It has been quite a week. Cold rainy days with only a glimpse of sunshine. Then on Saturday the sun came out and it was warm. I saw my first hummingbird of the season (no photo yet) but also I had my first black fly bite. Early in the week I removed this thing from my pantleg. They are everywhere.

This is probably a wood tick. I immobilized it by grabbing a leg with a hemostat. I’m not a fan of these things especially after a few bouts of cellulitis and a dose of Cephalexin.

Star Magnolia (Magnolia stellata)

The heavy snows broke many of the branches on my magnolia but the remaining branches had some flowers.

No peaches this year

We had a record breaking cold snap in February which was cold enough to kill the flower buds on stone fruit. My peach tree is devoid of flowers. The following photo was taken three years ago on May 7th. What I have now is bare branches.

No-Mow May

Once again I’m participating in the No-Mow May movement to allow the pollinators to thrive. However this year I am doing some mowing, setting the cutting blade high enough to miss the violets. These so-called weeds are very beautiful and deserve some respect.

The King of the lawn flowers

Of course there is one lawn flower that is vilified over all others, the Taraxacum officinale.

Dahlias in the cellar

I have bins of dahlia bulbs that will need to be brought out of cellar storage and planted in barrels. I’ve already taken a chance and moved out the two potted rosemary plants and my cold hardy cactus. There is no lack of Spring chores.

Website news

Readers of this site might have noticed that lately I have been more active with my postings. I pay to maintain this website, but I have been lax about adding new material. I’m trying to make a habit of writing something everyday and this is perfect medium for that. I suppose I would qualify this as a photo journal, a collection of photos with a little text to glue it together. I appreciate the folks that go to the effort of subscribing and adding a comment or two. More to come.