Sunday, September 2

Cottage Garden 10

The weather is finally giving us a break! When I came in at noon today from working in the garden, it was only 86 degrees! I think that would be a record low for us of late.

So, today I worked in the bed on the right of the house. Pulled out all the tomatoes, some of the zinnias that were just flopping all over the place, and a lot of weeds. I hacked out more grass to grow the bed some more, too. Although what's left is tall and gangly, thus making the bed look lopsided in places, it looks much better than it did!

The tomatoes were again loaded with large, juicy cutworms. Our neighbors recently put in a chicken coop, and the chicks and guinea hens are running around in there like they've lived there forever. I had a hunch they might be interested in the cutworms, so took them down, and I was right: the worms never touched the ground. There sure were a lot of fights in the coop, though! I am just happy to have found some useful end to the worms!

Now that the beds are somewhat cleaned out, I can think about the plants that should be arriving from Bluestone Perennials, and about the few that are still in their pots, struggling on my back porch to stay alive. I'm looking forward to this time next year, when I hope to have a true flowerbed that is worth looking at. Maybe next year it will rain, too? (That would help!)