past years I've posted alot about the garden beginning to grow, but we are so far ahead now that I didn't want to rub it in!!  Admittedly we had the garden nanny help out for 2 days a week or so ago so all things are groomed and ready to grow.

Our cherry trees are in blossom and so are the apples and plum! 

 

The Rufus hummers  (if you can spot it) are back in full force and I am encouraging more birds to nest nearby.

 The bleeding hearts are in full dress, so it is surely spring.

  The pond is tidied, the fountain back on, the fish are active, and my favorite chair is back in place.

 Part of the trimmings this weekend uncovered old garden ornaments like this squirrel in the salal.

And, Oops - gypsy is live art - and she is fully out of hibernation as well. 

I guess there is one thing to be said about perennials.  In the beginning its a lot of work, but once your garden is established, its really little work, and so much pleasure.

April Burn

What a weekend!  Not only was the weather great - but we were able to burn pretty much all our yard and trail trimmings before the burn deadline of April 15th.  Cutting back blackberries was number one on the list, and I have the arms now to prove the challenge.

Next was pulling out trail debris, and both Jake and Gypsy supervised the hard work!

 At least 16 barrows full of clipping and trimming up in smoke in no time at all. 

 There is such a sense of satisfaction having it all done and able to sit back till next spring!

Venomous Prey!

Cats are hunters by nature and unfortunately not able to discriminate between string, snakes, harmful prey and  non- harmful  prey.   Gypsy is no exception.  She loves to play and  hunt and this weekend we did a lot of yard work and burning.  Somewhere along the line, while clearing brush and pulling debris out for the bonfire she managed to find a prize!

 A Garter snake!  

 Wow - I have never seen her so animated.  She was doing serious damage to the poor thing.

 I simply had to rescue the Mr. Snake before it was too late. At first I thought it was actually just a shedded snake skin, but as I got closer, gosh, darn, if it didn't turn out to be a rubber snake I had bought years ago and placed on a rock near our back trail.  It must have been covered in leaves and soil for some time and then dug up on the weekend for Gypsy's enjoyment.  As I said, cats are not discriminating when it comes to hunting, and rubber snakes are not to be ignored.