A new start

Hi friends!

It's been ever so long since I posted here. I've been busy painting the concrete floor in our new little cottage, and that's turned into a huge job. I despise carpet, and have dust allergies to boot, so almost the first thing we did was remove it and I filled in all the nail holes with patching stuff...over 750 of them! A few more days of scraping and cleaning and it was ready for paint. Yesterday I finished up the last top-coat of paint/stain, and now I need to put on the finish coat. Luckily it is a *small* cottage. LOL.

The garden! Well, it's going slowly. I have a good reason...it's been over 90-degrees here for the last few weeks, and that's not good for new plants. Still, I couldn't resist putting in a few herbs in the existing flower bed alongside the house. Some boob planted crotons there and covered their roots with BLACK mulch. Good grief. I like crotons, sort of, but they are not bedding plants; they are houseplants. And black mulch just isn't good for anything in this climate.

Not to mention that it's black because it's been dyed. As I said, good grief!

So in their place are new rosemary, lavender, Mexican bush sage and salvia plants. I know all of those will appreciate the heat bouncing back off the light colored house and the concrete driveway beside it. I'm going to love getting out of the car and brushing up against them when they're larger, causing them to release their scents.

And I also planted a wee little fig tree there in the back garden area. It's about 8" tall now, and came from a cutting I took from the fig tree here at the Big House.

I'm sure you'll understand how happy I was to find earthworms in the soil there. That was exciting. (Yes, I get excited over worms. Don't you? LOL)

More later....some photos eventually, too!

Dig it!

bobbi c.

Wild bees and rosemary

The Earthly Gardener by Bobbi A. Chukran
February 20, 2007

Dear friends,

I’m sitting gazing out the window to my garden, and am happy to see that my little swarm of wild bees are back! They disappeared for a few months, and I was worried about them. I have no idea where they live, but a beekeeper friend identified them for me soon after they appeared here a few years ago…turns out they are honeybees! He told me he’ll help me capture them and put them into a hive, but I’m not sure I want the responsibility of tending a beehive. The bees seem to be doing fine on their own.



One surprise…they LOVE rosemary! My rosemary plants bloom off and on year-round here, and I never thought about that being a good source of pollen, or nectar. Apparently the bees think otherwise. I see a handful of them swarming the plant this morning, but last August there were thousands out there. The idea of rosemary-flavored honey is intriguing, I will admit.

I was glad to see the bees in the garden because they help the plants with pollination. One reason I have a totally organic garden is so that the beneficial insects can thrive in it and aren’t killed off by pesticides and synthetic fertilizers. Too many of our native pollinators are disappearing because of widespread spraying of crops. For me, that’s reason enough to go organic.

Until tomorrow….dig it!

bobbi c.
Copyright ©2007 bobbi a. chukran.

Signs of Spring!

The Earthly Gardener by Bobbi A. Chukran
March 1, 2007

Dear friends,

Somebody asked about the rosemary bush that was attracting all the bees. Here’s a photo of it, in my garden. It’s happy here in this Hill Country soil that is so much like the Mediterranean soil where rosemary is native. This bush is about 8 years old, and is only one of over a dozen I have in my garden area.



I also got a shot of the first bulb to bloom here, a grape hyacinth. It was planted four years ago, and comes up like clockwork every February/early March.



dig it!

bobbi c.
Copyright ©2007 by bobbi a. chukran. all rights reserved.