A Light In This World

DANJOU PEAR..............


PINOT NOIR............
BEARDED IRIS............

PURPLE CRABAPPLE..........
PERENNIAL DAISY...not the shasta, some freely seeding early blooming daisy............

SOME CALL THEM WEEDS..........

WEALTHY APPLE.........

CALENDULA...a very dependable flower, reseeds freely
DAFFODIL DELIGHT

BORAGE -FOR COURAGE

As long as we are here, we are a light in this world. SHINE ON!! The images I share today are just a small taste of the abundant beauty around us right now. I am blessed to witness the fullness of nature. Truly, the sweetest moments are those spent in the garden. I am grateful for my health and am truly enjoying watching my perennial orchard/vineyard come into maturity. It is a great way to mark the seasons, and feel a connection in this world.

Mid April Fullness

WOW! More going on than can even be documented! My computer harddrive is clogged with pics and the camera awaits the download. Sigh. Blossoms so quickly turn into fruit set and leaves, just bursting, have opened and are filling the sky. The weather has been windy, which I resent the most of all the weather that could come my way. It blows right through you, bone chilling.

Just a teasing array of photos today, the best are yet to come...

Digitally Tricked-Out LILAC...cool...


The KING Apple.........



The Green Cabbage BOLTING!!! How dare you! The secret to successful brassicas I have yet to learn...

Red Cabbage: Is it on the verge of flowering as well?? VOTE NOW!! Will the red cabbage head up?........

Silhouette of Almond........

Granny Smith Apple Overlooks the Eel River Valley........

Trillium.......

Chard.........

Fig.........

MY world through the eye of a Nikon Coolpix

This week has been beautiful. Cool nights and calm warm days. A nice low pressure moved in early in the week and we have had some rain since these photos were taken. It gave me a chance to do a few burn piles. We burned heaps of Himalayan blackberry bramble, and a giant pile of bamboo and honeysuckle brush. The bamboo will come back in a stately mound, but I am going to be digging up blackberry suckers and honeysuckle vine until kingdom come! And then, they may very well inherit this homestead!! A friendly bit of advice: NEVER plant honeysuckle anywhere you aren't willing to allow it to spread about 50' in each direction, keeping in mind it tries to choke off everything in it's path! The blackberry, well I won't even go there. I laugh when real estate listings say "blackberries" like it is a good thing! The rain has been sweet and welcome. It has been an ideal Spring thus far, and even the hostile weather forecast for this week has not amounted to much of anything. Tonight should bring the worst of it, with snow down to 3,000'. Our elevation is about 2,200'.


Sweet morning on the ridge.......

With the fog pouring out like the sea......





Onions are doing very well, I wish we had planted more..........


Peas on the other hand...........prime examples of ROOT ROT. The little buggers come up, get droopy, and then just sit there.. while below the surface, evil is lurking......


A few keepers, I have since replanted and the gaps are filling in nicely........


OH the PLUMS the PLUMS I am loving the PLUMS.........SATSUMA...

GREENGAGE...........

Silhouette of PLUM

SANTA ROSA...........

Kiwi Shoots........Saw some kiwi down the hill that were WAY ahead of these...could be a waste of time, space and pixels.......

STRAWBERRY....The small fruits, strawberry and raspberry, do very well up here......

PAKISTAN MULBERRY......very large and graceful. I've yet to see fruit. These are the immature berries. In years passed, it has dropped its immature fruit. It is 5 years old now and this spring, so far, couldn't be better. So maybe this is the year....



VAN Cherry.........Useless so far for fruit but WHAT BLOSSOMS!!

I love this little crabapple. It is a purple variety, and as you can see the blossoms look just like little roses, sigh...........


Come make time for rest under the old oak..........

BABY ALMONDS!!!! Too cute..................

Gravenstein Apple..............

Asian Pear overlooking the valley.............

The daffodils continue to delight us........

My goofy earback stickchewin' puppy.....

Contemplative pup..he wishes HE were as smart as SKIDBOOT!!

Very Smart Dog

videoplay-SKIDBOOT the World's Smartest Dog

Bloggette

My blogarhythms are off. It is too nice outside and too rigid in here. I can't believe how quickly everything bursting out! There are way-cute baby almonds and an abundant plum set as well. I hope to take pics in the softening light of this evening. Everything is so dry already. I ran the sprinkler all day. The cabbages, strawberries, garlic, raspberries, leeks, onions, and the new iris/bulb bed all got a soaking. Dry, dry, dry. I am hustling to get any pot bound juveniles in the ground. I've set out a lovely array of daffodils that I raised in 1 gallon pots all amongst the dwarf deciduous redwoods I planted earlier. NOTE: Congratulations to Jim for winning the first "name that plant" contest! He settled my confusion and taught us all a thing or two...figures, like everything it seems, they are from CHINA!! :)

What An Awesome Spring!

perfect weather if you are a bee...


pea seedling and volunteer chard...


Barlett Pear...

Bear Butte

Vineyard...

Darker days early in the week, brrrrr...



I am loving the warm days and cool nights. We had a some rain Sunday, a pretty significant dusting (2"+) of snow and blustery north winds early in the week and rest of the days have been a reliable spring pattern. It has been not too warm, a certainly not too wet or cold, which can often be the case around here in the months of March, April and even into May! We will see what the remainder of spring will bring. The peas have mostly all germinated. I kept the bed covered with a small remay cold frame. This kept the birds away. Last year, there were many grandmother chard plants in the bed I am using, (chard is a bi-annual, it puts out seed in the second year) so, all their offspring think this will be a great home for them! The plum trees have all set lovely little, teeny, tiny, baby plums.I have not been able to take any good pictures of them yet, because they are all wearing their faded blossoms like little windbreakers. SO cute. If we don't get any more harsh weather, it may be a bumper year for plums. The last two seasons were a real flop, when (global warming?) the plums all bloomed really early and then endured two months of snow, rain, hail and sleet! Only the latest blooming European prune style plums did anything of note. I finally finished pruning most everything. The great old granny smith apple was finally completed today. Practically killed myself on the orchard ladder, maybe 8 ft isn't tall enough! I was teetering at times...The pears are in full bloom, and the apples are just starting to pop. According to folklore, apple blooming time is the time to plant your green beans. I'll get right on that....I HAVE planted my arbor day foundation freebie trees that had been babied in the garden for 2 years. They are some sort of deciduous redwood tree?? I do not know. They look like a redwood trees but drop their needles each winter. Yew trees maybe? So those, a redbud, a yellow blooming forsythia, a mess load of bearded iris', and more baby daffodils all found earth for their roots this week. I jammed in the last (I've said this before) two plum trees as well. More plum trees why? (I already have 9!) Oh right, one died, and I am trying to put in all the latest varieties in an effort to outsmart global warming! Private plum passion.