Score One For Elmer Fudd

Remember poor Elmer? Always on the prowl for that Dwatted Wabbit? The cartoon always portrayed poor Elmer as a villain, but if you had planted those carrots and lettuce and peas……Well, call me Mrs. Fudd. A Dwatted Wabbit has been helping itself to my newly planted peas and spinach lately. One day I was proudly looking at two lush rows of green pea shoots and the next day those pretty green shoots had vanished. Overnight! Inexpicably, there were heartbreaking—now brown-- gaps in the row of gween shoots! There was only one possible conclusion: WABBIT.

And, no, I didn’t have to get out my trusty shotgun. Something beat me to it and I couldn’t be more pleased! This is a piece of Wabbit fur. You should have seen the garden. There were tufts of Wabbit fur all over it. I’ve never seen so much Wabbit fur in one place—except ON a Wabbit!

Explanation: overnight an owl had gotten a meal. One of our treasured raptors had zapped the blankety-blank, pea-eating Wabbit, and obviously had had a late dinner or early breakfast. . The carnage was evident.


And, yesterday? The remaining peas and spinach were undisturbed. I’ve replanted the rest.


Treasure your raptors! They consume vast amounts of pests that frustrate your gardening efforts.






Festival of Fragrance

Ahhhhhhh….it’s a feast! Out here, JOTOLR, we are enveloped with multi-layers of fragrances. We’ve passed out of the gluttony of splashy colors, and into a whiter, calmer selection of eye candy. On the other hand, though we’ve entered a phase of intoxicating fragrances as the locusts are in full bloom, as are the wild cherries! What an experience! This year’s fragrant blooms are simply beyond compare. A demure white they may be, but they are not shy. The trees are loaded with nose-inspiring blooms! I find myself, throughout the day, hovering close to these huge bouquets, and I give thanks for the lush generosity of these majestic offerings! What a gift!


Crop Circles

The Mayapples in our west pasture grow in a circle. Every year the circle grows larger, but never changes shape. I’m not certain it’s unusual, but the circle is – for all intents and purposes—always perfectly round.  It just gets bigger every year. Maybe we are inadvertently communicating with those aliens Stephen Hawking was talking about…without even knowing it…! I wonder what this crop circle out here JOTOLR is actually saying…a good place to land?

Here's wishing you a lovely weekend.  Here in West Virginia, it's going to be absolutely perfect! Thank you, dear readers, for all your comments this past week.  May your gardens  all be growing with vigor!  See you next week!