Category Archives: spring

Migrating Party

backyard bed, birds, spring, the Lot

I’m not sure how to explain what was happening today at the bird feeder in the back garden. On the Lot, we have a site line from our kitchen window into the middle of the back garden. The Other Half and myself enjoy watching for birds visiting throughout the seasons. We enjoy it enough our friend Ms. A purchased us a backyard bird ID guide.

Across the backyard near the garage we have a tray feeder for sunflower seeds, a hanging feeder for jams and fruit, and a suet cage. Right outside the kitchen window we’ve hung a thistle seed feeder on one side and a suet feeder on the other. The thistle seed feeder is often crammed full of American Goldfinch (Spinus tristis), both to our delight and the four-footed management’s frustration. The little roof at the top of the horizontally hung suet feeder ensures the suet is reserved for woodpeckers, nuthatches, and any other bird willing to cling upside down to enjoy the feed. We usually find the downy woodpecker (Dryobates pubescens ) grabbing a meal.

Anyway, back to today. I had left my office and walked downstairs to refill my coffee mug. I always like to look out our window into the garden to see who is at the feeders. A normal day will bring the goldfinches, house finches (Haemorhous mexicanus), woodpeckers, northern cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis ), recently a pair of black-capped chickadees (Poecile atricapillus) , mourning doves (Zenaida macroura ), and a whole load of house sparrows (Passer domesticus).

But today was different. Hopping around on the ground below the feeder was a rose-breasted grosbeak (Pheucticus ludovicianus)! I have NEVER seen this bird in the back garden since we moved here just over ten years ago. Mom G has loads of them in her garden 2 hours north of the Lot. It was a juvenile male, but still quite pretty.

I excitedly texted the Other Half to tell him the news. When I looked up again, there was yet another bird I had never seen at our feeder! It was a block of the prettiest gray, with a slightly darker gray cap and narrow, pointy beak. Some minutes spent with the ID book helped me to identify the bird as a gray catbird (Dumetella carolinensis).

Returning to my desk for work, I felt giddy with having witnessed these new visitors to the back garden. As mentioned many times before in this digital journal, one of the reasons I garden is for wildlife. Even if they were passing through for migration, I was happy to have created a space the birds could stop in and grab a bite.

Lunch time rolled around and I headed back down to the kitchen to get a meal of my own. I about fell over when I looked out the back window. Four adult male rose-breasted grosbeaks and one female were at the feeders. One of the males flew right up to the back window to take a try at the finch feeder. Also, hopping around on the ground below the feeder were several white-crowned sparrows (Zonotrichia leucophrys ). This is a bird who has visited before, but often is only here a short time as they make their way north to Canada.

And then, as if this bombardment of diverse birds all in one day wasn’t enough, I spotted it. A baltimore oriole (Icterus galbula). I have tried every. single. spring. since living here to get this bird to visit the Lot. I ever-so-slowly reached into the kitchen drawer for the binoculars we keep there and took a closer look at it. Yes! It was an oriole!!! The recently sought after advice from Sister G had paid off.

When I again texted the Other Half, his reply was “Now you’re just making stuff up”. At least when he got home tonight he was able to see a Ms. and Mr. grosbeak. The whole experience was fantastic and I can’t wait to see what this season brings with our feathered friends.

Resources

Veggies 10.4

seeds, spring, vegetables

Today was the last round of planting for this season’s cool crops.

Cool Crops 2019 – 4th Planting

  • ( 9) Arugula
  • (4) Pak Choi ‘Baby Bok Choy’
  • (16) Radish ‘Early Scarlet Globe’
  • (5) Swiss Chard ‘Bright Lights’ – container

Sprouts are Growing

I snapped a few photos to show where some of the seedlings I planted on March 24th are right now. On the first two plants, you can see the cotyledon or “seed leaves”. These embryonic leaves are in charge of powering the plant until the “true leaves” of the plant emerge.

This first shot is of some spinach. The spinach seedlings always look like they have mustaches to me.

Spinach Seedling and Hand

Here is an arugula seedlings.

Arugula Seedling and Hand

And finally, here’s a shot of a sugar pea plant.

Pea Seedling and Hand

Fix for a Tipsy Greenhouse

I think I may have found a solution for the lightweight greenhouse that had been blown over by Spring winds. We switched from landscape staples (on the right) to using our tent stakes (on the left). Cross your fingers for us.

Tent Stakes and Landscape Pins

Zone Creeper

spring, vegetables

This time of the season can be frustrating for gardeners in USDA Zone 6a and lower. We all just want to be outside in the garden. Weather doesn’t cooperate. After a week or so of pleasant temperatures and emerging spring flowers, this past Monday we wake up to something like this.

If you’re having a hard time reading the rain gauge, let me help. It’s between 1/2″ Disappointed and 3/4″ Quite Disappointed. This has happened most years so far on the Lot, but we continue to start seeds for cold crops around the end of March and beginning of April when there is still a good chance of a frost.

Extending the Growing Season

Depending on location, there are an estimated number of frost free days a gardener has to work with to grow crops. If we stuck to only frost free dates, our growing season isn’t long enough to grow some of the veggies we like to nom nom. Even though cool crops like greens and radishes have a certain amount of frost tolerance, we still use a few gardening techniques to get a jump on the growing season in the Spring. The same practices can also extend the season later into the Fall.

Hoop Houses for Raised Beds

Hoop Houses on Raised Beds

These are the two little hoop houses I constructed in the Spring of 2019. Metal brackets, PVC pipe, and heavy mil plastic gave me a very basic shelter to protect seedlings against frost. If I see evening temperatures will dip below freezing, I can pull the plastic over the frames and secure it with landscaping bricks and clamps. The following morning as temps warm again, I pull back the plastic to make sure the little seedlings don’t get toasted from the heat building up inside the covered hoops.

Pop-Up Greenhouse

One of this season’s experiments is the purchase of a temporary greenhouse. The Lot is on the smaller scale of garden plots, so a permanent greenhouse isn’t in the cards for the Other Half and I. Another option was a cold frame, but most we had seen were heavy and awkward to move. Here’s the greenhouse we picked out.

Temporary Greenhouse

Our Spring season is often wet and can be quite cold. Some seeds require a minimum temperature to germinate, so if dropped into the ground now they may end up rotting. With this little greenhouse, I’m hoping to start some flower seeds earlier than I could plant the seeds directly into the garden. This is all an experiment; I have no idea how it will pan out.

Seed Trays

The only problem so far as I mentioned in an earlier post, is the entire setup was knocked over by heavy winds. These are the trays all nicely planted the first time. I used landscape fabric staples to secure the left and right sides of the frame to the ground, but it didn’t hold. I think the solution is to use rope and tent stakes to secure all fours sides of the bottom of the structure to the ground.

How to Creep

There are other methods of extending your growing season. The above are what we are using on the Lot. Michigan State University Extension has a nice overview article to get you started.